yugoslavias implosion

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ChApter 2
within the unitary state. 187 Mamula insisted on reorganizing the ypa
and the Territorial Defense Forces to prepare for possible internal
disturbances and conflicts as well to accord with the amendments to
the 1974 Constitution. His main goal was to put Territorial Defense
under Army control, and in 1982 a new strategy was adopted whereby
the ypa was incorporated into the model of national defense and
social self-protection. The Council for Territorial Defense had been
formed in 1980, leading to the ypa’s full organizational and command
control of Yugoslavia’s military forces, including the State Security
Service and the Worker’s State Militia. With ypa Colonel-General
Franjo Herljević as federal secretary for internal affairs, the Council
for Territorial Defense assumed the duties and powers previously
assigned to local political authorities under Article II of the Law on
National Defense, thereby increasing the ypa’s military and political
authority. Such a concentration of military, paramilitary, secret
police, and criminal police power was unprecedented in Yugoslavia’s
postwar history and proved to be decisive in the collapse of
Yugoslavia. 188
REORGANIZING THE ARMY, DISARMING THE REPUBLICS
As a result of skilful lobbying by the Army leadership, orchestrated
by Mamula, the Law on National Defense of the sfry was
amended in 1982. Commenting on the resistance within the sfry
Presidency to amending the law, Mamula writes: “That was a valuable
lesson for us—that any subsequent review of concept, strategy
and defense plans must remain internal. We were forced to exercise
caution and apply all kinds of lobbying to obtain their verification by
the Presidency,” a statement that indicates the degree to which the
ypa had become independent. 189
187 Ibid. p . 51 .
188 Marko Milivojević in Yugoslavia’s Security Dilemmas, p . 36–37 .
189 Branko Mamula, Slučaj Jugoslavija, CID Podgorica, 2000, p .34 .