ABSTRACT
The Independent State of Croatia (Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, NDH), established on April 10, 1941, by the fascist Ustaša Croatian liberation movement (Ustaša hrvatski oslobodilački pokret), popularly called the Ustaša movement (Ustaški pokret), is chiefly known for two things: the brutal and sanguinary nature of its rule and the campaign of genocide it waged against minorities – primarily the indigenous Serb population as well as the state’s Jews and Roma. Racial politics and the “resolution of the Serb and Jewish questions” were at the center of the life of the state and almost every aspect of national life, including cultural politics, the social system, and economics was either informed by or directed toward these goals. The Ustaša leadership, state planners, and the majority of party theoreticians believed that a viable Croatian state could only be realized with the eradication of the Serbs. Paradoxically, however, the campaigns of mass killing, deportation, forced assimilation and incarceration in concentration camps greatly contributed to the instability and ultimate destruction of the state. The spontaneous armed rebellion among Serbs as a reaction to the genocide would form the core of the Partisan uprising against the new state in which increasing numbers of Croats also participated, leading to the overthrow of the Ustaša movement and the collapse of its state.
