Okupacija kot prelomnica v organiziranju slovenskih političnih subjektov – o »zgodovinski« vlogi Narodnega sveta za Slovenijo
Occupation as a Turning Point in the Organisation of Slovenian Political Entities – On the »Historical« Role of the National Council for Slovenia

Summary/Abstract: This paper examines the problems of the National Council for Slovenia, which was established at the proposal of Dr. Marko Natlačen, ban of the Drava Banate, when the Axis powers invaded Yugoslavia on 6 April 1941. The Council included representatives of all prewar political parties, save for the Communists. The Yugoslav constitution did not predict the establishment of the National Council for Slovenia, therefore it was an illegal entity that was formed ad hoc. The order for establishing the National Council for Slovenia after the anticipated attack of the Axis powers on Yugoslavia was conveyed to his party colleagues by head of the Slovene People‘s Party, Franc Kulovec, following the example of the same entity from 1918, when it helped manage the Slovenian interests during the dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy. It is precisely with this purpose that Kulovec came to Ljubljana on 3 April 1941 and immediately afterwards returned to Belgrade, where he was still serving in Simović‘s government as a minister. Kulovec based the idea of establishing the National Council on the information he acquired in Belgrade, namely that, after the German attack, Yugoslavia would cease to exist as a state. A Croatian state would allegedly be built on its ruins and “Slovenia would most probably become some sort of a German protectorate”. For realising such a solution, namely the establishment of a Slovenian state under the protectorate of the Nazi Germany, the National Council for Slovenia was established on 6 April 1941. This decision meant that the Slovenian political elite tied its existence to the fate of the Axis powers in the war. Those who held power in the Drava Banate founded such decision on a belief that the Axis powers would win the global conflict. After the news emerged about the establishment of the Independent State of Croatia on 10 April 1941 in Zagreb, the National Council took over the supreme authority and opened talks with representatives of the Yugoslav Army in the Drava Banate about their subjection to the National Council, but nothing came of them. Further efforts of the National Council to implement sovereignty and obtain Hitler‘s recognition of it were also fruitless, since the Council did not manage to get into contact with the German government in Berlin. On 17 April 1941, after the Italian army reached Ljubljana, president of the National Council for Slovenia, Natlačen, handed over the administration to Emilio Grazioli, the civil representative of the Italian military administration. At the same time, it was the end of Natlačen‘s “historical” role, which Kulovec, who was head of the Slovene People‘s Party, designated for him on 3 April 1941, when he ordered the like-minded members of his party to establish the National Council for Slovenia.

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