Quid Pro Quo? Croatia and Russia-USSR Respective Genocides Against Serbs and Poles

Why Eastern Orthodoxy - Russia has been so relatively quiet about the WW2 Croatian Clerical fascist Genocide Against Serbs?

In writing this blog Continuing Counter Reformation, I've long wondered why Russia has been so relatively quiet about the Roman Catholic Croatian genocide against the Eastern Orthodox Serbs in Yugoslavia during WW2.

Might this because of the Russian-USSR l930s and WW2 era genocide against the Polish/Polish descended peoples of the western USSR (primarily the Moscovite occupied lands of the traditional Polish Commonwealth)?

You may massacre the primarily Eastern Orthodox Serbs to the west of the Amber Path/Great Schism Line in northern Yugoslavia, if we may do that same to those primarily Roman Catholic (and perhaps minority Protestant) Poles to the east of that Line.  After all, we - the EASTERN pillar of the Roman Empire was already doing it during the 1930s before the 1939 outbreak of WW2 in Europe.

Quid pro quo ("something for something" in Latin^[1]) means an exchange of goods or services, where one transfer is contingent upon the other. English speakers often use the term to mean "a favour for a favour"; phrases with similar meaning include: "give and take", "tit for tat", and "you scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_Yezhov

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocides_in_history

Croatia

After the Nazi invasion of Yugoslavia, the Nazis and fascists established the Croatian state known as the Nezavisna Država Hrvatska (Independent State of Croatia) or NDH. Immediately afterwards, the NDH began a terror campaign against Serbs, Jews and Romani people. From 1941 to 1945, when Josip Broz Tito's partisans liberated Croatia, the Ustaše regime killed approximately 300,000 to 350,000 people,^[201] mostly Serbs and almost the entire Jewish and Romani population, many of them in the Jasenovac concentration camp. Helen Fein estimated that the Ustaše killed virtually every Romani in the country.^[202] The Ustaše enacted a policy that called for a solution to the "Serbian problem" in Croatia. The solution was to "kill one-third of the Serbs, expel one-third, and convert one-third".^[203] According to the United States Holocaust Museum, 320,000–340,000 ethnic Serbs were murdered under Ustaše rule.^[204] The Yad Vashem World Holocaust Museum and Research Center concludes that "more than 500,000 Serbs were murdered in horribly sadistic ways, 250,000 were expelled, and another 200,000 were forced to convert".^[205] The Ustaše killed nearly 80,000 Roma and 35,000 Jews.

Some historians consider the crimes of the Chetniks in Bosnia against non-Serbs to constitute genocide.^[206][207]

Volhynia and Eastern Galicia

Massacres of Poles in Volhynia in 1943. Most Poles of Volhynia (now in Ukraine) had either been murdered or had fled the area.

The massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia were part of an ethnic cleansing operation carried out by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) West in the Nazi-occupied regions of Eastern Galicia (Nazi created Distrikt Galizien in General Government), and UPA North in Volhynia (in Nazi created Reichskommissariat Ukraine), from March 1943 until the end of 1944. The peak took place in July/August 1943 when a senior UPA commander, Dmytro Klyachkivsky, ordered the liquidation of the entire male Polish population between 16 and 60 years of age.^[208][209] Despite this, most were women and children. The UPA killed 40,000–60,000 Polish civilians in Volhynia,^[210] from 25,000^[211] to 30,000–40,000 in Eastern Galicia.^[210] The killings were directly linked with the policies of the Bandera fraction of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists, whose goal, specified at the Second Conference of the OUN-B, was to remove non-Ukrainians from a future Ukrainian state.^[212]

The massacres are recognized in Poland as ethnic cleansing with "marks of genocide."^[213] According to IPN prosecutor Piotr Zając, the crimes have a "character of genocide".^[214] However, according to Katchanovski, the actions in Volhynia lacked evidence of an intent to eliminate all or part of the Polish population, and the anti-Polish action was mostly limited to a small region.

Yes, prior to the respective western and eastern Roman Empire massacre within Croatia and U.S.S.R. occupied eastern 2nd Respospolita, this already happened in the 'Byelorussian' and in the 'Ukrainian' S.S.R.

In and near Byelorussia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Polish_Operation_of_the_NKVD_%281937%E2%80%931938%29

The Polish Operation of the NKVD in 1937–1938 was a Soviet Great Purge-era mass operation against purported Polish agents in the Soviet Union, explicitly ordered against Polish spies, but interpreted by the NKVD as relating to "absolutely all Poles". It resulted in the sentencing of 139,835 people and the execution of 111,091 Poles,^[1] and those accused of working for Poland.^[2] The operation was implemented according to NKVD Order № 00485 signed by Nikolai Yezhov.^[3] Not all, but the majority were ethnic Poles according to Timothy Snyder: 85,000 is given by him as a "conservative estimate" of the number of executed Poles.^[4] The remainder being 'suspected' to be Polish without further inquiry.^[3]

NKVD personnel gathered Polish-sounding names from local telephone books in order to speed up the process. In Leningrad alone, almost 7,000 citizens were rounded up. A vast majority of them were executed within 10 days of arrest.^[5] In the fourteen months after the adoption of Order № 00485, 143,810 people were captured, of whom 139,885 were sentenced by extrajudicial organs, and 111,091 executed (nearly 80% of all victims).^[6]

It was the largest ethnic shooting and deportation action during the Great Terror.^[7]

Order № 00485

NKVD Order No. 00485 called "On the liquidation of the Polish diversionist and espionage groups and POW units" was approved on August 9, 1937 by the Party's Central Committee Politburo, and was signed by Nikolai Yezhov on August 11, 1937.^[3] It was distributed to the local subdivisions of the NKVD simultaneously with Yezhov's thirty-page "secret letter" explaining what the "Polish operation" was all about. The letter was entitled "On fascist-resurrectionist, spying, diversional, defeationist, and terrorist activity of Polish intelligence in the USSR".^[8] Stalin himself demanded to "keep on digging out and cleaning out this Polish filth."^[9] The operation was the second in a series of national operations of the NKVD, carried out by the Soviet Union against ethnic diasporas including Latvian, Finnish, German and Romanian, based on a theory about the fifth column residing along its western borders, and the Party's pronouncement of a "hostile capitalist surrounding." On the other hand, Timothy Snyder suggests that the argument was intended only to provide justification for the state-sanctioned campaign of mass-murder meant to eradicate Poles as a national (and linguistic) minority group.^[9]

Scale of the Polish Operation and its victims

The largest group of people with Polish background, around 40 percent of all victims, came from the Soviet Ukraine, especially from the districts near the border with Poland. Among them, tens of thousands of peasants, railway workers, industrial labourers, engineers and others. An additional 17 percent of victims came from the Soviet Byelorussia. The rest came from around Western Siberia and Kazakhstan where exiled Poles lived since the Partitions, as well as from southern Urals, northern Caucasus and the rest of Siberia including the Far East.^[6]

The following categories of people were arrested during the Polish operation of the NKVD, as described in Soviet documents:

• "Active" members of the Polish minority in Soviet Union (practically all Poles).
• All immigrants from Poland.
• Political refugees from Poland (mostly members of the Communist Party of Poland).
• Former and present members of the Polish Socialist Party and other non-communist Polish political parties.
• All prisoners of war from the Polish-Soviet war that remained in the Soviet Union.
• Members of Polska Organizacja Wojskowa listed in the special list (most of them were not in fact members of that organisation).

The operation took place approximately from August 25, 1937 to November 15, 1938.^[10] According to archives of the NKVD: 111,091 Poles and people accused of ties with Poland, were sentenced to death, and 28,744 were sentenced to labor camps ('dry guillotine' of slow death by exposure, malnutrition, and overwork);^[11] 139,835 victims in total.^[12] This number constitutes 10% of the total number of people officially convicted during the Yezhovshchina period with confirming NKVD documents.^[13] The Operation was only a peak in the persecution of the Poles, spanning over a decade. As the Soviet statistics indicate, the number of ethnic Poles in the USSR dropped by 165,000 in that period. "It is estimated that Polish losses in the Ukrainian SSR were about 30%, while in the Belorussian SSR... the Polish minority was almost completely annihilated."^[10] Historian Michael Ellman asserts that the 'national operations', particularly the 'Polish operation', may constitute genocide as defined by the UN convention.^[14] His opinion is shared by Simon Sebag Montefiore, who calls the Polish operation of the NKVD 'a mini-genocide.'^[15] Polish writer and journalist, Dr Tomasz Sommer, also refers to the operation as a genocide, along with Prof. Marek Jan Chodakiewicz among others.^{[16][17][18][19][20][21][22]}

Almost all victims of the NKVD shootings were men, wrote Michał Jasiński, most with families. Their wives and children were dealt with by the NKVD Order № 00486. The women were being sentenced to deportations to Kazakhstan for an average of 5 to 10 years. Their children, put in orphanages to be brought up as Soviet, with no knowledge of their own origins. All possessions of the accused were confiscated. The parents of the executed men – as well as their in-laws – were purposely left with nothing to live on, which usually sealed their fate as well. Statistical extrapolation, wrote Jasiński, increases the number of Polish victims in 1937–1938 to around 200–250,000 depending on size of their families.^[23]

Footnotes

1. Goldman, Wendy Z. (2011). Inventing the Enemy: Denunciation and Terror in Stalin's Russia. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-19196-8. p. 217.
2. Snyder, Timothy (January 27, 2011). "Hitler vs. Stalin: Who Was Worse?". The New York Review of Books. p. 1, paragraph #7. Retrieved June 12, 2012.
3. Н.В.Петров, А.Б.Рогинский. ""Польская операция" НКВД 1937–1938 гг." (in Russian). НИПЦ «Мемориал». Retrieved May 27, 2012. "Original title: О фашистско-повстанческой, шпионской, диверсионной, пораженческой и террористической деятельности польской разведки в СССР"
4. Snyder, Timothy (2010). Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin. New York: Basic Books. ISBN 978-0-465-00239-9. pp. 103–104.
5. Joshua Rubenstein. "The Devils’ Playground". The New York Times. Retrieved April 26, 2011. "Rubenstein is the Northeast regional director of Amnesty International USA and a co-editor of The Unknown Black Book: The Holocaust in the German-Occupied Soviet Territories."
6. Robert Gellately, Ben Kiernan (2003). The specter of genocide: mass murder in historical perspective.. Cambridge University Press. p. 396. ISBN 0521527503. "Polish operation (page 233 –)"
7. "A letter from Timothy Snyder of Bloodlands: Two genocidaires, taking turns in Poland". The Book Haven. Stanford University. December 15, 2010. Retrieved April 25, 2011.
8. Original doc. (see full text in the Russian language) entitled: "О фашистско-повстанческой, шпионской, диверсионной, пораженческой и террористической деятельности польской разведки в СССР." Хлевнюк О. В. Политбюро: Механизмы политической власти в 1930-е гг. М., 1996.
9. Matthew Kaminski (October 18, 2010). "Savagery in the East". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved April 26, 2011.
10. Prof. Bogdan Musial (January 25–26, 2011). "The 'Polish operation' of the NKVD". The Baltic and Arctic Areas under Stalin. Ethnic Minorities in the Great Soviet Terror of 1937-38. University of Stefan Wyszyński in Warsaw. p. 17. Retrieved April 26, 2011. "UMEA International Research Group. Abstracts of Presentations."
11. Dr. Eric J. Schmaltz. "Soviet "Paradise" Revisited: Genocide, Dissent, Memory and Denial". GRHS Heritage Society. Retrieved April 26, 2011.
12. OA Gorlanov. "A breakdown of the chronology and the punishment, NKVD Order № 00485 (Polish operation) in Google translate". Retrieved April 26, 2011.
13. McLoughlin, References, p. 164
14. Michael Ellman, Stalin and the Soviet Famine of 1932-33 Revisited PDF file
15. Simon Sebag Montefiore. Stalin. The Court of the Red Tsar, page 229. Vintage Books, New York 2003. Vintage ISBN 1-4000-7678-1]
16. Prof. Marek Jan Chodakiewicz (2011-01-15). "Nieopłakane ludobójstwo (Genocide Not Mourned)". Rzeczpospolita. Retrieved April 28, 2011.
17. Franciszek Tyszka. "Tomasz Sommer: Ludobójstwo Polaków z lat 1937-38 to zbrodnia większa niż Katyń (Genocide of Poles in the years 1937-38, a Crime Greater than Katyn)". Super Express. Retrieved April 28, 2011.
18. "Rozstrzelać Polaków. Ludobójstwo Polaków w Związku Sowieckim (To Execute the Poles. Genocide of Poles in the Soviet Union)". Historyton. Retrieved April 28, 2011.
19. Polska Agencja Prasowa (2010-06-24). "Publikacja na temat eksterminacji Polaków w ZSRR w latach 30 (Publication on the Subject of Extermination of Poles in the Soviet Union during the 1930s)". Portal Wiara.pl. Retrieved April 28, 2011.
20. Prof. Iwo Cyprian Pogonowski (22 March 2011). "Rozkaz N.K.W.D.: No. 00485 z dnia 11-VIII-1937, a Polacy". Polish Club Online. Retrieved April 28, 2011. "See also, Tomasz Sommer: Ludobójstwo Polaków w Związku Sowieckim (Genocide of Poles in the Soviet Union), article published by The Polish Review vol. LV, No. 4, 2010."
21. "Sommer, Tomasz. Book description (Opis).". Rozstrzelać Polaków. Ludobójstwo Polaków w Związku Sowieckim w latach 1937-1938. Dokumenty z Centrali (Genocide of Poles in the Soviet Union). Księgarnia Prawnicza, Lublin. Retrieved April 28, 2011.
22. "Konferencja "Rozstrzelać Polaków – Ludobójstwo Polaków w Związku Sowieckim" (Conference on Genocide of Poles in the Soviet Union), Warsaw". Instytut Globalizacji oraz Press Club Polska in cooperation with Memorial Society. Retrieved April 28, 2011.
23. Michał Jasiński (2010-10-27). "Zapomniane ludobójstwo stalinowskie (The forgotten Stalinist genocide)". Gliwicki klub Fondy. Czytelnia. Retrieved April 28, 2011.

Further reading

• McLoughlin, Barry, and McDermott, Kevin (eds). Stalin's Terror: High Politics and Mass Repression in the Soviet Union. Palgrave Macmillan, December 2002. ISBN 1403901198.
• Paczkowski, Andrzej (1999), "Poland, the "Enemy Nation"", in Stéphane Courtois et al., Black Book of Communism, pp. 372–375

Plus what happened in Ukraine to the KulAKS:

Holodomor

Main article: Holodomor

Passers-by ignore corpses of starved peasants on a street in Kharkiv, 1933.

During the Soviet famine of 1932–33 that affected Ukraine, Kazakhstan and some densely populated regions of Russia, the scale of death in Ukraine is referred to as the Holodomor and is recognized as genocide by the governments of Australia, Argentina, Georgia, Estonia, Italy, Canada, Lithuania, Poland, the USA and Hungary. The famine was caused by the confiscation of the whole 1933 harvest in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, the Kuban (a densely populated Ukrainian region), and some other parts of the Soviet Union, leaving the peasants too little to feed themselves. As a result, an estimated ten million died, including over seven million in Ukraine, one million in the North Caucasus and one million elsewhere.^[145] American historian Timothy Snyder wrote of "3.3 million Soviet citizens (mostly Ukrainians) deliberately starved by their own government in Soviet Ukraine in 1932–1933"^[146]

In addition to the requisitioning of crops in Ukraine, all food was confiscated by Soviet authorities. Any and all aid and food was prohibited from entering the Ukrainian republic. Ukraine's Yuschenko administration recognised the Holodomor as an act of genocide and pushed international governments to acknowledge this.^[147] This move was opposed by the Russian government and some members of the Ukrainian parliament. A Ukrainian court found Joseph Stalin, Vyacheslav Molotov, Lazar Kaganovich, Stanislav Kosior, Pavel Postyshev, Vlas Chubar and Mendel Khatayevich guilty of genocide on 13 January 2010.^[148][149] As of 2010, the Russian government's official position was that the famine took place, but was not an ethnic genocide;^[147] former Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych supported this position.^[150][151] A ruling of January 13, 2010 by Kyiv's Court of Appeal declared the Soviet leaders guilty of 'genocide against the Ukrainian national group in 1932–33 through the artificial creation of living conditions intended for its partial physical destruction.'"^[152]

http://continuingcounterreformation.blogspot.com/2014/02/kiev-founded-by-east-polans.html

^{http://continuingcounterreformation.blogspot.com/2014/02/crafted-in-austria-west-ukrainian.html}

B16 "'Kaboom' Moment"- Praises Stepinac in Croatia

From Wispers in the Loggia:

http://whispersintheloggia.blogspot.com/2011/06/hour-and-glory-b16-in-croatia.htmlhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif


excerpt

That said, whenever the Pope renders a "kaboom" moment in his travels, it tends to come not when Benedict speaks to the general church, but in his words to the ad intra crowd of clergy, religious and seminarians, as an underscore of their particular responsibility in ecclesial life, with an eye to the current challenges of the environment in which they serve.

Accordingly, before the cathedral tomb of now-Blessed Alojzije Stepinac (1898-1960) -- the 20th century cardinal-archbishop of Zagreb, now celebrated as a martyr as he was believed to have been poisoned under Communist house-arrest -- one of these pointed talks was had, with gentle prods among its threads on the need for courage and unity alike, pursuing a program of priestly formation that's attuned to the realities of our time, the proper way of presenting Catholic moral teaching, and (in the face of a checkered history between the groups) the task of church leadership to "strive for reconciliation" between Christians and Muslims:

This evening we gather for a devoted and prayerful remembrance of Blessed Alojzije Stepinac, a fearless Pastor and an example of apostolic zeal and Christian fortitude, whose heroic life continues today to illuminate the faithful of the Dioceses of Croatia, sustaining the faith and life of the Church in this land. The merits of this unforgettable Bishop are derived essentially from his faith: in his life, he always had his gaze fixed on Jesus, to whom he was always conformed, to the point of becoming a living image of Christ, and of Christ suffering. Precisely because of his strong Christian conscience, he knew how to resist every form of totalitarianism, becoming, in a time of Nazi and Fascist dictatorship, a defender of the Jews, the Orthodox and of all the persecuted, and then, in the age of communism, an advocate for his own faithful, especially for the many persecuted and murdered priests. Yes, he became an advocate for God on this earth, since he tenaciously defended the truth and man’s right to live with God.

“For by a single offering [Christ] has perfected for all time those who are sanctified” (Heb 10:14). This phrase from the Letter to the Hebrews which we have just heard, invites us to consider the figure of Blessed Cardinal Stepinac according to the “form” of Christ and his sacrifice. Christian martyrdom is in fact the highest measure of holiness, but it is so always and only thanks to Christ, by his gift, as a response to his oblation which we receive in the Eucharist. Blessed Alojzije Stepinac responded with his priesthood, with the episcopate, with the sacrifice of his life: a unique “yes” united to that of Christ. His martyrdom signals the culmination of the violence perpetrated against the Church during the terrible period of communist persecution. Croatian Catholics, and in particular the clergy, were objects of oppression and systematic abuse, aimed at destroying the Catholic Church, beginning with its highest Authority in this place. That particularly difficult period was characterized by a generation of Bishops, priests and Religious who were ready to die rather than to betray Christ, the Church and the Pope. The people saw that the priests never lost faith, hope and charity, and thus they remained always united. This unity explains what is humanly inexplicable: that such a hardened regime could not make the Church bow down.

Today too, the Church in Croatia is called to be united, to meet the challenges of a changed social context, identifying with missionary fervour new ways of evangelization, especially in the service of younger generations. My dear Brother Bishops, I would like to encourage you above all in the fulfilment of your mission. The more you work in fruitful cooperation among yourselves and in communion with the Successor of Peter, the more you will be able to confront the difficulties of our age. It also important for Bishops above all and for priests to strive for reconciliation among separated Christians and between Christians and Muslims, following the footsteps of Christ who is our peace. Regarding your priests, do not neglect to offer them clear spiritual, doctrinal and pastoral directions. While the Christian community admits legitimate diversity within itself, it cannot render faithful witness to the Lord except in the communion of its members. This requires of you the service of vigilance, offered in dialogue and with great love, but also with clarity and firmness. Dear Brothers, adhering to Christ means “keeping his word” (cf. Jn 14:23).

To this end, Blessed Cardinal Stepinac expressed himself in this way: “One of the greatest evils of our time is mediocrity in the questions of faith. Let us not deceive ourselves… Either we are Catholic or we are not. If we are, this must be seen in every area of our life” (Homily on the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, 29 June 1943). The Church’s moral teaching, often misunderstood today, cannot be detached from the Gospel. It falls particularly to the Bishops to propose it authoritatively to the faithful, in order to assist them in evaluating their personal responsibilities and in harmonizing their moral choices with the demands of the faith. In this way, your society will make progress towards that “cultural shift” necessary for promoting a culture of life and a society worthy of man.

Dear priests – especially those of you in charge of parishes – I know the importance and the variety of your tasks in an age when the scarcity of priests is beginning to make itself felt strongly. I urge you not to lose heart, to remain vigilant in prayer and in your spiritual lives, in order to perform your ministry fruitfully: to teach, to sanctify and to guide all those who are entrusted to your care. Welcome with magnanimity those who knock at the door of your heart, offering to each one the gifts that divine goodness has entrusted to you. Persevere in communion with your Bishops and in mutual cooperation. Nourish your commitment at the life-giving waters of Scripture, the Sacraments, the constant praise of God, always open and docile to the actions of the Holy Spirit; you will thus be effective workers in the new evangelization, which you are called to realize together with the laity, in a coordinated way and without confusing what pertains to ordained ministry with what belongs to the universal priesthood of all the baptized. Keep close to your hearts the promotion of vocations to the priesthood; by your enthusiasm and your fidelity, strive to transmit a living desire to respond generously and without hesitation to Christ, who calls each one to be conformed more intimately to himself, Head and Shepherd.

Dear consecrated men and women, how much the Church expects of you, who have the mission of bearing witness in every age to “the way of life which Jesus, the supreme Consecrated One and missionary of the Father for the sake of his Kingdom, embraced and proposed to his disciples” (Vita Consecrata, 22). May God himself be your only treasure: let yourselves be formed by him, thus making visible to the men and women of today – athirst for true values – the holiness, truth, and love of our heavenly Father. Sustained by the grace of the Spirit, speak to the people with the eloquence of a life transfigured by the newness of Easter. Your whole existence will thus become a sign of, and a service to, the consecration received by each of the baptized when they were incorporated into Christ.

To the young people preparing themselves for the priesthood or the consecrated life, I wish to repeat that the divine Master is constantly at work in the world and he says to all those he calls, “Follow me” (Mt 9:9). It is a call which asks to be confirmed every day with a response of love. May your hearts always be ready! May the heroic testimony of Blessed Alojzije Stepinac inspire a renewal of vocations among the young people of Croatia. And you, dear Brothers in the Episcopate and the priesthood, do not neglect to offer to young seminarians and novices a balanced formation, to prepare them for a ministry that is well integrated into the society of our time, thanks to the depth of their spiritual lives and the seriousness of their studies.

With the Croatian visit now in the books, the pontiff is off the road 'til mid-August, when he'll journey to Madrid for PopeTrip #20 and the Spanish capital's much-heralded hosting of global Catholicism's Olympic event: the triennihttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifal international World Youth Day, which will overtake the city for a full week, with crowds in excess of a million expected.

Following that, October will see Benedict's third journey to his German homeland since his election, but this time with the full panoply of a state visit and official reception in Berlin.

http://vaticancrusadebalkans.blogspot.com/2011/06/welcome-in-croatia-beast.html

Pope B16 to visit Croatia!

This announcement from the Vatican, 3 days after the guilty verdicts

Schedule set for Pope's June visit to Croatia April 18, 2011
http://www.catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=10026

The Vatican has released the full schedule for a trip by Pope Benedict XVI to Croatia, to take place June 4-5.

The trip—the Pontiff’s first foreign trip of this year—will coincide with the National Day for Croatian Families.

The Holy Father will leave Rome on Saturday morning, June 4, and arrive at Zagreb’s Pleso airport at 11. After a welcoming ceremony he will go to the presidential palace to meet with President Ivo Josipovic, then to the residence of the apostolic nuncio, where he will meet with Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor. Saturday evening the Pope will meet with community leaders in Zagreb, then preside at a prayer vigil for young people.

On Sunday morning, June 5, the Pope will preside at Mass for the National Day for Croatian Families at a stadium in Zagreb. After lunch with the country’s bishops he will lead a Vespers service for clergy and religious at the city’s cathedral, and pray at the tomb of Blessed Cardinal Aloysius Stepinac. Then he will meet with Cardinal Josip Bozanic, and travel from the cardinal’s residence to the airport for his return flight to Rome.

Here's the schedule:

Monday, April 18, 2011
PROGRAM OF THE POPE'S APOSTOLIC TRIP TO CROATIA
VATICAN CITY, 18 APR 2011 (VIS)
- Following is the program of Benedict XVI's apostolic trip to Croatia - scheduled for 4 - 5 June - for the National Day of Croatian Families.

The Pope will leave at 9:30am on Saturday, 4 June, from Rome's Fiumicino Airport and will land at Pleso International Airport in Zagreb at 11:00am. After the welcoming ceremony, a courtesy visit will be made to Ivo Josipovic, the President of the Republic, at the presidential palace, following which the Pope will meet with Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor at the apostolic nunciature at 1:50pm. At 6:15pm, in the National Croatian Theater of Zagreb, he will meet with representatives of civil society, the political, academic, cultural, and business world, the diplomatic corps, and religious figures. At 7:30pm, in Josip Jelacic Square, he will preside over a prayer vigil with the Croatian youth.

On Sunday, 5 June, at 10:00am, he will celebrate Holy Mass on the National Day of Croatian Families in the Zagreb Hippodrome. At 2:00pm he will have lunch at the new offices of the Secretary of the Croatian Bishops' Council with the Croatian and other invited bishops. At 5:00pm he will presided over vespers with the bishops, priests, religious, and seminarians and will pray at the tomb of Blessed Aloysius Viktor Stepinac at Zagreb's Cathedral dedicated to the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary and to St. Stephen. When finished there he will meet with Cardinal Josip Bozanic, archbishop of Zagreb, at his residence, and at 7:15pm will travel to Pleso Airport where, at 7:45pm he will make the return flight to Rome. The flight is scheduled to land at Rome's Ciampino Airport at 9:15pm.

PV-CROATIA/ VIS 20110418 (270)
Published by VIS - Holy See Press Office - Monday, April 18, 2011

Persecution of Orthodox By Roman Catholics Emerges

Friday, April 15, 2011
At last - the true horror of the persecution of Serbs by Croats emergeshttp://archbishop-cranmer.blogspot.com/2011/04/at-last-true-horror-of-persecution-of.html

His Grace has occasionally turned to this matter, but it is generally not an angle which interests the 'mainstream media'. Today, however, The Guardian reports that two Croatian generals - Ante Gotovina and Mladen Markač - have been found guilty of war crimes against the Serbs, and have received lengthy jail terms.

This was, of course, a Roman Catholic Croat majority against an Orthodox Serb minority, but it is rarely reported in those terms. Today, The Guardian boldly refers to a 'recalcitrant and powerful Catholic church'. Usually, only when the report is of the persecution of Bosnian Muslims does a hint of religion enter the equation. We are told:

Judges in The Hague found Ante Gotovina and Mladen Markač guilty on eight of nine counts for commanding operations that included the shelling of civilians, the torching of Serbian homes in south-west Croatia, the murder of hundreds of elderly Serbs and the forced exodus of at least 20,000 from the Serbian minority rooted in the Dalmatian hinterland for centuries.

Gotovina was given a 24-year jail sentence; Markač was jailed for 18 years.

This represents a political disaster and profound diplomatic embarassment for Croatia: but it is a triumphant vindication for Serbia. Effectively, the Croats have been told that the decisive victory of the war, which sealed their independent statehood, was a war crime. The judges found:

"Croatian forces committed acts of murder, cruel treatment, inhumane acts, destruction, plunder, persecution and deportation. There was a widespread and systematic attack directed against this Serb civilian population, (creating) an environment in which those present there had no choice but to leave."

His Grace has been sent a letter relating to this, which he is pleased to publish:

Sir

A UN court in the Hague has convicted a key wartime Croatian commander, General Ante Gotovina and another General Mladen Markac of committing atrocities in a campaign of shelling, murder and persecution which drove Serbs out of Croatia's Krajina border region in 1995. Having spoken at a Downing Street demonstration at the time, trying to get the British media to acknowledge those crimes, I am personally pleased.

At last the true horror of the persecutions of Serbs by Croats is acknowledged officially in western media who, throughout the Yugoslav war (begun by Croatia in 1991 when they declared illegal independence and started persecuting Serbs in Croatia) blamed only the Serbs.

The Yugoslav war crimes tribunal has also delivered a damning verdict on Croatia's then-president, Franjo Tudjman who declared that independence and whose 1969 book described genocide "as a natural phenomenon commanded by the Almighty in defence of the only true faith (Roman Catholicism)" - Serbs are of course Orthodox Christians. I note that even today the Croatian Roman Catholic Church has defended these convicted Generals.

Tudjman was said by the Court to have led a "joint criminal enterprise" to repopulate the Krajina region with Croats after driving out Serbs. It was Tudjman who had the full support of Germany and Croatia has been invited to join the European Union!

Yours etc

Rodney Atkinson

Croatian 'Operation Storm' Generals Convicted of War Crimes

Apparantly, some Croatians feel that it was okay to drive people from their homes because they were Orthodox rather then Roman Catholic.

Reportedly some 30, 000 appeared in downtown Zagreb (2008 population 804,020) to protest the guilty verdict.

This too, is the position of Croatia's national government.

"Operation Storm"- the summer 1995 miltary offensive being reported as the culmination of Croatia's independence from Yugoslavia, was against the Serbian Krijina Republic, which had succeeded from Croatia after Croatia succeeded from Yugoslavia, with the Krijina being Croatia's Serbian inhabitated regions. Whereas its stated mission was to destroy the Krijina Republic and reincorporate it into Croatia, it included the driving out of some 300,000 Serbian peoples.

Reportedly they were particularly incensed about the finding that operation storm was a 'criminal enterprise'. Indeed! I can agree with this insofar as yes the U.S. and NATO were co-conspirators- and by extension the U.S. State Department and the Clinton Administration.

Indeed, in reporting on these legal preceedings, The New York Times, in an article dated March 12, 2008, reported:

The New York Times wrote that the trial of Gotovina, Cermak and Markac will reveal the role of America in the Croatian Operation Storm.

The trial of Croatian general Ante Gotovina, who closely cooperated with American advisers as he directed the Operation Storm in 1995, may draw the attention on the covert American role in Croatia’s counter-offensive action against the Serbs, The New York Times reports.

“United States military advisers, among them retired and active personnel, helped plan the operation, and Americans directed drone aircraft over the battle zone to gain real-time intelligence for Croatian forces, Croatian officials have said” the NY Times reports.

Alluding to attorneys familiar with the trial, the daily wrote that the United States were not involved with any criminal charges related to the operation, but some of the American intelligence methods or sources could be disclosed.

“Washington has taken a keen interest in the trial, and American diplomats have visited the United Nations war crimes tribunal in The Hague to discuss the case, a former senior prosecutor said” the NYT added.

This url cites an article by Ivo Pukanic in Nacional, Croatian weekly magazine

http://www.nacional.hr/index3e.php?broj=2005-05-24&kat=english&id=516

May 24, 2005

Thrilled with Operation Flash, President Clinton gave the go ahead for Operation Storm

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The United States was actively involved in the preparation, monitoring and initiation of Operation Storm: the green light from President Clinton was passed on by the US military attache in Zagreb, and the operations were transmitted in real time to the Pentagon

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Considering that the US was much more interested in the situation in BiH than in Croatia, they asked Croatia to permit them to install a military base with ummanned aircraft. The United States not only monitored the complete Operation Storm, but they also actively participated with the Croatian Military in its preparation, and in the end directly initiated the operation. The green light from the White House and then President Clinton for Operation Storm was passed on by Colonel Richard C. Herrick, then US military attaché in Zagreb. Several days prior to the commencement of Operation Storm, Herrick visited Markica Rebiæ in Zagreb. Rebiæ, Miroslav Tudjman, then director of HIS and Miro Medimurac, then head of SIS, held the most intensive communications with the American military and intelligence agencies. As such, in 1996, Rebiæ was awarded the Meritorius Service Medal by Peter Galbraith, then US Ambassador to Croatia.

Herrick passed on the message that the US had no opposition to the beginning of Operation Storm, that the operation had to be ‘clean and fast’ and had to be completed in 5 days time. As Nacional has learned, Rebiæ was surprised that such an important political and military message would be passed on through those channels, and following Herrick’s visit, he immediately informed the state administration of the message in writing, and there is certain record of this today in the archives. As such, it is important to note the Ambassador Peter Galbraith was completely left out of the chain of ‘command’, and that this message came directly from President Clinton, Anthony Lake (then National Security Advisor) and Willian Perry (then Defense Secretary) via Rebiæ to Minister Gojko Šušak and President Tudjman.

This was the climax of the cooperation between the US and Croatia, which began to develop in 1992 at the beginning of the Serbian-Muslim war. In 1995, Clinton was preparing for his re-election, and Bob Dole was the Republican candidate who had requested that Congress remove the arms embargo for the Muslims in BiH. For Clinton, the Balkans became an important issue due to internal matters in the US and his stay in the White House. In their strategy to resolve the crisis, they decided to use Croatia to attack the Serbian forces in BiH, and therefore the Split Declaration was signed by Izetbegoviæ and Tudjman, which permitted the entry of HV forces under the leadership of Ante Gotovina into BiH for the purposes of cooperation with Army BiH. In order to realize that operation, HV had to climb the Dinarid mountains above Knin and liberate the city and Krajina through Operation Storm, and then immediately transfer their troops into BiH in order to pressure the Serbs and force Miloševiæ to sign the Peace Accord in Dayton.

This was a battle against the clock for Clinton, for he needed a quick solution to the crisis in order to halt Dole’s initiative and to prove himself before his voters as a decisive president who could resolve such great crises such as the one in the former Yugoslavia, the horrors of which were shown daily on CNN and other American TV stations. In order to keep the English and French off his back, Clinton bypassed the classical diplomatic channels, in order to be able to claim that he had not participated if the operation were to go sour. However, considering that the operation, led by Richard Holbrook on his behalf, ended successfully, and the men emphasized their success in their respective books.

The first contact at the highest intelligence levels began in 1992, when James Clapper was director of DIA (the Defense Intelligence Agency). His men in Croatia were Colonel Richard Herrick and his assistant Ivan Šaraè. Šaraè was a fourth order [master] sergeant, the highest rank for a non-commissioned officer. Of Croatian descent, he emigrated to the US when he was 17 years old. After a few years, he enlisted in the army and was sent to Zagreb at the beginning of the war there as he was familiar with the circumstances and knew the language. Colonel Herrick was a construction engineer, however, over time he climbed the ladder in the American military and became one of Clapper’s most trusted men.

Quickly a sort of ‘trade’ between the two agencies began. Croatia gave DIA Russian 500 kg underwater mines and the most modern Russian torpedos as well as the encryption codes used by the Yugoslav Army and the Russian army. These weapons were transferred to the US via the Split airport. When the transport was conducted, the entire airport was closed off. Hercules C-130s landed in the night, the arms were loaded and transferred to the US or one of their European bases under the greatest security measures. Also, the Croatian agency revealed the location of a chemical weapons factory in Bijelo polje near Mostar which the Serbs had transferred to Serbia. This was a well-concealed factory which was unknown even to General Bienefeld, who was the greatest expert for chemical weapons in Croatia. With the help of samples found, the American experts were able to uncover all the types of toxins produced there which had possibly been sold to Iraq or other potential enemies of the US. This was only the beginning of cooperation, by which the US immediately delivered wiretapping equipment aimed at monitoring Serbia and Montenegro, a system which could simultaneously record 20,000 telephone conversations. This cooperation was conducted with the US NSA.

Prior to Storm, the operations Summer 94 and Summer 95 had to be carried out. In planning the operations of bringing Croatian troops above Knin, the US assisted in the intelligence part of the operations. In order to precisely plan the penetration into the Bosnian mountains inland of Knin, much information was needed on the movement of Serbian troops, their communication system, codes and establishment of shelling points.

Considering that the US was much more interested in the situation in BiH than in Croatia, they asked Croatia to permit them to install a military base with ummanned aircraft. The basic condition was that this be the best-kept secret, so that it would not appear that the US had taken sides in this war. The island of Brac was selected, as it could be well protected. There all the equipment and personnel led by the CIA experts, with the long-range unmanned aircraft which could cover the entire territory of BiH to the Serbian corridor on the Sava River. The entire Krajina region in Croatia was also in its range. At that time, no one had any idea what was going on and what was being hidden on the island of Brac. Nor did the US allies, the Germans, have any idea. They sent their military attaché there on 1 January 1994. He hired a rent-a-car and drove the outer fence of the base and began taking pictures, thinking that the alertness in the base had faltered on New Year’s Day. However, he was quickly spotted by SIS and arrested. Only when he was brought into Gotovina for questioning was it learned that this was the German military attaché in Zagreb, Hans Schwan.

After this incident, the entire base was transferred to Šepurina near Zadar, and a triple line of defense placed around it. Equipment was brought in from the US overnight, and from Šepurina, the unmanned aircraft could cover every corner of Krajina and BiH. The Americans had a silent agreement with HV to hand over all the photos of the terrain and the Serbian troops, while the images were transferred via satellite in real time to the Pentagon. Three US and three Croatian officers monitored the situation at all times.

Prior to Operation Flash, which was supposed to serve as a dress rehearsal for Storm, at exactly midnight, six hours prior to the beginning of the operation, Herrick and Šaraè were called into the police and were informed that the planned action would begin in a few hours time. In the Police Ministry, at exactly midnight, the staff of Operation Flash was formed, which was transferred to the Defense Ministry at 6 a.m. When the staff was moved, the American military attaché moved with it. He constantly requested updates and sent them directly to Clinton in the White House. Each morning, the American President was informed of the preparations and every part of the operation. The Americans were thrilled by the way Flash was carried out, they realized that this model of cooperation with the Croatians was ideal, and could be decisive in the battle against Miloševiæ in BiH and could ultimately result in removing him from power. The Pentagon coordinated the entire action via Richard Herrick, and the CIA activities were coordinated by Marc Kelton, head of the CIA branch in Zagreb, who cooperated closely with Miroslav Tudjman, then head of HIS.

At the time Storm was under preparation, the Americans supplied HV with intelligence on the movements of Serbs in Krajina and the movements of YNA on the eastern borders of Croatia. They feared that Miloševiæ would launch a counter-attack with two tank brigades in eastern Slavonia if the Croats launched an attack on Knin. Through intensive monitoring of communications between Belgrade and Knin, and within Serbia, they came to the conclusion that there would be no counter-attack. It was risky that the Serbs might launch an attack from Knin itself when Gotovina and his units arrived on the Dinarid mountains above the city. Had the unmanned aircraft and monitoring showed offensive maneuvers by the troops, Storm would have begun ten days earlier.

In the wee hours of 4 August 1995, the Croatian units were issued the command to turn off all telecommunications devices between midnight and 4 am. Later it was learned that the Americans had used that time to electronically intercept and destroy the Serbian telecommunications devices.

HV was left with one hour, from 4-5 AM to use their radio ties to coordinate the operation. Just prior to Storm, the American military attaché was again called to the operation staff. Ivan Šaraè was again with him. One or two days prior to Storm, Herrick, who had prepared Storm with the Croatian officers and gave the operation the green light on Clinton’s behalf, was replaced by Colonel John Sadler. At exactly midnight, they arrived at the operative staff and from there followed all the events in the field. This time, the entire Operation was transmitted in real time via satellite to the Pentagon, where these images remain archived today. The signal transmitted to the signal by the Americans was also received by HV, and with the help of those images, the firing upon Serbian positions and the military base near Knin could be monitored to within millimeters. In addition to electronically destroying the Serbian communications, the US military also acted militarily against the Serbian positions, when it fired on the anti-aircraft battery near Knin from American combat planes that flew over the battle area. That news was released only once, on the 6 o’clock news. Afterwards, the US sharply condemned this, and that news was never repeated. No one believed the official American explanation for the rocket attack, and today the general perception is that this was direct US assistance to HV, only that even ten years after Storm this must not be admitted, due to US-British relations, as Britain had a completely different perspective on how to resolve the Balkan issue. And it still does today.

The US was thrilled with the how fast and clean the operation was conducted, and with its outcome, which permitted the lightning fast entry of HV into BiH and penetration all the way to Banja Luka and, finally, Belgrade’s consent to sign the Dayton Accord. The American control and satisfaction of the complete operation was later confirmed in the statements that the operation was carried out properly, and as such, the US-Croatian cooperation in intelligence and military matters intensified. General Colonel Patrick Hughes, Clapper’s successor as director of DIA, visited Croatia, intensified cooperation in the sector of electronic monitoring of Serbia and Montenegro, other intelligence was swapped, MPRI began its intensive training of the Croatian military and Rebiæ was decorated for his efforts.

The first word that Croatian officers might have to stand trial for the events during Storm was heard in 1997. The US immediately responded and requested on a dozen occasions in discussions with the Hague Prosecutor that Storm, as a militarily-clean operation, be left alone, as Nacional has learned from a high-ranking diplomatic source. At that time, there was a problem concerning the extradition of Mladen Naletiliæ Tuta to the Hague, and the US promised Croatia that the Hague would not raise charges for Storm if they handed Naletiliæ over. Naletiliæ was extradited, and Carla Del Ponte outwitted the American administration and began with her demands that the Croatian generals be investigated as suspects in Storm. The US was dismayed but was not allowed to show this, trying to resolve the matter through quiet diplomacy instead, which to this day has not succeeded. Therefore it would be a step in the right direction for the Hague to request that the Pentagon hand over all the images recorded by the ‘Predator’ unmanned aircraft during and after Storm.

Furthermore, for the interests of truth, all of the high ranking American military and intelligence officers involved in the entire operation, which ended the war in the Balkans and removed Miloševiæ from power, should be called to testify in the Hague. Those responsible for the crimes which took place after the operation are known, and they are the ones which should stand before the court, as they should have eight or nine years ago. Had these men been tried then, Carla Del Ponte today would have no aces up her sleeve, and Croatia would not have the problems it has, with the entire operation proclaimed a ‘criminal operation’ and the entire state administration of the time a ‘criminal organization’.

Ustase in Kentucky?!

Dark Past in Balkan War Intrudes on New Life
By MALCOLM GAY
Published: April 3, 2011

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/04/us/04hide.html?ref=todayspaper

STANTON, Ky. — Nearly two decades after fleeing her native Croatia, the squat, hardworking woman known as Issabell Basic lived a quiet life in this small town, firing up her Jeep Cherokee each day for the 25-minute commute to her job making Hot Pockets.

She doted on the dog she had bottle-fed as a puppy, was handy at sinking a fence post, and though neighbors never took to her stuffed grape leaves and cabbage, friends loved the cakes she baked each time a birthday rolled around.

Emphysema kept her close to the series of homes she shared with Steve Loman and his wife, Lucy, whom she called “Sis.” The Lomans, in turn, describe Ms. Basic, 51, as a “big-hearted” person — the kind who would not buy something for herself without first picking up a gift for a friend, but who was also so scarred by the Bosnian conflict that she could not watch war movies and had severed all ties with her native land.

But perhaps there was another reason for the break: the woman known here as Issabell is identified in court papers as Azra Basic, and prosecutors in Bosnia allege that in 1992 she was part of a vicious brigade of Croatian Army soldiers that tortured and killed ethnic Serbs at three detention camps in the early years of the Bosnian war.

Victims and witnesses from the camps, quoted in court documents, say that while wearing a Croatian uniform, twin knives strapped to her belt and a boot, Ms. Basic carved crosses into prisoners’ foreheads. They accuse her of slitting one man’s throat and forcing others to drink from the dead man’s wound.

One witness says Ms. Basic made him drink gasoline, then set fire to his hands and face. Others say she forced them to crawl — half-naked, a knotted rope in their mouths and a Croatian soldier on their back — across a floor littered with glass.

Now, after nearly 20 years, the past 15 spent working odd jobs in New York and Kentucky, Ms. Basic faces extradition to Bosnia and Herzegovina, where she would stand trial in district court on charges of war crimes.

One witness says Ms. Basic made him drink gasoline, then set fire to his hands and face. Others say she forced them to crawl — half-naked, a knotted rope in their mouths and a Croatian soldier on their back — across a floor littered with glass.

Now, after nearly 20 years, the past 15 spent working odd jobs in New York and Kentucky, Ms. Basic faces extradition to Bosnia and Herzegovina, where she would stand trial in district court on charges of war crimes.

“They’ve alleged that she is the woman that did these atrocities; we’re certainly going to contest that,” said Patrick Nash, who is representing Ms. Basic (pronounced BOSS-ich) in the extradition proceedings. Ms. Basic, who is being held at the Fayette County Detention Center in Lexington, declined an interview request through her lawyer.

Though she was first charged in 1993, Ms. Basic was not located by Interpol until 2004. The Bosnian government registered a formal extradition request in 2007, but United States authorities asked for additional evidence before sending federal marshals to arrest her here last month.

By that time, according to the Lomans, speaking publicly for the first time, Ms. Basic had been living with them for five years, most recently sleeping on a twin mattress in the living room of their rambling, three-bedroom home. Over coffee before work, trips to the store and nights spent in front of the TV, Ms. Basic confided the details of her old life to her new American “family.”

“It wasn’t like it was a secret or anything, ” said Mr. Loman, a retired truck driver who was arrested at the house with Ms. Basic on an unrelated weapons charge.

“The first man she killed, it made her sick,” Ms. Loman said. “She came face to face with him. And she had to kill him or be killed. She said it made her sick at her stomach, and then she said, after that it all went down pretty easy — after you kill your first.”

The extradition complaint accuses Ms. Basic of causing only one death.

The daughter of a ship’s captain, Ms. Basic told the Lomans that she and her young son had fled their home when the fighting broke out. She said her son had died of a heart ailment and that she was captured by Serbian fighters, after which she took up arms with the Croatian Army, which promised to feed her and give her cigarettes.

Court records contained in the extradition request indicate that she married Nedzad Basic in 1994. She later recounted to Ms. Loman how the Red Cross had helped resettle the pair in the United States, after a bomb blast destroyed one of her kidneys and lodged shrapnel in her skull.

Once in this country, she began reinventing herself. Ms. Basic changed her name to Issabell, moved from Rochester to Lexington, Ky., and became an American citizen. Court records indicate that she divorced her husband in 2005. Ms. Loman, who first met Ms. Basic while both were working at a Lexington-area nursing home, said that she often worked two jobs — in part to help support the men she dated — and that by the time she moved in with them, she had little contact with her previous life.

“She’d tell everybody that my son was her nephew,” said Ms. Loman, 63, who once offered to contact Ms. Basic’s family.

“She said: ‘Absolutely not. You’re my family.’ ”

The United Nations estimates that 104,000 people died in the ethnic strife that gripped the Balkans in the early to mid-1990s after the dissolution of the former Yugoslavia. The conflict, marked by ethnic cleansing, was the most brutal to occur on European soil since World War II and prompted the establishment of a special war crimes tribunal.

But unlike many who have later been found guilty of war crimes, Ms. Basic did not hide her history entirely from her two closest friends.

The revelations did not deter the Lomans from inviting Ms. Basic to come with them when they moved to Stanton, a 45-minute drive southeast of Lexington. Over time she divulged more details, including how she had once witnessed the extended gang rape of a teenage girl by Serbian fighters. The girl, Ms. Basic told them, died the next day.

“One time they came up on these Serbs, and she recognized the man that had raped that young girl,” Ms. Loman said. A fellow soldier drew his rifle, but “she said: ‘No. Don’t shoot him. I want him,’ ” Ms. Loman said, adding that nightmares often caused her friend to moan loudly, awakening the rest of the house.

“She got him, and she cut his penis off, and she said, ‘Now, you so-and-so, you’ll never rape anyone again.’ ”

The episode is not mentioned in the extradition request, though some witnesses say that Ms. Basic threatened to “circumcise” them. Ms. Basic’s lawyer, Mr. Nash, declined to comment on the matter.

“Anything she done, it was army connected,” said Ms. Loman, who said she believed that her friend was a fundamentally good person whom the horrors of war had forced to make impossible moral choices. The war toughened Ms. Basic, Ms. Loman said, but she was loyal and felt deeply for her friends, naming Ms. Loman in her will and buying carpet for a bedroom addition that would have allowed Ms. Basic her own room.

“I have no doubt if someone wanted to shoot me, she’d take the bullet,” Ms. Loman said.

The Lomans are not alone in this hill-country town of 3,000 when they say that what international courts deem war crimes are in fact rough justice.

“I don’t think she’s guilty of anything but being a human being,” said Eli Vires, a neighbor. “They should just let her out of jail and be done with it.”

The belief that Ms. Basic is being “railroaded” is bolstered here by her reputation as friendly and hardworking. Mr. Vires’s mother-in-law, Henrietta Kirchner, 88, said Ms. Basic had been very kind when attending her at an area nursing home.

“I thought she was a very nice lady,” Ms. Kirchner said.

But Amy King, who cooks pizza for the regulars at the Marathon gas station, said she was glad Ms. Basic was in custody.

“I was always taught an eye for an eye, but this woman is whacked,” said Ms. King, who has never met Ms. Basic but who like so many others in town has followed the case closely.

If convicted, Ms. Basic would most likely spend the rest of her life in prison. But if she is found not guilty, Ms. Loman said she would welcome her home.

“She’s already been through hell once,” Ms. Loman said as she sifted through Issabell’s clothes and pictures. “Why put her through it again?”