"Death to fascism, freedom to the people!", , , was a motto of the

Yugoslav Partisan The Yugoslav Partisans,Serbo-Croatian, Macedonian language, Macedonian, and Slovene language, Slovene: , officially the National Liberation Army and Partisan Detachments of Yugoslavia sh-Latn-Cyrl, Narodnooslobodilačka vojska i partizanski odr ...

s, first introduced by the

Communists Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, d ...

and afterward accepted as the official slogan of the entire resistance movement. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

and for a few subsequent years, it was also used as a greeting formulation among members of the movement, both in official and unofficial correspondence, often abbreviated as "SFSN!" when written and accompanied by the clenched fist salute when spoken (one person usually saying "Smrt fašizmu!", the other responding with "Sloboda narodu!"). Later, it was often quoted in post-war

Socialist Yugoslavia The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (commonly abbreviated as SFRY or SFR Yugoslavia), known from 1945 to 1963 as the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as Socialist Yugoslavia or simply Yugoslavia, was a country ...

History

The slogan was part of the

Communist Party of Yugoslavia The League of Communists of Yugoslavia, known until 1952 as the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, was the founding and ruling party of SFR Yugoslavia. It was formed in 1919 as the main communist opposition party in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats a ...

's 1941 call to arms for the people of Yugoslavia. The Bulletin of the Partisan Supreme Headquarters used the slogan in its first issue dated 16 August 1941. The August 1941 edition of the Croatian daily newspaper ''

Vjesnik ''Vjesnik'' () was a Croatian state-owned daily newspaper published in Zagreb. Originally established in 1940 as a wartime illegal publication of the Communist Party of Croatia, it later built and maintained a reputation as Croatia's newspaper ...

'', then the primary media publication of the Partisan resistance movement, featured the statement "Smrt fašizmu, sloboda narodu". The slogan became popular after the execution of Stjepan Filipović, a

. As the rope was put around his neck on 22 May 1942, Filipović defiantly thrust his hands out and denounced the

Germans Germans (, ) are the natives or inhabitants of Germany, or sometimes more broadly any people who are of German descent or native speakers of the German language. The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany, constitution of Germany, imple ...

and their

Axis An axis (: axes) may refer to: Mathematics *A specific line (often a directed line) that plays an important role in some contexts. In particular: ** Coordinate axis of a coordinate system *** ''x''-axis, ''y''-axis, ''z''-axis, common names ...

allies as murderers, shouting "Death to fascism, freedom to the people!". At this moment, a subsequently-famous photograph was taken from which a statue was cast.

Notes

References

{{Reflist Anti-fascism in Yugoslavia Last words 1941 quotations 1942 quotations Quotations from military Political catchphrases Yugoslav Partisans Yugoslavia in World War II World War II political slogans

History

See also

Notes

References