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Wikipedia:Requests for mediation/Draza Mihailovic

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Draza Mihailovic

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Formal mediation case
ArticleDraza Mihailovic (talk) 
Opened06 Apr 2010
MediatorSunray (talk)
StatusOpen
NotesNone

Dispute specifics

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Involved users
  1. BoDu (talk · contribs), filing party
  2. DIREKTOR (talk · contribs) Withdrew from mediation April 27, 2011.
  3. FkpCascais (talk · contribs)
  4. AlasdairGreen27 (talk · contribs)
  5. Jean-Jacques Georges (talk · contribs)
  6. Isidoradaven (talk · contribs)
  7. Nuujinn (talk · contribs)
  8. Свифт (talk · contribs)
Articles concerned in this dispute
Other steps in dispute resolution that have been attempted
  • Talk page discussion

Issues to be mediated

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Primary issues
  • An inflexible insistance on behalve of User:DIREKTOR in the heavy and serious accusation to consider, and include in the lede, Mihailovic "an World War II Axis collaborator" is being challenged. He backes his statement with 4 sources, and the interpretation of them has also being discussed.
  • Several parts of this (Mihailovic) and related articles have been edited by DIREKTOR in accordance to this accusations. A more NPOV editing is demanded by many other editors regarding this issue, since there are many contradictory sources.
  • An inclusion of Gen.Draža Mihailović and the Chetniks on the Template:Yugoslav Axis collaborationism has also been challenged.
  • The reliability of some sources is being challenged on both sides. FkpCascais (talk) 06:54, 10 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
While I'm sure this is probably obvious to any experienced mediator, I'll still mention for the record that User:FkpCascais' description of the issues is blatantly biased to the point of absurdity and is naturally not agreed upon. All points are simply incorrect or distorted for the benefit of the author's side of the debate in a somewhat naïve attempt to canvass the mediation. We are in agreement that mediation is necessary, however, if for nothing else than to keep sourced information in the article. --DIREKTOR (TALK) 17:45, 21 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
"Absurdity"?... direktor, please respect the mediators and spare them from your comments, and stop removing content from the request whatever reason you find (it was accepted like it was, it´s nobody´s fault you were "sleeping"). Please don´t answer to this, this is not a forum. FkpCascais (talk) 18:47, 21 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Additional issues (added by other parties)
  • The issue here seems to me to be the emphasis of the article lead. There is (as far as I am aware having read the talk page posts) no dispute that Mihailović collaborated with the German occupiers. The question is (and, other editors, please correct me if I am wrong) the way in which this collaboration should be described in the article lead. Was it a) wholehearted and enthusiastic; b) something that developed over time; c) an accommodation with the Germans because they shared a hatred for the common enemy, the Partisans; d) something occasional and opportunistic that Mihailović engaged in to suit his overall design (whatever that may have been - perhaps a return to the pre-1941 status quo - I don't know) or e) something else that somebody else can explain to us. These are not questions for us to answer; we can only reflect the sources. But this is the central point in the debate: those that support option (d) seem to claim that it is for the other editors to find a source that directly says that another option is correct, in other words, a good reliable source that says that "there is consensus/agreement/something similar in the academic community that...". Otherwise, option (d) must be the default position. My own view is that this is a bridge too far in the sense that historians never couch their language in such terms.
In summary, in terms of the lead, we can reflect that there are - as far as I am aware - no serious authors who dispute the fact that Mihailović was a collaborator, in other words, nobody says he didn't, but the question here is how to phrase the lead? That, my fellow editors, is the nub of the issue. Please correct me if I'm wrong in my extremely handy and highly beneficial summary of the issue at hand ;-) AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 18:43, 21 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Parties' agreement to mediation

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All parties should sign below, indicating that they agree to mediate the issue. If any party fails to sign within seven days, or if a party indicates they do not agree, then the mediation will be rejected. Only "Agree" or "Disagree" and signatures should appear here; any comments will be removed, but can be made at the talk page.
  1. Agree. BoDu (talk) 14:05, 6 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  2. Agree. FkpCascais (talk) 16:15, 6 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  3. Agree. Jean-Jacques Georges (talk) 17:19, 6 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  4. Agree. AlasdairGreen27 (talk) 12:20, 11 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  5. Agree. DIREKTOR (TALK) 22:22, 15 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
  6. Agree.--Свифт (talk) 20:39, 5 December 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Decision of the Mediation Committee

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A member of the Mediation Committee will indicate acceptance/rejection/other relevant notes in this section. Non-Committee members should not edit this section; all comments should go on the talk page, unless a party is specifically requested to reply here by a Committee member.

Yad Vashem: Chetniks collaborated with Nazis

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I am new to this wikipedia debate and my apologies to administrators if this project page is reserved only for them. I wanted to say that Yad Vashem clearly states that Serbian Chetniks collaborated with Nazis http://www1.yadvashem.org/odot_pdf/Microsoft%20Word%20-%205916.pdf . "The Chetnicks decided that there was no point in fighting the Germans, because the struggle was hopeless and unattainable. Their most important conclusion was that the real enemy was not Germany, but rather the pro-Communist partisans, who would attempt to take over Yugoslavia after the war. Therefore, the Chetnicks turned on the partisans. They even collaborated with their former enemies, the Germans and Italians, against the partisans. When the Chetnicks began cooperating with the occupying forces, any Jews among their ranks left. There were even instances where the Chetnicks killed Jews or surrendered them to the Germans."Yahalom Kashny (talk) 21:30, 30 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I have Jewish family and they were protected by the Chetniks. If it wasn´t for them, they wouldn´t had probably survived. FkpCascais. 92.250.83.11 (talk) 02:40, 9 January 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Since Chetniks were not an unified force, but collection of various groups (similar to Cossacks)it's unfair to label them all as one group. Chetniks of Kosta Pecanac were German collaborators, while pro-Axis puppet Serbian government had it's own Chetnik unit's. Chetniks of Dragoljub Mihajlovic were on allied side, and had Jewish members, like dr.Ljilja Atias (first Sephardic Jewish women doctor in Yugoslavia), Willy Schlesinger, Tibor and Anna Goldfan. Pro-Allied Chetniks and pro-Axis Serbian units had almost identical former royal Yugoslav uniforms, which contributed to confusion. There were Slovene, Croat, and Muslim Chetniks as well, so "Serbian" Chetniks is a misleading term.--Ganderoleg (talk) 22:20, 5 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ganderoleg, under the article Chetniks, we are focusing more on Mihailovic´s Chetniks for the WWII period because of several reasons. However, on the article itself the other Chetnik groups are obviously also included. FkpCascais (talk) 19:42, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Undisputable Evidence of Nazi Collaboration

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General Draza Mihailovic's Chetniks committed a massacre of innocent Serbian women, children and the elderly in a Serbian village of Vranici, near Belgrade, you can read a book from Dragoljub Pantic - survivor of the massacre (there are also photos of his slaughtered relatives) http://www.znaci.net/00001/22.htm . There are hundreds of Chetnik documents of Draza Mihailovic's crimes against Bosnian Muslims and the Chetnikcollaboration with Nazis. The documents were preserved in the Archives of the Military Institute in Belgrade. Dr. Bratnko Latas organized some of these documents in his book, which you can download here (by chapters) http://www.znaci.net/00001/114.htm (or for individual documents, you can look bottom of theis page http://www.znaci.net/ ). For non-Serbian speaking researchers, you may use Google translate.Yahalom Kashny (talk) 04:38, 6 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]


Draza Mihajlovic was leader of just one Chetnik movement (there were several of them). How do you know that these were his Chetniks? Besides that how is one massacre in Serbia evidence of "collaboration"? Allies massacred civilian population (there are numerous examples), while in Greece members of communist and monarchist resistance groups massacred each other and their civilian sympathizers. No one claims that they were "Nazi collaborators". Your claims are illogical, and emotionally biased. Bosnian muslims (families of collaborators) were attacked mostly because of their collaboration with SS and Croat fascist Ustashe: http://emperors-clothes.com/croatia/ss008.jpg , http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_U54NM9QE5VY/S2QpdNcubNI/AAAAAAAAJqI/h_gFTNuPst8/s400/grand_mufti_ss2.jpg, http://images.amazon.com/images/P/0764301349.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg --Ganderoleg (talk) 22:26, 5 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

There were NOT several Chetnik movements. That is simply nonsense. No serious published source makes such a claim. Apart from the Mihailović Chetniks (or the Chetniks), there was only one other Chetnik movement, the Pećanac Chetniks. The Pećanac Chetniks were very small, insignificant, and were disbanded in 1943. The only other "Chetnik" force unaffiliated with Mihailović that I can think of was the "Montenegrin People's Army", which existed briefly for several weeks at the end of the war in 1945. Unless you can show that the sources refer to Pećanac Chetniks, which is highly unlikely since their area of operations was very limited and restricted to a small part of Serbia, those are the Mihailović Chetniks.
Also, no amount of collaboration justifies the murder of civilians, even if you were to show that they did in fact collaborate, and were not simply ethnically cleansed in accordance with Chetnik greater-Serbian agenda (and I seriously doubt you can show anything of the sort). And please keep one thing in mind, User:Ganderoleg: blogs, forums, nonsense googled links or photos will be entirely disregarded without fail. Present evidence that was published in professional scholarly publications, per Wikipedia policy. --DIREKTOR (TALK) 10:27, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

- Lots of Bosnian Muslim and Croat civilians had family members in SS divisions and Ustase. They were considered as target of reprisals by Chetniks, for that, not because they were Muslims and Croats. Stalin, on other hand fully ethnically cleansed Crimean Tatars, Chechens and Volga Germans from their native territories for collaboration. No one claims that Soviets were collaborators because of that. What you saying doesn't make any sense.

- Besides Mihajlovic's and Pecanac's Chetniks, there were Momcilo Djujic's Chetnik corps in north Dalmatia (never under command of Mihajlovic), West Bosnian Chetniks under Uros Drenovic who stopped all contacts with Mihajlovic in 1941, Chetnik "Dinara" corps (not to be confused with Djujic's corps with same name), created by Italians, and Ljotic's volunteers that were also called (inaccurately) "Chetniks" by people, although "Ljoticevci" was common term. Mihajlovic never controlled West and central Bosnian Chetniks, nor Chetniks of northern Dalmata (Djujic men). He also never controlled Chetniks of south and southeastern Serbia and Macedonia. Pecanac's Chetniks were not disbanded, but they were merged with Nedic's regulars, while some units were taked under direct command of German army. Montenegrin Chetniks abandoned Mihajlovic in 1944. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ganderoleg (talk • contribs) 19:29, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

- Well, Soviet army murdered civilians en masse, like Greek resistance, and Polish resistance (Polish-Ukrainian conflict in Galizia). No one claims that they were collaborators.

- Since there were Slovene, Croat and Muslim Chetnik units, your claims about "greater-Serbian" agenda are pure nonsense.

- Why would Chetniks forcing "ethnic cleansing" of Muslims and Croats,and at the same time had Croat and Muslim units and members within their rank?

- Why would Chetniks "collaborate" (your claims) with greater - Croat Ustase and at the same time "ethnically cleanse" Croats and Bosnian Muslims, with whom they were "allied"?

- I have challenged your references in discussion page, and they are mostly works of amateur historians, or your Croat countrymen, that have clear ethnic and ideological agenda, like yourself. Your claiming of "professional scholarly publications" belongs to realm of joke. It's like quoting Mein Kampf as reliable source in articles about Jewish people. Works of political activists, medical doctors, and Tito's court historians are not reliable sources.

- My photographs presented are no better than yours. The fact that there are some Chetniks with Germans in photos, with captions "Chetniks with Germans" are not evidence of any "collaboration". Since there were several Chetnik groups, term "Chetniks with Germans" means absolutely nothing.

- You are Croat activist, with clear agenda, and you are unable to be impartial in this issue. 90% of your references are from Croat authors, posted by Croat(i.e You). Rest of authors mentioned by you are not historians, but either leftist political activists from West, and amateurs. Due to fact that your country was in war with "Chetniks", you have clear motive to degrade their role in the past and to present simplified propagandist Croat nationalist view on issue.

- You are probably only one forcing "collaboration" issue of Mihajlovic and Chetniks in general (Mihajlovic's and others), unlike other members who want more balanced view. It would be nice if moderators eliminate you as propagandist ideological activist. Mihajlovic's Chetniks were not just Serbian movement (fact supported by references), and your constant repeating of hysterical Croat war propaganda, with quoting of Croat historians will not help in resolving this issue.

- And for the record, lots of Croats from your city of Split joined Mihajlovic's Chetniks. There is some irony in of all this.So much about "Greater-Serbian ideology". --Ganderoleg (talk) 19:42, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Good buddy, you clearly have no idea how Wikipedia functions. The text, especially Chetnik collaboration, is supported entirely with high-quality sources (certainly not with mere photos). Virtually every single word of your above "essay" is also directly contradicted by high-quality sources. And unfortunately for you, Wikipedia and Wikipedians are only concerned with actual sources.
Furthermore, for future references please note that I am not at all interested in what you have to say. Present published, scholarly sources (preferably from outside ex-Yugoslavia), complete with page references for every single one of your claims - or else I assure you, you are wasting your time here. --DIREKTOR (TALK) 19:18, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]


- Your "high-quality sources" are mostly works of amateurs (proven by me), or your fellow countrymen with clear ideological bias, which was presented in discussion page, where I quoted sources and biographies of your "experts". What references you have that there were just two Chetnik movement?

- I have also quoted wikipedia articles about Croat Axis officers who became high ranking Partisan commanders later in war.Is this not reliable as well?

- Is quoting Mein Kampf or Protocols of elders of Zion reliable references, in article about Jewish people? For Nazi it certainly is. I don't think so. You (Croat) consider Croat authors, Tito's political historians and western leftist political activists (who are not historians) and amateur historians as reliable? That's the real problem. You and your sources are in the conflict of interests. You have only one reliable, and impartial reference on behalf of your claims. 90% of rest are so biased and propagandist that's not even funny. --Ganderoleg (talk) 19:42, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Gunderoleg, thank you for further explaining some obvious issues about some participants here, and about some issues that you explained regarding article content, some of them I had already tryied to expose earlier. Just don´t let yourself lower the level of conversation by some "buddies" found here because those "buddies" often end up being "protected" by some admins, while other participants end up blocked. Do everything by the WP:Policies. FkpCascais (talk) 19:48, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Well mine was just a verbal expression (that Fkp does not understand :P), but you two look like you might become buddies for real. By all means, pat each other on the back as much as you like. Maybe if the two of you become really good friends we can forget about WP:V and let ya have your way without any sources. :) keep at it guys, DIREKTOR out --DIREKTOR (TALK) 20:16, 6 February 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
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