AHC: Have Yugoslavia survive until the present day
- Thread starter Arcavia
- Start date
BigBlueBox
Banned
Tito decides to never set up the Territorial Defense Forces. The only military force in Yugoslavia is the JNA, and the general staff ensures that no Croat-majority units are stationed in Croatia, no Slovene-majority units are stationed in Slovenia, and no Bosniak-majority units are in Bosnia. The constitution also doesn't include a right to secede. Bosnia and Herzegovina has the Serb areas and the Croat areas each become autonomous regions like Vovjodina, and Krajina is also an autonomous region. This should be enough to ensure that any Croat or Bosnian independence attempt will become a far bigger clusterf*ck than OTL, and that no secessionist will have a proper military. There also needs to be some way to obliterate Kosovar separatism. Enough brute force should do the trick as long as both the West and the Soviets look the other way, or one of them actively supports Yugoslavia.
Pushing the more liberal and diverse Federalists over the pro-centralist Serbs within the government, whilst appealing to the latter in certain ways to ensure the former's dominance, may be one way of going about things. Dealing with the economy is also something that would need to be done, but economics always fly over my head.
This reminds me of one of the arguments made in the SANU Memorandum, regarding the "Status of Serbia and the Serb Nation". Creating such autonomous regions would definitely butterfly that argument, though whether it would do anything about Serbian victimhood, well, it probably wouldn't. As Saint_007 pointed out, as much as it is a difficult topic, the baggage of WW2 needs to be sorted if we wanted to avoid the chauvinist nationalism of OTL, especially with Serbia, Croatia and Kosovo.
This reminds me of one of the arguments made in the SANU Memorandum, regarding the "Status of Serbia and the Serb Nation". Creating such autonomous regions would definitely butterfly that argument, though whether it would do anything about Serbian victimhood, well, it probably wouldn't. As Saint_007 pointed out, as much as it is a difficult topic, the baggage of WW2 needs to be sorted if we wanted to avoid the chauvinist nationalism of OTL, especially with Serbia, Croatia and Kosovo.
You need to find a way to not have the economic and political crises in Yugoslavia coincide. If you had a functional economy, then I suspect the matter of political transition would have been easier. Imagine, say, a Yugoslavia where Tito died a decade early.
I doubt that preventing the formation of the Territorial Defense units would be enough. The pan-Serb nationalists had little interest in controlling Slovenia, or even most Croat-populated parts of Croatia. This might be a recipe for a Greater Serbia, but its borders would not coincide with the SFRY.
I doubt that preventing the formation of the Territorial Defense units would be enough. The pan-Serb nationalists had little interest in controlling Slovenia, or even most Croat-populated parts of Croatia. This might be a recipe for a Greater Serbia, but its borders would not coincide with the SFRY.
Unlikely, since Partisans could count on a much larger support from the people, while Cetniks were mostly Serbs with a few Slovenes sprinkled in. Also Cetniks started cooperating with the Axis very early on, so their support base in Serbia eroded rather quickly, and they were generally limited to Bosnia and Croatia where Serb populations were terorized by Ustaše, and even then they were in direct conpetition with Partisans, whose idea if Federal Yugoslavia was much more palatable to the people, then return to the Serbian dominated Royalist Yugoslavia.
To get wider support for Četnik movement yoe need a much different Četnik movement, and a very different Interwar Yugoslavia.
Avoiding the debt addiction of the Tito years is a must. Yugoslavia had a decent economic base, but was drowned by debt-spending on fruitless projects.
Miloavach himself was a royalist not a fascist. Some groups did collaborate but he remained loyal to the democratic ideal. Perhaps the Bosnians who don’t collaborate with the Reich can be won over.
Mihailović may have been a royalist with democratic leanings, but during the war he was a Serbian nationalist, and that is the main problem with forming any multi-ethnic resistance movement.
Muslims in Bosnia are rather tricky, since majority of them indentified as Croatians, unless I am mistaken, and thus often becoming victims of Cetnik raids.
If Cetniks are to become a truly wide resistance movement, their whole approach to non-Serbian populace has to be fundamentaly different. In fact, Yugoslavia itself has to be entirely different state, avoiding the radicalization of Croatians and other ethnicities, greater autonomy for others is needed, as was done with Cvetković-Maček agreement which came only in 1939, some two decades to late.
Koprulu Mustafa Pasha
Gone Fishin'
Milosevic does not succeed Tito. His decisions to add Vojvodina and Kosovo as a part of Serbia within Yugoslavia is what caused the paranoia among Croats and Bosniaks.
If one wants it save, add Albania to it after 1945 and there is no support for Kosovar Separatism from the neighbours.
If one wants it save, add Albania to it after 1945 and there is no support for Kosovar Separatism from the neighbours.
Perhaps a greater degree of federalism and less centralization. Of course, Milosevic's rhetoric wasn't exactly helpful
The problem in reigning in the forces of nationalism in Yugoslavia is that there will always be ambitious politicians willing to exploit it to gain power at the expense of everybody. Unfortunately Yugoslavia was built around Tito-Communist Party-YNA triangle and after Tito's death this system was not reworked to make it viable, with CP just continuing on autopilot, so there was no political will to purge the disruptive elements like Milošević from public life (as it was done in 70s) or adopt neccessary reforms. The political system was built around single powerful figure and after Tito there was none, so critical decisions couldn't be made. Perhaps if Tito sided with reformists in the 70s instead of purging them things might have turned differently or perhaps we would have seen even earlier dissolution of the country.
This would only make the seccession wars bloodier instead of preserving Yugoslavia. While TD became the basis for Slovenian army, it played no role in Croatia and BiH, Croatia instead expanded its police force with these reinforced police units becoming basis for ZNG, while in BiH the development of military forces was a mixture of police forces and local militias. The thing is that most of adult male population had military training, republics had paramilitarily trained police at their disposal, there was lot of black market arms avaiable in the region and military depots were vulnerable, thus YNA wouldn't be able to hold onto republics.
Miloševič did not succede Tito, he was president of Serbian SR since 1988
You want to solve problem of Albanian nationalism in Yugoslavia by adding more Albanians? I don't see the logic here.
Koprulu Mustafa Pasha
Gone Fishin'
Albania's population is not big enough to be out of control. Kosovo has about two third of Albania's population.
Without delving into the subject too closely there are very general things that can be done to improve the situation.
Sarajevo as the capital with a surrounding D.C. like area with sufficient ethnic diversity. Fully embracing the Brotherhood and Unity ideology by promoting individual nationalisms as building blocks of yugoslav nationalism. Avoid forced linguistic unity and promote equality of languages, religions and scripts. Choose a path of true neutrality like Switzerland and avoid sinking inanordinate amounts of money into the military. Focus more on the unaligned movement and use its position in europe to be the educational and inovation engine of the block at least initially while having access to resources and industrial potential of other members.
Also ensure a transition from Tito to a stable political succession. Basically Tito pulling a Sula.
Sarajevo as the capital with a surrounding D.C. like area with sufficient ethnic diversity. Fully embracing the Brotherhood and Unity ideology by promoting individual nationalisms as building blocks of yugoslav nationalism. Avoid forced linguistic unity and promote equality of languages, religions and scripts. Choose a path of true neutrality like Switzerland and avoid sinking inanordinate amounts of money into the military. Focus more on the unaligned movement and use its position in europe to be the educational and inovation engine of the block at least initially while having access to resources and industrial potential of other members.
Also ensure a transition from Tito to a stable political succession. Basically Tito pulling a Sula.
Gradual, hard and brutally open dialogue about the WW2 era, culminating to thruth commissions in late 1980s. This was the OTL route Finland took with the legacy of the bitter and bloody Civil War and equally grim WW2-era, and half a century later there finally exists a general consensus regarding the nature of the past historical traumas.
Whereas in Yugoslavia myths and competing narratives quickly filled the void created by decades of state-funded Titoist propaganda and violent suppression of all loud dissident voices. And this gave men like Milosevic ample opportunity to use nationalism to promote their own careers by burning the federation down.
Tito had gambled that freedom to leave, rising living standards and a stern oppression of dissidents would keep the society in control. This formula worked as long as he lived, and failed soon afterwards.
The only reason a similar arrangement persists in China is the fact that the state has a single major ethnicity and no qualms about oppressing all other minorities, and that the economy is keeping the middle class content.
Whereas in Yugoslavia myths and competing narratives quickly filled the void created by decades of state-funded Titoist propaganda and violent suppression of all loud dissident voices. And this gave men like Milosevic ample opportunity to use nationalism to promote their own careers by burning the federation down.
Tito had gambled that freedom to leave, rising living standards and a stern oppression of dissidents would keep the society in control. This formula worked as long as he lived, and failed soon afterwards.
The only reason a similar arrangement persists in China is the fact that the state has a single major ethnicity and no qualms about oppressing all other minorities, and that the economy is keeping the middle class content.