Rallies of Support in Serbia Again

Yelling Against NATO

The official propaganda which is in the past few days terrorising the unprotected citizens and polluting the mental space of Serbia with vehemence unseen even in 1991, does not show even the slightest signs, possibilities or hints that it might yield; in their statements high state and party officials explicitly reject the "salutary" idea about the arrival of troops under auspices of UN or OSCE, which is at the moment familiar only to Vuk Draskovic, the feeble partner of the Socialists in the federal government.

AIM Podgorica, 2 March, 1999

(By AIM corresponsdent from Belgrade)

Accompanied by the sounds of the marching song sung mostly in bars "Be prepared, ye Chetniks" ("the battle will be dreadful"...) well known to all the enthusiastic spectators of picturesque Veljko Bulajic's films all around former SFRY, last Saturday, the "spectacular" rally of the Serb Radical Party (SRS) began at the sports hall called Pinki in Zemun (where the Radicals control local authorities), all with the slogan "We will give Kosovo and Metohija at no price". In front of about three thousand "patriots" who were brought by bus to Zemun from ten odd small towns in Serbia - Vojislav Seselj, president of SRS and vice prime minister of Serbia, gave a speech at the rally, as well as the vice president of the party and another vice prime minister of the Republic, Tomislav Nikolic, along with high party and state officials Aleksandar Vucic, Maja Gojkovic and Dragan Todorovic.

On that same day, at the sports centre called Zdravlje in Leskovac (the "capital" of the so-called southern railroad region, poverty stricken part of the country which is the traditional stronghold of the ruling party) a no less patriotic "Meeting in defence of Serbia" was oreganised by the municipal committee of the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS). The musical leitmotif of this gathering was the song titled "Serb bugle resounds from Kosovo". In front of about four thousand citizens, Ivica Dacic, spokesman of the ruling SPS, gave a speech; (in the name of "young Socialists") Natasa Gacesa also addressed the organised patriots, and popular local actors Bata Dosa and Tika Apic also had a few words to say, and so did the singer of the Nis band Galija Nesa Milosavljevic, some young people and peasants from the district of Leskovac, as well as the representative of Romanies of the part of the country around Leskovac Jasmina Demic who retorted to the arrogant transatlantic country in her mother tongue: " Amerika nane sukar!" (America is no good)"; to make things completely in the spirit of the place and time, the gay atmosphere was created by the trumpet orchestra Bozidar Nikolic from Grdelica. Evil tongues claim that NATO was put in a very awkward position: even if it decided to come uninvited, it will be blown away by the trumpets from Grdelica..

These two gatherings organised at two ends of Serbia are the response of the "left" and the "right" half of the ruling coalition in Serbia to pressures the official Belgrade has been exposed to in the past weeks, primarily to the persistent demand of the international community to the regime to accept international military troops in Kosovo (which would regardless of their official name be practically under NATO command). Negotiations on the question of Kosovo in French castle in Rambouillet ended with no real result due to Serb rejection of this demand, as well as due to refusal of the delegation of Kosovo Albanians to sign the political plan of the solution which gives Kosovo a high level of autonomy, but leaves it within borders of Serbia and FRY, with no prospects of legal secession after the three year "transitional period" expires. Nowadays there are certain - still liable to change - indications that the Albanians will after all sign the peace plan during the second part of the negotiations; should that happen, Serbia will remain alone in the world: its authorities will be faced with resoluteness of America and western Europe

• and just weak, almost symbolic opposition of Russia - to implement the decision on international military presence as an important link in the chain of pacification of Kosovo.

Majority of observers within and without the country believe that Milosevic will act again as he usually does: he will strain relations with the international community to a dramatic level trying to draw as much for himself as possible, and then "at a minute to twelve" he will give in. This was how Milosevic bahaved during the wars in Croatia and Bosnia & Herzegovina, but Kosovo is something completely different: the last thing the regime wishes to see are NATO troops in Serbia. Not because of "threatened sovereignty and undermining of territorial integrity of the country", but because Milosevic knows that for him and his regime the presence of any armed force in Serbia which would not be controlled by him could be disastrous for him and his regime, even in one part of its territory, but especially of such a dangerous and powerful formation such as NATO. That is why the conclusion that Milosevic would certainly "yield in the end" is hastily made: analogy with Bosnia is quite unfounded.

The official propaganda which is terrorising the unprotected citizens ans polluting the mental space of Serbia with vehemence not seen since 1991, does not show even the slighest signs, possibilities or hints that it might yield; high state and ruling party officials in their statements explicitly reject the "salutary" idea about arrival of troops under auspices of the UN or OSCE (which is familiar only to Vuk Draskovic, the feeble partner of the SPS in the federal government). Things are too strained to be turned upside down overnight, so it seems that the regime and its extreme rightist allies are resolute to play the game to the end, even at the price of starting a war against NATO. As general Dragoljub Ojdanic, head of the Army of Yugoslavia, said: "We will respond to force by force, be what may".

And what might happen? Even the local petty politicking rabble-rousers are well aware that Serbia cannot win a war with NATO - even a tie is out of the question, it does not exist in the rules of the game - so that this defiant verbal radicalism, if it turns into such actions, cannot be interpreted as anything else but cynical adventurousness of persons who are ready to lead their own country into an impossible war the outcome of which is known in advance, in which many of their compatriots might lose their lives for nothing, just in order to enable them to demagogically prove their "firmness and resoluteness". Even if they lose Kosovo in that way, nobody could blame them for their "treacherous compliance", but "enormous superiority of foreign force" would be blamed for it.

That is the soource of the thundering rhetoric of speakers from Zemun and Leskovac who once again bet on xhenophobia and intolerance against those who think differently in this country. Vojislav Seselj threatened even this country's neighbours, especially the government of Macedonia which he warned "not to play with fire, because they have not created a state because they were capable, but because Serbia has given that state to them as a gift", stressing that "if a single rifle fires from the territory of Macedonia, nothing will be left of the Macedonian state"; the former Chetnik "duke" by the way warned the "fifth column" to be careful: "We have set things straight at the universities, we have almost set things straight in the media, we will set everything straight in the judiciary. Gradually, we will bring order to Serbia...".

Minister of information Aleksandar Vucic distinguished himself among other with the following brilliant statement: "They think that they have scared us and that anyone minds not being able to go to America or England. Whoever is interested in these countries? Whatever is there to learn there?" His party colleague from the government Tomislav Nikolic also had comments about these countries: "Haranguing Serbia and the Serbian people is directed by the USA and Great Britain which are ruled by homosexuals, pedophiles and lesbians". Young spearhead of the Socialist Party of Serbia Natasa Gacesa, recognised the avantgarde role of the Serbs in opposing the global NATO plague: "Those who are afraid of NATO shall fall its victims. There is no fear, they must be crushed. They cannot succeed in their intentions. If we the Serbs are the ones who must be the first to tell them that, we will do it".

That is how Serbia is entering perhaps its most dramatic period in its recent history astoundedly passive and peaceful, with frantic curses, infantile tall talk, inarticulate denunciations from the mouths of those who are leading it, accompanied by petty bourgeois "patriotic" hysteria of one part of its citizens and absolute, "anaesthetised" and fatalistic lethargy of the other.

A pensioner enthusiastically summarises the gathering of Seselj's followers in Zemun to the reporter of Danas: "It was magnificent. Neither NATO nor America can do us any harm, did you see the force gathered here". After that the happy elderly man drags himself home hoping he would by some miracle come across oil or sugar in some shop. If he dose not - it does not matter. "The Serbs can do without bread, but they cannot go on without their state", Radovan Karadzic, the most invisible Serb of the twentieth century, often used to say. Hardly anybody here wishes and dares see that such policy is inevitably leading the Serbs to the loss of both one and the other.

Teofil Pancic

(AIM)