Prelude: The Marshal undone by steel
The peoples of the Balkans are both blessed and cursed. They guard some of the most beautiful land that was ever crafted by God's hand, but are also cursed, in turn, to be mired in the misery of hatred and anger. To be forever steeped in tribal war. Like Tantalus grasping for the vine, they are always close to achieving greatness -- but never close enough. For the beauty of the Balkans is fed and grown not just with the Danube's water, but with the blood of the slain. And just as the world was scattered after Babel, so too are the Balkan peoples separated by language, faith and history, never allowed to unite and be more powerful then any of them could imagine.
But even in separation, the idea of Balkan unity remained. For even the bitterness of memory could not blind them from their essential same-ness. And even the Lord is sometimes made a fool by Fortune, that most fickle mistress. The Balkans must be watered with blood, yes -- but whose blood
For Fortune, the answer was clear: those that oppose her designs. Starting with one man: Marshal Josip Broz Tito.
***
Joseph Stalin, the man who remade the Soviet Union in his image. The leader who had held back the fascist hordes in the Great Patriotic War. The man so paranoid that, it was said, he'd send his own shadow to the gulag for looking at him the wrong way. And while Stalin certainly he earned this reputation, he was also, above all, a man with steel conviction and great ambitions. He abhorred weakness, and was very much willing to exploit it against his enemies. Enemies that, to Stalin, were everywhere and anywhere.
And that is exactly what he saw in the Western Allies. He saw their convictions, but he also saw weakness. He realized that the "Allies" were, at the best, rivals, and at worst, bourgeois enemies who had to be destroyed for the sake of the Soviet socialist revolution. But Stalin was not blind to his own weaknesses, even as the Red Army marched across Eastern and Central Europe. He realized that Tito had been right, in some ways -- that the capitalists had played him for a fool.
And upon that realization, Joseph Stalin made a fateful decision to redraw the Balkans. All bets were off, all sure assumptions dispelled. He could not, would not be weak, in the face of Western perfidy.
***
As August dawned in Yugoslavia, the country was in a deadlock between partisans and outside concerns. Tito's men had long since thrown out the Axis, reaching as far as Austria, but there was still a debate as to whether the country should be a monarchy or a republic. Despite Churchill's pro-monarchy leanings, the King had little support. Tito, on the other hand, had won the hearts and minds of the people as a liberator. There was a regency council, but the only action the council ever took was proclaiming Tito as Prime Minister. Things really came to a head when the elections were held. All parties were allowed, but the facts on the ground gave Tito a huge advantage.
Tito's popularity made him able to campaign more quickly and effectively all over the country, whereas his opponents had limited, regional appeal. In addition, Tito had force; opposition leaders were threatened to allow the People's Front (Tito and assorted parties) to surge ahead. In the end, Tito was elected with 85% of the votes, and the monarchy was abolished. These factors, along with Yugoslavia claiming and occupying Trieste, meant that tensions with the Western Allies continued to grow. In the newly-established United Nations, Tito pressed his claims even as he received harsher and harsher criticism from the Brits and Americans.
Had it been a different time, and had Tito not been backed up by Stalin, perhaps things would have gone differently. After a series of long and secret discussions, the top men of the USSR and Yugoslavia agreed to take a united stance on the issue. In addition, Stalin ordered General Tolbukhin, commander of the Southern Group of Soviet forces, to send half a division to be stationed in Yugoslavia near the border... in case something happened. Normally, Tito would have never agreed to this -- and he never had the chance. He went to Moscow to protest the move with Stalin, and returned to Yugoslavia violently ill, expiring a few days after returning to his country.
How a healthy man in the prime of his life died so quickly, under such circumstances, is a secret that has not yet been revealed from the Soviet archives. It is unlikely the world will ever know what -- or who -- killed Tito. His funeral saw a public outpouring of genuine grief, with thousands walking behind his casket, weeping. What drew attention, however, was the presence of a large Soviet force inside Belgrade.
Even as the people mourned, behind the scenes events were unfolding quickly. With the Communists firmly in power, they searched for someone suitable and well-liked -- and, most importantly, acceptable to Tolbukhin and Stalin -- to replace Tito. Unknown for the people of Belgrade, Tolbukhin's unit was in firm control of the party functionaries, with the full backing of the Yugoslav army, now under the complete control of the firmly pro-Soviet Arso Jovanovic. It quickly became obvious who would be the next leader of Yugoslavia, as the People’s Front gathered on the day after Tito’s funeral; Jovanovic was officially and fully endorsed as the next leader of Yugoslavia.
***
Macedonian identity, and with it Macedonian nationalism, are recent and overwhelming political creations. The genesis of Macedonian ethnicity began in 1944, but intensified at the beginning of 1945. The Communist leaders of the Balkans realized quickly that if equilibrium was ever to be achieved between the Serbians, Croats and Bulgars, that the disputed territories would have to be settled once and for all.
In Macedonia, the Communist planers decided, that balance was going to be achieved by encouraging the, albeit small, nationalist movement within the newly formed Macedonian Communist Party. And just like that, an ethnicity was created. While the idea of a "Macedonia" existed before, it had largely been exiled to the fringes of IMRO, with few people believing it. Suddenly, people who never envisioned themselves as or believed to be Macedonian were told by the government that they are, indeed, pure Macedonians.
Why was this idea put into action? The answer is simple: in the same way as Kosovo weakened Serbia, Krajina weakened Croatia, so did Macedonia weaken Bulgaria, It stopped any one power from dominating the federation while still retaining a united-ish outlook of the federation as a whole. However while the initial plan was to have Macedonia as a separate republic, Stalin intervened. The Bulgarian Stalinists were the most loyal to him and the USSR, and so an order was passed down to Dimitrov and Jovanonic to make Macedonia into an autonomous region inside Bulgaria as opposed to a separate republic.
And overnight, just as quickly as the Macedonization had begun, it was mellowed to avoid conflict with the Bulgarian ethnos. Today, it is seen as part of the Bulgarian ethnos, but also separate and distinct from the "core" Bulgarian people, much like Montenegro and Serbia. This was the result of a long series of negotiations between Jovanovic and Dimitrov, who met in a series of conferences in the Slovene city of Bled. The final agreement was reached on January 14th, 1947, paving the way for the Balkan Federative Republic. This final agreement solved the Macedonian question, abolished visas between the two countries, and created the cornerstones of the united Balkan currency, the dinar.
Historians point to this agreement as the basis of the "Confederation of Sovereign Nations" ideal. This federalist policy was a compromise, as the Bulgarian side headed by Dimitrov was pushing for centralization, which would have put Bulgaria in the dominating role of the Federation. The prospect of Bulgarian dominance was similar to the Serbian dominance that had so irked the Croats and Slovenians. With the other ethnic groups threatened by the prospect of Bulgarian supremacy, Jovanovic pushed for a more decentralized model of government. In the end, while Dimitrov had the backing of Stalin, the internal pressures were too great to centralize the Federation.
And so, the rule of the "Engineers" begun. Dimitrov was announced the President of the Balkan Federation, while Jovanovic became Prime Minister.
