Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T21:58:20.119Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Emergence of New Paramilitary Organizations in Bulgaria and Yugoslavia after the First World War

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 February 2021

Dmitar Tasić Open the ORCID record for Dmitar Tasić [Opens in a new window]
Dmitar Tasić*
Affiliation:
University of Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

As elsewhere in Europe after the First World War, the Balkans went through a process of “paramilitarization.” Unlike the rest of Europe, there existed a strong indigenous paramilitary culture originating from the time of Ottoman rule. In the interconnected, harsh political realities of victorious Yugoslavia and vanquished Bulgaria, both states and their political elites resolved to create new paramilitary formations. While in the case of Yugoslavia and its Organization Against Bulgarian Bandits there was a resurgence of an older style paramilitary formation, in Bulgaria leading figures of the ruling Bulgarian Agrarian National Union decided to create the Orange Guards—a completely new paramilitary formation based on the existing structure of their party. The common denominator for both formations was the threat posed by the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization for security, territorial integrity, and the normal development of both states. As in most cases of paramilitary formation, their existence and actions were followed by violence, often marked by extreme brutality. Both the agrarian regime and Orange Guards perished in the violent summer of 1923, when a carefully planned and executed coup d’état ended the agrarian revolutionary attempt to transform Bulgarian society. The Organization Against Bulgarian Bandits, under the new name of Peoples Self-Defense, continued to function throughout the existence of the Yugoslav kingdom.

Keywords

IMROBANUOrganization Against Bulgarian BanditsOrange Guardskomitajischetniks
Type
Article
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 49 , Issue 6 , November 2021 , pp. 1178 - 1190
Check for updates
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Association for the Study of Nationalities

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References

Bartulović, Niko. 1925. Od revolucionarne omladine do Orjune: Istorijat Jugoslavenskog omladinskog pokreta. Split: Direktorium Orjune.Google Scholar
Crampton, Richard J. 2009. Aleksandur Stamboliiski: Bulgaria. Chicago: University of Chicago Press and Haus Publishing.Google Scholar
Bell, John D. 1977. Peasants in Power: Alexander Stamboliiski and the Bulgarian Agrarian National Union 1899–1923. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Beneš, Jakub. 2017. “The Green Cadres and the Collapse of Austria-Hungary in 1918.” Past and Present 236 (1): 207–241.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Biondich, Mark. 2011. The Balkans: Revolution, War, and Political Violence since 1878. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bjelajac, Mile. 1994. Vojska Kraljevine SHS/Jugoslavije 1922–1935. INIS, Beograd.Google Scholar
Dobrinov, Decho. 1994. „Todor Aleksandrov i v’zstanovanieto na VMRO sled p’rvata svetovna vojna (1918–1924 g.)“. In 100 godini V’treshna makedono-odrinska revolucionna organizaciya. Sofiya, Makedonski nauchen institut, 145–156.Google Scholar
Garvanskata golgota (March 2, 1923). 1924. Sofiya: I. K. na s’yuza na makedonskite emigrant.Google Scholar
Gentile, Emilio. 2012. “Paramilitary Violence in Italy: The Rationale of Fascism and Origins of the Totalitarianism.” In War in Peace: Paramilitary Violence in Europe after the Great War, edited by Gerwarth, Robert and Horne, John, 85–103. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gerwarth, Robert and Horne, John, eds. 2012. War in Peace: Paramilitary Violence in Europe after the Great War. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gligorijević, Branislav. 1963. “Organizacija jugoslovenskih nacionalista (ORJUNA).” Istorija XX veka: zbornik radova 5: 315–396.Google Scholar
Jovanović, Vladan. 2002. Jugoslovenska država i Južna Srbija 1918–1929. Beograd: INIS.Google Scholar
Kučera, Rudolf. 2016. “Exploiting Victory, Sinking into Defeat: Uniformed Violence in the Creation of the New Order in Czechoslovakia and Austria, 1918–1922.” The Journal of Modern History 88 (December 2016): 827–855.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mikhailov, Ivan. 1965. Spomeni 2, Osvoboditelna borba 1919–1924. Louvain.Google Scholar
Mikhailov, Ivan. 1967. Spomeni 3, Osvoboditelna borba 1924–1934. Louvain.Google Scholar
Mikhailov, Pancho. 1924. “Srbite minaha prez seloto.” In V’ stranata na s’lzite. Sofiya: Jos. Cheshmedzhievy.Google Scholar
Newman, John Paul. 2012. “The Origins, Attributes, and Legacies of Paramilitary Violence in the Balkans.” In War in Peace: Paramilitary Violence in Europe after the Great War, edited by Gerwarth, Robert and Horne, John, 145–162. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Newman, John Paul. 2015, Yugoslavia in the Shadow of War. Veterans and the Limits of State Building 1903–1945. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Paleshutski, Kostadin. 1983. Makedonskiyat v’pros v burzhoazna Jugoslaviya 1918-1941. Sofiya: BAN.Google Scholar
Petrova, Dimitrina. 1995. D-r Rajko Daskalov (1886–1923). Politik i drzhavnik reformator. Stara Zagora.Google Scholar
Petrova, Dimitrina. 1999. B’lgarskiyat zemedelski naroden s’yuz 1899–1944. Sofiya.Google Scholar
Reiss, R. A. 1924. La question des comitadjis en Serbie du Sud. Belgrade: Vreme.Google Scholar
Spomenica proslave dvadesetogodišnjice Bregalničke bitke i desetogodišnjice osnivanja Narodne samoodbrane . 1933. Štip.Google Scholar
Tasić, Dmitar. 2006. “Leteći odred Jovana Babunskog u sprečavanju komitske akcije VMRO 1919. godine.” Vojnoistorijski glasnik 1-2 (2006): 79–92.Google Scholar
Tasić, Dmitar. 2019. “The Institutionalization of Paramilitarism in Yugoslav Macedonia: The Case of the Organization Against the Bulgarian Bandits 1923–1933.” The Journal of Slavic Military Studies 32 (3): 388–413.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Todorovski, Zoran. 2014. Todor Aleksandrov. Skopje: Makavej Državen arhiv na Republika Makedonija.Google Scholar
Todorovski, Zoran. 2013 Avtonomističkata VMRO na Todor Aleksandrov 1919–1924. Skopje: Makavej.Google Scholar
Tyulekov, Dimitar. 2001. Obrecheno rodolyubie. VMRO v Pirinsko 1919-1934. Blagoevgrad: Univ. Izd. “Neofit Rilski.” http://www.promacedonia.org/dt/dt1_1.html (Accessed June 30, 2020.)Google Scholar
Uzunov, Angel. 2014. Spomeni. Skopje: Makavej.Google Scholar
Vasilev, Vasil. 1991. Pravitelstvo na BZNS, VMRO i B’lgaro-Yugoslavskite otnosheniya. Sofiya: BAN.Google Scholar
Yaanchev, Veselin. 2014. Armiya, obshtestven red i vatreshna sigurnost mezhdu voynite i sled tyaah: 1913–1915, 1918–1923. Sofiya: Universitetsko izdatelstvo “Sv. Kliment Ohridski.” Google Scholar
Žežov, Nikola. 2008. Makedonskoto prašanje vo jugoslovensko-bugraskite diplomatski odnosi (1918-1941). Univerzitet “Sv. Kiril i Metodij,” Skopje.Google Scholar

Archival Sources

Archive of Yugoslavia (AJ), Collection no. 14 Ministry of the Interior, Kingdom of YugoslaviaGoogle Scholar
Archive of Yugoslavia (AJ), Collection no. 334 Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Kingdom of Yugoslavia.Google Scholar
Military archive Belgrade (VA), Register 4/3.Google Scholar
Natsionalna biblioteka “Sv. Sv. Kiril i Metodii” (NBKM) Google Scholar
Bulgarski istoricheski arhiv (BIA) Google Scholar
Collection 841 (VMRO) Google Scholar