Slobodan Milosevic: Making the most of the worst
In this story:
Overweight and a loner
'Slobo! Slobo!'
A knife in the back
'Greater Serbia'
'Milosevic does not matter any more'
After 72 days of NATO bombing left the Yugoslav infrastructure in smoldering ruins, many thought the Yugoslav Serbs would rise up and run Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic out of office -- and out of the country -- for good.
And, indeed, some tried to do just that. Thousands filled the streets of Belgrade in the summer and fall of 1999, demonstrating against what Alliance for Change leader Zoran Djindjic called "the last dictatorship in Europe." Djindjic added, "We will crush it."
Ridiculing the protesters as "cowards, blackmailers and sycophants," Milosevic tightened his grip on the power structure and waited until the demonstrations stalled. In the year 2000, he continued to dominate the country he has led since 1989, despite involving it in wars in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo -- losing every one.
Vilified as "the slickest con man in the Balkans" and "a consummate politician and pathological liar" and defended as "charming" and "reasonable," Milosevic's survival is testimony to his guile and, some say, his utter lack of conscience.
Indeed, when it was announced in May 1999 that a tribunal in The Hague had indicted him for alleged atrocities in Kosovo, state TV showed a smiling Milosevic condemning "aggression on our country" as he shook hands with Greek Premier Constantine Mitsotakis.
Mitsotakis later told Greek reporters that as far as he could tell, Milosevic wasn't fazed in the slightest by the indictment.
"He is stimulated by crises," an official who worked with Milosevic told the Washington Post. "When everything is normal, he can't come up with a strategy. He needs conflict. NATO played right into his hands."
"He's always creating a bigger crisis to cover up a smaller crisis," a Western diplomat told the Chicago Tribune. "That's how he thrives."
Overweight and a loner
Observers say such sangfroid is customary with Milosevic. He is chilly and distant with associates, seems uncomfortable in crowds and has a history of suicide in his family.
Milosevic was born Aug. 29, 1941, in Pozarevac, an industrial city in central Serbia.
His father studied to be a Serbian Orthodox priest, according to The New York Times, but never finished his studies and taught Russian and Serbo-Croatian for a living.
Eventually he left the family and returned to his native Montenegro, leaving Milosevic and his older brother, Borislav (who later became the ambassador to Russia), to be raised by their mother, a teacher and ardent communist.
Milosevic was reportedly overweight as a child and preferred writing poetry and being alone to playing sports and being around people.
While Milosevic was a student at the University of Belgrade, his father committed suicide. His mother took her life 11 years later, and her brother, a former general, also committed suicide.
After graduating with a law degree in 1964, Milosevic joined the Communist Party, the customary avenue to power in Communist Yugoslavia. He moved up the career ladder as a business administrator, eventually assuming the leadership of the state-owned gas company before being appointed director of Beobanka, one of the major state-run banks.
He also married Mirjana Markovic, a professor of Marxist sociology at the University of Belgrade who was even more devout in her communist beliefs than Milosevic. Markovic, who has been called "the Lady Macbeth of the Balkans," is said to insulate Milosevic from criticism and takes a hard line against dissent.
'Slobo! Slobo!'
Milosevic and his wife are reportedly devoted to each other and have two children -- daughter Marija, who has run a radio and television station, and son Marko, a disco owner and auto-racing enthusiast.
Markovic was instrumental in helping Milosevic oust his mentor, Ivan Stambolic, from leadership of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia. Stambolic had been Milosevic's friend for 25 years, and pulled Milosevic along with him as he climbed the organizational ladder.
In April 1987, Stambolic sent Milosevic to pacify restive Serbs in Kosovo. The Serbians wanted curbs put on the autonomy enjoyed by the province, which was dominated by ethnic Albanians.
Milosevic broke away from a meeting with ethnic Albanians to mingle with angry Serbians in a suburb of Pristina. The Serbs protested that they were being pushed back by police with batons, and Milosevic told them, "No one will dare to beat you again."
"Slobo! Slobo!" the crowd chanted.
A knife in the back
It was a pivotal moment in the dissolution of Yugoslavia, and in Milosevic's rise to power. Milosevic arranged for TV cameras to be on hand that day, and footage of the incident was shown repeatedly on state TV.
The incident not only heightened his profile as a Serbian nationalist, it also violated the "brotherhood and unity" dictum enforced by the late Yugoslav leader Marshal Tito to prevent ethnic strife.
As the leader of Serbia's Communist Party, Milosevic demanded the national government return control of Vojvodina and Kosovo -- both autonomous provinces -- to Serbia, and in 1988 he replaced party leaders in both provinces with his own supporters.
A year later, the Serbian assembly dumped Stambolic and replaced him with Milosevic. "When somebody looks at your back for 25 years, it is understandable that he gets the desire to put a knife in it at some point," Stambolic said later. "Many people warned me, but I did not acknowledge it."
In 1990, Milosevic orchestrated changes in the Serbian constitution that cut back on the provinces' autonomy. But an anti-Serb backlash erupted in the other republics, and in 1991 Slovenia, Croatia and Macedonia all declared their independence.
'Greater Serbia'
When Muslims and Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina also voted to secede, Milosevic supported Serb militias trying to unite Bosnia and Croatia with Serbia in a "Greater Serbia."
The fighting, which lasted three years, brought "ethnic cleansing" to the world's attention and established Milosevic as a key power broker in the region. His participation was considered essential to the Dayton Accords that ended the Bosnian conflict.
But after noting how he supported and then abandoned Serb groups in places like Bosnia to suit his own purposes, Western diplomats agreed with British diplomat Dame Pauline Neville-Jones that Milosevic is "ruthless."
Gerald Post, a psychiatrist who profiled world leaders for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, told "NewsStand: CNN & TIME" that Milosevic "has no conscience ... [and] is driven by power ... and will do anything possible not only to survive, but to maximize his power."
On the other hand, Radmila Milentijevic, who served in the Yugoslav government, told NewsStand that she found Milosevic to be "charming. He's winning as a person, in my experience, and he knows how to make you feel at ease."
She added that while he was clearly a politician, he was also "a reasonable man."
'Milosevic does not matter any more'
In 1996, Milosevic survived major opposition from a coalition of students and opposition leaders calling themselves "Zajedno" (Together). He stalled for three months before giving the opposition control of towns and cities that were bankrupt and in disarray. Political infighting eventually caused the coalition to unravel, however, leaving Milosevic firmly in charge.
When the Serbian constitution prevented him from serving another term as president in 1997, Milosevic had himself named president of Yugoslavia and invested what had been a ceremonial office with unlimited authority.
It was expected the Serbs would lose the war in Kosovo, just as they lost in Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia. And the demonstrations indicate many in Yugoslavia have no love for Milosevic. The question is whether they have enough desire to remove him.
The NATO bombing killed or wounded 15,000 Yugoslav Serbians. Another 500,000 lost their jobs. The standard of living in Serbia has declined precipitously. Prices have increased. Wages often are not paid on time. The result may be a population that lacks the will to overthrow the man who has brought such ruination upon them.
"When you have depressed people, they have many things on their mind," Belgrade psychiatrist Vesna Milovanovic said in September 1999. "They have many thoughts, they have many plans, maybe, but they do not have some kind of energy to realize it."
In January 2000, however, leaders of the various opposition factions did agree to work together that spring in another effort to unseat Milosevic. But Milosevic once again survived, and then called for local and federal elections in September of that year.
Given his ability to manipulate crises, some would argue that another one is just what Milosevic needs. But his opponents hope Milosevic has finally worn out his welcome.
"For most Serbs, Milosevic does not matter any more," a former associate told the Washington Post. "This is not about him. This is about the country."
