Ivan Mihaylov Gavrilov (; ;He is credited in English-language sources as Mihailov, while the Bulgarian and Macedonian transliteration schemes render it as Mihaylov and Mihajlov, respectively. 26 August 1896 – 5 September 1990), also known as Vancho Mihaylov (; ), was a Macedonian Bulgarian"... If you are asked what nationality you are, you will answer that you are Bulgarian. If you are asked where you are from, you will answer that you are from Macedonia. But in this case you can say that you are a "Macedonian Bulgarian" or "Bulgarian from Macedonia". With such an answer you have immediately clarified what your nationality is and what, more precisely, your native country is. Such a comprehensive answer is especially necessary in front of foreigners. There is no need, there is no reason to keep silent that you are from Macedonia. This does not serve your Bulgarian nationality. On the contrary, it is served when foreigners learn that Bulgarians live in Macedonia. Tito's communists are trying by all means to eradicate the Bulgarian name in the captured Macedonian districts, replacing it with the name Macedonian..." Иван Михайлов: Като съм българин не съм ли македонец? Статия във вестник „Македонска трибуна" от 28 януари 1971 г. revolutionary in interwar Macedonia and the last leader of the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization (IMRO).Indeed, some Macedonian Slavs still combine Bulgarian ethnic sentiment with the desire for an independent multi-ethnic Macedonia. In 1989, for example, Ivan Mihailov, a self-professed “Bulgarian from Macedonia”, told Macedonian journalist Boris Vishinsky (2001) that he sought “an independent Macedonia with recognized historical ethnic groups”. For more see: Alexander Maxwell, “Slavic Macedonian Nationalism: From 'Regional' to 'Ethnic,'” in Ethnologia Balkanica; issue 11 (2007) p. 147.
Under Mihaylov, IMRO became notoriously anti-communistTchavdar Marinov, Communism and Nationalism in the Balkans: Marriage of Convenience or Mutual Attraction? p. 510 in: Entangled Histories of the Balkans - Volume Two (2013) edited by Tchavdar Marinov and Alexander Vezenkov, pp. 469–555, BRILL; . and identified itself closely with Bulgarian nationalism, thus eliminating not only the enemies of the Bulgarian national idea in Macedonia but also its left-wing opponents within the Macedonian liberation movement. Mihaylov changed the organization's tactics from guerrilla campaigns to individual terrorist acts. Numerous attacks were carried out by IMRO against Yugoslav officials under his leadership, the most spectacular of which was the assassination of Alexander I of Yugoslavia, in collaboration with Croatian Ustaše.Moll, Nicolas (2012). "Kampf gegen den Terror". Damals (in German). No. 6. pp. 72–77. He actively cooperated with revanchist powers, such as Mussolini's Fascist Italy, Admiral Horthy's Hungary and Hitler's Nazi Germany.From the moment he took power, he allied the VMRO very closely with the Bulgarian nationalist and revisionist right. He also cooperated actively with the other revisionist powers—Benito Mussolini's Fascist Italy, Admiral Horthy's right-wing Hungary, and Adolf Hitler's Nazi Germany - and with right-wing movements, such as the Croatian Ustasha. For more see: Andrew Rossos (2013) Macedonia and the Macedonians: A History, Hoover Press, 2013, p. 162, .Frederick B. Chary (2011) The History of Bulgaria, The Greenwood Histories of the Modern Nations, ABC-CLIO, pp. 70-71; 114-116, .Ryan Gingeras, The Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organization: "Oriental" terrorism, counterinsurgency, and the end of the Ottoman Empire, pp. 372-373 in The Oxford Handbook of the History of Terrorism (2021) edited by Carola Dietze and Claudia Verhoeven, pp. 367-384; Oxford University Press, .Michael Palairet (2016) Macedonia: A Voyage through History (Vol. 2), Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp. 192-194; 196; 200; 208; 213; 223, .Dimitris Livanios (2008) The Macedonian Question: Britain and the Southern Balkans 1939-1949, Oxford Historical Monographs, OUP Oxford; pp. 28-30; . During the last stage of the war, he tried to realize IMRO's plan to create an Independent Macedonia but ultimately refused to move forward due to the lack of German military support and his reluctance to take a course that would lead to civil war.Stefan Troebst (2017) Zwischen Arktis, Adria und Armenien: das östliche Europa und seine Ränder: Aufsätze, Essays und Vorträge 1983-2016; Böhlau Verlag Köln Weimar, pp. 130-131; .
During the Cold War, Mihaylov lived in Italy while the emigrant Macedonian Patriotic Organization in the US and Canada worked under his guidance on the old IMRO's goal of an independent Macedonia. This was acknowledged by a CIA report from 1953, which dubbed the MPO as "the US branch of the IMRO" and asserted that it acted as a money-raising organ to support Mihaylov's activity.Background Whereabouts and Activities of Ivan Mihailov, 16 April 1953 . At the beginning of the fall of communism and the breakup of Yugoslavia, only a month before his death in 1990, he kept insisting: "I am a Bulgarian from Macedonia" and "I would recommend to the young people in Macedonia to hold on to the fact that we have been Bulgarians for a thousand years."Ivan Mihaylov: I am Bulgarian from Macedonia, Interwiev, Sertember 1989. (in English) Mihaylov was considered a Bulgarophile traitor and fascist in Communist Yugoslavia. He is still regarded as such in what is today North Macedonia,Виктор Цветаноски, Ванчо Михајлов умирал и тврдел дека македонска нација не постои. Која е контроверзната тетовка што ја слават Бугарите? (5) Утрински весник, 27.02.2007 г. while the organization he led is seen as a controversial Bulgarian organization because its ideas clash with the Yugoslav Macedonian nation-building narrative.In Macedonia, the interwar VMRO has traditionally been portrayed as Bulgarian, and as a champion of the ideal of a ‘Greater Bulgaria’ that included Macedonia. In turn, thus, SDSM politicians and mainstream historians have accused the VMRO-DPMNE of falsifying history and of taking a pro-Bulgarian stance. The acknowledgement of Bulgarian influence on Macedonian history is highly problematic to many Macedonians because it clashes with the Yugo-Macedonian narratives. Especially after the Tito–Stalin split of 1948, the cornerstone of Macedonian national identity and historiography had been the notion of a distinct, non-Bulgarian, Macedonian national consciousness, leading to a profoundly anti-Bulgarian stance in politics and historiography. For more see: Paul Reef (2018) Macedonian Monument Culture Beyond 'Skopje 2014'. From the journal Comparative Southeast European Studies. De Gruyter Oldenbourg. https://doi.org/10.1515/soeu-2018-0037 According to Bulgarian historian Chavdar Marinov, Mihaylov was regarded as a Nazi collaborator in Communist Bulgaria. He was later partially rehabilitated there, supporting the Bulgarian narrative that negates the existence of a widespread Macedonian national identity before the end of World War II and he has been fully rehabilitated today.Frosina Dimeska, WWII Bulgarian Nationalist ‘Glorified to Undermine Macedonian Identity’: Interview with the historian Chavdar Marinov, BIRN, April 21, 2022.
Mihaylov is the author of four volumes of memoirs and a number of articles and pamphlets, such as "Macedonia: Switzerland of the Balkans", "Stalin and the Macedonian Question", as well as other materials describing the Macedonian struggle for freedom.Иван Гаврилов Михайлов, Избрани произведения, редактори: К Гергинов, Цочо Билярски; Военноиздателски комплекс "Св. Георги Победоносец", 1993, стр. 5; .
Biography
Early years
Ivan Mihaylov was born on 26 August 1896 in the village of Novo Selo (today a quarter of Štip, North Macedonia), in the Kosovo vilayet of the Ottoman Empire. Mihaylov studied at the Bulgarian Men's High School in Thessaloniki up until the Second Balkan War (1913), when the school was closed by the new Greek administration. He later continued his schooling at a Serbian school in Skopje, then in the Kingdom of Serbia. A scholarship was offered to him by the Serbian Ministry of Education to pursue a degree at a European university, but he declined. During the First World War, he enlisted in the Bulgarian Army, which occupied the region at the time. After the end of the war, Mihaylov emigrated to Bulgaria, settling in Sofia. Here he began studying law at the Sofia University. It was at this time that he was offered to work as personal secretary to the then IMRO leader Todor Aleksandrov.
Leader of the IMRO
On 31 August 1924, Todor Aleksandrov was assassinated under unclear circumstances and IMRO soon came under the control of Mihaylov, who by then had become a prominent figure in Bulgarian politics.
IMRO's leadership was quick to blame Aleksandrov's death on the communists, while they claimed that Mihaylov may have actually been responsible for the murder. These events created friction between factions within the organization and led to several high-profile murders, including that of Petar Chaulev (who led the Ohrid uprising in 1913) in Milan.
During the interwar period, IMRO took action against several former members of IMRO's Sandanist (left-wing) faction. Gjorche Petrov was killed in Sofia in 1921. Todor Panitsa, who had killed the right-wing Boris Sarafov and Ivan Garvanov, was assassinated in Vienna in 1925 by Mihaylov's future wife, Mencha Karnichiu." Dimo Hadjidimov, Georgi Skrizhovski, Aleksandar Bujnov, Chudomir Kantardjiev, and many others were killed in a series of murders, all taking place in 1925.
Mihaylov's group of young IMRO cadres soon fell into conflict with the older members of the organization. The latter were in favour of the old tactics of incursions by armed bands into Yugoslavia and Greece, whereas the former favoured more flexible tactics, with smaller terrorist cells carrying selective assassinations of public figures.
The conflict grew into a leadership struggle, which led Mihaylov to order the assassination in 1928 of a rival leader of the older faction, General Aleksandar Protogerov, sparking a fratricidal war between the "Mihaylovists" and the "Protogerovists". The less numerous and ill-equipped Protogerovists allied themselves with Yugoslavia and certain Bulgarian military circles as Zveno, who favoured rapprochement with Yugoslavia.
That period led to the intensification of the armed struggle of the organization in Aegean and Vardar Macedonia. A total of 63 terrorist acts and attacks on bridges, warehouses, Serbian police stations, and military targets were carried out between 1922 and 1930, with the number of assassinated Serbian officials and collaborators numbering in the thousands.
IMRO had de facto control of Pirin Macedonia and acted as a "state within a state", which it used as a base for hit-and-run attacks against Yugoslavia with the unofficial support of Bulgaria and later Fascist Italy, while also establishing close links with the Croatian Ustaše movement. Numerous assassinations were carried out by IMRO activists in several countries, the majority of which occurred in Yugoslavia. The most spectacular of these was the assassination of King Alexander I of Yugoslavia and the French Foreign Minister Louis Barthou in Marseille in 1934, in collaboration with Ante Pavelić.
IMRO's constant fratricidal killings and assassinations abroad prompted some within the Bulgarian military to attempt to crush the organization after the Bulgarian coup d'état of 1934. In 1934, Mihaylov fled to Turkey and ordered his supporters not to resist the Bulgarian army and to accept the disarmament peacefully, potentially avoiding a civil war or foreign invasion. Many inhabitants of Pirin Macedonia met this disbandment with satisfaction because it was perceived as relief from an unlawful and quite often brutal parallel authority. Mihaylov had nine life sentences and three death sentences in Bulgaria.