ENGLISH SUMMARIES

• Revue MILITARY HISTORY, Slovene army
  Military Oath of Slovenian Insurgents,Volunteers and Soldiers
  essay in english language in PDF

• Revue MILITARY HISTORY, Slovene army
  Slovenian Volunteers in Serbian Liberation Wars 1912-1918 by Milisav Sekulić,
  essay in english language in PDF

MILITARY - On soldiers and spies
Warfare is a major human activity.
 
Matters military: The military matters.
You are visiting the website of a Slovene author who publishes articles and books on warfare and warcraft. Marijan F. Kranjc worked a number of years for the Security Service of the Yugoslav People's Army, making him an excellent witness to the post-war history of the Yugoslav, i.e. South-Slavonic nations. His works include some hushed-up military and security-intelligence service secrets.

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CONTEMPORARY MILITARY DOCTRINES:
LOW INTENSITY CONFLICT (Article)
"SAVREMENE VOJNE DOKTRINE – SUKOB NISKOG INTENZITETA.", Vojno delo. No. 5–6/1990, Beograd
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Uticaj doktrine sukoba niskog intenziteta na borbenu izgradnju JNA
     (To the article in Slovene/Serbian)
SODOBNE VOJAŠKE DOKTRINE - spopad nizke intenzivnosti
     (To the article in Slovene)

In addition to a typological analysis, which is the central focus of the article, the author briefly considers some significant doctrinal features of low-intensity conflict (LIC). Taking some illustrative examples of conflict in the contemporary world, he analyses the latest doctrinal trends in the USA, the USSR, and some other countries, anticipating this to be the likely warfare of the future. The author maintains that it is the acquaintance with all doctrinal trends in LIC that, firstly, supports the consideration of the necessity of building up and perfecting the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia's  (SFRY) total national defense and the concept of social self-protection, and, secondly, enables anticipation of a potential aggressor's warfare to be expected in a LIC situation launched against the SFRY, thus optimizing the search for an adequate model of the SFRY's armed forces that would be capable of deterring the aggressor.
(After original abstract by V. K., editor of Vojno delo, 1990.)

LOW INTENSITY CONFLICT (Book)
2007, Spopad nizke intenzivnosti. PRO-ANDY, s.p.,: Maribor.
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Spopad nizke intenzivnosti  (Publication date: 20th July 2007)

Skimming through the website of the Ministry of Defense of the Republic of Slovenia in late 2006, I noticed that authors of Slovene military doctrine had entered the concept of low-intensity conflict (LIC). Since I was unable to find any definition as to the meaning of the concept, I decided to inform the public and publish my own Major-General Degree paper on the warfare of LIC.

The US Department of the Army defines LIC as:
... a political-military confrontation between contending states or groups below conventional war and above the routine, peaceful competition among states. It frequently involves protracted struggles of competing principles and ideologies. Low-intensity conflict ranges from subversion to the use of the armed forces. It is waged by a combination of means, employing political, economic, informational, and military instruments. Low-intensity conflicts are often localized, generally in the Third World, but contain regional and global security implications.
United States Department of the Army (5 December 1990), Field Manual 100-20: Military Operations in Low Intensity Conflict) àhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_intensity_conflict (Accessed 18 August 2009.)

In my book, I first refer to LIC in the broader sense, defining it as "a political-military confrontation (conflict), in which all available forces and means are combined and employed". In the narrower sense, LIC is "a limited or controlled (directed), most frequently protracted political-military engagement, predominantly characterized by non-combat activities, primarily various types of support, protection, defense, active prevention, pressure and demonstration of force and power. In other words, it involves initiation and management of crisis situations, as well as intensive and short-term combat (interventions) on land, at sea and in the aerospace, directly (contact operation) and indirectly (non-contact operation or distance operation)" (Kranjc, 2007: 76).

In 1989 I defended my Major-General Degree paper dealing with the influence of the doctrine of LIC on the combat construction of the Yugoslav People's Army (YPA). I was the second YPA general to pass the final examination on this topic, so I, naturally, considered myself as a first-class expert in this new military doctrine. Another reason for publishing my degree was the fact that before 1991 only generals and admirals had not been able to publish their examination projects, while M.A. and Ph.D. theses had been freely published.

The visitors to my website now have an exceptional opportunity of learning what a YPA General examination degree was like. The General rank examination was composed of two parts: the practical and the theoretical examination. My practical examination consisted of a commanding trip through the region of Lika, from Gospić to Kočevje. I received a positive mark and after that I delved into the theoretical examination research.

Unfortunately, some problems awaited me, since my first degree supervisor died! My new supervisor, a very good military specialist, however, was not satisfied with my views, making me rewrite some of my conclusions, as these were not in accordance with the YPA General Staff's  future departures from Tito's  doctrine of total national resistance (the departures of which I was sadly unaware at the time and did not approve of later on either.) In the end I received a Very Good mark. After three months I was promoted to the rank of Major-General.

When in September 1990 I heard that an attack against Slovenia was being prepared, I requested to be retired. My published General Degree paper is a comprehensive presentation of the new doctrine of LIC, with my original conclusions how to fight it.

It is noteworthy that the YPA top officials were alarmed by my degree paper and my 1990 article, while a former CIA agent informed me that CIA and DIA were interested in both my article and the 2007 book publication.

INTELLIGENCE-SECURITY PROTECTION OF THE MARCH OF THE NATIONAL LIBERATION ARMY's  14^th DIVISION AND SLOVENE PARTISAN UNITS TO ŠTAJERSKA  (Security study draft)
"OBVEŠČEVALNO-VARNOSTNA ZAŠČITA POHODA 14. DIVIZIJE NOV IN PO SLOVENIJE NA ŠTAJERSKO.
(Skica za varnostno študijo)." Borec. No. 561–563/1998, Ljubljana
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OBVEŠČEVALNO-VARNOSTNA ZAŠČITA POHODA 14. DIVIZIJE NA ŠTAJERSKO (objava revija Borec)
  (To the article in Slovene)

In a draft for a security study, the author condenses scattered fragments on intelligence and security preparations for the march of the National Liberation Army's  14th Division and Slovene Partisan units to Štajersko (Slovene Styria) and on protection measures during the march. This is the first attempt at an overall treatment of the subject, which the author describes as a "prohibited" topic.

The author, an expert on security issues, has systematically examined and presented accessible sources and memoirs, done a questionnaire among the intelligence personnel and participants in the march, and talked with some of them at length. In doing so, he was following his thesis that the march claimed a great many casualties (more than 50 per cent) not so much because of the tactical and operational errors and the appalling winter conditions, but rather because of poor intelligence-security preparations and protection, an almost total lack of coordination with intelligence and security bodies in the field, and negligence with regard to counter-intelligence protection in the units.

Details published in memoirs lead the author to tentative conclusions, presented in special supplements, that there was a carefully placed German (Gestapo) agent in each of the three brigades, and that the Germans set up a special police and counter-intelligence system in Štajersko. For this reason the author doubts that the demonstrative march across Croatia (with ten skirmishes and a mass of rallies!) was not a surprise to the Germans.

The author rightly claims that the counter-intelligence mistakes cannot be remedied by the heroism of the fighters and their commanders. Obviously, only when German archives (those of the Gestapo, Abwehr and Sicherheitsdienst) are made accessible to the public, will it be possible to establish with due certainty all the dimensions of the intelligence penetration of the 14th Division and Partisan units, which is also the reason why this work can only be a draft for a study. The author, interestingly, does not give too much credence to the statements of the exposed and executed agents: the later reconstructions unequivocally showed that some statements were obtained by force and that many liquidated "infiltrators and Gestapo men" were indeed innocent, for instance the ones in the Bračič Brigade, which was later admitted by the 14th Division Commander.

(Revised English summary published in Borec.)

The author tackles a topical subject from post-war history, which may be expected to meet with different responses. In three integral chapters, carefully supplemented and interlaced with short biographical pieces, he presents the causes for and the chronology of major events in the period between 1945 and 1995 in the Balkans and Yugoslavia respectively.

He introduces three destabilization processes affecting the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY), namely: the first or the Western destabilization attempt, coded Express, between 1945 and 1947 (unsuccessful), the second or the Eastern destabilization attempt during the Informbiro period between 1948 and 1952 (unsuccessful), and notably the third or the Western destabilization D- day plan, spanning the from 1980 to 1995, which ended in a bitter war and the disintegration of the SFRY. The author gives proof of a daring thesis that in a directed and guided destabilization process implemented through the warfare of the current military doctrine of low-intensity conflict (LIC), the external factors have invariably decisive predominance over the internal ones. Taking illustrative examples from other parts of the world, the author provides a clear presentation of how, following a prepared scenario and in accordance with its doctrine, a certain superpower interfered in the given situation and forced its will on the nationalistic brawlers in "the Balkan tavern." He anticipates a similar course of events with another crisis in the making, i.e. Kosovo.

For the first time in Slovene history, the Counter-Intelligence Service (CIS) of the Yugoslav People's Army (YPA) is presented in a compact and comprehensive form. The CIS successfully protected both the Yugoslav Army and the state for fifty years, still the figures and security-political evaluations found in classified documents cannot truly present all the efforts put forth by the CIS to defend the SFRY. Notwithstanding, the author tries to demystify the role and importance of the CIS and later the Security Service of the YPA, in which he worked for almost thirty years. The Security Service of the YPA met a sad fate for the same reason as the YPA itself: the CIS made a wrong strategic, political and security estimate that one may impose one's own political will on other nations.

The second part gives an intriguing and detailed presentation of the genesis of the attacks on the YPA spanning the years between 1942 and 1991. He presents the post-Tito period between1980 and 1990 and the main elements of the D-day plan leading to the disintegration of the SFRY. The author also discusses the notorious "Military Trial against the Four", i.e. against three Slovene civilians and a Slovene Noncom of the YPA, in which he played the role of a literally "burgled party." Using published and unpublished records and publishing the first three classified YPA documents, he manages to persuasively prove that the "Military Trial against the Four" was neither a political matter nor set up by the YPA. Apparently, it was a military trial imposed on the YPA within the framework of an over-all scheme to compromise the CIS.

The third chapter focuses on a concise and well-documented presentation of the theoretical basis of the low-intensity conflict doctrine, which the author applies in order to offer theoretical proof of his thesis on the prevalence of the external factors. In addition, he shows it is this US warfare doctrine that includes elements that were tested out in the Balkan military range: the break-up of a multi-national state, leading to - without armed combat or a major number of victims, yet by deployment of an array of non-combat means, primarily by NATO peacekeeping forces (Unprofor, Ifor, Sfor) - an "occupation" of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the act of forcing on them (Dayton) peace.

Special attention should be dedicated to the chapters on the scenario of the guided or directed destabilization process of the SFRY, as well as the concise and documented presentation of the Yugoslav internal wars, especially that in Slovenia.

The author Marijan F. Kranjc, Major-General and Chief-of-Staff of the Bitola Army Corps, was the first Slovene general to leave the YPA in October 1990, because he was painfully aware that one must not fight against one's  own nation!

GENERALI - ADMIRALI SLOVENSKEGA RODU - SEZNAM 2000-2005
Slovenski častniki – književniki, umetniki in znanstveniki
GENERALI-ADMIRALI SLOVENSKEGA RODU - SEZNAM 2007
    (To the articles in Slovene)

The author discusses an almost forgotten and even ignored topic of Slovene military intellectuals. The first three chapters present a number of general issues and lexicographic data on the history of military intellectuals, military education and the formation of the military science section, along with fascinating information on military science as an interdisciplinary branch of scientific research.

The author makes up his own "non-ideological and genetic" list of all Slovene generals and admirals (255). Last but not least, he submits to the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts a proposal for a new class of research: Section of Military Science.

In November 2007 the author published an updated list of Slovene generals and admirals (298).

(Taken from the revised English summary published in Borec.)

SLOVENSKA VOJAŠKA INTELIGENCA

This is the first book about the Slovene military intellectual elite. The foreword is written by Dr. Iztok Podbregar, Lieutenant General, former Chief of the General Staff of the Slovene Armed Forces.

The main part of the book focuses on the earliest Slovene military intellectuals, who due to historical circumstances were placed in foreign, or "joint" national armies, first in the Austro-Hungarian Army and later in the two Yugoslav Armies – the Royal Army and the Yugoslav People's  Army. The author suggests the following four candidates to be regarded as the first Slovene generals, serving at the Military Frontier (Vojna Krajina): Jernej Basaj, b. 1720, in the Austro-Hungarian Army: Pavel Seničar, b. 1760 and Josip Novak, b.1772, and an admiral in the British Navy: John Jeffrey Rakovec, b.1770.

Furthermore he discusses two periods which laid the foundations for both an independent Slovene state and a Slovene army. The first period spanned the years 1918 and 1919, when the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was founded and the struggles for Slovenia's  Northern border raged, in which General Rudolf Maister distinguished himself. During the same period, Rear-Admiral Metod Koch was entrusted with the formation of the first Yugoslav Navy.

The second period, between 1941 and 1945, is the time of the National Liberation Movement and the Slovene Partisan Army. In May 1943, Franc Rozman – (nom de guerre) Stane, Chief of the General Staff of the Slovene Partisan Army was appointed as the first Partisan Major-General. The author also mentions Slovene officers, non-commissioned officers, soldiers and seamen. The author presents their list and a detailed list of Slovene generals and admirals, folk heroes and many renowned warriors, including national heroes, heading the list of the Slovene military intellectual community.

Owing to its genetic principle, the list is expected to receive some criticisms. Scientifically correct, taking paternal and maternal genetic material into equal consideration, it runs counter to the widespread and somewhat chauvinist opinion that "nationally pure" Slovenes can only be traced along the male line. Drawing from the latest genetic research findings, the author rejects this opinion with considerable justification. For instance, Wilhelm Tegetthoff, Vice Admiral of the Austro-Hungarian Navy, has already been recognized as a Slovene on the strength of his mother's  origin, therefore there is no good reason why the same principle should not apply to other similar cases.

The author's  main message is that throughout history, the Slovenes have proven themselves as a nation of rebels and courageous warriors, i.e. seamen, excellent officers, decoration holders, national and folk heroes, winners of national awards, inventors, doctors of military and defense sciences, astronauts and some 250 generals and admirals. The work provides a firm basis for a discussion of Slovene military intellectual elite prior to the formation of the proper Slovene Armed Forces.

(Taken from the revised English summary published in Borec.)

PLOTS AND ATTEMPTS ON TITO
- in a new book for  Croatia in 2011
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Having worked for almost 30 years for the Security Service of the Yugoslav People's Army (YPA), I felt qualified enough to tackle the sensitive topic of political plots and assassination attempts at on Josip Broz Tito.

From 1945 onwards, both the Western superpowers and the former USSR attempted to assassinate Marshal Tito and, in so doing, "behead" the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). This seems to support my thesis that the SFRY was not disintegrated on its own, but was, in their pursuit of geopolitical and strategic interests, first distributed among the superpowers (Teheran, Potsdam, Casablanca), to be eventually shattered to pieces in a bitter and sanguinary war (1991–1995).

In my book The Balkan Military Range (1998), I prove the daring thesis that in a directed and guided destabilization process implemented through the contemporary warfare of low-intensity conflict, the external factors have invariably decisive predominance over the internal ones. The "Day X" or the final phase of this plan could happen only after Tito's death, be it natural or violent. With so many plotted and attempted assassinations, there is no doubt that the Security Service of the YPA, of which I was a member, may take credit for the fact that Tito died in bed of natural causes.

My new book for Croatia also presents a systematic treatment of all known Tito political plots and assassination attempts on Tito, 70 in total. There are descriptions of about 18 main plots, although their number is higher. On an occasion, Tito himself referred to 23 attempts; yet that was the number he was led to believe for security's reasons. Following the military secret service methodology, I analyze 52 assassination attempts and group them into (thwarted or aborted) assassination plans (25), failed (or misfired) attempts (24) and fully implemented attempts/assassinations (3)

Political plots and assassination attempts on Tito (70) may be divided into three periods:

• 1928-1941: Tito's illegal operation as a member of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia (3),

• 1941-1945: Tito as leader of the National Liberation War (15),

• 1945-1980: Tito as Head of the SFRY and the Yugoslav People's Army (YPA) (52).

In addition, I describe two counter-intelligence operations in foreign countries, in which I personally took part. In conclusion, it is pointed out that the final truth about plots and attempts on Tito's life remains locked away in the archives of secret services – in Belgrade and in other foreign countries. As Tito's mother was Slovene, I regard him as a Slovene political leader. Last but not least, he ranked fourth in 2005 on Slovenia's list of the most popular Slovene historic personalities.

ZAROTE IN ATENTATI NA TITA (Grafis Trade: Grosuplje, 2003) /website in slovene language/

The TITO PLOTS AND ATTEMPTS author's  ideas about the relation between Jovanka Broz and Josip Broz Tito may be found in Brainy Encyclopedia.                                 To the article in Brainy Encyclopedia
(Posted: 22.09.2009 - temporary not reacheable)

SLOVENE CHETNIKS
2006. SLOVENAČKI ČETNICI. Filip Višnjić: Beograd
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PLAVA GARDA – POVELJNIKOVO ZAUPNO POROČILO, (Book published by PRO-ANDY, s.p., Maribor, 2006.)
SLOVENAČKI ČETNICI, (Book published by Filip Višnjić, Beograd, 2006.)

Many people in Slovenia are not aware that during the Italian and German occupation between 1941 and 1945 there were not only Partisans and the domobranci (Slovene Home Guard) but also Chetniks, in Slovenia known as the Blue Guard. Their Commander-in-Chief was Major of the General Staff (later on: Colonel) Karl Novak, a Chetnik duke, and as of September 1943 Colonel (later on: Brigadier General) Ivan Prezelj – Andrej (nom de guerre). There were about 300 to 600 Chetniks in central Slovenia, and after 1944 about 250 Chetniks in Štajersko in north-eastern Slovenia. They were all Italian and German collaborators.
In Slovenia the Chetnik issue was brought up again later on. In 1998, Dr. Aleksander Bajt, a well-known Slovene academic, wrote the book entitled Dosje Bergman ("Bergman File"), in which he uncovered that he had been a Chetnik lieutenant on Novak's Chetnik staff in Italy. New surprising details followed in 2003, when it was disclosed that Leon Štukelj, the internationally well-known Slovene Olympic gold medalist, was a Chetnik and British agent, and in 2006, when it became known that Hrvoj Maister, a son of General Rudolf Maister, was a Chetnik colonel!

In April 2006 Slobodan Kljakić, a Serbian reporter from Belgrade, offered to me a confidential report written by Colonel Karl Novak, the Chetnik Commander-in-Chief in Slovenia, which was sent to Colonel Živan Knežević in 1946, Adjutant to Yugoslavia's King Peter II. The document travelled from the US to Chetnik Major Kosić in Serbia, who passed it on to his friend, Mr. Bosnić, giving it finally to the reporter Kljakić.

Slobodan Klajkić and I decided to have the book first published in Slovenia and afterwards in Serbia. The Slovene book entitled "The Blue Guard: a Confidential Report by the Commander-in-Chief" was published by Pro-Andy in May 2006, while the Serbian edition entitled 's lovene Chetniks" was brought out in Belgrade in December 2006.

SLOVENE CHETNIKS OF ŠTAJERSKA: GERMAN COLLABORATORS?
(Newspaper article)
"ŠTAJERSKI ČETNIKI: NEMŠKI KOLABORANTI?." Nedeljski dnevnik. Ljubljana (13/02/2007.)
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To the article in Slovene

Since Novak's confidential report contained no information on Chetniks of Štajersko, I delved into the Archives of Slovenia after publishing the book "The Blue Guard".

As a 9-year-old boy living in the hilly region of Slovenske gorice in north-eastern Slovenia I encountered in October 1944 a group of Chetniks who by mistake killed the cook of our priest Alojz Klobasa – Püčko, with whom I served as an altar boy.

Colonel Karl Novak left the Slovene Chetniks in September 1943, which suggests that the Štajersko Chetniks had not been organized by that time. Historical sources and memoirs mention that Lieutenant Jože Melaher - Zmagoslav after a few months after the German occupation started to collect Slovene boys, becoming the Commander of the Štajersko Chetnik Unit. His memoirs published in the US, contain a number of inaccurate facts, while some relevant data are simply ignored.

Naturally, he does not mention that he was an agent working for the Abwehr and later for the Gestapo. The first to mention this was Melaher's courier and curate Henrik Goričan, who was arrested by the Gestapo and sent to Dachau. I learnt about the Štajersko Chetniks from the history degree thesis by Katja Zupanič, which she defended at Maribor University in 2000. I obtained the most relevant data from a Chetnik called "Rado", who was involved in the Chetnik attack on our village in October 1944. "Rado" was my guest at the promotion of my book "The Blue Guard" in Maribor.

"Rado"'s saddest moment happened in January 1945, when he was present at Melaher's signing the collaboration agreement with the Germans against the Slovene Partisans. In May 1945 there were about 250 Štajersko Chetniks, 500 men and women, including their families and friends. 125 men managed to flee to Austrian Carinthia, while only 75 Chetniks made it to the British refugee camp in Italy, "Rado" being one of them. He, however, returned to his homeland in 1947.

To the article in Slovene

In his memoirs, Lieutenant Jože Melaher - Zmagoslav, Commander of Štajersko Chetnik Unit, mention three attacks on the German forces in Štajersko. As a 9-year boy I witnessed such an "attack" on October 21 1944.

In May 2006 "Rado", a Chetnik involved in the "attack", and I made a reconstruction of the event, which, properly speaking, was more of a foray than an attack. "Rado" told me that three groups of the first Chetnik Company had been given a mission to disarm all the gendarmes at the station. They did so, finding about 70 rifles in the weapons dump.

Yet Sergeant Franz Ogrizek, Company Commander, wanting to frighten our parish priest Alojz Klobasa – Püčko, shot accidentally his cook. The final result of the Chetnik "attack" was a shot cook and 70 confiscated rifles.

To the article in Slovene

Miodrag - Mija Nikolić, an officer of the Yugoslav OZNA security agency, in his autobiographic book Odraščanje in ideali ("Growing up and Ideals"), published in Niš, Serbia, 2006, writes that after his death sentence in 1946 General Mihailović was not executed, but died in Moscow in 1960.

This sensational news shocked the Serbian people, especially the old Chetniks. The historians and the old members of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia knew that in 1972 Vladimir Dedijer, Tito's biographer, said that the data about whether Dragiša Vasić and Draža Mihailović had been Soviet agents in political or in military intelligence services (GRU) should be looked for in the Moscow archives. In 1935, a Yugoslav military attache to Sofia, Bolgaria, Colonel Mihailović, was recruited as a secret agent by the Soviet military attache General Wassily Timofeyevich Suhorukov. Dragiša Vasić, however, had been an old secret agent for the Comintern.

The first news about this matter was announced by the Russian historian Dr. Boris Starkov at St. Petersburg University at an international symposium on history in Spain, 1993. The author of this article, Slobodan Kljakić, met Dr. Starkov in Belgrade in 1995, where the former confirmed his discovery about General Mihailović and Vasić.

Another Russian historian, Artyom Ulunjan, told the Croatian weekly Globus in 1998 that Mustafa Golubić, the oldest Soviet secret agent, organized in 1936 in Istanbul a meeting between colonel Mihailović and Josip Broz Tito, who was just returning from the Soviet Union to Yugoslavia.

In 1940 Mustafa Golubić became the head of the Soviet Union spy network in Yugoslavia (and Balkan) and sent Dragiša Vasić to the Chetnik staff in Ravna Gora, organizing two meetings between Tito and Mihailović in June 1941. After that time Mustafa Golubić was arrested by the Gestapo and killed.

At the end of WW2, in November 1945, the OZNA captured Colonel Nikola Kalabić, former Commander of the Royal Mountain Guard, who agreed for the price of his own life to play Ozna's  "big game:" in March 1946 a group of masked OZNA men lead by Kalabić tracked down General Mihailović in a small village of Dobruna. A stupefied General Mihailović was brought to the OZNA prison in Belgrade on 13th May 1946. Before that Marshal Josip Broz Tito and his closest co-worker Edvard Kardelj, both former Comintern agents, had agreed that General Mihailović would be free to go to the West, while all other Yugoslav politicians insisted that he be tried at a major trial together with German collaborators. Later on, Stalin, the great leader of the Soviet Union, demanded that General Mihailović, a former agent of the Soviet military intelligence service, be granted a passage to the Soviet Union.

Some of the Chetnik prisoners were not executed. Dragi Jovanović, Chief of the Special Police in Belgrade, lived for another three years and helped the UDBA, i.e. the SFRY secret police organization. Stalin may indeed have remembered his man, i.e. General Mihailović. As Tito and Kardelj claimed: "General Mihailović was not sent to the West, but to the East!"

The OZNA informed Branko, General Mihailović's  oldest son and a Partisan, that his father lived until 1953 in Barajevo near Belgrade.

The old Chetniks' great wish is to see Mihailović's grave at the "House of Flowers," the mausoleum in Belgrade - by the side of Tito?

To the article in Slovene

Huddled in a shelter during the NATO raid in Belgrade, a group of my former colleagues commented my book The Balkan Military Range (1998), in which I maintain that the actual destabilization process of Yugoslavia began in mid-1966 at the Brioni Plenum meeting of the Central Committee of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia, when Aleksandar Ranković nicknamed Leka, Tito's Deputy, was suspended, and the national security system of the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia was destroyed, followed later by Slobodan Milošević destabilizing the Communist Party, the Yugoslav People's Army and the state.

Discussing my book at the shelter, Admiral Stanislav Brovet pointed out to his friends and Prof. Ladislava Becele Ranković, Aleksandar's  wife and a WW2 Slovene Partisan, that the 's lovene general wrote the plain truth about the Brioni Plenum." Hearing this, Mrs Becele Ranković, the former second Lady of Yugoslavia, decided to send me her book "My Life with Leka", written in Cyrillic Serbian, furnished with a dedication and a thank-you note. I determined to have the book translated into Slovene. I wrote the Foreword and added some new documents, the primary source being the story by a witness, Colonel Dušan Rusić, my former boss, who revealed the truth about the Brioni Plenum. In my opinion, the meeting was the Soviet Union's strategic intelligence operation against Yugoslavia and Tito or, rather, against the UDBA and Ranković.

It was well-known that the Comintern (and its successor) would never forgive disloyalty of its members and co-operators, so it is very likely that it was an act of vengeance that the Soviet intelligence services took on Tito for his departure from the Informbiro (Cominform), taking a classic and smart action to compromise the UDBA and the integrity of Alekasnadar Ranković, one of Tito's best and most loyal friends!

There are new issue-related facts and documents which I added to the Slovene translation. It was Ivan Kreačić – Stevo, the former head of the Yugoslav NKVD center who was the principle man behind the Brioni Plenum, receiving, of course, political support from top Communist Party officials (Kardelj, Bakarić, Stambolić, Crvenkovski), heads of civilian and military security services (brothers Milan and Gen. Col. Ivan Mišković) and relying on "evidence" from Croatia, i.e. Jovanka Broz's bugged telephone and false telephone cables to Ranković's villa mounted by the Zagreb operations and technology team while the Ranković family were on holiday in Dubrovnik.

1914-1919 WAR MEMOIRS OF FRANJO MALGAJ (Book)
2009. VOJNI SPOMINI 1914-1919, PRO-ANDY, s.p.,: Maribor
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To the internet site in Slovene

• Reserve Lieutenant in the 87th Celje Infantry Regiment of the Austro-Hungarian Army (1914-1918)

• Carinthian combatant - First Lieutenant of the Slovene Army and the first liberator of the Slovene Carinthia (1918-1919)

• General Maister's  trainee, comrade-in-arms, and a poet

• Slovene legendary hero

Marking the 90th anniversary of his death, this work is the first complete presentation of Franjo Malgaj. It is based on official and personal documents (military orders, notes etc.) and written in cooperation with Malgaj's  relatives, who have saved his journals, decorations, photographs and other personal belongings.

He was born in Hruševec near Celje in 1894. He finished the lower secondary general school in Celje and attended the upper secondary general schools in Kranj and Pazin, Istria.

He finished the Infantry Reserve Officers School in Gorizia. As an officer candidate he participated in the First and Second Battles of the Isonzo front, where he was stricken with typhus. His daring attack on an Italian fort on Monte Zebio during the Tirol front in 1916 earned him the Gold Medal for Bravery, whereupon he was sent to the rear area.

He liberated part of Southern Carinthia with the Celje volunteer detachment in 1918 and seized the Carinthian town of Velikovec (Völkermarkt) with his unit and a company of Serbian volunteers.

On 6 May 1919 he was surrounded and wounded at Tolsti Vrh in Slovene Carinthia. He chose an honour suicide, lest the enemy should get him alive. In 1920 he was posthumously awarded the Karađorđe fourth-degree Star with Swords.

Gold Medal for Bravery

Karl Troop Cross

Karađorđe Star with Swords

VIKTOR J. ANDREJKA, noble of LIVNOGRAD,
General Staff Colonel of Royal Yugoslav Army and first Slovene military intelligence officer
(first excerpt from new book FAMOUS SLOVENE INFORMERS - plan date of edition last quarter 2010)
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To the internet site in Slovene

Hailing from a renowned military family, General Staff Colonel Viktor J. Andrejka Noble, of Livnograd, (1881–1947), is both the last top military intelligence Slovene officer in the Austro-Hungarian Army (AHA) and the first Royal Yugoslav Army (RYA) military intelligence Slovene officer as well as Head of the most distinguished RYA military intelligence centre, based in Ljubljana. Col. Andrejka directed members of the TIGR antifascist resistance movement in their organized actions aimed at a Slovene Primorska. He was Gen. Maister's fighter, the first author of a history of the Slovene army and Head of the Legion of Pro-Carinthia Fighters. As the last RYA officer to leave Ljubljana he prevented the destruction of the food storehouses in April 1941, which earned him the appointment of the Chief of the Ljubljana Municipality Procurement Office during the Italian occupation. Remaining non-aligned, he only shouldered the responsibility of being one of the four General Staff officers in the Slovene Covenant, namely Maj. Novak, Lt. Col. Peterlin, Col. Vauhnik and Col. Andrejka. In late 1944 he was considered as the successor to Gen. Leon Rupnik, President of the administration of the Ljubljana Province. The author of the article believes that as an experienced military intelligence officer Col. Andrejka must have secretly worked for the Slovene Liberation Front, as was the case with Col. Vauhnik working with the Slovene author and Comintern agent Lovro Kuhar (Prežihov Voranc). Col. Andrejka certainly belonged to the group of neutral or “fair officers” in the RYA, lead by Brig. Gen. Ferdinand Janež, Gendarmerie Col. Alojzij Barle and General Staff Col. Viktor Andrejka. Due to the Communist Party’s sectarianism, the work of this fairly large group of Slovene officers and NCOs in the RYA has not been given the adequate attention, yet documents in the Archives of the Republic of Slovenia bear witness to their bona fides and patriotic conduct.

Slovene Military Intelligence Legends
Summary of the book LEGENDARNI SLOVENSKI OBVEŠČEVALCI, PRO-ANDY, Maribor 2011
(Translated by prof. dr. Silvana Kos Orel)

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Slovene Military Intelligence Legends: Military Intelligence and Counter-Intelligence Officers 1919—1991 is the first work of the kind in Slovene military history.

Numerous monographs worldwide present the world history of espionage, military intelligence and counter-intelligence activities, competent intelligence officers, intelligence centre heads, their secret field workers and co-workers, yet, to my knowledge, none contains any information on Slovenes. This is rather unfair, as in the recent decades I myself have known some top military intelligence officers and counter-intelligence officers and their secret field co-workers. This is the reason why I decided to write a national review of military intelligence legends enabling the presented Slovenes to find their way into world reference books, specialist journals and historical monographs.

There have been several top intelligence officers in Slovene history: Josip Kopinič, a colonel of the Yugoslav National Army, who was the head of the Comintern intelligence centre and the Soviet Army intelligence centre, both Zagreb-based, and Vladimir Vauhnik, a colonel of the Royal Yugoslav Army, who was renowned as a military attaché to Berlin and an analyst at the British military intelligence centre in Ljubljana. Another operative ranking among the best is Andrej Kobal, a reserve colonel in the US Air Force, who worked as an intelligence officer in the Oss operations in the Near East and Bulgaria and participated in the formation of Cia. These are three undisputable greats, three Slovene military intelligence legends.

A fourth legend is Carinthian Slovene Emil Wedam, an Abwehr Lieutenant, who was undoubtedly the best secret co-worker of the Ljubljana military intelligence centre, a veritable super spy of Slovene origin.

Many Slovenes may not be aware that Lt.Colonel Rudolf Vaupotič was General Maister's first security officer and that Colonel of the General Staff Viktor Andrejka - Livnograd established the efficient Ljubljana-based military intelligence centre as early as 1922. Furthermore, too little is known about the partisan intelligence officers Lieutenant Miro Kranjec, Major Andreana Družina, Colonels Franc Pirc and Vito Kraigher, as well as about three Allied intelligence officers Colonels Andrej Glušič, Hrvoj Maister and Lieutenant Ivan Rudolf.

Moreover, much data pertaining to the history of the Yugoslav People's Army (YPA) is hidden beneath the shroud of secrecy, e.g. the fact that the Yugoslav Military Intelligence Service was also headed by Slovene Colonel General Rado Pehaček and Admiral Stanislav Brovet. Even fewer know that Major-General Alojz Ahlin was deputy head of the YPA Military Security Service, and that its Slovenia-based detachment within the 9th Army Corps in Ljubljana was headed by four Slovenes: three partisans, ie. Colonels Zvone Rak, Alojz Škufca and Albin Barle, and, between 1984 and 1987, by myself as the first post-war officer and the last Slovene.

The present monograph is based on memoirs and a series of records, as the archives have been destroyed, eg. the Yugoslav and German archives on Vauhnik, or are still closed, eg. the Comintern archives on Kopinič.

The 1941—1985 period is described on the basis of two monographs on the intelligence and security (counter-intelligence) service of the YPA. Slovenia’s Security and Intelligence Service (Vos) is mentioned only in passing, as it was more of a political body maintaining a tough Party line rather than a military security organisation. My book neither tackles the security service nor the civil sector of the SFRY, with Ozna (the Department of National Protection) as Yugoslavia’s first security service, followed by Udba and Sdv (the State Security Service), the latter one restructured in 1991 as Slovenia’s Sova, ie. the Slovene Intelligence and Security Agency.

The 1985—1991 period is covered by my memoirs and observations. The book ends with a reprint of my article from 2002 entitled The prime objections to the suppressed issues of Slovenia's 1991 independence war. It also addresses objections to untruths and unfounded criticisms levelled at the so-called “Serbian” Kos (the SFRY Counter-Intelligence Service).

In the first place, I wanted to present Slovene generals or admirals, officers and NCOs who, having distinguished themselves as intelligence and security officers and scouts, were appointed to senior positions, such as intelligence service chiefs of general staff: Field-Marshal-Lieutenant Karl von Tegetthoff in the Austro-Hungarian Army and Colonel General Rado Pehaček and Admiral Stanislav Brovet in the YPA. There were several efficient heads of military intelligence centres, ie. Colonels Andrejka, Kopinič, Pirc and Kobal, Lt.Colonel Slekovec, Major Družinič, Lieutenant Kranjec, and military attachés, ie. Colonels Vauhnik and Stropnik.

While there have been many secret field workers and co-workers, it is necessary to know that much data and numerous persons will never be officially known, as the working principle of true-blue intelligence and counter-intelligence officers still holds true, namely that all secrets concerning their work should be taken into their grave. As a rule, military intelligence and counter-intelligence services prefer not to disclose their secrets and sources.

Naturally, this book on military intelligence and counter-intelligence manages to only partly fill the void within Slovene military history, providing an incentive for future researchers to study yet unexplored areas, as the secret archives of national and foreign intelligence and counter-intelligence services open.

66 years later: Father's grave found in Australia
The truth finally revealed - Jernej Poštrak never let on the Chetniks' hideout
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To the internet site in Slovene
To the related article SLOVENE CHETNIKS OF ŠTAJERSKA: GERMAN COLLABORATORS?

I mention in my article on Štajersko (Slovene Styrian) Chetniks that it was the »pro-German« Jernej Poštrak that told to the Germans on the Chetnik commander Jože Melaher's hideout at Zgornji Duplek some time in 1943. A few days later Poštrak was brutally beaten by two Chetniks, Melaher and Golob, who had managed to escape from the stormed hideout.

I have been recently told by Poštrak's daughter Ljudmila Vodušek, living in Sweden, that the hideout had not been divulged by her father, but a relative of theirs. The father never returned to his wife and ten children in the aftermath of WW II, fearing, as a former member of the German army, the threat of being liquidated. After 66 years of persistent search, Mrs Vodušek finally discovered that her father had emigrated to Australia, where he started a new family and died in 1979.

In late April 2010 I received a letter from the still living Chetnik sergeant “Rado”, who has been working on his war memoirs, clarifying the following points:

• Naturally, “Rado” could not have been familiar with the actual traitor of the three draft dodgers or deserters from the German army, hiding in the Zgornji Duplek caves, since “Rado” joined the Chetniks only a year later, in March of 1944.

• Chetnik commander Melaher later told “Rado” that the Chetnik's hideout had been presumably betrayed by Terezija Poštrak, who directed her son Jernej to the Zgornji Duplek Mayor Rudolf Partljič. Afterwards, on 6 February 1943, the Gestapo was informed by the mayor's secretary Rues.

• In 1944 “Rado” witnessed the punishment, i.e. beating, of the gendarme Jože Glonar, who used the rifle butt to smash the dead dodger Mirko Knuplež's head.

• After the liberation the escaped draft dodger Milko Golob, later a partisan and OZNA security agency officer in the Slovene towns of Ptuj in Lendava, was said to have sought revenge on the secretary Rues, the gendarme Glonar as well as Jernej Poštrak, who would not dare return home but rather emigrated to Australia.

Who is going to protect and defend Slovenia?
Towards a new security and defence system of the Republic of Slovenia
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Marijan F. Kranjc, Major-General Retired

The Contemporary Military Challenges journal presents academic papers on a future transformation of the Slovenian Armed Forces and the security and defence system of the Republic of Slovenia written by LTC General Iztok Podbregar, PhD, and Major General Alojz Šteiner, MSc, the former and present Chiefs of General Staff of the Slovenian Armed Forces. In a long and lively debate I seconded almost all their ideas and proposals. The following is a list of my final proposals that the visitors to my “MILITARY” website may be interested to know:

• It is necessary to implement the fundamental intention of NATO’s new Strategic Concept, which endorses national solutions, meaning that there is a need for a small-scale and efficient army, capable, independently or within an alliance, of cybernetic and nuclear-missile warfare.

• The new government of the Republic of Slovenia should not have more than seven departments, ie. Ministries of Foreign Affairs; Economy and Finance; Health and Social Affairs, Culture, Science, Education and Sport; Justice and Public Administration; Transport and Environment; and a united Ministry of Armed and Police Forces.

• The present organization of the Slovenian Armed Forces, ie. professional service members and contracted reserve, has to be abandoned, as it lacks functionality and is not conducive to the self-sufficient defence of the Republic of Slovenia. The country has to be defended by its own (professionally qualified) citizens, not by foreigners and mercenaries. Basically, the existing set-up is aimed at international peacekeeping operations.

• It is necessary to reconsider our historical and traditional experience that enabled the persistence and defence of Slovenian territory (the Republic of Slovenia), and to abandon foreign impractical experience and models, such as reserve police officers and gendarmes. What I have in mind is the successful partisan resistance movement between 1941 and 1945, and the efficient operation of the Territorial Defence in 1991. Therefore I propose a combined system of territorial operations, which should require the re-introduction of a 6-month national service and a conscript system (3-month military drill). The Armed Forces should consist of the active component (full-time senior members and professional soldiers – specialists) and the reserve component. All other non-warfare systems, including the special department for an alternative civilian service, should be extracted from the Slovenian Armed Forces and attached to the Police Forces or the sector of security and defence.

• The mobilization system should reintroduce conscription (for combat units and alternative civilian service in aid and rescue units). A minimum (3-month) Basic Training would be held at territorial (regional) training centres. To do their 3-month national service, the soldiers should be sent into the nearest operational-territorial unit, to which they would remain assigned. Also, reserve soldiers may be treated as a source of professional soldiers – specialists.

• The brigade system should be reorganized into the corps system, with the Force Command of the Slovenian Armed Forces and the fourth-level leadership and command being closed.

• The size of the Slovenian Armed Forces should be subject to professional analyses and studies. The military defence of the Republic of Slovenia seems not to require more than: two motorized corps (corresponding to the size of three brigades, each of these having a mechanized battalion), mountain brigade, missile anti-armour battalion, anti-aircraft missile defence battalion, helicopter battalion and marine defence battalion.

• The general staff should establish an anti-cybernetic centre with an anti-electronic warfare unit, whereas the corps and the brigades should have their subsidiary centres with the same standards as the allied forces. The traditional units should be developed by a new, ie. “Electronic-Cybernetic Unit”.

• The following structures should be terminated: the Force Command, the naval battalion (the sale of the Triglav-11 ship required), the air forces (the sale of Pilatus aircraft required), and the Support Command (the logistics battalion and health unit should be taken over by the Chief of General Staff), whereas the corps should have their territorial logistics bases and the brigade its mobile logistics battalion.

• The Command Support units should close the military vicariate (if a member of the Slovenian Armed Forces has to seek medical help in civilian health care facilities, then a worshipper may seek spiritual help in a local church) and the division of protocol - the Office of the President of the Republic of Slovenia and Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Slovenian Armed Forces, has its own state protocol staff, who could also cover military ceremonies. The guard unit should be reorganized as elite combat unit, also taking care of the security of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, the minister of the armed and police forces and the Chief of General Staff of the Slovenian Armed Forces.

• The Doctrine, Development, Educational and Training Command should be closed, including all schools, sports and other units, as well as the centres, except for the Library and Information Centre and the Military Museum.

• Instead of the said Command, the General Staff of the Slovenian Armed Forces should organize a Division of Education, which would include a new-formed Faculty of Military Science with the departments of Command and Staff, Officers, Non-Commissioned Officers, Specialists and Foreign Languages. The existing four centres should re-establish the Centre for Strategic and Development Studies.

• As the future Slovenian Armed Forces should be exclusively aimed at combat activities, it makes sense that we do not have an “army of old men”, aid and rescue staff, inspector offices and the like. What should be retained is contracted soldiers – professionals (for a period of 10 years) as well as contracted officers and non-commissioned officers (for a period of 30 years). This special status should exempt them from the category of public service employees. Having their responsibilities increased, they should be paid substantially higher salaries, comparable to the same categories in the allied forces (now partly in the peacekeeping missions). The Aid and Rescues Staff should be attached to the Police Forces, which should also take over voluntary and private structures.

The presented and other proposals call for a number of detailed studies. The readers shall understand that my ideas have not been supported by professional studies of experts working in different fields. Sometimes it is the very ideas that count. So much more when they result from extensive professional knowledge and practical working experience.

OUR BOYS:
Ivan Božič
Stanislav Rapotec, aka Stanislaus (Ivan) Rapotec
Frank van Krevel
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Ivan Božič was born on 9th January 1894 in Jurovo, Croatia. He came from a progressive family of farmers in the vicinity of the Slovenian town of Vipava, who eventually settled in the vicinity of the Slovenian town of Metlika. Božič was an officer serving in four armies: he was Second Lieutenant in the Austro-Hungarian army, Captain of the Serbian volunteer army or the army of the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs in Russia, Colonel in the Army of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, as well as Colonel and Major-General in the Yugoslav People’s Army. He was an excellent commander of the Matija Blagodić regiment and the Vladivostok Evacuation Detachment of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. Later on, he was the King's adjutant and a detachment commander. After the April war in 1941 he ended up in a German prisoner's camp. He was a supporter of the National Liberation movement. In 1947 he was promoted to the rank of Major-General. He was a lecturer and a founder of military geography and as such the first Slovene military geographer. He received a number of decorations in his native country and abroad. He was married to Russian Irina Baranov, they had, however, no children. Ivan Božič died in 1962 in Belgrade, Serbia, where he is buried. His relatives live in the southern part of Slovenia.

Stanislav Rapotec, AKA Stanislaus (Ivan) Rapotec, was born on 22nd October 1911 in Kozina, Slovenia. He came from a family of railway workers and antifascists, who settled in the town of Škofja Loka, Slovenia, after 1918. During the time of his secondary school and university education in Ljubljana and Zagreb respectively, he was an active member of “revolutionary” student organisations. He studied economics. He was connected with persons of interest to the intelligence service. As a reserve officer of the Army of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, he was a member of the military intelligence service. From 1941 onwards he was a foreign intelligence officer of the Yugoslav army and a secret agent of the British Special Operations Executive (SOE), code number A/H69. In the “HENNA” mission launched by the SOE in January 1942, Rapotec was landed by submarine on the Adriatic coast, where he gathered intelligence reports. He established contacts with Dr. Aloysius Stepinac, Archbishop of Zagreb, and Major Karl Novak, Commander of Slovene Chetniks. Rapotec was demobilised as Captain of the British Army in 1948 and settled in Australia. He finished his study of economics there. He was involved in abstract painting and attained worldwide success. Rapotec was made a member of the Order of Australia for service to the arts. He would come to Slovenia and exhibit his works of art there after 1991. He was married with no children. Stanislaus Rapotec died in 1997 in Sydney, where he is buried. His relatives live in the western parts of Slovenia.

Frank van Krevel was born in Heerlen, the Netherlands, in 1968. His mother, née Kenda, came from a family of miners living in the vicinity of Bovec, Slovenia. Her parents joined the Slovene mining community in Limburg in 1930. Van Krevel became a bank clerk and was a young member of democratic movements in Europe. He was taught Slovene by his grandmother, soon to become interested in research of Slovene immigration to the Netherlands. Following the events in Slovenia in late June 1991, van Krevel and a group of Dutch people of Slovene descent made special efforts towards the recognition of the young independent country of Slovenia. He was the Chairman of the Committee for the recognition of the Republic of Slovenia, which won him The Order of Services, presented to him by Dr. Danilo Türk, President of the Republic of Slovenia, in Den Haag in December 2011. He has launched a number of projects for the association of the Friends of Slovenia in the Netherlands. He was the first foreign promoter of the Slovene Armed Forces in August 1991.

Fr Bruno – Dr. Jožef Korošak, professor
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Father Bruno is my maternal relative of the Korošak family. I refer to him as a »God's Warrior« since he has fought for the truth in religion and theology.

Father Bruno was born in Maribor, Slovenia, in 1920. His family derives from places of Grlava and Grabonoš, with his ancestral roots going back as early as 1470. He attended grammar school in Ljubljana. As a Franciscan he started his theology study in1941, finishing it in Rome, where he was consecrated as a priest in 1943.

Father Bruno has devoted his life to the study of religious truths. He earned his doctoral degree in 1954, soon to become a university teacher of theology. Proficient in as many as 14 languages of the world, he can be considered a true polyglot. In 1978 he became Secretary General of the renowned Pontifical Urbaniana University in Rome.

Father Bruno has published as many as 26 books and 64 articles. He has contributed to four canonization procedures, including the Slovenian Bishops Baraga and Slomšek.

Retiring in 1984, he has lived at the Kostanjevica Monastery at Nova Gorica, Slovenia. He was well-known among the Slovenians as a priest at the Alpine pilgrimage church at Svete Višarje/Monte Santo di Lussari for many years. In a 2012 interview for Jana, a Slovenian women's magazine, Father Bruno let know the women of Slovenia that love and sex should not be considered as sinful.

In 2003, Father Bruno celebrated his 60th anniversary of priesthood at the Sveti Duh church, Slovenia, where writer Vinko Korošak presented his »Peasant Dynasty«, a romanced novel based on the Korošak family tree that I myself have prepared.

Father Bruno celebrated his 92th birthday in 2012. He has lived a rich life and we wish him still many happy returns of the day!

To essay in slovenian language BOJI ZA KOROŠKO 1918–1919 (in PDF)

Abstract

There has been no relevant study by Slovene or Serbian historians on the contribution of Serbian volunteers to the struggle for the Slovene Northern and Western borders, except for a handful of journal articles and nationalist responses published in newspapers. This has been due to several reasons, primarily due to the shortage of primary (archival) sources on the topic, which resulted in some arguable and biased assessments. The scarcity of published items does not allow a final assessment on the contribution of the Serbian volunteers to the struggle. The author proposes a new survey of the preserved archival materials, especially those kept at the archives of the Supreme Command of the Serbian Army and foreign archives, as well as other sources and publications.

Key words:
WWI, struggle for Slovene Northern and Western borders, Serbian POW’s - volunteers, illegal part of (Slovene) Army, Serbian Army – legal allied army, KIA Serbian volunteers and soldiers

Colonel Janko Vukasović, 1918

In my book Slovene Military Intelligence (2005), Janko Stibiel – Vukasović is presented as follows:

Janko VUKASOVIĆ - STIBIEL, Serbian Army Colonel, b. 1851 at Vrtovin near Ajdovščina (present-day Slovenia), 1876: Serbian resistance volunteer soldier in Bosnia, Serbian Army Sergeant promoted to the rank of Colonel and receiver of several decorations, Supreme-Commander in Chief and Serbian Gendarme Commander, Belgrade defender, participant in the withdrawal across Albania, Salonika Front soldier, 1919: Royal Yugoslav Army Colonel appointed as Assist. Commander of the Drava Division in Ljubljana, 1921: retired, 1923: dies in Ljubljana, buried at his native place.

I have obtained new data from his relative, poetess Tatjana Malec, and the military archives in Vienna and Belgrade. As an Austrian Military Navy Sergeant he deserted into Serbia in 1875, where he worked as a correspondent. He was married to Jelena, General Šturm's daughter. They had six children, among them Academic Pavle Vukasović, PhD.

Colonel Otmar Langerholz, 1939

Here is an update of the data on General Otmar Langerholz, mentioned in my book Slovene Military Intelligence (2005):

I have been contacted by several of his relatives from Belgrade, his grandson Radovan Kovačević, BSc (Eng), his granddaughters Nina Mihajlović, PhD, Sanja Marinković, BA, and Milena Kovačević.
They have contributed the following data: General Otmar Langerholz was born in Celje and died in Belgrade in 1970. He had three daughters, Ivet, Rene and Anriet, who was married to Lieutenant General Milan Kovačević. He was General Maister’s soldier, fighting in Carinthia in 1919. He was in German captivity during WW2, between 1941 and 1945.

Strani so avtorsko zaščitene © 2003-2015 Marijan F. Kranjc, Ljubljana. Objavljanje in kopiranje je dovoljeno samo s pisno privolitvijo avtorja.
Skrbnik strani in oblikovanje Andrej Ivanuša, Maribor. Tehnične napake javite na: andrej.ivanusa@amis.net.