From: josip@src.umd.edu (Josip Loncaric)
Subject: Re: Banjica the death camp   Was: Re: Flames
Organization: Systems Research Center, Maryversity of Uniland, College Park
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 1992 06:28:24 GMT

This is about Banjica, a WWII death/concentration camp a few miles
south of downtown Belgrade.

In article <1992Aug20.175233.14951@husc3.harvard.edu> stojanov@husc10.harvard.edu (Milan Stojanovic) writes:
>
>My point is: 
>
>1) You do not make distinction between concentration and death camps.
>You are using the present days propaganda terms to confuse the readers.

You claim Banjica was a concentration camp and not a death camp, and yet 
most of the 69,400 victims whose remains were found in Jajinci, just
over a mile away, were processed through Banjica.  Jajinci only
happen to have a different name, but this location was simply the
killing ground associated with the Banjica camp.  By any reasonable
standard, Banjica was where people were being collected for massive
execution, thus, a death camp.
(Source: "Banjicki logor u Beogradu", Enciklopedija Jugoslavije)

>2) You are ready of producing pages of well written, as far as English
>is concerned, data, which could not stand the simplest analysis.  You 
>are producing contradicting statements when facing any opposition.

And you whine when someone gives you a dose of your own medicine.

>>That Serbs did nothing wrong in Banjica?
>
>Yes, Nedic's government did more or less nothing wrong in Banjica, 
>unless it was forced to do by Germans.  Hunting down communists, with 
>our present days knowledge was nothing bad.

You are ignorant, insensitive or both.  Let me quote from the above
mentioned source (translatied from Serbian):

  [Banjica camp was established on German orders by Serbs], and the duty of 
  the chief of the camp was taken over by Svetozar Vujkovic on 7/4/41.
  Finding the location for the camp and organization of the camp was
  done by the commander of the city of Belgrade and the chief of
  Serbian State Security Dragomir-Dragi Jovanovic and his aide
  Miodrag-Mika Djordjevic.  Arrests and transport to the camp was 
  done by all police and gendarme, Ljotic, Nedic and various Chetnik
  organs.  The camp was in fact a waystation for being taken to
  execution by firing squad (first category; mostly in Jajinci), 
  being sent to forced labor in other camps (second category) and
  being held in the camp for some time (third category).  Categorization
  was done by organs of the IV anti-Communist section Ilija Paranos,
  Bosko Becarevic and Radan Grujicic.  ...
    Banjica and other camps were designed as institutions for physical,
  moral and psychical destruction of everything revolutionary, 
  liberating and patriotic.  All means of torture were being applied
  and forms of killing in the camp and outside of the camp; house rules
  and disciplinary procedures were established which demeaned human
  dignity, broke physical and spiritual strength; beatings were done, 
  trained dogs were used, hygienic conditions were very poor, and
  all other means of fascist torture were used; killing was being done 
  in the most cruel ways; mothers with children were also being killed.

At the end of the war, Nazis and the Serbian quisling command tried to
hide the evidence by digging up graves and burning corpses for five
months.  The prisoners who did this work were also killed and burned.
At the end of the war, 68,000 burned and 1,400 unburned corpses were
discovered at Jajinci alone, most of whom had passed through Banjica.

>
>>That what happened there is negligible and can be ignored?
>
>So, what was happening there?  Would you mind finally getting to 
>the point? 

See above.  I was surprised by the scale of this carnage: until I read
the encyclopedia I was under impression that a much smaller number
of victims was involved...

>>Maybe you think it can be ignored.  But, consider what Serb forces are
>>doing in Bosnia today.  
>
>Why are you changing the subject suddently?  Are you feeling that 
>you will recover the lost credibility due to you claims about 
>a) Klara Mandic ( you will never be able to produce anything 
>convincing to back your claims, and actually I do know that you mixed
>her with someone else, but let that be my little secret) 

I still think Klara Mandic is not what she claims to be, and that you
are only covering up for a fellow propagandist.

> b) vans/
>chambers story, where you were forced to back up from the claims of
>Serbs operating the van/chamber to Serbian company contracting the
>clothes ( by the way, do you know that Germans attempted to claim
>that some Jewish prisoners were operating gas chambers, thus 
>absolving them of any crime?) 

My memory said "chambers", but I was wrong -- I looked it up, and
a "van" was used.  The van was driven by four German soldiers, for
a period of two months, picking up people at Sajmiste (a camp run by
the Nazis) and driving them across the river Sava to Belgrade, where
gas would be connected, killing people on the way to Jajinci.  There,
seven Serbian prisoners would bury the dead.  At the end of the two
months, the killing was completed, the Nazi drivers got a vacation,
and the Serbian prisoners were shot.  By then, a lot of people in
Belgrade had learned of the gas van.

However, most victims were not gassed - they were shot.  See above.
(My memory said otherwise, and I also had a mistaken idea that a much
smaller number of victims was involved.)

On the other hand, the same reference (C.R.Browning: "Fateful Months",
Call number DS135.Y82S493) claims that the Sajmiste camp was constructed,
and its supplies provided, through Belgrade municipal budget.  

>c) trying to confuse everyone with 
>Sajmiste/ Banjica story ( where you your self seem to be backing 
>away from the initial branding of the Banjica as a death camp). 

Banjica was another camp, just south of Belgrade, where most victims
were processed.

>>WHY ARE THEY DOING THIS?  Are Bosnian Muslims
>>and Croats lesser life-forms than Serbs?  
>
>
>Nice try Mr. Loncaric. What does this have to do with our discussion?

Everything.  If non-Serbs were not being killed by Serbs, and if Serbs
did not conduct "ethnic cleansing" and have concentration camps today,
we might even get along fabulously (however unlikely this seems right
now).  We would not be arguing like this.

My point is simple: Serbs have never faced the evils their conationals
committed in WWII.  Had you done so, the war today and the resulting
carnage might have never happened.

>And, since you ask, fight going on in Bosnia and in Croatia
>is for self determination.  The right given to Croats and Muslims,
>but not for Serbs.  Do you think that Serbs should have this right?

Yes - within the established borders.  Changing borders by force instead
of negotiation is not acceptable.  Negotiated changes are OK.

And before you start another discussion, remember that republics of the
former Yugoslavia had a constitutional right to seceede, but counties
did not.


Josip

Xref: sparky soc.culture.yugoslavia:8207 soc.culture.bulgaria:1195 soc.culture.greek:7877