92 World War Two and the Partisan Struggle
part, proclaimed itself the highest political body of the Yugoslav peoples, elect-
ing an executive committee constituted by representatives of different ethnic
groups (Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, etc.) and ideological orientations (communists,
liberals, Christian-socialists, etc). While this body did not possess the formal
status of a government, it was nevertheless the first sign that the Partisan
movement aimed not only at liberating, but at ruling Yugoslavia.^227
At the inauguration of the AVNOJ “people sang in the streets, crowded in
front of the building where the council was in session, acclaiming the Supreme
Staff, Comrade Tito, our valiant army. The streets were full of men and women
in typical Bosnian Krajina and Lika dress. Some even came from distant vil-
lages, thirty to forty kilometers away, to be present at the great event.”^228 “The
First AVNOJ was entirely Tito’s work,” wrote Djilas, “he formulated all of the
decisions taken.”^229 It was not without significance that Tito did not mention
Stalin in his inaugural address, although he praised and sent greetings to his Slav
brothers, first of all to the Russians and to all the peoples of the Soviet Union.^230
Tito signed the dispatch sent to Grandpa on 29 November 1942, informing
him of the conclusions reached by the AVNOJ. He did so as Walter, as if he
were still a Comintern agent, but formulated it in such a way that Stalin would
grasp the subtleties of his message, in which he firmly stressed that his move-
ment now had an army, popular representation, and a territory. Although the
delegates hailed Stalin as the “great warlord and organizer of victory over
Fascism,” he was not satisfied by the events taking place in the Partisan camp.
It is telling that the Kommunisticheskii Internatsional published the news about
the First AVNOJ together with that of the Antifascist Women’s Conference,
as if both were of equal importance. This enraged and depressed Tito but did
not divert him from the political direction he had chosen.^231
Both the administrative apparatus that began being formed in the free ter-
ritory and his lifestyle testified to this. In the period of the “Republic of Bihać,”
he began behaving like a head of state. He lived in a manor, surrounded by
famous intellectuals, tolerating a cult of personality little different from that of
Stalin. Branka Savić, who replaced her husband Pavle in the code office of the
Supreme Staff, remembered later: “It seems to me that Comrade Tito changed
at that time, or better his position and tasks changed. He was not just a man
leading an army and military operations, nor only the head of a party, but a man
who was forging a state. The atmosphere around him was solemn.”^232 And
Antun Augustinčić, a sculptor who in the past had done a bust of Pavelić, but
later joined the Partisans, wrote: “In 1943, I noticed that it seemed more and
more important to him that his clothes were clean and pressed, that he carried