International Shipwrecks

It looks like the Serbian government will have to accept the unpleasant fact that this country is not alone in the world. Milosevic and his movement, before they achieved their present decadence, based all their plans on the supposition that the world could be ignored and disregarded. For years he himself traveled nowhere, it looked as if he didn't much like if anyone visited, and all the critics who compare him to Josip Broz are faced with the realization of this major difference at Milosevic's expense. Even with the world's involvement in the situation here and when diplomats began to file through Belgrade, asking for things, demanding, forcing concessions and promises, the Serbian leader behaved as if all this ceased to exists as soon as they turned their backs.

Nationalism is always turned in on itself, and when it blooms so beautifully and succumbs to its desires, it becomes completely blind to others. In Serbia in the last few years a "mental map" of the world has been carelessly put into circulation which geographically differs in that Serbia takes up enormous space and all the rest can hardly be seen. This is how the first ancient maps were drawn; this is how children draw: what is known and important to them is big. This kind of map was necessary in order to begin work on the Serbian state project, so that the contractors would believe in its feasibility.

Along with commerce, finance, health, education, culture, on Milosevic's list of unnecessary things was found foreign policy. It seemed to him that the army and police were sufficient to satisfy all his needs. As a matter of fact, he had no intention of occupying himself much with the outside world, but it began to occupy itself with him. When he noticed that this was happening more and more, that he couldn't defend himself from various missions and delegations, that they did not understand him, and that he didn't know what they wanted, he decided to look for expert help and Vladislav Jovanovic was recommended to him.

Milosevic was lucky in this choice. The type of ruler he is seeks absolute loyalty and it is very rare to get competency at the same time. Minister Jovanovic is one such exception. In assenting to represent Milosevic's Serbia to the world, this experienced diplomat made an enormous professional sacrifice and he undertook an impossible exercise, particularly when his boss still doesn't believe in foreign policy. Jovanovic has, in fact, been assigned the role of interpreter, and one who can translate the local onomatopoeia into a highly articulate program, in accordance with all international standards; transform deceit into truth, explain the unexplainable and wash the muck from the mud.

I don't believe that Vladislav Jovanovic agreed to all this just to get a bigger flat. This reserved, slightly stiff, melancholic, who plays chess and writes poems, seems, at the end of his career, to have consciously resolved to sacrifice himself for something he doesn't believe in. He knows what the world is like, what the balance of power is, and most certainly the rules of diplomatic games, but it must be that he never managed to accommodate some of his ideals to this. Milosevic probably won him over just because he does not recognize reality, and because he places his skill before insurmountable obstacles.

Serbia's ignoring of the world boomeranged even before Jovanovic became minister and tried to put some things right. Milosevic all at once noticed that he was completely alone, that no-one liked him and that this was causing him problems. This made his propagandists look for causes in the organization of the world, which showed itself to be hopelessly anti-Serbian. The English aren't serious when they say that the whole of the rest of the world drives on the wrong side of the street, but in Serbia they are not joking, and besides, they are not English and it isn't a question of harmless eccentricity but of pure tyranny.

All kinds of theories have appeared connected to the fall of the Berlin Wall, the destruction of the Soviet Union and the new world order. As far as Serbia is concerned, it turns out that the Berlin Wall shouldn't have been touched and the USSR left alone for at least another few years. Germany has increased in strength, but it isn't clear just why Serbia should be more against this than anyone else, even if Slovenia and Croatia managed to ingratiate themselves first. Serbia has calmly sacrificed its comparatively developed economic ties with Germany in order to drivel on about the Fourth Reich, the revival of Austro-Hungary, revanchism and the spread of fascism.

I don't see why there should be so much mourning about the disintegration of a murky military empire and why Serbia should try so hard to defend the prestige and dignity of Russia if the Russians themselves have come to the conclusion that it's time to spread some butter on their bread. It isn't a matter here of some kind of communist, Slav or even Orthodox nostalgia. Milosevic is just disappointed that there is no longer another bloc, that the world is becoming more homogeneous and there is no-one he can turn to about the verdict of the West to offer his natural alliance. The bloc division hid and protected many local delinquents, because the enemies of the West were welcome in the East, and vice versa. No-one managed to function quite so well in this division as the deceased Josip Broz, but Milosevic can't get over the passing of that era.

"Nature is complicated, but not malicious", wrote Albert Einstein in his polemic about some-one's terribly entangled theory. The same applies to the world of politics and international relations. The Serbs are now being offered an extremely entangled and, to anyone of sound mind, insulting explanation of why everything is against them. This sometimes takes the form of geopolitics, sometimes mysticism, secret interests and a new world order which is nothing more than a gentle indication of a more harmonious and safer world. The Serbs, however, fear that it is a question of eternal slavery, a thousand times worse than that under the Turks.

The world is now threatening new sanctions, a total blockade and the breaking of diplomatic relations and, if there is some kind of conspiracy in this, then it is that of the Serbian regime against the basic international order. If anyone here believes that it is a question of a huge mistake and injustice, this is because the biggest local medium does not show who is fighting in Bosnia and how. If anyone thinks that the world is badly informed and deceived, let them compare the informative quality of TV Belgrade with that of the BBC. If you think the punishment too harsh, this is because the world has lost all patience and any hope that the regime will understand another language.

Certain diplomatic efforts are still going on, but Milosevic will now have to make urgent and major concessions in order to halt the mechanism which seems to have been set in motion. He is beginning to discover the world at the time this same world is threatening to withdraw and remove itself completely from here. He now sees what he's going to miss. Maybe he can comfort himself that his biggest opponents in Serbia will not be able to gloat because they will be hit harder than him. This is the policy that of the nation, and even of the opposition, makes helpless hostages.

Viewed from a professional angle, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of a country that finds itself before an international blockade cannot imagine a greater failure. Vladislav Jovanovic most certainly felt extremely uncomfortable when he spoke in front of the Parliament of this, and where did the bizarre explanation that it was only a question of a routine announcement on the part of the CSCE come from. His problem is all the greater in that Milosevic probably won't allow him to resign because he knows he is not to blame as Jovanovic probably gave him much good advice which he didn't listen to. In the same way he didn't listen to the very open warning that Serbia was facing an international shipwreck, given to him two weeks ago, before it was too late, by Milovoje Maksic, then head of the Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Jovanovic did what he could. At the beginning he seemed like a great reinforcement, maybe like some kind of hope that it would be possible to talk to this regime and make it understand. His calmness, his reasonable tone colored by light resignation, maybe succeeded in giving Milosevic a much needed breathing space. But the final outcome could not be uncertainty, which he himself must have known. It is now a question of whether anything can be corrected; can Milosevic withdraw fast enough. What is worse, he cannot make a great national mobilization about the rejection of the ultimatum because this time Serbia will not be offered the opportunity for any kind of heroic gesture. It will simply be ignored and left to rot, and if we make a big noise about this and blame everyone except the one who is guilty, we will end up looking ridiculous as well.