DELATNOST CENTRALNOG JUGOSLOVENSKOG BIROA PRI CK RKP(b) U MOSKVI 1920–1921.
ACTIVITIES OF THE CENTRAL YUGOSLAV BUREAU AT THE CENTRAL COMMITTEE OF THE RCP (b) IN MOSCOW 1920–1921

Summary/Abstract: The article examines the activities of the Central Yugoslav Bureau under the Central Committee of the RCP(b) and the Yugoslav Council of Workers’ and Peasants’ Deputies in Moscow in the final stage of the civil war. According to Soviet and Yugoslav historiography of the socialist period, the Yugoslav communist organizations in 1920–1921 were mainly engaged in helping bring home Yugoslavs - former Austro-Hungarian subjects - who had participated in the civil war on both sides. The documents used in this article make it possible to assert that these organizations did not contribute so much to the repatriation of their nationals, but rather tried to “appropriate” part of the powers of the Bolshevik punitive organs in deciding, at its discretion, who among the Yugoslavs was a “proletarian element” and as such could count on returning, and who, like “all former Serbian and Montenegrin subjects without exception,” was subject to imprisonment in a concentration camp for the purpose of being further held hostage. The institution of hostage emerged within the framework of the “red terror” policy, the starting point of which was the order of the Cheka (a common name for the All-Russian Extraordinary Commission) dated 2 September 1918. As for the Yugoslav hostages, it was obviously impossible to use them to blackmail the “enemies of Soviet power” inside Russia. However, they could come in handy in case of establishing contacts with the authorities of the Kingdom of SHS. The Yugoslav Council had repeatedly sent them appeals to start talks on the fate of the Yugoslavs who ended up in Russia. Both they and other foreign citizens were interned by the Bolsheviks en masse in order to guarantee the immunity of their own emissaries abroad, as well as to exchange for arrested members of the European communist parties. In conclusion, the author offers his vision of the reasons for the closure of these organizations of the Yugoslav communists.

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