NATO extends to Montenegro but Serbia is pointing to its feet. What Happens in the Balkans?

(To Giampiero Venturi)
09/05/17

On April 28, Montenegro's entry into NATO was ratified, the third of the six former Yugoslav republics to choose the Alliance from 2009 to today.

Defense Online addressed the issue in the 2015, when the invitation to Podgorica was formalized, not relevant from a military point of view, but very incisive from a political point of view (read article). In consideration of the accession of Slovenia, Croatia and Albania, with the exception of the 20 km of Bosnian coast in front of Neum, the entry of Montenegro into NATO transforms the Adriatic into an Atlantic lake.

The figure is enormous from a historical and geopolitical point of view, even if it must be filtered in the light of some considerations.

Despite the dissolution of the USSR and the substantial change of equilibrium from the 1949 to today, NATO continues indefatigably to aim towards the east. The specter of a Eurasian block consisting of a virtual Brest-Vladivostock axis, so dear to De Gaulle, still disturbs sleep beyond the Atlantic. With this in mind, NATO has involved many former European enemies, paying the price with a smaller political compact than that which has characterized it for half a century.

There are many Balkan members of the Alliance who maintain excellent political relations with Russia, the terminal of all Western arrows. In addition to Hungary and Bulgaria, Greece should be mentioned in particular, which, although detached from a pro-Soviet past, maintains excellent relations with Moscow, above all for cultural issues.

The same could be said for Montenegro, a small cousin of Serbia, in turn the younger sister of Mother Russia. Divided internally by two opposing fronts, a pro-Western pro-West and a pro-Russian one, the small Balkan country has never denied ties with Moscow of which it has been the tourist and financial reference point in the western Mediterranean for the last twenty years.

Homogeneity of NATO countries apart, the objective fact remains that Podgorica is now officially part of a large US political and military umbrella.

Russia has had to swallow the toad by accepting the additional loop of rope that it carries around its neck from the 1991. In the '99 it fell to Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic; in the 2004 to the rest of the former Warsaw Pact, to the three Baltic republics (formerly Soviet) and to Slovenia, undermining the former Yugoslavia for the first time. He replied in the 2009 with the entry into the Alliance of Croatia and the ex-Stalinist Albania.

Although mother NATO has always been able to make hostile neighbors (the case of Turkey and Greece applies to everyone), not all countries have aligned themselves with the new trends. Communism died and the blocks crumbled, the cultural ties returned and the bad political relations between the former Yugoslavia and Moscow turned into a Slavic brotherhood between Serbia and Russia.

The arrival of Croatia in NATO not by chance repelled the ancient cultural boundary between East and West just between the Sava and the Danube.

Logically, the Serbia-Montenegro confederation, in friction with Atlantic interests, has for a decade been a thorn in the Alliance. As is equally logical it had to be eliminated.

The stages were progressive: first the political bond between Belgrade and Podgorica was split, removing from Belgrade the access to the sea, then the very strong pro-Russian nationalist component in the small Adriatic republic was closed. Entry into NATO was only a matter of time.

Not being able to curb a migration that is taken for granted if not at the risk of accusations of imperialist interference in European affairs (even if Montenegro is not part of the Union, ed), Russia has been able to do nothing but tighten up with Serbia, a historical ally now accustomed to to play the role of ugly duckling in the European forum.

Belgrade's participation in the annual military exercises Slavic Brotherood says it all. Although Serbia maintains a "non-hostile" relationship with the Atlantic Alliance, relations of friendship and collaboration with Moscow know no crisis.

In this regard it is good to clarify some aspects, related to the presidential elections of April 2017. The newspapers of mainstream Italian (Repubblica, April 2, ed.) presented Vucic's victory as a triumph of reform Europeanism. Vucic, a young and capable leader, is actually at the head of the Progressive Party which was born from a split from Seselj's Serbian Radical Party, of which he has renounced only the most obtuse positions. His pro-European positions are a clear necessity to avoid the economic strangulation of the country, which has been underway since the end of the former Yugoslavia.

So how does Serbia, the heart of the Balkans, stand?

Vucic's statement regarding military alliances with the West was crystal clear in this respect: "Serbia will never enter NATO" by virtue of its "different" role played in Europe for centuries and a special bond with United Russia of Putin. 

With Serbia on its toes, NATO's procurement campaign now appears to have reached its eastern terminal. Whether Belgrade will be a point of contact or a point of friction remains to be seen.

What will happen now?

The next step for NATO will be inward, seeking to reduce the differences between member states that contaminate political homogeneity. The task will be very difficult. Where it does not attack russophobia, the trump card in the Baltic countries and Poland, it will be the political elites that will make the difference. The elimination of nationalisms and sovereign movements will be the next strategic objective. The process has already begun, but it will probably be the most difficult job for Brussels.

(photo: Војска Србије)