The "Greater Croatia" Myth - Part One

  The internet has brought a wave of changes to many political agendas including those of likeminded Croats and Serbs. This grouping of people is to be considered the yugo-nostalgic an apologetic types that wish to blame the fall of their beloved "yugoslavia" on the big-bad nationalist boogyman. Through their ethnocentric viewing of events they have concluded that both Croatian and Serbian nationalists are essentially of the same make: Serbian nationalists wish to incorporate lands in which Serbs live into one unified Serbian State while Croatian nationalists (depending on their dedication) often or used to advocate what appears to be the resurrection of Croatian borders from WW2 - again claiming lands that were "not theirs" within the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia.

     Let's get a few things straight - both Croatian and Serbian nationalists love to mystify and romanticize their history in order to emotionally fuel their conclusions. Realistically, the notions of modern-day statehood came to these regions during the rise of the French Revolution. Before that, there is much mix up on the grounds of Imperial Europe. Croatia was predominantly influenced by the Roman Empire whereas Serbia was predominantly influenced by the Byzantine Empire. Now, the chronology of events is very important as well as the context: the development of Serbian nationalism occurred around the same time as the development of Croatian nationalism - and on the sidelines sat the Yugoslav nationalists who wanted to trump both and work out an experiment in which both would somehow be silenced.  The first Yugoslav nationalists and propagators of the Yugoslav state were actually Croats, albeit - a minority, who thought that they could appease Croatian Nationalism by leaving Austria-Hungary and putting Croatia in a new state joint with the Serbs yet not called Serbia. This would in-turn appease the Serbian Nationalists as all Serbs would thus be in one state - and they would then too settle with it not being called Serbia. Boy, did that ever backfire on the Croats - twice.

    There is no doubt that the Greater Serbian agenda was a secret plan of the Principality of Serbia - and "why not"? At that time in Europe all major powers were conquering the weak in order to show their alleged strength. Many do not know, but Belgrade was once a very progressive European city. However, the Greater Serbian agenda knew that they were to essentially take over lands that were not historically theirs but dug up historic 'evidence' to make claims to these regions. The problem is that their chronology doesn't match up with documented fact - but they have an answer for that too. Croatians - real ones, apparently disappeared and the ones left over were simply confused Serbs who converted to Catholicism. On the other hand, Croatian Nationalists wished to regain Croatian statehood from it's very birth - the unification of Croatia under Tomislav. Tomislav's Croatia stretched from the Adriatic Sea to the Drava River, and then from the Rasa River in Istria to the Drina River which is now the Eastern Border of Bosnia & Herzegovina, see: Euroatlas, 925. These borders were somewhat resurrected in April of 1941. Bosnia & Herzegovina were part of the Croatian State and then lost within the time that Croatia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Reclamation of these lands by Austro-Hungary eventually led to the assassination of Franz Ferdinand - the catalyst to the First World War. To be continued...

Photo Credit : Map from: en:File:Roman Empire 125.svg by Andrei nacu