Slobodan Milosevic served as the President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1997 until 2000, and as Serbian President within Yugoslavia for six years prior. While most political leaders avoid war at all cost, Milosevic managed to embroil his country in four armed conflicts. Worse still, he lost all of them. In spite of this, Milosevic stayed in power long past his sell-by date, demonstrating a very interesting set of political skills.
My guest for this conversation is Igor Bandovic (@IgorBandovic), Director of the Belgrade Centre for Security Policy, and the President of the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights. We discuss the shaky history of Yugoslavia, the rise of Serbian nationalism inside a country supposed to contain it, and the effectiveness of Western involvement in a part of the world where NATO troops have now been stationed for over twenty years.
Slobodan Milosevic served as the President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1997 until 2000, and as Serbian President within Yugoslavia for six years prior. While most political leaders avoid war at all cost, Milosevic managed to embroil his country in four armed conflicts. Worse still, he lost all of them. In spite of this, Milosevic stayed in power long past his sell-by date, demonstrating a very interesting set of political skills.
My guest for this conversation is Igor Bandovic (@IgorBandovic), Director of the Belgrade Centre for Security Policy, and the President of the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights. We discuss the shaky history of Yugoslavia, the rise of Serbian nationalism inside a country supposed to contain it, and the effectiveness of Western involvement in a part of the world where NATO troops have now been stationed for over twenty years.
Hello and welcome to the hated in the dead with Tom Leeman. This week, the ages in the dead focuses again on southeastern Europe. But this time, and for the first time, we will be looking at a country that no longer exists. The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, which died a slow ugly death in the 1990s, was made up of seven modern day countries. They are Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Herzegovina, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Kosovo, and Serbia. Whilst Slobodan Milosevic spent much of his political life claiming he was president of Yugoslavia, he can much more accurately be described as a Serbian nationalist. dissatisfied with what he saw as a powerful Serbia as emasculation within Yugoslavia. Milosevic spent his political career in the 1980s and 90s, tearing up a delicate balancing act in the Balkan country that had lasted for 40 years. The result was Europe's worst bloodshed since the Second World War, with four walls of independence gripping the former Yugoslavia through the 1990s and hundreds of 1000s losing their lives. Milosevic's forces lost all four walls. But in spite of this, he managed to stay in power until 2000 After nearly a decade of fighting whilst Milosevic's strategic and military judgement has to be called into question. His political skill in keeping the Serbian people on side for so long, and made international humiliation and retaliation in the form of NATO airstrikes cannot be sidelined. At a time when Europe is once again experiencing War and its soil. The ability for contemptible leaders to carry on even as the world applies pressure on them must not be forgotten, nor underestimated. My guest for this conversation is Igor Banda vich director for the Belgrade Centre for security policy, and the President for the Belgrade Centre for Human Rights. We discuss the shaky history of Yugoslavia. The rise of Serbian nationalism inside a country supposed to contain it and the effectiveness of Western involvement in a part of the world where NATO troops have now been stationed for over 20 years. Ladies and gentlemen, it's time to introduce Slobodan Milosevic. Good afternoon ego. How are you? Hello, Tom. Good. Slobodan Milosevic, is the subject of our conversation today. I've seen him described recently as the man Europe wished or hoped they'd never see, again. He represented something in the European body politic that Europeans thought had gone. What did Milosevic do to accrued that reputation in short? Well, Milosevic sparkled the nationalistic flame of the former Yugoslavia back in the early 90s. Actually, before that, when he came to power in Serbia immediately, in the late 80s, when he actually change his communist past with nationalistic present and the future. What he did was, he firstly redacted the autonomous provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo because he wanted to have central role in Serbia. And, and then actually pretending that he wants to defend Serbs across the borders of the former Yugoslavia that means former Republic server Slavia he practically waged war against all others in his life, and in his biography, you can put for wars that he basically lost. And I think that some worst atrocities in the former Yugoslavia and during the worst of wars happen during his reign. So this is probably something for which he will be remembered in European history. And unfortunately for the things that Europe didn't want to see this is genocide and celebrates ethnic cleansing. And, you know, basically all the characteristics of Yugoslav War, when you look at it from this perspective, can be boiled down to the fact that this was a war with It's a major characteristic of committing war crimes. And it was that nasty. So I think that that is his legacy. And this is what he did. Thank you. I think that sets up well, the conversation we're gonna have. Milosevic was born in 1941. Really in the eye of a storm. The Kingdom of Yugoslavia suffered terribly during the Second World War, and especially the the Serbs. I think what's really important in understanding the psyche of Milosevic, and the journey he took your country on, is the relationship between Serbia and wider Yugoslavia, which was not always an entirely harmonious one. What happened to the Serbians during the Second World War? And what was their tie to Yugoslavia at the time? Well, first of all, then kingdom when he was Slavia was composed of Serb Serbs, Croats, and Slovenians while other national minority so nationalities were not recognised, and it was Kingdom, and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was ruled by the Tina's dynasty of them karate, which, who were serfs, family cottages which were sitting in Belgrade. There were numerous issues when with this country, but it was, let's say, more or less as other countries back then in Europe, it was in the early phases. So in the in the Saudi industrialization, it was a country of persons, there was a big differences between rich and poor. And what happened with the invasion and actually was slightly of us trying to, to have, let's say, smart politics and not to really not to really provoke the Germans because they were, you know, invading than other parts of Europe. So then Kingdom of Yugoslavia sign those treaties with Germany trying not to be invaded by them. But due to the fact that very active Communist Party existed in Yugoslavia then, and riots broke out as a result of this treaty. Hitler then wanted to punish slavery, and he invaded and conquered it in six days. And this is exactly happen only a couple of months after Milosevic was born. And he was born in a religious family, his, his grandfather was a priest, but his father was a member of the Communist Party. So this, let's say predicted his future. He has been he has become a member of the Communist Party in the early days. He was a student of law back in the 60s in Belgrade, and then he starting to become politically active in the communist field. Then he met his then best friend, even somebody who was once president will Slavia and this is how he, let's say step up the ladder through the communist nomenklatura. This is what he wanted to achieve from the beginning. Yugoslavia survived the Second World War, but it became a communist country after 1945 led by Tito, a very famous figure in postwar European politics. I've seen that Yugoslavia given its kind of internal religious and ethnic diversity. You mentioned the Croats and the Bosniaks and the Serbs. It's always needed a kind of external force to keep it together. You know, and that could have been habits Berg's or the Ottomans in the kind of Imperial age. But Tito will also provided that role after World War Two. Serbia has always had the largest population within Yugoslavia. It's kind of the most dominant element amongst the crowds and the Bosnians, the Slovenes, etc. Do you think that to some extent, Tito's keeping together of Yugoslavia relied upon a certain subjugation of Serbia, and Serbian power you So there was a lot of that in Yugoslavia. But I think that Peter was also trying to rule by cutting of all the nationalistic movements in back then in in Yugoslavia, because in the early stages of Yugoslavia, the Communists were aware of the problem with nationalism that existed not only in the 90s, but also in the, during the Second World War, because when it comes to that, I mean, outside of Yugoslavia, maybe that was a war between, you know, evil in the good, but within the slavery, that was also a war between different ideologies, basically, capitalist and communist one. And also it was a brotherhood war, were actually Chetniks. And especially in Serbia, were fighting partisans, but also in Bosnia and other parts. So this was not only, I mean, in Serbia, and Slovenia, that was not really clear cut, who the war is, you know, who is fighting for what we did in this war. So in that sense, communists were aware that nationalism is alive and they have to reduce it, they have to keep it down in order for Slavia to survive, and to to somehow manage not to really open up that a lot in you know, and he managed, I mean, the slavery existed for, I mean, post Second World War, because slavery existed for 40 years. And he managed to find the balance, especially having in mind that he also had the relatively successful, autonomous, independent and outline politics, you know. But he then he died. I think this nationalistic wave, then was revived, and then no one was there to stop it. Yeah, I think that that balance that you talked about didn't really Outlast Tito. I think that's the the consensus. And it seems that Milosevic's Korea was really based on kind of tearing up that balance. I think he was the orchestrator of ending that that equilibrium. I'm constantly at that kind of uncomfortable equilibrium, though it might have been. I've read that one of the most important speeches in launching Milosevic as a politician was one he gave in 1987 in Kosovo. Can you explain a little bit about that speech? Yeah, that was a famous speech, because that was the bait. Basically, he came to support local Serbs. And as a result of that speech, he redacted the autonomous authority of the province of Kosovo. He came on the basis that Serbs are, let's say, threatened there. They are victims of the Albanian majority. And he gathered them on this famous place, which is called Casa pada. Which is also a symbol and a place where famous Kosovo battle took place in Turkey 89 Were actually Serbian knights were fighting on Ottoman Empire. So it has a very deep and symbolic meaning to Serbs. And he came there to and he said something which is important. First of all, he said, No one dares to be too meaning. Serbs will be protected against, let's say police harassment. And secondly, says he said that the war and the battles we will try to avoid, but we will not escape them. If if they are necessary, and I mean, all of the sudden did this was a kind of a proclamation of the war in Yugoslavia, you know, because mentioning all in that, I think, for other republics and other peoples in the Slavia was a dangerous thing. Especially in the in the moment when practically all federal institutions it was slightly over collapsing. And this is this is how it started. And, you know, for him, this is how he turned it Yes, and I suppose making that speech in of all places to play the site of the most famous battle in Serbian history in in Kosovo was was obviously a kind of indication of what his intentions were to some extent. I mean, he was basically speaking now as a politician for Serbians rather than Yugoslavian. Right, exactly. He was reacting against the kind of Serbia light, Tito arrangement? Yes, he was he was, he was trying to really occupy the political space with a new ideology. And that was nationalistic ideology. I mean, for him. And I, you know, looking back, looking back at those days, I never would say that he was very true believer in that in some kind of a nationalistic ideology of all Serbs or really protecting Serbian territories, territories and people against all others, but as a communistic operatic, which, which he was, he just needed to, you know, grab the power, and he was trying to be very opportunistic, and to, you know, to take advantage of the nationalistic ideology that was spread in the absence of the communist one. And he was just writing that way, basically, from the beginning. And this is how he came to power. Of course, the problem with him speaking for the Serbs was that technically he was still speaking for all of Yugoslavia, because he was the leader ostensibly of Yugoslavia of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. And that was a country that in over the next sort of five years after he gave that speech basically fell apart. You know, first the Croatians and the Slovenians left in 1991. And then, most crucially, in some ways Bosnia and Herzegovina voted in a referendum to leave in 1992. Why was Bosnia secession, so problematic for Serbia, and for Serbians compared to Slovenia and Croatia? I think that secession of both Croatia and Bosnia was much problematic, then Slovenia, and in case of Bosnia, it was the most terrible because it was the deadliest war that happened there. But I wouldn't differentiate really Croatia and Bosnia, the thing was that a lot of Serbs lived in Croatia, and especially Bosnia. And unlike in Slovenia, and for Slovenia, he gave up rather, you know, Slovenia easy because there were no Serbs there. For Croatia, there was a totally different story. And key wanted to protect Serbs there. And while I'm saying this protect, I think this is really false promise, because what he was trying to really fight for it was the territory of Yugoslavia. Not really people him he never really cared about people. And, you know, when we look at how all these refugees from both creation was ended up and how they were living in Serbia, and how they were moved around, we see that he didn't really care cared about people, he cared about the territory and he wanted to in the, you know, in the in the moment, when he realised that he was slightly above fall apart, he wanted to protect as much territory as he can. And and this is why he came up in Croatia and then also in Bosnia, been setting up this artificial Serb territories that actually he was arming Serbian paramilitaries, Serbian minority Serbian people who live there, and, you know, in a way, very much like what Putin is doing in Donetsk area in Ukraine, now arming them and trying to protect the territory claiming that Russian are claiming in Milosevic kits claiming that Serbian in Bosnia because Serbs were quite large population. And they had I think most of the arms left out of the Yugoslav People's Army, the fighting was the most fierce and the atrocities were the worst. And the death toll was the biggest of all wars in former Yugoslavia. So this idea of, of Serbian nationalism, Serbian chauvinism, you think, was just a ploy really. He saw, you know, valuable land slipping away, and he wanted to keep hold of him. Yes, I mean, you know, there was always an underlying factor of Serbian nationalism, which is not to be downplayed. And there were a lot of nationalists around him, who were, you know, fulfilling their nationalistic dreams. But for him himself, and just looking retrospectively on that he was not really in that way. You know, defender of Serbian national interest, or II, he was a really lousy one, because he, I mean, Serbia, lost things to him everything that it had. The war in Bosnia, attracted the attention of the Western powers. What did the Serbs do in Bosnia? What did Milosevic order in Bosnia to kind of attract the ire of the West and particularly in the end, NATO and the US, philosophy to get to allies in Bosnia, who were on one key and political leader of Bosnian Serbs, rather than courage. And on the other hand, Army General Ratko Mladic. And he was really running the Bosnia with them as, as allies as partners in that, in that joint criminal enterprise as it why would describe that the fact that was, Boston was the place where the most work, war atrocities happened, attracted international community. We had the first time after 50 years in Europe, concentration camps, we have separation of people based on the ethnicity based on the religion, they were separated, divided men from the women, massive rapes of the of the women who belong to different religion and nationality was a common thing in the Bosnian war. I don't know that I'm thinking about that. I don't know whether, you know, this happened because Serbs were armed to the teeth, or just they were instructed to do that. But when you ask Serbian nationalist in Bosnian why such terrible things happen, and why did you did them? They were usually explaining that this is a consequence of the Second World War. Because once we were the same victims, and we were basically in the same position, so you know, all of the sudden, sudden victims have become a perpetrators. So, yes, but these these pictures really, of concentration camps of people who are looking as people in Auschwitz, would look like, attracted international community, and especially us. Which the end they thought because he was, I would say, then really weak, weak organisation. It was just consolidating in terms of the its foreign and security policy. So the Member States and most importantly, Germany was there really to try to keep order in in that part of the Europe, but the US was really active. And when they saw that, I mean, it recalled all the pictures from the Second World War and they said, We have to stop that. And we have to stop this things happening in the you know, in the heart of the Europe basically. And this is how he started losing credibility. Because at the at the beginning, he had some sympathies in the West, because when he was talking to his interlocutors from the West, he was saying that he wants to preserve Yugoslavia. And for, for example, for the US in the early days, of the war, Yugoslavia was still viable solution. But when they saw what are the results on the ground when it comes to the creation, and then Bosnia, they thought this is just, you know, this is not going to fly. And we have to do something about that. And then, you know, all of a sudden, in it 95 Seven, and it's a massacre, genocide happened, and that was it. That was the end of the story. Yeah, so the Bosnian War ended with the Dayton agreement, which was negotiated by the Clinton administration administration of the United States, specifically Richard Holbrook. And it led, you know, ultimately to the independence of Bosnia, and a kind of shaky peace in that country. But it didn't get rid of mulata, which Milosevic signed the agreement. And I suppose that I'm speculating here, but from the US side, the agreement might have been that, that as long as Milosevic signs the agreement, then we'll keep him in place. Do you think that he could have stepped down and have been alright, at that particular juncture, say after date? And if he'd have stepped down? He might have been discredited. But do you think that he would have avoided the the end of his life in a jail cell in The Hague, that he ultimately got? Looking back? Was this a kind of point at which he had he had options? I think that's a date of agreement. He could he could have, get away with with everything. But unfortunately, he was then five years in power. And he, as most of the power politicians, he liked that, especially after data magazine, and there was some positive thoughts coming from the west. You know, I recall that Richard Kovac, the late Richard Holbrook call him, he's the guarantor of the peace and stability of the Balkans, for Milosevic. So I think that he liked that. And he liked to be important figure, I mean, all his life, he wanted to do that, to make peace or or to wage war for him. For him, that was important role to play. So he couldn't do that. Probably because immediately after, he was faced with relatively decent opposition movement, which grew in Serbia, as he was really focusing more on what's happening in Croatia and Bosnia, than really what what's happening in domestic politics in Serbia, and there was this coalition, which was called coalition together, which, at one point in time, managed to get, you know, party infrastructure in place, and they and the first local elections immediately after datum agreement. They won 30 biggest towns in Serbia. And then I guess, he if he thought probably that they will, you know, they will overthrown him at one point. So instead of recognising the elections, he basically falsify them. And that resulted in the biggest way of demonstrations against me and Russia, which, since he's inception in power, that was an the protest lasted for three months. It has been internationalised oisc came. They verify their licence and recognise the victory of the of the opposition. And this This is the first time that the opposition got into power in Milosevic, Serbia, which then resulted in in Veen that happened three years after in 2000. So this was 1990 676. Yes, yeah. I mean, you were sort of what 1920 At this point, Eagle. I was I was 19. I looked up your age before we started, I didn't just guess. I was fresh. In Belgrade. I was still in the first year of the faculty below them. Okay. I mean, I wanted to ask because obviously, Milosevic had had lost three wars by this stage. You know, Yugoslavia had had lost Slovenia, Croatia, and now Bosnia. And what was it like living In Serbia at that time, I mean, did it feel like this was a country that was falling apart? From your point of view? Well, I think that living then in Serbia was kind of living in war, which you don't see. But it's happening. You see all the consequences of the war. You see people marching in the uniforms coming from the battlefields in Bosnia every weekend, getting drunk in the in this in towns in Serbia and shooting their college nickels when they get drunk. There was a lot of chaos. And you know, important thing is that, since that united to Serbia was under tough sanctions of the UN. So basically, there was no, let's say, gas align, there was no oil. And poverty was huge. And we and probably the most important thing for my generation, then that we couldn't travel. We were not allowed to travel. I mean, this turned out to be positive thing, because by preventing you to travel, you create a huge mass of people who are really unsatisfied with the situation or country. I think that helped topple Milosevic in the end. Because I mean, unlike today, when we have I will not call it similar, but again, very autocratic leader in empowering Serbia, our our youth are leaving the country. I mean, even then there were a lot of people who are leaving, but most of them were staying and really resisting this because they were not allowed to turn on the on on the on the other side, I think we were not very, I mean, most of the people didn't know what was happening really in Bosnia and Croatia, because Milosevic media propaganda was such that we were always the victims of the war, and only those who are either living close to the border, or who were really the witnesses. Were really aware of that. I mean, not to mention that we have couple of TV channels, which were only controlled by Milosevic, it was not allowed to watch, you know, international news channels like CNN or BBC. So it was not easy to get information. But for those people who were, let's say, living close to the border, or, or, you know, hearing things about things that are happening, bossier Patia I think it was they were aware that things were not going on. Right. Then, when the protests started, and with a really, police brutality, you know, going on really high level, I think people are starting to realise that. It's not only in Washington, that is hard, you know, harmful to other nations in in former country, but also to towards the Serbs as well. So this is the feeling that we that we had. In some ways, the speech that Milosevic gave, if you look back at the speech that he gave in 1987, about Kosovo, it kind of foreshadowed the end of his quest to keep Yugoslavia together, because his final quest was a war in in Kosovo, that was the fourth wall that he fought. And I suppose in some ways, it kind of raised the stakes for him Kosovo, because Kosovo had been part of Serbia. Do you think that was the case? Do you think that this was this was a more important psychological war? For him? It was very important that somehow, you know, when you look at the circle of the violence that broke out in Yugoslavia, somehow the war came home in that way, because the war was happening in the territory of then you go Slavia Serbia, excuse me. And it was the first time that actually Serbian citizens were witnessing the war as it was happening outside of Serbia. I think this was a long time coming because the first incidents actually, on the eve of the beginning of the solution in Slovenia started in Kosovo. So so it was only a matter of time that actually incidents will spread, and miasha, which was using this type of crisis and incidents really, to roll more efficiently. And, you know, in case of costs, costs are more ruthlessly. So I think, for the most people, this was the first time that their business in war because apart from the war in Kosovo, what we had is the NATO bombing of all Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. That means, today, Serbia and Montenegro, but also emotionally, Kosovo was, I think, much important for majority of the people in Serbia, because of the whole meet about Kosovo, that existed in Serbia. And yes, this was this was this was, in a way, let's say landscape of that war. Yeah. So getting back to this sort of 1389 battle that's become such a big part of Serbian nation building. I also, I mean, in the end, obviously, this was when the the sort of Western powers really lost patience with with Slobodan Milosevic. And they, as you said, they they consistently bombed Serbia through 99. And, and in the end, they actually they obviously occupied Kosovo and and now there are barely any Serbians left in Kosovo. And this was this was ultimately the end of Milosevic this final humiliation, which was his ousting in 2000. Yeah, so I mean, there, there. I mean, first of all, many Serbs left Kosovo. There are still some of them who remain. It is around 100,000 people out of 2 million courseware Albanians who are living there. The peace was signed. And then military agreement was signed, which actually declared and asked for Serbian authorities, especially military and police to withdraw from Kosovo. NATO's forces, nicknamed que for kings, and they occupied and they're still there. So yes, for for Milosevic, that was the end of the war games in the Balkans, he retreated in Belgrade, to declare victory over NATO on the 12th of June 1999. And that he managed to protect vital interests of Serbia, which was totally not true. Having in mind that basically effectively as of that, Serbian army, and police are not controlling the part of the territory. And he has become even more ruthless towards the, you know, open to intellectuals in Serbia to critical opposition to civil society than and he was in a way coordinate as of 1989, while the international community was starting to look for the political alternatives, and then they started basically talking with the with the middle opposition parties, pro democratic opposition parties. And then the other thing was that the economy was in such a dire state that after the war in Kosovo, we had average salary of 30 Deutschmarks, which is now 10 euros. And this practically lasted until the fall of until the fall of Milosevic in October 2000. The so called bulldozer revolution. Yes. Because of the of the presence of a bulldozer, I think, at the site of the parliament, right, they sort of drove a bulldozer into the into the parliament building in Belgrade. Yes, yes. What happened is that preparations for big demonstration that they will overthrow Milosevic will happening as of end of the bombing, actually, for everyone. It was clear that there is no political. I mean, there's no way that he'll he will win anything. Again. He lost the wars. He was the territorian for even the Washington importantly, it was clear there is no future for him. It was only a matter. It was only a matter of how, because he has militarised police, he has become very ruthless. He already did some political assassinations of prominent journalists in Serbia proper. Also hit here, paramilitaries who came back from all this battlefields, you know, in Yugoslavia, and they came back to Belgrade. So he had widespread, let's say, armed forces on his display in order to counter the opposition parties and to arrest people and to harass them and everything else. So yeah, the preparations were on the way and then suddenly, all of a sudden, he, he decided to go for the elections. And to become, he wanted to become a president, instead of be President of Serbia. He wants to be president of Yugoslavia for now, another time. He shortened his mandate, and, and then actually preparations for his first of all, Democratic Opposition of Serbia, which was a United opposition front against him, managed to get more votes on one hand side, on the other count side, on that fifth of October, so called bulldoze that abortion, they managed to defend their electoral electoral victory in the streets of elevate. That was the end of Milosevic. He ultimately ended up dying in a jail cell in The Hague in 2006. He was awaiting a trial for for war crimes. I mean, I just want to I want to reflect on on his image, but also on on the way that the West kind of treated this this part of the world during this period, I've often seen Milosevic derided as being a bit of an idiot, you know, self obsessed, never listening to his advisers creating this ridiculous world around him where everybody agreed with him, and that he was doing brilliantly. I was thinking this morning, though, this was a man that lost four walls. By 2000, his country's, his country was about a third of the sizes it had been when he took over. At the end of the 1980s, he must have had some political skill to have gotten through all of that he led the country, he was so bad, the 90s was so awful. And yet he got to the end of it. And he warded off the Western powers for a long, long time. He ultimately wasn't taken down by the West, he was taken down by his own people, there must have been some political skill there. He was the guy who was very tactical. And he was using the manoeuvring very much and playing, especially during the night is best against the east. And this is one of his skills. Secondly, he he knew very well how to when to stop, and then to be draw. He knew what were his red lines, until the very end. And he was good in. I mean, that was his good diplomatic skill. Also, I think that most of the people around him, were pretty much, you know, picturing really, really rosy picture of what was going on. But he was as being paranoid as he was, he didn't believe them. And I think that that was another thing that he that he had. Also, I think that the problem is no ostrich or or his good thing about me, Washington, which was that international community, as we know, as we know, it nowadays, was only developing, you know, and there was no not I mean, in a way, former Yugoslavia and Serbia, and we all switch particularly, but the case study of development of international criminal law. You know, just to remind you that he was the first acting leader, who was prosecuted before the International Criminal Court while he was acting while he was president. Really. It happened during the NATO bombing in March 1999. So, I mean, there was a lot of that international community learn from that case. You know, both from Bosnian War and then before from Rwanda war. And I think that he used those loops and gaps in the international community to stay along in power. It was not only thanks to the blindness of people of Serbia, but also, as I said, it was also no fault of them international community. Why do you think it took so long for NATO to intervene decisively in Yugoslavia in Milosevic's case, because I mean, this was worn, it was worn on before, by the time that they really turned up the heat. He'd been in power for quite a long time. Well, they first of all, had relative success. I mean, they were using blimp limited intervention in Bosnia. And there was a bombing of Serbian forces in Bosnia, just before the datum agreement. And that led to data agreement, which was very important agreement and peace agreement because it stopped the war in Bosnia, which was the most bloodiest one. And then they thought this this recipe will be, you know, used again. But although, and when I look back, I mean, probably, if they have bombed in it Nitin to maybe the wars would be prevented, but then as I said, there was no, you know, the conflict itself could have gone in either way, it could have been prevented. But in our case, it just, it just spread it, you know, so northern New Delhi, you know, and I m for the NATO. NATO was celebrating 40 years of existence it exactly on the debt here when the bombing of Serbia started. And I think they will not, I mean, there was a lot of negotiations that even when the NATO intervene, there were a lot of members of the NATO who were against that, you know, so there was no consensus on that. And since then, we're bonding the country, which is in the Europe, they need to have consensus, at least for the European partner. So there was a lot of consensus building within the NATO. And this was, in a way, the first first intervention when actually they had 70 countries on board agreeing to do this. So imagine the diplomacy behind that. And this is, this is why it took them so long, probably. Yeah, I mean, I suppose that it was the the war in Kosovo was the marker of the transition from NATO being essentially a defensive organisation to being one that was offensive, because it was intervening in a country that was not a NATO member for the for the first time. And it's and it's gone through something of a clunky transformation into a more offensive power. Since when I asked your colleague VOOk, Alexandrovich, a couple of weeks ago about the possibility of further conflict in Yugoslavia, he said that that was unlikely because there are still NATO troops in the region. When I was listening to that back afterwards, though, it struck me that if the reason you're not concerned about further conflict, is because there are foreign troops there. It does beg the question of what would be happening if they weren't there. And the fact that the NATO troops are still there also calls into question the, the original NATO interventions in Bosnia and Kosovo, because if they're still there, you know, nearly 25 years after, has the situation really been bettered? I mean, in that context, I was just wondering, what do you think of the success of the NATO intervention? Do you think you can call it a success, given that they're still there? Well, I mean, probably you will have totally different question or answers. If you ask different people from from this part of the region, whether it was a success or not, especially, I mean, if you take into account totally different position of Serbs and Albanians for Albanians, it was a huge success. Because, you know, not much after that in 2008, they declared the cost was in independent country, while for Serbs that was a tough I mean, it was a loss of territory, and more importantly, very much loss of the emotional, historical part of the country. Whether it was a success, it was a success in a way that it prevented ethnic cleansing of Kosovar Albanians. And that was a short term success. It managed to somehow to put religion into peace. And when I say peace, this is not and this is probably your question about whether this peace is sustainable or not. I think that we don't care potential anymore to wage war. I don't think any nation, but whether we progressed into a European region that actually instead of conflicts, we are seeking, partnership, cooperation and progress, we are still not there. And I would say we are somewhere in between, there are still hatred. There are still tensions. I mean, they cannot be compared with the 90s, of course, but we still do need to have, I think, another generation of politicians who will actually secure that peace is sustainable, and that it is grounded in a way that we can build something on base. And I think that is something that is still missing here. Just as a final question, when I speak to westerners about Yugoslavia, I'm struck by how often they see Serbia as the bogeyman. I was speaking to a friend of mine about this recently. But I also think that, and this is something that you alluded to the fact that actually in World War Two, the Serbs were the victims, not the perpetrators of genocidal tendencies. I was thinking that if if, if we were speaking in, say, 19 7250 years ago, instead of 2022, we would see Croatia as the bogeyman because of what they did to Serbia in World War Two. As a Serbian, are you are you conscious of a certain degree of ill feeling abroad? Well, not any more, I was aware of that. And I was faced with that, immediately after democratic changes took place in 2000. When I was first, you know, first travelling to abroad, I was face to face with these questions, because, yes, there was a huge negative image of Serbia and Serbs because of Milosevic. And, you know, if I was asked, I remember in 2001, when I was in us, and I said, I'm from Serbia people, but didn't know what is what is the what is the name of the country? And the guy was, is that Slovakia? No, I said it's Serbia. Oh, I know. That's what I mean, watch which. So, I mean, he's really, you know, his connection in Serbia was Slobodan Milosevic, which is the guy I hated the most, you know, at the time. So, yes, I was aware of that. But I think that that that no longer exists, although, I have to say that for the old diplomatic internationals, who were working in Serbia, in the 90s, this is still the case. And they should steal this type of black or white. And good guys, bad guys. worldview. And this goes especially in in, you know, with the people who saw some, you know, really, really bad things happening in this region. But I think things in that way things are changing. So yeah, yeah. And I think image is improving things to other people, you know, who are famous Serbs. And do you see it as your job at the, at the Belfer grade security centre to kind of continue that to rehabilitate Serbia's image to some extent? Well, we are not really trying to do that. I think that's, that's, that's the job of this country and job of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I, but if I would be in their position, I would never make a rosy picture of the things or, you know, deny, deny things that happening. Because these things were happening under the regime of Slobodan Milosevic. Many people truly supported it, but many people didn't. You know, Serbia was famous for these things, but Serbia was also famous for the first anti war movement. Back in Yugoslavia, the first protests that happened in you Slavia against bombing of Dubrovnik happened in Belgrade the biggest number of individuals were fighting war and violence happen in Serbia. So, you know, it was even then that it proved to have democratic capacities. So you know, you don't need to brag about Serbia being an you know, just picture, the better image you can tell the true and people will choose on their own whether they will like it or not. Ego thank you I really enjoyed that. Is there anything you want to direct people towards people that are listening? You know, if people want to find out more about the work you do, where can they go? They can go to our website, it's www best bednarz.org We are working on foreign security policy of Serbia and region there are a lot of useful information and if they are not interested in with that they can just come to Serbia and they will see a lovely nature and enjoy the summer. Eagle Thank you. Thank you. 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