From: malenovi@plains.NoDak.edu (Malenovic Nikola V.)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.yugoslavia
Subject: Zivota Panic, tank driver ( VREME NDA 28 Aug 1992 )
Date: 28 Aug 92 20:45:52 GMT
Article-I.D.: plains.19950
Organization: North Dakota Higher Education Computing Network


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     "Vreme" News Digest Agency                     No. 47, August 17, 1992
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    Zivota Panic, tank driver
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                          GOING THROUGH A MINE-FIELD


    Perhaps General  Panic is the  perfect person for  the task he  is faced
    with: to bridge the gap between the old army and the new army, which the
    younger  officers  want,  and  at  the  same  time  preserve the big and
    delicate body, like that of any other army.

    General Zivota  Panic, chubby and  not unlike Jozef  Schweik, became the
    Chief of  General Staff of  the beaten-up and  mangled Yugoslav People's
    Army (JNA)  at the critical moment,  early in May, when  the former team
    was  chased   away.  Thirty-eight  generals  had   been  retired  in  an
    unprecedented  purge, and  the Chief  of General  Staff, General Blagoje
    Adzic, was forced to resign. The  difference between the old and the new
    chief  of   general  staff  is  illustrative:   Adzic  is  solitary  and
    stationary,  Panic is  quick and  lively, Adzic  is arrogant  and has no
    feeling for human relationships, Panic is pleasant and friendly, open --
    although  cunning --  and well-liked  by his  subordinates. While  Adzic
    yelled at soldiers and went for his  gun, Panic sat with them, offered a
    cigarette and finally took them for a drink. Blagoje Adzic was a general
    of the Brezhnev-type  real socialism. Panic learned his  trade as a tank
    driver in the  field, from the bottom of the  ladder, without a Partisan
    pedigree,  working  hard  and  was  noticed  for  his  expert  work, not
    political acceptability.

    As a major in Kumanovo (Macedonia),  Zivota Panic had been the best tank
    driver in JNA.  His subordinates, during various periods  of his career,
    have hailed him as a good man and a pal, as well as a clever officer who
    knew how to treat people. General  Panic will now need everything he has
    learned in  provincial garrisons and  muddy fields, because  he is in  a
    spot in which no Yugoslav general has ever been.

    Perhaps General  Panic is the  perfect person for  the task he  is faced
    with: to bridge the gap between the old army and the new army, which the
    younger  officers  want,  and  at  the  same  time  preserve the big and
    delicate body, like that of any other army.

    In view of  the damage that has already been  done and the dangers which
    are still lurking,  a good tank driver is perhaps  the best choice: they
    are  taught to  be responsible  for costly  equipment, to  take care  of
    supplies and plans, not to wander  off in mountain gorges and canyons or
    fall out  in pieces, because tanks  can only be effective  if they stick
    together.

    The  tactical  advantages  of  General  Zivota  Panic in the forthcoming
    crisis are not negligible: he is  a stable person from Trstenik (central
    Serbia), with  good family breeding and  a good marriage. He  enjoys the
    support of his  subordinates and is well-liked; he  is a good tactician,
    flexible  but  also  courageous  when  necessary.  He  can face reality,
    instead of ignoring it for the sake of doctrine.

    However,  the  dangers  are  much  greater  than the advantages: namely,
    General  Zivota Panic  is, in  spite of  everything, a  JNA officer.  In
    short, this inevitably means political  rigidness (a first love is never
    forgotten) and leaves a dilemma about the honesty of the "democratic and
    professional" orientation of the new army.  No one in the army is having
    an  easy time  now. The  army is  dealing with  a nationalist regime and
    ethnic cleansing in its own ranks. No  one can say for sure what General
    Zivota Panic,  from Trstenik, thinks  about this. He  must drive through
    the  mine-field very  carefully, like  walking on  eggs because even one
    mine is enough, and there are so many ...

    The Army of  Yugoslavia is in a doctrinal and  moral crisis: it has lost
    Bosnia  whose  natural  (mountains),  human  (Bosnians)  and  industrial
    (military  factories) resources  had been  the basic  concept of defense
    since 1918. It has lost its moral  credit and the trust of conscripts in
    an aimless war without strategy and waged for Slobodan Milosevic. It has
    lost political  power by losing territories,  people, technology and tax
    payers.  From the  flank and  rear, General  Panic has  to watch out for
    dubious  allies. Slobodan  Milosevic, who  did everything  to weaken the
    army and  eliminate it from the  political game, is slowly  becoming the
    biggest threat to its future. Namely, the UN sanctions have affected the
    Army of Yugoslavia in two ways:  the overall economic collapse has dried
    up the sources of income from taxes, and it seems that the generals have
    finally realized where their salaries and  flats had come from, and what
    is  even worse,  the sanctions  have deprived  it of  the possibility to
    import spare parts, fuel and  sophisticated technology, without which it
    cannot  survive and  there is  neither  time  nor money  or men  to make
    another one.  The army is slowly,  but surely, running out  of time: the
    resources and  reserves are melting  away, the pilots  and mechanics are
    angry;  all larger  modern armament   systems are  in danger  and nearly
    completely destroyed. General  Zivota Panic, as a tank  driver, is aware
    of  all this.  As the  Chief of  General Staff,  he must  know that  the
    sanctions  will not  be lifted  as long  as Slobodan  Milosevic (Serbian
    President)  is  in  power,  no  matter  what  his namesake Milan (Panic)
    promises and no  matter how President Cosic laments  about the injustice
    of it all.

    Milosevic will, therefore, play an important role in the survival of the
    army, which is, in the operative sense, headed by General Panic. Time is
    running out for Zivota Panic, while Slobodan Milosevic is running out of
    political  options, that  is, the  possibility to  choose. The  critical
    moment could  come if the  London Conference on  Yugoslavia -- in  which
    presidents  Milosevic and  Cosic have  invested all  efforts -- fails to
    meet the expectations of the  Serbian leader. Milosevic might then reach
    for the totalitarian option and introduce a dictatorship, relying on his
    favourite politician, part of the police  force which is on his side and
    the "quality Serbs".  The general would then find  himself facing a much
    tougher choice: either  appear as the saviour of  Serbian democracy (and
    Serbia, of course) or support Milosevic and completely ruin Serbia.

    In the  first case, the army  would regain much of  its lost reputation,
    ensure a political advantage for the new regime and pave the way towards
    a broad maneuvering space. In the second case, the consequences would be
    disastrous, probably fatal  to both the army and  the others. The danger
    of  a  military  intervention  in   Bosnia  and  Herzegovina,  in  fact,
    illustrates the nature of the threat.  General Zivota Panic will be in a
    position to show what he has learned during his service. The question is
    will he rise  to the bait of offered provocation?  Will he leap into the
    trap? Will  he accept the  challenge and neutralize  the threat, showing
    his  adversary  that   an  attack  would  not  pay   off?  The  existing
    technological   inferiority  of   the  Army   of  Yugoslavia   has  been
    deteriorating with the sanctions. This would  not be a problem if Serbia
    and Montenegro had allies. But, someone  has chased away the allies, and
    now everyone is  looking at the army, expecting it  to go to war against
    the whole world, alone and without logistic support.

    Everyone expects something from General  Zivota Panic and everyone wants
    to use him: Slobodan Milosevic for some  future war -- since there is no
    other  way he  can stay  in  power  -- even  risking a  Western military
    intervention (a  useful election ploy);  Milan Panic, the  Federal Prime
    Minister and  Minister of Defense,  for calming the  situation in Bosnia
    and keeping the promises he is  making left and right; Dobrica Cosic, to
    preserve --  and even enlarge --  the existing state; all  of them would
    like  Zivota Panic  to guarantee  their stay  in power.  Meanwhile, tank
    driver Zivota  Panic remembers well  the night between  March 9 and  10,
    1991, when tanks were sent to  the streets of Belgrade and what happened
    after that.  As a good  tank driver, he  knows what tanks  are used for:
    tanks cannot take the place of  tractors, or police cars, or city buses,
    or lorries to distribute bread. There is simply no civilian purpose they
    can be used for...

    General Zivota Panic  will need his good sense  and military experience,
    personal charm and tactical skill to get the army, himself and the state
    he is serving through the mine-fields of new politics in the Balkans. He
    will have to watch out and resist the temptation of Bonapartism, and not
    be  cheated  by  political  sharks  into  stretching  out his forces and
    playing his trump card. He  will need everything Serbian generals before
    him had prior to the Balkan wars, and even more: a democratic Serbia and
    its allies.  Zivota Panic has  a isolated Slobodan  Milosevic, a worried
    Dobrica  Cosic, a  cheerful Milan  Panic, a  Serbia alone  in the world,
    without allies,  without imports and exports,  without fuel, spare parts
    and  modern  technology.  Panic  is  not  in  an  easy  spot: he will be
    responsible for every loss and dismissed  if, by any chance, he succeeds
    in  achieving something.  But, this  is  what  was once  termed as  "the
    drudgery and greatness of the military profession."

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     "Vreme" News Digest Agency                     No. 47, August 17, 1992
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