In order to truly understand the political agenda of the Constitutional Arch Coalition (Koalicija ustavnega loka – referred to as the KUL coalition), which enjoys great support from the mainstream media, whether they are conscious of it or not, we need to go back to the 1930s. The First World War and the Treaty of Versailles presented Europe and Slovenians with some new facts. The Bolshevik proletarian revolution in Russia was successful, and the Soviet Union was formed. In parts of Europe, especially in Germany and Italy, but Spain should also not be overlooked; after the failed attempts of the communist revolutions, fascism and Nazism strengthened and also took power. Democracy was pushed to Western Europe – to France, Britain, and Scandinavia. Slovenians were forcibly included in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, with barely more than half of the national territory. The victorious forces of the Entente Powers, led by France in this respect, explicitly denied us Slovenians the right to be a nation-building country – our own nation, even though, according to international standards, we were justified in this right, at least since the Reformation onward. Violent denationalisation took place on Slovenian territories that were not included in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, and Slovenians living there were exposed to more and more terror. That is why a large number of them fled to the Yugoslav part of Slovenia – the Drava Banovina, which in the mid-1930s had a population of more than one million and an additional three hundred thousand refugees. Of course, Yugoslavia was not a democracy, much less an exemplary one at that. Here, too, the process of denationalisation of Slovenians took place, albeit less openly and violently than in neighbouring countries. As an example, let me just mention the abolition of the Slovenian Army, an army with the Slovenian language of command, which we inherited from Austria-Hungary.
Traditional political parties also reacted very differently to these conditions, which were far from favourable for us Slovenians. The leading Slovenian People’s Party (Slovenska ljudska stranka – SLS) and especially its president, Dr Anton Korošec, was clearly aware that Slovenians did not have the power to turn the situation in Europe and Yugoslavia decisively in our favour. Therefore, they took the situation into account, but in it, they also tried to preserve our national identity and promote our social and economic development. That is why the well-known Serbian writer Vuk Drašković still accuses us today of not entering Yugoslavia openly and without hidden ambitions. And in a way, he is right.
The traditional liberal camp was broken up into several parts.
The main two were – to use the predominantly used labels from Ljubljana at the time, Starini (older people) and Mladini (younger people). The older ones mostly became passive, saying that they did not like what was going on but also did not know what to do. The youth, who were also described by some as the Carniolan industrialists, openly supported the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and the concept of a triune nation. Thus, they agreed with the authorities that Slovenians are not a nation-building country but only a component in the concept of Yugoslavia. For many, this view was the result of an assessment that an autarkic, introverted, and largely economically backwards Yugoslavia gave them better chances for economic success. Social democracy, the third political group with its roots in Austria-Hungary, has become powerless and irrelevant to further political events.
Whoever is not with us is against us
And the fourth political group, which was also banned with the decree, was a small number of communists. Although few, the leaders of the Communist International (Comintern) had a clear goal in mind: the communist proletarian revolution. In order to achieve this goal, two methods were used. The first was mass protests in which their leading role was not clearly visible. They wanted to portray them as a spontaneous response from the disgruntled people. In doing so, their legal status and the economic crisis in the early 1930s proved to be quite useful.
As an example of this operation, we can take a closer look at the strikes of Trbovlje miners and railway workers in Ljubljana. In both cases, the demands of the strikers went much further than the usual union demands in a democratic society. In both cases, illegal groups led by the Communist Party caused violent riots, thus provoking the police and the authorities. Another component of the operation of the illegal Communist Party and their preparations for the revolution were propaganda slogans. At this point, I would like to mention only two of them that were well-known to my parents’ generation in Ljubljana. However, they were also very indicative in their own way. The first was: “Democracy is dead. You can choose fascism or communism.”
The concept of this slogan, which tells an untruth in the first part, and assumes something in the second, is that the untrue statement is actually true and draws a logical conclusion. This propaganda appearance was obviously well thought out, as it is also found elsewhere in communist activity. For example, it is an essential element of Mao’s Red Book. In Slovenia, this slogan worked well. There are two reasons for this. The claim that democracy is dead was based on the fact that the countries we Slovenians respected as democratic, especially France, as an exemplary democracy, denied us the rights of a nation-building country with the Versailles Peace Treaty and deprived us of almost half of our national territory. The resulting doubts about the democratic social order were reinforced by the economic crisis.
The second reason that for all those who accepted the first claim – that democracy is dead, communism was the only logical choice, was the fascist genocide against the Slovenian population that happened just thirty kilometres from Ljubljana.
The other well-known slogan was: “Whoever is not with us is against us.” This slogan requires people to identify with one group or the other. There is neither cooperation nor dialogue between these two hostile groups. The only possible dialogue, then, is the revolution planned by the Communists. It is possible that they would not have succeeded in their plans if the fascist states had not carried out an attack on Yugoslavia in 1941 and occupied it. Under these conditions, the Yugoslav Communists managed to carry out a Bolshevik revolution and establish terror and totalitarianism that lasted for a good forty-five years.
There are too many parallels between the actions of the pre-war communists and the Constitutional Arch Coalition
If we compare the events of the 1930s with the events in Slovenia in the last two years, we can unfortunately quickly notice many parallels. Even today, “spontaneous” protests of cyclists, anti-vaxxers, and others are taking place in Slovenia, and occasionally they escalate into violent protests. In all these protests, even a casual observer can see that they are systematic and well-run. Parties of the KUL coalition deny that they are organising and leading these protests illegally, but for me, these claims are far from credible since, at the same time, they claim to be the proud successors of the Communist Party. There are far too many parallels with the events of the 1930s. Furthermore, in their speeches, the most prominent representatives of the KUL coalition describe all parties that make up the current democratically elected government, especially the leading party of this government – SDS – as fascist, regardless of the fact that they received majority support in multi-party democratic elections.
These claims are at least as absurd as the claims that the government of Sebastian Kurz in Austria or of Angela Merkel in Germany is Nazi. However, these nonsensical claims by representatives of the KUL coalition again have a parallel in the communist slogan of the 1930s. According to them, there is no democracy in Slovenia, and voters can only choose between the proud successors of the Communist Party and fascists. And they hope, to paraphrase the head of Nazi propaganda, Goebbels, that if you repeat a nonsensical claim enough times, it will start to make sense, at least for some. Apparently, the KUL coalition believes him.
Finally, we come to the last slogan of the pre-war communists. The claims of the KUL leaders that they will not work with the parties that make up the current government or even only support it, not now and not after the elections, regardless of the outcome of the elections, are basically just another well-known communist slogan: whoever is not with us, is against us. And yet, the irrevocable division into two camps is in clear contradiction to the basic principles of democracy, and it is impossible to understand it in any other way than as preparation for a revolution.
I believe that we deal with history in order to learn something from it so that we would not repeat our past mistakes in the future. And according to the author of this column, there are far too many parallels between the activities of the pre-war communists and the KUL coalition for someone who cares about Slovenian well-being to overlook. I believe and hope that with this column, I have argued clearly enough that supporting the KUL coalition, the proud successors of the Communist Party, also means advocating for revolution. Do Slovenians really want it? The decision is still ours – for now.
Dr Andrej Umek
