The Leader's New Clothes

We will soon find out what has really been going on here. The dilemma which presents itself concerns the issue of whether the war served only as a political tool, or whether it represented an uncontrolled orgy which could be activated again at any moment. All the political qualms in that respect have been solved now and the drama is over. The world powers were forced to change the administrative borders into inter-state ones to make everyone here realize that they cannot be changed by force. Continuing with the war over the borders has now become futile.

As it is customary in such cases, America has had the final word, through its chief of diplomacy James Baker. Four republics will be recognized in the near future and the two which wish to stay together can call themselves whatever they like, but they will have to consult others over the issue of inheriting Yugoslav property. No one has a good reason to rejoice over such an outcome, although Slobodan Milosevic is the biggest loser. He has neither managed to extort the change of borders, or to defend his notion concerning "the right to stay in Yugoslavia", or to inherit it. He has been defeated along with all the ambitious nationalists who, siding with him or opposed to him, believed that Serbia could forcibly extend its borders or were simply not clearly opposed to that idea.

It would now be logical for patriots and traitors, for "good" and "bad" Serbs, to swop places. But this is precisely something which we will not live to see. In the civilized world people in power get dismissed easier than their policies. Here, people stay, swiftly changing not only their politics but the entire ideology as well, trading left for right, war for peace and vice versa, if need be. Everyone can become whatever they wish to become. The fact that this moral and political instability of post-communism can be understood, does not automatically mean that we have to enjoy it and prove that it is the natural state of affairs.

With regard to the Serbian defeat, it could be that it started as soon as the word "Serbianhood" entered the political jargon, especially when it does not denote all Serbs, but some strange mystical quality which makes them Serbian. Other cultures are concerned with citizens, with people, their language, history, culture. Here all that fits into a single strange neologism, which has become the target and the yardstick of the politics. No one in the whole wide world has managed to understand that policy, especially because it was immediately apparent that the protection of "Serbianhood" was to the detriment of each individual Serb. At any rate, Serbian politics did not look so drastically self-defeating, especially because the Slovenes and the Croats were working on the same task. The key issue was, of course, the war in which the army and Milosevic won huge parts of Croatia and suffered a defeat. Only a week before the beginning of the "minor war" in Slovenia, James Baker was visiting Belgrade. He stayed for some 20 hours and practically without a break talked to all republic and federal leaders, individually and all together.

That was the last attempt of the world to stop the war. Baker left disappointed at the separatist bigotry of Kucan and Tudjman, even more than at that of Milosevic, who had retracted somewhat from his original position, feigning innocence and disinterest. At that time Serbia fared better on the issue of separatism than either Slovenia or Croatia, although the world still wanted to give the priority to Prime Minister Markovic, while Milosevic's attitude towards him was a clear expression of his own separatism. As the war progressed, however, the blame was shifted from the western republics to the army and Milosevic who assumed an increasing responsibility.

The key to understanding the present denouement does not lie in the requests and pretensions of Serbia, Croatia or the Bosnian Moslems, since they all have their own reasons and arguments. The problem lies in the fact that the Serbian aims called for more drastic measures and Milosevic had the unfortunate priority in that respect. The interference of an external arbiter was inevitable in a conflict of that magnitude, something which Milosevic overlooked. And who else could it be but the European Community and America.

Serbia struggled in vain to find an ally, and then to discover differences among them and make divisions. Baker's last visit to Brussels and his agreement with the European allies have closed the last crack on which the Belgrade diplomacy played: the crack was a sham, anyway.

Someone who practically rules the world could pass no other verdict but that which corresponds to their own values and rules which the world should be based upon. The conquests should be annulled and if there were no war risk, Serbia would possibly be punished even more severely, although nobody is eager to award Tudjman either. After everyone has been forced to give up violence and after general Nambiar establishes his rule, a series of endless arguments will be started concerning the main two postulates on which the political solution depends: no change of borders by force and right to self-determination.

Bosnia is a shining example of how difficult it is to reconcile the two. It will be just as difficult elsewhere, so it seems to me that Serbs and Croats will soon see the resurrection of the "Yugoslav ghost". Milosevic and Tudjman seem to be so horrified at this possibility that they are prepared to give up the idea of self-determination altogether, which Serbs are finding especially difficult to cope with. But Milosevic has finally realized that he has lost his case at the Supreme Court in which he has tried to prove that there is a difference between nations and nationalities. That means that he would lose in Pristina whatever he would get in Knin.

Finally, all this should be explained to the people, which calls for a huge propaganda maneuver, but this time, Milosevic has an advantage over the opposition. There is truth in the accusations that he has almost closed the way to the West, which Serbia has always striven for. Nevertheless, it seems that he is now in a better position to realize what he has done, he is drawing more radical conclusions and is more realistic in fathoming the Serbian national problem than most of the opposition leaders.

The sanctions against Serbia will soon be lifted, which means that Milosevic is now more willing to cooperate and that he will not initiate a war in Bosnia. The opposition in Serbia will have to reform its ranks, since an entirely new match is in prospect, in which accusations of bolshevism and for betrayal of "Serbianhood" do not count for much. It would be much more important to find favour with Europe and America, which are primarily concerned with the issue of political loyalty, or rather with the actual observance of the world bon ton.

The world powers are involved in our affairs to such an extent that everyone who continues with nationalist whims is likely to fail shortly. Although it is difficult to believe in the swift modernization of the Socialist Party of Serbia, the opposition would do best to immediately and unconditionally accept whatever the West offers as a solution. This will happen sooner or later, since one should be quicker than his rivals; lastly, that is in the best interest of the citizens of Serbia. The West, namely, does not offer either humiliation or defeat, especially not to entire nations.

The surge of national pride is still alive and well, but the Serbian opposition should ponder over the fact that the Texan diplomat James Baker is its leader and that it should shape its strategy to suit his counsel. If they don't do it, Milosevic will.