an intro for those who don`t know who Prince Pavle (Paul in english) Karadjordjevic is…
Born in 1893 as a member of the Royal Family of Karadjordjevic, he took over the regency in 1934, after the assasination of King Alexander in Marseille. Pavle ruled until March 1941 when something unimaginable happened – on March 25th in Vienna he signed a Tripartite Pact and joined Germany, Italy and Japan in Axis Powers!!!
Because of his decision, massive demonstrations happened in Belgrade and 2 days after his cousin Peter II Karadjordjevic overthrew his government and took over. 10 deys after, unsatsified Axis Powers, led by Germany, bombed Belgrade and invaded Yugoslavia.
Royal family left the country and Prince Paul was kept in house arrest by British in South Africa, until the end of the war. He died in Paris on September 11, 1976, without ever coming back to Yugoslavia.
Noone ever managed to unveil the secret of his decision to join the tripartite pact… However, by his last will his complete archive was given to Columbia University, but not to be opened until after 50 years of his death.
Anyways, some important historians pressured his only daughter, Jelisaveta (which is the only one with rights to break the 50 years veto) and she finally agreed to break it and gave them rights to open the archive.
So, microfilms are on their way to Belgrade and I`m looking forward to know the truth about what happened back then… And why he made a decision that simply destroyed all good that his family did for our people in the history.. and made me hate them all…
Some say that he was forced to do it because British (his family was close to the UK at that time) betrayed him and he wanted to save the people… Some say that he was an evil man anyways and that he actually wanted to do it… Some say that he was simply stupid because he believed Germany that Yugoslavia will remain independent (in addition, he was strongly against communism) etc…
Well, I guess we`ll know really soon… As a big history lover, am not just looking forward… Am freaking excited!!