„LEVA SKRETANJA“ U SRBIJI 1941/1942. GODINE
„LEFT-WING TURNS“ IN SERBIA 1941/1942

Summary/Abstract: The Communist Party of Yugoslavia, as a party that has continuously nurtured the idea of gaining power through a revolutionary coup within its political platform since the 1920s , used the occupation of the country in 1941 to reenter the historical stage. As a radical left-wing political party, in the first phase of the uprising, according to the instructions of the Comintern, it successfully incorporated its political goals into a broader, national liberation platform, in order to achieve wider influence in society and the politically heterogeneous insurgent movement. However, ideas about the class struggle and the role of the „civil war party“ survived all the time during its activities on the field. With the later historization of events, class radicalization and the idea of moving to the „second stage“ of the struggle at the end of 1941 and the beginning of 1942 were assessed as „left turns“, a current mistake in the assessment of the party leadership. The analysis of the activities of the partisan detachments led by the communists leads to the conclusion that, below the surface, such phenomena were an inseparable part of the history of the partisan movement. Instead of „left turns“, one can speak of the consistent implementation of a revolutionary program for which only, according to the circumstances, different methods were used. During 1941, they were present through the early onset of revolutionary terror, as well as through the formation of new revolutionary authorities. With the interventions of the Comintern, such phenomena were suppressed on several occasions, but they left major consequences: the occupied country sank into a civil war. Part of the CPY’s responsibility for the outbreak and incitement of this type of conflict lies precisely in its pre-war determination to seize power by force - which was transferred and applied in 1941 as a year of historical crossroads.

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