Operation Alfa - Operation and Massacre

Operation and Massacre

In early October, the operation was launched by the Italians targeting Partisans located northwest of the middle part of the Neretva River. The Italian 29th Battalion of the 4th Bersaglieri Regiment, and the 2nd Battalion of the 94th Regiment from the 18 Infantry Division Messina took part. Between 3,000–5,500 Chetniks took part in the operation and were under the command of Dobroslav Jevđević and Petar Baćović. Partisan sources reported 4,000 soldiers of the Italian 6th Army Corps, 5,000 Chetniks of the Trebinje, Nevesinje, and Romanija Corps, the Croatian Home Guard's 7th and 15th Infantry Regiments, and the Croatian Air Force as being involved.

The operation was coordinated with Germans and NDH armed forces located near northern Partisan territory in the direction of Banja Luka. The Chetniks arrived by trains from Dubrovnik and Metković and by Italian trucks from Nevesinje. On October 2–3 they arrived in Mostar and left on October 3. The same day, they killed one villager and committed mass looting in the village of Raška Gora, 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) north of Mostar. In the village of Gorani, 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) southwest of Mostar, three villagers were killed and, as elsewhere, they carried out looting and burning. The next day they were in Drežnica where Jevđević gave a speech that "the chief enemy of Serbs are the Partisans, then the Ustaše. They need to be ruthlessly destroyed and the other left alone". Subsequently the Chetniks killed between 62–142 people, looted, and carried out burnings in the town.

On October 4–5 the Chetniks crossed the Neretva River in Konjic and headed, as did the Italians, towards Prozor, Šćit, Gornji Vakuf, Donji Vakuf, and on to Bugojno, Komar, and Travnik where the headquarters of the 5th Montenegrin and the 10th Herzegovinian Partisan brigades were situated. The offensive took place from three directions with light and heavy artillery and a large number of tanks and trucks converging. Three battalions of the 10th Herzegovinian Brigade intended to group up near Prozor, but had withdrawn and escaped on October 6, before the arrival of the Italian-Chetnik forces. The Partisan battalions estimated that 1,200–1,500 soldiers of the Italian army and about 3,000–3,500 Chetniks were approaching, while they had a little over 300 men, a ratio of approximately 1:15.

On October 7–8 the Italians heavily bombed Prozor with artillery and airplanes and entered the town on October 8. On the same day, Mihailović informed his commanders in Herzegovina that "now is the definite time to wipe out the communists" and to be as tactical as possible with the Muslims and Croats. The nature of these tactics required the Muslims to "only be organized under the command of our military leaders and in our struggle against the Ustaše and the communists with complete loyalty to the Serb population to repair the shameful role they've played since the capitulation of Yugoslavia up to today". He also called for the Muslims to "take part in the liquidation of those Muslims who still today work against the Serb people". As for the Croats: "what will become of the borders of the Croatian unit and what rights the Croats will have in the new state of the future will depend solely on them". He explained that "if they continue to be inactive, there will be no force that will be able to protect them from the retribution of the Serb people, so let them guide themselves in accordance with that" and announced that after the "liquidation of communists, they will be able to liquidate the Ustaša".

On October 14–15, the Chetniks, acting on their own, massacred over five hundred Catholics and Muslims and burnt numerous villages in the process of the operation on the suspicion that they "harbored and aided the Partisans". According to historian Jozo Tomasevich, incomplete data shows 543 civilians were massacred. At least 656 victims are known by name while another source says about 848 people, mainly "children, women, and the elderly", were killed. Historian Ivo Goldstein estimates 1,500 were massacred in total and attributes the discrepancy "due to the fact that the estimates refer to different territories". Historian Antun Miletić and Vladimir Dedijer place the figure killed at 2,500.

In the following days, around 2,000 Chetniks were in the district of Prozor. According to Partisan sources, they moved southeast to the Neretva River and Mostar at the request of Italian officers. The Partisan sources claim that was done by the Italians because "atrocities of the Chetniks and Italians caused great resentment in the local population, including in the Croatian Home Guard located at nearby stations, which wanted to intervene militarily against such oppression"—while Chetnik commanders argue that in fact it was done by the Germans to prevent the Chetnik movement from heading west towards the Dinara.

On October 23, Baćović reported to Mihailović that "in the operation of Prozor we slaughtered more than 2,000 Croats and Muslims. Our soldiers returned enthusiastic." Borba, a Partisan newspaper, also reported that "about 2,000 souls" were "killed by the Chetniks in Croatian and Muslim villages of Prozor, Konjic, and Vakuf". The report also mentions that "the districts of Prozor and Konjic have hundreds of slaughtered and murdered women and children as well as burnt houses."