Croatian National Guard

In the 1990 parliamentary elections in Croatia, the ruling communist party was defeated, and the Croatian Democratic Commonwealth (CDU) nationalist party won, which, after coming to power, adopted a number of measures and laws that were considered discriminatory ^{[1] [2] [3]} in relation to the significant part of the population of the republic to the Serbs . This increased ethnic hostility between Croats and Serbs ^[4] . The command of the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA) considered that Croatia, following the course of secession, could use the forces of the Territorial Defense , create its own armed forces and enter into open confrontation with the central authorities ^[5] . To minimize resistance, the army confiscated all Territorial Defense weapons ^[6] .

In August 1990, the Serbian population of the Slovak Republic announced a forthcoming referendum on autonomy, which provoked a sharp reaction from the Croatian authorities. An attempt by the republican Ministry of Internal Affairs to prevent a referendum by special forces encountered opposition from the Serbs, who began to build barricades on the roads. Local police secretariats also began distributing weapons to everyone. These events, known in historiography as the “Log Revolution,” originally took place in Dalmatia, populated mainly by Serbs, south and west of the city of Knin ^[7] . However, then the Serbs of part of Lika, Kordun, Baniya, Slavonia, Srem and Baranya also declared disobedience to the CDU and President Tudjman. In July 1990, the Serbian National Chamber was formed, which opposed the policy of the President of Croatia, Franjo Tudjman , who sought to independence of the country. The Serbian Autonomous Region of Krajina was proclaimed, with Milan Babić , a dentist from Knin as president, and a militia inspector from the same Knin, Milan Martic , leading the Krai militia, originally represented by local MIA departments that had left Zagreb. These two people became leaders of the state, which included the territory of Croatia with a dominant Serbian population ^[8] .

UNA got information that Croatia was going to create its own armed forces, which would be commanded by Captain Vladimir Jager, a double agent who worked for Croatian nationalists and counterintelligence of Yugoslavia . The Yugoslavs began to prepare a secret operation, code-named “Shield,” during which it was planned to disarm Croatian rebels and arrest the entire leadership of the Croatian independence movement. The operation was prepared in December 1990, and the country's defense minister, Velko Kadievich , only had to give an order. However, this did not happen: Kadievich ordered the special services not to take any action ^{on the} day appointed for the operation ^[5] .

In early 1991, Croatia did not have regular troops, and in order to ensure defense, the Croats doubled the number of police (up to 20 thousand people). The most effective unit was a detachment of 3 thousand people, divided into 12 battalions on a military model; there were also another 9 to 10 thousand reservists, divided into 16 battalions and 10 companies, but they did not have enough weapons ^[9] .

Education

Preparations for the formation of the Croatian National Guard began on April 12, 1991 : the need for a police paramilitary unit escalated after the March clashes in Pakrats and Plitvice Lakes . Since the Constitution prohibited the creation of its own armed forces, bypassing it, Croatian politicians decided to create a paramilitary police unit subordinate to the Minister of the Interior and at the same time able to repulse the Yugoslav People’s Army. Croatian Sabor adopted the Law on the Ministry of the Interior on April 18 , President Franjo Tudjman signed it on April 20 , and five days later the National Guard itself was formally formed. The range of its tasks included maintaining the constitutional order in Croatia, maintaining law and order, conducting anti-terrorist operations, protecting the borders of Croatia, territory, coast and territorial waters. It was necessary for the Guard to develop an understandable structure, and to staff the staff with highly qualified specialists. In the future, it was planned to reassign the Guard to the Croatian Ministry of Defense ^[10] .

On May 5, the strength of the Croatian National Guard was announced and its structure: the transfer of police to the new unit was personally led by Minister of Defense Martin Spiegel and Minister of the Interior Josip Bolkovac . The translation began on May 10, and by May 15 four brigades had already been formed ^[11] . By July, the number of Guard grew to 8 thousand people who were well armed ^[9] . The police reserve, numbering 39 thousand people in April, was also transferred to the reserve of the Croatian National Guard and to separate battalions ^[11] . On May 18, the Zrinsky battalion was formed as a special detachment under the National Guard, the core of which was 27 people from a special police detachment in the village of Kumrovets , as well as immigrants from Croatia who served in the French Foreign Legion ^[12] . By July, the reserve of the Guard amounted to 40 thousand people, distributed across 19 brigades and 14 separate battalions, but they were sorely lacking weapons. The Croatian police were armed with 15 thousand units of small arms, and in August another 30 thousand units were brought into the country from abroad ^[9] .

On May 28, a solemn parade of the Croatian National Guard took place at the Kranchevichev Stadium with the aim of raising the morale of soldiers and officers. The parade was attended by 800 soldiers, several dozen anti-aircraft missile systems, armored vehicles and armored personnel carriers were involved; also took part in the Presidential Guard and cavalry participating in the Xin Alka ^[13] .

Formation Issues

To command individual detachments, the regional command of the National Guard of Croatia was deployed in late July - early August in the following territories: East Slavonia, Bania-Kordun region, Lika, Central and Northern Dalmatia, South Dalmatia and the surroundings of Zagreb . The headquarters of the National Guard, to which the units were subordinate, were located directly in the municipalities ^[14] . The command structure itself was very, very weak, so almost no one expected coordinated actions from the units ^[15] . Despite their importance and their authority, the headquarters consisted mainly of politicians whose level of military training was very low (at best, they all served in the Yugoslav People's Army). Numerous units located in separate areas often did not have permanent communication with the headquarters and could not coordinate their actions, and the command systems of the Territorial Defense did not work in all cities, although they saved the Guard from complete collapse ^[16] .

The personnel became another large-scale problem: there weren’t enough trained officers, the training of soldiers was very poor in conditions of a shortage of weapons and ammunition, there wasn’t enough uniforms (about 20% of the soldiers received uniforms, the remaining 80% were in civilian clothes); there was also a serious shortage of food, fuel and medicine ^[17] . The mobilization, however, was very successful: about 80% of the inhabitants of Zagreb responded to the call in September and October. In July 1991, Shime Jodan was appointed Minister of Defense instead of Spegel, and on August 3, Spegel left the post of commander of the National Guard. The reason for the resignation of Spegel was the outbreak of conflict with Tujman, who refused to implement the plan of attack on the Yugoslav barracks ^[18] . Spegel eventually became the inspector general of the Croatian forces, and General Anton Tus was appointed to command the Guard ^[19] .

Transfer of units to the Croatian army

In mid-September, the regional commands were replaced by six operational zones with headquarters in the cities of Osijek , Bjelovar , Zagreb , Karlovac , Rijeka and Split ^[14] . The strength of the operational zones was already very, very large: in Slavonia and Dalmatia, the troops were heavily armed, and in Zagreb the number of troops was twice the national average ^[20] . During the battles for the Yugoslav barracks, the Croats managed to seize the weapons warehouse: this had a positive effect on the state of the Guard, and it expanded to 60 reserve brigades and individual battalions by the end of October (with four professional guard brigades) ^[14] . In each brigade, according to the plan, there should have been 1800 people, but their actual number varied from 500 to 2500 people ^[21] . In addition to the Zrinsky battalion, three more battalions of Croatian special forces were formed in the National Guard: Frankopan , King Tomislav and Matvey Vlašić ^[22] .

On September 20, 1991, the Croatian Sabor passed the Defense Law, according to which the Croatian National Guard and the Croatian Ground Forces merged together into the Armed Forces of the Republic of Croatia, which are already subordinate to the Minister of Defense. The reserve units of the Territorial Defense were included in the reserve of the National Guard ^[24] . On September 21, 1991, the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Croatia was formed, whose chief was Tus ^[17] . On October 8, 1991, on the anniversary of the independence of Croatia, the Law on Defense was signed, and the National Guard finally joined the Croatian Armed Forces. The reserve units of the Guard became the reserve units of the Croatian army, which they began to call the Household ( Croatian. Domobranstvo ). The National Guard became a full-fledged military formation, and on November 3, 1991 it was formally abolished, giving way to the finally Armed Forces of Croatia ^[25] .

Participation in hostilities

Units of the National Guard of Croatia participated in a number of the most important battles of the war in Croatia, including in battles with the forces of the JNA in 1991 . Гвардия сражалась под Госпичем ^[26] , Шибеником ^[27] и Задаром ^[28] , защищая побережье страны от ЮНА; билась в Восточной Славонии под Вуковаром ^[29] и Осиеком ^[30] , обороняла Дубровник ^[31] , а также сыграла важную роль в успешном для Хорватии исходе сражения за казармы ЮНА ^[32] и операции «Ураган '91» (попытке выбить югославские войска из Западной Славонии) ^[33] .

Военные преступления

Во время боевых действий в 1991 году подразделения Национальной гвардии занимались этническими чистками сербского населения, а также совершили ряд военных преступлений. Жертвами были как гражданские сербы, оказавшиеся на подконтрольных хорватским силам территориях, так и военнопленные солдаты ЮНА и Территориальной обороны. В частности, по разным оценкам, до 600 человек были убиты в Сисаке , до 300 — в Западной Славонии , от 76 до 123 — в Госпиче и т.д. На подконтрольных территориях были созданы несколько лагерей, в том числе близ Пакраца, в Госпиче и лагерь Лора, где были убиты десятки гражданских и военнопленных. Ряд солдат и офицеров гвардии были осуждены хорватскими судами ^{[41] [42]} .