Neither Unity nor Law

The obvious strategy to unify all Serbs into a single state through a war of conquest and ethnic cleansing of territories followed by a demand for a "self-determination of peoples" until secession (e.g., annexation) is close to ending in total failure on account of poor timing, if its very conception had been sound, which it wasn't. The process became so drawn out that unforeseen elements joined in the fray.

Eastern Herzegovina, a Serb land owned by Mr. Bozidar Vucurevic, Trebinje truck driver and singing poet, was unwittingly drawn into the war by the will of others. Last summer and autumn, Montenegrin brothers from Niksic under a mask of the JNA occupied the entire region (including Mostar) with the clear intention of carving off southern Dalmatia and Dubrovnik, the "future Serbian capital." Mostar could not be taken, so it was destroyed, but then the Croatian army advanced deep into the Serbian Autonomous Region of Herzegovina, triggering a collapse of Vucurevic's state. Was that state already rotten when it collapsed so swiftly?

So it would seem. The departure of the JNA was enough for the collapse. Vucurevic's regime began as an autocratic one, with all the inherent shortcomings. Non sympathizers were ostracized as "bad Serbs" (a classification in use in all Serbian lands); supporters, on the other hand, were given free rein. The famous SDS (The Serbian Democratic Party) representative in the Bosnia-Herzegovina Parliament, Dusan Kozic from Ljubinje, was caught carrying 80 Russian automatic rifles in a lorry (it seems the police patrol in Bileca had not been warned in advance), and was then ceremonially set free in Niksic, while Mr. Vucurevic sang Chetnik songs. A year later , on May 14, 1992, Mr. Kozic was caught again, this time with 518 kilos of Marlboro cigarettes in his lorry.

The rape and pillage of Mostar created new problems: what Strugar's and Perisic's troops left behind them was cleaned out by Herzegovinians like ants - Soko, the tobacco factory and the Aluminum Complex were stripped of all that could be taken. Unfortunately, an economy based on theft has one disadvantage - it's strictly one-time - you can't steal something twice. The question was raised: where are the goods?

The aluminum is said to have crossed the river Drina and to be waiting for higher prices. Former SDS president Dragomir Grubac says Herzegovina received from Serbia "food and other aid enough to cover all the needs of the entire Serbian people in Bosnia-Herzegovina for four years," but that "elite Serbs" allegedly sold it all off to "Croats, Slovenes and even to western Herzegovinians." Another mystery is the fate of some of some 40,000 firearms, a huge quantity of ammunition, and anti-tank missile systems of the Fagot type (copy of the Russian AT-4, itself a copy of the French Milan), the most modern owned by JNA, ceremonially unveiled late in March this year in Nikinci, Vojvodina. The Croatian troops are also reported to have this missiles.

Far more important than all this is the fact that eastern Herzegovina has been economically dead for over a year - the biggest income was participation in a the tourist sector of Dubrovnik area, where agricultural produce was marketed and many found seasonal employment. By killing tourism in Dubrovnik, the Herzegovians killed their principal source of income (just like their brethren in Knin). Now they blame the Montenegrins and say they have had enough of the war.

In short, the vital interest of the Herzegovinians no longer exists: who will feed them and how are they to live? The sanctions pushed Serbia - let alone Montenegro - on the very brink of hunger , while anarchy, crime and corruption are the normal results of a failed and outdated policy.

Another who has a similar problem with time is Dr. Radovan Karadzic, whose Serb political associates on April 6 set out for the hills around Sarajevo with fresh underwear for just three or four days in the expectation that Sarajevo would take that long to fall (it didn't, and isn't expected to, while the world got a chance to see the bloody ethnic cleansing of eastern Bosnia, the burning down and total destruction of villages.

The plan code-named RAM called for supplying Serb regions in Bosnia-Herzegovina with fuel and food to take them through three months of war - these three months have now expired. There was ample talk in the Serb Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina in those three months about the resale of those supplies, and no satisfactory answer has ever been given for the accusations. There was never a chance that it would, anyway - disrespect for the law quickly reached its very apex in the Serb Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Gangs of renegades (paramilitary formations) are roaming through eastern Bosnia with total disregard for anything or anyone, including the Serbian government agents describing themselves as "Commanders of the Local Territorial Defense." The leaders of the groups (at least ten are known to exist) openly say they have no intention of ever returning to Serbia, where they could face trial for war crimes. Their objective is to settle down one day and become high-ranking officials in a future Karadzic government. Murder, hostage-taking, looting, the expulsion of people from their homes have become do normal that even the combat morale of Karadzic's troops has suffered. The President of the Serb Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina no longer controls his troops, and neither does General Ratko Mladic, who said so two weeks ago.

The hope harbored by Messrs. Cosic and Milosevic that they will succeed at the forthcoming London conference in pushing through what is already a fait accompli and annexing Serb lands they are holding by sheer force mean s nothing here - even if they do succeed - and that's highly doubtful - a fait accompli cannot feed hungry mouths. Time has taken its toll: the factories have stopped, neither have fields been sown nor harvests reaped, the state is in the midst of an isolation that a fait-accompli annexation by way of a referendum ("the right of nations to self-determination") will not eliminate. Even if the entire plan were to succeed, the distant Serb lands - the Bosnian and Knin Krajinas and the northern territories protected by UN. peace keepers - remain too far: the links with them pass through dangerous zones, and their economies are feeble.

What "VREME" in its last issue called the Serbian Autonomous Region (SAO) "Corridor" (the line of communication linking Bijeljina and Banja Luka) has two characteristics: it is very difficult to defend (especially from guerrilla attacks), thus sharing the fate of all such corridors, the best known example being the one to Gdansk-Danzig before the Second War, and it is of vital, in fact critical, importance for the very survival of the two Krajinas, the Bosnian and Knin Krajinas. What we have is two territorial and political entities far from each other. One id the Autonomous Region of Bosnian Krajina, its center in Banja Luka, and the other the Republic of Serb Krajina, its center in Knin. Far to the east lies the state of Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem, part of the whole but very different in the economic and political sense: it is politically close to Serbia (and thus far easier to control) and is also economically far stronger than the two Krajinas, in spite of all the destruction the war has brought. The political unity of the republic of Serb Krajina has been suspect from the very beginning: the influence of Dr. Milan Babic in and around Knin was always strong enough to resist attempts to force Mr. Goran Hadzic on all Krajina Serbs as their chief political authority. The Bosnian Krajina, on the other hand, was always politically autonomous, often widely at variance with the policies of Karadzic, with who it should by definition be in total agreement. This is understandable: they are historically and in many other ways two different regions, Apart from this, Karadzic happens to be physically distant. Real political control of the Bosnian Krajina thus came into the hands of the "Gang of Four" - Radoslav Brdjanin ("Our state from here to Moscow"), Vojo Kupresanin, Dr. Radisav Vukic and Predrag Radic, all SDS leaders in Krajina. Law and order isn't their best side, either: Banja Luka and its surroundings are controlled by paramilitary forces made up of sundry armed persons who blow up houses and business establishments, commit murders now and then, loot, extort. The first to appear early in April were the red berets of the Serbian Liberation Forces (SOS), initially believed to have been sent by Karadzic to take control of Bosnian Krajina. It turned out later that the SOS was a half-private army set up, according to our sources in Banja Luka, by some of the most powerful behind-the-scenes figures in the city - Pantelija Damjanovic, the owner of the Hotel BOSNA, Nenad Stevandic, an important SDS "hawk," a certainJankovic and a certain Dubocanin. Like the bosses - like the army: most of its "troops" have thick police files. The principal activity of the SOS was extortion aimed against well-to-do members of the Moslem and Croat communities: cars were "impounded" in broad daylight and earnings of cafes and shops "confiscated." Either pay up or have your business premises blown up, On May, Security Day, the Serbs decided that they'd also had enough of the SOS and officially abolished it. However, under cover of darkness (and Banja Luka is nowadays very seldom blessed with electric power), the bombings and thefts continued, and people wearing uniforms continued cleaning out shops and private lodgings without obstruction of any kind.

On the broader political plane, however, Krajina continues to tame the same line, well aware that it is the only force capable of supporting its own - and the biggest - Serb army in Bosnia-Herzegovina, including an Air Force headed by the youthful General Ninkovic. The Krajina people have already begun to retailor borders, with scant regard for dr. Karadzic's Serb Assembly on Mt. Jahorina. Banja Luka is the seat of the National Bank of the Serb Republic of Bosnia-Hrezegovina, and Knin is also there to lend a hand. On Krajina depends whether SAO Corridor will hold, or if a different political solution will have to be sought. This situation places in a very awkward position General Talic, subordinate to General Mladic in Pale: should he serve those who pay him, yet have secessionist ambitions - or indeed those who nominally head the state of the Serbs?

Important contradictions were built into the Republic of Serb Krajina from the outset, contradictions that had to surface sooner or later. The first is historical - the difference between the Chetnik tradition of Knin and the Partisan tradition of Lika, Kordun and Banija. The love at first sight couldn't last very long - the League of Communists - Movement for Yugoslavia, using its personal links and tradition, infiltrated its own people into the area, and things went so far that Babic's decree banning the activities of the said Movement in Krajina was much more than just a symbolic gesture by a newly-fledged anti-Communist. The other contradiction is geographic - Krajina, Lika, Kordun and Banija will never find anything in common with Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Srem, however strong the rhetoric by ideologues of reawakened Serbianhood. One is simply close to Serbia, whereas the other isn't.

It is clear today that all thirteen main communes in Krajina are in a very special position. Their principal source of income was tourism and the traffic linked with it - two fields of activity by necessity linked with the Croatian coast on the one side and the industrial-communications hinterland on the other. These communes were for years recipients of aid for underdeveloped areas. Virtually the entire town of Knin survived on the salaries of 3,000 railway workers: the last regular train passed through Knin almost two years ago. During the Second World War, traffic on the line linking Split and Zagreb came to a halt several times, but the longest stoppage was only 72 hours. The only train on the line now is an armored one traversing the stretch between Knin and Licki Osik (Teslingrad). When it killed the tourism of central Dalmatia, Knin finished off its own source of income - the Plitvice National Park brought in 100 million dollars a year from entrance fees alone. UNPROFOR will defend the Serbs in Krajina from a Croatian attack, but it will not feed them. Someone will have to - the Republic of Serb Krajina is not capable of surviving on its own, even if it does manage to produce something.

This situation logically resulted in an erosion of legality, in autocratic power, and in heretic thoughts in the fringe parts of the state of Krajina. First the Croats were expelled from the Knin Krajina - their only village, Kijevo, was razed to the ground. Next came the "bad Serbs": criticize Babic and your reward could easily be a hand grenade in your back yard. A quarrel between Dr. Babic and Insp. Martic sparked off a purge of supporters of the former.

It then turned out that Babic enjoys bigger support than Dr. Goran Hadzic, who no longer dares show his face in Knin without strong military escort. Meanwhile, the presidents of the northern Krajina communes began thinking about more serious matters - for example how to feed the people - and started to count on the legitimacy that proceeded from the fact that they were chosen at elections in Croatia (as Babic himself, for that matter).

The game is obvious: the winter is coming, and there's no food - negotiations will have to be started with the Croats to restore economic cooperation to whatever extent it might be possible, otherwise they'll all be dead. Some communal heads have already begun to hold secret meetings, in spite of the "principled position" of Colonel General Martic, who seems to be ill-informed about the latest developments. During his recent talks with Lord Carrington, Mr. Hadzic was seen to have backed down from his previously firm position of "Yugoslavia at all cost," clearly convincingly discouraged in advance from sources in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia itself. The London Conference on Yugoslavia - the very last hope of Messrs. Cosic and Milosevic - will be a place where the two will try to salvage whatever can be saved: at least the cleansed areas along the border - Slavonia, Baranja, eastern Bosnia. Knin and Krajina are just too far...

As things now stand, the Krajina Serbs have been left alone, and they are just not very good company for themselves.

VREME has already analyzed in depth the situation in Baranja, Eastern Slavonia and Western Srem: war communist regimes - no money, no market, no economic, administrative list distribution of everything (mostly aid from Serbia), iron discipline and total "unity." The ethnic cleansing has been completed, and all that we are now waiting for is a referendum on unification with the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The era of the Khmer Rouge has come: no money, no market, no "bourgeois delusions" - that few people that now live in Vukovar must guard their tongues, lest they have to "write the statement".

Meanwhile, negotiations continue, in London, on frigates in the Adriatic, in New York. We are waiting for a national leader to appear and say how well we did in our stand - off with the world. They promised everything, and "achieved" what they could with their weak minds.