Mihailovic's forces (those directly under his control) stopped fighting the Germans by the end of 1941. The Partisans didn't begin to receive weaponry until much later than that.
Tito had no interest in fighting the Germans regardless of all the Partisan propaganda to the contrary.
Neither did Mihailovic, as evidenced by Chetnik actions after 1941. The plan was to lay low and wait for an Allied landing in Dalmatia or an Allied approach on the old Yugoslav border and then begin a rebellion. In the meantime, Chetniks within Nedic's Serbia were to fight the Communists and take part in the collaboration security services under Nedic until the time for rebellion was to arrive.
His interest was winning the civil war within Yugoslavia’s boundaries so that he could take over the country after the war and impose his own special brand of communist dictatorship.
Much like Mihailovic and his Chetniks. One need only look at the Moljevic Plan draw up in 1942 by Stevan Moljevic (one of Draza's righthand men) to see what was in store for non-Serbs in a future "Yugoslavia".
Mihailovich and his forces also had to contend with the terrible Nazi reprisal policy against the civilian population. Tito did not care about civilian casualties.
Correct. Tito sought reprisals to radicalize the peasantry against the Germans/Italians/etc.
Mihailovich did care. For every action that the Chetnik forces took against the Germans, the Germans would take the lives of their civilian supporters and burn their homes and rampage their villages. Mihailovich had to literally evaluate the benefit/cost ratio of every single action that he was to take against the Germans. He did so because he had a conscience.
Not much of a conscience when it came to Partisan villages, Croatian, Muslim, or Albanian villages, that's for sure.
Another issue, of course, is the horrendous, unprecedented Croatian massacres perpetrated on the Serbian population living within the boundaries of the NDH - The Independent State of Croatia, which after April 10, 1941, when the Croats enthusiastically welcomed the Nazi occupiers whom they viewed as their “liberators”, included the Krajina area of Croatia and all of Bosnia and Hercegovina.
That's quite the hyperbole! Yes, there were massacres, but they differed little from what the Serbs had done for the previous century and a half to others in the region. Nor did the massacres happen in a vacuum. The massacres were horrendous, no doubt about it...but many were tit for tat, and others had nothing to do with the Ustashe but were the continuation of old feuds such as the massacres of Serbs in Eastern Hercegovina in the summer of 1941 by the Muslims.
The Italian forces were the primary occupiers of the areas in Croatia mainly populated by the Serbs. Chetnik forces in certain areas made accomodations with the Italian occupiers indeed (”accomodation” being vastly different in character than “collaboration”) to save their own people from the Croatian Ustashe. The Italians were, to say the least, considerably more “humane” than were the Croats.
You can call it accomodation all you want. The fact of the matter is that it was direct collaboration. The Chetniks in these zones (apart from Montenegro) never, ever fought the Italians, accepted weapons from the Italians, and took orders from the Italians. The main figure here was Dobroslav Jevdjevic, a former member of Parliament in Belgrade who was Mihailovic's political liason in Hercegovina and Dalmatia. Ilija Trifunovic-Bircanin was another one. Both men were protected from the Ustashe by Italian guards for example.
General Mihailovich, and I say this unequivocally and with complete conviction, was NEVER a collaborator nor was he guilty of the alleged crimes he was accused of by the Yugoslav communists.
Mihailovic approved first of the collaboration with the Italians in regards to the Chetniks under Djujic in Dalmatia/Lika, the Hercegovina Chetniks, and later the Montenegrin Chetniks. He then later approved of collaboration with the Germans (1943) and by 1944 his small band that he directly controlled was accepting weapons from the Germans.
I can also mention the collaboration between Major Dangic (the head Chetnik of Eastern Bosnia) and the Germans in late 1941.
Diocletian, I know that ultimately no “facts” or testimony will change your mind, but I do think it’s disingenuous of you to keep repeating communist propaganda
How can German documents from Germany and Italian documents from Italy be "communist propaganda"? Did Tito occupy Rome and Berlin and forge the documentation?
I don’t want to take cheap shots, but I have to honestly say that it always makes me smile when I hear anyone of Croatian heritage accuse Serbs of being “Nazi collaborators”. That takes an awful lot of hubris.
No, all it takes is knowing the facts.
The Serbs of Dalmatia, Lika, and Western Bosnia never fought the Axis and collaborated from the get-go>
The Chetniks of Montenegro at first fought the Axis but began collaboration as early as 1941 (Coastal Montenegro) and as late as 1942 (Pavle Djurisic of Eastern Montenegro).
The Chetniks of Eastern Bosnia began collaboration with the Germans in December 1941.
The Chetniks of Serbia stopped active resistance by late 1941 and began collaboration in stages.
Those are the facts.
The Blog I’ve referred you to also contains German testimonies about General Mihailovich and his forces. The Nazis knew better than anybody just who was collaborating and who wasn’t. According to them, Mihailovich was no collaborator, and they had NO REASON whatsoever to lie, while other factions in Yugoslavia had plenty of reason to lie.
Except, of course, that the German documentation shows that Mihailovic ended up collaborating by the end.
Secondly, you're playing the trick of referring to the small band directly under Mihailovic, leaving out the Chetniks of Montenegro, Eastern Bosnia, Hercegovina, Western Bosnia, Dalmatia, and Lika i.e. the overwhelming number of Chetniks.
Okay, I think I can finally cut through all the mustard and see your point on the issue of collaboration.
Specifically, you're asserting that the independent U.S. commission that concluded that General Mihailovic was not a collaborator was incorrect (right?).
Thus, it necessarily follows, for example, that President Truman was thereby misguided for awarding Mihailovic the Legion of Merit for his (alleged) contribution to the Allied victory (right?).
Please correct me if I'm wrong.
The Chetniks of Eastern Bosnia began collaboration with the Germans in December 1941.
The Chetniks of Serbia stopped active resistance by late 1941 and began collaboration in stages.
Those are the facts.
Dio: You sound like a prosecuting attorney.
Now, what in the world is your overall major point???