YUGOSLAV-AMERICANS AND NATIONAL SECURITY DURING WORLD WAR II
BY LORRAINE M. LEES PROFESSOR OF HISTORY
Wars and the events surrounding them have usually produced outbreaks of nativist hysteria in the United States, with the country believing that ethnic groups, who were presumed to have divided loyalties, represented a danger to American security. In response, administrations ranging from that of John Adams in the eighteenth century to George W. Bush in the twenty-first developed policies aimed at controlling the political activities of America's foreign nationalities population. This group, consisting of inhabitants of the United States who were born abroad, or born in the United States of foreign parents, viewed themselves as Americans, and could not understand why their interest in the welfare of their former homelands made them an object of suspicion.
Yugoslav-Americans and National Security During World War II, published by the University of Illinois Press, explores this persistent tension between ethnicity and national security by examining the foreign nationalities policy of the Roosevelt Administration during the Second World War. Scholars have previousl documented the hostility directed at the "enemy alien" Japanese-American community. In general, however, historians have usually credited FDR with avoiding the wide-spread nativist hysteria that characterized American's participation in World War I. In reality, while the administration did not incite the public to express anti-immigrant attitudes, American policymakers were fearful of disloyalty among even "friendly" ethics and routinely acted on those fears. The administration charged several agencies with the management of the country's at-large European ethnic population; much of their work centered on the Yugoslav-American community, which was split between monarchists loyal to the Serbian king, and left wing supporters of Tito's Partisans. The Departments of State and Justice revealed, in their attempts to control the political activities of Yugoslav-Americans, the conviction that European exiles and refugees who appealed to ethnics in the United States for support undermined American foreign policy; the suspicion that such activities would lead to fifth column and communist penetration of America's ethnic communities was a given. As a result, the Federal Bureau of Investigation surveilled members of ethnic organizations, and the Department of Justice demanded that ethnics raising money for the war effort register as foreign agents or face prosecution. By contrast, the Foreign Nationalities Branch of the Office of Strategic Services and the Office of War Information viewed the foreign nationalities population as an important asset in psychological warfare and morale building campaigns and maintained extensive contacts with immigrant groups and exiles throughout the war; but they too worried that immigrants' ties to their homelands would leave them open to foreign manipulation. Despite their differences, all of these agencies demonstrated, in their approach to the Yugoslav-American community, the administration's tendency to equate ethnicity with disloyalty and to rest its national security policy, at least in part, on a nativist base.
My interest in this topic is both professional and personal. My training in diplomatic history centered on exploring the domestic and ideological roots of American foreign policy; I also grew up hearing my German immigrant grandparents talk of the "government men" who came to the door during WW II, even though my grandparents had long since become citizens, and of the hostility expressed by neighbors. The research for the book was rewarding but long and difficult; much of the material had to be obtained from Freedom of Information Act requests, and often took years to appear. When I began this study, I did not know how timely the topic of ethnicity and security would be, and I regret that the nativism I explored during WW II has resurfaced in the wake of 9/11. However, as a historian, I have learned not to be surprised.
Lorraine M. Lees
