by Marinko CULIC
Now that plan can only be achieved at a much larger or even the highest possible cost. If Djukanovic keeps insisting on an independence referendum, that could be an introduction into ulsterization of Montenegro. Or, to be clearer, an introduction into creation of some sort of Slav Northern Ireland, in which one and the same nation, split by tribal and other borders, heads for two different states. Thus the survival of Yugoslavia becomes a sensible alternative at the most absurd moment of her history, when almost all the content had been sucked out of her name. Only an empty husk that flies in the wind has remained.
To at least one half of Montenegrins Yugoslavia has no meaning at all. To make everything even more bizarre, among their implacable opponents, Serbs, the mistrust is even higher. However, Yugoslavia will, under this or some other name, apparently survive and that is without doubt a big defeat for Djukanovic. Most importantly, that is a defeat that could hardly have been avoided, regardless of the somewhat open somewhat more discrete support that Milo got from outside, including Croatia. The defeat came because of the unprecedented autism of the Montenegrin president, who even after the "October revolution" and the fall of Milosevic kept pretending that nothing had changed in Belgrade. He tried to convince himself and others that only the leaders were different but that the policy was the same.
The magnitude of his mistake is probably best illustrated by the fact that Belgrade hardly paid attention to Djukanovic's ravings, allowing that self-destructive verbal ritual to reach its conclusion. And really, when everything was over, the main victim of Djukanovic's verbal tirades was he himself, while on the opposing side hardly a scratch was noticeable. Therefore, he passed his own verdict. His supporters and prompters from Croatia in time pulled out to make sure they were not caught on the scene of the accident. However, even that would have most likely happened had they not received a signal from the Western governments to get out, as Djukanovic does not any more enjoy the same leniency in the West he had during Milosevic's time.
Otherwise, Zagreb would have almost certainly been caught in embrace with Podgorica, as it has almost been forced to do so by its primitive political instinct to which it can hardly resist even after changes from January 3 2001. That is the instinct that Croatia must always and in everything oppose Belgrade, even when Belgrade is on the ropes; even at the moment when even basic knowledge of history warns that Serbia destroyed and humiliated just like Weimar Germany can become a potential source of revanchism and new military conflict in the region. This should especially be kept in mind in the light of something that is becoming increasingly visible, and indicates that we do not after all know everything about the recent history of this region, as we have until recently thought, and there is a lot of uncertainty in it.
The best indication of that is the new wave of instability and conflicts that has recently started in the former Yugoslavia even though the chief riders of the Balkan apocalypse - Milosevic, Tudman, Izetbegovic - are now out of saddle, while some of them are not even among us. That of course does not mean that they are to be released from responsibility for wars fought during the last decade, but that definitely means that the circle of responsible individuals does not end with them. Besides, towards the end of that period, some nationalisms that at first were not so prominent matured and reached adulthood, so to speak. A part of responsibility for that is definitely shared by the international community, which as a rule encouraged those nationalisms to assert themselves by making territorial demands, rather then by striving for some mode of regional or group autonomy without territorial basis.
Besides, as was obvious in some cases, as for example recently in Macedonia, international officials allow legal authorities in some countries to deal on their own with nationalist "revolutions" and thereby demonstrate whether they actually deserve to have their own state. They got involved and provided assistance only after that survival test had been passed. To a smaller extent that approach was used in the post-Milosevic Yugoslavia, as until recently Montenegro kept receiving rather unconvincing requests to give up secession. That was advice that should have been followed, but nothing bad would have happened if Montenegro decided to reject it.
Only after Djukanovic's electoral fiasco it is to be expected that that bilingual communication will cease and that Montenegrin president will be given strict instructions to slow down and stop risking a civil war in deeply divided Montenegro. There is no doubt that in accordance with that it will also be demanded from Croatia to align her diplomacy with the new circumstances. But even without that Croatia must be interested in the events in the Balkan east, among other because those events will to a large extent correspond to some developments in Croatia. Namely, although Djukanovic's push for Montenegrin independence is most likely to fail, it is certain that regionalist tendencies will escalate in Montenegro, Kosovo, Macedonia, Bosnia-Hercegovina...
On most cases that will be a compensation for the unrealized statehood of minority ethnic communities, but regionalization will also go in other directions, affecting even the most ethnically homogeneous states. That is why Croatia will also be affected, although she is doing everything to prevent that. The decision by the government to suspend the key parts of the Istria County statute is naked violence against these expected post-Yugoslav processes, and violence conducted for the sake of politics. Those processes are strongly supported as long as they take place abroad but if they are even as much as mentioned in Croatia, that is a cause for panic. Istrians are being threatened (Racan), told that they have opened Pandora's box, as now it could even happen that "some counties demand the introduction of the Serb or Hungarian language into official use". What horror!
One of ethnically and religiously most homogeneous states in this part of Europe is afraid that the remaining few percentages of the different ones - some of whom have these days been beaten up without punishment in the center of Zagreb - may steal the state. That is why we screamed at the very mention of the "equality" of Croatian and Italian languages, although the inhabitants of the Istrian peninsula decided that that should be the case, since as many as two thirds of them use both languages. But that does not mean anything to the official Zagreb, which should not be surprising, as it obviously has a different view of ethnic minority issues.
Namely, ethnic minority rights are treated as something that is given to minorities, and always in fear that too much could be given out, instead of being treated as something that belongs to minorities (and is guaranteed by the Croatian laws).
Unfortunately, the government and its legal "experts" apparently do not even realize where they are going with this course of action. And they have gone so far - and they should be told this - that they are even retroactively giving legitimacy to the Serb rebellion in Croatia as now, it turns out that Serbs had to fight for the rights that belong to them. In that case, isn't it obvious that the recent events provide legitimacy to the demands of Istrians and Istrian Italians? All their demands have been made in the state institutions and even at the time when that was not possible, as under Tudman, they did not rebel but calmly accepted defeat.
Therefore, exactly they were in the best position to lay the path for the organization of regions as non-state creations, but in accordance with their ethnic and other characteristics. That is why uncontrolled outbursts of rage, in which even an Istrian "revolution" is mentioned, are an unnecessary gaffe of the Istrian political leadership, which can thereby only turn the public against itself. Nervous outbursts should be left to the other side. It can maybe slow down or delay regionalization, but it will most definitely not stop it.