Boys In Blue, Boys In Green

There is a rumour that Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, as a member of the Military Council, criticised General Momcilo Perisic, the Yugoslav Army ChiefofStaff, for three things: crime in the military, encouraging some Serb hardliners west of the Drina River, and killings of conscripts doing their army service in the Yugoslav Army.

However, according to more serious assessments General Momcilo Perisic has fulfilled the task assigned to him. Praised as ``Knight of Mostar'' (Perisic fought in the area of Mostar and began the destruction of the town) and a new man who would restore order in the military with an iron hand following a series of scandals during his predecessor General Zivota Panic, the new Yugoslav Army ChiefofStaff showed what the idea wasthat nothing can be changed in the Yugoslav Army as the successor of the Yugoslav Peoples' Army. New army caps and insignia, apart from poor quality emblems on uniforms, are the only visible result of the loudly announced ``transformation'' of the Yugoslav Army, that began with unprecedented replacements and transfers in the officers corps a year ago. Everything else is the same or even worse. The fact that Milosevic did not attend the assembly marking Yugoslav Army Day and that General Perisic was never given the opportunity to visit the Serbian President in his cabinet is not accidental. Perisic's statements that ``the Yugoslav Army behaves in accordance with the state policy,'' i.e. that the army is the most stable institution in the state alongside the new dinar, do nothing to dispel doubts that the army leadership's time is out. Milosevic simply doesn't want the army that he cannot absolutely control especially because of the current political situation, the circumstances in which its personnel were trained and the fact that it cannot be bribed because of its size. That is why it is publicly subjected to utter humiliation.

The incident on the YugoslavMacedonian border provides the best example. The Yugoslav Army was first sent to take control of Cupino Brdo (some 150 meters inside Macedonian territory). Control of this peak was presented to be in the vital interest of defence. The withdrawal of the Yugoslav Army soldiers followed eventually without an adequate explanation.

It is difficult to tell how ready and capable General Perisic was to turn the Yugoslav Army into a modern force. Those in the know claim that most of the sessions of the Military Council passed in his asking for money that he was never given allegedly because of the sanctions and the overall economic situation.

But if there is no money for soldiers, there is a plenty of it for policemen. The Serbian Interior Ministry has 120 and 82 mm caliber mortars, anti aircraft cannon, APCs, helicopters, and other typically military equipment. Moreover, cadets at the the police academy undergo strictly military training, including infantry and parachute drills, so that a core of the new army can be discerned. On the other hand, no matter how much training policemen got, they still can't take over all functions of armed forces; the air force and the navy remain out of their reach. But, the Serbian President has found a solution even to that. The air force was throughly purged in a series of well timed scandals. The goal of the ``Opera'' affair (a rigged court martial for military officers charged with espionage and terrorism) was to remove the officers with proYugoslav orientation. The protagonists of this affair were later replaced as people close to Vojislav Seselj, the leader of the Serbian Radical Party (SRS). The remaining ones are mostly professionals loyal to the current regime and without any political ambitions. That is why many believe that once General Perisis is politically wasted his successor will be an air force man.

The situation in the navy is also under control. Its function has already been devalued by the short Montenegrin coast without islands and there is a rumor that the preparations for the trial of some protagonists of the Dubrovnik operation for criminal acts, i.e. stealing of yachts and cars, are underway. Therefore, it seems that the first steps toward some form of symbiosis between the Serbian Interior Ministry and the two, in their nature, most professional branches of the Yugoslav Army, have already been taken.

General Momcilo Perisic, as the representative of the late JNA and its political influence, seems to be facing the last days of his career. He can console himself with the fact that he was promoted three times in the span of two years.