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Antoine Ratnik

| 2012-01-19 09:34:37

Na 3 dni przed ta straszna data podaje po angielsku tekst wstrzasajacego testamentu Marszalka Kvaternika. W jednym ze zdan mowi On wprost, iz Niemcy ogromnie zgrzeszyly atakujac Polske w 1939 roku i ze tu lezy jedna z przyczyn ich kleski. "My last message I am so oppressed by sufferings of various kinds that I don't believe that I'll be able to endure this confinement much longer. It appears that I shall not be brought before the court again. Since they cannot find valid evidence to convict me of the crimes with which I have been charged, it is likely that they will simply dispose of me here in the prison. I have been given medicines which, I am told, will cure me of my physical ills; it seems to me that I am being poisoned rather than helped by these remedies. I asked to be allowed to talk with Archbishop Stepinac. They would have allowed me this privilege had I been willing to agree to make undignified declarations and to meet other conditions that they demanded of me. Of course, I refused with indignation and contempt to oblige them in this matter. Then, when I requested a confessor, they brought to me a very suspicious fellow indeed. I addressed to him some question of general character concerning the principal teachings of the Catholic Church. Since he was unable to give me any kind of intelligent answer I refused to make my confession to him. Evidently he was an agent of the OZNA who was posing as a priest in the hope that he might be able to extract some kind of a compromising confession out of me. They tried this trick on me again, bringing to me a person who wore robes of a Franciscan. When I asked him to show me his Cross, he replied that he never carried one. He did not possess a stola either. Nevertheless I asked him to give me a prayerbook in order that I might prepare myself to make my confession to him. He told me that it was not necessary to consult a prayerbook before making the confession, so I sent him packing too. Afterwards I saw that I had done well for I had made my last confession to our beloved priest and national hero, Vilim Cecelja, and this is my last comfort as I prepare to make my exit from this hell. I pray to God daily in behalf of our martyred people and for our poor, suffering Croatian land and my last prayer will be for them. Three days ago towards midnight a dark complexioned man, rather tall and with a savage look about him, came into my cell. While an escort stood awaiting him in front of the cell door, he began to load his service pistol with bullets in a most ostentatious manner. He told me that he had come to shoot me and asked if I wished to make any last wishes before he did so. I said to him that I had none and that I was thankful that by the infinite mercy of God my sufferings finally had reached their end. When he heard me speak thus the fellow left my cell uttering a variety of oaths and blasphemies that no one but a Marxist could think of. Despite what I said to him I did have one last request that I should have liked to have had granted. It was that Generals Percevic, Navratil, and I be allowed to wear Croatian military uniforms, even though they lacked our insignia of rank. This request was not granted for my captors said that they had no such uniforms. My appeal was made in accordance with internationally accepted conventions governing the rules of war, but it was to no avail. So we are not to be allowed to die as Croatians. I am suffering a great deal from malaria and from spells of dizziness. My captors have been so kind as to give me various pills and shots - after receiving which I invariably feel much worse than I did before. One result that they seem to produce is vomiting. I believe that an important cause of my poor physical state is that I am not allowed to sleep. Every time that I doze off they shake me awake. I have the feeling that I am being poisoned too. They have refused me the services of two physicians in whose integrity I have confidence. A friend smuggled a message into my cell. It was to the effect that I should ask for nothing. To request anything, whatever its nature, would be the surest way to get myself liquidated. As it is I have to sign records all the time. Some of these are supposed to relate to the "check-ups" that the doctors have given me; I don't even know what the contents of some of the "records" were. Unfortunately, I have neither the desire nor the energy to raise questions about anything any more. I am altogether apathetic. I have friends outside who are willing to risk anything to get me out of here. They prepared a plan of escape for me. It was well designed and I think it would have worked. But I refused to try it for if I did escape, it might cost the lives of several young Croatians. In days to come Croatia will need new workers and new fighters. But I am a worn out old man who already has given all that he had to give for his people and nation. My day is done, and whatever good I have done, or whatever harm I may inadvertently have done, belongs now to the judgment of history. There is no point in causing any of my friends or young Croatian patriots in general to sacrifice their lives to save mine, which is much less valuable. Tito's people, like most cowards, are always trying to find excuses for perpetrating new massacres. I shall seek my happiness, not in escape from this jail but in life to come when I may meet again those Croatian officers and generals who were knifed or otherwise murdered in Belgrade, along with so many other Croatian martyrs. Let our blood be the last that suffering and oppressed Croatia has to shed before attaining the freedom and happiness that we have sought for her! I feel that what strength I have is giving out and I apprehend that my end is near. Therefore I am sending to you my dearly beloved, my last greetings. All of my activities were designed to secure the freedom of my country. Still today I am conscious of what I did when I took upon myself the responsibility of proclaiming the national independence of Croatia. I did not take this action arbitrarily on my own account or in my own interests, nor on the advice or with the help of any foreigners whatsoever. Whoever asserts that I acted either in my own behalf or in that of foreigners does not comprehend the irresistible aspirations of the Croatian people to be free and master in their own homeland. Above everything else the Croatians want the national independence of their country. The uprising staged by Croatian troops in Karlovac in the fall of 1939 was a portent of things to come. It was a clear sign that the tide of national feeling could not be dammed up by the artificial restrictions imposed by the Serbian dictatorship, nor could the course of this national tide be turned into the waters that the Serbians desired. From this day on it was evident that the fate of the totalitarian and aggrandised "Great Serbia", known to the Western World as "Yugoslavia," would be sealed by the bullets and rifles of Croatian soldiers who were only waiting for the right moment to strike at the hydra-headed monster of 1918. Between April 6 and April 10, 1941, the most accurate and inspiring of national plebiscites in the history of the Croatian people was carried out. No one can hold this plebiscite against us for twenty-three years of slavery gave us the right and the obligation to free our people whenever the opportunity offered; to act in any other way would be to mark us out as a nation that does not deserve freedom. Those who are our friends will not hold our actions of 1941 against us for they know how much we had to suffer and how much we love our country. We were sorry that our goal of national independence had to be realised during a war that was not provoked by us, that we did not want, and in which we had no wish to be involved. Those who took our freedom from us and who tortured, hanged and murdered so many Croatian patriots between 1918 and 1941 bear the responsibility for what happened in 1941. This was the harvest they reaped for their persecution of us in and out of court, during church processions and funerals, and even at the election polls. I am positive that the more talented statesmen in the western democracies foresaw - they must have foreseen - what was going to happen. After the assassination of Stjepan Radic, an Englishman himself admitted as much to me. Furthermore it ought to be remembered that when we struck in 1941, the United States of America was not involved in the war. We counted upon receiving moral aid and sympathy from this great and free nation, the greatest of world powers, which has given bread to so many Croatians. We had no reason to enter the last war which was a clash between the major powers of the world. All insinuations that we participated in the struggle in the hope of securing territorial gains, or in order to impose Croatian rule upon non-Croatian peoples, are base calumnies. I want to take this opportunity to admit one thing, which, in fact, I perceived clearly in the fall of 1939, and this is that Germany sinned greatly in attacking Poland. By so doing, apart from the wrong done to the Polish people and state, the defence of the West against Soviet Russian aggression was fatally weakened. In this first act of war the key to the eventual German failure is to be found. Another fatal mistake made by the Axis was its treatment of Croatia and Slovenia. Particularly the demand made by Italy, or rather by the Italian Fascists, for our Croatian Dalmatia was utterly insensate. I never reckoned upon the Italians being so stupid as to grab the most purely Croatian and most culturally advanced of all Croatian provinces. In the seizure of Dalmatia I saw the greatest and most dangerous evil that could possibly have befallen us. This act demonstrated the basic inability of the Axis to settle world affairs wisely and honestly. I did what I could to impede the Italian takeover of Dalmatia and to prevent the other evils that befell us through our association with the Axis. I helped whomever I could help; I protected whomever I could protect. Everyone who has taken the trouble to inform himself as to my activities knows this well; above all, the good Lord, who is my best witness, knows it best. I think that some of my collaborators and friends are still alive today. They know how, despite the pressure applied by the Axis Powers to make things take place in our country not according to democratic principles but in conformity with the practices that prevailed in the Axis Powers themselves, we never stopped working to effect our final liberation from their tutelage. I thought that Croatia, like Denmark and other small nations, would be able to find a haven of peach amid the whirlpool of war. It is too bad that Germany did not know how to conserve her great forces for the inevitable conflict with Soviet imperialism. It pains me when I see who today are considered to be war criminals. For the guilt of the last war is almost as much Russia's as Germany's. After all, Germany's first ally in the war was Russia and it was Russia who partitioned Poland with her. I freely admit that I agreed to permit Croatian volunteer troops to fight against the Soviets in 1941 and in succeeding years in order that they might do their bit to free mankind from a great Asiatic lie, and from the greatest terror and slavery that ever has prevailed at any time anywhere. I am a soldier and I do not like to discuss politics any more. However in this connection I have to add one last word and it is this: In essence the Croatian people are addicted to democratic principles. The greatest sons and most illustrious intellects of Croatia were permeated by democratic principles. Ante Starcevic, Stjepan Radic, and many younger men, who today are continuing to work for the salvation of Croatia, are numbered among them. Every Croatian knows that democracy is the primary conditions for the peace, happiness, and freedom of our country and people. Stjepan Radic knew how to express in a couple of words that which is engraved deeply upon the Croatian national soul. How proud we Croatian officers and political representatives were before and during World War I, when in Sabor he opened every speech he made with the words: "Highly Respected National Parliament!" May the Lord rest his soul; perhaps in a few days time I'll be in his company again! All that I did was done in the belief that I was acting for the good of my fellow Croatians and of our common fatherland. I am firmly convinced that when the Croatian people finally obtain the freedom for which they have fought and suffered, they will establish on our national territory a firm fortress of peace and progress. May God grant that this day of freedom will come soon! May the Croatian people as a nation emerge unscathed from this greatest catastrophe of all the centuries. May they never allow their enemies to rule over them! May they be wary of whatever the Serbs have to say to them, for the Serbs deceived us in the basest way right up to the final minute of the war. And still today, as exponents of Bolshevism, they are continuing to spread a network of poisonous intrigue in order to annihilate our Croatian land and national consciousness. My last greeting to all of my beloved ones, to my children first of all, and then to my friends and collaborators, my brother officers, and to all Croatian soldiers right down to that youngest Croat soldier who to the last drop of his blood will stand as a guard of the Eternal Croatia! God and the Croatians!"