croatia, the int criminal tribunal for the former yugoslavia

Croatia, the International Criminal Tribunal

for the former Yugoslavia, and General

Gotovina as a Political Symbol

VJERAN PAVLAKOVIC

IN 2005, CROATIA’S PROSPECTS FOR EURO-ATLANTIC integration depended entirely

on one man. Surprisingly, it was neither the country’s prime minister, nor the

president, nor any other government official, but rather a former French Foreign

Legionnaire and retired Croatian Army general who determined the progress of

Croatia’s bid for membership of NATO and the European Union. The arrest of

General Ante Gotovina, who had been in hiding since his indictment by the

International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was made public in

the summer of 2001, was the litmus test for Croatia’s cooperation with the Tribunal in

The Hague, and correspondingly the country’s readiness for further European

integration. The fugitive general and hero of Croatia’s war for independence

(Domovinski rat, or Homeland War, 1991–1995) had transformed from being merely

one name on a long list of individuals suspected of war crimes in the former

Yugoslavia and had become the cause of Croatia’s foremost political dilemma. The

four and a half year drama of Gotovina’s flight from justice epitomised the unresolved

legacies of devastating interethnic conflict, Croatia’s relations with the ICTY and the

EU, and internal political struggles in the wake of the post-communist transition. By

2005, Gotovina’s transfiguration into a political symbol reached a high point, both

domestically, where radical nationalist opposition groups used him to challenge the

pro-EU policies of the government, and internationally, where he was cited as

evidence of Croatia’s alleged non-cooperation with the ICTY.1

Part of the research for this article was made possible by a post-doctoral fellowship at the Woodrow

Wilson International Center for Scholars. I would also like to thank Dejan Jovic and Chris Lamont for

organizing the workshop at the University of Sterling and for their feedback on earlier drafts of the

article.1As former ICTY spokesperson Florence Hartmann has noted, the EU’s decision to insist on ICTY

conditionality has yielded results in pressuring the Yugoslav successor states to cooperate with the

tribunal (Hartmann 2009, pp. 67–69). Former chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte had long claimed that

Gotovina was being hidden in Croatia or neighbouring Bosnia & Herzegovina with the help of

hardline nationalists in the Croatian government and intelligence services, especially after the media

EUROPE-ASIA STUDIES

Vol. 62, No. 10, December 2010, 1707–1740

ISSN 0966-8136 print; ISSN 1465-3427 online/10/101707-34 ª 2010 University of Glasgow

DOI: 10.1080/09668136.2010.522426

The general’s arrest on 7 December 2005 on the Spanish island of

Tenerife closed one chapter of the Gotovina saga, deflating the political

tension which had overshadowed the myriad of other social and economic

issues facing the Croatian people. At the time of writing, Gotovina’s trial in The

Hague (along with fellow indicted generals Mladen Marka�c and Ivan Cermak)

still influences how Croatian society comes to terms with some of the darker

moments of its recent past and potentially challenges the dominant narrative of the

war, yet there is no longer the same degree of politicisation that had previously

threatened to destabilise the country’s fledgling democracy. It should also be noted

that Croatia has not yet become a member of the EU, a testament to the lasting

consequences of the war, the difficult post-communist transition, and troubles with the

ICTY. Croatia did, however, join NATO in April 2009, an important step in Euro-

Atlantic integration which was likewise contingent on cooperation with The Hague

tribunal.

This contribution examines the process of the construction of Gotovina as a

political symbol from 2001 to its culmination in 2005; the historical and ethno-

national images and meanings associated with it; the places, moments and contexts

when it was used; and the reasons why Gotovina was deemed to be the appropriate

symbol by the groups utilising him for their own political agendas. Since 2006, the

dynamic of the Gotovina symbol has changed significantly, largely because his

arrest removed him from the realm of everyday politics. While Gotovina remains a

potent symbol for many Croats in how they understand the Homeland War, the

pro-EU consensus in the Croatian parliament has meant that the ICTY, and even

important trials such as Gotovina’s, are simply ignored by the political establish-

ment, except in cases when Croatia’s cooperation with the tribunal is brought into

question.2 Although the Gotovina trial itself deserves greater analysis, because of

space limitations the focus of this contribution is on the period before Gotovina’s

arrest.

Many of my sources include media representations of and the discourse on

Gotovina, fieldwork conducted at some of the most important commemorations

organised by the Croatian state (including those related to World War II) where the

Gotovina symbol was present, and a wide range of materials related to the visual

culture of the Gotovina cult.3 I have striven to be as critical as possible of my sources,

especially media articles, which were extremely polemical across the ideological

spectrum during the period of investigation. Rather than a comprehensive analysis of

the political and diplomatic manoeuvrings that characterised Croatia’s efforts to

revealed the latter had been obstructing the ICTY’s work under orders from Tu�dman in what was

known as ‘Operation Hague’ (Slobodna Dalmacija, 17 October 2004). Both the Ra�can and Sanader

governments vehemently denied that Gotovina was in Croatia during his period on the run, and the

general’s arrest on Spanish territory seemed to exculpate the Croatian authorities, even though

Gotovina’s exact whereabouts from 2001 to 2005 remain murky and subject to rumours.2In 2009 this centred on the failure of Croatia to locate documents related to Operation Storm,

collectively known as the ‘artillery journals’.3I consider cult here to be defined as ‘an instance of great veneration of a person, ideal, or thing,

especially as manifested by a body of admirers’ (Webster’s 1998, p. 488).

1708 VJERAN PAVLAKOVIC

resolve the Gotovina affair, the focus of this study is the interplay of symbolic politics

and ritual in the post-conflict Balkans. Drawing on work by historians as well as

anthropologists and sociologists, I hope to contribute to the understanding of a

Croatian society still confronted with the legacies of the Homeland War and the

challenges of constructing a stable democracy after the experiences of the turbulent

twentieth century.

Political symbols and post-communist Croatia

‘Politics is expressed through symbolism’, asserts anthropologist David I. Kertzer,

suggesting that even people in modern societies are influenced more by symbolic

forms than rational calculations (Kertzer 1988, p. 2). Kertzer cites the prevalence of

political rituals, replete with emotional, historical and national symbols, in every

political system regardless of whether it is a democracy with free market capitalism

or an authoritarian regime with a state-run economy. Symbols and rituals play a

particularly important role in states which have recently achieved independence and

nationhood, in order to legitimate the new governing institutions, territorial

integrity and borders, and the ruling elite who lay claim to the founding myths of

the country. The countries of Eastern Europe experienced a radical transition from

communism to democracy in the late 1980s and early 1990s, involving the

transformation of people’s values, ideologies and political culture, as well as their

repertoire of symbols. As a number of studies have shown, symbols were used by

the communist regimes in an attempt to maintain their hold on power, as well as

by the opponents of communist rule, who used counter-symbols to challenge the

legitimacy of the Soviet system (Arvidsson & Blomqvist 1987; Kubik 1994;

Kowalewski 1980).

In the Yugoslav successor states, the transition from communism was exacerbated

by the horrors of war and ethnic cleansing. Nationalists in Serbia, Croatia and

Bosnia & Herzegovina often resurrected or co-opted national symbols, some dating

from the World War II period, as Yugoslavia and its cache of communist symbols

disintegrated (Kaufman 2001; Rihtman-Augustin 2000; Pavlakovic 2008b). In the

decade since the guns fell silent, potent national symbols continue to be evoked as

the former Yugoslav republics seek to codify their versions of the recent past and

prepare their citizens for future EU integration. Public debates over the legacy of

World War II, the conflict in the 1990s, cooperation with the ICTY, and strategies

for EU membership have not always involved serious discussions between

historians, legal specialists, political scientists and other experts; often they have

taken on the form of political drama and emotional symbolisation. According to

Edelman (1964, p. 31), ‘it is a characteristic of large numbers of people in our

society that they see and think in terms of stereotypes, personalizations, and

oversimplifications, that they cannot recognize or tolerate ambiguous and complex

situations, and that they accordingly respond chiefly to symbols that oversimplify

and distort’. With the wounds of the war still open, symbols and rituals associated

with the conflict serve not only as powerful emotional public spectacles that create

group solidarity across the region, but they also foster further divisions in these

polarised societies.

CROATIA, THE ICTY AND GENERAL GOTOVINA 1709

From the foreign legion to the Croatian Army

In the Croatian coastal city of Zadar on 27 July 2001, some 5,000 people crowded into

the main square to attend the promotion of a biography of Gotovina by Nenad

Ivankovic (2001). Ivankovic had chosen the date carefully to coincide with the public

revelation that two sealed indictments from the ICTY, which had been delivered to the

Croatian government over a month earlier, were for Gotovina and another Croatian

Army general, Rahim Ademi. Whereas Ademi voluntarily surrendered to the tribunal,

Gotovina, evidently warned by opponents of the ICTY in the government and

intelligence services, evaded the police sent to arrest him and disappeared from sight.

That moment defined Gotovina’s transformation from mere soldier, adventurer and

ladies’ man, into a potent political symbol. In the 1990s, Ivankovic had been the editor

of Vjesnik, a pro-government newspaper under President Franjo Tu �dman. He also

served for a time as the vice president of the Croatian Real Renaissance (HIP,

Hrvatski istinski preporod), a right-wing party headed by the former Croatian

President’s son, Miroslav Tu�dman. Ivankovic was therefore close to the creators of,

and in fact contributed to, the dominant narrative of the Homeland War, which

expunged all references to war crimes committed against Croatian Serbs and

whitewashed Croatian involvement in Bosnia & Herzegovina.4

Ivankovic made no mention of any of those darker aspects of the Homeland War in

the book; it romanticised the adventures, military campaigns and love conquests of

Gotovina, who was portrayed as triumphantly returning to Croatia to defend his

homeland against Cetnik aggression after years spent as a soldier of fortune in the

French Foreign Legion. According to Ivankovic, the victimised Croats, outgunned

and subject to barbaric atrocities committed by their Serbian enemies, slowly built a

real army under the guidance of professional soldiers such as Gotovina, who

ultimately led them to victory during Operation Storm in the summer of 1995. After

visiting more than 40 cities and towns across Croatia promoting his book—events that

increasingly took on a political character against the coalition government in power at

the time—Ivankovic told one interviewer that

[Gotovina] is now a metaphor for Croatia. Whatever happens to him happens to all of us,

whether we are conscious of it or not . . . He is unquestionably a symbol and legend of the

Homeland War, a symbol for Croatia!5

Why was Gotovina, and not any of the other indicted Croatian generals, chosen as

the symbol of the anti-EU opposition? In many ways the photogenic general was the

archetypal Croatian soldier, unlike most of the other indicted Croatian Army officers,

who resembled unfit armchair generals, had long careers in the Yugoslav People’s

Army (JNA, Jugoslavenska narodna armija), or were not even ethnic Croats. The

4Croatia’s war for independence and resistance against Greater Serbian aggression directed from

Belgrade had been marred by the systematic persecution of its ethnic Serb minority, the murder of Serb

civilians in towns from Slavonia to Lika, and the widespread looting and destruction of Serb regions

following the liberation of occupied territories (Goldstein 2008, pp. 699–751).5Interview with Nenad Ivankovic in Dom i svijet, 11 February 2002, available at: www.hic.hr/dom/

373/dom03.htm, accessed 1 April 2009.


http://www.hic.hr/dom/373/dom03.htm

http://www.hic.hr/dom/373/dom03.htm

former chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte described him as ‘sharp-eyed, square-jawed,

and devastatingly handsome in his Croatian Army dress uniform’ (Del Ponte &

Sudetic 2008, p. 243). His background and significant contributions to Croatia’s war

effort were ideal for nationalists seeking to maximise the legacy of the Homeland War

and resist the post-Tu�dman changes in Croatian society.6 Furthermore, the death of

former chief of staff Janko Bobetko in early 2003 robbed nationalists of another

indicted Croatian officer who had fervently defied the tribunal.

Gotovina was born on 12 October 1955 on the island of Pasman, not far from Zadar

on Croatia’s Dalmatian coast. According to Ivankovic’s hagiography, the young

Gotovina was inspired by Homeric epics and decided to escape from what was then

communist Yugoslavia, stowing away and later working on a ship that took him

around Europe and to the United States (Ivankovic 2001, pp. 4–5). He joined the

French Foreign Legion before he was 18 years old and fought in various battlefields in

Africa and Latin America as an elite paratrooper. Ivankovic chronicles Gotovina’s

rigorous training, exposure to the dangers of combat and the charms of women

around the globe, and his encounters with atrocities associated with warfare in the

developing world, which are described in graphic detail in the book.

Gotovina’s activities become unclear in the 1980s, when he was allegedly sentenced

to nine and a half years for burglary, extortion and assault in France. The weekly Feral

Tribune broke the story in February 2002, but it was not commented on in the

mainstream press until three years later as pressure on Croatia grew from the EU and

ICTY.7 In August 2007, Carla Del Ponte released additional details about Gotovina’s

‘French dossier’, which some Croatian media interpreted as confirming the shady

details of his past, while others, notably Nacional, argued were a part of a politically

motivated plot connected with Gotovina’s involvement with Gaullist forces in

France.8 Not surprisingly, Gotovina’s criminal past was missing from Ivankovic’s

biography, while Gotovina’s defence team issued a statement claiming the allegations

were fabricated in order to discredit their client.9

When fighting broke out in Croatia in 1991 Gotovina decided to return to his

homeland for the first time in 20 years and volunteered to help build Croatia’s nascent

army. Some members of the military leadership, products of the JNA, were reluctant

to accept mercenaries as volunteers, but Gojko Susak, one of Tu�dman’s closest

collaborators (and minister of defence from September 1991 until May 1998) realised

Gotovina’s extensive military skills were desperately needed as Croatia fought against

an enemy with superior fighting power. As Martin Spegelj, one of Susak’s predecessors

between August 1990 and July 1991, noted in his memoirs, Susak and his associates

6The Croatian government embarked on a process of de-Tu�dmanisation after 2000, which in

principle related to a shift away from the radical nationalism, overt corruption and increasing

authoritarianism of the 1990s and towards greater EU integration (Søberg 2007; Matic 2008).7Feral Tribune, 15 February 2002; Jutarnij list, 24 August 2007.8Jutarnji list, 24 August 2007; Feral Tribune, 31 August 2007; Nacional, 8 January 2008.9‘Jutarnji list is Publishing a Forgery’, press statement from Gotovina’s defence team (20 February

2005), available at: www.antegotovina.com/print.aspx?clanak¼3320&LID¼1, accessed 1 April 2009.

Gotovina’s lawyer Luka Misetic subsequently claimed that the charges against his client were

fabricated as part of an internal struggle in French politics. See Globus, 29 August 2007; Jutarnji list, 29

August 2007 and Feral Tribune, 31 August 2007.


http://www.antegotovina.com/print.aspx?clanak=3320&LID=1



recruited ‘all sorts of adventurers and individuals with criminal pasts’, including a

number of former members of the French Foreign Legion (Spegelj 2001, p. 195).10

Gotovina quickly proved himself an adept soldier and officer, commanding a

number of operations in Dalmatia, western Bosnia & Herzegovina and Slavonia. By

1993 he had been appointed as the commander of the Split operative zone,

encompassing the region where the JNA and Milosevic-backed rebel Croatian Serbs

had carved out their para-state, the Republic of Serbian Krajina (RSK, Republika

Srpska Krajina). As the Krajina leadership balked and stalled the Croatian

government’s attempts at peacefully reintegrating the occupied territory, the Croatian

Army (HV, Hrvatska vojska) was transformed into an effective fighting force, trained

by retired US officers working for Military Professional Resources Incorporated

(MPRI), and it began planning a military option for dealing with the RSK.11

Gotovina, eventually promoted to the rank of Colonel General, was directly involved

in the planning and execution of a number of offensives in the winter of 1994 and

summer of 1995 in western Bosnia that tightened the noose around the rebel Serbs’

capital, Knin. As many observers have since noted, the coordinated operations that

summer of the HV, the Croatian Defence Council (Hrvatsko vijece obrane) and the

Bosnian Army were instrumental in breaking the Serb siege of the Bihac pocket. They

also probably prevented atrocities on the scale of Srebrenica following that city’s fall

in July.12

Gotovina and the controversies of Operation Storm

The reasons for Gotovina’s popularity and resonance among the Croatian people13

cannot be explained simply by his contribution to the defence of the country

(thousands of other Croatian veterans from Vukovar to Dubrovnik were equally as

10Spegelj also discusses the tensions between the officers who had come from the JNA, and the

emigres and HDZ members who were more receptive to the rehabilitation of the ‘spirit and model of

the NDH [pro-fascist Croatian regime during World War II]’ (Spegelj 2001, p. 195). See also Tus (1999,

pp. 75, 89).11The exact role of MPRI, which received Pentagon approval to begin working with the HV in early

1995, remains subject to debate. Its spokesmen have denied any ‘role in planning, monitoring, or

assisting in Operation Storm’, in order to distance themselves from any possible association with the

war crimes committed in the course of that action (New York Times, 13 October 2002). Sociologist

Ozren Zunec, who has written extensively on the Homeland War, however, argues that MPRI had

been present for years in Croatia (the organisation had initially sent its employees as border monitors

to Croatia as early as 1991) and that ‘in one way or another, MPRI was involved in many functions of

the structure of the Croatian Army’ (Zunec 1999, p. 143).12Galbraith (2006, p. 126); interview with General Atif Dudakovic, ‘We Needed Operation Storm as

Much as Croatia Did’, Bosnian Institute, 15 September 2006, available at: http://www.bosnia.org.uk/

news/news_body.cfm?newsid¼2225,accessed 30 June 2010; Chollet (1997, pp. 32–34); Tanner (2001,

pp. 296–98).13A poll conducted in early 2005 during the broadcast of one of Croatia’s most watched political

television shows, Latinica, is just one indicator of Gotovina’s popularity while he was evading capture.

Viewers were asked if they were to encounter Gotovina, would they report him to police or help him

hide. Only 8% of the respondents said they would turn him in, while 92% said they would help him

avoid arrest. Of those who said they would help him, 76% said they believed he was innocent (see

www.youtube.com/watch?v¼YEvVcjLaDFw, accessed 30 June 2010).


http://www.bosnia.org.uk/news/news_body.cfm?newsid=2225



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEvVcjLaDFw

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEvVcjLaDFw

heroic), but rather because the ICTY identified Gotovina as the highest ranking officer

responsible for arguably the Croatian Army’s greatest victory during the conflict,

Operation Storm (Oluja).

On the morning of 4 August 1995, Croatian forces commanded by Gotovina

launched a massive attack against the RSK from several directions. Croatian military

planners knew that panic among the Serb civilian population, already frightened by

HV successes in Operation Flash (Bljesak) in May 1995 and the summer offensive in

Bosnia & Herzegovina, would contribute to a quicker collapse of Serb units worried

about the fate of their families, and therefore carried out psychological warfare against

the RSK to encourage the flight of all civilians (CIA 2002, p. 370).14 The demoralised

and outnumbered Serb forces rapidly crumbled, and by 7 August the Croatian

government declared that the fighting was over. Realising that neither the

international community (sickened by Serbian atrocities in Bosnia) nor the Serbian

leader Slobodan Milosevic were going to intervene on behalf of the RSK, the Krajina

leadership ordered the evacuation of the entire civilian population. Between 150,000

and 200,000 Serbs fled Croatia in long refugee columns of cars and tractors loaded

with personal belongings (Baric 2005, pp. 533–67). Even though President Tu �dman

issued an appeal for the Serbs to stay, guaranteeing their safety and full rights after the

return of Croatian sovereignty, it was evident that few people in the Croatian

leadership were sorry to see the mass exodus of a population considered by

nationalists to be an impediment to Croatian statehood.15 On 6 August, an elated

Tu �dman arrived in liberated Knin and told the gathered television reporters that

Operation Storm had dashed the idea that ‘Serbs could ever again play the role they

had played in Croatian history, which was stabbing a knife in the back of the Croatian

people’.16

The events that followed the HV’s rapid destruction of the RSK would ultimately

lead to Gotovina’s transformation from victorious general to alleged war criminal and

symbol of the Croatian right wing. Whereas the goal of Operation Storm was to

liberate internationally recognised Croatian territory (an action tacitly approved by

the US administration under Clinton, which wanted to resolve the conflict in

neighbouring Bosnia & Herzegovina), the aftermath of the offensive would, in the

prescient words of former EU negotiator for the Balkans, Carl Bildt, ‘cast a dark

14This psychological warfare included fake radio broadcasts and leaflets of alleged RSK government

evacuation plans. These actions are referred to in the amended joint indictment of Gotovina, Cermak,

and Marka�c issued on 17 May 2007 (available at: www.icty.org/x/cases/gotovina/ind/en/got-

amdjoind070517e.pdf, accessed 30 June 2010).15In a statement that was aired on all Croatian media, Tu�dman called on ‘Croatian citizens of

Serbian nationality, who did not actively participate in the rebellion, to stay in their homes without

fear for their lives or property, and await the arrival of Croatian authorities’ (Vjesnik, 5 August 1995).

However, some Croatian historians have argued that the publication of the so-called Brioni

Transcripts (based on recordings of a Croatian government meeting on the Brioni Islands on 31 July

1995 to discuss the plans of Operation Storm, available at: www.camo.ch/brijunski_transkripti.htm,

accessed 12 October 2009) are proof that Tu�dman’s call for Serbs to stay was not sincere, while others

have insisted that the Brioni text was taken out of context and manipulated in order to accuse Tu�dman

of ethnic cleansing (Goldstein 2008, p. 747; Marijan 2007, p. 140).16Transcript of film Oluja nad krajinom (2001), available at: www.b92.net/specijal/oluja/

index.php?start¼0&nav_id¼174029, accessed 5 June 2008.


http://www.icty.org/x/cases/gotovina/ind/en/got-amdjoind070517e.pdf


http://www.camo.ch/brijunski_transkripti.htm

http://www.b92.net/specijal/oluja/index.php?start=0&nav_id=174029




shadow over Croatia for a long time’.17 Historian Nikica Baric has documented how

the Croatian leadership ordered its units to behave according to the Geneva

Convention during Operation Storm, and noted that Gotovina was angered at the

widespread looting and destruction already taking place on 6 August during a

recorded meeting in Knin (Baric 2005, p. 558). Yet in the weeks and months after

Operation Storm, witnesses observed militia units, civilians and even individuals in

HV uniforms systematically pillaging and burning Serb properties throughout the

Krajina, while dozens of mostly elderly civilians who had decided to stay or had been

unable to flee were found murdered. The Croatian Helsinki Committee documented

the killing of at least 410 civilians in Sector South (the UN-designated zone

encompassing the Krajina) and the destruction of approximately 20,000 houses and

buildings in the 100 days after Operation Storm, rendering the formerly Serb

municipalities virtually uninhabitable (HHO 2001, p. 129).18

Mate Lausic, formerly the chief of Croatia’s military police, cited three strategic

mistakes in the aftermath of Operation Storm that led to the crimes: the civilian

government failed to establish control, despite the appointment of General Ivan

Cermak in Knin; Home Guards and militia units were allowed to roam the liberated

territory instead of being confined to their barracks; and military units, including some

52,000 reservists, mainly comprised of Croat refugees, were not demobilised quickly

enough.19 Rather than making a concerted effort to halt the destruction or punish

those responsible for the killings, the Tu �dman regime turned a blind eye to what was

happening in the newly liberated regions, suggesting that the government condoned

this behaviour. Croatian authorities claimed that several thousand criminal cases were

being reviewed by the courts, but Amnesty International and other human rights

organisations called this a ‘strategy of statistics’, citing a lack of details on the

individual cases, a dearth of prosecutions for murder, and no prosecutions for war

crimes.20

It was precisely the failure of the Croatian leadership to make at least a symbolic

effort in condemning the war crimes committed in the territory under its control that

prompted the determined investigation into Operation Storm by the ICTY, and the

subsequent issue of indictments against Gotovina and other HV officers responsible

for restoring order. The prosecution accused Gotovina, Cermak and Marka�c of

persecutions on political, racial and religious grounds; the deportation and forcible

transfer of the Serb population in the RSK; plunder of private and public property;

wanton destruction; murder; and inhuman acts and cruel treatment.21 This was

particularly problematic in the eyes of many Croatian opponents of the ICTY because

17New York Times, 6 August 1995.18During Gotovina’s trial, the former president of the Croatian Helsinki Committee, Zarko

Puhovski, admitted that the figures of the report were not precise due to the difficult conditions in the

former war zone and the lack of cooperation from the Croatian government (Novi list, 17 February

2009; Novi list, 18 February 2009).19Globus, 5 August 2005.20Amnesty International Report EUR 64/04/98, Croatia: Impunity for Killings after Storm, August

1998, available at: www.amnesty.org, accessed 5 June 2008.21Amended joint indictment of Gotovina, Cermak, and Marka�c issued 17 May 2007, available at:

www.icty.org/x/cases/gotovina/ind/en/got-amdjoind070517e.pdf, accessed 30 June 2010.


http://www.amnesty.org


the three generals were charged with being part of a ‘joint criminal enterprise’ (which

included Tu�dman, Susak, Bobetko, Zvonimir Cervenko, and many other Croatian

political and military leaders), and this, the nationalists argued, threatened the

foundation of Croatia’s independence (Pavlakovic 2008a, pp. 466–67). However,

despite the claims of Croatian nationalists that the ICTY indictments criminalised the

entire Homeland War, the reality was that the tribunal prosecuted individuals for

specific violations of international humanitarian law and was committed to

investigating war crimes committed by all sides in the conflict, albeit with the

shortcomings and politicisation that accompanied such an ambitious endeavour.

While the murder of civilians and the destruction of property in the Krajina are

indisputable facts, the massive flight of the Serb population is not so clear-cut. While

the Gotovina indictment alleged that the removal of Croatia’s Serbs was the goal of

Operation Storm, the RSK authorities ordered, and had prepared for several years,

the evacuation of the entire civilian population. This was confirmed in the memoirs

of participants (Sekulic 2000), captured documents,22 and in testimonies at trials

already in progress at The Hague.23 However, what was problematic regarding the

actions of the Tu �dman government, in addition to their failure to investigate the

murders of Serb civilians, was their obstruction of refugee returns,24 treating Serbs

as second class citizens,25 and settling Bosnian Croats in regions with formerly Serb

majorities.26

Thus, although Gotovina’s trial focuses on his individual guilt on the basis of

command responsibility, ultimately the tribunal’s verdict will include judgment on

whether or not Operation Storm is considered to be a case of deliberate ethnic

cleansing, which is why the indictment has so profoundly shaken Croatian society and

the political establishment.

22Nacional, 24 June 2003. Although these documents seem to leave little doubt that the RSK was

planning the evacuation of civilians long before Operation Storm was even conceived, it should be kept

in mind that some of the documents have been identified as fabrications, part of the propaganda

campaign carried out by Croatian intelligence services to destabilise the Krajina prior to the military

offensive (Feral Tribune, 2 August 2003).23Peter Galbraith, the former US ambassador to Croatia, emphasised this fact during his appearance

on the witness stand at the Milosevic trial (Jutarnji list, 26 June 2003; Jutarnji list, 27 June 2003; Feral

Tribune, 5 July 2003). Transcripts of the testimony are available at: www.icty.org/x/cases/slobodan_

milosevic/trans/en/030625ED.htm, and www.icty.org/x/cases/slobodan_milosevic/trans/en/030626IT.

htm, both sites accessed 25 March 2009.24Journalist Darko Hudelist, in a controversial biography of Tu�dman, alleges that ‘Tu�dman is the

father of the Homeland because, once and for all, he was able to resolve the Serb question in Croatia

. . . It certainly does not sound nice, but it is correct: Tu�dman’s strategy towards the Serbs in Croatia

consisted of the plan that by the end of the Croat–Serb war there would be less than 5% of them left’

(Hudelist 2004, pp. 680, 709).25See the report by Human Rights Watch (1999).26In a recording of a conversation held on 24 August 1995 in his office, Tu�dman can be heard

discussing the resettlement of Croats, including emigres living in Paraguay, in regions abandoned by

the Serbs (Lucic 2005, pp. 485–86; Goldstein 2003, p. 432). The conversations referred to here are from

transcripts of recordings that Tu�dman made in his office during his administration, similar to the

Nixon tapes. They were secret recordings of meetings, subsequently made public by former President

Stjepan Mesic.


http://www.icty.org/x/cases/slobodan_milosevic/trans/en/030625ED.htm

http://www.icty.org/x/cases/slobodan_milosevic/trans/en/030625ED.htm

http://www.icty.org/x/cases/slobodan_milosevic/trans/en/030626IT.htm

http://www.icty.org/x/cases/slobodan_milosevic/trans/en/030626IT.htm

Constructing the Gotovina symbol

The Gotovina phenomenon reflects the difficulty societies have in constructing

historical narratives of their independence in the aftermath of horrific violence, and

raises the question of who can write a country’s history. The Croatian government’s

use of symbolic rituals associated with the Homeland War, and the opposition’s use

of counter-ritual and symbols of Gotovina, reaffirms Kertzer’s conclusion that

‘symbolism is necessary to prop up the governing political order, but it is also

essential in overthrowing it and replacing it with a different political system’ (Kertzer

1988, p. 174). Those providing the greatest amount of support to the Gotovina cult

have generally been those elements of Croatian society that have remained,

politically and economically, disenfranchised after the transition from the

nationalism, authoritarianism and cronyism of the Tu�dman era to a Croatia on

the path to the EU and the rule of law. Gotovina represented many of the values

associated with the newly independent Croatia—patriotism, a willingness to fight

against Serbian aggression, religiosity—yet had personally never exhibited any

political ambition or political agenda other than protesting against what he saw as

the ICTY’s revisionism of the Homeland War. As Orrin Klapp notes, ‘some public

men mean far more as symbols than in terms of anything they have really done’

(Klapp 1964, p. 53). In the case of Gotovina, his transition from military to political

figure transpired entirely without his involvement in the process. The use of

Gotovina as a political symbol reached its zenith in 2005, when all further Euro-

Atlantic integration was conditioned on the fugitive general’s arrest, arousing greater

anti-EU sentiments among the Croatian population and especially among right-wing

political parties.

The centrality of Operation Storm to Croatia’s war for independence, Gotovina’s

role in that offensive, and the volatility of the debate over recent history in the post-

Tu �dman period help to partly explain the Gotovina cult and the potency of his

political symbolism. The ICTY, an institution created to bring justice to a post-war

society and foster long-term stability, has provoked considerable opposition to its

work in many parts of the former Yugoslavia, to a large extent precisely because it is in

effect creating a record of the ‘historical truth’ which challenges both Croatian and

Serbian versions of the same events. While that statement is controversial, many

tribunal officials, including Carla Del Ponte, have maintained that one of the goals of

the ICTY was the establishment of a definitive account of the past. As Goran Granic

admitted after years of being closely involved with Croatia–ICTY relations, ‘a great

deal of the history of this region is also being written in The Hague’.27 The Croatian

Institute for History devoted an entire issue of their journal to the question of the

ICTY as an instrument of history (Turkovic 2004). Ksenija Turkovic, who served as a

part of the legal team for a suspect at The Hague, has argued that the tribunal, as a

judicial body, is a problematic historian because of the selection of evidence,

simplification of testimony, disregard for political context, insistence on definite, not

conditional, answers, and the inexperience of the judges in historical interpretation

27Nacional, 23 January 2007.


(Turkovic 2004, pp. 41–67).28 Reflecting such views, on 5 August 2007, while attending

the Operation Storm anniversary celebrations, Prime Minister Ivo Sanader asserted

that ‘no one but [Croatia] will write our history and change the historical truth’,

alluding to the perceptions that the ICTY was rewriting history through the trials of

Croatian officers in The Hague.29

Thus the narrative of Operation Storm, with Gotovina as one of its key

protagonists, is part of the ‘contested history’ of modern Croatia being created by

both domestic and foreign historians, with significant political ramifications. As James

J. Sheehan noted in an essay on contested histories, ‘many of these contests have to do

with the founding of a nation; all of them set individual events into a national

narrative with which each side sustains its historic identity and defines its political

program’ (Sheehan 2005, p. 3). Western scholarship has been critical of Tu�dman and

Croatian nationalism, whereas Croatian historiography generally characterises the

conflict in the 1990s as strictly a war of aggression by Serbia and Croatian Serbs

rebelling against the Croatian state.30 It is this broader debate over recent Croatian

history that helps to explain the resonance of the Gotovina symbol among the

Croatian public, especially as a counterweight to the perceived ‘rewriting of history’ by

the ICTY noted above.

Gotovina as a political symbol has essentially been dominated by the two archetypal

forms of hero and martyr. Furthermore, the discourse from the right-wing political

spectrum, which emphasised and justified Gotovina’s evasion of the ICTY rather than

defending his innocence at the tribunal, evoked elements of the hajduk tradition from

certain Croatian regions. According to his most fervent supporters, Gotovina

represents not only the generals of Croatia’s victorious army, but the Homeland

War, Croatian sovereignty, the Croatian state, and ultimately all Croats. The radical

right, which constitutes the core of the Gotovina cult, has insisted that the ICTY does

not intend to apply individual guilt but rather collective guilt. While the political

parties that publicly called on Gotovina to not surrender to the tribunal are for the

most part marginal, they have been successful at getting considerable media attention

and saturating the Croatian landscape with Gotovina’s image.

28See also the discussion about the controversial role of the ICTY as historian in Zunec (2007, pp.

23–66). For a comparative perspective, in particular the role of the so-called ‘Holocaust trials’ and the

history of World War II, see Osiel (1997) and Douglas (2001).29Statements made to journalists and others, including the author, after the commemoration in

Knin, on 5 August 2007. Sanader was quoted in Vjesnik, 6 August 2007.30The polemics and media spectacle surrounding the proposed publication of a history textbook

supplement about the 1980s and 1990s is illustrative of the sensitivity over narratives of the Homeland

War. The Croatian NGO Documenta published the controversial textbook supplement along with a

collection of press clippings and commentary which vividly shows the divisions between historians who

argue that there are multiple perspectives and approaches in analysing the recent past, and those who

advocate a single narrative that should be promoted by the state and ministry of education

(Documenta 2007). A response from those opposed to the textbook supplement was published a year

later (Skenderovic et al. 2008). Serbian historian Mile Bjelajac and Croatian sociologist Ozren Zunec

have identified many of the contested narratives within both Croatian and Serbian historiography and

politics in their essay about the war in Croatia (Bjelajac & Zunec 2007, pp. 11–65).


Politics of victory: Gotovina as a war hero

The most common slogan associated with Gotovina is undoubtedly ‘Hero, Not a

Criminal’, initially popularised by the massive banner that hung near the entrance to

the old city in Zadar from 2001 until it was removed by the police in December 2004

(see Figure 1).31 In the militarised atmosphere of wartime Croatia, when the

independence of the state was directly threatened, Croatian soldiers were glorified in

the state media, public rituals, popular music and political discourse (Senjkovic 1996,

pp. 41–42; 2002, pp. 181–266). According to the Homeland War narrative, it was the

heroism of the average Croatian citizen who fought against a much stronger opponent

that allowed Croatian nationhood to be preserved. Gotovina, a professional soldier

who helped transform the HV from a rag-tag militia into a modern military force,

exemplified the heroic ideal that drew from centuries of an oft-violent Croatian

history. According to a poll in Jutarnji list in February 2005, 81.4% of respondents

believed that he was a war hero, and 54.4% were against his arrest.32 According to a

poll one year later and after his arrest, 64.8% of respondents had a ‘positive’ or

‘mostly positive’ opinion of Gotovina, while only 4.7% had a ‘negative’ or ‘totally

negative’ view of him.33

FIGURE 1. ‘HERO! NOT A CRIMINAL’. POSTER HUNG ON ENTRANCE TO ZADAR’S OLD CITY, 2003

31The editor of the right-wing weeklyHrvatski list noted bitterly that ‘the same members of the HDZ

who hung posters of the general in public places in Zadar’, and who even used those images to call for a

public uprising against Ra�can’s former coalition government and Stjepan Mesic were pressured by

Sanader and the international community to turn away ‘from the symbol which until yesterday

embodied their own political philosophy’ (Hrvatski list, 30 December 2004).32Cited in Institute for War and Peace Reporting, Balkan Crisis Report, 547, 16 March 2005,

available at: iwpr.net/?p¼bcr&s¼f&o¼241979&apc_state¼henibcr2005, accessed 5 June 2008.33Jutarnji list, 18 March 2006. The same poll revealed that 54.7% of the respondents thought he was

innocent.


His status as a hero was an effective mobilising symbol because of the powerful

emotional response evoked among a population that had fresh collective memory of a

recent national trauma. As Orrin Klapp notes,

When people identify with a hero’s role, they usually experience a thrilling sense of uplift,

triumph, or achievement. If the hero plays a role that serves the group or its values, they also

derive a sense of security and well-being. (Klapp 1964, p. 43)

Operation Storm, which ended four frustrating years of occupation of a strategically

vital region of Croatia, unleashed emotions of triumph and achievement among the

Croatian population. Consequently, Gotovina, and Croatian soldiers in general,

embody the victorious memories of the Homeland War.

The political symbol of Gotovina as a war hero was primarily manifested through a

visual campaign that peaked in 2004–2005 and through public commemorations of the

Homeland War. The most visible expression of the Gotovina symbol was the vast

billboard campaign, centred primarily in Dalmatia but extending to other regions of

Croatia as well. From giant pictures of the general in his uniform to posters plastered on

any available surface, during the peak of the public debate over Gotovina it was

practically impossible to travel in the country without encountering his image. In

March 2005, sociologist Drazen Lalic noted that the ‘jumbo posters’ supporting

Gotovina ‘were until recently only seen in a few places, but in the last few weeks they

can be seen everywhere’.34 Many of the slogans accompanying his photos played upon

the double meaning of his name (in Croatian ‘gotovina’ means ‘cash’), and alluded to

the sell-out of a war hero for the interests of the ruling party. They included: ‘There is no

Gotovina! Try a postponement’; ‘We are not giving you Gotovina and the Homeland

we earned with our blood’; ‘Ignorance and incompetence will not be paid for with

Gotovina’; and ‘Don’t pay for entry into the EU with Gotovina’. As Edelman notes,

word choice accompanying political symbols can be interpreted as ‘an index of group

norms and conceptual frameworks’ of the groups wielding those symbols (Edelman

1964, p. 121). In this case, the emphasis was on the sacrifice of Croatian soldiers and the

traitorous behaviour of the Croatian political class. Gotovina wine bottles, t-shirts

carrying the slogan ‘Gotovina¼Croat’ worn at sporting events and pro-Gotovina

messages amidst the ubiquitous graffiti covering Croatia’s buildings are a few other

examples of how prevalent the Gotovina cult was in Croatian society (see Figure 2).

Commemorations of the Homeland War, and to a lesser extent public demonstra-

tions, provided an active stage for the display of the Gotovina symbol, specifically to

challenge the Croatian government’s cooperation with the ICTY. The various

anniversaries associated with key moments in Croatia’s war for independence—such

as the Day of Victory and Homeland Thanksgiving (5 August), Independence Day (8

October) and the fall of Vukovar (18 November)—and the unveiling of monuments

commemorating the victims of the war served not only to reinforce the ruling party’s

narrative of the recent past, but provided the political opposition with an opportunity

to counter symbolically both the narrative and contemporary policies. During the

coalition government of Ivica Ra�can (2000–2003) and Ivo Sanader’s first administra-

34Feral Tribune, 24 March 2005.


tion (2003–2007), various right-wing groups attempted to push the issue of war crimes,

and in particular the ICTY indictment against Gotovina, to the forefront of the

political debate as a means to mobilise electoral support. However, other than media

attention, these attempts had a minimal impact for the parties on the far right in

parliamentary elections in 2003 and 2007. The electorate on the right continued to vote

for the HDZ even after Sanader extradited more Croatian generals to The Hague than

his predecessor.

The 5 August celebration (Day of Victory and Homeland Thanksgiving), held in

Knin, is perhaps the most evocative commemoration and is directly associated with

the Gotovina legend. Knin itself is a powerfully symbolic place, since it was

historically the seat of Croatian kings, and during the 1990s the heart of the Croatian

Serb rebellion—‘not only a synonym for the occupation, but the five year humiliation

of Croatia’.35 Although Tu �dman celebrated the anniversary of Operation Storm in

Knin in 1996 (along with Gotovina and Defence Minister Gojko Susak), in subsequent

years he commemorated the date in Zagreb, even taking the oath of office for his

second presidential term there on 5 August 1997.36 Knin once again came into the

spotlight in 2000, when the commemoration was overshadowed by rumours of new

indictments of Croatian generals, and alleged war crimes were mentioned for the first

time in the context of the anniversary. In April 2000, Ra�can’s coalition government

recognised the ICTY’s jurisdiction over Operations Storm and Flash in a

constitutional declaration on cooperation with The Hague, provoking a series of

domestic and international crises over the war crimes issue which plagued Ra�can

through the rest of his time in office (Pavlakovic 2008a, pp. 453–60).37

FIGURE 2. ‘GOTOVINA, HERO’. GRAFFITI IN RIJEKA, 2009

35Interview with Ante Gotovina in Slobodna Dalmacija, 4 August 2000, available at: www.arhiv.

sloboodnadalmacija.hr/nedjelja/20000804/, accessed 1 April 2009.36Vjesnik, 6 August 1996; Vjesnik, 6 August 1997.37The text of the Croatian government’s declaration of cooperation with the ICTY was published in

Narodne Novine, 41, 18 April 2000, available at: www.nn.hr, accessed 12 October 2009. Following the

arrest of Mirko Norac, the escape of Ante Gotovina and the refusal of Janko Bobetko to appear before


http://www.arhiv.sloboodnadalmacija.hr/nedjelja/20000804/

http://www.arhiv.sloboodnadalmacija.hr/nedjelja/20000804/

http://www.nn.hr

Whereas Ra�can decided to downplay the importance of the Knin commemoration,

wisely realising its potential for mobilising the radical right opposed to his

government, the HDZ’s return to power in December 2003 signalled a renewed

interest in the political spectacles associated with the Homeland War. Beginning in

August 2004, the anniversary of Operation Storm was celebrated by the entire

Croatian political leadership in Knin, including the president, prime minister and

speaker of the parliament. Despite using anti-ICTY rhetoric while in opposition,

Sanader’s administration quickly continued Ra�can’s (arguably passive) policy of

cooperation with The Hague,38 outraging many of the HDZ’s more nationalist

supporters. The HDZ, which had previously supported the politicisation of the heroes

of the Homeland War—most notably during the massive demonstrations in Split

protesting the war crimes charges against General Mirko Norac on 11 February

2001—also found itself the target of criticism from opponents wielding the symbol of

Gotovina.

The presence of protestors carrying Gotovina banners and wearing shirts with his

image at places of Croatian victories and defeats is illustrative of the powerful role

symbols and ritual play in the nexus of politics, recent history and collective memory.

The commemorations associated with the Homeland War are part of the fabric the

political leaders weave in reaffirming their legitimacy and threading it into the

founding myths of the state. According to Kertzer,

Ritual offers a powerful means for the dramatic presentation . . . This is often seen in the

manipulation of symbols and accompanying rituals connected with traumatic national

experiences of the past, especially wars, which lend themselves particularly well to a universal

form of political symbolism, one that pits the enemy against the savior. (Kertzer 1988, p. 70)

Because they are emotionally charged events, commemorations present opposition

parties who use the Gotovina symbol the opportunity to challenge the government’s

claim to legitimacy by directly associating themselves with the heroes and veterans of

the Homeland War. This was evident in 2005, when frustration at the government and

EU pressure culminated on the tenth anniversary of Operation Storm held in Knin.

The commemorations of the tenth year anniversary of Operation Storm on 5

August 2005 exemplify how ‘government sponsored rites . . . provide a symbolically

powerful setting for rites of opposition’ (Kertzer 1988, p. 120). A crowd of several

hundred individuals bearing Gotovina iconography jeered President Stjepan Mesic

during his speech calling for ‘an honest examination of our own past’, and repeatedly

the tribunal resulted in internal pressure from numerous demonstrations by veterans and nationalists,

and international pressure from the chief prosecutor and EU member states who felt the Croatian

government was not doing enough regarding cooperation.38During 2004, for example, the Croatian government effectively extradited generals Cermak and

Marka�c and cooperated in handing over documents, but was criticised repeatedly by Carla Del Ponte

for failing to take concrete actions in arresting Gotovina or even challenging his heroic image in public;

some HDZ officials attended pro-Gotovina events, had pictures of Gotovina in their offices and

publicly insisted on his innocence (Ve�cernji list, 11 October 2004; Novi list, 24 November 2004; Globus,

10 December 2004). Veteran HDZ parliamentary deputy �Duro Perica told reporters that ‘90% of HDZ

members are against the government’s policy of extraditing our heroes to the Hague tribunal’ (Novi

list, 23 February 2005).


interrupted him with chants of ‘Ante, Ante’.39 Knin itself was covered in images of

Gotovina, at the time still a fugitive, and his supporters—including retired generals

currently engaged in politics—organised a parallel commemoration in Cavoglave,

hometown of the controversial singer Marko Perkovic Thompson (see Figure 3).40

The right-wing press called the Cavoglave commemoration the ‘largest public

celebration of Operation Storm’41 and mocked the official commemoration, while

the mainstream press concluded that despite the militant rhetoric of the protests, the

more extreme nationalists remained toothless.42 The protesting generals and their

supporters also tossed flyers showing images of Gotovina from the fortress walls

overlooking the city of Knin, and issued a statement sharply attacking the

government:

What kind of celebration is this, without General Ante Gotovina, who is most responsible for

what we are commemorating. The traitors who are now celebrating are the ones who

were against the creation of [an independent] Croatia. The people will pass judgment on

them.43

FIGURE 3. ‘CAN WE PAY FOR OUR DIGNITY WITH GOTOVINA?’ T-SHIRTS ON SALE IN KNIN DURING THE

ANNIVERSARY OF OPERATION STORM, AUGUST 2007

39Novi list, 6 August 2005.40For more on Thompson, see Catherine Baker’s contribution to this collection.41Hrvatski list, 11 August 2005.42Globus, 12 August 2005. Croatian authorities successfully prevented any serious acts of violence

associated with demonstrations in support of indicted Croatian generals, despite the often heated

rhetoric of veterans’ organisations and the radical right, such as the threat of terrorist bombings in

Vukovar if Gotovina was arrested (Novi list, 1 June 2005).43Hrvatski list, 11 August 2005.


One of the generals, Ljubo Cesic Rojs, had previously campaigned for president of

Croatia with the slogan ‘a vote for me is a vote for Gotovina’.44 His election bid in

January 2005 (in which he received 1.85% of the vote), like other attempts at

transforming popular support for Gotovina into political results such as the counter

commemoration in Cavoglave, was ultimately unsuccessful.

Other than the controversy over the commemoration in Knin, there were two other

significant public protests regarding Gotovina in 2005. On 17 March, the day after

negotiations with the EU were frozen because of the Gotovina issue, demonstrators

mobilised in Zagreb’s main square and plastered the statue of Ban Josip Jela�cic with

pictures of the fugitive general, while large banners of him were set up in other parts of

the city.45 Despite the tension in the square, no serious incidents were reported,

although several members of the right-wing Croatian Rightists (Hrvatski pravasi)

party were charged with disturbing the peace.

The final major mobilisation attempt around the Gotovina symbol occurred after

his arrest, which can be seen as both the peak of populist reactions to cooperation with

the ICTY and the end of any active resistance to the government’s strategy of Euro-

Atlantic integration from the right-wing. When news of Gotovina’s arrest reached

Croatia in early December 2005, demonstrations were organised in nearly every major

city, the largest being held in Split on 11 December.46 Between 40,000 and 70,000

people gathered on the city’s waterfront, but without the support of any major

opposition party, and with the Catholic Church leadership calling for calm, the

demonstrations failed to carry the same weight as they did in 2001. In fact, only the

mayor of Split, Zvonimir Puljic, and the prefect (zupan) of the Split–Dalmatian

county, Ante Sanader (both members of the HDZ), gave political speeches at the

event, revealing that even this ‘demonstration’ was firmly under the control of the

ruling party.

During the Ra�can administration, the HDZ’s support of street demonstrations had

threatened the government’s ability to competently handle the war crimes issue; by

2005 however, Sanader was carrying out the same policies as his predecessor, but more

effectively and without the same threat from the extreme nationalist opposition.47 One

reason was that Sanader’s HDZ, despite the pro-EU orientation adopted by the party

leadership after Sanader’s defeat of hardliners around Ivic Pasalic in 2002, maintained

its nationalist credibility. As the party of Tu �dman, the party that won the Homeland

War, and the party that was in power when Croatia achieved independence, it had a

legitimacy which right-wing factions of the HDZ that formed new parties lacked.

Furthermore, the HDZ had influence in the most numerous veterans’ organisations

and the ministry which oversees veterans’ affairs (Ministarstvo obitelji, branitelja i

me �dugeneracijske solidarnosti).

44Vjesnik, 14 December 2004.45Novi list, 18 March 2005; Vjesnik, 18 March 2005.46Ve�cernji list, 12 December 2005.47One day after a group of youths, several in Ustasa uniforms, damaged the Social Democratic Party

offices in Zadar, Ra�can was asked to comment about the possibility of violent protests in response to

Gotovina’s arrest: ‘I don’t think the demonstrations will be very big’, he told reporters, ‘and the reason

is very simple. The HDZ had previously organised protests against my government, but today they

certainly won’t demonstrate against Sanader’ (Novi list, 10 December 2005).


Even after 2005, the Gotovina as a hero symbol could evoke an emotional response

among Croats, but the strength of the country’s democratic institutions and consensus

among the ruling elite on EU accession meant that it was incapable of achieving the

political results the manipulators of that symbol wanted. On the one hand, a fervent

supporter of Gotovina might still vote for the HDZ during elections, since that party

continues to represent the more conservative and nationalist body of the Croatian

electorate, and is more likely to defeat parties on the left than the extreme right which

uses the Gotovina symbol explicitly. On the other hand, the regional factor also has to

be taken into account when considering the effectiveness of political symbols. For

example, Gotovina’s popularity is greatest in his native Dalmatia, where the HDZ has

consistently won elections, limiting the ability of other right-wing parties to make

significant gains. Another example is in Slavonia, where Branimir Glavas, who was

responsible for the defence of Osijek during the 1990s and subsequently was convicted

of war crimes, has benefited from the symbolic power of the Homeland War and

Gotovina.48 An erstwhile HDZ member and Sanader loyalist, Glavas criticised the

HDZ’s position on Gotovina. In 2005 he publicly countered government policy by

calling ‘Gotovina a hero of the Homeland War, a man who is responsible for Croatian

independence and for freeing us from Greater Serbian occupation’.49 He subsequently

founded his own party (HDSSB, Hrvatski demokratski savez Slavonije i Baranje), and

was successful in national and local elections in 2007 and 2009.50 In Slavonia,

therefore, Gotovina as a symbol resulted in electoral mobilisation around a local

‘hero, not a criminal’ rather than for other right-wing parties discussed below.

A blurring of the past and present: Gotovina as martyr

Because political symbols can represent one idea while simultaneously retaining

ambiguous and multiple meanings, ‘the same symbol may communicate different

things to different people’ (Elder & Cobb 1983, pp. 9–10). Thus, while Gotovina has

primarily been depicted as the archetypal Croatian hero, he has also symbolised

Croatian martyrdom, drawing upon a rich repertoire of imagery from Croatia’s

traumatic past and Catholic faith. Although eventually victorious, Croatia and Croats

were victims of Greater Serbian aggression during the 1990s. The martyrium myth is

one of the most common archetypes in the taxonomy of myths (Hosking & Schopflin

1997, pp. 29–30), and is present among all nationalist narratives in the Balkans,

especially in the violent twentieth century, because

the experience of victimization and its presence in the collective memory raises group

awareness. Members of the group may begin to think of themselves as members of a

48In 2009, after a long and controversial trial, the Zagreb county court found Glavas guilty of crimes

against Serb civilians in Osijek and sentenced him to 10 years in prison, but he had already fled to

Bosnia & Herzegovina, arguing that the trial was a political farce directed by his former ally Sanader.49Index.hr, 11 March 2005, available at: www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak.aspx?id¼254250, accessed 3

October 2009.50Veteran political commentator Davor Butkovic noted in 2005 that ‘by glorifying Gotovina in his

speeches, Glavas has again institutionalised nationalism as one of the founding tenets of the ruling

party’s ideology’ (Jutarnji list, 19 March 2005).


http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak.aspx?id=254250

http://www.index.hr/vijesti/clanak.aspx?id=254250

particular nation precisely because they have become victims of atrocities that are afflicted

upon them by others. (Kolstø 2005, p. 21)

This martyr symbolism has also appeared alongside iconography associated with

the Ustase, fascists who ran the notorious Independent State of Croatia (NDH,

Nezavisna Drzava Hrvatska) during World War II. Croatian history is full of martyrs

who have been remembered as dying for the Croatian national cause: Matija Gubec;51

Fran Krsto Frankopan and Petar Zrinski;52 Eugen Kvaternik;53 Stjepan Radic;54

Andrija Hebrang55 and Alojzije Stepinac,56 to name just a few. It was no coincidence

that a large photograph of Gotovina was on display during the founding ceremony for

the Church of Croatian Martyrs in Udbina in the summer of 2005.57 Whereas some of

the other heroes who died for the Croatian national cause were anticlerical, Gotovina

is both an active Catholic and a Croatian patriot. At other times he was shown with

symbols of the Catholic Church. For example, on 15 March 2005, which one reporter

dubbed ‘Ante Gotovina Day’, the centre of Zadar was covered with posters featuring a

photo-montage of Gotovina with Pope John Paul II.58 The effectiveness of the image

of the martyr as a political symbol derives from its ability to evoke sympathy, and as

Klapp reminds us, ‘if you cannot win, you can lose heroically; and this sometimes

makes a better symbol than a victory’ (Klapp 1964, p. 86).

The public activities of the Organisation of Croatian Political Prisoners (Hrvatski

politi�cki uznici) are illustrative of how the symbol of Gotovina as a martyr was used.

Pamphlets distributed by this organisation featured a montaged image of Gotovina

bearing a heavy cross under the words ‘Croatia in the torture chamber’ (see Figure 4).

The accompanying text provides some insight into how the ‘suffering’ of Gotovina was

incorporated into the metanarrative of Croatia’s thousand-year dream for an

independent state:

The fate of all Croatian martyrs in the history of Croats on this territory was perpetuated

exactly in the same way as befell our greatest and most famous hero of the Homeland War

(1991–1995), General Ante Gotovina. Following the celebrated victories of Croatian soldiers

in the final battles—such as the battle known as Operation Storm against the Serbian

51Matija Gubec led a failed peasant uprising in 1573 and was put to death with a crown of hot iron

on his head.52The scions of two Croatian noble families, Petar Zrinski and Fran Krsto Frankopan were executed

outside of Vienna in 1671 after plotting against the Habsburgs.53A close collaborator of Ante Star�cevic, the ‘father’ of Croatian nationalism, Eugen Kvaternik was

killed in a bungled attempt to start a rebellion in the Krajina region against Viennese rule in 1871.54Stjepan Radic, a founder of the Croatian Peasant Party and uncontested leader of the interwar

Croatian national movement, was mortally wounded in the Yugoslav parliament by a deputy of the

Serbian Radical Party in 1928, paving the way for King Alexander’s royal dictatorship.55The leader of the Croatian Communist Party during World War II, Andrija Hebrang died under

mysterious circumstances (apparently executed while in prison in 1949) after the Tito–Stalin split.56Accused of collaboration with the Ustasa regime and imprisoned by the communist authorities,

Archbishop Alojzije Stepinac symbolised the repression of the Catholic Church in post-World War II

Yugoslavia.57Novi list, 10 September 2005; Globus, 23 September 2005.58Vjesnik, 16 March 2005.


aggressor in the year of our Lord 1995, commanded by the Knight-Krilnik59 Ante

Gotovina—the Croatian people, after 893 years of slavery under foreign lords, at last

received de facto and de jure independence. Unfortunately, this did not last long. Only five

years later, with the return of communists to power, Croats once again became slaves to

foreigners, this time slaves to the ‘globalisation’ known as the European Union . . . That is

why we have made this montaged image of the knight Ante Gotovina, for all Croatian men

and women, to symbolise all the victims in the past centuries of Croatian slavery.60

In addition to employing the discourse of victimisation, this organisation highlights

another aspect of the political use of the Gotovina symbol, the blurring of the World

War II narrative—specifically regarding the Ustase—with the war in the 1990s. This is

most visible at the commemorations held at Bleiburg.

Bleiburg (an Austrian village near the border with Slovenia), where an annual

ritualised event recalls communist massacres against the retreating armed forces of the

NDH, has traditionally been a gathering site of pro-Ustasa groups. In May 2005, the

Speaker of the Parliament, Vladimir Seks, was interrupted during his speech at

Bleiburg by whistling and shouts of ‘Ante, Ante’ from the crowd, where some

individuals held up photos of Ante Pavelic and Ante Gotovina; it was not clear which

Ante the protesters were invoking.61 But it was not just the crowd that was

symbolically making a connection between World War II and the Homeland War.

Seks himself used the stage at Bleiburg, a powerful lieux de memoire for the Croatian

people, to lash out at the ICTY:

FIGURE 4. ‘CROATIA IN THE TORTURE CHAMBER’. BANNER CARRIED DURING THE COMMEMORATION IN

BLEIBURG, MAY 2007

59Krilnik was the highest military rank used by the Ustase during World War II, and briefly by

paramilitary groups in Croatia in 1991.60Pamphlet issued by Hrvatski politi�cki uznici hrvatske, in the possession of the author.61The reporter noted about 100 people dressed in Ustasa uniforms (Glas Slavonije, 15 May 2005).


We will never allow the revision of our history. Even today some international organisations,

with sweeping and false judgments, are trying to revise the Homeland War, but we will never

allow the legal and legitimate military actions that liberated [Croatian territory] to be

declared part of a criminal enterprise by anybody.62

In 2007, several large banners featuring images of Gotovina were displayed

alongside the Ustasa iconography that has become an integral part of the landscape

at Bleiburg.

Shouts of ‘Za dom spremni’ (‘Ready for the homeland’, the Ustasamotto), Ustasa-era

songs, and Ustasa flags could be heard or seen at events organised by Gotovina

supporters throughout 2004 and 2005. ‘Za dom spremni’ also featured prominently on

a large billboard under Gotovina’s image located in the centre of Sinj, in the

Dalmatian hinterland (see Figure 5). Radical Croatian sports fans, notorious for their

use of pro-fascist symbols and racist outbursts, also blended Ustasa and Gotovina

imagery. For example, at a handball game in Zagreb against a visiting team from

Belgrade in March 2005, fans carried posters of Gotovina and some wore the insignia

of the Nazi-allied Ustasa regime, while outside a riot erupted between the opposing

fans. Graffiti—an unavoidable component of the Croatian urban landscape, often

laced with political messages—increasingly incorporated Ustasa symbols alongside

pro-Gotovina slogans when sprayed on city walls, churches, and most provocatively,

antifascist monuments.63 ‘Fascistic messages and iconography have obtained official

status’, Feral Tribune’s Viktor Ivan�cic observed in an article reporting on the

widespread appearance of pro-Ustasa graffiti and Gotovina images.64 It should be

emphasised here, however, that Gotovina himself never publicly expressed any pro-

Ustasa sentiment, nor utilised symbols associated with the movement.

Although the connection between the Gotovina cult and Ustasa symbols calls for

further investigation, one explanation can be found in the belief among radical right-

wing Croatian nationalists that the criminalisation of the Ustasa regime was part of an

anti-Croat conspiracy, which invented the atrocities committed during World War II

in order to deny the Croatian people their own state. For apologists of the NDH, the

Ustasa movement had nothing to do with either fascism or Nazism, but rather was an

expression of the Croatian desire for independence and a reaction to Serbian

oppression. During socialist Yugoslavia, however, any kind of Croatian nationalism

was immediately denounced as a return to the Ustasa ideology, and Croats were held

to be collectively guilty of the crimes of the NDH era. Serbian propaganda

exaggerated the number of victims at NDH death camps such as Jasenovac, and

relentlessly sought to portray the democratic Croatia of the 1990s as identical to the

NDH in order to discredit its struggle for independence. Tu�dman and other Croatian

historians who dared to question the Jasenovac myth were subject to censure and

62Glas Slavonije, 15 May 2005.63The streets of Split were covered with Gotovina graffiti especially in the aftermath of his arrest

(Feral Tribune, 16 December 2005). In March 2005, a church outside of Rijeka was defaced with Ustasa

symbols, ‘Long live Gotovina’, and anti-Serb and anti-EU messages (Novi list, 12 March 2005). And in

October 2005, two Partisan monuments in the Gorski kotar region were covered in paint glorifying the

NDH and proclaiming Gotovina a hero (Novi list, 11 October 2005; Novi list, 17 October 2005).64Feral Tribune, 17 March 2005.


pressure under the communist regime (Tu �dman 1990, pp. 56–58; Sobolevski 1993, pp.

42–47).

The unresolved debates over World War II were rekindled during the 1990s and

remain intertwined with the events of the Homeland War. Invoking the previous

experience of collective guilt under communism, opponents of the ICTY have sought

to portray the indictments against Croatian generals of the Homeland War as a new

anti-Croat threat challenging the existence of the Croatian state. Drazen Budisa, the

longtime president of the Croatian Social Liberal Party, told reporters during a visit to

Gotovina at The Hague that he was against the indictments precisely because Croats

‘had for decades lived under one hypothesis [Croats as a genocidal nation], and now

we have yet another one’, alluding to the perceived criminalisation of the Homeland

War and belief that the indictment was politically motivated.65

Hero not a criminal: Gotovina and the hajduk tradition

Although as an HV general Gotovina obeyed the institutions of the Republic of

Croatia, his past exploits and fugitive status earned him the reputation as a warrior

above the law. Hero cults of bandits (most notably the hajduks described below) and

alleged war criminals are not limited to Croatia or the Balkans (Hobsbawm 1969).

Long before the Gotovina indictment was unsealed in July 2001, Radovan Karadzic

and Ratko Mladic, the two Bosnian Serb political and military leaders at the top of the

ICTY’s wanted list, enjoyed hero status in both Republika Srpska and Serbia.

FIGURE 5. ‘READY FOR HOMELAND, FOR THE HOMELAND WE WILL PROTECT ANTE GOTOVINA’.BILLBOARD IN SINJ, 2006

65Novi list, 13 December 2005.


Billboards, t-shirts, posters and trinkets for sale across the region with the images of

Karadzic and Mladic, often with the label of ‘Serbian hero’, were similar in style and

symbolic meaning to their Croatian counterparts. Images of the two were frequently

placed alongside Draza Mihailovic, the leader of the Cetniks in World War II, who

was executed by the communist regime in 1946. Also, followers of Vojislav Seselj, the

president of the Serbian Radical Party on trial in The Hague, have regularly worn

shirts with the image of this indicted war criminal during sessions of the Serbian

parliament. This parallels the style of Ustasa iconography and the fate of HV officers

indicted by the ICTY. Among the Bosnian Muslims Naser Oric, the former wartime

leader of Srebrenica, has hero status despite accusations that he committed atrocities

against Serb civilians; upon his return to Sarajevo from The Hague thousands of his

supporters wore shirts with his image above the words ‘He is a hero’ and carried

banners saying ‘The Bosnian Army is not criminal’.66 Similar public manifestations of

support were held for members of the Kosovo Liberation Army indicted by the

tribunal.67

Drawing comparisons between the heroic stature of these individuals is in no

way intended to equate the deeds they are accused of committing in their

indictments, but rather to illustrate how each of the warring sides uncritically

glorified their military commanders in spite of irrefutable evidence that war crimes

were committed during the conflict. This phenomenon, especially if supported by

governments and political leaders, can have long-term negative consequences that

obstruct coming to terms with the past. Heroes, like myths, become sacred in

public discourse. Zoran Pusic, the president of Croatia’s Civic Committee for

Human Rights, warns that lionising individuals accused of war crimes ‘creates rifts

in society and strengthens extremists favoring political violence, and by glorifying

such people they are in reality publicly approving of the deeds for which they were

indicted’.68

The blurring of the distinction between heroes and criminals is not characteristic

only of the war in the 1990s. The hajduk tradition in the Balkans, glorified in folksongs

and national histories, partly explains the widespread appeal of individuals who

potentially committed crimes against humanity and, according to Ivo Zanic, the

hajduk legacy has influenced the public perceptions of soldiers turned war criminals

during the violence of Yugoslavia’s collapse. Hajduks, still the subject of modern-day

bards and turbo-folk singers,69 represent an anti-modern, anti-urban and anti-state

mentality that resonates among the peoples of the Dalmatian hinterland, Bosnia &

Herzegovina and Serbia, who have historically been willing to harbour outlaws since

the days of the Ottoman occupation. As Zanic notes, hajduk epics do not differentiate

between good and evil or freedom fighters and common criminals. According to this

worldview,

66Washington Post, 1 July 2006.67Los Angeles Times, 19 January 2003.68Feral Tribune, 22 September 2006.69Turbo-folk is a popular genre of Balkan music, often with nationalist undertones.


any individual who takes to the hills as an outlaw, with that act alone, becomes opposed to

the institutions of the existing socio-economic and political order, and is therefore exceptional

and worth honoring; in fact all new hajduk songs share the common idea that a struggle

against an unjust order is inevitable. (Zanic 1998, p. 104)

Although Zanic’s study primarily concerns hajduk epics among Croatian Serbs, it is

evident from the Gotovina case that his conclusions are applicable to certain segments

of Croatian society.70 For example, popular singers Miroslav Skoro and Marko

Perkovic Thompson, both associated with right-wing political groups, composed the

duet ‘Sude mi’ (‘They Are Judging Me’), a not-too-subtle allusion to Gotovina’s

problems with the tribunal.71 Hence, Gotovina can be interpreted as a folk hero who

defended the Croatian people first from an internal enemy (rebel Serbs) and then from

an external one, the ICTY, which is commonly seen as acting as an extension of the

political order constructed in Brussels and Washington, DC. Unlike many of the

actual criminals, mafia thugs and paramilitary bandits who became infamous during

the Balkan wars, Gotovina was an officer of Croatia’s legitimate military forces, and

thus many aspects of the hajduk tradition do not apply to his case.72 However, during

the period of his hiding from the law, he functioned symbolically as a hajduk in those

regions where the tradition was the strongest. Wendy Bracewell has argued that the

bandit-hero in the Balkans

is an excellent example of a national symbol used to encapsulate and communicate political

meanings to naturalize present ideological understandings through reference to the nation’s

history. He has served both as a symbol of the nation and its struggle for freedom and as a

device for marking the boundaries between one national community and another. (Bracewell

2004, p. 23)

The discourse of Gotovina’s supporters—including references to Croatian history and

victimisation, opposition to foreign rule and the reinforcement of national identity—

all reaffirm this observation.

Generals who fulfilled their duty by surrendering to the ICTY, such as Rahim

Ademi, Mladen Marka�c or Ivan Cermak, or those who cooperated with the tribunal’s

investigators, received far less public attention, and public support, than either Janko

Bobetko or Gotovina, who reacted to the indictment by going into hiding. The public

veneration of heroes who avoided the law challenged the Croatian elites’ ambitions of

70In Tomislavgrad, near the Croatian–Bosnian border, the local government founded the Hajduk

Group of Mijat Tomic (Hajdu�cka druzina Mijata Tomica) in 1995 within the 1st Croatian Guards Unit

in order to ‘preserve the traditions’ of the town and celebrate the seventeenth century Croatian hajduk.

See www.hbzup.com/tomislavgrad/kultura/hajducka/index.htm, accessed 10 June 2008. See also

Jutarnji list, 15 July 2001, for other examples of Croatian hajduks. The football club of Split, Croatia’s

second largest city, carries the name Hajduk.71In an interview, Skoro claimed that the song was not just about Gotovina, Mirko Norac and other

Croatian generals indicted by The Hague, but about ‘the crucified Homeland’ and other martyrs from

Croatia’s past such as Petar Zrinski, Fran Kristo Frankopan and Matija Gubec (Ve�cernji list, 9 June

2005). Similar sentiments are expressed in his song Hag (The Hague).72For a discussion of the veneration of criminals who became national heroes during the wars of the

1990s, see Colovic (2004).


http://www.hbzup.com/tomislavgrad/kultura/hajducka/index.htm

Euro-Atlantic integration, and prompted many in Brussels to question Croatia’s

readiness for EU membership.

In late 2004, as Croatia awaited news of a starting date for EU accession talks,

Carla Del Ponte suggested that precisely because no one in the government had

‘challenged his [Gotovina’s] status as a national hero’, Sanader’s administration had a

credibility problem when it came to full cooperation with The Hague on the Gotovina

issue.73 There was also considerable support for Gotovina among some clergymen of

the Croatian Catholic Church, including the charismatic young priest Zlatko Sudac,

even though the Church leadership stood by the government’s decision to cooperate

with The Hague.74 In February 2005, as international pressure mounted, Novi list

sharply criticised the government, concluding that Croatia was returning to ‘square

one’ regarding EU integration because ‘it is a country where the political elite still is

not clear on how to treat General Gotovina—as a hero or as an indicted war

criminal’.75

The debunking of the Gotovina myth on the part of the government, which included

the removal of banners from public spaces and the publication of Gotovina’s criminal

record in the mainstream press, started in December 2004. However, it was not fully

implemented until the spring of 2005 when it became clear that failure to locate or

arrest the fugitive general would seriously jeopardise Croatia’s EU prospects.

Sanader’s strategic shift in approaching the Gotovina case was encapsulated in his

‘Action Plan’.76 This ultimately led to Gotovina’s arrest on the Canary Islands, but it

did not diminish Gotovina’s unblemished hero image among the opponents of the

ICTY. Hidajet (Hido) Bis�cevic, one of the members who drafted the Action Plan, and

who was former Croatian deputy foreign minister, subsequently reflected on the

importance of demystifying Gotovina’s hajduk image in an interview:

My duty was to raise consciousness about the necessity of the rule of law in Croatian society.

It is important to raise that consciousness and to shift away from . . . a hajduk concept of

justice, and a belief that local laws and village traditions are more important than European

laws.77

Despite the change in the government’s attitude, some groups remained defiant in

rejecting any efforts to discredit their political symbol. For example, a group of 37

Dalmatian veterans’ groups issued ‘a serious warning to the Croatian government, as

well as all international blackmailers’, that ‘no one, other than the Croatian people,

has the right to determine which direction Croatia is headed, who can be celebrated as

73Novi list, 24 November 2004.74Globus, 25 February 2005.75Novi list, 5 February 2005.76In early 2005, under increasing EU pressure, Sanader and Mesic convened a meeting of all

Croatian intelligence and security services in order to create a smaller team dedicated to tracking down

Gotovina and implementing the government’s ‘Action Plan’. This included breaking up Gotovina’s

support network, a coordinated shift in the ruling party’s rhetoric on the Gotovina issue, and direct

communication with the ICTY about Gotovina’s possible whereabouts. Sanader also authorised

Mladen Bajic, Croatia’s chief public prosecutor, to pursue information leading to Gotovina more

aggressively than the previous year (Novi list, 5 February 2005; Jutarnji list, 4 June 2005; International

Herald Tribune, 27 December 2005).77Obzor (Ve�cernji list), 26 July 2008.


a hero, and whether or not the picture of any general, soldier, or average Croatian

peasant can be displayed in some town or village’.78 In general however, the active use

of the Gotovina symbol essentially ceased shortly after his arrest, as if the symbolic

capital of his fugitive-hajduk status dispersed once he became just another suspect

awaiting trial in The Hague.

‘Gotovina saved us from the EU’: behind the symbol

Who were the creators and manipulators of the Gotovina image? The general

himself never expressed any political ambition, although arguably he became one of

the most powerful political symbols in Croatia. The parties that were most active in

rallying behind the HV generals indicted by the tribunal were part of the general

populist trend that emerged in the other post-communist countries of Eastern

Europe. In general these parties were nationalistic and xenophobic; had platforms

that were against the EU, globalisation and change; suffered from a persecution

syndrome; and occasionally advocated radical, anti-democratic methods (Mungiu-

Pippidi 2006). As Vladimir Tismaneanu has observed, ‘paranoid fears and foreign

conspiracies combine in the radical populist imagination with the demonization of

critical intellectuals, liberal and conservative anti-collectivist thinkers, and any other

advocate of an uninhibited, open public space’ (Tismaneanu 1998, 2001, p. 17).

Many of their members and voters were those elements of society who were the

‘losers’ in the transition.

Tismaneanu’s characterisation of Eastern European populism is certainly relevant

to Croatian post-communist populist parties, which included the unreformed hardline

nationalists from the Tu�dman era who were marginalised after the pro-European

orientation of mainstream politics following the 2000 elections (Grdesic 1999, pp. 171–

89). Gotovina was an ideal symbol for populist parties because he evoked Croatian

patriotism and provided a link to the cronyism and war profiteering of the Tu �dman

era. Zarko Puhovski, the former president of the Croatian Helsinki Committee,

warned that the mobilisation around the Gotovina symbol represented ‘the

strengthening of the right-wing outside parliament which is against the Europeaniza-

tion of Croatia’ and coincided with ‘the activation of an anti-European cultural

public’.79 According to Ivo Goldstein, ‘Gotovina became a symbol of traditionalist

political culture’ which, in addition to adopting a narrow interpretation of the

Homeland War, included anti-Serbianism and pro-Ustasa sentiment.80 The strength of

heroic symbols lay not only in their emotional aspect, but in their ability to unify a

diversity of meanings and at the same time retain ambiguity, complexity and

uncertainty (Kertzer 1988, p. 11). Gotovina as a political symbol can therefore be

interpreted as a victor and a martyr, a bulwark alternatively against the East (Serbia)

as well as the West (the ICTY and the EU), an embodiment of both the Croatian

78Ve�cernji list, 12 March 2005.79Novi list, 5 March 2005.80Globus, 18 December 2005. Goldstein used the term ognjistari to refer to these Gotovina

supporters, which can best be translated as traditionalists, even though the Croatian word is derived

from ognjiste, or hearth (thus they could be described as ‘hearthists’).


military and the entire Croatian nation, and the protagonist of both the past glory of

the 1990s as well as a means for a return to power by discredited nationalists.

The political parties most actively using the Gotovina symbol have been the

Croatian Bloc (HB, Hrvatski blok),81 the Croatian Real Renaissance (HIP),82 the

Croatian Rightists (HP), the Croatian Pure Party of Rights (HCSP, Hrvatska �cista

stranka prava)83 and the Croatian Christian Democratic Union (HKDU, Hrvatska

krs�canska demokratska unija). None of these parties received the minimum number of

votes needed to enter the parliament in either the 2003 or 2007 national elections,

suggesting they were unable to transform the public’s support of Gotovina into

electoral gains. Nationalist mobilisation around Gotovina ultimately resulted in votes

for the HDZ as a safeguard against a possible return of the left. As noted above, Ljubo

Cesic Rojs, a former general and one-time HDZ deputy, included pictures of himself

standing next to Gotovina in his campaign publicity during his presidential bid in

January 2005 (see Figure 6).84 Realising that divisions among right-wing parties

resulted in poor election results, many of these parties united under the organisation

Jedino Hrvatska (Only Croatia) in the autumn of 2006. The following year they staged

a demonstration on the Knin fortress on the Day of Victory and Homeland

Thanksgiving, holding a large banner with the words ‘Greetings to Operation Storm’

while Mesic, Sanader and Seks stood nearby for the flag raising ceremony.

The paradox of the Gotovina symbol is that it continues to evoke powerful

associations with Croatian national identity and the legacy of the Homeland War, but

as a political symbol it has failed to win support for the parties using it most explicitly.

After publishing a sensational interview with Gotovina in June 2003, in which the

fugitive general recognised the ICTY but refused to surrender to it, the weekly

Nacional boasted that it ‘had completely shattered the Croatian extreme right’, since

they had allegedly been outmanoeuvred by their own political symbol.85 While

politically weak, these populist parties continued to attract attention precisely through

their public actions related to Gotovina and other ICTY indictees. Of the parties with

parliamentary representatives, only the Croatian Party of Rights (HSP, Hrvatska

stranka prava), which was notorious for its open use of Ustasa iconography, criticised

the government’s cooperation with The Hague. But even the HSP, whose deputies

staged a dramatic exit from the parliament when Gotovina’s arrest was announced,

distanced itself from the demonstrations on the Split waterfront in 2005, fully aware

that its political ambitions in a future coalition government would be jeopardised by

such behaviour.86

81The party’s founder, Ivic Pasalic, who was one of Tu�dman’s closest advisors, lost to Ivo Sanader in

the struggle for the HDZ leadership following Tu�dman’s death.82The HIP was founded by Miroslav Tu�dman, the former president’s son and the former chief of

Croatia’s intelligence services.83For many years the party’s office in Split displayed a large Gotovina poster, and the HCSP

president, Luka Podrug, was active in organising public gatherings in support of the indicted general.84The caption for the advertisement read ‘2 January 2005—Together Again’, suggesting that as

president Rojs would not arrest Gotovina, but rather would give him a position as an advisor (Hrvatski

list, 23 December 2004).85Nacional, 17 June 2003.86Ve�cernji list, 8 December 2005.


In addition to protesting against cooperation with the ICTY, right-wing parties

have sharply criticised both Ra�can’s and Sanader’s pro-EU policies. Making EU

accession conditional on Gotovina’s arrest not only contributed to a decrease in

support for entry into the EU among the Croatian public (it dropped below 50% for

the first time after March 2005),87 but supported the right-wing’s argument that an

anti-Croat conspiracy existed in the West that sought to force Croatia back into a new

Yugoslav federation through the criminalisation of HV generals and the Homeland

War. Right-wing publications such as Hrvatski list, Hrvatsko slovo and Fokus,

regularly featured articles by leaders of the abovementioned parties which included the

most scathing anti-EU and anti-West rhetoric in discussions about Gotovina and

other indicted generals.88 Anti-EU slogans and images were also regular features of

pro-Gotovina demonstrations. During a protest in Zagreb in March 2005, the vice

president of the Croatian Rightists declared that ‘Gotovina needs to be thanked

because he saved us from the EU’.89

But right-wing political parties were not the only driving force behind the Gotovina

hero cult. A network of veterans’ groups formed the backbone of the protest

movement. They were also largely responsible for saturating the Croatian landscape

with images of Gotovina, which were practically venerated as religious icons. During a

FIGURE 6. ‘2 JANUARY 2005—TOGETHER AGAIN’. CAMPAIGN ADVERTISEMENT FOR LJUBO CESIC ROJS,BACK COVER OF HRVATSKI LIST (23 DECEMBER 2004)

87For public opinion polls see the webpage of the Croatian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and

European Integration, available at: www.mvpei.hr/ei/default.asp?ru¼219&sid¼&akcija¼&jezik¼2,accessed 5 December 2008; and Jutarnji list, 26 September 2006. Whereas support for the EU was

around 70% for a number of years, it has generally been below or around 50% since 2005.88For example, see articles in Hrvatsko slovo, 6 October 2006; Hrvatsko slovo, 29 December 2006;

and Fokus, 1 December 2006.89Novi list, 18 March 2005.


http://www.mvpei.hr/ei/default.asp?ru=219&sid=&akcija=&jezik=2





police raid on one organisation’s headquarters in Zagreb, a veteran who had been

beaten by the police told reporters: ‘They tore up a banner of Gotovina in front of the

building. That hurts us more than our bruised ribs’.90 Although the Organisation of

Croatian Volunteers of the Homeland War (UHDDR, Udruga hrvatskih dragovoljaca

Domovinskog rata) claimed the largest membership (some 300,000 veterans), the

Croatian Military Invalids of the Homeland War (HVIDR-a, Hrvatski vojni invalidi

Domovinskog rata) was the most vocal and aggressive veterans’ group in the debate

over cooperation with the ICTY. There are dozens of other veterans’ organisations at

the national, regional and local level, and while they did not always have a unified

position, they coordinated their actions under umbrella organisations such as the

Headquarters for the Defence of the Dignity of the Homeland War (Stozer za zastitu

digniteta Domovinskog rata), which was renamed in December 2005 as the

Headquarters for the Truth of the Homeland War (Stozer za istinu o Domovinskom

ratu).91 Retired generals, such as Marinko Kresic and Ljubo Cesic Rojs, are also

politically active in the Croatian Generals’ Assembly (Hrvatski generalski zbor), which

criticised Sanader’s administration so extensively on issues related to war crimes and

veterans that the prime minister formed his own Council for Promoting the Truth

about the Homeland War in December 2006.92

Under Ra�can, the Croatian government undertook many vital military reforms,

including a reduction of the excessively large officer corps, cutting the total number of

troops, investigating fraudulent disability claims, and other policies which were

interpreted by veterans as a loss of the privileges they had under Tu �dman’s HDZ

(Edmunds 2003, pp. 37–44). According to Goldstein, the HV ‘was a kind of party

army for the HDZ’, a party which regularly had active generals on its election lists

during the 1990s (Goldstein 2003, p. 428). Combined with the indictments issued by

the ICTY, Ra�can’s downsizing of the military was perceived as an attack on the

bedrock of the Croatian state. The case against Gotovina particularly angered the

veteran population. As both supporters of Gotovina’s fugitive status and those who

called for his surrender noted, never in history has a general of a victorious army been

tried for war crimes, a fact that fuelled speculations of an anti-Croat bias at the

tribunal and anti-Croat conspiracies in the international community.

For veterans’ organisations, therefore, the symbol of Gotovina served in the first

place to draw attention to their concerns as soldiers in addition to the broader issues in

Croatian politics. Not surprisingly, there is considerable overlap between the populist

parties and veterans, as the ideological orientation of both groups is embedded in the

past of the Tu�dman era and the Homeland War instead of in a future within the EU.

Their resistance to developing a modern, democratic Croatia that functions under the

rule of law is evident in their rhetoric and methods in response to Croatia’s

international, and constitutional, obligations regarding ICTY indictments. Although

90Ve�cernji list, 10 January 2006.91Novi list, 12 December 2005. In February 2006, the Foundation for the Truth of the Homeland

War was established to raise money for Gotovina’s defence, fund research on the Homeland War, and

provide scholarships to the children of veterans.92Novi list, 6 December 2006. Some 40 generals were invited by the HDZ to participate on this

council, yet another body dedicated to the ‘truth’ of the Homeland War. For details on other political

activities of former generals, see Feral Tribune, 10 November 2006.


the most ardent manipulators of the Gotovina symbol argued their primary goal was

to defend the innocence of Croatian generals, the true motives were political agendas

carried out through undemocratic means, public declarations encouraging the

violation of domestic and international laws, and an unwillingness to critically

examine the myths of the Homeland War. The use of war crimes issues for political

gain was made clear during the demonstrations in Split over General Mirko Norac in

February 2001, and was renewed in the autumn of 2002, when an indictment was

unsealed for General Janko Bobetko. While threats of a coup were never made

explicit, Ra�can’s government was repeatedly paralysed due to right-wing agitation

over its cooperation with The Hague, and even HDZ leaders once called for a ‘march

on Zagreb’ in front of the massive crowds in Split.93

The public debate in Croatia was rarely about the innocence or guilt of Croatian

generals, but whether or not to use legal means to defend them. Mesic, Ra�can, and

eventually Sanader argued that the truth about the Homeland War, and the soldiers

who fought in it, needed to be defended before the tribunal with full access to military

and state archives. Meanwhile, opposition groups called for Gotovina to continue his

evasion of the authorities and to not surrender. Advocates of cooperation with the

tribunal were labelled traitors. There also existed an extensive support network, both

inside and outside the government, which helped finance Gotovina’s fugitive status

until Sanader implemented his much touted ‘Action Plan’ in the spring of 2005.94

Rather than help defend Gotovina’s innocence, the strategy of his supporters was

actually counterproductive to his own interests. His period of four years in hiding

ruined Gotovina’s chances for provisional release until his trial, created an

international media sensation that presupposed his guilt and tarnished Croatia’s

image, and elevated him to the same status as Radovan Karadzic and Ratko Mladic in

statements issued by the UN Security Council, the ICTY, and NATO.

Finally, entirely missing from the discourse over Gotovina are the actual victims of

Operation Storm, even if Gotovina is legally not accountable for them. The dual

symbols of hero and martyr leave no room for any crimes to have occurred; the hero is

incapable of anything dishonourable, while the martyr is himself the greatest victim of

the narrative. Even within the hajduk narrative, the victim disappears, since ‘not only

did the end justify the means, the means themselves acquired a certain heroic glamour

through association with the hajduk tradition, which could excuse and even glorify acts

of cruelty and vengeance, and the rejection of all external authority coupled with

unforgiving discipline’ (Bracewell 2004, p. 31). Fokus, formerly the leading Croatian

right-wing weekly, commented on Gotovina’s capture in its cover story with the

following: ‘The majority of Croats are unhappy with the arrest of Ante Gotovina. Not

only because they consider the general to be innocent, as is every other Croatian

general, officer, and soldier, but primarily because of the anti-Croat content of the

indictment against Gotovina as well as our other generals’.95 If Gotovina, who

symbolises all Croats in the discourse of the right-wing, is innocent, then no Croat can

be guilty of war crimes.

93Novi list, 10 December 2005.94New York Times, 2 January 2006.95Fokus, 16 December 2005.


The pain, trauma and raw emotions of those individuals who lost loved ones and

family members in the wars of the 1990s often overwhelm efforts at post-war

reconciliation and acceptance that the enemy side also had innocent victims. The

conflict in Croatia resulted in over 15,000 civilian and military deaths, over half a

million refugees and internally displaced persons, the destruction of some 500 cultural

monuments, and the devastation of the country’s cities, industry, infrastructure,

agriculture and tourist economy (Goldstein 2003, p. 402). The repercussions of that

violence will be felt within Croatian society and in the country’s relations with its

neighbours. For Croatia to come to terms with its past the facts about the victims of

both sides will need to be investigated and openly discussed. However, as long as the

discourse is dominated by political symbols rather than honest dialogue, that process

will be obstructed for years to come.

Conclusion

Croatia as an independent and democratic state has existed for less than 20 years, yet it

is exceptionally burdened by the contested narratives of its founding and remains a

battleground of competing symbols from its recent past. Even as debate still swirls

around the use and display of communist and fascist symbols from World War II, the

pro-West Croatia, symbolised by the EU flag, is challenged by a variety of nationalist

symbols, including the image of a Croatian general, which represents a strain of

Croatian nationalism that has openly rejected further European integration. Although

on the surface the Gotovina phenomenon was about fears of criminalisation of the

Homeland War and politically motivated indictments, a deeper issue is an increasing

mistrust of ‘Western imperialism’ among conservative voters in Croatian society,

which has been felt most explicitly through the use of the ICTY as a tool for

influencing political developments in the Yugoslav successor states.96 Igor Zidic, the

president of the cultural institution Matica hrvatska, expressed the sentiment of many

Croatian right-wing intellectuals during a speech at the height of the debate over

Gotovina: ‘We are all Gotovina! We are all, like him, being extorted by the European

Union, and we need to fight with all our strength against this extortion’.97

The transfer of Gotovina to The Hague brought to a close one chapter of the drama

that captivated Croatia for over four years, and the second, trial phase, has shifted

from the emotional stage of domestic politics to a more sober discussion of the

proceedings in the court room, although even public and media interest dropped

significantly after the opening week of the trial. The transition from the Tu �dman

model of authoritarianism enabled Croatia to make considerable progress in

strengthening democratic institutions, but perceptions of the ICTY, Operation Storm

and Gotovina remain polarising for Croatian society. The centrality of Operation

Storm to Croatia’s war for independence, General Ante Gotovina’s role in that

96Right-wing publications regularly warn readers about the ‘dark plans’ of the West, including the

‘neocolonial ambitions of the United Kingdom’ and neoliberal economic interests which want to force

Croatia into a new Yugoslavia masked as the Western Balkans (Hrvatski list, 15 February 2007;

Hrvatsko slovo, 28 November 2008; Fokus, 20 February 2009).97Novi list, 1 March 2005.


offensive, and the volatility of the debate over recent history help to explain the

phenomenon of the Gotovina cult and the potency of his political symbolism. The

Homeland War continues to be omnipresent in everyday life, from films and pop

culture to ongoing war crimes trials and the socioeconomic and mental issues of

veterans, all of which are subject to media representations as well as external pressure

from the international community that likewise views Croatia through the prism of the

war.

The Gotovina case is emblematic of the nexus of politics, symbols, rituals and

collective memory in Croatia, and more broadly in the former Yugoslavia. History is

constructed not only through facts, but through myths which often have more weight

than statistics. The indictment of Croatian generals, especially Gotovina, for crimes

associated with one of the most important battles of the Homeland War and

foundation of the modern Croatian state has exposed the difficulties of a society

coming to terms with the myths and darker moments of its recent past. While I have

argued that until this point the Gotovina symbol has been used primarily by certain

political groups for their own interests, the effectiveness of the former foreign

legionnaire to evoke emotional responses signifies he plays an important role in the

modern Croatian psyche. The outcome of the trial will certainly influence the

likelihood of Gotovina transforming from a political symbol into an actual political

figure in the near future.

University of Rijeka

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