Breakup of Yugoslavia

An animated series of maps showing the breakup of the second Yugoslavia; The different colors represent the areas of control.
Key:

  Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia

  Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Serbia and Montenegro, Serbia

  Slovenia

  Croatia

  Republic of Macedonia

  Inter-Entity Boundary Line (IEBL): Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska

  Kosovo

  Montenegro

Yugoslavia was a south-eastern European country in the Balkans, a region with a long history of sectarian and ethnic conflict. It was a conglomeration of six regional republics and two autonomous provinces that roughly divided on ethnic lines which split up in the 1990s into five independent countries. These eight federal units were the six republics: Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and two autonomous provinces within Serbia: Kosovo and Vojvodina. The most important elements which fostered the hatred that split into the civil war are the formation of the first Yugoslavia, the civil war during the Second World War, the overreaching idea of "Greater Serbia" and the Balkan adaptations of Pan-Slavism. The borders dividing the republics were the product of old treaties signed by the great European powers. Among the republics created was ethnically mixed Bosnia-Herzegovina. Bosnia had never been a modern state, moreover, it did not have a clear ethnic majority with “44% Muslims, 33% Serbs, and the remaining population consisting of Croats and other minorities.” This left "Greater Serbia" open to interpretation, with large tracks of Bosnia and Croatia under dispute as to its proper ownership.

Timeline of the breakup of Yugoslavia

After the death of Josip Broz Tito

After the death of Tito on 4 May 1980, ethnic tensions grew in Yugoslavia. The death of Tito removed what many Yugoslavs and Westerners saw as the country’s main unifying force. The legacy of the Constitution of 1974 was used to throw the system of decision-making into a state of paralysis, all the more hopeless as the conflict of interests had become irreconcilable. The constitutional crisis that inevitably followed played in favour of Slovenia and Croatia and their strongly expressed demands for looser ties within the Federation.

1986-1989

In 1986, the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts drafted a memorandum addressing some burning issues concerning position of Serbs as the most numerous people in Yugoslavia. Although the largest Yugoslav republic in territory and population, Serbia had been dispossessed of its attributes of statehood by the new 1974 Constitution. Because its two autonomous provinces had de facto prerogatives of full-fledged republics, Serbia found that its hands were tied, for the republican government could not take nor carry out decisions that would apply to the provinces. Since the provinces had a vote in the Federal Presidency Council, they even entered into coalition with other republics, thus outvoting Serbia. Serbia's political impotence made it possible for others to exert pressure on the 2 million Serbs (20% of total Serbian population) living outside Serbia.

File:Smilo.jpg

Slobodan Milošević.

Serbian communist leader Slobodan Milošević sought to restore pre-1974 Serbian sovereignty, which the republics of Slovenia and Croatia denounced as the revival of great Serbian hegemonism. The autonomy of Vojvodina and of Kosovo and Metohija was reduced, though both entities retained a vote in the Yugoslav Presidency Council.

As a result, the ethnic Albanian miners in Kosovo organized strikes, which dovetailed into ethnic conflict between the Albanians and the non-Albanians in the province. At 77% of the population of Kosovo in the 1980s, ethnic- Albanians were the majority. The number of Slavs in Kosovo (mainly Serbs) was falling fast due to the ever increasing violence of Albanians against Serbian population, and by 1999 they formed as little as 10% of the total population. This was a far cry from the days when it was the other way around, less than a hundred years before.

Meanwhile Slovenia, under the presidency of Milan Kučan, along with Croatia openly supported Albanian miners, and initial strikes turned into widespread demonstrations demanding a Kosovo republic. This angered Serbia's leadership who proceeded to use police to restrain the violence. As police was insufficient force, the Federal Army was ordered by the Yugoslav Presidency to restore order.

1990s

In January 1990, the extraordinary 14th Congress of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia was convened. For most of the time, the Slovenian and Serbian delegations were arguing over the future of the League of Communists and Yugoslavia. The Serbian delegation, led by Milošević, insisted on a policy of "one person, one vote", which would empower the majority population, the Serbs. In turn, the Slovenians, supported by Croatians, sought to reform Yugoslavia by devolving even more power to republics, but were voted down. As a result, the Slovenian, and eventually Croatian delegation left the Congress, and the all-Yugoslav Communist party was dissolved.

Following the fall of communism in the rest of Eastern Europe, each of the republics held multi-party elections in 1990. The unresolved issues remained. In particular, Slovenia and Croatia elected governments oriented towards independence (under Milan Kučan and Franjo Tuđman, respectively), while Serbia and Montenegro elected candidates who favoured Yugoslav unity. In Croatia there was growing advocacy of "Croatian state and historical rights", the Serbs were stripped of their national and constitutional rights, thus becoming demoted from a constituent nation of Croatia to national minority. Following this, the Serbs proclaimed the emergence of Serbian Autonomous Areas (known later as Republic of Serb Krajina) in Croatia. Croatia embarked upon the illegal importation of arms, mainly from Hungary, and were caught when Yugoslav Counter Intelligence (KOS, Kontra-obavještajna Služba) showed a video of a secret meeting between Croatian Defence Minister Martin Špegelj and two men. Špegelj announced that they were at war with the army and gave instructions about arms smuggling as well as methods of dealing with the Yugoslav Army's officers stationed in Croatian cities.

In March 1990, during the demonstrations in Split (Croatia), a young Yugoslav conscript was pushed off the tank after driving it through people. Also guns were fired from army bases through Croatia. Elsewhere, tensions were running high.

In the same month, the Yugoslav People's Army (Jugoslovenska Narodna Armija, JNA) met with the Presidency of Yugoslavia (an eight member council composed of representatives from six republics and two autonomous provinces) in an attempt to get them to declare a state of emergency which would allow for the army to take control of the country. The representatives of Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo and Metohija, and Vojvodina voted for the decision, while Croatia (Stipe Mesić), Slovenia (Janez Drnovšek), Macedonia (Vasil Tupurkovski) and Bosnia and Hercegovina (Bogić Bogićević) voted against. The tie delayed an escalation of conflicts, but not for long.

Following the first multi-party election results, the republics of Slovenia and Croatia, further seeking to provoke the JNA into declaring a state of emergency, proposed transforming Yugoslavia into a loose confederation of six republics in the autumn of 1990, however Milošević rejected all such proposals, arguing that like Slovenes and Croats, the Serbs should also have a right to self-determination.

On March 9, 1991 demonstrations were held against Slobodan Milošević in Belgrade, but the police and the military were deployed in the streets in order to restore order, killing two people. In late March 1991, the Plitvice Lakes incident was one of the first sparks of open war in Croatia. The Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) maintained an impression of being neutral, but as time went on, it was becoming more and more involved in state politics.

On June 25, 1991, Slovenia and Croatia became the first republics to declare independence from Yugoslavia. In Slovenia, Slovenian people's defence (paramilitary force) seized the Yugoslav border posts with Austria and Italy taking down the Yugoslav and raising the Slovenian flag. The following day (June 26), the Federal Executive Council speifically ordered the army to take control of the internationally recognized borders.

The Yugoslav People's Army forces, based in barracks in Slovenia and Croatia, attempted to carry out the task within next 48 hours. However, due to the misinformation given to the Yugoslav Army conscripts, and the fact that the majority of them did not wish to engage in a war on their home soil, the Slovene territorial defence forces retook most of the posts within several days with only minimal loss of life on both sides. Recently the Austrian ORF TV station showed footage of several young Yugoslav soldiers at Holmec (border crossing with Austria), carrying a white cloth and raising their hands in the air, apparently to surrender to the Slovenian territorial defence, before gunfire was heard and the troops were seen falling down. However, none were killed in the incident. Ceasefire was agreed on. In the Brioni Agreement, agreed upon by representatives of all republics, the international community pressured Slovenia and Croatia to place a three-month moratorium on their illegal independence declarations. During these three months, the Yugoslav Army completed its pull-out from Slovenia, but in Croatia, a bloody war broke out in the autumn of 1991. Ethnic Serbs, who had created the their own state Republic of Serbian Krajina in heavily Serb-populated regions resisted the forces of the republic of Croatia who were trying to bring that breakaway region back under Croatian jurisdiction. In some places, the Yugoslav Army acted as a buffer zone, in others it was protecting the Serbs from new Croatian Army disguised as a police force.

War in former Yugoslavia.

Countries of former Yugoslavia.

In September 1991, the Republic of Macedonia also declared independence illegaly, becoming the only former republic to gain sovereignty without resistance from the Belgrade-based Yugoslav authorities. Five hundred U.S. soldiers were then deployed under the U.N. banner to monitor Macedonia's northern borders with the Republic of Serbia, Yugoslavia. Macedonia's first president, Kiro Gligorov, maintained good relations with Belgrade and the other breakaway republics and there have to date been no problems between Macedonian and Serbian border police even though small pockets of Kosovo and the Preševo valley complete the northern reaches of the historical region known as Macedonia, which would otherwise create a border dispute if ever Macedonian nationalism should resurface (see IMORO).

As a result of the conflict, the United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted UN Security Council Resolution 721 on November 27, 1991, which paved the way to the establishment of peacekeeping operations in Yugoslavia.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina in November 1991, the Bosnian Serbs held a referendum which resulted in an overwhelming vote in favour of staying in a common state with Serbia and Montenegro. On January 9, 1992 the Bosnian Serb assembly proclaimed a separate "Republic of the Serb people of Bosnia and Herzegovina". The referendum and creation of SARs were proclaimed unconstitutional by the government of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and declared illegal and invalid. However, in February-March 1992 the government held a national referendum on Bosnian independence from Yugoslavia. That referendum was in turn declared contrary to the BiH and Federal constitution by the federal Constitution court and the newly established Bosnian Serb government; it was largely boycotted by the Bosnian Serbs. The turnout was somewhere between 64-67% and 98% of the voters voted for independence. It was unclear what the two-thirds majority requirement actually meant and whether it was satisfied . The republic's government declared its independence on 5 April, and the Serbs immediately declared the independence of Republika Srpska. The war in Bosnia followed shortly thereafter.

The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia consisted of Serbia and Montenegro.

The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) was formed on April 28, 1992, and it consisted of the former Socialist Republics of Serbia and Montenegro.

The war in the western parts of former Yugoslavia ended in 1995 with U.S.-sponsored peace talks in Dayton, Ohio, which resulted in the so-called Dayton Agreement.

In Kosovo, throughout the 1990s, the leadership of the Albanian population had been pursuing tactics of non-violent resistance in order to achieve independence for the province. In 1996, radical Albanians formed the Kosovo Liberation Army which carried out armed actions in the southern Serbian province. The Yugoslav reaction involved the indiscriminate use of force against civilian populations, and caused many ethnic-Albanians to flee their homes. Following the Racak incident and unsuccessful Rambouillet Agreement in the early months of 1999, NATO proceeded to bombard Serbia and Montenegro for more than two months, until the Milošević's government submitted to their demands and withdrew its forces from Kosovo. See Kosovo War for more information. Since June 1999, the province has been governed by peace-keeping forces from NATO and Russia, although all parties continue to recognize it as a part of Serbia.

21st century

Milošević's rejection of claims of a first-round opposition victory in new elections for the Federal presidency in September 2000 led to mass demonstrations in Belgrade on October 5 and the collapse of the regime's authority. The opposition's candidate, Vojislav Koštunica took office as Yugoslav president on October 6, 2000. On Saturday, March 31, 2001, Milošević surrendered to Yugoslav security forces from his home in Belgrade, following a recent warrant for his arrest on charges of abuse of power and corruption. On June 28 he was driven to the Yugoslav-Bosnian border where shortly after he was placed in the custody of SFOR officials, soon to be extradited to the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. His trial on charges of genocide in Bosnia and war crimes in Croatia and in Kosovo and Metohija began at The Hague on February 12, 2002, and he died there on 11 March, 2006, while his trial was still ongoing. On April 11, 2002, the Yugoslav parliament passed a law allowing extradition of all persons charged with war crimes by the International Criminal Tribunal.

In March 2002, the Governments of Serbia and Montenegro agreed to reform the FRY in favour of a new, much weaker form of cooperation called Serbia and Montenegro. By order of the Yugoslav Federal Parliament on February 4, 2003, Yugoslavia, at least nominally, ceased to exist. A federal government remained in place in Belgrade but assumed largely ceremonial powers. The individual governments of Serbia and of Montenegro conducted their respective affairs almost as though the two republics were independent. Furthermore, customs were established along the traditional border crossings between the two republics.

On May 21, 2006, 86 percent of eligible Montenegrin voters turned out for a special referendum on the independence of Montenegro from the state union with Serbia. They voted 55.5% in favour of independence, recognised as above the 55% threshold set by the European Union for formal recognition of the independence of Montenegro. On June 3, 2006, Montenegro officially declared its independence, with Serbia following suit two days later, effectively dissolving the last vestige of the former Yugoslavia.

New states

The present-day countries created from the former parts of Yugoslavia are:

• Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Croatia
• Montenegro
• Republic of Macedonia
• Serbia
• Slovenia

Reasons for the breakup

Structural problems

Tito’s Yugoslavia was characterised by constant reforms which failed to resolve key national problems. Moreover, the federal system, due to increasing national tensions, and the communist party’s wish to support "national self determination" began to loosen its control. This resulted in the creation of Kosovo, an autonomous region of Serbia, legislated by the 1974 constitution. This constitution broke down powers between the capital and the newly created autonomous regions in Vojvodina (an area of Yugoslavia with a large number of ethnic minorities) and Kosovo (with a large Albanian population). This not only exacerbated Serbian fears of a "weak Serbia, for a strong Yugoslavia" but also hit at the heart of Serbian national sentiment. A majority of Serbs see Kosovo as the "cradle of the nation," and would not accept the possibility of losing it to the majority Albanian population. Albanians were especially feared because they were both Muslims and non-Slavs.

Kosovo's special significance was due to the defeat of Prince Lazar, the last King of Serbia. It was said that he was betrayed at the Battle of Kosovo Polje against the invading Ottoman Turks. The devastating defeat was the end of the Serbian kingdom and the beginning of 400 years of subjugation under the Ottomans. However, the first records of the battle weren’t created till 100 years after the battle, and then in the form of a poem. The romantic spin given to this episode of history contributed to the sacred and hallowed nature of the region of Kosovo. The significance of Kosovo in the Serbian mindset was so strong that Serbian children were christened as “little avengers of Kosovo.” This emotional attachment to Kosovo was a major reason for the Kosovo War that broke out in 1999.

This loosened version of the federation, essentially made Yugoslavia a de facto confederacy, placing pressure upon the legitimacy of the regime and engendered resentment in the richer republics. Slovenia and Croatia, the most developed republics were continually frustrated by their inability to further lift their standard of living as they had to subsidize the development of the poor republics in what they described as an "economic black hole." It highlighted the vast differences in the quality of life in the different republics. Tito’s death created further problems, in an effort to ensure his legacy, Tito’s 1974 constitution established a system of year long presidencies, on a rotation basis out of the eight leaders of the republics. Such short terms were highly ineffective. Essentially it left a power vacuum which was left open for most of the 1980s, with only Slobodan Milošević taking the reigns in 1987.

Economic weakness

Along with internal structural problems, Yugoslavia was further undermined by economic factors. Yugoslavia’s non-aligned stance had resulted in access to loans from both superpower blocs. This contact with the West opened up Yugoslavia’s markets sooner than the rest of Central and Eastern Europe. The 1973 oil crisis coupled with Western trade barriers, dramatically hindered her thirty years of breakneck economic growth. In order to maintain this, Yugoslavia took on a number of International Monetary Fund (IMF) loans and subsequently fell into heavy IMF debt. As a condition of receiving loans, the IMF demands certain "liberalisation" of a country’s market place. During this time Yugoslavia incurred $19.9 billion in foreign debt by 1981. This problem was compounded by the general "unproductiveness of the South," which not only added to Yugoslavia’s economic woes, but also irritated Slovenia and Croatia further. However of real concern was the unemployment rate, at 1 million by 1980. The recession lowered the number of consumer products available, which had always been higher in Yugoslavia than in other socialist states. It illustrated to the general public the incompetence of the communist party to run the system. A decade of tightening belts resulted in growing frustration and resentment against the both Serbian ‘ruling class,’ and the minorities who were seen to benefit from government legislation.

The international climate

Yugoslavia was a unique state, straddling both the East and West. Moreover, Tito was fundamental maker of the third world or "group of 77" which acted as an alternative to the superpowers. More importantly, Yugoslavia acted as a buffer state between the West and the Soviet Union and also prevented the Soviets from getting a toehold on the Mediterranean Sea. However, with the rise of Gorbachev, perestroika and glasnost, the West felt secure enough in the USSR’s intentions that Yugoslavia was no longer of strategic importance. The external status quo, which the Communist Party had depended upon to remain viable was beginning to disappear. Furthermore, the failure of socialism all over Central and Eastern Europe once again brought Yugoslavia’s inner contradictions, inefficiencies and ethno-religious tensions to the surface.

Nationalism

The perceived disadvantage on the part of the Slovenes and Croatians, the inefficacies of the state, and the "disproportionate" majority of Serbs in the state apparatus allowed nationalist leaders such as Franjo Tudjman of Croatia to whip up nationalistic sentiment in order to demand independence. Tudjman’s reinstatement of the Croatian Checkerboard as the symbol of Croat independence ignited fears of a return to the fascist World War II-era Ustaše state, which was compounded further by circulation of a new currency also named after its Ustaše counterpart. Tudjman’s government-controlled press portrayed the Serb population within Croatia as subversive and imperialistic.

Slobodan Milošević was a master demagogue. In 1989, the 600th anniversary of Serbia’s historic defeat at Kosovo Polje, Milošević gave a highly provocative speech to one million Serbs, which made reference to the nation's great historic past. Milošević’s answer to the incompetence of the federal system was to centralize the government. Considering Slovenia and Croatia were looking farther ahead to independence, this was considered unacceptable.

At the Yugoslav conference in late 1989 talks broke down. The leaders could not come to an agreement on how to deal with the rotating presidency. Moreover many members were no longer willing to rescue what they saw as a sunken ship. War soon broke out in Slovenia in 1990. After a week, the Slovenes were victorious and the break up of Yugoslavia had begun.

References

• Almond, Mark, Europe’s Backyard War, William Heinemann Ltd, Great Britain, 1994
• et. al. Duncan, W. Raymond and Holman, G. Paul, Ethnic Nationalism and Regional Conflict: The Former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia, Westview Press Inc, USA, 1994. ISBN 0-8133-8813-9
• Dragosavljevic, Angelija, Slobodan Milosevic: A Study In Charismatic Leadership And Its Distortions 1987-1992, Australian National University Press, Canberra, 1993
• Magas, Branka, The Destruction of Yugoslavia: Tracking the Break-up 1980–1992, Verso, Great Britain, 1993. ISBN 0-86091-593-X
• Mojzes, Paul, Yugoslavian Inferno: in the Balkans, The Continuum Publishing company, USA, 1994
• Parenti, Micheal, To Kill a Nation: The Attack on Yugoslavia, Verso, London, 2000
• Radan, Peter, Break-up of Yugoslavia and International Law, Routaledge, Great Britain, 2002
• Woodward, Susan, L. Balkan Tragedy: Chaos & Dissolution after the Cold War, the Brookings Institution Press, Virginia, USA, 1995

See also

The present-day countries created from the former parts of Yugoslavia:

• Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Croatia
• Montenegro
• Republic of Macedonia
• Serbia
• Slovenia