Из дипломатије у ИБ емиграцију. Догађаји у југословенским дипломатским представништвима у САД-у поводом резолуције Информбироа 1948. године
From Diplomacy to the Informbuerau Emigration: Goings-on in the Yugoslav Diplomatic Missions in the USA on Occasion of the Resolution of the Informbureau in 1948

Author(s): Ondřej Vojtěchovský
Subject(s): Diplomatic history, Political history, International relations/trade, WW II and following years (1940 - 1949)
Published by: Institut za noviju istoriju Srbije
Keywords: diplomacy of the FNRJ; the Soviet-Yugoslav interruption of relations; the Communist Party of Yugoslavia; the Informbiro movement; the Informbiro emigration;
Summary/Abstract: The diplomacy represents one of the spheres of Yugoslav State and Party apparatus that were extraordinary affected by the Soviet-Yugoslav dispute in June 1948. The communists (most of them former partisans) in ranks of diplomats and consular staff were in a different position compared to other Party members. Working abroad they had an opportunity to relatively openly express their opinions. This paper tries to reconstmct and analyze the events during the summer of 1948 that occurred in the Yugoslav Embassy and other representative bodies in the United States. The Cominform critique of the Yugoslav leadership, namely, received among the staff there stronger support than in any other diplomatic mission of Yugoslavia in the world. The supporters of the Cominform gathered around two high rank diplomats Pero Dragila and Slobodan Ivanović. After several weeks they spent in internal discussions, controversies with loyal officials, and consultations with American communists as well as with Soviet diplomats, they left America and were accepted as political emigres in Czechoslovakia. Dragila and fvanović became the crucial persons of the new established exile organisation, on the editorial staff of its journal Nova Borba and in the external Cominformist movement in general. The group of former diplomats within the framework of the organisation made up a consistent unit that expressed radical views and advocated militant means in struggle against the Titoist regime. The so called ,,Americans“ were labelled by their adversaries among Czechoslovak Party officials and other emigres with the mark of leftist faction and gradually they lost their confidence. The author of this paper assumes that the origin of such a political style should be partly sought in the group’s collective experience since the suimner of 1948. The very hard decision-making had frustrating impact on them and contributed then to the cementing of their unity in pro-Soviet radicalism. The reasons for their decision could be found mainly in the following aspects: Diplomats in the USA were not infonned well about the situation in their country; they did not have ordinary communication with Belgrade and in critical moments they did not get any instmctions; they orientated themselves on the ground of opinions of American Communist Party leaders; far away from Yugoslavia and confronted with the worldwide scale antagonism of the Cold War, they preferred the supposed interest of international communist movement. On the other hand there were also less ideological reasons: the conflicts of communist diplomats with the ambassador Sava Kosanović who was a non-Party person; the lost of trust toward Yugoslav Party leadership because of chaotic and non adequate instructions for Party members working abroad. Finally it was the reason mentioned routinely by all adherents of the Cominform resolution, namely, their high emotional admiration for the Soviet Union and its leader.

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