The verdict of the Appellate Court on the murder of Slavko Ćuruvija changed people's awareness of the power of the secret service and caused a new wave of indignation and disbelief. This is proof that many of us are not yet aware of the reality in which we live. Or they even see it rationally, but emotionally refuse to accept it, like the beginning of the bombing in '99. Although the Service and the entire state organization in general have not been hiding what and how they are doing for a long time, the public is still looking for explanations, wondering, hoping for a solution from heaven. Very good or very bad news is the hardest to believe.
This text will not deal with describing the daily situation and revealing details of the work of the Service that would be of interest to the public until the next attraction appears. Instead, and from the perspective of the former controller of the work of services and other state bodies, it is more responsible towards this stunned and confused society to shake it with a hard reality:
1. The secret service in today's Serbia does not make mistakes, but works according to plan and program, like a well-oiled clock;
2. The calculation of the state of the world made by the regime in Serbia and on which it relies may not turn out to be correct, but it is not excluded that it will;
3. The published Constitution and laws in reality do not apply and do not protect anyone by themselves.
JOB OF THE SECRET SERVICE
The task of secret services everywhere in the world is to achieve the goals set by the government. The essential difference compared to other state bodies is that they do it by secret methods and therefore only for goals of importance for national security and those that can only be validly achieved in secret. If the government sets goals for the service that it hesitates or refuses to fulfill for some reason, such a situation will not last long. In our conditions - either the service in its own ways will try to influence the change of such authority, or the government will replace the leaders of the service, and the new one will change its last blood cell until the whole thing breathes with the government as one. The first thing happened to us, and now the second one.
Today, the secret service of Serbia works exactly according to the established plan, precisely like a clock that is completely synchronized with the melody and rhythm of the ruling regime. He knows what he wants, he has a plan to achieve it, and the Service plays a major role in it. Instead of its interference in the country's life being the exception, it is the rule. The work of other state bodies is adapted to it and they adopt its methods and manners. The fact that some prove that the direction and way of governing Serbia is wrong, ultimately harmful to national interests, does not affect them at all. All arguments fall on ears that hear them only as the voice of an enemy that needs to be neutralized. Today, the Service neutralizes almost without hesitation, like a well-oiled clock. The fact that we think we live in a different time zone does not make that clock broken, because it works exactly as the one who winds it wants.
Furthermore, the Regime and the Service are efficient: they have a leader and a hierarchy, goals they communicate, tasks they issue and whose fulfillment they monitor, discipline and loyalty they reward abundantly. Their "complete idiots" from Savamala do not miss a single hair on their heads, all national resources are at their disposal. During that time, a "leaderless" system is imposed in the civic political alternative, any collectivity is despised, hierarchy is considered offensive, discipline is surpassed, loyalty is overrated, and most of all, removing every prominent head to feed one's ego is preferred. The Regime wholeheartedly encourages such a political culture among its opponents by all means, and of course also through the Service. Because he knows that in a real conflict, the stronger and more efficient wins, not the one who is essentially right.
ARE THERE BRAKES ON THE PLANE?
The mechanism of the Service not only works according to the given plan, but also smoothly because in the meantime all the brake cogs - people who learned and believed in some different professional standards and stood as an internal barrier to what was once considered abuse - have been removed without a trace in the meantime. Personnel who, according to some other standards, would not be allowed to approach the Service even on an open day, today they are bright and dressed with it. What used to be the stuff of their wet dreams is now a basic rule of thumb at work.
Furthermore, the Service works smoothly because the external control mechanisms, which are supposed to monitor, react and prevent various types of abuses that easily occur in every secret service in the world, thoroughly changed the blood and all internal organs, and they only have an external form of parliamentary control, Protector of citizens, courts and other supervisory bodies. The term "kidnapped state" is not an empty phrase, it has a real meaning and it doesn't always happen to someone else there.
photo: ap photo / darko vojinović...
Finally, the Service not only works according to plan and smoothly, but also creates it for others. In the geo-positioning of Serbia, and then in bringing the people to the chosen position, the Service has a key role. Formally the former and still current head of the Service, in a recent interview he openly writes: "BIA is not just wiretapping or arresting, BIA is a service that creates processes and through all available means forms and implements the ideological concept of our country and people". The problem that arises when the secret service, which according to the law must be politically neutral, openly admits that it creates an ideological concept of one nation, is solved by the second of the two articles of the actually valid Constitution of today's Serbia, which we will mention later.
Why is it written here about the "Service" in the singular even though there are still more of them formally in Serbia? In the past, it was avoided to merge the external (foreign) and internal (work in the country) components of the service into one, because that would easily lead to the overflow of the external work methods (which, in principle, the most important thing on the territory of a foreign country is done outside the laws of that country) into the internal, which should that it is strictly bound by the Constitution and laws, especially when dealing with its citizens in the country. Today in Serbia, those two components do not differ in any way. A fundamental, not just formal, distinction was made between the military and civilian services, so that each would better fit into its field of work and give more concrete results. Today, everyone has the same goals, the same targets and the same boss. The idea that there should be more of them, so that in case of need one could point out the shortcomings of the other, and that none of them would have too broad and too great a power, was rejected because in the work of the services there can no longer be a failure and no power is too great . One is the Service and it is always right. Anyone who wants otherwise is an enemy, and as with enemies - "you know"!
It is not of practical importance that in all textbooks and democratic standards everything is written about the work of the services differently from the way the Service works today. Because the Regime and the Service do not recognize those textbooks and standards. For a while, they were acting and quoting them, and they were preparing for something completely different, but for several years now, they have been mopping the floor with them and laughing. Unfortunately, those standards have been trampled occasionally and those who wrote them trample them when they need them. Here it's just taken to the extreme and there's no hiding it.
photo: bia & tanjugAleksandar Vulin at the BIA anniversary celebration, October 2023.
A WAR OF TWO REALITIES
It is perfectly clear to the regime that we live in a world in which two parallel realities, Western and Eastern, are crystallizing, more and more ready to cancel the other. "Cancel" culture, in which there is nothing cultural, is a reflection of that process. Where "cancellation" is still only media, business, artistic, economic, social, tomorrow it may become physical, as in Ukraine. A new cold war is underway and its temperature is rising.
The regime in Serbia has been preparing for that scenario for a long time, and the work of the entire security sector, as well as the entire state organization, is adapting to the reality of which side it has chosen. Which one is it? The official state policy is that we want to join the European Union, to the West. But everything says that the path is truly traced by the ideological matrix of the predecessor of the Serbian Progressive Party - the Serbian Radical Party, and its model Liberal Democratic Party (sic!) of Russia, the late Vladimir Zhirinovsky.
In an interview, Aleksandar Vučić openly says that "the whole world is waiting for the American elections with divided tickets, and until then we have to survive politically and strengthen economically". Apart from the fact that he has chosen the wrong cards so far, this time it is clear that he is counting on either the return of Donald Trump, or severe instability in the USA if Trump tries to prevent himself from running for office with court rulings. And that by "we" he does not mean the whole nation, but his government. Fearful "experts" from both sides either swear by that scenario in the US, or laugh at it. The truth is that it is possible. If it happens, especially its second variant, autocrats across Europe will take off their last gloves. How will Serbia welcome the outcome? Three years ago, I publicly wrote that, due to the path and method chosen by the Regime, Serbia "will once again be shown as a source of problems, with a people who allowed themselves to be subjugated by a destructive autocrat for the second time in a short period of time. We have not yet recovered from the scars left by Milošević, and we will get new ones. In just a few decades, from a country that was a symbol of freedom, anti-fascism, strength and aspirations to gather South Slavic peoples into a strong and prosperous alliance, to a powerless, ostracized, humiliated and non-independent territory with a disoriented people - the image of us will be sealed for a long time and our children children will carry it like a burden". But if Putin wins the second cold war, the regime in Serbia is counting on it all to pay off. The other side is not doing nearly enough to help the consolidation of democracy in Serbia, not nearly as much as it helped the consolidation of the power of Aleksandar Vučić when it was thought that he had chosen her after all. If anyone thinks that this can be done again with sanctions, they are seriously mistaken and we will all fight against it, for one reason or another.
The alternative to Vučić's regime, which he wholeheartedly promotes whether she is aware of it or not, is constantly confusing people with its inconsistency. With a non-national approach to national issues, a "hippie" approach to security policy, and a performance approach to politics in general, many in it give the impression of immaturity and frivolity. The system that is leading the country in an organized way in the wrong direction and/or in the wrong way is running against it - no less a system. Populist reactions to the mention of the return of mandatory military service! While every able-bodied Swiss without conscientious objection has active service for 10 years and can keep not only a military uniform but also a rifle at home, and then buy them back, while Germany lifts its military restrictions one by one, and the US for military they give more to the budget than all the other countries of the world combined, as an alternative to the bad concept that showed its scope in Banjska, it offers a concept - what will defense do for us, NATO will defend us!? Every germ of a different alternative to the Regime has to fight not only with him, but also with the Pomodari and confused civil public and the heroes who change like on a tape.
There is another way: Serbia is militarily neutral and on its own, oriented towards peace, but ready to defend itself with war. For such a thing, Tito's Yugoslavia needed a powerful original national and political ideology (then found in brotherhood and unity, and socialist self-management, today it would have to be something different); a solid organization with a capable leader at the helm, a country big enough to be authentic and relevant economically, culturally, sportingly and in every other space, a wide network of friendly countries and not least important – a favorable geopolitical situation. Watching it from the wrong speeding train, that road now seems farther than ever.
But both Serbia and the world need a new kind of change. The mangupis have read the textbook of Western democracy, written a long time ago, especially the solutions from his end, and they cheat a lot. Deceivers know how to deceive, those whom they deceive know that they are being deceived, and they are the first to know that the latter know, and both of them think that they can do so indefinitely, because the only alternative is the eastern type of modern despotism. But it is no longer possible to condemn the "special military action of Russia" and proclaim its "preventive interventions" as the pinnacle of international law. One cannot turn a blind eye to the policy of fire and sword in Gaza, which claimed more than 30.000 civilian lives, and calmly report that the intelligence assessment did not even cause serious consequences to the military structure of Hamas. You can't attack Iraq because of the production of weapons of mass destruction and then say - oops, we made a mistake and nothing happens to anyone. In terms of human rights and the concept of democracy in general, one cannot carry out police repression against those who protest because of their countries' support for indiscriminate targeting of civilians, arrest Julian Assange for uncovering a series of crimes, and put the focus of human rights on terminological political correctness and coming out to meet exotic sexual orientations and identities. The family cannot be deprived of the right to raise children in accordance with family values that are not prohibited and insist only on the rights of the child, and consider obligations as abuse. And no, Serbia cannot be forced to mine lithium and build an ecological oasis from its own lands. Finally, the world cannot be forced to choose between only two models - despotic authoritarianism and corporate, military-industrial democracy. At least not forever, which does not change the fact that at this historical moment - it seems that it can.
RETURN TO HARSH REALITY
The next question is - what is the regime of Aleksandar Vučić doing and what is he still planning to do with those people in Serbia who see their country and life differently from the path chosen by the regime and who decide to democratically fight for their vision? What follows - persecution, imprisonment, a bullet in the back... Will this be a land of freedom only for the murderers of Slavko Ćuruvija?
The Regime's hands are untied. The written Constitution and laws in Serbia do not protect anyone because in reality only what is certain to be implemented is valid. Today, the unwritten but actually valid constitution of Serbia has only two articles, which provide answers to all legal questions in our country.
1. "Laws do not apply to members of the regime" i
2. "So what".
Because of them, the safety of the citizens of Serbia, their life, freedom, health, property, reputation... are worth and exist as much as the life of a stray dog on the side of the highway. They have them until they get in the way, or they're just unlucky and they cross the wrong person's path or he needs something of theirs. Or until they become part of the Regime, then they have all rights and no obligations. There are too many examples to be an exception. The entire system of security and justice has been connected by the Regime into a harmonious whole that ensures that reference to written law and rules sounds like a sign of serious social maladjustment. People who are encouraged by both the regime and mainstream Western culture to focus only on themselves, don't believe it until it happens to them. Then they expect help from people who have had the same thing happen to them, or worse and have been left stranded, or those who still think that it always happens to someone else and that they should mind their own business. The regime knows the thought attributed to Benjamin Franklin - that those who temporarily exchange freedom for security ultimately lose both, and it works to make it so. Lightly accepted innovations, such as "Bologna" or "dual education", do everything possible so that people do not know about it and fall into that trap.
STATE, NATIONAL AND MAFIA SECURITY
The late prof. Vojin Dimitrijević wrote several decades ago about the difference between the concepts of "state" and "national" security, explaining how one protects the government, and the other the nation and its interest, one the interest of the party, the other the people. Today, according to the view that governs Serbia, this is a false dilemma: the state, the government, the Leader and the Party are one. There were dogs by the side of the road. This concept has been known for a long time and from time to time it experiences its renaissance. And it has its legitimate end. But perhaps for the first time, mafia and crime were added to that trio as an equal member. It could be an authentic contribution to the theory and practice of the state and society. Once the services used criminals, today criminals use the Service. How else would one explain, for example, that the house in Ritopek where the most monstrous murders were committed, according to the available information, was covered by video surveillance of the security services? When criminals started using it, even the road to it was paved with public money!?
With the unlimited potential of monitoring everyone's life, made possible by the explosive development of information technology, and with the concentration of media influence, today's secret services and their masters can make a human freak or a hero out of anyone, as needed. Especially in a society confused by millions of contradictory information and increasingly forced to choose the lesser of two evils, while meanwhile the difference between good and evil is being systematically erased. The generations whose education was still paid for by society through student loans that we did not have to pay back, have at least the obligation to return the favor with such warnings and attempts to change something in the course of things. Although we are aware that we are now outnumbered and realistically without influence.
But even the one who longs for great power, no matter how much he manages to gather it, has a habit of overestimating it.
Mysterious arrest - at least until further notice
In the moments when this issue of "Vremena" goes to press, the news that the BIA "broke another spy network in Serbia" and that four spies were arrested did not resonate in the media space at least like the fireworks in Belgrade on Republika Srpska Day.
There were no special shows on Pink, Hepi, Prva, RTS, Aleksandar Vučić and Aleksandar Vulin did not address to talk about who is doing everything to Serbia and the president, nor did Ana Brnabić swear that, if necessary, with her body to protect Vučić and his family from all those domestic and foreign spies, for which every opportunity is used.
The news was published on pro-regime portals - all of them used the same text, apparently written in some office of the Service - and then somehow it sank. In Dnevnik on Pink Television on Monday at 15 p.m., this, by definition, spectacular information that should scream on the front pages, especially tabloid media, was only the fourth in a row, after Mitsotakis's visit to Vučić, Eksp and Đilas as Kurti's associate. It was read succinctly, and we moved on.
It is also interesting that neither N1, nor Nova S, nor Danas published this news all day, even though it cannot be traced.
RV
