Conduct Unbecoming: Aussie Diggers dishonour ADF with Nazi collaborator selfies and Nazi flags while toasting mass killers
In 2022/2023, several serving ADF members have photographed themselves with Nazi collaborator groups, incensing other veterans and those who lost family members in the Holocaust
During World War 2, Serbia’s Chetnik movement had several collaboration agreements: first with the Serb collaborationist Milan Nedić forces in Serbia, then with the Italians in occupied Dalmatia and Montenegro, with Ustaše forces in northern Bosnia, and after the Italian capitulation, also with the Germans directly as of September 1943.”
Daytona Beach Morning Journal 12 June 1946
In fact, Chetnik leader Draza Mihailovich, far from fighting the Germans, admitted at his trial in 1946 that he secretly co-operated with them for most of World War 2.
The term ‘co-operated ‘ does not exist in Serbo-Croatian, and for all intents and purposes means exactly the same as ‘collaborated’.
So it’s quite disturbing to see current and former ADF members honouring this war criminal in Australia at a celebration known as ‘Draza Days’, held annually by nationalist Serbs throughout the country in late June to honour Draza Mihailovich.
ADF members with Chetniks, Blacktown, Sydney, Anzac Day 2019. Note the flag in top right hand corner:
The flag of Serbian Nazi Collaborator & Chetnik ally, Milan Nedic.
What’s even more disturbing is seeing serving ADF members and RSL brass sitting under Nazi collaborator flags while celebrating a man judged by history as being a traitor and Nazi collaborator for most of World War 2.
Chetniks with Germans & Chetniks marching in ANZAC Day Melbourne, 2016 / Facebook.
Not that any of this is a state secret. Fed up with their constant collaboration, Winston Churchill decided to break all ties with Mihailovic in December 1943.
In mid-May 1945, the entire Chetnik army surrendered to Allied forces in Italy and Austria. Because of his collaboration and other war crimes, their leader Draza Mihajlovic was executed by Yugoslavia in July 1946.
Serbian Chetniks with Germans, 1943 / Independent Australia
But just how the RSL managed to convince its members to accept a Nazi-aligned unit marching shoulder-to-shoulder with Australian veterans is unknown, but it is thought the late Bruce Ruxton, the pugnacious former President of the Victorian branch of the RSL was a key supporter of the Chetnik’s inclusion into the event.
Unidentified serving ADF member kneeling with Serbian Chetniks in Blacktown, NSW, April 25, 2023 / Facebook.
It’s even more serious when you look at the massive amount of evidence available for not allowing the Chetniks into the Anzac Day march, evidence that’s been around for 80 years.
For example, Yad Vashem noted: “There were many instances of Chetniks murdering Jews or handing them over to the Germans.”
Serbian chetniks marching in Anzac Day march, 2013 / Facebook.
Even the Americans were aware of what was going on. According to the CIA: “[Chetnik Leader] Djujic and the Chetniks long record of collaboration with the Germans” – and they should know, as he was working for the CIA for 50 years right up until his death in 1999.
Allied document from 1946 listing Momcilo Djujic as a ‘Jugoslav Quisling’ wanted by the Allies for questioning / Wikipedia.
Winston Churchil was quoted as saying: “We have irrefutable evidence of General Mihailovich’s collaboration with the enemy.” (Llewellyn Woodward. P. 339.)
Chetniks give gift serving ADF member / Facebook.
Winston Churchill in this own book: “Closing the Ring” wrote that: “All reports show that he [Mihailovich], had been in active collaboration with the Germans.” (Churchill. P.415.)
Serving ADF officers pose with Serbian Chetniks in Blacktown, NSW, July, 2022, taken from extremist Serbian newspaper article / Facebook
Fitzroy MacLean in his memoir, “Eastern Approaches pointed out that: “The Partisans claimed that the Chetniks had betrayed their position to the Germans and had joined in the German attack against them.” (MacLean. P.312.)
Momcilo Djujic (extreme right) with senior Italian fascist commander. Right: Serbian Chetniks holding their flag outside Blacktown RSL / Facebook.
As noted earlier, in May 1944. Winston Churchill told the British House of Commons. “The reason we have ceased to supply Mihailovich, is a simple one. He has not been fighting the enemy, and moreover some of his subordinates have been making accommodations with the enemy.”
According to the late Australian historian and former New Zealand soldier Jack Vlasich:
“The policy of the Australian RSL, with at least the tacit approval of the Australian government, is to embrace and acclaim representatives of, and the national and military banners and flags of the World War Two pro-Nazi government of Serbia, the Ljotic Serbian Nazi fascists, and the Mihailovic Serbian Chetniks Nazi auxiliary collaborator support forces, of major war crime and crimes against humanity, onto the highest platform of ANZAC honour and ANZAC high esteem, in the annual ANZAC Parades in Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide.”
Chetniks co-ordinating their joint attack on Partizan positions, Zajecar, Serbia, 1943 / Wikipedia.
During the now famous Operation Weiss, a major joint German Italian operation against the Partisans in 1943, 12,000 Serbian Chetniks forces fought on the enemy side. Mihailovic was personally directing these Chetnik forces fighting shoulder to shoulder on the German/Italian side. (Llewellyn Woodward. P.341.)
Furthemore noted Vlasich, “Serbia was not an Ally of Australia in World War Two, and Serb and Serbian Chetniks forces were major acts of Nazi collaboration, mass murder, genocides or attempted genocides, war crimes and crimes against humanity and human rights abuses.”
Stars & Stripes, June 14, 1946 / Wikipedia
On February 28, 1943, writes Vlasich, “British Colonel William Bailey who was attached to Mihailovic’s Staff, Mihailovic gave a speech in which he accused the British of perfidy and of ‘fighting to the last Serb’ and stated that his enemies were the Partisans, the Ustashas, the Muslims and the Croats and that “As long as the Italians remained his sole adequate source of benefit and assistance generally, nothing the Allies could do would make him change his attitude towards them.”
‘Subsequently following the Italian capitulation to the Allies in September, 1943, German collaboration with the Chetniks increased. On the basis of Field Marshall Maximillian Von Weichs 21 November 1943 directive, several of Mihailovic’s top officers, above all Vojislav Lukacevic, Nikola Kalabic, Jevrem Simic and Ljuba Jovanovic-Patak, reached agreements for collaboration with the Germans,” he says.
‘Draza Day’ celebration advertisement. ADF & RSL members have attended this Nazi celebration since 1998/ Vesti
RSL & ADF members at ‘Draza Day’ lunch in 2019 / Facebook.
By October 6 of that same year, Australia followed suit and no longer considered the Chetniks as being ‘allies’.
Serbian Chetniks (right) marching in ANZAC Day, Sydney, 2021 / Facebook.
By the end of the war, Serbian Chetniks were being hunted by Tito’s Partisans, with their leader General Mihailovich executed for the crimes of Nazi collaboration, mass killings and crimes against humanity on July 17, 1946 in a Belgrade prison.
Chetniks pose with their German Nazi allies just before Operation Weiss, 1942 / Wikipedia
Those Chetniks that were not caught by the Partizans, surrendered to the British, who in turn threw them into POW camps, under the classification of ‘SEP’ or Surrendered Enemy Personnel.
Serbian Chetnik pose for pictures at the front of the War Memorial, Sydney, 2018 / Facebook.
Therefore it’s from a profound sense of shock and sadness to see current and serving ADF members taking selfies with those who have been proven to be Nazi collaborators and mass murderers.
Journalists, civil rights campaigners and ex-RSL members have for years been warned by a range of national media outlets to point out the absurdity of having Nazi’s march with Australian veterans only to be told by one online news portal that ‘It’s not news - Australian’s don’t care about Nazis anymore’.
Victoria RSL head Dr. Robert Webster (left) awarding life membership to members of the SS-led Serbian Chetnik Nazi collaborationist Dinara Division, which was under the field command of Momcilo Djujic but under the overall command of the SS / RSL.
This leaves Australia in the absurd position as a country that decries it will stamp out the evil of Nazism while allowing a group of Nazi collaborators from Serbia to publicly march as ‘Allies’, despite the fact this same group is forbidden to march as ‘Allies’ in Serbia itself.
The leadership of the NSW Serbian Chetnik RSL (holding Chetnik flag) with neo-Nazi Greek Golden Dawn members, Sydney, 2018 / Facebook.
Perhaps ‘absurd’ is too much of a mild term. Maybe a far more apt one would be ‘hypocritical’.
More so when one considers that Serbian Chetniks ANZAC spokesperson, Savo Kovacevic described, the World War 2, Chetniks/German Nazi alliance as being “a loose alliance with the Germans to fight communist guerillas”. (The Australian Newspaper. 27 -28 April, 2019.)
It looks as if Australia and not Ukraine may be the place that may really be in need of some ‘denazification’, as Nazis and their collaborators are not only accepted as part of everyday Australian culture, but they are also celebrated and honoured by its military and political establishment as well.
Lewiston Evening Journal 5 February 1946