Jugoslawien in Strategie und Politik der Alliierten 1940-1943. by Hans KnollReview by: Gerhard L. WeinbergSlavic Review, Vol. 47, No. 2 (Summer, 1988), pp. 363-364Published by:Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2498514 .

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Reviews 363

Ljusic's initial chapter describes the achievement of autonomy, Serbia's institutions in the early 1830s and the reacquisition of six districts previously controlled by Karadjordje. The au- thor then examines Milos's elimination of the Turkish feudal system and his establishment of a reasonable annual Serbian tribute. There is much valuable statistical data on population as well as information about the economy. The author discusses the constitutional situation, political institutions, and growing popular opposition to Prince Milos's unrestricted absolutism in two chapters. Ljusi6 describes Serbia's relationship with its Turkish suzerain and Milos's steady efforts toward autonomy. In the late 1830s Serbia became a factor in international affairs and leading European powers opened consulates in Belgrade. Two of these powers, Austria and Russia, bla- tantly and persistently interfered in Serbia's internal affairs. In a lengthy chapter the author traces developments in education, literature, and the arts when the basis was being laid for Serbia's eventual emergence as a European state. The book concludes with the story of Prince Milos's abrupt fall from power in 1839. The oligarchical group later known as Defenders of the Constitu- tion used the Turkish constitution of 1838 and Russian support to overthrow the autocratic Milos and to establish a constitutional monarchy. Concludes Ljusi6: "In the 1830s Serbia became an attractive nucleus not just for Serbs but for other Yugoslav peoples" (p. 463).

This most impressive work of scholarship is based upon a wide variety of archival materi- als, especially from the prince's chancellery in the archive of Serbia. Ljusi6 likewise secured valuable data from the Archive of Russian Foreign Policy in Moscow. Clearly written and objec- tively presented, with its wealth of statistical data and detailed notes, this book should remain the definitive work on this important transitional epoch of Serbian history.

DAVID MAcKENZIE University of North Carolina, Greensboro

JUGOSLAWIEN IN STRATEGIE UND POLITIK DER ALLIIERTEN 1940-1943. By Hans Knoll. Siudosteuropaische Arbeiten no. 82. Munich: R. Oldenbourg, 1986. 671 pp. DM 148, cloth.

Like other newly independent or enlarged countries in Eastern Europe, Yugoslavia struggled to develop a stable and functioning order for itself after World War I but saw this effort interrupted by the expansionist activities of the Third Reich. For Yugoslavia, as for the others, the upheaval of World War II would bring internal and external changes, changes especially violent in her case because foreign conquest was accompanied by the horrors of civil war as well as the terrors of occupation. All of these events took place in a setting in which Yugoslavia played a role in the calculations and policies of the major powers, a role at times of great importance and at times quite marginal. When the storm had passed, the country had been altered dramatically. This book illuminates the interaction between the policies of the Allies and the internal developments within Yugoslavia from the beginning of World War II until the major Allies shifted their support to Marshall Tito's partisans in 1943.

Knoll begins with a thoughtful survey of the major literature. He has worked extensively in the British archives, consulted archives in the United States, and has a comprehensive familiarity with both postwar Yugoslavian exile literature and materials published within that country. Given the extraordinary complexity of the subject and the extent to which records are still in large part closed, these characteristics make the book especially important.

He discusses the competition for influence in Yugoslavia in the first months of war and provides detail for the period from the campaign in France to the German invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941. In the discussion of this period the author's mastery of detail is not matched by a realistic assessment of the broader contours of the situation. Always siding with the leaders in Belgrade, he cannot comprehend that their faith in the promises of Adolf Hitler will appear as naive to contemporary readers as it did to the British at the time. Furthermore, the premise that

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364 Slavic Review

joining the Tripartite Pact (with its implied and eventually realized obligation that the signatories declare war on the United States) could have been in Yugoslavia's best interest should surely be tested against the experience of Hungary, Rumania, and Bulgaria.

As for the Belgrade coup of 27 March 1941, Knoll shows that British Minister Ronald Campbell was taken in by the regent, Prince Paul, and opposed the advocates of the coup. The British, though with some contacts to the plotters, had in fact given up all hope. The new govern- ment was as unrealistic about Germany as the one it replaced. The total and immediate military collapse of Yugoslavia was as much a product of its internal problems and the blindness of its leadership as of the swift, bloodily ruthless, and carefully designed operations of the Germans.

Once occupied and partitioned by the Germans, Yugoslavia became one of the first places where the British tried out their new strategy of preparing local subversive groups that would assist the return of British forces to the continent to liberate peoples rising against the Germans once the Germans had been weakened by bombing and blockade. This strategy did not work because of a combination of four elements: The British agencies involved, including the newly organized Special Operations Executive, were hopelessly engaged in internal squabbles; the Yugoslavian leadership in exile was generally incompetent and badly divided; young King Peter showed no signs of qualifications for leadership; and the situation inside Yugoslavia defied the expectations, plans, and hopes of all the allies.

Internal realities never matched external expectations. The Chetniks under Draza Mihailovi6 never had the strength attributed to them, were unwilling to risk reprisals against the population by acting against the occupation forces, and were more interested in postwar than in wartime developments. The partisans under Tito were always willing to risk reprisals, could not be con- trolled as easily by the Soviet Union as either the Soviet Union or the other Allies imagined, and were similarly looking to the future. The Chetniks were prepared to negotiate with the Germans and did work out temporary local agreements with the Italians. Tito's forces, on the other hand, were unwilling to do this during the period covered by Knoll's book. They used the Chetniks' ties to the occupying forces to discredit them but followed a similar policy themselves later.

Knoll shows how the realities within the country began to assert themselves in 1943. Tito's forces were more successful than were the Chetniks in recovering from their defeats of late 1941, and the quiescence of Mihailovi6 in Serbia discredited him. After all, this was the very portion of the country in which he was allegedly strongest and through which the main German railway ran. By summer 1943 the Allies had shifted all their emphasis to the partisans.

In the preceding two years, the British Mediterranean strategy opened up new perspectives for a while, but these had all faded before the slow progress of the war in North Africa and the shortage of allied shipping. Whatever the temporary hopes of some in London, the campaigns in Italy and France would take priority.

Readers will be grateful for Knoll's careful handling of extremely complicated problems with sources. Tight editing would have cut out some detail and repetition. There are a few annoy- ing errors; and at the price charged for the book, a map should have been included. Anyone looking for a guide through the thicket of wartime Yugoslavia will find this book very helpful indeed.

GERHARD L. WEINBERG

Untiversity of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

WIRTSCHAFT UND BESATZUNG IN SERBIEN 1941-1944: EIN BEITRAG ZUJR NA- TIONALSOZIALISTISCHEN WIRTSCHAFTSPOLITIK IN SUDOSTEUROPA. By Karl-Heinz Schlarp. Quellen und Studien zur Geschichte des ostlichen Europa, vol. 25. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 1986. viii, 443 pp. Tables. Figures. Maps. DM 98.00, paper.

Schlarp's book is the second German study in recent years that deals with the occupation and eco- noinic exploitation of part of Yugoslavia during World War II. The first was Holm Sundhaussen's Wirtschaftsgeschichte Kroatiens irn nationalsozialistischen Grossralum 1941-1945 (1983).

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