Vukovar, Croatia: Skeleton of the Balkan Wars

July 2010
Several friends have told me of the beautiful Dalmatian Coast of western Croatia.  Someday, I want to go there.  The Danube only dips into eastern Croatia for a relatively short distance, and the river bank is likewise peaceful and lovely today.  But the town of Vukovar is more likely to be found in a book of modern history than a popular travel guide.   Here, where the Danube forms the eastern border between Croatia and Serbia, Vukovar  became the first and one of the worst battles of the Balkan Wars (1991-1995).

In 1991 when Croatia declared independence from the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Vukovar was a prospering industrial town of about 84,000 people, surrounded by rich agricultural fields. It was ethnically mixed (about 50% Croats and 30% Serbs) and peaceful.  I have neither the space nor knowledge to untangle all that happened.  Robert Kaplan's book Balkan Ghosts is a fascinating look into the history and relationships of the varied Balkan groups.  From what I understand from guides, scholars, and Wikipedia, some of the minority Serbs living in Croatia started a rebellion which became supported by the mostly Serbian Yugoslav's People's Army (JNA) as well as the national Serbian army and Serbia's leader Milosevic.  It was a confusing time.  The JNA and Serbian armies had different leadership and ambitions for the war, with the JNA more aggressively seeking to annex Croatian territory.  While the world's media focused on other battles, such as Dubrovnik or Sarajevo (1992), few realized what had happened in remote Vukovar.  Only later did the building with pink geraniums became a magazine cover.

The JNA and Serbian generals attacked Vukovar with superior artillery and numbers (50,000 to 1,800) and started bombardments from across the river in Serbia.  But many of the JNA/Serb soldiers were poorly motivated.  It was an unpopular war in Serbia that was struggling with its own issues with the crumbling of Yugoslavia.  Mass demonstrations against the war were held in Serbia, and only about 13% of those eligible for the draft reported to duty.  Many non-Serbs in the JNA deserted.

On the other hand, the Croats were fierce in their guerilla fighting in the streets of Vukovar.  One of the main streets became known as the Tank Graveyard when the front and back tanks of a convoy were ambushed, trapping the other tanks in the middle.  The Battle of Vukovar was an 87 day siege that destroyed over 90% of the city and left at least 3,000 dead, many of whom were civilians.  According to our guide, at times there were thousands of  bombs shelling the city.  The JNA/Serbian armies ultimately won the Battle of Vukovar, but the Croats won the more important war for world opinion.

The conquering Serbs began "ethnic cleansing" by forcing 20,000 Croats to leave their homes.  In the Vukovar Massacre, 260 patients and medical personnel at the town's  hospital were  taken and shot. (2 JNA generals were later convicted of war crimes.)  However, wars are rarely simple.  There were also Croat leaders convicted of war crimes against Serbs in Osijek. (coming post) Some Croats were detained in prison camps;  others just forced to leave the territory.  It would be seven years before the conflict was resolved and the Croats were allowed to return.  Ten years after the attack (2001), the population of Vukovar was only 31,000.

Today, Vukovar is still a damaged town.  While there are busy streets and neighborhoods that have been rebuilt, there are many buildings still in ruins.  You can see a brightly painted home with a dish satellite next to ruins covered with brush; a modern chic shop next to a bombed out shell with a little cafe in front; fruitful fields of corn and sunflowers beside red taped mine fields that have yet to be cleared.  With 35% unemployment (according to our guide), it is hard to find the resources to rebuild.  The damaged  water tower has been left as a symbolic reminder of the war, and along the river bank is a memorial of toppled house-shaped stones decorated with remnants of destroyed homes.

This section of the Danube has been prized for millennium.  Nearby  are Roman ruins and those of the native culture of Vucedol.  It was here that they discovered a ritual vessel in 1938 which resembles a dove.  I brought home a replica of the Vucedol dove which is now considered the symbol of Vukovar.  I do hope it will bring them lasting  peace.  There is a haunting beauty to Vukovar.  I shall let the slideshow speak for itself.

Click link for slideshow:
Vukovar

Music:  Barber, Adagio for Strings, Evening Adagios
More information:  en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Vukovar
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vukovar

Hard Times in Budapest II: Communist Era and Statue Park

Throughout my trip,  I saw enormous statues celebrating the Soviet "liberation."  One such, a woman holding a palm leaf overhead, still stands on Gellert Hill in Budapest, although she is now without  the Soviet soldier who guarded her.  While Russian soldiers should be honored for their bravery and sacrifice to free these areas from the Nazis, unfortunately, the liberation ended up being a Soviet conquest, and true freedom did not follow.

The communists even took over the Nazi SS building for their own secret police, and  today's Terror Museum in Budapest tells the story of intimidation and torture.  The Hungarian dictator, Rakosi, was brutal and demanded unquestioned
devotion.  While the Nazis were vocal about their enemies, the communists were more secretive, engaging neighbors to report and spy on each other.  A few years ago, they found a film made in Budapest for training the secret police. A chilling DVD  "The Life of an Agent"  can now be seen and purchased (It doesn't work on my American DVD player, but is fine when played on the computer).  Those 60's spy movies were not far from the truth.

The first world event I remember was a scene from the news on our little black and white television of a crowd of people being beaten by soldiers.  It was a short clip and I was quite young, but its images  stayed with me.   I later realized it was the 1956 Hungarian uprising in Budapest.  What started as a student protest that pulled down the statue of Stalin to his boots near Hero's Square ended up a revolution that left thousands dead in its suppression.  Soviet tanks rolled into Hungary, and the retribution was severe.  However, their next leader was more pragmatic and gradually policies softened in the 60's and 70's.  To buy western goods on the street, Vaci utca, in Budapest was the dream of most Eastern Europeans, and I believe they also got the first McDonalds.  In the period of glasnost, the Hungarian communist party peacefully voted for its own dissolution, and free elections for the Republic of Hungary were held in 1990.


The communists were masters of graphic propaganda--huge posters and statues--used to rally and intimidate the masses.  In spite of intermittent rain, I arranged for a private car to take me to Statue Park or Memento Park (I found both names used) on the outskirts of Budapest (can be accessed by public transportation as well).  While most former communist countries destroyed the statues, the Hungarians removed them to this park to teach the value of freedom.  Although the ticket lady only spoke Hungarian and only accepted Hungarian florins or credit cards, I had a delightful, young, English-speaking guide who explained the architect's symbolic design.

Across from the entrance is a replica of the Stalin boot platform to remember the courageous Hungarians who fought tyranny.  The entrance looks like a classical building, but the main doorway is blocked by an engraved copy of the poem "One Sentence about Tyranny"-- a very long sentence written by Gyula Illyes, a poet and 1956 activist.  One must enter through a side door which is how they learned to get things done in that era.  But there is nothing behind the entrance facade, indicating that communism looked good, but was an empty promise.  The statues are arranged in figure 8 paths which only lead one in circles, and the park ends at a brick wall to show there was no future.

It was cold and rainy during our outside tour, but the guide said that was another appropriate symbol for their dismal days.  We talked of the symbolism of these statues, such as the Hungarian worker welcoming with both hands, while the Soviet soldier kept one clenched fist to his side, and how the Soviet is larger than his Hungarian counterpart.  The Soviet statue soldier from Gellert Hill was also there, but with no one to guard.  Some of my pictures are unfortunately splotchy from the rain.  I've decided they are symbolic of not having been able to see reality clearly.

Sometimes there were internal jokes about the statues, such as the giant statue of a man running out of City Park with his banner which was quietly called  "the cloakroom attendant."  They thought it looked like he was running after someone, yelling "Sir, you forgot your scarf."  The museum's guide book, In the Shadows of Stalin's Boots, is an excellent pictorial reference to the park and events of that era.


 I returned to my cruise group, more appreciative of my freedom and impressed by the Hungarian devotion to democracy.  Yet, in talking to my driver, who was the son of a Soviet rocket scientist, I was reminded that the quality of one's life in those years varied according to connections and positions (see earlier Small World post under Danube Cruise).  Ironically, when I was there, one of the former communist party buildings on the Danube was draped with a Mc Donald's "I'm lovin it" banner.   Indeed, it does look like the Hungarians are loving their freedom.

Click on link for slideshow:  
Budapest: Communist Era

Music: Shaporin, Soldiers' Chorus from the Decembrists, Soviet Army Chorus and Band
More information: /en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Republic_of_Hungary

/www.szoborpark.hu/index.php?Content=Szoborpark&Lang=en

Hard Times in Budapest I: Nazi Occupation

I had planned on combining my comments on the Nazi and Soviet occupations, but found there was too much to say.  So here is Part I.

I am not a historian nor a political analyst, but I  could not travel through Eastern Europe without recognizing the impact of back to back terror and repression, first from the Nazis and then the communists.   As a traveler, I go to understand and enjoy a new culture, not to judge it.   And, like in a family, I understand there are sometimes arguments and fights.  However, there is no justification for a group of our worldwide siblings to be treated as subhumans and systematically oppressed or exterminated.  Sadly, this was not the first nor the last time it has happened in our world.

Hungary had been occupied 150 years by the Ottoman Turks (1541-1699); then made part of the Hapsburg Empire (see Hapsburg and Budapest posts).  Struggling after WWI, Hungary swung between pro and anti-fascist prime ministers and even had a brief communist/ socialist government.  When the Nazis went to war,
 Hungary allied with them.  

Though Hungarians had oppressive anti-Semitic laws, they did not actively seek to destroy the populations of Jews (almost a million) until the Nazis invaded them in 1944, fearful that the Hungarians would work out their own deal with the advancing Russians.  Adolf Eichmann, SS, was sent to Budapest to handle the Jewish "problem."  In two months, he deported 440,000 Jews from the countryside, mostly to Auschwitz and the death camp Birkenau (future posts).  As a youth, I remember the capture and riveting trial of Eichmann, but did not fully comprehend the extent of his crimes against humanity.  At trial, he looked like a little, unimportant man; yet he had been the instrument of incomprehensible terror and suffering. The largest remaining group of Jews (70,000)  were crowded into the ghetto area of Budapest behind the great synagogue, with plans that they, too, would be exterminated.

But an unlikely hero arrived: Raoul Wallenberg, a diplomat from neutral Sweden, who in conjunction with a few other brave diplomats, worked tirelessly to set up safe houses for the Jews and distribute Certificates of Protection, saving tens of thousands.  Horrific killings continued, such as shooting Jews tied together into the Danube (hence the memorial of bronze shoes on the Danube bank near Parliament; photo taken on a rainy day through a bus window), but some of the young and healthy ones were sent to labor camps.

One such was 16-year old Tamas (Tom) Lantos, who, with his classmates at the Jewish high school, was sent to a labor camp north of Budapest to repair the bombed railway tracks.  Successful in his 2nd escape attempt, he found his way to one of Wallenberg's safe houses where he ran risky errands for food and medicine.  He managed to survive  the bloody month-long battle of Budapest,  the arrival of the Soviets, and the meager post-war life, until he won an essay contest sponsored by the Jewish League that gave him the opportunity to study in the US.  He went on to serve as the US Representative to Congress for San Mateo District, California, from 1980 until his death in 2008.  For many years, he was the Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee.  Two of my good friends worked for him during many of those years. (memorial photo from street in Washington, DC)

There was no gratitude to Wallenberg from the Soviets for his noble efforts to save Hungarian Jews.  Such a man was considered dangerous in the new regime, and, though a diplomat, he was last seen being taken into custody by the Soviets in 1945.  Then, like so many others, he simply disappeared in the Stalinist Soviet regime.  There were reported sightings through the years, but none substantiated.  There have been a number of books and a mini-series starring Richard Chamberlain about him.  In 1981, Lantos sponsored a bill to make Raoul Wallenberg an honorary US citizen.   At the Jewish Museum in Budapest, they have a memorial for him and other non-Jews who stood up in those frightening times.  There is also a wall and a touching metallic weeping willow tree whose leaves are inscribed with the names of victims.  

The museum was built on the site of mass graves and near where Theodore Herzl , the founder of modern Zionism, was born.  The Great Synagogue in front of this museum was built in the 19th century in a dramatic Byzantine-Moorish style and has a large organ (unusual for a synagogue) that was played by Liszt and others.  It can hold up to 3,000 people (second largest in the world).   This area was the heart of the old Jewish community, and today has become a pleasant and peaceful part of the city.  The  Holocaust Museum in Budapest tells even more of this tragic era in the story of Hungary.

More information: 
http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005458
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raoul_Wallenberg

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Lantos

Hungarian Countryside (Szentendre) and the Danube Bend

There is certainly more than one bend of the Danube, but the stretch between the Slovakian border and Budapest is particularly lovely.  It was rainy and dark on my recent journey, but on the trip up the Danube in 2006, we saw the towns and cliffs at dusk.  Coming from Slovakia, one would first encounter the massive basilica (the largest church in Hungary)  on the cliffs of Esktergom.  This town was once Hungary's capital where Stephen was born and later crowned king in 1100, but it finally succumbed to the Ottoman conquest in 1543.

Next appear the haunting ruins of Visegrad, where the Angevin kings of Hungary built a palace in the 14th century, once known throughout Europe an an "earthly paradise." Vlad, the Impaler, did indeed sleep there, but as a prisoner from 1462-1475.  Unintentionally, I seem to have found myself entangled in the Dracula legend since last summer's trip to Whitby, England. (see UK Whitby post)  Hmmmm...

Less dramatic when viewed from the river, one passes the town of Szentendre before arriving in beautiful Budapest.  Jenny and I wanted to see some of the interior of Hungary, so we decided to do our independent tour of Szentendre and the Hungarian Open Air Village Museum at nearby Skansen, using public transportation and speaking no Hungarian.  Relying on Jenny's navigational skills, we started on the subway, then the tram, walked across Margaret Bridge, took the stairs down to buy tickets on what must have been the slowest (and hottest) train in Hungary.  We got off at the right station, used gestures to find the center of this colorful town with its artists and craft shops and arrived just in time to watch a parade with the local band, celebrating something we didn't know about.

Then we hurried to catch the bus to the even smaller town of Skansen and walked down a dirt road through a field to the entrance of the Village Museum.  We felt very adventurous. The Museum consists of homes, churches, and workshops from the 18th-20th centuries from across Hungary. In some spots, crafts people were there to give demonstrations and explain the heritage.  The area is quite large, and it was very hot (high 90s F or mid 30s C), so we frequently sought shelter in the coolness of the buildings.  Even the Hungarians were struggling with the heat.

We noticed what seemed like a nice family wandering around.  And, after a refreshing lunch of apple juice and that wonderful salad we found throughout the region of cucumbers, tomatoes, onion, peppers, and feta cheese (no lettuce), we headed toward the bus stop to wait until the bus showed up (no precise schedule).  It turned out the young adult in the family we noticed spoke very good English, and so we chatted while waiting in the hot sun.  They then helped us find our way back on the train for our return journey.  You can imagine our surprise when, the next day, we encountered that family again as we were all heading into the LDS (Mormon) chapel in Budapest for services.  It is truly a small and welcoming world.  What fun to find new friends in Budapest!
Click link for slideshow:
Szentendre and Skansen


Music:  Bela Bartok, Hungarian Sketches: An Evening in the Village, Bartok (Fritz Reiner Chicago Symphony Orchestra)
More information:  http://www.danube-river.com/
http://www.hungary-tourist-guide.com/szentendre.html
http://www.hungary-tourist-guide.com/visegrad.html#citadellandroyalpalace
http://www.hungary-tourist-guide.com/esztergom.html