Goodbye President Not-Tudjman
Balkan Insight
Marcus Tanner
February 26, 2010Croatia’s president, Stjepan Mesic, has left office and been replaced. Or at least, I think he has – because I read nothing about it in the British, or American, press, unless it was brief news item.
Admittedly, for most Croats, this new feeling of international obscurity is probably pleasant – better than the notoriety gained by Franjo Tudjman.
But there are downsides to being invisible, not least that your interests get trampled on, as Croatia found out when it tried to establish a maritime protection zone in the Adriatic, which Slovenia and Italy then torpedoed without anyone even murmuring on Croatia’s behalf.
Of course, president Mesic was not solely responsible for the way in which Croatia became the European equivalent of the Cheshire Cat in Alice in Wonderland – which vanished bit by bit until nothing remained except a smile. But he was part of the phenomenon.
The only real ace that Mesic ever held was not being Tudjman. Beyond that, what was there? A political relic from the Yugoslav communist era, embodying all that movement’s grudges and limitations.
The international community initially serenaded him as “President not-Tudjman”, and then forgot about him. Partly this was because he did not seem to have anything to say on his foreign visits to the West, nor a foreign language in which to converse. There were rumours that he spoke French. But there was no sign of English; like it or not, that was a major handicap in today’s globalised world.
Mesic’s fans respond that he did a great thing by abdicating most of the prerogatives of the presidency. Why this was automatically a good thing was never made clear. In fact, there is nothing intrinsically good or bad about strong or weak presidencies. Limited presidential systems suit some countries, not others. It works in Germany. It was a catastrophe in France. They careered from one disaster to another under weak presidents until the Algerian crisis, when they opted for an imperial presidency instead. Half a century on, there is no sign of a rethink.
Where Mesic did keep some political manoeuvring space for him as president was in foreign affairs. But there his record was mixed, at best. At first, he renounced interference in Bosnia, which was wise. But by the end of his term he was interfering in Bosnia all the time, talking wildly of wanting to send some kind of expeditionary force into northern Bosnia to stop the Bosnian Serbs from seceding.
The idea that Croatia might be claiming some kind of dispensation to invade countries in order “to save them from themselves” – a doctrine pioneered by the Soviet Union, incidentally, and tried out in Hungary and Czechoslovakia – was breathtaking.
Had this truly mad “Mesic doctrine” been acted on, it might have touched off the Fourth Balkan War. Who was to say the Bosnian Serbs would not then invade Croatia in any case? Goodbye then to years of painful work, rebuilding Croatia’s tourist industry. Even if it was only empty talk, it was garrulous and foolish all the same, and it has made the Bosnian Serbs more hostile to Croatia in the meantime.
Irresponsible as they sounded, Mesic’s outbursts in those last weeks somehow were not surprising. Goading Serbia clearly came instinctively him. What else was the reason for a pointless visit to Kosovo just before leaving office? It did nothing useful for the Kosovars, who depend on Washington’s goodwill, not Zagreb’s, but it certainly riled the Serbs.
Had Mesic been a statesman as opposed to a politician, he would have seen, as De Gaulle did after the war in France, that far-sighted statesmanship and short-term populist politics travel in opposing directions. People often forget now that the policy of Franco-German reconciliation after 1945 was bitterly resented in France at the time. Yet, De Gaulle, the archetypal French nationalist, pushed on – abandoning the old French policy of encircling Germany by forming alliances with its neighbours. De Gaulle abandoned that policy for good reason; it was utterly useless.
Mesic was the mini-equivalent of one of those pre-war French politicians, always off to Sarajevo, or Pristina and Podgorica. The value of these unofficial alliances to Croatia is almost nil. Each is either a broken reed, or just too small to count for anything. Bosnia is a Humpty Dumpty ally. According to the old English children’s rhyme, the fragile, egg-shaped Humpty falls off the wall every time he’s put back up, “And all the King’s horses, and all the King’s men, couldn’t put Humpty together again.” Substitute “EU bureaucrats” for “King’s men” and there you have it. The only thing to be done with Bosnia, as a neighbour, is to maintain a cool, polite distance, because for all intents and purposes there are two Bosnia’s, and if you curry favour with one part, you lose favour with the other.
Mesic could have invested his traveling time in a more worthwhile project, working on lasting reconciliation with Serbia – but he wasn’t up to it. There was no instant applause in that. Yet, surely, that was the prize worth aiming for. Many Croats seem under the impression that Serbia doesn’t count for much these days. But Serbia is a state with a long pedigree and old, firm alliances, notably with Russia. Its recent success in halting the process of recognizing Kosovo should remind everyone of Belgrade’s diplomatic clout. Croatia has no outside patron, equivalent to Russia, which is why it is so easily pushed around.
Perhaps Mesic’s successor is going to make a better job of foreign policy. But it may be too late to undo the damage with the Serbs. The next government, and next president, in Serbia are likely to be more nationalistic than the present team, and thus more difficult to deal with.
Meanwhile, Zagreb appears to have clarified its role as the sworn foe of Bosnian Serb self-determination (a pretty unconvincing principle for the Croats, of all peoples, to champion), while quite unnecessarily crossing swords with Belgrade over Kosovo and, more recently, over Bosnia. That would appear to be the sum results of Mesic’s regional diplomacy – alongside virtual invisibility elsewhere. Welcome to the presidency of Croatia, Mr Josipovic, you have plenty to do.
