Between deep comradeship and nationalism: The social dynamics of solidarity on the battlefield

Abstract This article explores the social mechanisms that facilitate the transformation of micro‐level bonds into coherent nationalist narratives of solidarity. The aim is to explain the paradox: while the armed forces are highly nationalist institutions, most ordinary combatants detest nationalist rhetoric on the battlefield. Drawing on the interviews with the combatants who fought in the 1991–1995 wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina together with the analysis of the mass media reports, I examine how deep bonds of micro‐solidarity forged in the violent experiences are transformed into coherent nationalist discourses. I explore how social ties generated in the protracted face‐to‐face interactions can be enveloped by the specific social organisations and then ‘translated’ into nationalist ideologies that project deep comradeship as ‘national solidarities’. I aim to show that the direct war experience does not automatically generate strong bonds of national solidarity. Instead, nationalism is always a product of protracted coercive‐organisational, ideological and micro‐interactional work.