The paper is mostly based on both published and unpublished archives for researching the normative determinants and circumstances of the emergence of military courts established in the periods during and after the Second World War by Yugoslav Communists. The organisational and normative system of military courts emerged gradually and was fully established in the last years of World War II, when the Yugoslav Communists created other major repressive bodies. However, the normative determinants and structure of military courts were continually governed by party interests. Thus appeared the norms and structure which were in every way in opposition to other contemporary non-communist judiciary models.