Talk:Communist purges in Serbia in 1944–1945/Archive 1

Article
The aim of this article is allegedly to present the bloodletting at the end of World War II. Instead it already questions the FACT that it was commited by the Yugoslav Partisan Movement in the intraductory sentence! It's ridiculous that the chapter "Killings" is constituted from two lines, as well as the lack of a description of the crimes committed. This is purely denial and relativisation of a historical crime. Ethnic cleansing or crimes against humanity, should be stated in the first paraghraph, "killings" is preposterous. "Killings were killings" is childish and not really a decent English sentence, but the main goal of some here seems to be the denial. Disappointing.Transylvanus 20:55, 20 November 2006 (UTC)


 * The point is that we should have here an article that will correctly describe these events. We should not use this article as modern irredentist propaganda which have goal to propagate for territorial autonomy of Hungarians in northern Vojvodina. History is one thing, politics another... PANONIAN   (talk)  15:42, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

How come the German and Hungarian ethnic cleansing is referred to as "crimes of the occupiers", whereas the Yugoslavs´ murders of Hungarians are simply "killings"??


 * Because crimes of the fascists in WW2 are well known and undisputed historical facts, while these killings after the war are very controversial issue, hence the "killings" is best word that can describe it. PANONIAN   (talk)  23:04, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

So the massacres of Serbs are "undisputed, historical facts" but the massacres of Hungarians are "a very controversial issue"? Christ, what double standards. As far as I can tell from these articles, both events can and should be labelled as "killings" or "massacres".
 * No, you missed the terms - the crimes of the Axis side in the war are undisputed historical facts, while crimes of Allies are controversial issue, no matter of the ethnic origin of the victims. And furthermore, counting victims by ethnic origin here might not be the best solution because we know that fascist Hungarian state in World War II killed many ethnic Hungarians. Of course, the modern Hungarian nationalists do not care for those killed Hungarians because they were not killed by "evil neighbours". That are double standards, my friend. PANONIAN   (talk)  01:39, 29 December 2006 (UTC)

The aritcle has being attacked by the Serb nationalist (User:PANNONIAN). I wanted to make a memorial artcile for the victims, but he can't stand that we should talk about the innocent civilian victims of the partisans. HunTheGoaT 18:31, 29 September 2006 (CEST)


 * Please refrain from personal attacks, ok? And better do not ask me to say what you "wanted" here, mister "No Trianon" guy. PANONIAN   (talk)  16:43, 29 September 2006 (UTC)


 * And by the way, if I am nationalist, how you explain the fact that when you created this article, an user from Italy taged your article as non-neutral: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1944-1945_Killings_in_Ba%C4%8Dka&diff=78500862&oldid=78500585 Is he a Serbian nationalist too? PANONIAN   (talk)  17:04, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

For User:Öcsi
Do you please have some reasonable explanation for this edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=1944-1945_Killings_in_Ba%C4%8Dka&diff=78874310&oldid=78791238 You changed numbers, but you left here a sources that present different numbers to show that they in fact present "your" numbers. There is one word for it - a falsification!!!

Now here is list of sources, and a quotation what they claim:
 * 1. Dimitrije Boarov, Politička istorija Vojvodine, Novi Sad, 2001. Quotation: "estimations about number of killed Hungarians range from 4,000 to 40,000 with 20,000 being most probable number"
 * 2. Dragomir Jankov, Vojvodina - propadanje jednog regiona, Novi Sad, 2004. Quotation: "There were 20,000 killed Hungarians and this number included both, those that commited war crimes and innocent civilians".
 * 3. http://www.krater.hu/pprint.php?print=102&PHPSESSID=086c47ea596fafd2ed0f5f10ca1a0262 This is article in Hungarian. I cannot read this, but User:Laslovarga told me that article claim that most probable number of killed Hungarians is 20-25,000. I assume it is this sentence: "A bácska-bánáti 20-25 000 magyarnak azért is pusztulnia kellett"
 * 4. http://www.huncor.com/delvidek4445/delvidekindex2.htm According to User:HunTheGoaT this site claim that the highest estimation about number of killed Hungarians is about 50,000.

So, let write this article in accordance with Wikipedia policy:
 * 1. Our job is not to declare which source is right and which is wrong, but to present data from ALL sources that we have.
 * 2. we have to write two things here: 1. the lowest and highest possible estimation of this number and 2. the number that is most probable. So, if we compare all these sources, we will see that lowest and highest estimations are 4,000 and 50,000 and most likely numbers are 20-25,000. If somebody have opposite opinion, it would be good to discuss it here instead to simply change numbers with no explanation. PANONIAN   (talk)  21:12, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

The number of killed Hungarians is much higher than 20000, and 4000 is only ridiculous. My source is the Hungarian Wikipedia, the Duna TV and hungarian people living in the Bácska. But the fact is that nobody knows exactly how many people died in these killings. I could also mention the ten thousands of Hungarians who died in the prisoner-camps. Öcsi 11:08, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

"The number of killed Hungarians is much higher than 20000, and 4000 is only ridiculous"

I am sorry, but it is your personal opinion and nothing else. I simply presented here what my sources say and it is in accordance with verifiability policy of Wikipedia. Whether you personally like or dislike this data is only your own problem. Regarding your sources, you use Hungarian Wikipedia as a source? Is this a joke or something? I hope that you know that anybody could edit that article on Hungarian Wikipedia and could write anything there. As for Duna TV, I can watch that TV on my cable television, and I just can say that they too much times showed a map of Greater Hungary in their TV program. The only correct thing that you said is "that nobody knows exactly how many people died in these killings", so our job is not to present only those numbers that we personally like more, but numbers from ALL sources. PANONIAN  (talk)  14:43, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

reason for totallydisputed tag?
Nothing, except PANONIAN's own researches. Nationalism rules. But not on Wikipedia. Tag removed, and will be considered as vandalism, untill a valuable reason won't be shown here for 1. what facts are not correct 2. wich part is POV, and why, and what text would be good instead of it. --195.56.80.183 16:17, 6 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Reason for tag is data that come from unreliable sources in this section of the article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1944-1945_Killings_in_Bačka#Killings Unreliable sources are Hungarian Wikipedia and web site named "Hungarian holocaust in Yugoslavia 1944-1992". PANONIAN   (talk)  16:22, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Read the books mentoned in the notes section dude. Some of them are in serbian. I put some more in, and changed those refs to those wich are in the hungarian one. (books) --195.56.80.183 18:07, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

The page, you disputed has a BIBLIOGRAPHY part, wich means, they put the text seen there, from these:
 * Márton Matuska: Days of the revenge. Forum Publisher Novisad, 1991.
 * Tibor Cseres: Blood feud in Bácska. Magvetö Publisher Budapest, 1991 Selections from articles:Weekly Hungary: Mihály András Beke Weekly Hungary: György B. Walkó
 * Hungarian Word: Article of the editor, 4 August 1992 Hungarian Forum: Márton Matuska
 * Gate: Ajtony Bese
 * Sunday of the Hungarian Catholics: Attila Balázs
 * Selections from the reports of Ferenc Szaniszló, made for the program of Hungarian Television, Panorama. ,
 * Documents of the National Library "Széchenyi' were selected by István Bálint, librarian
 * The Report was edited by Ferenc Kubinyi, historiographer

No more notes needed. Yours sincerely. --195.56.80.183 18:13, 6 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Sorry, but it is not enough to list your books here. If you want to remove the tag, you should find a proper quotes in these books to support disputed section of the article. In another words, you should quote the exact book that claim this and not to quote article from Hungarian Wikipedia. PANONIAN   (talk)  19:54, 6 October 2006 (UTC)


 * Ok, you changed some of the quotes, but there are still those from web site named "Hungarian holocaust in Yugoslavia 1944-1992", which are still disputed because this site speak about non-existing "holocaust". I mean, killings in 1944-1945 did happened, but they certainly did not happened in 1945-1992 period. PANONIAN   (talk)  19:59, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

Cleanup
I've done a bit of cleanup, still needs a lot more. - Francis Tyers · 22:24, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

The source that was added is far from impartial or academic "hungarian-history.hu", come on, the site is called "Serbian Vendetta in Bacska" hah. - Francis Tyers · 09:15, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

If your study of site is deeper, you would see that this is an e-book version of the book published in Budapest in 1991. I recommend you to read chapters from "Cover" to "Vendetta. Retaliation Multiplied", because of discernment. Enough academic? Bendeguz 19:34, 14 November 2006 (UTC)


 * No. Basing the whole thing on one book published by Hungarians (the alleged victims) is NO DEAL. Find some impartial, non-partisan, reliable sources. Books, journal articles etc. written by non-Yugoslav, non-Hungarians. - Francis Tyers · 08:48, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

One of the main principles of collective amnesia is: "If we don't talk about events, the events didn't happen." You modified this principle to: "If we don't have reliable (English) sources, the events didn't happen." (alleged is your word). The tragedy of losers and small nations is that, there is nobody to write their history, except themselves.

From interview with author:

I: Were your hopes fulfilled in the form of Serbian writers making the same symbolic act of collective regret, if not a confession for their crimes like the one you had made in Cold Days.

A: None of my hopes were fulfilled. A few Serbian writers voiced their opinion that in World War II almost two million people lost their lives in their country, so these few tens of thousands of Hungarians should not be of interest to them, especially not as writers.(COLD DAYS - A NOVEL AND A FILM, Page 18)

Collective amnesia and denial, instead of regret. This is - Fact, Serbia even now.

To do (warm up your cleaning-machine Francis) (to be continued) Bendeguz 22:10, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Crimes of the occupiers in Vojvodina, 1941-1944 "alleged victims" mainly Serbs, completely Serb sources.
 * Foibe massacres, "alleged victims" Italians, completely Italian sources.


 * Neither of these should exist unless there are sources as I specified above. - Francis Tyers · 11:04, 16 November 2006 (UTC)


 * PS. I don't insist on English, if you can find reliable sources in French or Romanian -- or any other language -- written by non-Yugoslav, non-Hungarians then that would probably be ok. - Francis Tyers · 11:14, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Merged
I've merged this into Occupation of Vojvodina, where it looks much more at home. - Francis Tyers · 12:11, 16 November 2006 (UTC)


 * If we ever get enough non-partisan, reliable sources to write an article on this, we can demerge it. - Francis Tyers · 12:18, 16 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Merging is not a good idea because we have here two different events with different motives. Besides this, the Yugoslav/Serbian sources do speak about killed Hungarians in 1944-1945 as well as Hungarian sources speak about killed Serbs in 1941-1944, so both events are not "alleged", but well known in literature published in both countries. Of course, I speak about events in general, although the certain parts of the article like number of killed people is indeed controversial issue and should be indeed confirmed by reliable sources. PANONIAN   (talk)  01:06, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Serious concerns
1. This article is below any acceptable standard, in its present form seems more like a stub. 2. This article is seriously biased.

1. The article does not fulfil the promise of the title, the Chapter entitled Killings contains TWO LINES of low quality "explanation".

The English of the intraductory sentence is extremely poor.

There aren't any sites mentioned, in contrast with the "Occupation of Vojvodina, 1941-1944" article: "include Novi Sad, Bečej, Vilovo, Gardinovci, Gospođinci, Đurđevo, Žabalj, Lok, Mošorin, Srbobran, Temerin, Titel, Čurug, and Šajkaš."

The pictures aren't very relevant.

2. The title in itself is strange enough. Killings as the most appropriate term for the events? As a comparison articles dealing with Yugoslavia of the same era: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bleiburg_massacre ,http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foibe_massacres, or: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupation_of_Vojvodina%2C_1941-1944 (the author, Panonius? speaks about "war crime" and "the mass murder of the civilians" in connection with the 1942 raid. I agree with those terms, but why did he restore "killings instead of my "ethnic cleansing"? The lowest estimate given by the present (shameful) page is 4000, compare this with 3800 after the 1942 raid. How is this not a massacre, war crime or ethnic cleansing???

In the same sentence "allegedly"! Come on! Were there any other armed men capable of committing a crime on this scale? What are you suggesting? That not all of them were officially members? Some of them lost their Partisan ID?

"This was due to the fact that members of these two ethnic groups showed the largest level of collaboration with the Axis authorities and committed most of the war crimes against the citizens of Vojvodina." This is not a fact only an accusation, or an excuse for the perpetrators or war criminals. As far as I know War Crimes are War Crimes regardless from their origin.

"many citizens of Vojvodina belonging to all ethnic groups joined the partisan resistance movement to fight against occupation" is this a factual sentence or something taken from a communist internationalist fairy tale?

"Some Hungarian houses were sacked and one number of Hungarian civilians was executed and tortured. [10] Some women and children were raped. [11] Some men who were able to work were deported to Siberia." This is the most disgraceful sentence, "some" as a cover for 4000 to 50000 murders plus rapes and all the others, this is the clearest example of downplaying of a Second World War tragedy I have ever seen on Wikipedia.

I am afraid that the moderators of the page aren't really experts in the field. Thus, please consider the mistakes made and do not restore the original version when I make a correction. Transylvanus 22:44, 20 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Sorry, you don't own this article (and neither of us does). As far as I can tell, no serious source apart from Hungarian partisan sources describes the events as "ethnic cleansing" and I don't see any proof of "attempt at expelling the entire ethnic group", which is the definition of ethnic cleansing. As with any inter-ethnic massacre, we're witnessing both downplaying the numbers on one side and overblowing them on the other. Yes, this article is bad. But your edits didn't improve it either. Duja ► 10:44, 21 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Hi, yes, there is a problem. The problem is of inadequate sourcing. As I have requested above, please find sources that are reliable, written by non-partisan scholars. We can't just base the whole article on unreliable Hungarian sources. I admit I have tried to find references to these killings in reputable publications (via a search on Google Scholar) but was unable to find anything. Perhaps you will have more luck? - Francis Tyers · 11:48, 21 November 2006 (UTC)


 * The problem with the event described in the article is that Greater Hungarian irredentist propaganda often twist historical facts regarding the event with goal to advocate the creation of territorial autonomy for Hungarians in northern Vojvodina. Therefore, we should first see the difference between political propaganda and historical facts. Part of that propaganda is claim that the intention of partisans was to ethnically cleanse Hungarians and that is simply not truth because partisans were internationalists and their goal was to "cleanse" unloyal population no matter of the ethnic origin of that population. Therefore, partisans also killed many ethnic Serbs who were members of the chetnik forces or members of the forces loyal to Milan Nedić. Besides this, the Hungarians that were loyal to new Yugoslav regime gained very large amount of rights in Vojvodina including official usage of their language, preservation of their culture, their participation in the Vojvodinian government, etc. Since we know all these facts, it is simply ridiculous that somebody claim that goal of partisans in 1944-1945 was to ethnically cleanse Hungarians. Regarding terms, it was already discussed, the term "massacre" usually refer to one specific event, while this article speak about various events in various places, hence the term "killings" is most appropriate (some of these killings were individual when only one person was killed, so we cannot use term "massacre" if only one person was killed). On the contrary, the 1942 raid is a clear example of massacre because it was a mass murder of civilians in specific time at specific place. Regarding reasons for killings, the members of Hungarian and German ethnic groups indeed showed the largest level of collaboration with the Axis authorities and that was reason why they were target of these killings after the war. The goal of partisans was to "cleanse politically incorrect population", and in Vojvodina most of such population was among Hungarians and Germans. Regarding participation of citizens of Vojvodina in anti-fascist struggle duting the war, it is correct that many Hungarians were members of the partisan movement and fought against fascism. Therefore, such Hungarians were not persecuted by the new Yugoslav authorities, which again disapprove theory about ethnic cleansing after the war. And regarding sentence that "some Hungarian houses were sacked", the usage of word "some" is most correct here or you would say that "all" Hungarian houses were sacked? Regarding "expertism" about this page, Duja and Francis might not be experts for Serb-Hungarian relations in Vojvodina and Hungarian irredentist propaganda, but same cannot be said for me, so I very well know the difference between historical facts and propaganda here. PANONIAN   (talk)  15:38, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Right. I'm glad for receiving some explanations, I will try to adress each of them during the week.

1. I have nothing to do with "Great Hungarian propaganda". 2.This is still a terribly unbalanced article. As a historian my concerns are connected to terminology, and the usage of language and that of the sources.

"unreliable Hungarian sources" Of course one could argue against every book and article. My problem here is that the only "reliable" sources according to the present form of the articles are Yugoslav ones. Now that is ridiculous. My suggestion is to present two narratives. 1. The official Yugoslav or serb version (preferably not simply based on the postwar idea of collective guilt as the present version does)  2. A Hungarian version (or a non extremist Hungarian one). Cseres Tibor for instance can not be interpreted as "irredentist". I can elaborate on his views if there is request for it.


 * But the whole problem here is that this is not a question of Serbian versus Hungarian version of the event, but the question of accuracy. If we want to find the truth what were motives of the partisans here, then we also should to raise a question of accuracy of sources that speak about such motives. We also cannot disregard modern political aspirations of some sources that mention this event. Therefore, the claim that motive of the partisans was ethnic cleansing is simply not supported by the two facts: 1. the fact that partisans killed thousands of Serbs that were members of chetnik army, and 2. the fact that partisans did not killed or expelled other Hungarians. PANONIAN   (talk)  21:43, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Francis Tyers requested more reliable (non Yugoslav, non Hungarian) sources. I have two problems with this. Firstly, avoiding local sources is not accepted as a scholarly approach. (You can't study ancient history without the Greek or Latin etc. sources.) Sources from at least the two most affected nations have to be included. Or get rid of the serb sources? No, you have to use Cseres at least. Secondly, aricles published in the English speaking world were also mainly written by authors of Hungarian or South Slavic origin. The most respected of them was probably Jozo Tomasevich at Stanford University. However, I'm not sure how much of their research was based on primary sources. Their conclusions were reached in the 80's, when for example the shocking results of the Slovenian exhumations were not known (296 mass graves with 180000 (!) corpses, see Bleiburg massacre), which is four times more than Tomasevich's estimate!


 * Hi, thanks for getting back to me on that. Our articles on Greek and Roman events are largely not based on Greek or Latin sources. They are based on Western sources. PS. You should read: Dulic, T. (2004) "Tito's Slaughterhouse: A critical analysis of Rummel's work on democide". Journal of Peace Research. 41:1 pp. 85-102 . It isn't directly related to this particular set of incidents, but covers some of the issues with using selective, biased local sources. - Francis Tyers · 10:58, 22 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Note, that while this is obviously written by a Slav, the paper has been published in a reputable international journal. I welcome sources written by Hungarians and Slavs that have been peer-reviewed and published in reputable international journals, or published by reputable academic western publishers, e.g. Cambridge University Press etc. - Francis Tyers · 11:06, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Anyway, I will get the Tomasevich, and some other publications as well (Barbara Jelavich). I will try to balance the article by including their results.

For the short term. 1.While no one disputes the internationalist character of the Parisan Army it still had a nationalist(South Slavic) layer in the same way as the Stalinist Soviet Union did; ethnic cleansings happened here and there as well.
 * The fact that partisans persecuted only smaller part of the Hungarian population and provided large amount of rights to the larger part simply do not support claim that ethnic cleansing was a motive here. PANONIAN   (talk)  21:43, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

2. The term "Killings" is in no way acceptable, it is simply not in line with the standard of other Wikipedia or any scholarly war crime related article. Individual killigs occured during the 1942 raid or around Bleiburg as well. Those Wikipedia articles use the right terms: massacres, mass murder, war crimes. My suggestion is "Massacres in Bačka".
 * Massacres would be POV term, because we do not have clear example of one massacre here (read massacre article for description: individual events of deliberate and direct mass killing). So, we do not have individual event, but many events of which not all were mass killings. Besides this, since you compared it with 1942 raid, which is much closer to definition of massacre, even article about that raid do not say "1942 massacre", but "1942 raid". PANONIAN   (talk)  21:43, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

3. The "Killings" chapter and "some houses". I very much doubt that you can describe at least 4000 deaths by saying "some". If you(?) don't want to reveal the numbers you should at least say somethig like "hundreds", "dozens" "several thousands" or "some hundreds". Neither can I imagine that a serious publication described the number of those affected in such terms, so the problem is with our interpreter.

Please at least change "killings", and specify the numbers.

Bests, Transylvanus 20:16, 21 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Well, the person that originally posted this sentence did not specified exact numbers, so until numbers are specified, we cannot use better description than "some". PANONIAN   (talk)  21:43, 21 November 2006 (UTC)


 * The wording is bad indeed; from my (admittedly very limited) knowledge on the subject, the most common methods were deaths by firing squad, with or without a short trial, or simple bullet-in-the-head. More cruel ways of execution were likely encountered as well, but their numbers certainly can't be specified. However, the section is referenced to Kasaš's and Karapandžić's books, presumably added by Panonian? Are they misreferenced, or just misquoted? Duja ► 10:40, 22 November 2006 (UTC)


 * No, these two books were not added by me. PANONIAN   (talk)  16:01, 22 November 2006 (UTC)

Massacres or killings
Thanks for drawing my attention to the Wikipedias own massacre article PANONIAN, but I don't see there anything weakening my argument. You've quoted individual events of deliberate and direct mass killing. Yes at least 4000 (possibly ten times more) as agreed in the article is definitely "mass" and deliberate that is again supported by the article (pre-planning, orders). The massacre aricle also says: "A massacre shall be considered the execution of five or more people, in the same place, as part of the same operation and whose victims were in an indefensible state." That's spot on. I am convinced that you as a local historian (localpatriot,researcher?) must be aware of at least a dozen sites which correspond to this description. I have no doubt about the meaning of massacre and killing in the English speaking world, but I also checked their relevance in Wikipedia, the result is obvious "killings" only appears in this article to describe an atrocity. Massacre on the other hand is widely used. The Boston Massacre is used to describe the killing of 5 civilians on one day, while the Bleiburg massacre was committed during a longer term, involving tens of thousends. Still the English grammar allows the usage of the singular form massacre.

Mind you none of them is marked as POV only for using this term.

My reason for recommending the term massacre(or massacres) is to show our condemnation. It covers the "never again" message. I have no objection to use it when Hungarian are crimes are described.

Due to my profession I know that those times had different standards and I understand their emotions,["Massacres are the fruit of bitterness, and of the calculations of leaders." concluded Milovan Djilas in his "Wartime" after describing the massacre of some Italian prisoners (translated by Michael B. Petrovich, 1977. edition, London page 338.)] but I'm convinced that in the 21. century our norm ought to be different. Bests, Transylvanus 02:01, 23 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Perhaps you simply want to make partisans to "look more evil" with your name change proposal. But I will give you one example why all these events cannot be desctibed as massacres: I read on some irredentist Hungarian web site (do not remember which one) detailed description of some of these events and there for example was described a event like this: partisans came to the village and killed local Hungarian priest, i.e. they killed only one person (do not remember which village that was), but the killing of one person certainly cannot be described as massacre. The numbers of killed people presented in this article certainly include people that were individual victims and not part of mass killings, thus change of the name of the article would also ask from us to change number of killed people as well, i.e, to include only those that were killed as part of mass killings, but not those that were killed individually. PANONIAN   (talk)  02:40, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Don't get into personal attacks. That only shows your lack of arguments. 1. You can not bend a language as you wish. Terminology is important in history. 2. The war was brutal enough in the whole area, there is no need to denigrate the partisans. The Foibe massacres and the Bleiburg massacre proves this perfectly, Djilas is not denying it either. I'm not saying that one side was better or worse than the other! Individual killings occured in each of the quoted cases but they all happened "as part of the same operation" Again: "A massacre shall be considered the execution of five or more people, in the same place, as part of the same operation and whose victims were in an indefensible state." Transylvanus 09:29, 23 November 2006 (UTC)


 * What personal attacks? I do not remember that I attacked you personally. However, your own political goals that stand behind your proposal are not so irrelevant issue at all. As I already said before, these killings are very controversial issue, thus naming article "massacres" would not help it to be NPOV. I really have no intentions to discuss names of "Bleiburg massacre" or "Foibe massacres" articles because I have no any knowledge about these events. I am well aware of irredentist attempts to rewrite history and to make WWII Allies look more evil than Nazis. Let just keep this article in the line with generally accepted World history. This article is alredy POV to certain level and its further POV-ization is the last thing that we need here. PANONIAN   (talk)  16:57, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
 * At least, you realized, that this page is POV, wich is good. Nevertheless, you moved this page illegally, without a survey, so in fact this page sould be moved back to that name, then you should write out a RM survey, for moving this page to it's recent name. --Vince hey, yo! :-) 16:42, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
 * I do not think that you understand what is really POV here. I moved name of the page simply to make it less POV than it was, but the POV nature of the article is that it speak about controversial events and much of its content could be found only in Hungarian irredentist sources and nowhere else. PANONIAN   (talk)  14:31, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

I'm gettig bored by these "irredentist" and "Nazi" charges. Do I have to assume that every massacre article in Wikipedia, describing Allied war crimes is motivated by some form of fascism??? This must be a joke.

Instead of accusations we should work together to improve these articles. I can find the relevant English and Hungarian articles, while you and Duja might check articles, books published in Yugoslavia.

Maybe we could write a new article in paralel with the Occupation of Vojvodina, 1941-1944. Let's call it "The liberation of Vojvodina in 1944-45". This could include a "War cimes committed during the liberation" with chapters about massacres and individual killings. The crimes and rapes commited around Belgrade by the Red Army leading to a confrontation between Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union could be mentioned as well. The Aftermath should deal for instance with the post-war trial of war criminals. I'm sure that if we trust each other and cooperate a consensus can be reached. Bests, Transylvanus 09:47, 24 November 2006 (UTC)


 * We do not discuss here other articles, but only this one. I told you that I do not know much about other similar events (i.e. if these events are really similar to this one), but what I know is that we should not use irredentist sources to write this article. These events did happened, but let try to write an NPOV article and not to turn it into political propaganda. If one Greater Hungarian irredentist web site say that those were massacres that does mean that it is a proper word that should be used used in one non-Hungarian and non-political encyclopaedia such is Wikipedia. Regarding usage of word "liberation", it is exactly Greater Hungarian irredentists who objected that this word should be used within articles describing this event, so I do not think that usage of this word would be good choice. PANONIAN   (talk)  14:42, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

Hi Transylvanius. Write out a RM survey, and report personal attacks here: Personal attack intervention noticeboard. Since discussing with PANONIAN unfortunately leads to nothing in recent times, whatever you do, he'll revert, and starts a endless polemia on the talk page(s), to prevent NPOVing of the article(s).--Vince hey, yo! :-) 16:39, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
 * He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone. But yes, I'm not against the NPOV tag; too many things are there to be straighten out. Duja ► 16:48, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Tu quoque. --Vince hey, yo! :-) 16:56, 30 November 2006 (UTC)
 * Vince, you was already blocked because of this behaviour, so I kindly ask you to stop this false accusations and personal crusade against me on Wikipedia or I will report this to some administrator that could deal with such things. PANONIAN   (talk)  14:46, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

This is a massacre, genocide, and/or ethnic cleansing, since it occured on the winter of 44-45, within 2 month.

There's no mention of the internal camps of Gakovo, Jarek, Kruševlje, Molidorf, Knićanin, and Sremska Mitrovica where between 1945-1948 another 70,000 german and hungarian civilians died, so in fact this page is only abt those massacres, wich are made by the Yugoslav armies, and does not mention the german fatalities, so also one sided. The full number of dead ppl is around 80-100 000 (!). This WAS a mass genocide, not "killings". --Vince hey, yo! :-) 16:55, 30 November 2006 (UTC)


 * Claim that it was ethnic cleansing is wrong because if the intention of the partisans was to perform ethnic cleansing, then why other Hungarians were not ethnically cleansed too? Regarding name of the article, if you want, you can ask for arbitration about this from the third neutral party, but I remind you that in this case some really neutral sources about these events should be provided to support your claims about usage of the name massacre. PANONIAN   (talk)  14:55, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

It's a pity that no one seems ready to do more work to improve the article. Accepting minor changes would already make a difference. Available English publications on ethnic cleansing alone: Fires of hatred : ethnic cleansing in twentieth-century Europe / Norman M. Naimark., Redrawing nations : ethnic cleansing in East-Central Europe, 1944-1948 / edited by Philipp Ther and Ana Siljak., Ethnic cleansing in twentieth-century Europe / editors, Steven Béla Várdy and T. Hunt Tooley, German scholars and ethnic cleansing, 1919-1945 / edited by Ingo Haar and Michael Fahlbusch ; foreword by Georg G. Iggers., The dark side of democracy : explaining ethnic cleansing / Michael Mann. etc.

Transylvanus 17:32, 1 December 2006 (UTC)


 * Then please, go ahead with editing if you do have those sources. The dispute so far revolved about VinceB's attempts to use partisan Hungarian sources and portray the events as pure ethnic cleansing and genocide, and Panonian's (and mine) opposition to it, and the unsuccessful attempts to describe the motives for those killings rather than to describe the killings themselves. But the article certainly lacks the facts: who was killed? how many? by whom? at which site? in retaliation or in pure hatred? Who says it's a genocide? Who says not? But, as we explained on the talk page, your attempts were met with resistance from our side because they didn't add to solution, but to the problem. Duja ► 10:12, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Duja. Due to my other duties I need a few weeks to locate and read the available English sources, but ideally we should also include the Yugoslav version. Could you possibly have a look at the sources published in Serbian language? We could than present the claims of each side, hopefully reaching some kind of consensus. Bests, Transylvanus 11:35, 4 December 2006 (UTC)


 * I could probably get in touch with dr. Aleksandar Kasaš, who works at my university; his Ph.D. thesis "Mađari u Vojvodini 1941-1946." seems to be fairly widely cited all around; I could probably get a copy at the faculty library, although I don't think I can take it out for deeper reading; I'll ask him for an electronic copy. Here's an overview of the wider Hungaria-related history, with a passing mention of Cseres and Matuska works (page 13). Office for Hungarian Minorities Abroad's document is also an interesting reading (pp. 10-11); while they say that "This genocide had a three-fold purpose...", they also acknowledge that "One tenth of this distributed land was given to 18,000 landless Hungarians. With the exception of the Germans, no large scale deportations or population exchange took place. Yet, about 30,000 Hungarians – mostly those who had served in the Hungarian army and members of their families – moved to Hungary". Here's a news article (Serbian) about the establishment of Assembly of Vojvodina's commitee for investigation of all WWII crimes in 2000. I can't seem to find its findings, though. Duja ► 12:37, 4 December 2006 (UTC)

The article in the current form is severely biased, it presents the mass murder of Hungarians as a "justifiable collective revenge" for the atrocities committed by the occupants between 1941-44 (which undeniably happened, also out of revenge for Partisan violence against regular forces and the local population). It also fails to mention the sadistic cruelty by which most of the murders were carried out (impaling, mutilation, torture). See the book of Tibor Cseres as a reference. Árpád 07:13, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Requested move
1944-1945 Killings in Bačka → 1944-1945 massacre in Bačka (or 1944-1945 ethnic cleansing in Bačka, however most popular name of the event (in hungarian) is "1944-1945 blood feud in Bačka") – the page was illegally moved to recent name, wich does not describe the action properly, and Serbian POV. The death of 35,000 ppl within three month can not be describet as "killings". It was a massacre, and an ethnic cleansing. It was a feud for the 1941 annexation of Northern Vojvodina by Hungary. (see refs, and discussion above) Vince hey, yo! :-) 15:30, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
 * The Massacre article claim that term massacre "refers to individual events of deliberate and direct mass killing". We do not have here an article that describe individual event, but article that describe many different events. It also was not an ethnic cleansing because partisans were internationalists who killed people because of the political affiliation, not because of ethnic origin. Finally, the article itself is very controversial and based on controversial sources, so the proposed name change would make it even more controversial than it is now. Also, name "blood feud in Bačka" is certainly not popular name in Hungarian, but only among certain irredentist Hungarian historians - I am sure that reliable Hungarian historians do not use this term. Also, the page was not moved "illegally", it was just moved to NPOV title - the article with old title was originally created by Hungarian nationalist who had "No Trianon" sign on his user page: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=User:HunTheGoaT&oldid=78704643 That can say all. Also, the real number of killed people was never exactly established and the lowest estimation is 4,000 and much of those were individual executions, not mass killings. Anyway, if current title of the article is not best solution, I can support move of the name to any better title, but I do not support the move to POV and wrong titles such are "massacres", "ethnic cleansing", etc, because those are just unproved accusations.  PANONIAN   (talk)  17:15, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Survey
Add "* Support" or "* Oppose" followed by a brief explanation, then sign your opinion with ~ Vince hey, yo! :-) 15:30, 25 March 2007 (UTC)


 * By the way, I believe it is against Wiki voting practice to call users to vote like this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Hungarian_Wikipedians'_notice_board#Request_for_move PANONIAN   (talk)  17:31, 25 March 2007 (UTC) Of course, just read this to see why: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Canvassing#Votestacking and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Canvassing#Campaigning  PANONIAN   (talk)  17:42, 25 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Also, VinceB, please read Wikipedia policy about voting: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Discuss%2C_don't_vote PANONIAN   (talk)  17:39, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

The discussion above is ongoing since Nov 23, 2006. 6 month is more than enough to decide something. No compromise reached, so survey is the next step. Lots of wiki policies/guidelines are on enwiki, such as „Don't be a dick”, PANONIAN. --Vince hey, yo! :-) 22:55, 25 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Sorry, but false voting (you called other Hungarian users to vote in favor of your proposal and that is clearly against Wikipedia voting policy) canmot resolve this problem. Also, please refrain from personal insults. PANONIAN   (talk)  23:15, 25 March 2007 (UTC)


 * support per above. --Vince hey, yo! :-) 15:30, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
 * Neutral - obviously Panonian thinks it's much better to simply kill people of other nationalities than do a thorough ethnic cleansing. It's true that the partisans would have been able to eliminate the whole Hungarian minority in 1944-45 if they had this intention. For me it seems that they intended to kill only the Hungarians in the Titel District. Zello 18:23, 25 March 2007 (UTC)
 * I do not think what is better, but what happened and what did not happened - it is fact that partisans had intention to kill people who were of "wrong political affiliation" and that (if we look Yugoslavia as a whole) they killed much more Serbs (those who were chetniks) than Hungarians. What that can tell about motives? PANONIAN   (talk)  23:15, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

Discussion
There's a section, called "Discussion" below (here). How about adding your comments here, instead of other parts in the survey? I put them here. You know what? I never brought not really known WP policies, but now on, I'll. I'm just avoiding instruction creep, because Wikipedia is not a bureaucracy, so I kindly ask you to stop wikilawyering. Thanks. --Vince hey, yo! :-) 23:48, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

PS: I'm intrested, what did you consider a personal attack here? I just attracted your attention to a WP policy, named Don't be a dick. Or from now on bringing policies will be pa-s also? --Vince hey, yo! :-) 23:59, 25 March 2007 (UTC)


 * I will post my comments where I consider appropriate (not you), so please do not play with my comments, you have your own... And you (indirectly) called me a dick, which is a personal insult. PANONIAN   (talk)  00:29, 26 March 2007 (UTC)


 * No, I am wrong, you directly called me a dick. Here are your words: "Lots of wiki policies/guidelines are on enwiki, such as „Don't be a dick”, PANONIAN". So, since you mentioned my nickname in the sentence it is direct implication that I am a dick. PANONIAN   (talk)  00:35, 26 March 2007 (UTC)


 * :-))) Ok, I won't argue with you about this, if you're that sure about it. --Vince hey, yo! :-) 22:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

PS: All right, don't stick to rules, if you're the one, who has to keep them. :)) and turn the survey into a mess. I like ppl with double standards. --Vince hey, yo! :-) 22:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

Preface section
There was already a dispute which numbers should be mentioned in the preface part and dispute was solved by moving all numbers to separate section. The exact number of killed people was never exactly established and estimations range between 4,000 and 50,000, with claims that between 20,000 and 35,000 is most probable number. So, if we mention any of those numbers without other numbers, that would be POV because we have no proof that any of the numbers is correct one - there are only different estimations, and since this is the case, all estimations have to be mentioned together. In fact, we can even move all numbers from the separate section to preface part, but my point is that all numbers should be together, no matter if that is in the preface or in separate section. PANONIAN  (talk)  22:56, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

POV
Can someone give an update on the neutrality issues here? The tag had been around a year, where does the article stand now?-- Birgitte SB  22:51, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

PANONIAN you dirty nazionalist, who are you backing?? "Claim that it was ethnic cleansing is wrong because if the intention of the partisans was to perform ethnic cleansing, then why other Hungarians were not ethnically cleansed too?" ARE___ YOU___ NUTS?:?????? :O why others were not cleansed???? YOU ARE IN NO WAY A HISTORIAN JUST A WILD SERB PROPAGANDA PRODUCT, YOU ARE DEFENDING WAR CRIMINALS AND GENOCIDE, YOU D BE THE FIRST TO DO THAT TOO, YES I M GOING PERSONAL! ABOUT NUMBERS: 10.000 JUST IN CSUROG! COMPLETELY UNPOPULATED! SURVIVORS COMMEMORATE IT EVERY YEAR WHERE 3000 INNOCENT WERE BURIED, THEY BRING FLOWERS JUST TO HAVE THEM TRASHED BY THE DAY AFTER! BY PEOPLE NOT AS SOPHISTICATED AS YOU! ABOUT OBJECTIVES: THERE ARE DEATH LISTS AND OFFICIAL ORDERS CLEARLY ON ETHNIC CLEANSING! VICTIMS ARE NO WAY "COLLABORATORS" JUST EVERYDAY PEOPLE LIKE YOU AND ME! EXCEPT FOR YOU BACKING WAR CRIMES! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.131.154.159 (talk) 10:35, 4 April 2008 (UTC)
 * If I was not in a good mood, there would be a lot of words in this place, that your mother would not like. The fact that Serbian government during '90s had bad international propaganda is not enough for you to SHOUT HERE WITH CAPITAL LETTERS. Numbers you mention here can also be classified as Hungarian propaganda, and killings that Hungarian fascist did in Vojvodina can be named as ethnic cleansing. Could this be true? Jdjerich (talk) 12:05, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

CAPSLOCK went to dear PANONIAN, he seems to like it. head responsibles of killings in vojvodina were condemned to death in hungary right away! while those killings went all the winter long, systematically and with state support! not to mention the aftermath where memorials (oh well...speaking) were forbidden, mass graves are built upon in the next years, or even exhumated for industrial use of remnants! making glue. but can we all just cite horribilities? past is past. but mr P and his likes destroy truth today. and facing the facts would already be a step towards tomorrow! some destroy the memorials, some destroy the facts. one day P will say it was a tea party! :( i'm taking the numbers from black lists. the juridiction and guiltiness in ethnic cleansing from military orders. known documents today! not to mention the survivors and executors still alive in numbers! the witnesses! but there comes a "historian" who plays with numbers and adjectives to relativise events. with brilliant phrases like "should ve it been an ethnic cleansing, why didn't they cleanse other hungarians?" he also adds proper contributions at science... pisses me off, really. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.97.19.203 (talk) 02:09, 9 April 2008 (UTC)
 * Please do not insult other users. Thank you. (and have a nice day in Trianon Hungary) :) Btw, everything that I said still stands and, furthermore, seems that we now have new data which say that partisans killed more than 20,000 Serbs in Vojvodina as well. This is clear evidence that "ethnic cleansing of Hungarians" was not their goal. "Political cleansing" would be most accurate description for both, Serbs killed by partisans and Hungarians killed by partisans. PANONIAN  22:42, 25 March 2011 (UTC)

Outesticide
Ok, now you deleted sourced data with explanation "not important". It is clear now that your goal here is exactly propaganda against Serbia and an attempt to present Serbia as country where "minorities are persecuted" and where "monuments of minorities are destroyed". this source clearly states that damaging of monument was performed by two young non-adult boys, who were arrested by the Serbian police. If we mention that something was damaged then it is important to mention who damaged that. Seems that you purposely trying to write this sentence in a way that state of Serbia looks guilty for minority monument damaging and that Serbia, because of this, should no longer govern territories where "persecuted minorities" are living. I am sorry, but we have a source that say who damaged monument and there is no reason why this should not be mentioned. I do not insist that statement of Šandor Egereši is mentioned, but fact that boys who damaged monument were arrested by Serbian police is very important. PANONIAN 22:36, 25 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Outesticide, you now reverting this article without discussion. Please try to use talk page to explain your edits. The whole question about damaged monument is unrelated to subject of this article, which are events in 1944-1945. So, if you want to mention that monument is damaged in our days then info that boys who damaged it are arrested cannot be excluded. If you continue to revert this I will crop central part of your picture and I will upload it as new file in which only central (undamaged) part of monument would be visible. I will replace your original image with this one and then we would not have problem to explain why monument in the picture looks damaged. You please decide which of the two possible solutions we should implement. PANONIAN  19:03, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
 * One more thing: despite your obvious intention to hide info, you using "ref" tag in wrong way. "Ref" tags are used to mention references, not to hide parts of the text.I hope that you understand this simple thing. PANONIAN  19:09, 29 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Each year should be change the text to exactly who destroyed it therefore unnecessary. maybe we should write all incident from 1994. Outesticide (talk) 21:04, 30 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Well, as I said, this is not article about destroyed monument. It would be best that we have picture of undamaged monument instead of this one. However, since you took this picture of damaged monument in 2009, events relevant to this picture are only those after 2009, i.e. the events that we should describe in relation to this picture are that monument was damaged and that boys who damaged it are arrested. Why else would somebody speak about damaged monument if not with a goal that police find and arrest those who done this? So, they are arrested and what seems to be the problem if that is mentioned? Of course, in that way, Wikipedia readers would see that Serbian state and police are actually protecting Hungarian minority and their monuments, which contradicts to Greater Hungarian nationalistic propaganda that human rights of Hungarians in Serbia, Slovakia and Romania are violated. The goal of such propaganda is certainly not this action of Serbian state and police that arrested those who are responsible for minority monument damaging. The true goal of that propaganda would be much larger event in which borders would be changed and these lands would be transfered from Serbian to Hungarian state, and then, Hungarian police would "rightfully punish" those boys responsible for monument damaging, not only by arresting them, but by executing them, since "no such enemies of Hungarian state should walk alive" (of course, such fate could reach all non-Hungarians in "future Greater Hungary", no matter if they are damaging Hungarian monuments or not - by the view of Hungarian nationalism, they are just "minor races" that should be ruled by "noble Hungarians"). This is the true nature of this problem. PANONIAN  08:49, 2 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Als I can write pages of Serbian nationalism and Greater Serbia but not is the question. Outesticide (talk) 18:07, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Okay, this discussion is indeed getting further and further from the original topic. But I also have to mention that the monument getting damaged yearly is not irrelevant here, since the vandalism itself is the direct aftermath of the ethnic hatred which was so widespread during the 20th century conflicts. It's also true that for the sake of objectivity we have to mention that the perpetrators were arrested. Let's cool down here, and not accuse each other with nationalist propaganda. If an average English-speaking Wikipedia reader would read this article, and the fact that the vandals were arrested was left out, they could might as well think that the police simply failed to find them. Also, I would avoid this kind of speculations about the nationalist propaganda which wants those boys to be executed by the Hungarian police in the hellish nightmare of the Greater Hungary (if you detect a hint of sarcasm here, that's not a coincidence) because the mainstream Hungarian far-right always attacks the police for being to "liberal" to the current minorities so it's not very clever to think that they would hope that the police will "handle" them in that situation. Of course there are morons who are dreaming about such scenario sleeping under their Greater Hungary poster, but they are not a majority, even in the midst of otherwise colourful Hungarian right-wing extremist movements. It's also a convenient position to refuse the disliked text as mere nationalist propaganda. The current text which states that the memorial is being regularly vandalised with the mention of the police arrest seems fairly objective.
 * yossarian44 03:28, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * yossarian44, is this an article about the monument? no, it is not. how the story about monument damaged in 1994 or in 2008 could be relevant for the article about events in 1944-1945? This is an historical article that describe events in 1944-1945 and modern issues are completely unrelated to this. And so what if "vandalism itself is the direct aftermath of the ethnic hatred"? This is not article about ethnic hatred, but about ideological war crimes of communist regime. Anyway, since user Outesticide removed part of description that say that police arrested those who damaged this monument, there is no reason that we keep description that monument was damaged in 1994. Picture of the monument was taken in 2008, so the only relevant description could be the one that monument was damaged in that year. But, as soon as somebody took new picture of undamaged monument, this one already in the article should be replaced. PANONIAN  07:31, 16 April 2011 (UTC)


 * ok but we should replace the text every year. who is going to do? Outesticide (talk) 18:13, 6 April 2011 (UTC)
 * Why you think that monument will be damaged in next years? Police arrested those responsible, so this probably will not happen any more. Serbian state is able to protect its minorities. PANONIAN  07:34, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

Suggested changes
Also, I have to mention some other stuff:

1. The part about the massacre in Bezdan is very poorly written, and contains a number of false information, and the English there isn't very great. Cseres' work here: http://mek.oszk.hu/03300/03393/03393.htm#16 does not mention that the Russians have stopped the bloodshed, only that as soon as the Russians forces arrived, the partisans left. Also, the 118 victims weren't shot into the Danube, but they were forced to march to a forest near Isterbác, where they were made to dig their own graves and in which they were shot into in groups of twelve, according to all the witnesses. This whole part should be re-written, because it's not backed up by any sources.

2. For the accuracy's sake we should mention the reason of the significant difference in numbers provided by the various sources. For most of the readers it might not be clear that the post-war communist regimes both in Yugoslavia and Hungary didn't really tolerate the research of this event, so the estimates are relying on the post-communist researches.

3. The ethnic cleansing aspect: the definition of ethnic cleansing also means the mass deportation of people. It is true that the massacre of Serbians was a political act, to punish the collaborators, but the German part of the whole event seems to be a true ethnic cleansing. Of course, it's not true that the whole cleansing was against the Hungarians, it was against the Germans. According to Niall Ferguson (book War of the World page 584.) 13 million Germans were relocated from Eastern Europe to Germany, those from Vojvodina were part of them. Checking the records of the census in Vojvodina (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_history_of_vojvodina) the 90% of Germans disappeared from the area by 1948 - of course it's true that most of them left as the Nazi withdrawal. The others were forced to leave, or were killed. Knowing these data in seems that the ethnic cleansing of Germans was going on here, since the whole mass deportation of Germans is often described us such. The Hungarians were much more likely the victims of simple ethnic hatred rather than an organised act of ethnic cleansing, because in 1948 there's "only" 10% loss of Hungarian population since 1941. I think we should include these facts. We could leave this part in: "Some Hungarian historians are introducing idea that such killings were an ethnic cleansing of Hungarians" but we should put the data here, which shows that since the Hungarian population loss is much less than the German, so it's quite unlikely that it was a direct cleansing action against the Hungarians. We might even put a whole section which is describing these facts.
 * Actually communist authorities gave a political reason for their actions against Germans as well: the given explanation was that Germans are collectively politically "incorrect" because they did not participated in anti-fascist struggle in large number (like other citizens of Yugoslavia) and because 95% of them were members of Kulturbund organization. Other reasons were economical, i.e. houses and property of Germans were used for refugees and for restoration of regional economy. Those authors who wrote about communist actions against Germans did not offered a conclusion that these actions were conducted because of "simple ethnic hate" (in fact, historically, there was never such hate between Serbs and Germans in Vojvodina). Similar problem we have with Hungarians: if aim of communist authorities was an ethnic cleansing of Hungarians then why all of them or at least large majority of them were not "ethnically cleansed"? Examples of ethnic cleansing in Balkans or eastern Europe are showing to us that victims of such ethnic cleansing are either entire populations either "critical majority" of these populations. If we speak about Vojvodina Hungarians, their entire population or "critical majority" was certainly not a target of any ethnic cleansing (and if we compare results of 1931 and 1948 census, we can see that number of Hungarians increased from 376,176 to 428,554). I do not see here evidences that ethnic cleansing was an aim of communist authorities. Further more, by some estimations, communist killed as much as 300,000 Serbs in whole of Yugoslavia. Events in Vojvodina are only one part of events in whole of Yugoslavia, and even if largest estimations about number of killed Hungarians are correct, they could not compete with estimated number of killed Serbs. So, if Hungarians were victims of ethnic cleansing we perhaps should conclude that communists also aimed to ethnically cleanse Serbs. You also mentioned "10% Hungarian loss since 1941". Please have in mind that some of Hungarians who were listed in 1941 census were in fact Csango colonists who were brought to Vojvodina by occupational authorities. They were not part of local Hungarian population that was recorded by 1931 census. So, the "loss" of Hungarians could be only seen by comparison of 1931 and 1948 data and such comparison show us that there was no "loss", but increase of Hungarian population in Vojvodina. PANONIAN  08:01, 16 April 2011 (UTC)

4. I read the argument about the killings/massacre term, and I think that both should be mentioned. The "killings" argument is true, because it wasn't a fully organized act, but a longer chain of events with multiple locations. But we also can't overlook the fact that in some cases (e.g.: Brezdán) clearly an organised massacre is what happened. I think we should put edit the first sentence this way: "The 1944–1945 killings in Vojvodina (or Vojvodina massacre) were executions of several...", so in this way we respect both POV's, and the objectivity doesn't really get damaged, since in Hungary we still call these events a massacre. yossarian44 03:30, 4 April 2011 (UTC)
 * By definition, massacre is an localized event (localized by specific time and place) and therefore an article that describe a group of events that occurred in relatively longer time period cannot be titled as "massacre". Furthermore, there are no academic English language sources that are using term "Vojvodina massacre", so it is not up to us to invent such titles. Also, events in Vojvodina were not separate from events in whole of Yugoslavia from that time and perhaps this whole article should be merged into newly created article with name Communist killings in Yugoslavia in 1944-1945. This whole article that is focused on part of Yugoslavia only is example of original research. PANONIAN  09:00, 16 April 2011 (UTC)


 * Just go ahead and be bold. No such user (talk) 07:04, 15 April 2011 (UTC)

Dead link
During several automated bot runs the following external link was found to be unavailable. Please check if the link is in fact down and fix or remove it in that case!


 * http://www.hungarian-history.hu/lib/cseres/index.htm
 * In Ethnic cleansing on 2011-03-18 09:32:24, 404 Not Found
 * In 1944–1945 killings in Vojvodina on 2011-05-25 03:19:03, Socket Error: 'A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond'
 * In 1944–1945 killings in Vojvodina on 2011-06-04 16:28:58, Socket Error: 'A connection attempt failed because the connected party did not properly respond after a period of time, or established connection failed because connected host has failed to respond'

--JeffGBot (talk) 16:29, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Purge, Religion and the Serbian mindset of 1944-45
After reading the arguments regarding the use of the words 'killing' and 'massacre', a more appropriate term would be purge for these reasons:

1. More than one ethnic groups were killed, including Rus - Russyns (which wasn't mentioned in the article).

2. Similar models can be found, for example Stalinist and Maoist purges.

3. Partisans who committed these purges were in the most part, politically motivated by Tito.

4. The killing of the intelligentsia.

What is missing from the article is the sense of retribution, which has been identified by Hungarian and Serb sources as well as taking from models in the past:

1. Hatred by the Orthodox Church factions against the Roman Catholic Church.

2. Ethnicity based on previous migration and settlement from Austro-Hungary, Croatia, Germany, Slovenia. There is a 450 year history of this.

3. Serbian Partisan levels of hatred, precluded the idea of resettlement or expulsion.

4. Following point 3, partisan hatred and the moral and ethically debased forms of torture they used against some of their victims.

5. Most contentiously, Partisans' inability for judgement or trial. Accusations by local Serbs against those of higher socio-economic status or of those who were in competition, those who owned land and houses.

6. Lack of education of the partisan Serbs. Xenophobic and Fascist motivations evident by some groups, replicating the Nazi fascism they were trying to purge.

7. Lack of time and therefore opportunity. As soon as the Russian liberation forces came through (some Bulgar forces as well), the partisans either stopped or went away then returned after they passed through.

8. Inconsistency. On many occasions, partisan attitudes varied from place to place and over time.

None of this is in the article.

As for Nationalism, it should be stated within the article that Nationalistic tendencies bias the current information available and that all viewpoints should be aired.

The comment about 'peer reviewed sources' is interesting in that very little is available, not just on this topic but generally over the whole of Eastern European history. Empirical sources do exist and have been used in arguably nationalistic histories. All historians argue and there is no reason not to include these sources in an explanatory manner. Htcs (talk) 15:09, 17 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Do you have any source which use word "purge" or it is your original research? PANONIAN  22:05, 17 September 2011 (UTC)
 * For your information, The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as: an abrupt or violent removal of a group of people: In usage: the savagery of government’s political purges
 * Here is the link for you - http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/purge — Preceding unsigned comment added by Htcs (talk • contribs) 01:52, 18 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I meant: do you have any source that use word "purge" in relation to this event? PANONIAN  07:29, 18 September 2011 (UTC)

Rusyns, Orthodox Church and Partisan motivation
I added a small section on Rusyns. Unfortunately, the English of Tibor Cseres work is not very clear. I think he was trying to say that the 1944 partisans were also motivated by the fact that the Rus were not attacked by the Hungarian forces in 1941, therefore they deserved punishment? Hopefully others may be able to clarify this point.

His main thesis is that the partisan actions were based on revenge against the Hungarian forces that were putting down rebellions in 1941. I have stayed away from this, although he states that revenge, particularly on the local level was common-place. Some community leaders, like Serbian Orthodox priests, defended RC priests and targetted ethnics and the partisans generally left them alone. In other localities, the Orthodox priest outright accused the RC priest and congregation because they preached that they worshipped God as the God of Hungary (Magyar Isten). So I am personally interested if there were any factionalism between Greek Catholic, Eastern Catholic, Roman Catholic, Lutheran (Evangelical) and other denominations from other sources.

In any case, a section on Partisan Motivation should be added, perhaps including religious factions and socio-economic factions. Htcs (talk) 06:06, 19 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Well, Cseres does not look like reliable source. His book speaks with hate about Serbs and therefore it is hard to say what were his motives: investigation of one historical event or propaganda against Serbia and Yugoslavia. Anyway, statements of Cseres should be at least confirmed by some other authors who are not expressing so strong nationalistic tendency. PANONIAN  08:30, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

I wouldn't put it exactly like that. There is history that he is reporting like numbers, places, names, events. But then there is his argument. I think it is his argument that is flawed, which makes the reader think that his history is also flawed. It is a valuable source as he uses first hand empirical accounts so it shouldn't be discounted. Confirmation of numbers would be good, but that would mean looking at RC church registrations (Matrica) and civil registration books for every town he mentions. Then there is the 100 year law. It will take another 38 years before those records are public domain. Then the same has to be done for Serbs, Germans, Rus etc. University research with co-operative governments. The subject matter is too hot anyway.Htcs (talk) 11:52, 21 September 2011 (UTC)


 * I have his book (I downloaded it from the Internet) and I can say that it contains: 1. speech of hate against Serbs, 2. wrong or nationalistic interpretations of certain general historical events. Due to that, we cannot take info presented by Cseres without criticism, especially because we have other sources that provided different estimations about number of killed people and because we have other sources that speaking about Serbs and Germans who were also killed by the Yugoslav communists. That fact alone deny some interpretations provided by Cseres about motives and reasons that triggered these events. PANONIAN  15:29, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

Title change: Killings>warcrimes>purges
Before anyone starts making objections, the title change was discussed at length with PANNONIA on the talk page. Readability and accuracy have improved. The article has a lot more NPOV and it has expanded to include Central Serbia. The principal reason for the change was that the actions committed by the partisans were directed by the Serbian military governance at the time. This by definition is a purge and not 'killing' or 'massacre'; terms that denotes nationalistic POV which must be avoided.Htcs (talk) 15:18, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Neutrality
This article is not neutral at all. It looks like the biggest problem is the user Pannonian and his nationalist point of view. HE would like to prove that this area is serb, and there are no place for another view and nationalities. However, the fact is:

Most of Vojvodina became part of the Kingdom of Hungary in the 11th century and remained in Hungary until about 900 years later (1918/1920), except for the period of the Ottoman conquest (see below).

Its demographic balance started changing at the end of the 14th century, as it welcomed Serbian refugees fleeing from territories conquered by the Ottoman army. The first Turkish census, of 1557-58, described the northern parts of the territory having a Hungarian majority. Large numbers of Serbs were settled as a conscious policy on the part of the Habsburg emperor at the end of the 17th century. They were granted widespread exceptions and communal rights, in exchange for providing a border militia that could be mobilised against invaders from the south, as well as in case of civil unrest in Hungary.

Regarding killings, even serbian minds are changing, and Pannonian views and nationalism is minority now. Previously unknown fact are emerging, and this article should be updated: I will cite only serbian sources, as everything what is not serbian is unacceptable for user Pannonian. http://www.autonomija.info/sacinjen-spisak-s-imenima-85000-civila-pobijenih-u-vojvodini-u-drugom-svetskom-ratu.html

http://cadmus.eui.eu/bitstream/handle/1814/2599/HEC04-01.pdf;jsessionid=B9BA0BA0BDE5F0F742A6FFBB1967E1AF?sequence=1 page 57

further:

Među pomenutih 84.000 žrtava, koje je pobrojao istraživački tim profesora Živkovića, daleko najveći broj, tačnije preko 47.000, čine Srbi, dok je između 1944. i 1948. stradalo oko 17.000 Nemaca, a naročito u tom posleratnom periodu, pobijeno je i oko 6.000 Mađara.

Medjutim ovde sam Zivkovic kaze sledece:

Novinar: E. Marjanov http://www.slobodnavojvodina.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3880 Živkoviæ navodi da je u Vojvodini u tom periodu stradalo ukupno 97.000 civila raznih nacionalnosti. Dr Dragoljub Živkoviæ kaže da je za vreme Drugog svetskog rata u Vojvodini bilo 72 logora. Toliko su držali i partizani posle rata. Živkoviæ takoðe kaže da je od 97.000 žrtava koje su stradale posle rata bilo 20.000 dece starosti izmeðu jedne i sedam godina. On istièe da su meðu žrtvama pronašli i 9.800 ljudi bez nacionalnosti.

Prema podacima koje smo mi sakupili u Vojvodini, stradalo je 20.000 vojvoðanskih Nemaca. Taj broj æe biti veæi pošto struèna ekipa Vojvoðanske akademije nauka, koja je od Anketnog odbora Skupštine Vojvodine svojevremeno preuzela projekat, još nije obradila podatke iz Baèkog Jarka i Molindorfa. Za taj posao nedostaje nam oko 2.000 evra. Prema našim procenama, u tim mestima stradalo je oko 7.000 nemaèkih civila, tako da raèunamo da je posle Drugog svetskog rata pobijeno oko 30.000 nemaèkih civila

ISto dalje, sledeci clanak: http://www.bulkeser.de/srpskiwebsait-3.html Dr Dragoljub Živkovic kaze: Do sada smo došli do broja od 110000 stradalih Vojvodana i Vojvodanki. Sva dosadašnja istraživanja su išla do brojke od 70000 stradalih. Utvrdili smo i veoma velike razlike u pogledu tvrdenja koliko je ljudi stradalo iz koje nacionalne skupine. Važno je da kažem da ovo istraživanje pod stradalnicima (žrtvama) podrazumeva ljude koji nisu nosili pušku, dakle nisu pripadali vojnim formacijama. Rec je pre svega o deci, ženama, starcima, mladim ljudima koji nisu hteli da nose pušku. Nažalost, najveci broj stradalnika su sasvim nevini ljudi.

It means, the number is at least 110000 people, and this number is growing.

This article from 2009 confirms the number of 110000, and says "komisija je utvrdila oko 6.500 imena mađarskih žrtava, a pretpostavlja se da ih je bilo još oko 1.000. " http://www.slobodnavojvodina.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=81:pokrajinski-anketni-odbor-dao-dobre-temelje-meudravnoj-komisiji&catid=4:fokus&Itemid=17   Ssh in use (talk) 00:14, 18 November 2011 (UTC) ssh_in_use Ssh in use (talk) 23:22, 21 November 2011 (UTC)


 * Ssh in use, Wikipedia is not a Forum. Talk pages are here so that article content could be discussed (in civilized manner, of course) - this is no place where you should comment other users or present your (dubious) political views about regional history. Your personal insults addressed to me are far from civilized way of discussion. I do not see that your comment contains anything that could be discussed in relation to this article. Your claim that "article is not neutral because user PANONIAN is an nationalist" is really funny and I am kindly asking you to remove this insult addressed to me. If you continue to insult me like this, I will report your behavior to administrators. Finally, estimations presented by professor Živković are already used in this article, so I do not see a point of your quotations. PANONIAN  10:35, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Pannonian, there is nothing personal here. We are just talking about same facts. So, let it be so kind and answer: Are you nationalist? and: Would a nationalist create a NEUTRAL acticle ?  Ssh in use (talk) 23:08, 22 November 2011 (UTC)
 * Did I ever declared myself as nationalist or did I ever said anything nationalistic? No, I did not. So, please stop with this personal crap. And by the way, I did not created this article, I only made some changes to make it more NPOV. PANONIAN  05:13, 23 November 2011 (UTC)

Youtube movie
Regarding link to youtube movie that I removed, problem is not the ethnic origin of author of that movie but obvious fact that movie is a forgery. Here is evidence for that which could be examined in two easy steps:


 * 1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqCRZpeLEtA (on 2:09, the disputed movie show hangings presenting them as "execution of Hungarians in 1944-1945").


 * 2. Now please see original movie which shows that these hangings were in fact hangings of Serb civilians in Pančevo in 1941 performed by German fascists (exactly same image on 1:41 in that movie): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fj24C962oX8

So, Ssh in use, tell me, which Wikipedia policy supports propagation of obvious forgeries on this web site? PANONIAN 19:10, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Removal of content
The lead section of this article has had sourced content removed three times. This will be reported as 3R violation. I was in the process of editing the lead to improve its grammar and re-insert the fact that the victims were also Serbs (in fact probably mostly Serbs), when the third reversion occurred. This is my proposed lead:

The Communist purges in Serbia in 1944–1945 were purges committed by members of the Yugoslav Partisan Movement and post-war communist authorities after they gained control over Serbia in 1944. Most of these purges were committed between October 1944 and May 1945. During this time, several tens of thousands of people were executed. The victims were of different ethnic backgrounds, but were mostly Serbs, Hungarians, Germans and Croats. Different sources provide different estimates regarding the number of victims. According to one source, at least 80,000 people were executed in the whole of Serbia, while other source states that the number of victims was more than 100,000. Some 40,000 Hungarian civilians were tortured or summarily executed, and tens of thousands of fleeing Croatian soldiers and civilians were slaughtered. The names of about 4,000 individual Germans who were killed by the Partisans are known, but it is likely that many more ethnic Germans were murdered. These events during the fall of 1944 are often referred to as "bloody autumn".

Peacemaker67 (talk) 08:23, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you and, of course, the lead should also talk about the Serb victims, but citations should be provided. Furthermore, I would like to ask the IP editor to identify his/her issues with the statement about the Croatian victims. Also (s)he should not violate the 3RR and provide reliable and verifiable sources in case of changing the numerical data. K &oelig;rte F  a   { ταλκ }  11:15, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Sure, no prob. I was actually the one who tagged the Croatians. What was the story there? I wasn't aware any NDH forces crossed the Drina. Peacemaker67 (talk) 11:18, 27 October 2012 (UTC)
 * I have rm the Croats, those killings are not part of these purges. I have also tagged a few unreliable sources such as a map from a blog and a statement by a parliamentary deputy. In what appears to be a contested article, reliable sources are critical and all claims that could reasonably be expected to be challenged should have inline citations. Peacemaker67 (talk) 12:44, 28 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Thank you, Peacemaker67, your work is appreciated. I agree that the killing of the Croats that the source talk about does not fit to the current article. However, I think that the title and the scope of the article is quite strange. First, it is not evident whether all partisans can be simply classified as "communists", second, the country was then called Yugoslavia, so why should we restrict the scope of the article to the current borders of Serbia? In my opinion, the article should be renamed to "Partisan purges in Yugoslavia in 1944–1945". What do you think about that? K &oelig;rte F  a   { ταλκ }  05:21, 30 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Its limited scope makes it a potential vehicle for POV-pushing, but I think any decision about expanding its scope needs to take into account the incredible complexity of what went on in 1944-1950. Just look at the contested nature and POV-pushing that has gone on at Bleiburg repatriations. This article probably needs to be expanded as far as possible using WP:RS, then we can decide if we believe a "Yugoslavia-wide" scope article is warranted. Peacemaker67 (talk) 06:04, 30 October 2012 (UTC)


 * Another issue is the question of sources introduced by the IP editor. Most of them are questionable in my opinion, i.e., they are just websites "floating around" on the web. This is a very sensitive topic and hence, it is especially important to have proper sources for the claims. Pointing to a website, e.g., of a tabloid magazine (Blic ), in order to support historical data is quite questionable. If possible, we should only use scholarly sources, for example, academic and peer-reviewed documents published by reputable publishers. Consequently, I would like to ask the IP editor to either argue that the provided sources should be considered reliable or replace them by reliable ones, otherwise the claims should be deleted. K &oelig;rte F  a   { ταλκ }  05:38, 30 October 2012 (UTC)
 * In respect of this issue we are in agreement, WP:RS required. Peacemaker67 (talk) 06:04, 30 October 2012 (UTC)
 * Since the IP editor did not provide reliable sources (most of them are dubious), the new additions should be removed. However, in this case, we will need a good source about the Serb victims. We should look for some reliable references for them, too. K &oelig;rte F  a   { ταλκ }  09:37, 8 November 2012 (UTC)