The concept of Greater Croatia (Croatian: Velika Hrvatska) describes the irredentist belief in the equivalence between the territorial scope of the Croat people and that of the country of Croatia. It is a foundational tenet within multiple variants of Croatian nationalism. The term has been used to describe the Croatian diaspora living in Southeast Europe as a regional sphere of influence. The Croatian language is spoken in many neighboring countries, extending its cultural reach abroad.
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👉 Greater Croatia in the context of Ustaše
The Ustaše (pronounced [ûstaʃe]), also known by anglicised versions Ustasha or Ustashe, was a Croatian fascist and ultranationalist organization active, as one organization, between 1929 and 1945, formally known as the Ustaša – Croatian Revolutionary Movement (Croatian: Ustaša – Hrvatski revolucionarni pokret). From its inception and before the Second World War, the organization engaged in a series of terrorist activities against the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, including collaborating with IMRO to assassinate King Alexander I of Yugoslavia in 1934. During World War II in Yugoslavia, the Ustaše went on to perpetrate the Holocaust and genocide against its Jewish, Serb and Roma populations, killing hundreds of thousands of Serbs, Jews, Roma, as well as Muslim and Croat political dissidents.
The ideology of the movement was a blend of fascism, Roman Catholicism and Croatian ultranationalism. The Ustaše supported the creation of a Greater Croatia that would span the Drina River and extend to the border of Belgrade. The movement advocated a racially "pure" Croatia and promoted genocide against Serbs—due to the Ustaše's anti-Serb sentiment—and Holocaust against Jews and Roma via Nazi racial theory, and persecution of anti-fascist or dissident Croats and Bosniaks. The Ustaše viewed the Bosniaks as "Muslim Croats", and as a result, Bosniaks were not persecuted on the basis of race. The Ustaše espoused Roman Catholicism and Islam as the religions of the Croats and condemned Orthodox Christianity, which was the main religion of the Serbs. Roman Catholicism was identified with Croatian nationalism, while Islam, which had a large following in Bosnia and Herzegovina, was praised by the Ustaše as the religion that "keeps true the blood of Croats."
In this Dossier
Greater Croatia in the context of Yugoslav Wars
The Yugoslav Wars were a series of separate but related ethnic conflicts, wars of independence and insurgencies that took place from 1991 to 2001 in what had been the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFR Yugoslavia). The conflicts both led up to and resulted from the breakup of Yugoslavia, which began in mid-1991, into six independent countries matching the six entities known as republics that had previously constituted Yugoslavia: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, and Macedonia (now called North Macedonia). SFR Yugoslavia's constituent republics declared independence due to rising nationalism. Unresolved tensions between ethnic minorities in the new countries led to the wars. While most of the conflicts ended through peace accords that involved full international recognition of new states, they resulted in a massive number of deaths as well as severe economic damage to the region.
During the initial stages of the breakup of Yugoslavia, the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) sought to preserve the unity of the Yugoslav nation by eradicating all nationalists in the governments of the republics. However, it increasingly came under the influence of Slobodan Milošević, whose government invoked Serbian nationalism as an ideological replacement for the weakening communist system. As a result, the JNA began to lose Slovenes, Croats, Kosovar Albanians, Bosniaks, and Macedonians, and effectively became a fighting force of only Serbs and Montenegrins. According to a 1994 report by the United Nations (UN), the Serb side did not aim to restore Yugoslavia; instead, it aimed to create a "Greater Serbia" from parts of Croatia and Bosnia. Other irredentist movements have also been brought into connection with the Yugoslav Wars, such as "Greater Albania" (from Kosovo, idea abandoned following international diplomacy) and "Greater Croatia" (from parts of Herzegovina, abandoned in 1994 with the Washington Agreement).
Greater Croatia in the context of World War II persecution of Serbs
The Genocide of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia (Serbo-Croatian: Genocid nad Srbima u Nezavisnoj Državi Hrvatskoj / Геноцид над Србима у Независној Држави Хрватској) was the systematic persecution and extermination of Serbs committed during World War II by the fascist Ustaše regime in the Nazi German puppet state known as the Independent State of Croatia (Serbo-Croatian: Nezavisna Država Hrvatska / Независна Држава Хрватска, NDH) between 1941 and 1945. It was carried out through executions in death camps, as well as through mass murder, ethnic cleansing, deportations, forced conversions, and war rape. This genocide was simultaneously carried out with the Holocaust in the NDH as well as the genocide of Roma, by combining Nazi racial policies with the ultimate goal of creating an ethnically pure Greater Croatia.
The ideological foundation of the Ustaše movement reaches back to the 19th century. Several Croatian nationalists and intellectuals established theories about Serbs as an inferior race. The World War I legacy, as well as the opposition of a group of nationalists to the unification into a common state of South Slavs, influenced ethnic tensions in the newly formed Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (since 1929 Kingdom of Yugoslavia). The 6 January Dictatorship and the later anti-Croat policies of the Serb-dominated Yugoslav government in the 1920s and 1930s fueled the rise of nationalist and far-right movements. This culminated in the rise of the Ustaše, an ultranationalist, terrorist organization, founded by Ante Pavelić. The movement was financially and ideologically supported by Benito Mussolini, and it was also involved in the assassination of King Alexander I.
Greater Croatia in the context of Croatian nationalism
Croatian nationalism is the set of political, economic, civic, cultural, and ethnic ideologies that promotes the interests and influences within Croatia, the Croat people, Croatian citizens and the Croatian diaspora. It indicates the aspects that characterize and distinguish Croatian society as an autonomous community. The national identity and self-determination of Croatia has seen significant dynamism throughout its history. The cultural and ethnic unity of Croats has been a key component of nationalism since the 19th century. Roman Catholicism and the Illyrian movement influenced early-stage nationalist ideas. The claim and promise of historic statehood for Croats has informed many varieties of modern Croatian nationalism. This created the concept of Greater Croatia, the belief in the equivalence between the territorial scope of the Croatian people and that of the Croatian state. This regional sphere of influence spreads Croatian nationalism across Southeast Europe.
Following the independence of Croatia in 1991, modern Croatian society has been dominated by ethnic nationalism and historical revisionism. Its deepening integration within Europe and the broader Western world, has led to increased legal and rational concepts of nationalism such as the shared Croatian language, cultural traditions, national values, and citizenship. Croatian nationalism exists across the ideological spectrum – from the left-wing to the right-wing – of the country's political establishment. Croatia has strong ultranationalist (or hyper-nationalist) currents that advocate for extreme interpretations of Croatian hegemony, which has at times led to ethnic tension and political violence. Many national symbols and cultural exports define Croatian nationalism, including its national flag, anthem, soccer team, tourism sector, and cuisine, among others.