Arso Jovanović

When Joseph Stalin broke with Josip Broz Tito in 1948, Jovanović, along with other political and military personnel sided with the Soviet Union. He was killed by Yugoslav border guards while trying to escape to Romania with Vlado Dapčević and Branko Petričević.

Educated through the Yugoslav Royal Army academies, Jovanović was one of the best-educated generals among the partisan forces in Yugoslavia, speaking French, Russian and English. His military reports distinguished him, sometimes running to as many as ten pages, and he stayed close to the partisan High Command, lecturing in the first partisan officer school in Drvar, 1944. After the Tito–Stalin Split in 1948, Jovanović openly sided with the Soviet Union. He was killed by Yugoslav border guards while trying to escape to Romania with two other Montenegrin dissidents, Vlado Dapčević and Branko Petričević, who were captured alive.

After the unsuccessful battle for Pljevlja, which was intended to connect the communist-controlled territory in Sandžak and Montenegro, Jovanović was called up to supreme command. He thought that he would be relieved of duty, but (instead of Captain Branko Poljanac) Jovanović was appointed on December 12, 1941, as head of the Supreme Command of Yugoslavia's partisan forces. He held this post until the end of the war. Jovanović wrote an extensive report on the uprising in Montenegro and the reasons for the unsuccessful attempt on Pljevlja. In this report he described the shortcomings of the partisan forces.

He went on to the Higher School of the Military Academy, where he studied several subject including tactics of war and French, graduating in 1934. He returned to Sarajevo where he became a commander of the cadet company at the School for Reserve Infantry Officers, until the Nazi German Invasion of Yugoslavia.

In 1934, he married Senka Vujić, a law clerk from Nikšić; together they had two daughters.

His father was, until 1910, an officer of the Royal Serbian Army, stationed with the artillery regiment in Topčider, a suburb of Belgrade, capital of the Kingdom of Serbia. Jovanović went to school in Podgorica, and then progressed to the Yugoslav Royal Army's military academy in Belgrade in 1925. There he was a contemporary of Velimir Terzić and Petar Ćetković, who would later also become significant commanders in the partisan forces during World War II. He graduated near the top of his class, and was appointed sergeant (platoon commander) in the 10th Infantry Regiment "Takovski", stationed in Sarajevo.

Arsenije "Arso" Jovanović (Serbian Cyrillic: Арсо Јовановић; 24 March 1907 – 12 August 1948) was a Yugoslav partisan general and one of the country's foremost military commanders during World War II in Yugoslavia.

Arso Jovanović was born in the village of Zavala near Podgorica, Principality of Montenegro on March 24, 1907, into a family belonging to the Piperi clan. His blood relative Blažo Jovanović was a prominent Montenegrin communist.