Greater Serbian propaganda and pseudohistory of Zebrnjak near Kumanovo

Delegations from Serbia commemorate events from its history in our country, such as the Battle of Kumanovo (23.10.1912), which was part of the Greater Serbian occupation of Vardar Macedonia, and in doing so, they spread propaganda and pseudohistory, while the guest of these commemorations is the Russian ambassador to the country, who has also made such statements. Paradoxically, a completely opposite holiday is celebrated in our country at the same time–the founding of the historical VMRO (23.10.1893), however, the Government led by VMRO-DPMNE does not react to these provocations, and its Deputy Prime Minister Ivan Stoilković is close to Serbian nationalist circles and Moscow

 

Author: Vangel Bashevski

 

It is common for a country to pay respect to the graves of its soldiers abroad, however, more advanced European countries are moving towards reconciliation and cooperation, so they avoid provocative speeches at those commemorations, while state delegations from Serbia violate that etiquette in our country.

At the Zebrnjak memorial ossuary in the Kumanovo region, they promote Greater Serbian propaganda, while Serbian soldiers from the Battle of Kumanovo (October 23, 1912), which was part of the Balkan Wars, lie there.

There may be different perspectives on the same events, but our historiography maintains that those wars were enslaving, a view confirmed by the Carnegie Commission. Therefore, guests from Serbia should show greater consideration towards the host country. This also applies to the civic association Serbian Community in Macedonia (SZM), which also participates in those commemorations in Zebrnjak.

Such behavior can offend our public, so to please and win them over, the speeches at Zebrnjak are peppered with pseudohistory.

 

Flagrant pseudohistory

To begin with, let’s mention what Gordana Jović-Stojkovska from SZM, a writer originally from Grdelica near Leskovac, said at Zebrnjak this year:

That battle was not accidental. There was nothing accidental and there was no story of conquest. We, who grew up with our grandfathers and great-grandfathers, who spoke about all of that, know that their goal, that their voluntary entry into the war was for the purpose of liberating our brothers in Macedonia and freeing our brothers from 500 years of slavery, for the opportunity to freely respect our faith, to speak our language, to live with our people in harmony with other peoples.

Indeed, the Battle of Kumanovo was fought against the Ottomans, but their oppressive rule in Vardar (now North) Macedonia was subsequently replaced by Serbian rule, which carried out repression, colonization, and forced assimilation (Serbianisation). Even personal surnames were not spared, with the suffix -ić being added, and the Serbian Orthodox Church was imposed as well. Therefore, there was no question of freedom or idyllic coexistence.

 

Greater Serbian nationalism and playing with South Slavic feelings

The speech of Zoran Antić, who is a government representative of Serbia, was much more controversial, but it was mainly a reprise of what Dr. Slavenko Terzić had said there in 2010.

Terzić was the director of the Institute of History Belgrade during its most nationalistic period–from 1987 to 2002, which coincided with the rule of Slobodan Milošević, in whose defense Terzić appeared before the war crimes tribunal in The Hague.

In Antić’s speech it was said (fragments):

By nurturing the traditions of Serbia’s liberation wars, we show that Serbia did not wage wars of conquest, as some say, but rather sought to liberate the Serbian people in Old Serbia from Ottoman rule and at the same time to help liberate the other Balkan, Christian peoples. Serbia was returning to the old centers of Serbian spiritual and state life.

Two days after the liberation of Kumanovo, on October 26 our army entered Skopje, the capital of the Serbian Empire in the 14th century.

Old Serbia is a term that encompasses Kosovo, Raška, (Sandzak) and Vardar Macedonia, territories that were under Serbian rule during part of the Middle Ages and that Serbia sought to reconquer in 1912, an act that in our country was viewed as an enslavement. Therefore, Antić’s statements were provocative, but there were others that followed:

 

Preserving the achievements of the liberation wars of Serbia, we want to bring back from oblivion the brave and glorious ancestors who spared no effort fighting for the freedom of the Serbian and other South Slavic peoples. On this occasion, let us remember the great heroes: Jovan Stanojković-Dovezenski, Jovan Stojković-Babunski, Vasilije Trbić-Veleški, Krsta Kovačević-Trgoviški, Risto Stevanović-Starački, Micko Krstić, Đorđe Skopljanče, Gligor Sokolović

Let us remember the battles fought near Čelopek in 1905 and Drenovo in June 1907.

This refers to the Chetniks sent from Serbia into Ottoman Macedonia, whom our historiography views as enemies. The battle near Drenovo, in the Veles region, in June 1907 was fought precisely between them and the VMRO committees, who, in turn, are regarded as heroes in our country.

Vasilije Trbić-Veleški was not from Veles, but a Serb from Croatia, and Đorđe Ristić-Skopljanče was not from Skopje, but a Serb from Kosovo. Thus, that movement was led from Belgrade, as is also acknowledged there, and did not arise spontaneously in Macedonia, although it did recruit some local residents like Gligor Sokolov(ić). The question remains, however, whether he was truly a Serb, as he had been a renegade from VMRO.

Also from Macedonia were the pro-Serbian Chetniks Jovan Stanojković-Dovezenski, Jovan Stojković-Babunski, and Micko Krstić-Porečki or Krstev(ski), who even held Dame Gruev, one of the founders of VMRO, hostage for a month.

Antić creates the illusion that Macedonia then had a large and clearly defined Serbian population, which the Serbian army rightfully liberated in 1912. He also states the following:

The Serbian army in 1912 did not come to an empty wasteland, nor to a foreign land.

In the second half of the 19th century, in Old Serbia and Macedonia, there were 70 Serbian boys’ schools and 7 girls’ schools in operation. 

Serbian schools operated in Kichevo, Gostivar, Debar, Lazaropole, Tetovo, Kochani, Zletovo, in the villages of the Veles and Ohrid regions, in Leshtani (correctly Leshani, Debarca, our note), Borovac (Boroec, Struga region, our note), Vevchani, and in Skopje and other nahiyahs. 

In Skopje, there was a Serbian high school, a boys’ and girls’ teacher-training schools, a girls’ vocational school, a music school, and the Serbian printing house Vardar, which published the newspaper of the same name.

At the beginning of the 20th century, under Ottoman rule, the Serbs in these areas had two bishops: one in Skopje and one in Veles-Debar.

Ironically, even Gruev would have become Grujić, or a “Serb,” after being enticed with a scholarship for studies in Belgrade by the local Society of Saint Sava. However, he later fled from that assimilationist propaganda. In a similar situation, but in Athens, our well-known writer, revivalist, and would-be “Greek” Grigor Prlichev, alias Grigorios Stavridis, found himself as well.

Volumes of books have been written about this neighboring propaganda in our country, and it was also noticed by foreigners like Henry Noel Brailsford. It was implemented through church influence on our illiterate villagers, by opening schools for them, etc., so it happened that out of two brothers, one declared himself a Serb or Greek, and the other a Bulgarian.

Gruev warned that this Serbian propaganda and its armed bands could provoke hatred and even a “general slaughter of Serbs in Macedonia.” He was against such “animal extermination” and “senseless Bartholomewian killing,” and even proposed a settlement to the Serbs, but without success. He is even credited with founding some kind of secret society against the Serbs.

In the First Balkan War, there was an attempt to overcome differences with the Balkan League (Serbia, Montenegro, Greece, and Bulgaria), which, with the help of the VMRO bands, defeated the Ottomans, but that solidarity quickly waned, and the Second (inter-allied) Balkan War followed.

The result was the division of Macedonia and the fall of its Vardar part under Serbian rule. The Tikvesh and Ohrid-Debar uprisings, as well as the Valandovo-Udovo action, were soon launched against it. In some of these activities, the VMRO collaborated with Albanians and Turks.

In World War I, however, members of the VMRO such as Hristo Matov, Todor Aleksandrov, Aleksandar Protogerov, and Petre Chaule served in the 11th Macedonian Infantry Division and other units of the Bulgarian army, which fought alongside the Central Powers (Austria-Hungary, Germany, and the Ottoman Empire) against the Entente (Serbia, France, Britain, and Russia).

The culmination was the assassination of the Serbian (i.e., Yugoslav) king Alexander Karađorđević, carried out by the VMRO member Vlado Chernozemski in collaboration with the Croatian Ustaše. Interestingly, Alexander had been a commander in the Battle of Kumanovo, although he served as prince regent at the time.

Our goal is not to rekindle old hatreds, but to point out that the Serbian occupation of Vardar Macedonia was not experienced as a liberation, at least not by the majority population.

 

Warlike statements in front of the Serbian military

Antić presented this propaganda to uniformed representatives of the Serbian army who had accompanied him to pay homage at Zebrnjak, which made the whole scene even more provocative. Speaking about Serbian heroes of the past, Antić also stated the following:

They taught us young people, through their exploits, that we have the right to fight for biological survival and to use all means in that fight.

If necessary, let us be worse than evil itself.

These statements sound extreme, so a sentence was inserted between them that mitigates that effect, in the sense that that fight, after all, should be chivalrous, noble, etc., but that doesn’t really help much, and when something like this is being promoted from a war cemetery, it can hardly be something positive.

 

The Deputy Prime Minister of North Macedonia and the Russian Ambassador

Ivan Stoilković was also at Zebrnjak, but he did not react to those provocations, which is his duty as Deputy Prime Minister of North Macedonia, regardless of his Serbian ethnicity.

And the Government, in which he serves as Deputy Prime Minister, is led by his coalition partners VMRO-DPMNE, who claim to be “heirs of the historical VMRO.” Yet they did not react either, even though this occurred precisely when we celebrate VMRO Day (October 23, 1893).

Stoilković is close to Serbian nationalist politicians like Milorad Dodik. He called the UN resolution commemorating the Srebrenica genocide a “necrophile Disneyland,” compared North Macedonia to a gold digger, and, in the midst of sanctions against Russia, took part in a security forum there. That was in May 2023, when he was not yet deputy prime minister, so the question arises: why did he then receive that high position?

Zebrnjak’s guest was also the Russian ambassador Sergey Bazdnikin, who himself spreads such propaganda, and indeed, pseudohistory. At the commemoration of the Russian soldiers who died here in the First World War, he claimed that they “liberated the Macedonian land.” However, in that war, Russia was an ally of Serbia, a major ally at that, with Vardar Macedonia as part of Serbia.

The question is whether a representative of a sanctioned country like Russia should be invited to events attended by the Deputy Prime Minister, especially because it is carrying out aggression against Ukraine.

Some may justify this invitation by pointing out that Russia played a key role in the formation of the Balkan League, but Zebrnjak also hosted the ambassador of the PRC, which has nothing to do with it. The point was simply to send a common anti-Western message, and we have no other explanation. Ironically, this took place in a NATO member state.

Otherwise, Russia helped the Balkan League not to liberate Macedonia, but to ensure it could serve as a tool against Austria-Hungary’s southward expansion following its annexation of Bosnia in 1908. The members of the Balkan League divided Macedonia, yet Russia did not intervene.

 

Reciprocity

In comments on social networks, some say that this behavior of the Serbian delegations must be tolerated as reciprocity for our ASNOM celebrations at the St. Prohor Pčinjski Monastery in Serbia, but our state delegations there do not engage in provocations.

There was some kind of provocation only on August 2, 1990, when members of the MAAK and VMRO-DPMNE parties went there, waving nationalist flags and publicly reading some kind of manifesto, but they were not official representatives of the then Yugoslav Macedonia, and Serbia not only did not tolerate them, but its police beat them with batons. At the same time, Vojislav Šešelj‘s Serbian Chetniks then broke the memorial plaque for ASNOM.

How civilized Europe holds commemorations

Developed European countries have also had their own conflicts and sins, but they seek reconciliation, avoid provocations, and even hold joint commemorations. There are such events at foreign military cemeteries in our country, where the French ambassador speaks in German and the German ambassador in French.

At such events, the German war song “Der gute Kamerad” and the French “Sonnerie aux morts” are played one after the other, expressing regret for all the victims and appealing for it not to be repeated, instead of promoting hatred.

The case of September 22, 1984, when French leader François Mitterrand and his German counterpart Helmut Kohl held hands while their countries’ anthems were played at a joint commemoration near the town of Verdun, famous for the 1916 battle, is particularly memorable.

Gazimestan Islamophobia and Albanianophobia

In his speech about the Battle of Kumanovo, Antić also stated the following:

It was not just a victory of the Serbs, but a civilizational victory of the Europeans over the Ottoman Empire, a victory of European social-humanistic values ​​over Ottoman-despotic values, a victory of Christianity over Islam.

This is Islamophobia, which Antić uses to manipulate our citizens, who are mainly Orthodox Christians, as well as the broader European public, concerned about large-scale immigration and Islamic extremism. He even claimed that Serbs have been defending Europe from Islamic conquests since the Battle of Kosovo in 1389.

It is a reprise of what Milošević said in his ominous Gazimestan speech in 1989, which is considered a harbinger of the Yugoslav wars and was delivered in a distinctly Albanian-phobic atmosphere:

Six centuries ago, Serbia defended itself here, on the Kosovo Field. But it also defended Europe. Serbia (our note) then stood as a bulwark of Europe (our note), protecting European culture, religion, and society as a whole.

How much of this is true and how much is nationalist myth is questionable. For example, many Serbs became vassals of the Ottomans and fought for them, such as Stefan Lazarević, who, ironically, was the son of the Serbian leader in the Battle of Kosovo, Lazar Hrebeljanović. He, in turn, is often called “Tsar Lazar,” although he was only a prince, and even Milosevic admitted at Gazimestan that:

Today it is difficult to say what is historical truth and what is legend in the Battle of Kosovo. Today, it no longer even matters.

However, Antić is right about the following. The Ottoman Empire emphasized religious affiliation, privileging Muslims (not only Turks, but also Albanians, Bosniaks, etc., who were counted together as “Turks”), and oppressing Christians. In reality, the Empire was mired in medieval darkness (impalements, the blood tax), while a developed Europe was rushing forward: humanism and the Renaissance, the Reformation, the Enlightenment, and so on.

But no matter how correct Antić is in that part, what is the point of taking us back to that dark past and those old conflicts? One of these conflicts was the one that broke out in our country in 2001, about which Antić stated:

And in 2001, Macedonian police and soldiers in these areas were not killed by Serbs, they were killed by others.

This sounds like incitement against Albanians, as if saying: “We, the Serbs, are together with the Macedonians against the Albanians,” which is highly inappropriate and undiplomatic for a foreign guest in a country like ours, one that is trying to overcome some old tensions and heal long-standing wounds.

All of this has been criticized by representatives of the Albanian and Bosniak communities in the country, including journalist Naser Selmani and the leader of the SDA party, Dželal Hodžić.

 

Riling up the Bulgarians

In his speech, Antić also mentioned the Battle of Bregalnica from the Second Balkan War, which Serbian delegations are also commemorating here. He emphasized that the Serbs were not fighting against the Macedonians at the time, but against the Bulgarians, an assertion that is problematic for several reasons. 

First, Zebrnjak’s commemoration is about the Battle of Kumanovo, at a time when the Bulgarians were allies of the Serbs, which Antić ignored; second, in his speech he alluded to some kind of Christian and Slavic brotherhood, but excluded the Bulgarians from it; and third and most importantly, such incitement, as we said, is inappropriate and fuels the tensions we have with Bulgaria.

Perhaps that is why its president, Rumen Radev, appealed to European institutions to take seriously the threat posed by the so-called Serbian World, which is a copy and extension of the so-called Russian World. It is a doctrine of Serbia, i.e. Russia, aimed at spreading influence over areas that were once under their rule and where there are ethnic Serbs, i.e. Russians, who are being instrumentalized for that purpose.

North Macedonia also falls into that sphere of influence, and this is criticized not only by Bulgaria, but also by our former Prime Minister Ljubcho Georgievski. He believes that Macedonians are close to Bulgarians and that this Serbian World is creating a rift between them, something Georgievski writes a lot about on social networks.

His views on the common history of Bulgarians and Macedonians in our country are considered controversial, but whatever one’s position on them, some of his points are indisputably valid and can no longer be ignored. The fact is that the Serbian World influences our citizens, sowing hatred toward Bulgaria, and many people fall for these manipulations, as evidenced by the numerous “likes” they leave on such content on social networks.

The strong media, cultural, and other influence from neighboring Serbia, such as turbofolk, contribute to all of this, no matter how naive that may seem.

According to Georgievski, this is no longer Yugonostalgia, but Serbization, in which ideas are promoted that even Tito’s Yugoslavia would not have tolerated. Some time ago, we wrote about a local election candidate who is a declared “Vmrovec,” yet in his podcast he promotes Greater Serbian Chetniks, which is an absurd stance resulting from the confusion created by such propaganda and pseudohistory. 

 

Conclusion 

It is understandable that Serbia wants to honor its victims, but it could do so more diplomatically and sensibly, rather than with Gazimestan speeches, an approach that has already been surpassed in a developed Europe, which we are striving to become. At least officially, that remains our aspiration, as Hodžić points out.

What is even more frightening is that all of this is laced with pseudo-history, creating unprecedented confusion. Selmani rightly points out that, in effect, this amounts to celebrating the Serbian occupation in our country.

The most devastating aspect is the ease and naivety with which our citizens “take the bait” of the Serbian World, as Georgievski points out, along with the silence of the ruling “most patriotic” party, which effectively allows Stoilković to pursue a parallel policy. How can the deputy prime minister of a NATO member state and official EU candidate embrace the Russian ambassador in the midst of sanctions?

The goal here is not only to expand the Serbian World, but also the Russian one–by sowing discord within the Euro-Atlantic camp in the Balkans on ethnic, religious, historical, and other grounds. The presence of the Russian, and even Chinese, ambassador at Zebrnjak is therefore neither accidental nor naive.

 

 

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