Ustaša – Croatian Revolutionary Movement
Ustaša – Hrvatski revolucionarni pokret |
|
---|---|
Poglavnik | Ante Pavelić |
Founder | Ante Pavelić |
Founded | 7 January 1929 | (de jure), 1930 (de facto)
Dissolved | 8 May 1945 | (banned)
Preceded by | Party of Rights |
Succeeded by |
Crusaders, others Ustaše and supporters who emigrated established various pro-Ustaše-style organizations after the war; the Croatian Liberation Movement is a far right party founded by former leaders of the Independent State of Croatia |
Headquarters | |
Newspaper | Hrvatski Domobran |
Youth wing | Ustaše Youth (UM) |
Membership (1941) | 100,000 |
Ideology |
Croatian nationalism Ultranationalism Clerical fascism Fascism |
Political position | Far-right |
Colours | Red, white, blue, black |
Slogan | Za Poglavnika i dom spremni (For Poglavnik and homeland ready) |
The Ustaše (pronounced [ûstaʃe]), also known as "Ustashe", "Ustashas", and "Ustashi", were members of the Ustaša – Croatian Revolutionary Movement (Croatian: Ustaša – Hrvatski revolucionarni pokret), a Croatian fascist,ultranationalist and terrorist organization, active, in its original form, between 1929 and 1945. Its members murdered hundreds of thousands of Serbs, Jews, Roma (Gypsies) as well as political dissidents in Yugoslavia during World War II.
The ideology of the movement was a blend of fascism, Roman Catholicism and Croatian nationalism. The Ustaše supported the creation of a Greater Croatia that would span the Drina River and extend to the border of Belgrade. The movement emphasized the need for a racially "pure" Croatia and promoted genocide against Serbs, Jews and Romani people, and persecution of anti-fascist or dissident Croats and Bosniaks.
The Ustaše were fiercely Catholic, identifying it with Croatian nationalism. They declared that the Catholic and Muslim faiths were the religions of the Croatian people. They claimed the Islam of the Bosniaks was a religion which "keeps true the blood of Croats".
When it was founded in 1930, as Ustaša – Croatian Revolutionary Organization (Croatian: Ustaša – Hrvatska revolucionarna organizacija) it was a nationalist organization that sought to create an independent Croatian state. When the Ustaše came to power in the NDH, a quasi-protectorate established by Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany during World War II, its military wings became the Army of the Independent State of Croatia and the Ustaše militia (Croatian: Ustaška vojnica).