Editing Jasenovac concentration camp (section)

===Post-war victim number estimates===
In post-war Yugoslavia and later independent Croatia and Serbia, Jasenovac victim estimates became the subject of fierce ideological battles, with initial exaggerated estimates, followed by later minimizations of victim numbers and denial of Ustaše crimes.{{sfn|Geiger|2020}} The extent of the crime committed in Jasenovac led to it becoming a paradigm of victimhood, both organically and through state-sponsored propaganda, which in turn caused the paradigm to have a life of its own, leading to a multitude of manipulations.{{sfn|Jovanović|2013}}

A 15 November 1945 report of the National Committee of Croatia for the investigation of the crimes of the occupation forces and their collaborators, which was commissioned by the new government of Yugoslavia under [[Josip Broz Tito]], indicated that between 500,000 and 600,000 people were murdered at Jasenovac. The report suffered from methodological shortcomings since it was based on the testimonies of survivors along with general approximations.{{sfn|Odak|Benčić|2016}}

The State Commission of Croatia for the Investigation of the Crimes of the Occupation Forces and their Collaborators from 1946 concluded:<blockquote>Such a manner of preconceived and inhumane torture and slaughter of a people has never been recorded in history. The Ustase criminals followed precisely the model of their German masters, most consciously executed all their orders, and did so in pursuit of a single goal: to exterminate as many of our people as possible, and to create a living space as large as possible for them. The total dependence by the Ustase on their German masters, the foundation of the camp itself, the dispatch of the "disloyal", the brutal implementation of Hitler's racist Nazi theories and the deportation to the camps and extermination of the racially and nationally "impure", the same methods of torture and atrocities with minor varieties of Ustase cruelty, the building of furnaces and incineration of victims in furnaces (the Picilli furnace) — all of the evidence points to the conclusion that both Jasenovac and the crimes committed in it were fashioned from a German recipe, owing to a German Hitlerite order as implemented by their servants, the Ustase. Subsequently, responsibility for the crimes of Jasenovac falls equally on their German masters and the Ustase executioners.{{sfn|Walters|2010|p=461}}</blockquote>

The 1945 figures were cited by researchers [[Israel Gutman]] and Menachem Shelach in the ''[[Encyclopedia of the Holocaust]]'' from 1990.{{sfn|EotH|1990}}{{page needed|date=June 2022}} Shelach wrote that some 300,000 bodies were found and exhumed.{{sfn|Shelach et al.|1990|p=189}} The [[Simon Wiesenthal Center]]'s Museum of Tolerance website adopted the number of 600,000 at some point.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://motlc.learningcenter.wiesenthal.org/pages/t034/t03448.html|title=Jasenovac|publisher=[[Simon Wiesenthal Center]]|work=Museum of Tolerance|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060512122324/http://motlc.learningcenter.wiesenthal.org/pages/t034/t03448.html|archive-date=12 May 2006|access-date=22 March 2015}}</ref>

In 1964, the Yugoslav Federal Bureau of Statistics created a list of World War II victims with 597,323 names and deficiency estimated at 20–30%, giving between 750,000 and 780,000 victims. Together with the estimate of 200,000 "collaborators and quislings" {{clarify|date=March 2016}} killed, the total number would reach about one million. The bureau's list was declared a state secret in 1964 and published only in 1989.<ref name="ReferenceA">Federal Bureau of Statistics in 1964; published in ''[[Danas (newspaper)|Danas]]'', 21 November 1989</ref> After the war, a figure of 700,000 reflected the "conventional wisdom".{{sfn|Zečević|2004|p=169}}{{sfn|Bulajić|2006}}{{sfn|Bousfield|2003|p=122}}{{sfn|Geddes|2013|p=217}}

According to the 1964 victim census, 49,874 people perished in Jasenovac, 9,587 people in Stara Gradiška and 128 persons in Gradina, in total 59,589 people.{{sfn|Sobolevski|1993|p=112}} The survey results showed a far lower figure of 59,188 killed at Jasenovac, of whom 33,944 were recorded as Serbs.{{sfn|Kolstø|2011|pp=226–241}}

In 1946, 967 victims from the Stara Gradiška sub-camp were exhumed (311 men, 467 women and 189 children) from 4 mass graves, at Uskočke šume.<ref name=":14" /> The remains were later interred in a common cemetery at Stara Gradiška, while identified victims were returned to where they had come from, mostly the [[Syrmia]] (Srijem/Srem) region. About a thousand additional victims are buried in Međustrugovi Woods in one enormous mass grave. These victims were thrown, naked and tangled together, into the pit. and it was impossible to exhume and identify them due to the condition and position of the bodies.<ref name=":14" />

On 16 November 1961, the municipal committee of former partisans from [[Bosanska Dubica]] organized an unofficial investigation at the grounds of Donja Gradina, led by locals who were not forensic experts. This investigation uncovered three mass graves and identified 17 human skulls in one of them. In response, scientists were called in to verify the site. Dr Alojz Šercelj started preliminary drilling to identify the most likely grave locations, and then between 22 and 27 June 1964, exhumations of bodies and the use of sampling methods was conducted at Jasenovac by Vida Brodar and Anton Pogačnik from [[Ljubljana University]] and Srboljub Živanović from [[Novi Sad University]].{{sfn|Krušelj, 23 April 2005}}

Consistent with accounts by captured Ustaše and the few surviving inmates of Ustaše camps, excavations of sites in and around the former concentration camps revealed evidence of mass burning of corpses before the end of the war were conducted. In some places the scientists found only ashes and the charred remains of bones.<ref name=":5" /><ref name=":6" />  They also uncovered a total of seven mass graves, which held a total of 284 victims' remains, including one mass grave with 197 corpses, of whom 51 were children below age 14, and 123 were women.<ref name=":5">{{Cite web|url=http://www.forum.tm/vijesti/revizionisticki-pamflet-igora-vukica-o-kozarackoj-djeci-3-6039|title=Revizionistički pamflet Igora Vukića o kozaračkoj djeci (3)|website=Forum tjedni magazin – Forum.tm|date=26 August 2017|language=hr|access-date=2020-03-22|archive-date=2020-04-07|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200407062447/http://www.forum.tm/vijesti/revizionisticki-pamflet-igora-vukica-o-kozarackoj-djeci-3-6039|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":6">{{cite news|url=https://www.jutarnji.hr/globus/Globus-komentari/potrebno-je-zacepiti-nos-da-bi-se-ugazilo-u-kloaku-vukiceve-konstrukcije-da-je-jasenovac-mjesto-na-kojem-su-zrtve-same-izazvale-svoje-stradanje/7468782/|title=Potrebno je začepiti nos da bi se ugazilo u kloaku Vukićeve konstrukcije da je Jasenovac mjesto na kojem su žrtve same izazvale svoje stradanje|first=Goran|last=Hutinec|newspaper=[[Jutarnji list]] / Globus|date=8 June 2018|access-date=2020-03-22|archive-date=2020-03-22|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200322204608/https://www.jutarnji.hr/globus/Globus-komentari/potrebno-je-zacepiti-nos-da-bi-se-ugazilo-u-kloaku-vukiceve-konstrukcije-da-je-jasenovac-mjesto-na-kojem-su-zrtve-same-izazvale-svoje-stradanje/7468782/|url-status=live}}</ref> A large number of these corpses, especially the children, showed evidence of blunt force trauma, as their skulls were cracked, fractured and broken in numerous places. The scientists concluded that the entire Jasenovac complex could have around 200 similar sites.{{sfn|Krušelj, 23 April 2005}}

The Jasenovac Memorial Area states that to date more than 160 mass graves have been discovered, including 105 mass graves at Gradina, covering a total area of 10,130 m<sup>2</sup>.<ref name=":13" /> A further 22 mass graves have been found at the same site, plus an additional 21 mass graves at Uštica, site of a camp for Roma and Serb women and children, the latter with a surface area of 1218 m<sup>2</sup>.<ref name=":3" /> At the Limani site, inside the Jasenovac III Camp site, seven mass graves are located, with a total surface area of 1,175 m<sup>2</sup>.<ref name=":15" /> An additional 3 mass graves are found at Krapje, where mostly Jewish victims were buried.<ref name=":16" /> At the Jablanac and Mlaka sites, where mostly Serb women and children were held and murdered, 5 mass graves were found.<ref name=":17" /> Four more mass graves were uncovered at Uskočke šume, with 947 exhumed bodies, and one large one at Međustrugovi, with some 1,000 bodies.<ref name=":14" />

The second edition of ''Vojna enciklopedija'' (1972) reproduced the figure of the State Commission of Crimes, 600,000 victims in Jasenovac up to 1943.{{sfn|Tomasevich|2001|pp=725}} In August 1983, General [[Velimir Terzić]] of the Partisans asserted that, according to the newest data, at least one million Serbs were killed at Jasenovac. Novelist Milan D. Miletić (1923–2003) speculated the number at one million or more.{{sfn|Tomasevich|2001|pp=725}} Based on documentary material and information from inmates and camp officials, and from official war crimes commissions, archivist [[Antun Miletić]] quoted from the sources the estimation at 600–700,000 victims, most Serbs.{{sfn|Tomasevich|2001|pp=726}}

An analysis of 1970s high school history textbooks published in Yugoslavia showed that while all textbooks devoted about 1 or 2 paragraphs to Ustaše crimes, there were considerable differences in victim estimates across the then republics. Thus the main 1970's Croatian history textbook had the lowest estimate of Jasenovac victims (“thousands of people”), while the Serbian textbook wrote of “hundreds of thousands”, and the Bosnian textbook listed 800,000 victims.{{sfn|Pavasović Trošt|2013|p=24}}

Antun Miletić, a researcher at the Military Archives in Belgrade, collected data on Jasenovac since 1979.{{sfn|Anzulovic|1999|p=104}} By 1999, his list contained the names of 77,200 victims, of whom 41,936 were Serbs.{{sfn|Anzulovic|1999|p=104}}

In the 1980s, calculations were done by Serbian statistician [[Bogoljub Kočović]], and by Croatian economist [[Vladimir Žerjavić]], who claimed that total number of victims in Yugoslavia was less than 1.7 million, an official estimate at the time, both concluding that the number of victims was around one million. Kočović estimated that, of that number, between 370,000 and 410,000 ethnic Serbs died in the Independent State of Croatia,{{sfn|Pavlowitch|2008|p=34}}{{sfn|Kočović|2005}} of whom 45–52,000 died at Jasenovac.{{sfn|Geiger|2011|p=728}} Žerjavić estimated that 322,000 Serbs died in the NDH,{{sfn|Adriano|Cingolani|2018|p=280}} of whom 50,000 were killed at Jasenovac.{{sfn|Kolstø|2011|pp=226–241}} Both Kočović and Žerjavić estimated 83,000 total deaths at Jasenovac,{{sfn|MacDonald|2002|p=162}} Žerjavić's figure includes Jews, Roma, Croats and Bosnian Muslims, as well as Serbs.{{sfn|Geiger|2011|p=728}} His figures also showed that 13,000 Jews perished in the camp, along with about 10,000 Croats, 10,000 Roma and others.{{sfn|Kasapović|2018|pp=13–14}} According to Vladimir Žerjavić the number of killed is about 85,000 people, respectively 50 thousand Serbs, 13,000 Jews, 10,000 Croats, 10,000 of Romani people and 2,000 Muslims.{{sfn|Žerjavić|1995|p=556}}

In October 1985, a group of investigators from the [[Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts]], led by [[Vladimir Dedijer]], visited Jasenovac and made a record of it, in which the record taker, Antun Miletić, mentioned the 1961 excavation, but misquoted the number of victims it identified as 550,800. They also noted the 1964 excavation, and estimated that Gradina held the remains of 366,000 victims, without further explanation.{{sfn|Krušelj, 23 April 2005}}

In November 1989, Živanović claimed on television that their research resulted in victim counts of more than 500,000, with estimates of 700,000–800,000 being realistic, stating that in every mass grave there were 800 skeletons.{{sfn|Krušelj, 23 April 2005}} Vida Brodar then commented on that statement and said the research never resulted in any victim counts, and that these numbers were Živanović's manipulations, providing a copy of the research log as corroboration. A Croatian historian, Željko Krušelj, publicly criticized Živanović and labeled him a fraud over this.{{sfn|Krušelj, 23 April 2005}}

During the 1980s and early 1990s, 700,000 to 1.2 million victims were highlighted in many Serbian publications as part of the [[SANU memorandum]] program and also as part of the [[Slobodan Milosević]] policy.{{sfn|Benčić|2018|pp=47–48}} [[Antun Miletić]], the director of Belgrade's military archives, in 1997 claimed the figure for Jasenovac was 1.1 million, and criticized Žerjavić's research. Another critic of Žerjavić, [[Milan Bulajić]], former director of the {{Ill|Belgrade Museum of Genocide Victims|sr|Музеј жртава геноцида}}, maintained that the numbers were in the range of 700,000–1,000,000.{{sfn|Kolstø|2011|pp=226–241}} Bulajić based his estimates entirely on survivor accounts, without scrutinizing the numbers, which led to him advocating for statistical improbabilities.{{sfn|Biondich|2002|p=39, 46}} In 1997, the Museum of Genocide Victims in Belgrade identified 10,521 Jewish victims at Jasenovac, with full names.{{sfn|Bulajić|2002|p=55}}
The Belgrade Museum of Genocide Victims had supported the figure of 700,000 to 1 million victims of the camp, but ceased to do so since 2002. After Bulajić retired from his post, Dragan Cvetković, a researcher from the museum, published a book on wartime losses together with a Croatian co-author, giving a figure of approximately 100,000 victims in Jasenovac.{{sfn|Kolstø|2011|pp=226–241}}{{sfn|Jovanović|2013}} In 2013, Cvetković has estimated the total deaths at Jasenovac between 122,000 and 130,000 based on their then-current victim list containing 88,000 names.{{sfn|Jovanović|2013}}

In his 1989 book, [[Franjo Tuđman|Franjo Tudjman]], the future president of Croatia, claimed there were only 30–40 thousand Jasenovac victims, without explaining how he got these figures.{{sfn|MacDonald|2003|p=168}} He also claimed "most of the victims were Gypsies, then Jews and Serbs", thus putting Serbs in third place, when all credible sources state Serbs were the most numerous victims.{{sfn|MacDonald|2003|p=168}} The book met with widespread criticism around the world, not only for reducing Jasenovac victims, but also for downplaying the guilt of Ustaše murderers. Tudjman claimed Jasenovac was administered by Jews, that estimates of 6 million Jewish Holocaust victims were exaggerated, that Jews invented ethnic cleansing, while accusing Jews of genocide and other misdeeds.{{sfn|MacDonald|2003|p=168}} [[David Bruce Macdonald]] writes, "What emerged from Tudjman's extreme moral relativism was the essential insignificance of Jasenovac and, in fact, the Holocaust in world history."{{sfn|MacDonald|2003|p=168}}

During the [[breakup of Yugoslavia]], the Croatian side began publicly suggesting substantially smaller numbers of victims.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/22/us/anger-greets-croatian-s-invitation-to-holocaust-museum-dedication.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm|title=Anger Greets Croatian's Invitation To Holocaust Museum Dedication|last=Schemo|first=Diana Jean|date=22 April 1993|newspaper=[[The New York Times]]|access-date=14 June 2011|archive-date=2 April 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402165652/http://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/22/us/anger-greets-croatian-s-invitation-to-holocaust-museum-dedication.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm|url-status=live}}</ref> In 1991 the new Croatian government established the Commission for the Determination of War and Post-War Victims, which in its final report listed only 2,238 victims of Jasenovac, and only 293 Jewish victims in all Croatia.{{sfn|Geiger|2013|p=219}} Later the head of the Commission and former Constitutional Court justice, Vice Vukojević, claimed that “The Jasenovac camp was run by Jews, the [NDH] State only provided guards”.<ref>{{cite news|date=2009-04-22|newspaper=[[Jutarnji list]]|title=Vice Vukojević: Židovi su upravljali Jasenovcem|url=https://www.jutarnji.hr/naslovnica/vice-vukojevic-zidovi-su-upravljali-jasenovcem-3815754|access-date=2020-09-19|language=hr|archive-date=2021-02-20|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210220200425/https://www.jutarnji.hr/naslovnica/vice-vukojevic-zidovi-su-upravljali-jasenovcem-3815754|url-status=live}}</ref>

In 1998, the [[Bosniak Institute]] published [[SFR Yugoslavia]]'s final ''List of war victims from the Jasenovac camp'' (created in 1992).<ref name="Bosniak">{{cite book|author=Bosniak Institute|title=Jasenovac: Žrtve rata prema podacima statističkog zavoda Jugoslavije|publisher=Bosniak Institute Sarajevo|location=Zürich & Sarajevo|year=1992|isbn=3-905211-87-4|url=http://www.bosnjackiinstitut.ba/home/sadrzaj/110|access-date=22 March 2015|author-link=Bosniak Institute|archive-date=25 February 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200225131521/http://www.bosnjackiinstitut.ba/home/sadrzaj/110|url-status=dead}}</ref> The list contained the names of 49,602 victims at Jasenovac, including 26,170 Serbs, 8,121 Jews, 5,900 Croats, 1,471 Romani, 787 Bosnian Muslims, 6,792 of unidentifiable ethnicity, and some listed simply as "others."<ref name="Bosniak"/>

In 1998, the [[Croatian State Archives]] issued an announcement that a notebook had been found containing partial raw data of the State Commission for War Crimes, where the number of victims of Jasenovac from the territory of the [[People's Republic of Croatia]] was 15,792, with victims by year: 2,891 persons in 1941, 8,935 in 1942, 676 in 1943, 2,167 in 1944, and 1,123 in 1945. The notebook was generally described as incomplete, particularly the Jasenovac records, but the said numbers were deemed credible as all the other numbers of victims mentioned in the book were consistent with those from the other documents released by the State Commission.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.hrt.hr/arhiv/98/07/07/h8_hrv.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402104704/http://www.hrt.hr/arhiv/98/07/07/h8_hrv.html|url-status=dead|archive-date=2 April 2015|language=hr|title=U Hrvatskom državnom arhivu pronađena bilježnica o žrtvama rata|publisher=[[Croatian Radiotelevision]]|date=7 July 1998|access-date=22 March 2015}}</ref>

The Jasenovac Memorial Site, the museum institution sponsored by the Croatian government since the end of the [[Croatian War of Independence]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.jusp-jasenovac.hr/Default.aspx?sid=6484|publisher=Jasenovac Memorial Site|title=Renovation of Jasenovac Memorial Site|access-date=22 March 2015|archive-date=2 April 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402175540/http://www.jusp-jasenovac.hr/Default.aspx?sid=6484|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.jusp-jasenovac.hr/Default.aspx?sid=6502|publisher=Jasenovac Memorial Site|title=Jasenovac Memorial Site – From the return of the museum inventory to the present day|access-date=22 March 2015|archive-date=2 April 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402160450/http://www.jusp-jasenovac.hr/Default.aspx?sid=6502|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.min-kulture.hr/default.aspx?id=78|publisher=[[Ministry of Culture (Croatia)|Ministry of Culture]]|language=hr|title=Propisi|trans-title=Regulations|quote=Zakon o Spomen-području Jasenovac (NN 15/90; NN 28/90 Ispravak, NN 22/01)|access-date=22 March 2015|archive-date=20 March 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150320000437/http://www.min-kulture.hr/default.aspx?id=78|url-status=live}}</ref> has since stated that current research estimates the number of victims at between 80,000 and 100,000.<ref name="jusp-vnest">{{cite web|url=http://www.jusp-jasenovac.hr/Default.aspx?sid=7619 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180203180352/http://www.jusp-jasenovac.hr/Default.aspx?sid=7619 |archive-date=2018-02-03 |url-status=dead |publisher=Jasenovac Memorial Site|title=How many victims were there of Jasenovac Concentration Camp? |work=FAQs|access-date=22 March 2015}}</ref> There have been revisionist efforts in Croatia that greatly minimize Jasenovac victim numbers, or entirely deny that it was a place of mass murder of Jews, Serbs and Roma, instead claiming that Jasenovac was a mere “work-camp,{{sfn|Kasapović|2018}}<ref name=":7">{{Cite news|title=Dunja Mijatović: Negiranje zločina u Jasenovcu opasan put|url=https://www.slobodnaevropa.org/a/29877282.html|access-date=2020-09-05|website=Radio Slobodna Evropa|date=12 April 2019|language=sh|archive-date=2020-10-23|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201023223626/https://www.slobodnaevropa.org/a/29877282.html|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name=":8">{{Cite web|date=2018-09-04|title=Croatian Book on Jasenovac Distorts Holocaust History|url=https://balkaninsight.com/2018/09/04/croatian-book-on-jasenovac-distorts-holocaust-history-09-03-2018/|access-date=2020-09-05|website=Balkan Insight|language=en-US|archive-date=2020-11-09|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201109024419/https://balkaninsight.com/2018/09/04/croatian-book-on-jasenovac-distorts-holocaust-history-09-03-2018/|url-status=live}}</ref> and some of these have received the support of the Croatian Catholic Church, state media, some politicians, and have even obtained state funding.<ref name=":7" /><ref name=":8" /><ref name="Jutarnji-Bajruši-2020">{{cite news|date=2020-07-18|newspaper=[[Jutarnji list]]|title=Glas Koncila objavljuje revizionističku 'nizanku' o Jasenovcu. O ustaškim klanjima nema ni slova|first=Robert|last=Bajruši|url=https://www.jutarnji.hr/vijesti/hrvatska/glas-koncila-objavljuje-revizionisticku-nizanku-o-jasenovcu-o-ustaskim-klanjima-nema-ni-slova-15008803|access-date=2020-09-05|language=hr|archive-date=2020-09-15|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200915160018/https://www.jutarnji.hr/vijesti/hrvatska/glas-koncila-objavljuje-revizionisticku-nizanku-o-jasenovcu-o-ustaskim-klanjima-nema-ni-slova-15008803|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news | ref = Jutarnji-Goldstein-2018 | date = 2018-06-19 | newspaper = [[Jutarnji list]] / Globus | first = Ivo | last = Goldstein | title = Skandalozno pozivanje čovjeka koji negira zločinački karakter Jasenovca | url = https://www.jutarnji.hr/globus/koliko-nisko-moze-pasti-hrt-nize-nego-sto-mislite-skandalozno-pozivanje-covjeka-koji-negira-zlocinacki-karakter-jasenovca-7500075 | access-date = 2020-09-05 | language = hr | archive-date = 2021-04-22 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20210422162648/https://www.jutarnji.hr/globus/koliko-nisko-moze-pasti-hrt-nize-nego-sto-mislite-skandalozno-pozivanje-covjeka-koji-negira-zlocinacki-karakter-jasenovca-7500075 | url-status = live }}</ref>