Milosevic Pulled the Strings, US Ambassador Testifies

Before he was appointed US Ambassador to Croatia, Peter Galbraith was familiar with violence in the former Yugoslavia and Milosevic’s role in it. As Advisor to the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, he made four trips to the region in 1991 and 1992. The result was a report on ethnic cleansing in Bosnia.

While the report concluded that Serbia, Montenegro and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) didn’t directly control the actions of the Bosnian Serbs, who it held responsible for the ethnic cleansing, the authors added that they “must share responsibility for what is now underway.” They noted the Bosnian Serbs were receiving some financial support directly from Serbia, that Serb paramilitaries were fighting in Bosnia, and that sanctions against the FRY were broken by laundering goods through the Republika Srpska. The report said that when the Yugoslav People’s Army (JNA) withdrew from Croatia in May 1992, it left 85% of its personnel and most of its equipment in the hands of the Bosnian Serbs.

As for Milosevic’s role, the report concluded, “The Serb leader, Slobodan Milosevic, has been a proponent of ethnic cleansing. With sanctions and the threat of military force he would like to disassociate himself. . . .” When Prosecutor Geoffrey Nice asked for his comment on this conclusion, the Ambassador replied, “We believed that Slobodan Milosevic was the architect of the policy of creating a Greater Serbia and little happened without his knowledge and involvement.”

The report was released to the public and the media by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in August 1992. In October, Mr. Galbraith hand carried copies to Serbia, where he presented one to Prime Minister Milan Panic. He was unable to recall whether he presented one to Milosevic when he met with him, but he believed he did. At any rate, the report was widely disseminated. As Mr. Nice noted, “The document was made available to the Accused in 1992 and constitutes notification to him of views held of him by others.”

When Mr. Galbraith took on the mantle of Ambassador to Croatia in 1993, he soon learned about Milosevic’s pivotal role first hand. The US had belatedly decided to take a more activist role in seeking a peaceful resolution to the ongoing bloodshed in the region. Ambassador Galbraith was tasked with doing something about the Krajina, from which Croats had recently been expelled by Serbs who declared it an autonomous region and sought to join the Serbian motherland. The Croats wanted their territory back.

In Court, the Prosecutor asked the witness to describe some of the major players in this contentious process. For the Krajina Serbs that meant Milan Martic and Milan Babic. He described Martic, President of the Republic of Serbia Krajina (RSK), as a former policeman of very limited intelligence, a man “way out of his depth.” The Ambassador concluded that “he was unwilling to act on any key matter without approval from Belgrade,” and believed he had no particular interest in the Krajina Serbs.

His predecessor and nemesis was Milan Babic, a popular and charismatic politician who headed the majority party in the RSK Assembly and was later the Prime Minister. Babic, who testified earlier against Milosevic, was also a nationalist who had participated in the creation of the RSK and the expulsion of the Croatian Serb population. The Ambassador concluded Babic was the only politician who had any concern for the local population. He was also the only one who appeared interested in negotiating, but he was intimidated by Milosevic and Martic who controlled the RSK army.

The Ambassador had daily, if not more frequent, contact with Franjo Tudjman, President of Croatia. He described Tudjman as an effective leader, one “who knew where he wanted to take Croatia.” He surrounded himself with capable subordinates and was able to delegate to them while maintaining overall control. “To say that he was effective,” however, “was not to say his motives were good,” the Ambassador added. He was a nationalist and a racist with little respect for fundamental human rights.

The fourth major player was the Accused, a dark shade hovering almost invisibly over all the events. In relation to the Krajina, Ambassador Galbraith concluded, “It was apparent to me and all other international mediators that the Accused was the key to any peace settlement, that the Krajina Serb leadership wouldn’t make any substantive agreement without his approval. . . . Leaders with whom I negotiated, Babic, Milanovic, said they regularly consulted with the Accused.”

Milosevic made his impact felt when he orchestrated Babic’s election loss to Martic, who would prove more malleable. In the first round of the RSK presidential election, the popular incumbent Babic won 49% of the vote to Martic’s twenty-something percentile. In the second round, however, Martic shot up to an inexplicable 53% while Babic lost two points. Ambassador Galbraith testified this dramatic reversal was “without precedent in democratic elections.” Perhaps that’s because the election wasn’t – democratic. Babic confided in him that he believed the election was rigged with Milosevic’s participation.

Milosevic also replaced the head of the RSK Army after its military defeat in 1995, according to the Ambassador. Milosevic wanted someone who wouldn’t carry out an order like that Martic gave to launch a rocket attack on Zagreb.

Tudjman and the Croatian Government also considered Milosevic critical to any agreement with the Krajina Serbs. When he concluded that Milosevic didn’t support a negotiated settlement for the Krajina, he launched Operation Storm (see CIJ Report, 'Milosevic Had no Interest in the Welfare of Serbs,' Says US Ambassador, 26 June 2003).

Following Operation Storm, the US “took over the peace process,” according to Ambassador Galbraith. Working as a team with Thorvald Stoltenberg, the Ambassador facilitated an agreement on eleven basic principles between Croatia and the Krajina Serbs. Since Milosevic was not a party to these negotiations, he later told US Ambassador Richard Holbrooke that no such agreement had been reached.

Then came Dayton, Milosevic’s stage. In the autumn of 1995, the U.S. brought the necessary players to Dayton, Ohio to work out a nonviolent settlement to the wars in Bosnia and Croatia. Milosevic negotiated for both the Bosnian Serbs (their leaders couldn’t come because they had been indicted by the ICTY for war crimes) and the Croatian Serbs. While he had written authority from the RS leaders, he had nothing similar from the RSK leaders. It didn’t matter. He just proceeded to represent them.

At the first joint meeting between Milosevic and Tudjman, Eastern Slavonia was on the agenda. An agreement had pretty much been worked out in advance between the local Serbs and Croatia. Tudjman, however, said that the key issue was “whether Milosevic is going to accept reintegration of the territory into Croatia.” Milosevic, ignoring the negotiated agreement, said there should be a referendum. When Tudjman reacted angrily and threatened military action, Milosevic replied, “You’re a good man, but I can see you’re under the influence of your generals.” After a heated conversation, Milosevic dropped his referendum requirement. When the Prosecutor asked the Ambassador whether Milosevic had complete authority to negotiate, his response was, “Apparently.” However much he said the issue was for local Serbs to decide, he made the decisions.

Milosevic indicated as much to the Ambassador himself, following a 45 minute conversation after the conclusion of the joint meeting. At the meeting the parties agreed that Ambassador Galbraith and Lord Owen should go to the region and negotiate a resolution for Eastern Slavonia directly with the locals. Though Milosevic had signed on, he implied to the Ambassador that it was a waste of time and he’d be better advised to “spend his time on vacation in Dubrovnik.” “I interpreted that to mean that settlement on Eastern Slavonia would not be decided by locals but in Dayton at such time as Milosevic thought convenient and useful to him to settle the issue.”

Back in the region, Milosevic’s advice was confirmed by Milan Milanovic, negotiating on behalf of the Serbs in Eastern Slavonia. When the Ambassador presented a draft proposal to him, Milanovic said, “I’ll sign this draft if Milosevic tells me to do so.” Ambassador Galbraith concluded, 'It was completely clear to me we were not going to have an agreement until the Accused decided we would and it wouldn't depend on anything in Eastern Slavonia but when he found it convenient in Dayton, in the overall process.'

With each succeeding witness, Milosevic's influence on events and people gains a more substantial shape. Rather than the disinterested peacemaker, he looks more and more like the very interested puppet master, pulling strings, directing the course of events. Of course, he did not act alone. But he was the one person everyone else had to reckon with.