yugoslavias implosion

24
IntroduCtIon
occupy a prominent, even at times dominant, political role, because
the dream of a Greater Serbia could only be realized by an exercise
of power, including military power.
Throughout the twentieth century, whatever the structure of
the state, the Army has played an active role in politics. Usually, it has
served as a loyal instrument of the regime, fighting to enlarge Serbian
territory or to maintain order within the country. But it has also
been a force to be reckoned with, even by the king or the Communist
leadership, and has at times operated as an independent political
actor, formulating and pursuing its own goals for the nation.
The Serbian leadership and the military had an identical stance
on the 1974 Constitution, and in the early 1980s they both pressed for
its amendment with the aim of recentralizing Yugoslavia. The Yugoslav
People’s Army (ypa) grew more powerful and influential as the
1980s advanced and Yugoslav society became more militarized. The
ypa and the Serbian leadership were also in full agreement that Serbs
had played a decisive role in the establishment of Yugoslavia, both
in 1918 and in 1945, and that they constituted an integrating factor
because of their size and distribution in the country.
By 1990, the ypa had become the de facto Serbian army, with
General Veljko Kadijević, the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia’s
minister of defense, pledging that “the ypa shall defend the
Serbs and define the borders of the future Yugoslavia.” A shared
commitment to recentralization was the glue that bound the ypa to
the Serbian leadership, but in the process of pursuing that objective,
the ypa relinquished its founding principles—namely, to defend the
people of Yugoslavia from external threats. Actions that ultimately
brought about the downfall of the ypa included the boycott of the
federal parliament; the subjugation and decommissioning of the Territorial
Defense Units; siding with the Serbian government during
wars in Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina; and mobilizing
volunteers to replenish the swiftly diminishing rank and file forces.