Who Can Stop the War ?

There are only the humble traces of the revolutionary, totalitarian and police regime. The Leader has left, followed by the Party and finally, by the Army. The State Security Police has gone as well. However, apart from certain institutions and hard feelings, a certain way of doing business has rubbed off on the majority of people within the leading circles of the regime and the opposition. The Democratic Party provides the only exception and that is the reason it has been subjected to severe attacks and suspicion from other opposition parties , although the state institutions neither offer nor provide more significant "allowances" to it than it is the case with other opposition parties.

We are talking about war and peace. In our political arena, our ideas and dealings are different in both the ruling party and the opposition, although there are times when certain attitudes are common to other opposition parties and groups, just as there are times when there exists an underlying consensus with the views of the ruling party in Serbia, or even with the Federal Government. This is the stand the Democratic Party is arriving at spontaneously, without to having to specify a particular tactic. The Democratic Party is only trying to resemble the democratic institutions and the democratic traditions in the country where that has not yet become the rule. And here we are faced with the question of the attitude towards war and peace.

If we look at the warmongering politics and its devastating propaganda, as well as at the stand of certain pacifist groups which are now active within the opposition, it is obvious that they both represent the remains of the old regime, or rather, its ideology. Although these attitudes are contradictory, being militant and pacifist, they come from a contradictory Leninist- Stalinist political school of thought. The first bolsheviks were praising pacifism, whereas, in fact, they were getting ready for one of the bloodiest revolutions in history. Titoism in this respect represents the continuation of both such an ideology and such a practice. In our inter-national context, the ideology and the practice of war have remained within the armed forces, but the intellectuals have retained something of the feminine pacifism and they are now, albeit unsuccessfully, protesting with their slogans, their recitals and neurosis.

It is certain that for an educated public the state of peace would be the most natural in any society, but wars are not unnatural either. Every educated group of individuals should be fighting against the war, but it should also be prepared to accept it if it has its own "historical logic", or rather, if it is unavoidable. What makes us so bitter about the current war in Croatia is not the war as a historical category but its complete senselessness and its inability to solve any problem in the long run.

Politically speaking, this war is the product of frivolity: they want to create the most independent state on the territory where the traces of blood are still to be found from the last war; they want to observe the right to self-determination, whereas the ones who are exercising it are being branded as rebels; the soldiers who have taken Vukovar are being praised, whereas the killing of innocent civilians along with the complete destruction of the city list as their achievements; Serbia is not in the war with Croatia, but the coffins are arriving to our villages and cities day and night...

But this ludicrous war can be stopped by the giant political force based on national politics which has evolved from the will of the majority of our people.

The platform of the Democratic Party is clearly based on the stand that "the right to self-determination can not be withheld with the call for the survival of the state", and the need for "the talks on cessation" from such an association. There is more to follow "the president of Serbia and the Socialist Party of Serbia are the most to blame for the position Serbia found itself in after the Hague conference on Yugoslavia". The Hague could have passed such a verdict only because it was faced with the undemocratic regime in Serbia and thus the regime in Serbia caused its own isolation.

A sensitive question posed even before the March events, concerned the "collaboration" with the regime, or rather, its readiness to participate in the new coalition government. But the Democratic Party was never alone in this: it has always been supported by almost all of the opposition parties. The Democratic Party clearly demonstrates that Serbia is badly in need of unity, but that "the foundation of such unity can not be represented by the politics of the present leadership". "The Democratic Party wants to be actively involved in the representation of democratic and justified interests of Serbia and the Serbian people, but not in such a way as to support the politics of the present Serbian regime"- says in the document of the Party dated August 5. A few weeks later, all the opposition parties, apart from the Reformists "offered a full cooperation in the shaping of Serbian politics".

But, although it opposes the present war in Croatia, or in any of the republics, especially in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Democratic Party, and the Serbian people as well, do not feel any inferior to the European Community or any country in and outside Europe. Thus, the Democratic Party can not accept the Hague declaration in full, but is in turn calling upon the Serbian government to "unreservedly accept the part of the Hague declaration which refers to the maintaining of cease-fire", since it is precisely this aspect which determines the development of a final solution.

When considering the Hague document, the Democratic Party is the leading one not only in comparison with other parties and groups but also compared to its own attitudes and politics. Their initial position is that the European Community can not be the one to shape the future of the country which is not its member, so they insist that the United States and the Soviet Union should take part in the negotiations and they consider, rightfully that Germany can not have the "leading role", not only because of our unfortunate relations in the past but also because Germany has shown from the outset that it does not intend to stay neutral. But the Democratic Party cites the infamous role of the Socialist Party of Serbia even here. It is accusing the Serbian regime for pursuing the politics of "chaos and fait accompli". There are two factors which should be taken into account when

discussing the tragi-comic problems which Serbia is facing today. On the one hand, that this unfortunate historical moment is witnessing the clash between the problems of starting the democratic processes and the historical, as yet unsolved problems of inter-national conflicts. On the other hand, it seems that all the Yugoslav republics, and especially the republic of Serbia are getting to grips with the fact that the essential problem is contained within itself, in the very social structure and not in the institutions of power, and that consequently, the society should make a fantastic effort, individually and within the social groups to overcome this bleak state of affairs, which marks the transitional period. This can only be achieved by pursuing rational, liberal and educated politics, but also the kind of politics which corresponds to the general trends of the civilized world and the European Community, regardless of whether we are talking about the democratic institutions, or the "antinationalist nationalism", or the modern organization of the market economy, or the all-pervading cultural solidarity and cooperation.