Once Upon A Time There Was Mostar...

Proclaimed capitals of newly-created ethnically clean states in the Balkans have one thing in common: they were razed to the ground. A lot of water will flow down the Danube and Neretva Rivers before Vukovar becomes the capital of the Republic of Serb Krajina, and Mostar of the Republic of Herzeg-Bosnia. Words should not be wasted on when Sarajevo will become the capital of the Serb Republic in Bosnia. Like its fatal model, Mostar has become a mirror image of its conquerors, their creation and expression. The latest events have shown that Herzegovina represents yet another proof that there is absolutely no difference between a specific sort of Croats and Serbs. Really, what's the difference between Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic and his Croat counterpart Mate Boban? All of them will kill the neighbor's cow for one piece of steak, destroy beautiful, rich and old towns in order to loot one duty-free shop or plunder fertile fields whose yields amounted to millions in German Marks only to stay in power. Herzegovina is now shared among the rulers of scorched lands, autocrats over starved peoples and traitors of their fellow-soldiers from the very same trench. Yet, it is them, a disgrace to both Serbs and Croats, who are now sent to Geneva to negotiate.

There was a stable political, economic and civilisational balance in Herzegovina over the past 45 years. Its wealth grew year after year: electrical industry, traffic, agriculture, tourism and production. The balance meant preserving the differences: the Neretva Valley, Mostar and Dubrave (a fertile triangle between Mostar, Stolac, Metkovic and the Bregava Valley) were rich, whereas even a goat could hardly find anything to graze on in the rocky mountains to the east and west. Nevesinje, Gacko, Bileca and Trebinje in the east, the so-called 'Skutorija' in the west: Ljuti Dolac, Citluk, Ljubuski, Listica and Grude. Konjic prospered from electricity and the `Igman' ammunition factory; Jablanica also produced electricity; Mostar had aluminum, the producer of aircraft `Soko' and agriculture; Capljina had industry and agriculture; Domanovici and all villages to Stolac grew fruits on fertile land which bore the first crops; the Dubrovnik Riviera, where best bargains were made. Trebinje had Popovo Polje. During the peak of tourist season, trucks loaded with tomatoes, potatoes, peaches, grapes, veal, etc. with Capljina license plates went as far as Istria. Serbs from Eastern and Croats from Western Herzegovina made good living as merchants and truck-drivers, investments in underdeveloped areas were encouraged... It is too late now to discuss whether this was enough... `Soko' was one of Europe's top producers, `Hepok' was one of the largest agricultural plants in the country, hundreds of successful firms made money, while hard-working farmers, Muslims, Croats and Serbs alike, were among the wealthiest in Yugoslavia. Roads were better that those in much richer areas. Capljina, Stolac and Mostar competed for the title of the most beautiful town in Yugoslavia. Herzegovinians, who are clever, quick-witted and hard-working people, worked, studied and left for Sarajevo, Zagreb, Belgrade, or abroad.

The economic, ethnic and political balance on the Neretva River began to change when Virgin Mary appeared in Medjugorje. Western Herzegovinians made hundreds of millions DM a year on this miracle, but there were many more who benefited from pilgrims. The consequences were soon to be visible in Mostar: people from the mountains in Western Herzegovina descended into the town. They started buying businesses, houses and flats and taking up positions. Things were relatively stable until 1990.

Then, in 1990, the national parties, SDS, HDZ and the Party of Democratic Action (SDA), in Mostar agreed to vote for each other in order to chase the communists away and defeat the reformists. This marked a beginning of a messalliance or a treacherous partnership, for which all parties were to pay dearly later on. Eastern and Western Herzegovina were already raw: chauvinist propaganda from Belgrade and Zagreb found a fertile ground: Western Herzegovina is a traditional stronghold of Croatian nationalism, Eastern Herzegovina as Serbia's forward position with Montenegro behind was in a similar situation. The first electoral swindle was perpetrated by HDZ in Mostar: eight villages belonging to the municipality of Siroki Brijeg (Listica) were adjoined to the municipality of Mostar immediately before the elections were held. When the ballots were counted, it suddenly turned out that Croats were majority population in Mostar (by 1%).

This is what the situation was more or less like until the war broke out in Croatia in 1991. We now know that the famous plan RAM(a 1990 agreement between Milosevic and Karadzic on arming the Serbs in Bosnia) had already been activated at the beginning of 1991 and that shipments of arms for Serbs already left for Herzegovina. The elections in Eastern Herzegovina placed Bozidar Vucurovic of SDS into power. The Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO) won in Nevesinje. That is where the first paramilitary unit of Serbs, called `Karadjordje' was formed under command of Arsenije Grahovac. The first barricades were erected and ambushes set on the Mostar-Nevesinje road in the spring of 1991. Alija Delimustafic, the then Interior Minister of B-H, had a risky and slippery policy of trying to avert the confrontation with Serbs and the JNA (in this respect he had a detailed agreement with General Aleksandar Vasiljevic, the head of army security) and to preserve the illusion of law and order in the republic. That is the reason why Bosnian police closed their eyes to arms shipments for Krajina which passed through Bosnia, but also to arms shipments for Serbs in Bosnia. There were few exceptions(2-3 scandals had been hushed up). The one in Bileca on May 23, 1991 is relevant to this story. That day, as it later turned out, a police patrol, which had not been informed previously, stopped a truck and found 80 Russian M-41 assault rifles and 17,000 bullets in original packing from police reserves of one brotherly republic. There was a scandal when police tried to take the arrested together with weapons to Mostar, which the Serbs from Eastern Herzegovina prevented. An interesting development followed: Bozidar Vucurovic and Nikola Koljevic (now Vice President of the Serb Republic in Bosnia) arrived to calm spirits. Koljevic pacified the Muslims (``neighbors Muslims, a neighbor can be dearer that a brother'') and warned the Serbs, ``reflection of your honor and honesty will be the places where Muslims and Croats are in minority.'' Bozidar Vucurovic insisted that no one was endangered in Eastern Herzegovina, neither Serbs, Muslims nor Croats, so that everybody parted with friendly farewells, yet seriously concerned deep inside (Nothing came of `honor and honesty' in spite of Vucurovic's and Koljevic's promises. There are hardly any Muslims out of 2,000 or 14.7% of them in Bileca now... They are either detained or expelled.).

Serious games were soon to be played throughout Eastern Herzegovina: in Dubrave (where the population was mixed) there was shooting from automatic weapons at nights. The message was clear...

Herzegovina could still be saved by the summer of 1991. Then the Uzice Corps of General Milan Torbica arrived with its reservists, mostly of Montenegrin origin. ``This is not the JNA we served,'' said the people of Dubrave and took shelter. The army advanced as if on the enemy territory: drunken, unbridled, destroying Muslim and Croat homes and stables, singing Chetnik songs and going on the rampage. ``This is Serbia!,'' they explained to the local population and occupied positions on the left bank of the Neretva River, on the heights above Mostar, Pocitelj and Capljina. On July 16, 1991, Mihalj Kertes, the MP of the Serbian Socialist Party and Milosevic's man for arming the Serbs, promised `a Greater Serbian state from Montenegro to the left bank of River Neretva, with Dubrovnik as its capital.' Milan Babic supported this idea and everything was clear...

HDZ did not wait for another provocation: bombs wet off in Serb shops in Mostar, 26 explosions in all before open hostilities broke out. This went on until fall, when things changed. JNA launched two ill-fated operations: one in Dubrovnik on October 2, 1991, and the other in Mostar. The war in Mostar actually started on September 17, when reservists of the Uzice Corps began patrolling the town causing scandals. Politically speaking, the reservist of the Uzice Corps did HDZ a big favor: with increasing violence and provocation they strengthened at the time luke-warm support of the Croatian national party in Mostar, which was the town with a pro-Yugoslav orientation. The people of Mostar and other Herzegovinians sent their delegations to the regular JNA commands and complained about reservists but there was no answer: they were told that everything was under command of Belgrade and that they could not communicate with the Uzice Corps in the field. What did Belgrade want? According to the memoirs of General Veljko Kadijevic, who was the Defense Minister at the time, the JNA had planned to proceed from Mostar to Split and thus reach ``the borders of the future state'' (which resembles the famed borders running through Karlobag, Karlovac, and Virovitica, as envisioned by Vojislav Seselj, the leader of the Serbian Radical Party--SRS). They eventually gave up for some reason, but that is a long story...

Tension was there, reservists spread terror, bombs went off and police split into those who wore a five-point star on their caps and those who didn't. HDZ consolidated and armed its ranks. The operation in Dubrovnik was well underway all until Vukovar fell and the Vance plan appeared on the table. The Dubrovnik coastline was completely devastated, the town did not fall but bad blood between Dubrovnik and Herzegovina was made. Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic stated that he had no idea about the operation in Dubrovnik to which Montenegrins replied ``oh, is that so?'' and pulled out. The operation thus failed and the Serbian Autonomous Region Eastern Herzegovina lost access to the sea. Milosevic kept his word with regard to the Vance plan, JNA withdrew, and General Janko Bobetko, the commander on the southern front scored his first political points as `Croatian Schwarzkopf'.

On April 3 in Villa Neretva in Mostar presidents of all municipalities in Herzegovina held a meeting with Fikret Abdic (the member of the Presidency of B-H and the Muslim leader in Cazin Krajina) and Franjo Boras, the members of the Presidency of B-H, Jerko Djogo, the Defense Minister, Alija Delimustafic, the Police Minister, Miodrag Simovic, the MP, and Generals Momcilo Perisic and Radomir Damjanovic. The meeting was chaired by Milivoj Gagro. The only item on the agenda was: how to avoid war. The discussion went on for hours, as accusations against Chetniks and Ustashi were made. Fikret Abdic lost his patience, began to shake and slammed his fist on the table, saying, ``You mother f...! Can't you see what's going on! Whoever wants war, he's welcome to have it but in his own back yard!'' He spoke for half an hour, while everybody else kept quiet. Vucurovic raised the tension again, Zvonko Maric from Grude and General Perisic started a fight. Red with rage, Perisic threatened Maric, ``You'll remember me!'' No one know why. They all made up in the end over whiskey and parted on friendly terms. Three days later in Sarajevo, the war in Bosnia broke out.

It was no longer funny: the Croatian Army of General Bobetko seized initial positions from south of the mouth of Neretva River all the way up to Konavli. They waited for JNA to withdraw and attacked in the direction of Trebinje, Popovo Polje and Stolac, taking control of the area south of the old rail track in Popovo Polje to Hum, and almost one fifth of the territory of Trebinje. Thus they came into the mortar range of the town. In April, general Perisic immediately launched the operation of pulling out `Soko' planes and other military and industrial resources from the Mostar Valley. They took whatever they could. HVO immediately went into action and General Perisic fiercely retaliated. His action against civilian targets in Mostar cannot be forgotten: he called in the radio programme and `threatened' to level the town with the ground and then `jump from the highest building in Mostar.' His artillery carried out his threat, almost literally. The town was shelled from Velez, the hill above Blagaj, from Bivolje Brdo and other heights. HDZ and HVO got credit from the local Muslims. The Tudjman-Izetbegovic agreement on mutual defense was taken for granted. When JNA pulled out of Mostar in June 1992, what it left behind was ruins, while the local Serbs ended up in the camps, in which the Muslims are detained now. Serbs were expelled from the Neretva Valley, while their churches, cemeteries and villages were razed to the ground. HVO made advance to below Trebinje, above Ljubinje, seizing control of Stolac and reaching Berkovic on the Stolac-Bileca road. They also seized Blagaj and Buna. According to witnesses, when pulling out from Popovo Polje, General Radomir Damjanovic left a plate of steaming goulash on the table, he was in a hurry... Muslims from the Neretva Valley fought side by side with Croats of HVO, which was formally under command of the Army of B-H.

Before the operation in Dubrovnik the Muslims from Eastern Herzegovina, which became the Serbian Autonomous Region Herzegovina of Bozidar Vucurovic, had been mobilized in the local territorial defense and police reserves. 1,300 were called up in Trebinje; percentagewise their response was much better than that among the Serbs; they fought well and took many casualties. From July 1992 Muslims started to slowly move out of Eastern Herzegovina; first those wealthier and those who disagreed with Vucurovic (Muslims, but also Serbs). In January 1993 there were still some 500 Muslims there, they also wore Serb insignia and belonged to the Herzegovina Corps of the Bosnian Serb Army, under command of Colonel Radovan Grubac.

Vucurovic and company were first to betray their war comrades: at the end of January 1993 disarmament and expulsion of Muslims from the Herzegovina Corps began, with tears and rage of former fellow soldiers from the same trench. And, them, ethnic cleansing followed: entire families, including war invalids, injured in fighting together with Serbs, were driven away from the Serbian Autonomous Region Herzegovina to Montenegro, and then to Sandzak. The Serbian police turned them away from the border with Montenegro. Mosques in Trebinje were blown up and rubble leveled. Muslims who stayed behind got killed, robbed and maltreated. A few Serbs were also killed because they tried to help their neighbors. Eastern Herzegovina would soon become ethnically clean...

The Muslims from Mostar realized at one point that Croatian political game was nothing but hypocritical: Mostar, which belonged to Muslims and Croats, suddenly became the capital of Croat Herzeg-Bosnia. Tudjman's European intrigues that ``Bosnia should be divided between Serbia and Croatia'' as it is ``an artificial Titoist creation'' and ``a spring of Islamic fundamentalist expansionism in Europe'' were brought to light, which the action in the field confirmed. Tension between Muslims and Croats was rising, the Army of B-H separated from HVO and it was clear what was coming. This summer saw the explosion: the Croat leadership of Herzeg-Bosnia opened their cards and started ethnic cleansing against their former fellow soldiers. The camps where the Serbs had suffered were now filled with Muslims. One Muslim, who had had it both with the Serbs and Croats, told VREME, ``Our dear Serbs...'' Everybody agrees that HVO members are crueler to Muslims in the Neretva Valley than they ever were to Serbs...

Mostar is suffering again. General Praljak is wrapping up what General Perisic failed to do. The old bridge is hardly holding up. ``If I could only return to Mostar, I'd destroy it myself,'' said one citizen of Mostar and added, ``Screw the bridge when there are no people there...''

Herzegovina is finished: ruined, looted and killed. HVO even blew up the installations on the dam of the hydro-electric power plant Salakovac, in order to spite Mostar. Impoverished Serbs got together in the hills without a ``Greater Serbian state'' which had been promised to them. Croats conquered a deserted wasteland and the capital, where they can now freely jump from the highest buildings, upon General Perisic's advice. In this war it seems everybody has his own Vukovar.