When soon-to-be Saint Pope John Paul II visited Croatia his final time, he greeted the Croats by calling them "the fearless witnesses of faith." While there, he called on the Croats to once again open their hearts to mercy and forgiveness. To love thy neighbor and forgive the trespasses of those who raised their hand against them throughout their long and turbulent history.

For years it has been the Croats that have asked forgiveness. For years it has been the Croats who have granted forgiveness. And for years it has been the Croats who have been denied forgiveness and mercy.

Perhaps it is because the Croats truly live their faith, that the Almighty has placed upon them a cross often too heavy to bear.

For centuries their towns and villages were sacked and pillaged by the Ottoman Turks. Their children taken into bondage. Their grandfathers murdered. For centuries Venice robbed them of their freedom; and for centuries the Habsburgs exploited and victimized them. The Croats would have to endure 70 more years of Serbian tyranny in the 20th century capped off with a final act, a bloody war of aggression committed against them in the 1990s by Belgrade, to finally win their freedom.

That is Croatia's tragic history in the simplest of terms. And that is the context in which Croatia has forgiven her enemies, once again extending her hand of peace -- having granted amnesty to those who wish her freedom was never won.

Like no other people in history, the Croats have collectively forgiven and amnestied their enemies. Like no other nation in history, Croatia has, under the direction and instruction of the late Vicar of Christ, welcomed into her bosom those who wished she never existed.

Croatia has forgiven her enemies. She has resettled and fed the returning Serbian population that fled Croatia under Milosevic's directo orders in a mass-exodus of August 1995. She has offered jobs, tools, money and brand new homes. She has in many ways granted her minorities preferential status and entitlement -- above and beyond what Croats themselves (ironically and absurdly) can expect. And she has done everything asked of her in the many processes of Euro-Atlantic integration. She has bent over backwards to please the great powers of Europe. And Croatia has even handed over the upper echelon of her victorious military to a politicized International Tribunal at The Hague intent on rewriting the history of her successful war of liberation. Something no victorious nation has done in recorded history.

The Croatians have received nothing in return.

That is Croatia's recent history. It is in that atmosphere; it is in that post-war and transitional society, overflowing with once pent-up frustration, anger and fear of a treasonous political elite - that the Croats have once again gathered around a Rock & Roll singer catapulted to fame by his patriotism, faith in God and willingness to defend his people. As he did, not only with his guitar, but also on the battlefield with a British-made submachine gun called Thompson.

It was with a World War II era weapon that Marko Perkovic headed into battle to defend his faith and nation. Thanks to an arms-embargo placed on Croatia by the world's major powers while that country was struggling to survive. Marko Perkovic no longer uses a weapon to defend his values and ideals. He has traded in his Thompson gun for a microphone and amplifier.

How could a common man from a small Dalmatian village achieve such notoriety, many ask. It's quite simple: By channeling the love and honesty of the Croatian masses into his music. His unique synthesis of Rock & Roll, Croatian ethno-themes and patriotism have granted him star-status in Croatia and among Croats around the world.

Since the death of Croatian president Franjo Tudjman in 1999, every value and every ideal Croatian soldiers fought for has been dragged through the proverbial political/media mud in that country. Their victorious military commanders have been shipped to The Hague, deemed "war criminals" having not even stood trial. Their honest fight for independence has been trashed, spit on and historically revised by proponents of neo-Yugoslavism/Balkanism masquerading as the promoters of EU-style democratic principles. Some of which hold high positions in Croatia. Like Budimir Loncar, ex-Yugoslav police agent and ex-Yugoslav representative at the UN. Remembered by his compatriots at his birthplace, Preko, for the purging of anyone branded suspicious by Tito's murderous regime. Budimir Loncar is, ironically, now chief foreign policy advisor to Croatia's president Stipe Mesic.

It is Yugoslav communism that is being flirted with by major Croatian politicians, journalists and activists - not fascism or Nazism. It is Yugoslav communism that has not been abolished in Croatia. The remnants of Yugoslav communism are the ones that sit in key-positions of power in post-war Croatia. And it is on the foundations of a perverse brand of anti-Croatian world-view that they champion as "anti-fascism" with which they wish to maintain their stranglehold on the ever-defiant Croat masses. It is with their fallacious "anti-fascism" that they cloak and justify the systematic murder of Croats within Croatia and around the world during the reign of Yugoslav butcher, Josip Broz Tito.

Where was the Simon Wiesenthal Center and where were reporters of The New York Times in late may when a festival was held in honor of Yugoslav murderer Josip Broz Tito? Why then did they not sound the alarms? Why was there no international outrage? Does the glorification of a Yugoslav and communist butcher not warrant the attention of international organizations? The better question presenting itself is: Where were they all when the Serbs backed by the Yugoslav National Army were wreaking havoc and murdering Croats in the early 1990s? Where were they when the Serbs were running concentration camps in Bosnia & Hercegovina?

Not a peep can be heard from Danijel Ivin, The Croatian Helsinki Committee, Zarko Puhovski, Efraim Zuroff or Ivo Goldstein when such manifestations are taking place. The many non-governmental organizations in Zagreb; the many "rights" groups are nowhere to be found when thousands gather to honor and celebrate the birth of one of the world's most notorious communist murderers. Till this very day, Zagreb has one of its prettiest streets named in his honor.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center has done nothing to protest the erection of a Serbian Republic in Bosnia & Herzegovina founded on rape, genocide and the systematic murder of 100,000 people. Efraim Zuroff ignores the plight of remaining Croatians and muslims in that land. And Efraim Zuroff does nothing to protest the glorification of Nazi collaborator Serbian Cetniks that have been completely rehabilitated in Serbia. Cetniks, the same band of thugs that assisted the Germans in the eradication of Serbia's Jews in WW2. After all, it was Belgrade that declared itself the first European capital to be "free of Jews." Yet, it is the same Efraim Zuroff egging on Belgrade to apply more pressure on Zagreb.

So how have a Rock & Roll artist and his fans -neither politicians nor ideologues- warranted the ire of critics around the world?

It is because of his message. A message of love, faith in God and dedication to Catholicism. And the refusal to surrender all that which led Croats in the successful defense of their homeland - their values.