A State Without Bread

The military rebellion in Banjaluka did not come as a great surprise to those familiar with the situation, it had been expected for months. The city's once strong economy has been working at 8% of its capacity since the start of the war; there is no electricity in spite of Karadzic's promises and the fact that pylons have been laid all the way to the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Electricity can be ordered and paid for: 100 DM for 24 hours. A cubic meter of firewood sells for 25 DM, one liter of gasoline (depending on the offer) costs 3 DM-10 DM, while a box of cigarettes costs 5 DM. One Deutsche Mark cost 350 million dinars in Banjaluka when it reached 700 million dinars in Belgrade. One kilo of bread costs 90 million dinars. Until Friday, September 10, the day of the rebellion, a soldiers' pay was 1 DM-4 DM; pensions received by the families of dead soldiers were the same, the salaries of those working for private businesses were 30 DM-40 DM. Secondary school enrollment fees for children of soldiers were 20 DM, and 80 DM for the children of others. Schools require that parents ensure money for food, firewood, teaching equipment. The children bring jam to school and then everything is shared. Ninety percent of all economic activities are privately owned; cafes are working well (it is said in Banjaluka that people never drank this much and that they aren't very choosy), trade and the black market to which everything boils down in the end, are prospering.

Four local gangster groups (they call themselves ``military police'') have divided the city among themselves, and all the cafes pay racket. The occasional Moslem is swallowed up by the night, while the lucky ones are just robbed or harassed. All are victims of crime, including Serbs. Armed men in fatigues with stockings distorting their faces enter flats and houses of better off citizens and loot them. As a rule, the perpetrators remain undiscovered. This was happening during the ``September 93'' action, as the rebellion has been called. Citizens of Banjaluka estimate that over 60,000 people have left the city in a year and a half. The rich were the first to leave. As of recently, educated Serbs have started leaving en masse. During the rebellion and in the general euphoria, two busloads of people left for Denmark and Norway. One of those leaving was crying: ``We've been beaten, looted, abused, threatened; so, how can I stay?'' It is said that the savage and vandalistic destruction of all 16 mosques in Banjaluka hurt the people most.

That there can be no state without bread was clear from the start. The Western Serb lands, the Banjaluka Krajina and the Republic of Serb Krajina were cut off by the war from their natural economic surroundings and linked to Serbia with a narrow and unsafe corridor. The Republic of Serb Krajina territories derived their income from tourism, traffic and the exchange of goods with Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. There are no other sources. In the once prosperous Banjaluka the economy has been left without electricity and experts, while the rest of Bosnian Krajina, although richer than the Knin state, can barely manage to feed itself. During the war slogans about a state without bread were in use, supported with aid from Serbia and ``war booty,'' i.e. by looting the property of expelled Croats and Moslems. But, Serbia was hit with sanctions and can no longer feed itself, less alone brethren in the diaspora. The situation in Eastern Bosnia and Eastern Herzegovina which border with Yugoslavia, is very difficult, and Montenegro is now occupied with its problems.

In the meantime the war has taken on a dug in-artillery aspect, which means that it has become positional, eliminating looting. There are no more neighbors who are not Serbs, and this is where we reach the scandalous (or shameful) part of the story. VREME said in its August 23, 1993 number that this war had passed its expiry date. Slogans and promises can help one live for only a short period of time. After the looting, killing and destruction, the states which have emerged resemble botched up abortions rather than newly fledged states. The warlords have multiplied, and the undercurrent of grumbling against thieves and war profiteers is becoming increasingly louder in the Republic of Serb Krajina and the Serb Republic in Bosnia-Herzegovina. This was to be expected. When a state introduces ethnicity as the measure of all instead of a legal-moral system, the inevitable and very dangerous process of a disintegration of values is put into motion. Looting becomes a normal mode of behavior when it concerns the property of Croats and Moslems; a thief, however, is first and foremost a thief, and if he has robbed his neighbor who is of a different faith, then he will also rob his brother Serb.

And this is what has happened. The first incidents took place this summer. A group of fighters from the Benkovac-Obrovac front arrived in Knin with tanks and destroyed a cafe owned by a man who had just celebrated his first million Deutsche Marks of profit.

President of the Banjaluka municipality Predrag Radic forecast ``serious social clashes'' for late October when he said that 50,000 pensioners were not receiving any money.

On Friday, September 10 early in the morning, soldiers of the 16th. armored brigade, the military police corps battalion and some other units of the 1st. Krajina corps captured Banjaluka and took control of all the approaches to the city without firing one single bullet. They founded the Crisis Headquarters (see box), suspended all civilian organs of authority and issued their first, and content-wise, very interesting statement: ``... While we were fighting, the majority of our fellow citizens and skillful manipulators, with the blessing of the existing authorities, increased their private empires and carried out their depraved political dreams in a safeness of the rear. Then, with a pompous promotion by the mass media, and by throwing philanthropic crumbs to the people and the army, they have become the saviours of the Serbian nation overnight... We have decided to launch a battle against all our fellow citizens who have been involved in shady businesses or have allowed them, thus betraying the interests of the Serbian people...''

The ``September 93'' action Crisis Headquarters showed an impressive degree of political skill from the very beginning. They announced their demands in 18 points which can be put into three groups: the improvement of the fighters' social status and that of their families, a drive against crime and corruption and, military issues. The first two groups of demands are clear and typical for rebellions by front line soldiers; the third group mentions the abuse of the military police for everything but military tasks, a purge in the Army along national lines, and demands that officers reactivated after retirement be retired again, allowing the young faster promotion. The responsibility of incompetent officers is also sought. Captain Ostoja Bilak (doesn't wish to accept promotion to major) does not have a very high opinion of the 1st. Krajina Corps Command: ``We surprised and surpassed them in all elements. It was funny to observe the behavior of some of the officers when we captured a place.'' Crisis Headquarters Commander Ostoja Zec said: ``I don't expect the Serb Republic in B-H and the Assembly sitting at Jahorina to resolve anything, because they have never managed to do so.'' Of his corps commander General Momir Talic, Zec said that he had ``issued a clear order that all armored vehicles heading towards Banjaluka must be shot at. Who then pushed Serbs against Serbs?'' General Talic's explicit order to Bilak as the highest ranking officer, to immediately return the units to barracks and unblock Banjaluka was ignored. General Talic then said that it was none of his business, that it was his duty to think of the front, and gave up on the whole thing.

On Friday, September 10, Captain Dragan Babic, Commander of the city of Banjaluka telephoned Karadzic and Mladic around 3 p.m. ``I heard a lot of instructive things from them,'' said Babic, adding that it would all be talked about at the Crisis Headquarters, but that they wouldn't be going to Pale (Serb Republic in B-H political center). A message was sent to Karadzic and Serb Republic in B-H Assembly President Momcilo Krajisnik at Pale, and was also carried by the Banjaluka paper ``Glas Srpski'' on Saturday under the title ``Bureaucrats have forgotten the people.'' The message says: ``... it is with a heavy heart that we have decided to take matters into our hands...''; ``Do not think, gentlemen, of sending tanks against us, because then you will have to seek a second homeland...''

Karadzic's reaction was confused and in the typical old Communist manner when it comes to dealing with spontaneous social rebellions; this style will remain to the end. In his message to the Crisis Headquarters, Karadzic first expresses solidarity and then promises to ``use all means to prevent war profiteering''; then he begs the soldiers and tells them to ``take care and not be manipulated by our enemies'' and ``foreign intelligence services and those domestic elements which are opposed to the creation of a Serbian state.'' In the end he asks them to return to barracks and send a delegation to Pale. The Crisis Headquarters refused the invitation, and invited Karadzic and Bosnian Serb Army Commander Ratko Mladic to visit Banjaluka. The haggling took the usual form: on Saturday, September 11, the Serb Republic in B-H Assembly wrote off Banjaluka: ``Part of the demands were justified,'' but ``the political consequences could be catastrophic,'' Banjaluka is ``divided into three parts,'' ``in the interests of the enemy,'' but ``the state top will pardon all honest soldiers and demand an energetic investigation into the political background of the event, i.e., it will discover the forces which tried to manipulate the just dissatisfaction of the soldiers.''

Karadzic goes on to say: ``This could turn into a great disaster, even the fall of the free city of Banjaluka.'' Momcilo Krajisnik called the rebellion ``the greatest blow to the Serb Republic in B-H, because it could result in disturbances in the city, which would be a signal for the arrival of foreign troops.'' The Crisis Headquarters then replied that it had prevented the ``blockade of several other cities,'' because it was necessary to ``clean up Banjaluka first, and then the others.'' It went on to say that 115 persons had been arrested, that ``we know that war profiteers have connections with their counterparts in other cities.'' Karadzic escalated: on Sunday he told the citizens of Banjaluka that ``various elements were backing them,'' and that ``the soldiers, naturally, were not aware of this.'' On Monday ``Glas Srpski'' carried statements by people in streets: ``Let Karadzic set up a commission to find out what happened to 2,500 Golf cars, 50,000 tons of crude, 100,000 tons of alcoholic beverages and 60 tons of cigarettes, all totalling to 300 million Deutsche Marks.'' This was a low blow, because Karadzic's name and that of some of his closest associates has been mentioned for over a year and a half in connection with some business transactions linked to the above mentioned goods. Captain Dragomir Babic said: ``We have disturbed a hornet's nest, so that we will wait for Karadzic to join us here.''

Orders were issued to the notorious Colonel Radmilo Zeljaj to block the RTV relays on Mt. Majevica and Mt. Kozara, so that TV Banjaluka would not be able to broadcast anything to the city. Serbia's regime media and Serb Republic in B-H media carried a series of political attacks against the soldiers in Banjaluka.

On Thursday, September 16 an illegal radio station calling itself the ``Serbian Radio'' started spreading misinformation somewhere in the vicinity of Banjaluka. The citizens of Banjaluka were correct in their behavior towards Karadzic and Mladic. The situation became serious in the middle of last week when Karadzic's and Mladic's arrival in Banjaluka were practically forced. Specifically, only General Mladic showed up. He entered the city, was seen with the people and held a speech from the roof of a field vehicle. In this way General Mladic scored some important political points which Karadzic failed to do. Karadzic had not dared show up among the citizens of Banjaluka, and this will be remembered. Stories about Seselj having ``information'' of ``an assassination plot'' against Karadzic, are an attempt at helping his friend Radovan and not the truth. After many hours of talks between General Mladic and the Crisis Headquarters, and his driving to and from a certain motel where Karadzic was waiting for him, the players finally met. A compromise was reached: on Friday morning the Crisis Headquarters showed up at a press conference without two things: without ``political demands'' (early elections, a change of government and various organs, a lifting of deputy immunity) and without Ostoja Zec and Miljan Zugic. The Crisis Headquarters were renamed the ``committee for monitoring'' the battle against corruption. The government at Pale promised to: pardon all participants of action ``September 93''; that all evidence collected by the Crisis Headquarters would be considered by the state commission and that members of the Crisis Headquarters would take part in the commission's work. Authority was returned to the civil organs.

That is how the Banjaluka rebellion ended. It was obvious on Friday: the Deutsche Mark jumped from 350 million dinars (the rate during the days of action ``S93'') to 450500 million dinars, while on Friday afternoon it hit 800 million dinars, the same as in Belgrade. Luxury cars which had not been in evidence for a week were in the streets again. Life returned to its usual routine. It seems that the Crisis Headquarters has resolved to sacrifice some of its members in order to reach a compromise. All this will not change much: even if all war profiteers were to be arrested and their property nationalized (something hard to believe), this will not feed the hungry Serbs of ``Western Serbia.'' Officers, soldiers and the poor will continue to point to war profiteers and corruption around them and the very top of the Serbian state, but there won't be any bread. To Serbia's shame, these profiteers and corruptionists are Serbs, in fact Serbs who have distinguished themselves most in persecuting and robbing non-Serbs. The rebellion in Banjaluka was just the first warning of future disturbances, rebellions and shocks among the Serbs.