The soldier-premier caught between a coup and defeat
In November 1918, reporting from Zagreb, Simović wrote that the overwhelming majority were 'taken with the idea of Yugoslav solidarity', and he blocked Italy's attempt to occupy Ljubljana by having the Serb Army enter the city first.
Dušan Simović was a Royal Yugoslav air force general who led the 27 March 1941 coup and became prime minister amid crowds cheering the overthrow of the pact with Germany. Yet in power he refused to formally repudiate the Tripartite Pact, hoping to avert a German invasion, and after the German attack he headed the London government-in-exile until 1942.
Career timeline
- 1900Graduated from the Belgrade Military Academy, commissioned second lieutenant of artillery
- 1912–1918Served in the Balkan Wars and First World War; commanded the 7th Infantry Regiment on the Salonika Front
- 1918Serbian government and Supreme Command delegate to the National Council of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs in Zagreb
- 1936–1938Commander of the Royal Yugoslav Air Force
- 1938–1940Chief of the General Staff of the Royal Yugoslav Army; resigned after advocating resistance to a German attack
- 1941.03–1942.01Prime Minister and Chief of the General Staff after the 27 March coup
- 1941–1942Head of the Yugoslav government-in-exile in London
- 1945–1946Returned to Belgrade and testified at Mihailović's trial
Soldier-diplomat who pushed for the German alliance in Berlin and, as prime minister under occupation, sped up the Jewish deportations
Born Dimitrije Stojaković into a Serb family in Versec (Vršac), he served in the First World War as an intelligence officer of the Austro-Hungarian general staff. After the war he specialised in counter-espionage in Horthy’s counter-revolutionary army, was military attaché in Berlin from 1927 to 1933 and, from 1935 to 1944, Hungary’s minister in Berlin, where he pressed for alliance with Germany. Prime minister and foreign minister after the German occupation of March 1944, he legalised the Arrow Cross, dissolved the trade unions, jailed opponents and sharply accelerated the deportation of Jews. Forced out by Horthy’s pressure in August, he was captured by American troops after the war, handed over to Hungary, sentenced to death by a People’s Tribunal and shot in 1946.
Career timeline
- 1917–1918Intelligence officer, Austro-Hungarian general staff
- 1919–1925Intelligence and counter-espionage officer, National Army
- 1927–1933Military attaché in Berlin
- 1935–1944Minister in Berlin
- 1944Prime minister and foreign minister
- 1946Sentenced by a People’s Tribunal and executed
A Serbian nationalist commander who sought to restore the monarchy
In 1941 he rejected Tito's call for a general uprising as premature, and the two resistance movements soon turned their struggle into armed conflict.
Draža Mihailović was a Royal Yugoslav Army officer who led the Chetnik movement, seeking to restore the monarchy and a Serbian nationalist order after the Second World War. He built an organization at Ravna Gora in 1941, but chose to prepare for postwar power and avoid a general uprising rather than follow Tito's Partisans into sustained open resistance, bringing the movements into conflict. Parts of the Chetnik organization and Mihailović's command network collaborated with Axis and collaborationist forces, a choice that weakened the movement in multi-ethnic Yugoslavia and contributed to the Allies shifting support to the Partisans. Captured after the war, he was executed for treason and war crimes, while Serbia's Supreme Court overturned the verdict in 2015 as politically motivated.
Career timeline
- 1912–1913Serbian Army cadet, Balkan Wars
- 1914–1918Serbian Army officer, First World War
- 1935–1936Military attaché in Bulgaria
- 1936–1939Military attaché in Czechoslovakia, staff officer
- 1941Deputy chief of staff, Yugoslav Second Army
- 1941–1945Commander of the Chetnik Detachments of the Yugoslav Army
- 1946Tried for treason and war crimes, executed
The last king who carried Yugoslavia’s royal legitimacy into exile
On 27 March 1941, Dušan Simović told him: "Your Majesty, from this moment you will exercise your full sovereign power."
Peter II became king of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia as a child after the assassination of his father, Alexander I, and was its last monarch. The 27 March 1941 coup ended the regency and declared him of age, but the Axis invasion soon forced him to lead a government in exile from London. His crown represented state continuity against occupation, yet the exile government’s divisions and the Partisans’ military and political victory stripped it of an effective base of power. After the monarchy was abolished in 1945, his permanent exile left unresolved the question of Yugoslavia’s political legitimacy.
Career timeline
- 1934Acceded as king under a regency
- 1934–1941Nominal king of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia
- 1941.03.27Declared of age after the coup
- 1941.04–06Went into exile with the government after the Axis invasion
- 1941–1945Head of state of the Yugoslav royal government-in-exile in London
- 1944.09Called on Yugoslav forces to join Tito
- 1945Deposed when the monarchy was abolished
- 1945–1970Lived in exile in the United States
- 1970Died in Denver, United States
