Security Inclusion of the FR Yugoslavia into Euro-Atlantic Community

According to the themes and issues they address, the papers and transcripts of discussions are grouped into four sections.

The first section includes the papers that, taken together, describe the international and local political climate in which FRY’s prospects for joining the security system of the Euro-Atlantic Community are being examined. A comparative reading of articles by Dušan Lazić and Robert Serry provide the reader with an insight into the official views of FRY and NATO concerning the prospects for their future cooperation. This gives the readers an opportunity to compare and contrast these views. In the text that follows, Philipp Fluri examines the experience of the neutral Switzerland and its motives for joining the Partnership for Peace program, explaining why in his opinion FRY should also begin the process of integration with the Euro-Atlantic Community as soon as possible. The results of an opinion poll conducted by Milorad Timotić show the reader what the citizens of Serbia think about this issue. Finally, a text by Vladimir Rukavishnikov informs the reader about the Russian views on NATO’s European policy. This is all the more intriguing as the “Russian factor” has so frequently been referred to on the Serbian political scene – both in a sober and a manipulative fashion.

What links together the texts from the second section of the present volume is their focus on contemporary security theory and practice. The section opens with an essay by Michael Pugh, in which he problematizes, in general terms, the relation between the civil society and the security sector, examining the role and status of the civil society in relation to the new concept of security. Marc Houben, on the other hand, focuses on the stages that the reform of armed forces usually goes through in developed Euro-Atlantic societies and the impediments that sometimes arise in this process. Vojin Dimitrijević examines, in the context of international peace, the interdependence of internal prosperity and external security in the countries that managed to break away from their Communist past, while Radoslav Stojanović analyzes the influence of the specificities of the Balkan region on European security.

The third section of our collection features papers examining FRY/Serbia’s internal prospects for joining the security system of the Euro-Atlantic Community. By analyzing the key elements of the transition strategy adopted by the new Serbian government (the Democratic Opposition of Serbia), Vladimir Goati implicitly explains why DOS is currently reserved towards FRY’s speedy admission to the Partnership for Peace program. Miroslav Hadžić uses his short account of the dominant political and ideological discourse in Serbia as an opportunity to elaborate on the possible ways in which FRY could benefit by getting integrated into the Euro-Atlantic Community’s security system. In the essay that follows, Mile Stojković presents his findings concerning FRY military and defense system’s capacities for integration. Finally, Zlatan Jeremić writes about the changes that have already been made and those that still lay ahead if the Yugoslav Army is to join the Partnership for Peace program.

The fourth section brings together five essays of authors from five different countries: Jovan Teokarević looks at FRY’s attitude to the Partnership for Peace program. Ivan Ivanov sums up the Bulgarian experience with the program, Zsolt Rabai gives an account of what Hungary had to do to become a member of NATO, while Ljube Dukoski writes about the attitude of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to the Partnership for Peace program. The section and the whole collection end with Stefan Merisanu’s analysis of the goals, structure and area of responsibilities of the Partnership for Peace program.