Croatia Through the Years
The Mergers and Acquisitions
Why and how Croatia exactly united with Hungary are some of the most common topics of debate among many historians. However, based on the research of the US Library of Congress, Hungary’s King Ladislaus became Croatia’s new ruler in 1091 following the death of the last king of Croatia.
But a Croatian leadership system was upheld by the separate institutions of Croatian statehood, such as the assembly of nobles called the Sabor. During the 1409s as the Ottoman Empire attempted to conquer the Balkans, Croatia found itself stuck in fights between the Hungarians (https://www.better-tourism.org/hungary/) and the Turks.
After several years of the Ottomans’ tough bashing, Croatia was able to resist them and united with the Hapsburgs. The country soon became a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
The Kingdom of Yugoslavia
When World War I ended and the Austro-Hungarian Empire fell, the loyalties of Croatia were afloat all over again. A delegation from Croatia decided to align their forces with the Serbs, establishing the “Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes.”
The said “Kingdom of Yugoslavia” failed fast and declined into civil war and uprising with the Ustase, a rebel Croat group, embarking on a vicious terrorist campaign to get rid of all the Jews and Serbs. The Chetniks, an opposition group, resisted but they also ended up as terrorists, massacring the Croats.
But the Partisans, another group under the leadership of Josip Broz or Tito earned extensive support. When World War II ended, Tito became Yugoslavia’s leader.
Communist Yugoslavia
With Tito as the leader, Yugoslavia, which included Herzegovina and Bosnia, Serbia, Slovenia, Macedonia, Croatia, and Montenegro, followed a form of planned market socialism, nationalizing privately owned estates and factories.
Tito also made Yugoslavia into an industrialized nation coming from being a mostly agricultural one. However, when Tito passed away in 1980, the gaps in the Yugoslav system got bigger. There was a weak economy, a divisive Serbian nationalism was stirred up by Slobodan Milosevic, and the Yugoslav government’s unity became feeble.
