*CASE STUDY* 

Operational Management: John Deer Case Study

The company that has been chosen for this case study is John Deere Equipments. This company was founded by John Deere in 1837 and was incorporated in 1868 as Deere & Company. John Deere started this company as a one-man blacksmith shop and it is now a worldwide corporation that has its offices in more than 160 countries and employs more than 46,000 people. John Deere is one of the oldest industrial companies in the United States and it is guided by the original values of quality, innovation, integrity, and commitment that John Deere instilled at the beginning. The business strategy of John Deere, in their own words is: “We aspire to distinctively serve customers — those linked to the land — through a great business, a business as great as our products. To achieve this aspiration, our strategy is: Exceptional operating performance, Disciplined SVA growth, Aligned high-performance teamwork Execution of this strategy creates the distinctive John Deere Experience that ultimately propels a great business and, for all with a stake in our success, delivers...Performance That Endures” (1).

The company is always striving to give its stakeholders the maximum value for their money by continuous improvement and growth in all sectors of the company. The company is organized into four manufacturing divisions:

• Agricultural Equipment – products for farms;
• Commercial and Consumer Equipment – equipment related to lawn and ground care, residential needs, golf and turf, and commercial operations;
• Construction and Forestry Equipment; and
• John Deere Power Systems – products involved with developing engines for other John Deere products.

John Deere is a listed company and its stock is traded on the New York, Chicago, and Frankfurt, Germany, stock exchanges. The following is a summary of its operations around the world:

Products and Services:         John Deere, with the help of its many subsidiaries, is involved in the manufacturing, distribution, and financing of a large and complete line of agricultural equipment. The product line also includes a very broad range of forestry and construction equipment, and various other consumer and commercial equipment. Other features of the company include the provision of credit and managed health-care plans for other businesses and also for the general public.

Marketing:     The products of John Deere are marketed throughout the world via a large network that consists of many independent dealers, which are supported by a decentralized marketing organization. These dealers have their offices in many countries such as Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, England, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Mexico, South Africa, Spain, Switzerland, the United States, and Uruguay.

Manufacturing: The factories for John Deere are located in various countries including Argentina, Brazil, Canada, China, Finland, France, Germany, India, Mexico, New Zealand, The Netherlands, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, and the United States. John Deere products in the United States and South America are produced by affiliated companies.

Research & Development:    Research and investment has always been one of the key interest points for John Deere as the company is known to have invested in large quantities. The various areas of research and development include activities for support of current product development, the development of new products and also for the search for new product-oriented businesses. Many of the factories run by John Deere have a product engineering department whose responsibilities include the design and development of the products.

Diversity:        Deere & Company considers diversity to be a vital part of the company’s core mission and goals. Deere & Company believes in building a vast and great building, one that would strive to cater to all the various stakeholders, including the consumers, the employees, shareholders, business partners, and communities all over the world. Since Deere & Company is a global company with its offices and production factories situated all over the world, it has a very large responsibility to all its stakeholders all over the world. More than 20,000 of this company’s employees reside outside the United States and 45% of the total sales incurred come from outside of North America. Deere continues to expand its production and products worldwide and is making its presence known in various new markets all over the world. This also means that new and diverse employees, suppliers, and business partners from various ethnic, social, and cultural backgrounds have to be continuously incorporated in the business strategy of Deere. Deere has to remain committed to its stakeholders all over the world and in the various dimensions for them to be able to remain the market leaders. For this, they have to continuously incorporate people from diverse backgrounds into their company to keep the global leading team of employees so that they can better deal with the needs and expectations of the company’s customers.

            Deere has followed certain paths and guidelines that have enabled this company to grow beyond a one-man operation into the large corporation that it has today. One of the key aspects that have contributed to this huge growth has been because of the company’s comprehension of the importance of diversity in running a global company. One other thing that has contributed to the vast success of this company is that it was able to recognize the importance of globalization very early and was successfully able to tap into the vast market around the world when the time was ripe. This is why this company enjoys huge opportunities for growth and has come to realize many of the goals set up by its core mission values and vision. Many critics note that Deere has made considerable progress in the area of diversity and it is continuously improving its business initiatives in order to incorporate all aspects of its existence. “Accountability for diversity starts at the very top of the organization; diversity and inclusion are an integral part of the business agenda. Deere believes that diversity is good business and is essential to maintaining the company's market leadership and sustaining its reputation as one of the most ethical and respected corporate citizens” (2). Some of the areas that Deere is especially involved in include:

• Senior Leadership and Accountability
• Supplier Diversity
• Dealership Diversity
• Employment and Retention
• Employee Networks
• Community Involvement (2)

Product Diversification: Even though John Deere is very committed to its core businesses, it sternly believes that growth in the future not only depends upon carrying on with the current businesses, but also by introducing new products and services to the markets. This is why John Deere has ventured into the areas of finance and leasing by opening up John Deere Credit, which is one of the largest equipment finance and leasing companies in the United States. “It provides financing of farm and construction equipment, recreational and homeowner consumer products, commercial equipment, and revolving credit financing for agricultural purchases. John Deere Health provides health-care benefit-management services to more than 4,400 client companies and covers nearly 505,000 members. With these and future business developments, John Deere is positioned to take full advantage of tomorrow's growth opportunities” (2).

Technology:   Deere has also realized that in order to be leaders in this world and in order to remain the leaders, advancement in technology is also very important. This is why Deere & Company has kept technology as the jugular of its business innovation. Deere & Company works with the latest software and other cutting-edge technological equipment to provide its consimers with state-of-the-art products and services. “For example, product development uses the latest virtual prototyping techniques to produce John Deere products. Other major initiatives include precision-farming systems and global vehicle communications systems, designed to help customers become more productive and profitable. These technological initiatives will provide a major competitive advantage and continued industry leadership position to John Deere” (2).

Commitment to Employees: Deere & Company believes in treating its employees with as great a concern as their customers. Deere greatly values its employees and provides them with very high quality employee benefits. Deere has adhered to these excellent conditions since the conception of the company. Health and pension benefits were offered to the employees of Deere company as long as a 100 years ago. Deere continues to provide excellent support to its employees through various programs and benefits that have evolved over the years in accordance with the changing environment. The employees can choose their own preferences and can chose their benefits. Some of the benefits that are offered include:

• Continuing Education
• Financial Planning
• Fitness
• Flexible Work Arrangements
• Health Benefits
• Other Benefits
• Resources for the Parents
• Other Services and Discounts

John Deere has a unique personality when it comes to its image as a business in the global market. One of the first things that any stakeholder would notice about this company is that it has been around for more than 165 years. Ever since the conception of this company, certain core values and contents have been included in the corporate image and culture of this company. These include:

Quality:          John Deere, the man behind this company, was a rugged blacksmith who started business as a one-man shop. He is known to have quoted in 1837: “I will never put my name on any product that does not have in it the best that is in me.” This statement has become one of the core values of the company today and this idea of striving for the best and to be the best is still followed by the company managers, 165 years later. All of the employees at John Deere are trained to be extremely quality conscious and to put quality before anything else.

Innovation:    As with the obsession with quality, the company also believes in innovation through thinking out of the box. It is related that “John Deere chanced upon a shiny, discarded sawmill blade and he suddenly imagined a way to solve the problem plaguing Midwestern farmers of wet gumbo soil sticking to their plows. The next day he used the saw blade to fabricate a crude self-scouring “steel plow” that ushered in modern agriculture. You might say John Deere was founded by thinking out of the box. John Deere employees are innovative” (3).

Integrity:        Money and profits are not everything at John Deere. The Deere & Company was around during the American Great Depression of the 1930s and it saw that many of the customers of the company were not in a position to pay back their machinery debts. Deere & Company decided to carry these customers for as long as necessaries and even though it suffered heavy losses, it kept its promises to the customers. Eventually, all the debt was paid back and Deere retained its goodwill amongst its stakeholders; this goodwill still runs deep and strong in the company’s veins. John Deere employees strive for long-term win-win relationships.

Commitment: “The John Deere trademark is one of the world’s most trusted and distinctive brands. Since all brands are simply promises in short-hand, their name recognition speaks directly to a great many promises made and kept. John Deere employees understand shared commitment is powerful. Nothing runs like a Deere” (3).

            Some of the ways in which the Deere & Company was able to achieve its success through operational management includes two of its most famous systems. The environmental management system and the safety and health management system. “The John Deere Environmental Management System (EMS) is a set of formal, documented processes for controlling environmental impacts and driving continuous improvement. It provides the framework for John Deere facilities to meet legal obligations and company standards everywhere we do business. The John Deere EMS closely parallels ISO 14001, and also incorporates elements of the company's business conduct guidelines. The John Deere EMS is composed of four sections -- assessing, planning, implementing, and reviewing -- and fourteen elements” [see table below]

Table Taken from (4)

“The John Deere Safety and Health Management System (SHMS) is a set of formal, documented processes for controlling safety and health impacts and driving continuous improvement. It provides the framework for John Deere facilities to meet legal obligations and company standards everywhere we do business. The John Deere SHMS Standard draws elements from the OHSA 18001 and the ANSI Z-10 Standards, as well as our business conduct guidelines.

The John Deere SHMS is composed of four sections – assessing, planning, implementing, and reviewing – and thirteen elements” [see table below]

Table Taken from (5)

Other operational management parameters that make Deere & Company unique and the purpose of this study include its extensive audits and assurance programs. Both the above mentioned systems run strict audits and assurances based in three elements: an annual compliance assurance letter, a corporate/third party audit program, and a self-audit program. The compliance assurance letter allows the company to keep track of its parts and distribution facilities for financial risks. The managers are required to fill some forms that are related to the safety of the working environment as well as the management of risks involved in the working conditions. A third party audit is held that checks with the safety and health of the employees.
These audits provide assurance that adequate safety and health policies and standards are implemented worldwide. The self-audit program complements the formal third-party audit program. The scope of a unit's self-audit is dependent on the safety and health risk of the facility.

Conclusion

Perhaps one of the most important reasons why John Deere has been chosen for this case study is because this company has strived to keep up with the changing times and has successfully grown itself in the various markets all over the world. It took many companies a long time to realize that the global market was the market of the future but Deere & Company had envisioned this growth a long time ago. And the best thing is that they were successfully able to ‘strike while the iron was hot’ and take home the winning prize of global growth and customer care. The Deere Co. has also been very successful in its endeavors of providing the stakeholders what they need world wide.

Work Cited:

1. Deere & Company Website, “John Deere Strategy and Promise,” Online, http://www.deere.com/en_US/compinfo/strategy/index.html (Accessed August 12, 2005)

2. Deere & Company Website, “Company Information: General Information,” Online,  http://www.deere.com/en_US/compinfo/generalinfo/ (Accessed August 12, 2005)

3. Deere & Company Website, “John Deere Culture and Values: Who We Are?”, Online, http://www.deere.com/en_US/careers/diversity/jdculture_and_values.html (Accessed August 12, 2005)

4. Deere & Company Website, “Environmental Management System,” Online, http://www.deere.com/en_US/compinfo/envtsafety/operations/EMS.html (Accessed August 12, 2005)

5. Deere & Company Website, “Safety and Health Management System,” Online, http://www.deere.com/en_US/compinfo/envtsafety/operations/SHMS.html (Accessed August 12, 2005)

"Macedonia to the Macedonians"

"Two hundred and forty five bands were in the mountains. Serbian and Bulgarian comitadjis, Greek andartes, Albanians and Vlachs... all waging a terrorist war" (Leon Sciaky in "Farewell to Salonica: Portrait of an Era")

"(Goce Delcev died) cloak flung over his left shoulder, his white fez, wrapped in a bluish scarf, pulled down and his gun slung across his left elbow" (Mihail Chakov, who was nearby Delcev at the moment of his death, quoted in "Balkan Ghosts" by Robert D. Kaplan)

"I will try and tell this story coldly, calmly, dispassionately ... one must tone the horrors down, for in their nakedness, they are unprintable..." (A.G. Hales reporting about the Illinden Uprising in the London "Daily News" of October 21, 1903)

"The Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization directs its eyes neither to the West, nor to the East,nor to anywhere else; it relies primarily on its own powers, does not turn into anybody's weapon, and will not allow anybody to use its name and prestige for personal and other purposes. It has demonstrated till now and will prove in the future that it establishes its activities on the interests and works for the ideals of struggling Macedonia and the Bulgarian race."

TODOR ALEXANDROV The Leader of the IMRO from 1911 to 1924

The Treaty of Berlin killed Peter Lazov. A Turkish soldier first gouged his eyes out, some say with a spoon, others insist it was a knife. As the scream-imbued blood trickled down his face, the Turk cut both his ears and the entirety of his nose with his sword. Thus maimed and in debilitating agony, he was left to die for a few days. When he failed to do so, the Turks disembowelled him to death and decapitated the writhing rump.

The Ottomans granted independence to Bulgaria in the 1878 Treaty of San Stefano unwillingly, following a terminal defeat at the hands of a wrathful Russian army. The newly re-invented nation incorporated a huge swathe of Macedonia, not including Thessaloniki and the Chalcidice Peninsula. Another treaty followed, in Berlin, restoring the "balance" by returning Macedonia to Turkish rule. Turkey obligingly accepted a "one country, two systems" approach by agreeing to a Christian administration of the region and by permitting education in foreign languages, by foreign powers in foreign-run and owned schools. Then they set about a typical infandous Ottoman orgy of shredded entrails, gang raped corpses of young girls and maiming and decapitation. The horrors this time transcended anything before. In Ohrid, they buried people in pigsty mud for "not paying taxes". Joined by Turks who escaped the advancing Russian armies in North Bulgaria and by Bosnian Moslems, who fled the pincer movement of the forces of Austro-Hungary, they embarked on the faithful recreation of a Bosch-like hell. Feeble attempts at resistance (really, self defence) - such as the one organized by Natanail, the Bishop of Ohrid - ended in the ever escalating ferocity of the occupiers. A collaboration emerged between the Church and the less than holy members of society. Natanail himself provided "Chetis" (guerilla bands) with weapons and supplies. In October 1878, an uprising took place in Kresna. It was duly suppressed by the Turks, though with some difficulty. It was not the first one, having been preceded by the Razlovci uprising in 1876. But it was more well organized and explicit in its goals.

But no one - with the exception of the Turks - was content with the situation and even they were paranoid and anxious. The flip-flop policies of the Great Powers turned Macedonia into the focus of shattered national aspirations grounded in some historical precedent of at least three nations: the Greeks, the Bulgarians, and the Serbs. Each invoked ethnicity and history and all conjured up the apparition of the defunct Treaty of San Stefano. Serbia colluded with the Habsburgs: Bosnia to the latter in return for a free hand in Macedonia to the former. The wily Austro-Hungarians regarded the Serbs as cannon fodder in the attrition war against the Russians and the Turks. In 1885, Bulgaria was at last united - north and formerly Turk-occupied south - under the Kremlin's pressure. The Turks switched sides and allied with the Serbs against the spectre of a Great Bulgaria. Again, the battleground was Macedonia and its Bulgarian-leaning (and to many, pure Bulgarian) inhabitants. Further confusion awaited. In 1897, following the Crete uprising against the Ottoman rule and in favour of Greek enosis (unification), Turkey (to prevent Bulgaria from joining its Greek enemy) encouraged King Ferdinand to help the Serbs fight the Greeks. Thus, the Balkanian kaleidoscope of loyalties, alliances and everlasting friendship was tilted more savagely than ever before by the paranoia and the whims of nationalism gone berserk.

In this world of self reflecting looking glasses, in this bedlam of geopolitics, in this seamless and fluid universe, devoid of any certainty but the certainty of void, an anomie inside an abnormality - a Macedonian self identity, tentative and merely cultural at first, began to emerge. Voivode Gorgija Pulevski published a poem "Macedonian Fairy" in 1878. The Young Macedonian Literary Society was established in 1891 and started publishing "Loza", its journal a year thereafter. Krste Misirkov, Dimitrija Cupovski, the Vardar Society and the Macedonian Club in Belgrade founded the Macedonian Scholarly-Literary Society in 1902 (in Russia). Their "Macedonian National Program" demanded a recognition of a Macedonian nation with its own language and culture. They stopped short of insisting on an independent state, settling instead for an autonomy and an independent church. Misirkov went on to publish his seminal work, "On Macedonian Matters" in 1903 in Sofia. It was a scathing critique of the numbing and off-handed mind games Macedonia was subjected to by the Big Powers. Misirkov believed in culture as an identity preserving force. And the purveyors and conveyors of culture were the teachers.

"So the teacher in Yugoslavia is often a hero and fanatic as well as a servant of the mind; but as they walked along the Belgrade streets it could easily be seen that none of them had quite enough to eat or warm enough clothing or handsome lodgings or all the books they needed" - wrote Dame Rebecca West in her eternal "Black Lamb and Grey Falcon" in 1940.

Goce Delcev (Gotse Deltchev) was a teacher. He was born in 1872 in Kukush (the Bulgarian name of the town), north of Thessaloniki (Salonica, Solun, Saloniki). There is no doubt about his cultural background (as opposed to his convictions later in life) - it was Bulgarian to the core. He studied at a Bulgarian gymnasium in Saloniki. He furthered his education at a military academy in Sofia. He was a schoolteacher and a guerilla fighter and in both capacities he operated in the areas that are today North-Central Greece, Southwestern Bulgaria and the Republic of Macedonia. He felt equally comfortable in all three regions. He was shot to death by the Turks in Banitsa, then a Bulgarian village, today, a Greek one. It was in a spring day in May 1903.

The death of this sad but steely eyed, heavily moustached youth was sufficient to ignite the Illinden uprising three months later. It erupted on the feast of Saint Illiya (Sveti Ilija). Peasants sold their sacrificial bulls - the fruits of months of labour - and bought guns with the proceeds. It started rather innocuously in the hotbed of ethnic unrest, Western Macedonia - telegraph wires were cut, some tax registers incinerated. The IMRO collaborated in this with the pro-Bulgarian organization Vzhovits. In Krusevo (Krushevo) a republic was proclaimed, replete with "Rules of the Macedonian Uprising Committee" (aka the "Constitution of the Uprising"). This document dealt with the liberation of Macedonia and the establishment of a Macedonian State. A special chapter was dedicated to foreign affairs and neighbourly relationships. It was all heart-achingly naive and it lasted 10 bloody days. Crushed by 2000 trained soldiers and horse bound artillery, the outnumbered 1200 rebels surrendered. Forty of them kissed each other goodbye and blew their brains out. The usual raping and blood thick massacres ensued. According to Turkish records, these ill-planned and irresponsible moments of glory and freedom cost the lives of 4,694 civilians, 994 "terrorists". The rape of 3,000 women was not documented. In Northwestern Macedonia, an adolescent girl was raped by 50 soldiers and murdered afterwards. In another village, they cut a girl's arm to secure her bracelets. The more one is exposed to these atrocities, the more one is prone to subscribe to the view that the Ottoman Empire - its halting and half hearted efforts at reform notwithstanding - was the single most important agent of retardation and putrid stagnation in its colonies, a stifling influence of traumatic proportions, the cause of mass mental sickness amongst its subjects.

As is usually the case in the bloodied geopolitical sandbox known as the Balkans, an international peacekeeping force intervened. Yet it was - again, habitually - too late, too little.

What made Delcev, rather his death, the trigger of such an outpouring of emotions was the IMRO (VMRO in Macedonian and in Bulgarian). The Illinden uprising was the funeral of a man who was a hope. It was the ululating grieving of a collective deprived of vengeance or recourse. It was a spasmodic breath taken in the most suffocating of environments. This is not to say that IMRO was monolithic or that Delcev was an Apostle (as some of his hagiographers would have him). It was not and he was far from it. But he and his two comrades, Jane (Yane) Sandanski and Damyan (Dame) Gruev had a vision. They had a dream. The IMRO is the story of a dream turned nightmare, of the absolute corruption of absolute power and of the dangers of inviting the fox to fight the wolf.

The original "Macedonian Revolutionary Organization" (MRO) was established in Sofia. The distinction between being a Macedonian and being a Macedonian-Bulgarian was not sharp, to use a polite understatement. The Bulgarians "proper" regarded the Macedonians as second class, primitive and uncultured Bulgarian relatives who inhabit a part of Bulgaria to the east. The Macedonians themselves were divided. Some wished to be incorporated in Bulgaria, the civilized and advanced society and culture. Others wanted an independent state - though they, too, believed that the salvation of such an entity - both demographic and financial - lies abroad, with the diaspora and benevolent foreign powers. A third group (and Delcev was, for a time, among them) wanted a federation of all states Balkan with an equal standing for a Macedonian polity (autonomy). The original MRO opted for the Bulgarian option and restricted its aims to the liberation and immediate annexation of what they solemnly considered to be a Turkish-occupied Bulgarian territory. To distinguish themselves from this MRO, the 6 founders of the Macedonian version - all members of the intelligentsia - added the word "Internal" to their name. Thus, they became, in November 1893, IMRO.

A measure of the disputatiousness of all matters Balkanian can be found in the widely and wildly differing versions about the circumstances of the establishment of IMRO. Some say it was established in Thessaloniki (this is the official version, thus supporting its "Macedonian"-ness). Others - like Robert Kaplan - say it was in Stip (Shtip) and the Encyclopaedia Britannica claims it was in ... Resen (Resana).

Let it be clear: this author harbours no sympathy towards the Ottoman Empire. The IMRO was fighting for lofty ideals (Balkanian federation) and worthy goals (liberation from asphyxiating Turkish rule). But to many outside observers (with the exception of journalists like John Sonixen or John smith), the IMRO was indistinguishable in its methods of operation from the general landscape of mayhem, crime, disintegration of the social fabric, collapse of authority, social anomie, terror and banditry.

From Steven Sowards' "Twenty Five Lectures on Modern Balkan History, The Balkans in an Age of Nationalism", 1996 available HERE: http://www.lib.msu.edu/sowards/balkan/lect11.htm

"Meanwhile, the Tanzimat reforms remained unfulfilled under Abdul Hamid's reactionary regime. How effective had all these reforms been by the turn of the century? How bad was life for Christian peasants in the Balkans? In a 1904 book called 'Macedonia: Its Races and Their Future', H. N. Brailsford, an English relief worker, describes lawless conditions in Macedonia, the central Balkan district between Greece, Serbia, Albania and Bulgaria. In the areas Brailsford knew, the authorities had little power. He writes:

'An Albanian went by night into a Bulgarian village and fired into the house of a man whom he regarded as an enemy. ... The prefect...endeavored to arrest the murderer, but [his Albanian] village took up his cause, and the gendarmes returned empty-handed. The prefect ... marched upon the offending village at the head of three hundred regular troops. ... The village did not resist, but it still refused to give evidence against the guilty man. The prefect returned to Ochrida with forty or fifty prisoners, kept them in gaol for three or four days, and then released them all. ... To punish a simple outbreak of private passion in which no political element was involved [the prefect] had to mobilize the whole armed force of his district, and even then he failed.'

Robbers and brigands operated with impunity: 'Riding one day upon the high-road ..., I came upon a brigand seated on a boulder ... in the middle of the road, smoking his cigarette, with his rifle across his knees, and calmly levying tribute from all the passers-by."

Extortionists, not police, were in control: "A wise village ... [has] its own resident brigands. ... They are known as rural guards. They are necessary because the Christian population is absolutely unarmed and defenceless. To a certain extent they guarantee the village against robbers from outside, and in return they carry on a licensed and modified robbery of their own.'

Self-defense by Orthodox peasants was dangerous: 'The Government makes its presence felt ... when a 'flying column' saunters out to hunt an elusive rebel band, or ... to punish some flagrant act of defiance. ... The village may have ... resented the violence of the tax-collector ... [or] harboured an armed band of insurgents...; or ...killed a neighbouring civilian Turk who had assaulted some girl of the place. ... At the very least all the men who can be caught will be mercilessly beaten, at the worst the village will be burned and some of its inhabitants massacred.'

It was not surprising that peasants hated their rulers. 'One enters some hovel ... something ... stirs or groans in the gloomiest corner on the floor beneath a filthy blanket. Is it fever, one asks, or smallpox? ... the answer comes ..., 'He is ill with fear.' ... Looking back ... , a procession of ruined minds comes before the memory--an old priest lying beside a burning house speechless with terror ...; a woman who had barked like a dog since the day her village was burned; a maiden who became an imbecile because her mother buried her in a hole under the floor to save her from the soldiers; ... children who flee in terror at the sight of a stranger, crying 'Turks! Turks!' These are the human wreckage of the hurricane which usurps the functions of a Government.'

Four things are worth noting in Brailsford's account as we consider the prospects for a reform solution to Balkan problems.

First, revolutionary politics was not the foremost issue for the Christian population: nationalism addressed the immediate problems in their daily lives only indirectly, by promising a potential better state.

Second, loyalties were still local and based on the family and the village, not on abstract national allegiances. If criminal abuses ended, the Ottoman state might yet have invented an Ottoman "nationalism" to compete with Serbian, Greek, Romanian, or Bulgarian nationalism.

Third, villagers did not cry out for new government departments or services, but only for relief from corruption and crime. The creation of new national institutions was not necessary, only the reform of existing institutions.

Fourth, and on the other hand, mistrust and violence between the two sides was habitual. So many decades of reform had failed by this time. The situation was so hopeless and extreme that few people on either side can have thought of reform as a realistic option."

During the 1890s, IMRO's main sources of income were voluntary (and later, less voluntary) taxation of the rural population, bank robberies, train robberies (which won handsome world media coverage) and kidnapping for ransom (like the kidnapping of the American Protestant Missionary Ellen Stone - quite a mysterious affair). The IMRO developed along predictable lines into an authoritarian and secretive organization - a necessity if it were to fight the Turks effectively. It had its own tribunals which exercised - often fatal - authority over civilians who were deemed collaborators with the Turkish enemy. It must be emphasized that this was NOT unusual or unique at that time. This was the modus operandi of all military-organized ideological and political groups. And, taking everything into account, the IMRO was fighting a just war against an abhorrent enemy.

Moreover, to some extent, its war was effective and resulted in reforms imposed on the Sublime Port (the Turkish authorities) by the Great Powers of the day. We mentioned the peacekeeping force which replaced the local gendarmerie. But reforms were also enacted in education, religious rights and tolerance, construction, farm policy and other areas. The intractable and resource-consuming Macedonian question led directly to the reform of Turkey itself by the Macedonia-born officer Ataturk. And it facilitated the disintegration of the Ottoman empire - thus, ironically, leading to the independence of almost everyone except its originators.

The radicalization of IMRO and its transformation into the infamous organization it has come to be known as, started after the Second Balkan war (1913) and, more so, after the First World War (1918). It was then that disillusionment with Big Power politics replaced the naive trust in the inevitable triumph of a just claim. The Macedonians were never worse off politically, having contributed no less - if not more - than any other nation to the re-distribution of the Ottoman Empire. The cynicism, the hypocrisy, the off-handedness, the ignorance, the vile interests, the ulterior motives - all conspired to transform the IMRO from a goal-orientated association to a power hungry mostrosity.

In 1912 Bulgaria, Serbia, and Greece - former bitter foes - formed the Balkan League to confront an even more bitter foe, the Ottoman Empire on the thin pretext of an Albanian uprising. The brotherhood strained in the Treaty of London (May 1913) promptly deteriorated into internecine warfare over the spoils of a successful campaign - namely, over Macedonia. Serbs, Greeks, Montenegrins and Romanians subdued Bulgaria sufficiently to force it to sign a treaty in August 1913 in Bucharest. "Aegean Macedonia" went to Greece and "Vardar Macedonia" (today's Republic of Macedonia) went to Serbia. The smaller "Pirin Macedonia" remained Bulgarian. The Bulgarian gamble in World War I went well for a while, as it occupied all three parts of Macedonia. But the ensuing defeat and dismemberment of its allies, led to a re-definition of even "Pirin Macedonia" so as to minimize Bulgaria's share. Vardar Macedonia became part of a new Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes (later renamed Yugoslavia).

These political Lego games led to enormous population shifts - the politically correct term for refugees brutally deprived of their land and livelihood. All of them were enshrined in solemn treaties. The Treaty of Lausanne (1923) led to the expulsion of 375,000 Turks from Aegean Macedonia. 640,000 Greek refugees from Turkey replaced them. Each of the actual occupiers and each of the potential ones opened its own schools to indoctrinate the future generations of the populace. Conflicts erupted over ecclesiastical matters, the construction of railways and railway stations. Guerilla fighters soon realized that being pawns on this mad hatter's chessboard could be a profitable vocation. The transformation from freedom fighters to mercenaries with no agenda was swift. And pecuniary considerations bred even more terror and terrorists where there were none before.

In the meantime, Serbia enacted a land reform legislation in "Vardar Macedonia" - in effect, the confiscation of arable land by thousands of Greek settlers, refugees from Turkey. Much of the land thus "re-distributed" was owned by Turkish absentees, now refugees themselves. But a lot of land was simply impounded from its rightful, very much present and very Macedonian owners. The Serb authorities coerced the population to speak the Serb language, changed Macedonian names to Serb ones in brutally carried campaigns and imposed a corrupt and incompetent bureaucracy upon the suffering multitudes.

IMRO never gave up its proclaimed goal to liberate both occupied parts of Macedonia - the Aegean and the Vardar ones. But, as time passed and as the nature of its organization and operation evolved, the perfunctoriness of its proclamations became more and more evident. The old idealists - the intellectuals and ideologues, the Goce Delcev types - were removed, died in battle, or left this mutation of their dream. The IMRO insignia - skull and crossbones - linked it firmly to the Italian Balckshirts and the Nazi brown ones. The IMRO has developed into a fascist organization. It traded opium. It hired out the services of its skilled assassins (for 20 dollars a contract). It recruited members among the Macedonian population in the slums of Sofia. Finally, they openly collaborated with the Fascists of Mussolini (who also supported them financially), with the Ustashe (similarly supported by Italy) and with the Nazis (under Ivan Mihailov, who became the nominal quisling ruler of Vardar Macedonia). It was an IMRO man ("Vlado the Chauffeur") who murdered King Alexander of Yugoslavia in 1934.

All this period, the IMRO continued to pursue its original agenda. IMRO terrorists murdered staff and pupils in Yugoslav schools in Aegean Macedonia. In between 1924-34, it killed 1,000 people. Tourists of the period describe the Yugoslav-Bulgarian frontier as the most fortified in Europe with "entanglements, block houses, redoubts and searchlight posts". Throughout the twenties and the thirties, the IMRO maintained a presence in Europe, publishing propaganda incessantly and explaining its position eloquently (though not very convincingly). It was not very well liked by both Bulgarians and Macedonians who got increasingly agitated and exhausted by the extortion of ever increasing taxes and by the seemingly endless violence. But the IMRO was now a force to reckon with: organized, disciplined, lethal. Its influence grew by the day and more than one contemporary describes it as a "state within a state". In Bulgaria it collaborated with Todor Alexandrov in the overthrow and murder of the Prime Minister, Alexandur Stamboliyski (June 1923) and in the appointment of a right wing government headed by Alexandur Tsankov.

Stamboliyski tried to appease Yugoslavia and, in the process, sacrifice inconvenient elements, such as the IMRO, as expediently as he could. He made too many powerful enemies too fast: the army (by cutting their inflated budget), the nationalists (by officially abandoning the goal of military expansion), the professional officers (by making them redundant), the Great Powers (by making THEM redundant as well) and the opposition (by winning the elections handsomely despite all the above). By signing the Treaty of Nis (allowing Serb forces the right of hot pursuit within Bulgarian territory), he in effect sealed his own death warrant. The IMRO teamed up with the Military League (an organization of disgruntled officers, both active duty and reserve) and with the tacit blessing of Tsar Boris and the forming National Alliance (later renamed the Democratic Alliance), they did away with the hated man.

Following the murder, the IMRO was given full control of the region of Petric (Petrich). It used it as a launching pad of its hit and run attacks against Yugoslavia with the full - though clandestine - support of the Bulgarian Ministry of War and Fascist Italy. From Pirin, they attacked Greece as well. These were exactly the kind of international tensions the murdered Prime Minister was keen to terminate and the IMRO no less keen to foster. In the meanwhile, Alexandrov came to an end typical of many a Bulgarian politician and was assassinated only a year after the coup d'etat.

The decade that followed did not smile upon the IMRO. It fragmented and its shreds fought each other in the streets of Sofia, Chicago-style. By 1934, the IMRO was a full-fledged extortionist mafia organization. They ran protection rackets ("protecting" small shop-owners against other gangs and "insuring" them against their own violence). Hotels in Sofia always had free rooms for the IMRO. The tobacco industry paid the IMRO more than a million British pounds of that time in six years of "taxation". Robberies and assassinations were daily occurrences. So were street shoot-outs and outright confiscation of goods. The IMRO had no support left anywhere.

In 1934, it was disbanded (together with other parties) by Colonel Kimron Georgiev, the new Prime Minister of Bulgaria and a senior figure in the Zveno association of disgruntled citizenry. His rule was brief (ended the next year) but the IMRO never recovered. It brought its own demise upon itself. Colonel Velcev (Velchev), the perpetrator of the coup, was swept to power on the promise to end all terrorist activities - a promise which he kept.

The modern Republic of Macedonia is today ruled by a party called VMRO-DPMNE. It is one of a few political parties to carry this name and the biggest and weightiest amongst them by far. It is founded on the vision and ideals of Goce Delcev and has distanced itself from the "Terrorist-IMRO". The picture of Delcev adorns every office in both Macedonia and Bulgaria and he is the closest to a saint a secular regime can have. In 1923, the Greeks transferred his bones to Bulgaria. Stalin, in a last effort to placate Tito, ordered Bulgaria to transfer them to Macedonia. Even in his death he knew no peace. Now he is buried in his final resting place, in the tranquil inner yard of the Church of Sveti Spas (Saint Saviour). A marble slab bearing a simple inscription with his name under a tree, in a Macedonia which now belongs to the Macedonians.

http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/12-24-2001-8358.asp

♥◘LOVE◘♥

If I could have just one wish,
I would wish to wake up everyday
to the sound of your breath on my neck,
the warmth of your lips on my cheek,
the touch of your fingers on my skin,
and the feel of your heart beating with mine...
Knowing that I could never find that feeling
with anyone other than you.

- Courtney Kuchta -

◘◘◘FaMiLy◘◘◘

◘FaMiLy◘

My family will forever be in my heart,
My sister's mean the world to me,
More than life,
All I ever wanted was a complete family,
To have a mother whom I never met,
My family will always remain who they are in my heart and soul,
My family is more important than my friends and my lover,
Family will always come first,
Family is family,
No matter what they did they'll always remain family. 



-Jennifer Rondeau-

♥♥♥♥fRiEnDsHiP♥♥♥♥

Friends

A friend is someone we turn to
when our spirits need a lift.
A friend is someone we treasure
for our friendship is a gift.
A friend is someone who fills our lives
with beauty, joy, and grace.
And makes the whole world we live in
a better and happier place.

- Jean Kyler McManus -

Patuloy Ang Pangarap (Angeline Quinto)