Balkan Federation
Encyclopedia
The Balkan Federation was a project about the creation of a Balkan federation or confederation, based mainly on left political ideas.

The concept of a Balkan federation emerged at the late 19th century from among left political forces in the region. The central aim was to establish a new political unity: a common federal republic unifying the Balkan Peninsula on the basis of internationalism
Internationalism (politics)
Internationalism is a political movement which advocates a greater economic and political cooperation among nations for the theoretical benefit of all...

, socialism
Socialism
Socialism is an economic system characterized by social ownership of the means of production and cooperative management of the economy; or a political philosophy advocating such a system. "Social ownership" may refer to any one of, or a combination of, the following: cooperative enterprises,...

, social solidarity, and economic equality. The underlying vision was that despite differences among the Balkan peoples the historical need for emancipation was a common basis for unification.

This political concept went through three phases in its development. In the first phase the idea was articulated as a response to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire
Ottoman Empire
The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

 at the beginning of the twentieth century. In the second phase, mostly through the interwar period (1919–36), the idea of the Balkan federation was taken up by the Balkan communist parties. The third phase is characterized by clash between Balkan communist leaders and Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

 as an opponent of the idea during the post-World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...

 period.

Background

At first in Belgrade at 1865 a number of radical Balkan intellectuals founded the Democratic Oriental Federation, proposing a federation from Alps to Cyprus based on political freedom and social equality. They confirmed their adherence to the ideals of French Revolution in the line of Saint-Simon
Claude Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon
Claude Henri de Rouvroy, comte de Saint-Simon, often referred to as Henri de Saint-Simon was a French early socialist theorist whose thought influenced the foundations of various 19th century philosophies; perhaps most notably Marxism, positivism and the discipline of sociology...

’s federalism and in relation to the socialist ideas of Karl Marx
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx was a German philosopher, economist, sociologist, historian, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. His ideas played a significant role in the development of social science and the socialist political movement...

 or Mikhail Bakunin
Mikhail Bakunin
Mikhail Alexandrovich Bakunin was a well-known Russian revolutionary and theorist of collectivist anarchism. He has also often been called the father of anarchist theory in general. Bakunin grew up near Moscow, where he moved to study philosophy and began to read the French Encyclopedists,...

. Later, in France, a League for the Balkan Confederation, was constituted in 1894, in which participated Greek, Bulgarian, Serbian and Romanian socialists, supporting the Macedonian autonomy inside the general federation of Southeast Europe, apprehending the complexity of the Macedonian Question. The next attempt came immediately after the Young Turk Revolution
Young Turk Revolution
The Young Turk Revolution of 1908 reversed the suspension of the Ottoman parliament by Sultan Abdul Hamid II, marking the onset of the Second Constitutional Era...

 in 1908. The following year, in Salonika the Socialist Workers Association merged with two Bulgarian socialist groups and the Socialist Worker’s Federation of Ottoman Workers was founded. Although it underestimated, till 1913, the political significance of the national question, as this significance manifested itself in the right of national self-determination, and its leadership kept a moderate position in regard with the nationalistic tendencies in Balkan social-democratic parties.

Balkan Socialist Federation

On January 7 and 9, 1910, the First Balkan Socialist Conference was held in Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...

, then within the Kingdom of Serbia
Kingdom of Serbia
The Kingdom of Serbia was created when Prince Milan Obrenović, ruler of the Principality of Serbia, was crowned King in 1882. The Principality of Serbia was ruled by the Karađorđevic dynasty from 1817 onwards . The Principality, suzerain to the Porte, had expelled all Ottoman troops by 1867, de...

. The main platforms at the first conference were Balkan unity and action against the impending wars. Another important aspect was the call for a solution to the Macedonian Question. In 1915, after a Conference in Bucharest
Bucharest
Bucharest is the capital municipality, cultural, industrial, and financial centre of Romania. It is the largest city in Romania, located in the southeast of the country, at , and lies on the banks of the Dâmbovița River....

; it was decided to create a Revolutionary Balkan Social Democratic Labour Federation, comprising groups who adhered to the Zimmerwald Conference
Zimmerwald Conference
The Zimmerwald Conference was held in Zimmerwald, Switzerland, from September 5 through September 8, 1915. It was an international socialist conference, which saw the beginning of the end of the coalition between revolutionary socialists and reformist socialists in the Second International.-...

 and opposed participation in World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. Initially headed by Christian Rakovsky
Christian Rakovsky
Christian Rakovsky was a Bulgarian socialist revolutionary, a Bolshevik politician and Soviet diplomat; he was also noted as a journalist, physician, and essayist...

, it had Vasil Kolarov
Vasil Kolarov
Vasil Petrov Kolarov was a Bulgarian communist political leader and leading functionary in the Communist International.-Early years:Kolarov was born in Shumen, Bulgaria on 16 July 1877, the son of a shoemaker...

 and Georgi Dimitrov
Georgi Dimitrov
Georgi Dimitrov Mikhaylov , also known as Georgi Mikhaylovich Dimitrov , was a Bulgarian Communist politician...

 among its prominent activists. In 1915, Dimitrov wrote that Macedonia
Macedonia (region)
Macedonia is a geographical and historical region of the Balkan peninsula in southeastern Europe. Its boundaries have changed considerably over time, but nowadays the region is considered to include parts of five Balkan countries: Greece, the Republic of Macedonia, Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia, as...

, "...which was split into three parts...", would be, "...reunited into a single state enjoying equal rights within the framework of the Balkan Democratic Federation." This independent and united Macedonia would have consisted of the corresponding geographical departments of Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Greece. The Federation was repressed by national governments at different intervals (Rakovsky himself was arrested by the Romanian government in 1916).

Balkan Communist Federation

After the October Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...

 in Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

, a Balkan Communist Federation was formed in 1920-1921, and was influenced by Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...

's views on nationality (see Proletarian internationalism
Proletarian internationalism
Proletarian internationalism, sometimes referred to as international socialism, is a Marxist social class concept based on the view that capitalism is now a global system, and therefore the working class must act as a global class if it is to defeat it...

). It was a communist
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...

 umbrella organisation in which all the communist parties
Communist party
A political party described as a Communist party includes those that advocate the application of the social principles of communism through a communist form of government...

 in the Balkans
Balkans
The Balkans is a geopolitical and cultural region of southeastern Europe...

 were represented. It was dominated by the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 and Comintern
Comintern
The Communist International, abbreviated as Comintern, also known as the Third International, was an international communist organization initiated in Moscow during March 1919...

 requirements. It advocated a "Balkan Federative Republic" that would have included Bulgaria
Bulgaria
Bulgaria , officially the Republic of Bulgaria , is a parliamentary democracy within a unitary constitutional republic in Southeast Europe. The country borders Romania to the north, Serbia and Macedonia to the west, Greece and Turkey to the south, as well as the Black Sea to the east...

, Yugoslavia
Kingdom of Yugoslavia
The Kingdom of Yugoslavia was a state stretching from the Western Balkans to Central Europe which existed during the often-tumultuous interwar era of 1918–1941...

, Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

, and Turkey
Turkey
Turkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...

; some projects also involved Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...

, but most of them only envisaged its fragmentation. The body thus oversaw the activities of the Bulgarian Communist Party
Bulgarian Communist Party
The Bulgarian Communist Party was the communist and Marxist-Leninist ruling party of the People's Republic of Bulgaria from 1946 until 1990 when the country ceased to be a communist state...

 (BKP), the Communist Party of Yugoslavia
League of Communists of Yugoslavia
League of Communists of Yugoslavia , before 1952 the Communist Party of Yugoslavia League of Communists of Yugoslavia (Serbo-Croatian: Savez komunista Jugoslavije/Савез комуниста Југославије, Slovene: Zveza komunistov Jugoslavije, Macedonian: Сојуз на комунистите на Југославија, Sojuz na...

 (KPJ), the Communist Party of Greece
Communist Party of Greece
Founded in 1918, the Communist Party of Greece , better known by its acronym, ΚΚΕ , is the oldest party on the Greek political scene.- Foundation :...

 (KKE), the Communist Party of Turkey (TKP), and, to a certain measure, those of the Communist Party of Romania
Romanian Communist Party
The Romanian Communist Party was a communist political party in Romania. Successor to the Bolshevik wing of the Socialist Party of Romania, it gave ideological endorsement to communist revolution and the disestablishment of Greater Romania. The PCR was a minor and illegal grouping for much of the...

 (PCdR). It was disestablished in 1939.

From the beginning, the Bulgarians assumed a leading role in the BCF. In Sofia
Sofia
Sofia is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria and the 12th largest city in the European Union with a population of 1.27 million people. It is located in western Bulgaria, at the foot of Mount Vitosha and approximately at the centre of the Balkan Peninsula.Prehistoric settlements were excavated...

, May-June 1922, the question of the "autonomy of Macedonia, Dobruja and Thrace was raised by Vasil Kolarov
Vasil Kolarov
Vasil Petrov Kolarov was a Bulgarian communist political leader and leading functionary in the Communist International.-Early years:Kolarov was born in Shumen, Bulgaria on 16 July 1877, the son of a shoemaker...

 and was backed by Dimitrov, the Bulgarian delegate who presided over the meeting. The Greek delegate asked for a postponement as he was reluctant to approve a motion that was not on the agenda. In December 1923, Balkan Communist Federation held its 5th Conference in Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

.In 1924 the Comintern
Comintern
The Communist International, abbreviated as Comintern, also known as the Third International, was an international communist organization initiated in Moscow during March 1919...

 entered negotiations about collaboration between the communists and the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO), Internal Thracian Revolutionary Organisation
Internal Thracian Revolutionary Organisation
The Internal Thracian Revolutionary Organisation , ITRO, was a Bulgarian revolutionary organisation active in Western Thrace and southern Bulgaria between 1920 and 1934.The reason for the establishment of ITRO was the deplorable situation of the Thracian Bulgarians in...

 (ITRO) and Internal Dobrujan Revolutionary Organisation
Internal Dobrujan Revolutionary Organisation
The Internal Dobrujan Revolutionary Organisation or IDRO was a Bulgarian nationalist and revolutionary organisation active in Romanian Dobruja from 1923 to 1940...

 (IDRO) and the creation of a united revolutionary movements. The idea for a new unified organizations was supported by the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

, which saw a chance for using this well developed revolutionary movements to spread revolution in the Balkans and destabilize the Balkan monarchies. The so-called May Manifesto of 6 May 1924 was issued in which the objectives of the unified Macedonian liberation movement were presented: independence and unification of partitioned Macedonia, fighting all the neighbouring Balkan monarchies, forming a Balkan Communist Federation and cooperation with the Soviet Union. In 1925, a left wings named Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (United)
Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (United)
The Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization , commonly known in English as IMRO...

, Dobrujan Revolutionary Organisation and Internal Thracian Organization, respectively, seceded from the main organizations under the influence of the Bulgarian Communist Party
Bulgarian Communist Party
The Bulgarian Communist Party was the communist and Marxist-Leninist ruling party of the People's Republic of Bulgaria from 1946 until 1990 when the country ceased to be a communist state...

. This wings militated for a Soviet Republics, which would either be part of a "Balkan Communist Federation". The Bulgarian Communist Party was compelled by Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

 to accept the formation of Macedonian
Macedonians (ethnic group)
The Macedonians also referred to as Macedonian Slavs: "... the term Slavomacedonian was introduced and was accepted by the community itself, which at the time had a much more widespread non-Greek Macedonian ethnic consciousness...

, Thracian and Dobruja
Dobruja
Dobruja is a historical region shared by Bulgaria and Romania, located between the lower Danube river and the Black Sea, including the Danube Delta, Romanian coast and the northernmost part of the Bulgarian coast...

n nations in order to include those new separate states in the Balkan Communist Federation. Later even a resolution of the Balkan Communist Federation
Resolution of the Comintern on the Macedonian Question
The resolution of the Comintern of January 11, 1934 was an official policitical document, in which for the first time, an authoritative international organization provides direction for recognizing of the existence of a separate Macedonian nation and Macedonian language.In June 1931 the registrar...

 for the recognition of a Macedonian ethnicity was issued on January 7, 1934, by the Balkan Secretariat of the Comintern
Comintern
The Communist International, abbreviated as Comintern, also known as the Third International, was an international communist organization initiated in Moscow during March 1919...

. It was accepted by the Political Secretariat in Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 on January 11, 1934, and approved by the Executive Committee of the Comintern.

The Communist Party of Greece
Communist Party of Greece
Founded in 1918, the Communist Party of Greece , better known by its acronym, ΚΚΕ , is the oldest party on the Greek political scene.- Foundation :...

 (KKE) delegate Nikolaos Sargologos signed the motion without central authorisation; instead of returning to Athens
Athens
Athens , is the capital and largest city of Greece. Athens dominates the Attica region and is one of the world's oldest cities, as its recorded history spans around 3,400 years. Classical Athens was a powerful city-state...

, he emigrated to the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. The KKE political organ and newspaper, Rizospastis
Rizospastis
Rizospastis is the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Greece. It is published daily. It was first published in 1916. Some of the more prominent editors in it are Nikos Boyiopoulos and Liana Kanelli.-Motto:...

, was against the motion because it saw it as good for BCP in Bulgaria but disastrous for the KKE in Greece. The KKE found the BCF's position on Macedonia difficult but briefly went along with it. In June 1924, at its 5th meeting, it recognised "the Macedonian people" and in December 1924, it endorsed the motion for "a united and independent Macedonia and a united and independent Thrace" with the perspective of entering into a union within a Balkan federation "against the national and social yoke of the Greek and Bulgarian bourgeoisie
Bourgeois nationalism
Bourgeois nationalism is a term from Marxist phraseology. It refers to the alleged practice by the ruling classes of deliberately dividing people by nationality, race, ethnicity, or religion, so as to distract them from possible class warfare...

". However, in 1928 it suffered a crushing defeat at the Greek elections, especially in Greek Macedonia. By 1927, dissentions within the KKE made the motion untenable and in March, the KKE conference watered it down, calling for autodetermination of the Macedonians until they join a "Balkan Soviet
Soviet (council)
Soviet was a name used for several Russian political organizations. Examples include the Czar's Council of Ministers, which was called the “Soviet of Ministers”; a workers' local council in late Imperial Russia; and the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union....

 Socialist Federation" and only for "a section of Macedonia (Florina area) inhabited by Slavomacedonians" (Holevas 1992). By 1935, it simply called for "equal rights
Social equality
Social equality is a social state of affairs in which all people within a specific society or isolated group have the same status in a certain respect. At the very least, social equality includes equal rights under the law, such as security, voting rights, freedom of speech and assembly, and the...

 to all" due to the "change of the national composition of the Greek part of Macedonia" and hence because "the Leninist
Leninism
In Marxist philosophy, Leninism is the body of political theory for the democratic organisation of a revolutionary vanguard party, and the achievement of a direct-democracy dictatorship of the proletariat, as political prelude to the establishment of socialism...

-Stalinist
Stalinism
Stalinism refers to the ideology that Joseph Stalin conceived and implemented in the Soviet Union, and is generally considered a branch of Marxist–Leninist ideology but considered by some historians to be a significant deviation from this philosophy...

 principle of self-determination
Self-determination
Self-determination is the principle in international law that nations have the right to freely choose their sovereignty and international political status with no external compulsion or external interference...

 demands the substitution of the old slogan". The Communist Party of Yugoslavia
League of Communists of Yugoslavia
League of Communists of Yugoslavia , before 1952 the Communist Party of Yugoslavia League of Communists of Yugoslavia (Serbo-Croatian: Savez komunista Jugoslavije/Савез комуниста Југославије, Slovene: Zveza komunistov Jugoslavije, Macedonian: Сојуз на комунистите на Југославија, Sojuz na...

 (YCP) had its own problems and dissentions; fears of Serbianisation
Serbianisation
Serbianisation or Serbification or Serbisation is the spread of Serbian culture, people, or politics, either by integration or assimilation.-Serbianisation:...

 of the party and of the Vardar Banovina
Vardar Banovina
The Vardar Banovina or Vardar Banate or Vardarska Banovina was a province of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia between 1929 and 1941. It was located in the southernmost part of the country, encompassing the whole of today's Republic of Macedonia, southern parts of Central Serbia and southeastern parts of...

, whose inhabitants felt closer (though not necessarily identified) to Bulgaria than the Kingdom of Yugoslavia
Kingdom of Yugoslavia
The Kingdom of Yugoslavia was a state stretching from the Western Balkans to Central Europe which existed during the often-tumultuous interwar era of 1918–1941...

. The YCP followed the KKE example in 1936.

In 1936 the left wings of IMRO, ITRO and IDRO were incorporated by regional principle into the Balkan Communist Parties.

Period after Comintern (1943-)

As result, for a short period after the Second World War, the Yugoslav and Bulgarian Communist leaders Josip Broz Tito
Josip Broz Tito
Marshal Josip Broz Tito – 4 May 1980) was a Yugoslav revolutionary and statesman. While his presidency has been criticized as authoritarian, Tito was a popular public figure both in Yugoslavia and abroad, viewed as a unifying symbol for the nations of the Yugoslav federation...

 and Georgi Dimitrov
Georgi Dimitrov
Georgi Dimitrov Mikhaylov , also known as Georgi Mikhaylovich Dimitrov , was a Bulgarian Communist politician...

 worked on a project to merge their two countries into a Balkan Federative Republic. As a concession to the Yugoslavian side, Bulgarian authorities agreed to the recognition of a distinct Macedonian ethnicity and language as part of their own population in the Bulgarian part of geographical Macedonia. This was one of the conditions of the Bled Agreement
Bled agreement
The Bled agreement was an agreement signed on the 1st August, 1947 in Bled, Slovenia. The agreement was signed between Bulgaria under Georgi Dimitrov and Yugoslavia under Josip Broz Tito which paved the way for future unification between the states in a new Balkan Federative Republic...

, signed between Yugoslavia and Bulgaria on 1 August 1947. In November 1947, pressured by both the Yugoslavs and the Soviets, Bulgaria also signed a treaty of friendship with Yugoslavia. The Bulgarian president Georgi Dimitrov was sympathetic to the Macedonian Question. The Bulgarian government Communist party was compelled once again to adapt its stand to Soviet interests in the Balkans.
The policies resulting from the agreement were reversed after the Tito-Stalin split
Tito-Stalin Split
The Tito–Stalin Split was a conflict between the leaders of Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, which resulted in Yugoslavia's expulsion from the Communist Information Bureau in 1948...

 in June 1948, when Bulgaria, being subordinated to the interests of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....

 took a stance against Yugoslavia.

Marshal Tito
Josip Broz Tito
Marshal Josip Broz Tito – 4 May 1980) was a Yugoslav revolutionary and statesman. While his presidency has been criticized as authoritarian, Tito was a popular public figure both in Yugoslavia and abroad, viewed as a unifying symbol for the nations of the Yugoslav federation...

 supported the Greek communists during the Greek Civil War
Greek Civil War
The Greek Civil War was fought from 1946 to 1949 between the Greek governmental army, backed by the United Kingdom and United States, and the Democratic Army of Greece , the military branch of the Greek Communist Party , backed by Bulgaria, Yugoslavia and Albania...

 because the communists promised to give the territory of Macedonia
Macedonia (Greece)
Macedonia is a geographical and historical region of Greece in Southern Europe. Macedonia is the largest and second most populous Greek region...

to Yugoslavia. When the communists lost the civil war, the idea of annexing Macedonia was set aside.
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