Branko "Đuro" Mamula (Serbian Cyrillic: Бранко "Ђурo" Мамула; 30 May 1921 – 19 October 2021) was a Serbian politician and Yugoslav officer who participated in World War II in Yugoslavia. He was later the Minister of Defence of Yugoslavia from 1982 to 1988.
== Biography == Mamula was born in Kordun in May 1921 to an ethnic Serb family. He joined League of Communist Youth of Yugoslavia in 1940 and at the start of World War II in Yugoslavia in 1941 he joined the Yugoslav Partisans. In 1942, he joined Communist Party of Yugoslavia. During the war, he was put in charge of numerous units, moving through the ranks of the Partisans. Before he became the Defence Minister, he held the rank of admiral as Chief of the General Staff of the Yugoslav People's Army from 1979 to 1982. After becoming Defence Minister in 1983, he was promoted to Admiral of the fleet. He lived in Opatija from 1985 until 1991.
Mamula remarked on the Yugoslav People's Army's (JNA) failure to respond to Milan Kučan's rise in Slovenia, Franjo Tuđman's rise in Croatia, and Slobodan Milošević's rise in Serbia, respectively, in his 2000 book Slučaj Jugoslavija (transl. Case Yugoslavia):
The military leadership of the JNA bears responsibility for not carrying out a coup d'état. Instead, it allowed the nationalist leaders and the separatist behaviour of the two western republics to push the JNA into the hands of Greater Serbian nationalism, which unscrupulously utilised the Army in the inter-ethnic war, and eventually rejected it. From 2007, he lived in Tivat, Montenegro. Mamula turned 100 in May 2021. He died on 19 October 2021, from COVID-19 during the COVID-19 pandemic in Montenegro.
Honours
=== National Honours === Yugoslavia: Order of the Hero of Socialist Labour Great Star of the Order of the Yugoslav Star Order of the People's Army (3x recipient) Order of Labour with Red Banner Great Star of the Order of Military Merit (2x recipient) Order of Merits for the People with Golden Star Order of Brotherhood and Unity with Golden Wreath Order of the Partisan Star with Rifles Commemorative Medal of the Partisans of 1941
=== Foreign Honours === France: Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour Poland: Partisan Cross Sudan: 1st Class of the Order of the Republic Italy: Grand Officer of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic Kingdom of Nepal: Member 1st Class of the Order of the Gurkha Right Arm Indonesia: Navy Meritorious Service Star, 1st Class (Indonesian: Bintang Jalasena Utama) Tunisia: Grand Cordon of the Order of the Republic Greece: Grand Commander of the Order of Honour Austria: Grand Star of the Decoration of Honour for Services to the Republic of Austria Jordan: Grand Cordon of the Al-Hussein Order of Military Merit
