World War Two and the Partisan Struggle 73
found the aid of local collaborators. At the end of August, they installed General
Milan Nedić, one of the most prestigious officers of the former Royal Army, as
head of the government in Belgrade. Once in power, Nedić organized a strong
gendarmerie, established secret contacts with Draža Mihailović, and proposed
that he and his men cross over into Bosnia to fight the Ustaša and their Muslim
allies. In the meantime, he would destroy the communists in Serbia. The Ger-
mans, when informed, prohibited such initiatives, convinced, as Hitler had
said, that the “treacherous Serb gang” should not be trusted. On 16 September,
he ordered the Southeast Command of the Wehr macht to “suppress with all
necessary energy the rebel movement,” meaning both the Chetniks and Tito’s
followers. In order to achieve this, he sent fresh troops to Serbia from Greece,
France, and even from Russia.^122
That same day, Tito left Belgrade with a false passport, issued in the name
of one “engineer Petrović,” a collaborationist. He was on his way to south-
western Serbia, where a “liberated” zone had been created by the first insur-
rectionary units, led by Sreten Žujović (the Black One), Koča Popović, and
Petar Stambolić, all Spanish Civil War veterans. Elegantly clad, he departed
from the central station in the company of two women, a German from Vojvo-
dina, and an Orthodox priest. One of the women was Davorjanka Paunović
(called Zdenka), his secretary and new lover.^123 The trip was adventurous.
In the vicinity of Valjevo, where the party left the train, Tito first ran into a
group of drunken Chetniks at an inn. They let him go only after he showed
them a pass, issued by one of their vojvods (chieftains). Immediately thereafter,
he met a Partisan unit that regarded him suspiciously, thinking he was a spy
because of his distinguished appearance, foreign accent, and passport. They
nearly shot him.^124
A week later, on 26 and 27 September 1941, Tito convened about twenty
collaborators in the village of Stolice. The decisions they made influenced the
subsequent course of events. They agreed to organize a guerrilla-type resis-
tance, avoiding head-on confrontations with the enemy, and to structure their
units regionally, in accord with the ethnic variety of the country, but under a
common Supreme Staff. Following the Russian example, the combatants were
to be called “Partisans,” and were to be led by political commissars as well as
military officers. More important still, they decided to replace the old royal
administration in the liberated areas with national liberation committees, which
were to be an expression of the new power. As their symbol they chose the red
star, that ancient magical pentagram, and the clenched fist as the Partisan
salute, a symbol of solidarity, both made popular by the October Revolution.^125
Tito proved a good organizer of the uprising; he chose mostly the “Spaniards,”
former members of the International Brigades who had substantial fighting