Well, what else is new? Afghanistan is said to be the graveyard of empires, but turbulence in the Balkans often is also the precursor to an empire or two being buried in its wake. Not for nothing, in the fall of 1918, as the Salonica front was crumbling, Kaiser Wilhelm complained to his General Staff what a shame it was for the outcome of the Great War to be decided by 70,000 Serbs. Some decades previously, his chancellor Bismarck (who himself had more than a few drops of Serbian blood on his grandmother’s side) averred dismissively that the Balkan riff-raff was not worth the bones of a single one of his Pomeranian Grenadiers. By 1918 Wilhelm had learned better.

At the moment, it is Montenegro that holds centre stage in a brewing Balkan political storm. The ostensible provocation – the consecration of the country’s new Orthodox metropolitan – is as unlikely a trigger for a major crisis just as Montenegro (once celebrated in breezy operettas such as “The Merry Widow”) appears to be an unexpected mise en scène for a major geopolitical earthquake.

In the event, most Balkan eyes will be riveted on the old Montenegrin royal capital of Cetinje, where on September 5 an oddly controversial ecclesiastical consecration ceremony should take place in the local monastery, which also happens to be the metropolitan’s residence and symbolic headquarters. Why would a solemn religious rite in a monastery be anything but routine? Because it is scheduled to take place in a part of the world where everything offends someone, or has a double or even triple, or occult, significance which is thought to menace someone’s perceived self-interest, and because in that part of the world where everything is convoluted and simplicity is scarce, virtually nothing can be passed off as routine.

Without seeking for an explanation which goes back centuries (an approach that history-obsessed natives would undoubtedly prefer) we can probably manage to get a good grasp of it by backing up a mere couple of decades. The statelet of Montenegro, the only patch of Serbian territory to avoid falling under the Ottoman yoke, was a proud Orthodox principality (after 1910 recognized as a kingdom) which cherished its organically close ties to Russia to the extent that in 1905 in all seriousness it declared war on Japan, in solidarity with its Big Brother. After World War I Montenegro joined Serbia and Slavic lands that had formed part of defeated Austria-Hungary in the newly established Kingdom of Yugoslavia. In the interwar period, many ideologically naïve Montenegrins were unable to distinguish between the Russia for which they went to war with Japan and the new dispensation that had replaced it. Consequently, communism became “in” with a portion of the population, while another portion remained steadfast in its more sober Russophile yet also traditional Serbian nationalist convictions.

The split in Montenegrin society, pretty much down the middle, bore bitter fruit in the form of unrestrained factional slaughter during the dark and confused period of World War II Axis occupation. After 1945, the winners in the tragic civil war, waged within the context of anti-occupation resistance, sought to reshape Montenegro (as well as the rest of Yugoslavia) in their own ideological image. After ruthless extermination of traditionalist elements, the supporters of the new system decreed not just that God was dead, but also that everything Montenegrins had been told before about their identity was false. The “nation builders” who seized control of the country now informed their subjects that they were not Serbs at all but were partakers of a distinct Montenegrin ethnicity, with all the requisite appurtenances which always accompany such identity decrees issued from on high. Yes, eventually a “Montenegrin language” was also invented and adorned with two new symbols that no one had ever heard of or seen before, thought up by a committee of foreign linguists specially hired for the purpose.

With the advent of “democracy” in the 1990s, the fiefdom of Montenegro was turned over to a promising young politician by the name of Milo Djukanovic. Belying his youthful appearance (that was thirty years ago) Mr. Djukanovic displayed some remarkable political nimbleness by successfully combining newly prescribed, post 1990 political forms with the ideological substance inherited from the preceding not-so-democratic times. The resulting, breathtakingly hybrid, system of governance produced numerous ostensible anomalies. The rebranded old political elite, led by Djukanovic, took Montenegro into NATO, glibly talked Euroatlanticist “values” gibberish while never fully mastering their own “Montenegrin” dialect, with its two contrived but distinctively unique symbols, which they were disingenuously promoting for use by others, and in general it toed the new Washington-Brussels party line with old-time ideological fervour, and without ever missing a beat.

The seemingly eternal ascendancy of the refurbished old regime cabal, now conveniently repackaged as pro-NATO and “European” enthusiasts (sadly, an opportunistic conversion not in the least unique following the disintegration of the Eastern bloc), came to a screeching halt two years ago when quite possibly they made the biggest mistake of their political career. At some point, NATO overlords had apparently hinted to their Montenegrin vassals that in addition to its own language, airline (since gone into bankruptcy, as irony would have it), etc. the fledgling new Alliance “partner” was expected to seal its new identity with the formation of its own “church” (analogies to the Ukraine scenario are anything but accidental). Presto, the atheist crew steering Montenegro into NATO and values-based European “integrations” promptly undertook to comply. It composed a new law divesting the metropolitanate of the predominant Serbian Orthodox Church of its status and property, intending thus to set the stage for replacing it with the self-styled “Montenegrin Orthodox Church” that regime operatives had earlier brazenly set up as an NGO. It was again a re-enactment of the Ukrainian playbook, complete with feelers to Patriarch Bartholomew to bless the impious new arrangement.

And that is when all hell broke loose, to the infinite chagrin and gnashing of teeth of all concerned in this atheist-inspired religious swindle, but with very serious political implications.

Massive, spontaneous religious processions erupted throughout the tiny country in which over half of the population participated. They lasted for months and in the previously scheduled parliamentary elections of August 2020 a new majority coalition, though not as coherent as one might have wished, emerged to govern the country. Upon the advice of the late metropolitan Amfilohije, who subsequently passed away with a covid diagnosis, a new prime minister, Zdravko Krivokapic, was installed to struggle with the residual hydra of the previous regime. As it turned out, compared to the Montenegrin swamp, the Washington swamp that Trump had proposed to eradicate was a rather innocuous affair.

Months after taking office, prime minister Krivokapic has precious little to show for his efforts. Most key figures from the ancien régime are still firmly in place and sabotaging at every turn. They have already provoked numerous physical incidents, manipulating crowds of brainwashed identitarian “Montenegrins” fanatics to destabilise the country and prepare the conditions deemed necessary for the cabal’s political restoration.

Fast forward to the consecration of the new metropolitan on September 5. The cabal has made it clear that the consecration of the newly elected Serbian Orthodox Church metropolitan of Montenegro and the Littoral Joanikije in his Cetinje monastery would not be allowed because he is an agent of Serbia, a foreign state, and an official of the “foreign” Serbian Orthodox Church. This preposterous demand, made by elements of the preceding pro-NATO and pro-European Union regime, is equivalent to objecting to the investiture of the archbishop Paris at the Sacré-Cœur cathedral on the rationale that he is an agent of the Vatican.

Tensions are rising in Montenegro as September 5 approaches. Goons of old regime supporters are staging hostile demonstrations in front of the ancient monastery and threatening violence if the consecration proceeds as planned. The only comment so far of the U.S. and British embassies on this outrage, the extraordinary trampling of religious liberty in a NATO country fully on track for membership in the enlightened European Union, was an insipid appeal for “calm,” while endorsing the search for alternative venues for the “controversial” ceremony.

On September 5 blood may or may not be shed, but at the instigation of NATO’s Montenegrin foot soldiers feathers are guaranteed to fly. Empty Atlanticist “human rights” and respect for religion promises are again on ostentatious display. The perfidious weaponisation of a religious ceremony as a high potency political issue to generate social strife and even violence is part and parcel of the ominous chaos strategy for the Balkans that Western strategists are pursuing, whose general contours are increasingly visible even to the untrained eye.

As work nears completion in the first phase of an ambitious project in Montenegro to develop a highway that will connect the Adriatic port of Bar with Serbia, Western officials and mainstream media are ramping up attacks on the endeavor. Western commentators are united in condemnation, ranging from fear-mongering over China’s role to disparaging the plan’s viability. Consistently, they dismiss it as “the highway to nowhere,” implying foolishness on the part of Montenegro and presenting it as a cautionary tale on the dangers of doing business with China. The theme fits neatly within the framework of Washington’s campaign to economically isolate and cripple China, its main competitor in the global economy.

“One of the world’s most expensive roads,” the New York Times informs us, has reached “its destination: a muddy field outside a hamlet with a few dozen houses, many of them empty.” [1] It is an image meant to invite contempt. Never mind that this is the endpoint of one stage of the project, and the plan is to continue construction of the highway; it is better to repeat as a mantra, “the highway to nowhere.” Like a steady drumbeat, Western ridicule is relentless and unvarying: Montenegro has launched a “megalomaniac project” that serves no useful purpose, taking on debt of monstrous proportions in the process.

Western officials warn that China has captured Montenegro in a “debt trap” that will allow it to wield undue influence over Montenegro’s policies and seize control of territory or infrastructure. Moreover, it is argued that the debt to the Export-Import (Exim) Bank of China is unsustainable. The New York Times reports that Montenegro “is now saddled with debts to China that total more than a third of the government’s annual budget.” [2] The impression given is one of unsustainable excess, and that would be so were the entire debt due to be repaid in a single year. A closer look at the details of the loan shows how misleading the Times article is.

The initial interest rate on the Exim Bank of China loan was 2%, and former Montenegrin President Filip Vujanović reports that the loan terms “were by far the most favorable, and no bank or financial organization could match them.” [3] However, Western media warn that the loan totals $1 billion, which is due and cannot be repaid.

Although Montenegro is not a member of the European Union, it relies on the Euro for its currency. However, Exim Bank of China’s loan required payments to be denominated in U.S. dollars. To be precise, the agreement that Montenegro signed in 2014 with Exim Bank of China covers up to a maximum of $944 million, which is €796 million at today’s exchange rate. The contract established between the Chinese construction company building the highway and the Ministry of Transport and Maritime has a fixed conversion rate. However, the fluctuating value of the Euro against the dollar has added to the cost. [4] The loan is in the form of a draw-down, which means that the government can access money in installments on an as-needed basis while construction proceeds.

The latest Montenegrin government statistics show that the actual loan balance, as of the end of 2020, is €640 million. [5] Under terms of the 2014 loan, Exim Bank is responsible for financing 85 percent of the project’s first phase. A six-year grace period was provided, which Montenegro took advantage of, and a 20-year repayment schedule. This year, Montenegro made its first annual loan repayment, amounting to €27.79 million. [6] Far from having a ruinous economic impact that is destroying the economy, that amount accounts for a mere 1.5% of the government’s annual budget of €1.88 billion.[7]

Objections are also expressed over the amount of the Chinese loan relative to the size of the national economy. It is said that the loan has sent the nation’s GDP/debt ratio “soaring” to stratospheric levels, far beyond the norm. The latest figure for Montenegro’s GDP/debt ratio stands at 103%. [8] That is, the nation is carrying more debt than its gross domestic product. Taken at face value, this would seem an unsustainable burden, as Western reports would have us believe.

A comprehensive comparison reveals a different picture, though. On the international scene, Montenegro’s GDP/debt ratio is not unusual. Statistics for 2020 show Japan leading the pack at 266%, and several other countries exceed Montenegro’s standing, including the United States at 131%. [9] When only Montenegro is singled out, a different impression is given than reality suggests.

One question never asked is to what extent the loan from Exim Bank of China is responsible for Montenegro’s supposed predicament. We are led to believe that this loan is single-handedly responsible for a mountainous debt load. You will never see it pointed out in mainstream media, but the Chinese loan accounts for only 15% of Montenegro’s GDP/debt ratio. Montenegro’s Eurobond debt is more than triple that. There are also several loans from Western financial institutions, which cumulatively easily surpass the amount of the Chinese loan. [10]

Is it plausible to claim that there is something uniquely unsustainable about 15% of Montenegro’s debt because its origin is Chinese? Or that concern over debt should focus on that single loan while ignoring the primarily Western loans comprising the remaining 85%? It would appear that Western resentment over Chinese competition is driving this narrative.

Whether the impact of the loan is measured against the national budget or the GDP/debt ratio, the standard narrative is misleading either way. So in the latter case, the €27.79 million that Montenegro paid this year to Exim Bank of China amounts to less than one percent of its GDP, hardly a crushing weight. [11]

An oft-repeated canard is that China seized the port of Hambantota as collateral when Sri Lanka ran into difficulties in making loan payments. The lesson imparted is of the danger involved in taking out a loan from a Chinese bank. But, as usual in Western reports, assertion substitutes for evidence. Chinese banks have never grabbed an asset from another country and have often reduced interest rates or written off debts when a nation has run into difficulties. Nor is it true that China grabbed the port of Hambantota. [12]

Montenegro’s government was eager to modify the loan terms, and Exim Bank of China generously agreed to reduce the interest rate to 0.8%. [13] Montenegro also struck a hedging deal with Deutsche Bank, Société Générale, Merrill Lynch, and Goldman Sachs that provides a cross-currency swap, allowing the nation to make loan payments in Euros rather than dollars to eliminate the potential impact of fluctuating rates.[14]

U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Palmer regularly visits the Montenegrin capital of Podgorica, urging the government to exercise “caution” in its dealings with China. [15] In an interview on the Montenegrin news station Televizija Vijesti, Palmer praised the hedging deal the nation reached with Western firms as a demonstration of “fiscal responsibility” and progress on “limiting the ability of outside actors, in this case China in particular, from making mischief.” He added, “China around the world employs this kind of debt-trap diplomacy to get countries on the hook for obligations that they’re not in a position to finance and then use that as leverage to extract political concessions.” [16] American officials are prone to such wild accusations, which generally serve as imprecations rather than statements of fact. Responding to Palmer’s defamations, Chinese Foreign Minister Spokesperson Zhao Lijian pointed out, “The true intention behind the false accusation of ‘debt trap’ is to sow discord between China and relevant countries.” [17]

The United States and European Union sense an opportunity to muscle in on China’s presence in Montenegro, thereby sending a message to the rest of the Western Balkans. A source familiar with the debt negotiations reveals that the plan is that once the hedge agreement was reached, talks would likely continue with the aim of having Western financial institutions refinance the entire loan and take Exim Bank of China out of the picture. [18] Montenegrin Finance Minister Milojko Spajić says that the hedging deal “was an intermediate step towards refinancing.” [19]

It seems unlikely that any Western loan could match Exim Bank of China’s reduced interest rate of 0.8%. But then, Montenegro may not have much maneuvering space if it wants to remain on the path to EU membership.

Although Montenegro is the only European country without a highway, we are taught that this endeavor is unnecessary, and money is being thrown away. Construction of the road is proceeding in three phases, the first of which is scheduled to be completed by the end of November. When the final phase is done, a modern 164-kilometer highway will connect Montenegro’s port of Bar on the Adriatic coast with the Serbian village of Boljare on the border. From there, Montenegro will link to the rest of the Balkans and Central Europe.

The China Road and Bridge Corporation is leading the first phase, the 41-km Smokovac-Mateševo section, which is the most technically difficult. The cost-per-kilometer is often disapprovingly remarked upon in Western reports. We are led to question why this section of highway should be expensive. However, this is no ordinary road. The terrain the builders must contend with is suggested by Montenegro’s name — Crna Gora, meaning ‘Black Mountain,’ and known in the English-speaking world by the Spanish equivalent.

Tunnels had to be blasted through mountains and bridges built to span deep chasms. In all, bridges and tunnels account for 60% of this section of the road.[20] The Moračica Bridge is one of the tallest in the world, [21] requiring 100,000 cubic meters of concrete, 15,000 tons of reinforcement, and 2,000 tons of cables. [22] It makes for an imposing sight.

The Vjeternik tunnel presented a particular challenge. According to engineer Lazar Smolović, “Half a million cubic meters of earth and stone were excavated.” [23] Chinese engineer Wang Xinwei explains that the greatest difficultywas dealing with around one hundred karst caves discovered during tunneling. [24] According to an observer, these subterranean caves had to be filled with concrete. He noted the difficulty the construction team faced in working at high altitudes and strong winter winds. As he rather poetically put it, “Across the mountains and karst, and through the canyons and plateaus, where only goats and donkeys could fight their way through the centuries, today’s Chinese builders are building” the first section of the highway. [25]

When completed, the road will include 48 tunnels and 107 bridges and viaducts, traversing some of the most challenging terrains in the Balkans. [26] View this engineering marvel or even the Moračica Bridge alone, and ask how intellectually honest Western reporters are when they jeeringly question why this highway should have a price tag on the higher end when ordinary roads cost so much less.

The remaining two sections of the highway will be considerably easier and cheaper to tackle. Despite the New York Times sarcastically describing the initial section as “petering out in the middle of a largely uninhabited forest,” implying that it serves no purpose, it will be put to immediate use all along its 41 kilometers. This section of the road will also enable the government to launch its plan to develop the northern region, where plentiful natural resources have been essentially inaccessible up to now. [27]

It is incorrect to suggest that the first phase of the highway is any measure of the costs to be expected going forward. Nor is it accurate to maintain, as the New York Times does, that there are “no funds available to extend it” while the first phase is still underway. On the contrary. Finance Minister Milojko Spajić has announced that funds are available to continue the project, and Montenegro plans to call a tender for the two easier sections by the end of this year. [28]

Another charge frequently hurled at the China Road and Bridge Corporation is that it missed the deadline for completing work on the Smokovac-Mateševo section, resulting in a contract extension that demonstrates the unreliability of China as a business partner. Unmentioned is any indication of the reasons for the schedule change. Covid-19 severely hampered progress in terms of labor shortages and supply disruptions, not uniquely so on the world stage. [29] Also, as work progressed, the need for additional construction, water, and electrical supply was discovered. [30]

We are told that the China Road and Bridge Corporation is taking all the money back to China, while Balkan companies and workers are excluded from involvement. This is yet another accusation made without foundation. The Montenegrin civil engineering firm Bemax plays a significant role, as do other companies, including the Serbian firm Titan Cement. As for the exclusion of local and regional workers, the contractor’s report from May shows that of 1,131 personnel, only 34% are from China. [31]

Western reports argue that the highway makes no economic sense for Montenegro, as tolls from anticipated traffic from Serbia and elsewhere cannot possibly compensate the project’s expense. Montenegro has never claimed otherwise. An international bond prospectus issued by the government of Montenegro on the London Stock Exchange declares, “It is expected that in the longer term, approximately half of the [highway] project’s expenditures will be covered from road toll fee revenues.” [32] This is not negligible, but the highway has far broader significance for Montenegro and the Balkans.

Indeed, one could argue that toll fares comprise the least of considerations. Montenegro’s economic development is heavily concentrated along its coastal region, leaning heavily on the tourist trade. Due to the pandemic’s near-total elimination of tourism, the economy contracted by 15 percent last year, illustrating the nation’s need for economic diversification. [33] Moreover, the lack of adequate roads has a disparate impact in the country’s northern region, where the unemployment rate is more than six times that of the coastal area. [34] Completing the highway, the government reports, should more evenly balance economic development and reduce the heavy population outmigration from the northern region. [35]

Improved transportation should also accelerate agricultural development in the mountainous area, where market access is constrained. [36] The European Project management Journal reports, “In the north, the road from Podgorica to Kolašin through the Morača canyon and continuing onto Serbia is considered the bottleneck of Montenegrin road network, as it is a curvy mountainous road, often unsafe during the winter.” Completing the highway, it continues, “will result in more equitable development of Montenegro” and “enable greater and safer mobility of people, goods, and services.” [37]

Montenegro will also more fully integrate with the rest of Europe. Associated plans include the modernization of the Bar-Belgrade railway, which is currently in poor condition. [38] Additional rail projects are envisioned, and Montenegro intends to increase capacity at the port of Bar and develop the port industrial complex. [39] The government says that the highway is expected to “allow for increased exports from the landlocked countries in the region (such as Serbia, Montenegro’s largest trading partner)” and significantly increase the amount of freight passing through the port of Bar. It is also anticipated that “facilitating access to regional markets and decreased direct purchase costs” should improve the business environment. [40]

The Bar-Boljare highway links Montenegro to the Pan-European Corridor XI, running from the Adriatic port of Bar to Belgrade and Bucharest, Romania, and including a ferry connection to Bari, Italy. In addition, the corridor will connect with Pan-European Corridor X, involving several Balkan nations and running from Salzburg, Austria, to the Greek port of Thessaloniki on the Aegean. [41] According to the European Union’s Western Balkans Investment Framework, the Bar-Boljare highway “will link the ports on the Adriatic Sea to those on the Danube” and provide “the shortest connection from Hungary and Romania through Serbia and Montenegro to southern Italy and Albania.” [42] The potential economic benefits, not only for Montenegro but the region as a whole, are enormous. To reduce the question of profitability, as Western critics do, to a simple matter of toll revenues on Serbia-Montenegro traffic is misleading in the extreme. The impact of the highway and related enterprises promises to be nothing less than transformational. Washington cannot be happy about any of this and has repeatedly advised Montenegro against the highway or doing business with China.

Western lending institutions have been resistant to providing support. Having failed to prevent Montenegro from starting construction, advisors are trying to convince the government to set aside plans to proceed with the subsequent two phases. The IMF is typical in warning Montenegro “that caution is needed in implementing the next phases of the Bar-Boljare highway project until feasibility, cost-benefit analyses, and financing issues are fully addressed.” Moreover, public-private partnership arrangements “should be approached with caution to reduce the risk of assuming significant contingent fiscal liabilities.” More bluntly, the IMF advised Montenegro that it has better things to do with its money and to “weigh the benefits of the Bar-Boljare highway project,” with its “low economic return on the overall highway, based on limited potential for toll revenues relative to cost.” [43] The focus on tolls alone is so wrong-headed that one wonders if Western financial institutions are being deliberately obtuse as a means of discouraging Chinese involvement. Similar admonishments from Western financial institutions preceded the launch of the first phase of highway construction. Montenegro’s challenge may be in finding a willing partner that Washington finds acceptable. The United States can be counted upon to exert every effort to block Montenegro from continuing its partnership with China. Whether the United States can succeed in stopping the project altogether or limiting its scope remains to be seen. The Montenegrin government is keen on joining the European Union, and numerous conditions have been put in its path. However, the highway could potentially prove to be another hurdle.Shortly after last year’s election in Montenegro, but before the new government took power, U.S. diplomat Matthew Palmer stated that among other things, “we expect the next government…to cooperate well and closely with the United States.” [44] Neither a partnership with the Chinese nor completion of the highway fits in that picture. Montenegro is ensnared in the U.S. war on China. By around the end of the year, the first phase of the highway will become operational, and Montenegro will stand at a crossroads. The Bar-Boljare highway project has advanced too far, and the potential benefits are too great for it to be readily abandoned. At the same time, imperialism has many ways to inflict pain on a small wayward nation. Will Montenegro leap into the future and see the highway project through to completion, or will it bend to pressure and allow Washington to hinder its development?

Notes.

[1] Andrew Higgins, “A Pricey Drive Down Montenegro’s Highway ‘From Nowhere to Nowhere’”, New York Times, August 14, 2021.
[2] Andrew Higgins, “A Pricey Drive Down Montenegro’s Highway ‘From Nowhere to Nowhere’”, New York Times, August 14, 2021.
[3] Filip Vujanović, “Accusing China of Creating ‘Debt Trap’ for Montenegro Groundless,” Belt & Road News, April 22, 2021.
[4] “Although the loan facility does not include a fixed U.S. Dollar/euro exchange rate, the construction agreement between the CRBC and the Ministry of Transport and Maritime includes a fixed U.S. Dollar/euro exchange rate of $1.3718 to €1.00.” https://www.rns-pdf.londonstockexchange.com/rns/2057L_-2018-4-17.pdf
[5] “Report on the General Government Debt of Montenegro, as of December 31, 2020,” Montenegro Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare.
[6] Radomir Ralev, “Montenegro Pays First Installment of China’s Exim Bank Loan – Report,” SeeNews, July 21, 2021.
[7] Radomir Ralev, “Montenegro’s Govt Adopts 2021 Draft Budget with 3%/GDP Deficit,” SeeNews, March 31, 2021.
[8] “Report on the General Government Debt of Montenegro, as of December 31, 2020,” Montenegro Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare.
[9] https://www.gfmag.com/global-data/economic-data/public-debt-percentage-gdp
[10] “Report on the General Government Debt of Montenegro, as of December 31, 2020,” Montenegro Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare.
[11] “Report on the General Government Debt of Montenegro, as of December 31, 2020,” Montenegro Ministry of Finance and Social Welfare. Note on bottom of page 3 provides the GDP for 2020 as 4,193 million Euros.
[12] Kevin Acker, Deborah Brautigan, Yufan Huang, “Debt Relief with Chinese Characteristics,” China-Africa Research Initiative, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, June 2020. Deborah Brautigan and Meg Rithmire, “The Chinese ‘Debt Trap’ Is a Myth,’ The Atlantic, February 6, 2021.
[13] Predrag Milić, “Spajić: Vlada Sa Kineskom Bankom Dogovorila Smanjenje Kamate Na Dug Za Autoput,” Voice of America, July 8, 2021.
[14] Nikola Đorđević, “Montenegro Narrowly Avoids Chinese Debt Trap, for Now,” Emerging Europe, August 9, 2021.
[15] https://twitter.com/usembassymne/status/1413142985210941448
[16] https://ms-my.facebook.com/montenegro.usembassy/videos/das-palmer-tv-vijesti-interview/514085246479986/
[17] “Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Zhao Lijian’s Regular Press Conference on July 13, 2021,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China,” July 13, 2021.
[18] Guy Faulconbridge, “Montenegro Close to Deal on Lifting Chinese Debt Burden – Minister,” Reuters, July 7, 2021.
[19] “Montenegro Agrees Hedging Deals to Ease Chinese Debt Burden – Report,” Reuters, July 21, 2021.
[20] https://www.crbc.com/site/crbcEN/77884/info/2015/46840520.html
[21] http://www.highestbridges.com/wiki/index.php?title=Moracica_Bridge
[22] “Спојен мост Морачица, завршетак до марта 2020,” Politika, October 11, 2019.
[23] Veliša Kadić, “Морачица мост за понос,” Večernje Novosti, July 14, 2017.
[24] https://m.cdm.me/english/1600-metres-vjeternik-tunnelled/
[25] https://alexsrb.livejournal.com/396102.html
[26] https://waytomonte.com/en/n-615-novost-47
[27] Filip Vujanović, “Accusing China of Creating ‘Debt Trap’ for Montenegro Groundless,” Belt & Road News, April 22, 2021.
[28] “Montenegro’s Chinese-funded Highway to Replace ‘Death Road,” Reuters, June 1, 2021.
[29] https://www.cdm.me/english/bar-boljare-motorway-project-380-chinese-workers-returned-to-montenegro
[30] Z. Zorić, “ПЕНАЛИ ИЛИ ПРОДУЖЕТАК: Кинези поднели захтев да им се одобри одлагање завршетка ауто-пута,” October 6, 2020.
[31] “ЗАВРШЕНО 95 ПОСТО РАДОВА: За ауто-пут Бар – Бољаре до сада плаћено 700 милиона евра,” Večernje Novosti, June 25, 2021.
[32] https://www.rns-pdf.londonstockexchange.com/rns/2057L_-2018-4-17.pdf
[33] “Western Balkans Regular Economic Report No.19: Subdued Recovery,” World Bank, Spring 2021.
[34] “Montenegro 2020 Report,” European Commission, October 6, 2020.
[35] “Detaljnog Prostornog Plana Autoputa: Bar-Boljare,” Montenegro Ministry of Economic Development, August, 2008.
[36] “Detaljnog Prostornog Plana Autoputa: Bar-Boljare,” Montenegro Ministry of Economic Development, August, 2008.
[37] Sanja Međedović and Michael Ellis, “A Project Management Approach to a Highway Construction in Montenegro,” European Project Management Journal, Volume 7, Issue 1, December 2017.
[38] “Bojanić: Crna Gora će Predložiti Srbiji Zajedničku Gradnju Autoputa,” Vijesti, April 12, 2021.
[39] “Detaljnog Prostornog Plana Autoputa: Bar-Boljare,” Montenegro Ministry of Economic Development, August, 2008.
[40] https://www.rns-pdf.londonstockexchange.com/rns/2057L_-2018-4-17.pdf
[41] https://www.worldhighways.com/wh8/news/serbia-and-china-discuss-preljina-boljare-section-corridor-xi
[42] https://www.wbif.eu/project/PRJ-MNE-TRA-006
[43] “IMF Country Report No. 19/293: Montenegro Article IV Consultation,” IMF, September, 2019.
[44] https://m.cdm.me/english/palmer-about-montenegro-we-expect-people-who-are-committed-to-the-nato-agenda-to-be-in-key-ministries/

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The August 30 parliamentary elections in this coastal former Yugoslav republic of some 620,000 people brought electoral defeat to the party of Montenegrin strongman and current president Milo Djukanovic for the first time in some 30 years. This was proclaimed by some as the long-awaited fall of the Berlin Wall in that country, seeing that the ruling Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS) had seamlessly evolved from the League of Communists of Montenegro at the beginning of the 1990s, thus making its rule basically uninterrupted since the communist takeover of Yugoslavia in 1945. On September 23, the three opposition lists that won a narrow 41 seat majority in the 81-seat parliament elected the parliament’s new president and formally proposed the leader of the “For the Future of Montenegro” list, mechanical engineering professor Zdravko Krivokapic, as the new prime minister. Djukanovic has 30 days to offer him the mandate to form a government. In theory, he can offer it to someone else, but only Krivokapic has secured a majority. In any case, a new government must be either confirmed by parliament within 90 days or new elections called.

However, while to the casual observer the “Montenegrin Spring” appears to be in full bloom, it seems that some things are not open to democratic or any other debate after all. In the first place, the country’s pro-Western course, most importantly its NATO membership, EU integration path and the recognition of Serbia’s breakaway Kosovo province. Which tells us much about where we have arrived some three decades after the West’s proclaimed victory in the Cold War, and Fukuyama’s annunciation of the “end of history” and the final victory of “liberal democracy.”

Of course, there are no NATO troops concentrating at the Montenegrin border, no overt threats of foreign armed intervention – yet. Which is not to say that there are no threats at all. In fact, Djukanovic, a recent winner of the “Person of the Year in Organized Crime” award, has threatened violence twice in the space of several days, just in case the new government should decide to stray from the “correct” path.

In a recent interview for Sarajevo’s FACE TV, after speaking approvingly of the new majority’s assurances that the country would not veer from its westward course, Djukanovic nevertheless warned that he was prepared to defend Montenegro “from the woods if necessary,” invoking the country’s long history of armed resistance to attacks on its “statehood.” He also threatened to “demolish” any stone used to build a new church in the old capital of Cetinje – which was clearly an arrow aimed at the Serbian Orthodox Church, which led the mass resistance to Djukanovic’s Orwellian “Law on Religious Freedom” that turned out to be driving force behind his party’s election loss.

Djukanovic reiterated his threat in another interview several days later, throwing in, for good measure, the usual westward-directed virtue signaling and scaremongering about the Russian and Serbian threat to Montenegrin statehood and all that is great and good in the world.

What should be noted here is not just Djukanovic’s ominous rhetoric but the uniform silence with which it has been greeted by Western embassies and capitals, otherwise quick to detect and decry phantom Russian (and, locally, Serbian) threats at the drop of a hat. Which shows that the new parliamentary majority will be under the watchful eye of Brussels, Washington, London, Paris and Berlin, who are still counting on Djukanovic, warts and all, as a viable insurance policy just in case Montenegrins start getting some ideas of their own about how to run their country and start taking democratic choice a tad too seriously.

So, while Djukanovic is allowed to casually sling threats of violence from the sidelines, ready to pounce at his opponents’ slightest misstep, the new democratically elected majority is compelled to offer endless pledges of fealty to the country’s “unalterable” pro-Western course. Note, for example, the inquisitorial tone of a question posed to Krivokapic in a recent Deutsche Welle interview: “Djukanovic has distanced himself from Milosevic, declared Montenegro’s independence, supported EU sanctions against Russia, recognized Kosovo and entered NATO. How will you convince Brussels and Washington that you will not change his Western-supported foreign policy course, which is not supported by your own supporters, especially the pro-Serbian and pro-Russian parties in coalition with you?”

Naturally, Krivokapic assured his interrogator that neither he nor his political partners had any intention of straying from the Washington/Brussels party line or path, pointing to their coalition agreement as proof. In a nutshell, to quote Brezhnev’s famous policy speech given to Polish workers in November 1968, Krivokapic and company assured Western comrades that “none of their decisions should damage either socialism democracy in their country or the fundamental interests of other socialist democratic countries, and the whole working class democratic movement, which is working for socialism democracy.”

And, taking no chances, in a subsequent article written for the Washington Times, Krivokapic additionally reassured the Westintern that the new majority’s three-way agreement “guaranteed not only to maintain Montenegro’s commitment to NATO membership but to deepen our place in the alliance; and we pledged to accelerate reforms that can take our country into the European Union.”

In his defense, this approach is basically understandable, as Krivokapic and his partners are well aware of all the obstacles they will face tackling their most important challenges, which are of an internal nature – deconstructing Djukanovic’s corrupt political machine, opening up the media for diverse political views, ending anti-Serb discrimination, voiding or amending the afore-mentioned Law on Religious Freedom, reforming the judicial system and coming to terms with the country’s high indebtedness and rising unemployment, exacerbated by the destruction of the tourist season as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But of course, even internally, we can be sure that the neo-Brezhnevite guardians of Western “fundamental interests” will be closely watching for any kind of opening to Russian, Serbian or Chinese “malign influence,” even if it might be economically beneficial to this impoverished country. That’s where Krivokapic may run into trouble down the road as, set-in-stone foreign policy pledges notwithstanding, he has also unequivocally stated that Serbia and Montenegro are “the closest of states,” that “the Russian Federation is our brotherly country and great, centuries-long friend” and that he and his political allies are “obliged to repair our political relations with Russia, as well as Serbia.” He also did not neglect to remind that Djukanovic had granted recognition to so-called Kosovo despite the fact that, quoting Montenegro’s outgoing prime minister, “85% of Montenegro’s citizens were against the recognition of Serbia’s southern province.” In the eyes of the Westintern, such views are doubtlessly seen as double-plus-ungood.

Which means that more “pro-democratic” reinforcements are bound to be brought in, such as the former commander of U.S. forces in Europe, Ben Hodges. In a recent interview for the pro-Djukanovic Pobjeda daily, Hodges, now an associate of the neocon CEPA Washington think tank, gently reminded the future government that it is “expected to fulfill its NATO obligations,” while sending the usual barrage of unsubstantiated accusations Russia’s way, covering everything from using “force, disinformation and poison” to being responsible for Syria’s refugee crisis and other similar nonsense.

In observing the situation in Montenegro, the words of former England striker Gary Lineker come to mind, “Football is a simple game – 22 men chase a ball for 90 minutes and at the end, the Germans always win.” What the collective West seems to be saying to Montenegrins these days is, “Democracy is a simple game – the people cast their ballots on election day and at the end, NATO and the EU always win. Or else…”

Behind the new Democratic Curtain, the Brezhnev Doctrine has found new life.

The outcome of the electoral contest is ambiguous, as most things are in the Balkans. The ruling pro-Western DPS Party (ironically, the acronym stands for “Democratic Party of Socialists” which is the successor to the former League of Communists), if we are to go by the official count, obtained a plurality of the votes, about 35%. (Of course, this generous percentage might be modified somewhat by factoring in reported widespread fraud which, according to some persuasive estimates, ascends to 40,000 phantom votes, or roughly one-third of DPS’ total.) But while DPS was presumably the biggest single vote-getter, together the three opposition coalitions it was facing still beat it by a wide margin. These opposition groups have signed a political pact with the intention of jointly forming Montenegro’s new government.

Even if they were to succeed, however, things at the top of the political pyramid would still remain the same. President Milo Djukanovic, who has been running Montenegro for the last thirty years, has another three years to go before his mandate expires. If the new government, as is likely, is formed by the opposition we will soon find out what the President thinks of the idea of cohabitation as the French would put it and had practiced successfully in the 1990s. Would temperamental Montenegrins manage to abide by the rules of such a delicate arrangement?

The choices facing President Djukanovic are stark. In order to evade legal problems related to broad accusations of criminal misconduct, he must hold on at all cost to the immunity afforded by the Presidential office. His options are neither many nor pleasant, given the palpable cooling in the stance of his Western sponsors toward his regime.

He could string out the appointment of the new government (constitutionally the process can take up to ninety days) or try to cobble together a majority coalition around his DPS by luring (in the Balkans there is little mystery about the means that would encompass, and personal charm is certainly not a part of it) a sufficient number of opposition deputies over to his camp. With thirty years of political experience, he surely has a dossier on every one of them and is well informed about their weaknesses.

The first option would depend heavily on Djukanovic’s betting on a Biden victory. Djukanovic has scored some good points with the Albanian factor in the Balkans by recognizing Kosovo and cooperating in other important ways. In fact, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama, breaching diplomatic etiquette, made an impassioned appeal on Djukanovic’s behalf on the eve of the election. Biden is known to be sympathetic to the Albanian lobby, so support from him in the event he wins in November would not be an unreasonable expectation.

But while that is neither here nor there, the here and now does not look very cheerful. Signs that the West is getting tired and even annoyed with Djukanovic were accumulating as election day drew near and became particularly noticeable after the results were in. In a Statement issued two days after the votes were counted, EU honchos Josep Borrell and Olivér Várhelyi made it clear that Brussels would take a dim view of Djukanovic’s post-electoral shenanigans, though the warning was couched in refined diplomatic language. They referred to “a number of concerns in relation to undue advantage for the ruling party and the unbalanced media coverage” and urged “all political actors and relevant institutions … to engage in a transparent, decisive and inclusive dialogue on the implementation of these recommendations to address long-standing electoral shortcomings well ahead of the next elections”. Contrasted with effusive praise that until recently was showered on Djukanovic, these terse words are the functional equivalent of being politically thrown under the bus.

The other, more offensive strategy Djukanovic could employ is to play deaf to EU warnings and manufacture a parliamentary majority that would relatively smoothly prolong his rule. He could do it by…well, temporarily suspending the European values that he swears by and reverting to tried and tested Balkan methods of pressure creatively mixed with bribery. The alleged acquisition of enormous quantities of cash by illicit means is, after all, precisely one of the compelling reasons for holding on to the immunity of Presidential office, so the cash might as well be put to good use.

Djukanovic’s legacy is not pretty. Its leitmotif, simply put, is treachery, with larceny running not too far behind as the defining characteristic of his political career. His endless series of betrayals started with the opportunistic repudiation of his political mentor Slobodan Milosevic in the 1990s. During the NATO aggression in 1999, he openly consorted with his country’s adversaries, whose bombs were destroying Montenegrin targets and killing Montenegrin civilians, as in the village of Murino. In 2006, he organized a fraudulent referendum which led to Montenegro’s separation from Serbia with himself as its undisputed ruler. When in 2010 the NATO occupied statelet of Kosovo declared its independence, he obligingly recognized it although a good part of it was Montenegrin territory until the beginning of World War I. But what did he care?

Having placed his fate entirely in the hands of new sponsors in Washington and Brussels, in lockstep with them he instituted a radically anti-Russian policy, even imposing “sanctions” on the Russian Federation, unconcerned about the overwhelmingly pro-Russian sentiment of the Montenegrin people. In 2015, by a vote in parliament under his party’s domination and without taking into account the opinion of the Montenegrin public, he dragged the country into the universally loathed NATO alliance.

The climax – and the beginning of his downfall – was the December 2019 law on religious communities that targeted the Serbian Orthodox Church. Unexpectedly, it touched a raw nerve. That is where the public, which had sullenly tolerated egregious misrule, finally drew the line. When parliament which he then still controlled passed the offensive religion law, peaceful rebellion could no longer be contained. Mass religious processions began being held in protest, demanding that the discriminatory law be repealed. With a new parliament to be seated soon, that very well may happen.

Fittingly, the great betrayer is now himself being betrayed by his foreign sponsors and there are signs that his domestic political machine is beginning to implode as well, as many of his lieutenants sense that the end is near. It is unlikely that many will regret Milo Djukanovic’s demise.

But it would be a mistake to see this as a belated outburst of Western-inspired triumphalism over the remnants of the vanquished Cold War enemy’s remnants. There was more irony than triumph here. And not because Djukanovic is still president, his mandate running until 2023, or because the opposition will likely have a razor-thin 41-40 majority, faced with the daunting task of disentangling the elaborate political-economic-media-criminal webs of a deep state built since 1989 (although many argue that its origins go back to the final communist liberation/takeover of Yugoslavia in 1945).

The irony, rather, lies in the fact that Djukanovic’s (un)reformed neo(liberal)-communists were a trusted Western partner and accomplice over most of that period. Djukanovic’s betrayal of the demonized Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic, who had helped him ascend to power in the first place, followed by the subsequent betrayal of his main political partners, breakup of the joint state with Serbia in 2006 by way of a referendum of questionable validity and his sharp turn against Russia and towards NATO – these were all lauded in Western capitals, with hardly a peep about a “Berlin Wall” that needed taking down – until the desired tasks were accomplished, that is.

When Djukanovic and company staged a crudely organized, evidence-free “Russian-supported coup attempt” during the elections of October 2016, using the occasion to reduce turnout and proper election monitoring just enough to secure a (nevertheless narrow) victory and then, less than a year later, steered this coastal country of some 600,000 to the seemingly safe harbors of full NATO membership – they did not realize that the deafening applause they were hearing from the self-designated guardians of global democracy and all that is good, was in fact the far off sound of their swansong, and that it was time for a graceful exit. As it ultimately happens with all the West’s situational favorites, their expiration date was nearing.

For why would the West put up with living evidence of its double standards and selective attention to human rights and democracy longer than it had to, especially on hallowed European soil, where “democracy” is supposedly an indigenous plant? Djukanovic and pals had already become notorious for their Latin American-style rule, financed by proceeds of cigarette and drug smuggling, murky privatizations of state property and (deep) state-backed monopolies. Not to mention unsolved high-profile murders with a clearly political dimension, such as the May 27, 2004 assassination of the editor-in-chief of an opposition newspaper. In 2015, Djukanovic was even deemed worthy of a “criminal of the year” award.

But the warning shots, in the shape of increasingly unfavorable media coverage and negative “independent” reports on crime and corruption, went unheeded. Instead of gracefully withdrawing from the political stage to enjoy his millions, Djukanovic – the “eternal president” as Deutsche Welle dubbed him – reentered the arena and reclaimed the country’s highest office in 2018, which was his eighth term as either prime minister or president.

And Djukanovic’s party might very well have carried these last elections as well if not for the monumental mistake he made at the end last year, when, at his behest, the Montenegrin parliament passed the Law on the Freedom of Religion in the early hours of December 27, 2019. Despite its name, the law called for a de facto nationalization of properties of the Serbian Orthodox Church (SOC) in Montenegro and for the Church to “register with the authorities” under an officially approved name, despite the fact that the SOC had just celebrated the 800^th anniversary of its autocephaly, along with its first diocese – the Zeta diocese – established in 1219 on the territory of today’s Montenegro, by Archbishop Sava, a prince of the Serbian Nemanjic dynasty. During the parliamentary voting, which took place in the dead of the night, the most vehement opposition MPs were arrested, despite their immunity.

Public resistance started the next day. Some of the police acted with brutality. A bishop was beaten severely enough to require hospitalization (another would be arrested a couple of months later, along with several priests). However, what first looked like just another mass political protest of the kind Djukanovic had previously successfully put down, quickly transformed into a spiritual tidal wave that washed over the country’s entire landscape – both physical and political.

It was estimated that anywhere between a quarter and a third of Montenegro’s population joined in what soon became daily processions. The scenes from the peaceful processions, in which priests and the faithful carried church banners, huge wooden crosses, icons, Serbian and traditional Montenegrin flags (whose colors are identical) while singing spiritual songs exploded over the region’s social media.

As was the case with most human activity, the processions were interrupted after three months in mid-March by the pandemic and the accompanying anti-mass gathering measures that the Montenegrin government was all too eager to enforce. But the damage had obviously been done. The spiritual uprising, with its rallying cry: “We won’t give up our shrines,” had broken the suffocating political atmosphere. The resistance of the Orthodox faithful also encouraged those of other faiths or even no faith at all to join in, and wound up serving as an organizing framework for all that were in any way opposed to Djukanovic and his 30-year rule, just in time for the August elections. The clear anti-regime opposition united in three blocs, preventing the dissipation of votes that had hampered previous campaigns, and secured the parliamentary majority.

Unlike previous times, Djukanovic could no longer count on overt pre- or post-election support from his Western allies. The incoming messages were neutral at best, and often unapproving. Even Freedom House was not amused, assessing that “corruption is a serious issue,” and that “investigative journalists and journalists critical of the government face pressure, as do many nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).”

It may have been hard enough to support a figure like Djukanovic for so long, but now he had become undefendable. It wasn’t just the malevolent new law, but the fact that Djukanovic, himself an avowed, unbaptized secularist, was announcing the formation of a new, domestic “church.” This was not only a potential embarrassment for the post-religious Eurocrats in Brussels, but something that even the Ecumenical Patriarchate, fresh from its ill-conceived Ukrainian adventure, refused to support, standing firmly behind the Serbian Orthodox Church and its historical roots. Doubleplusungood.

Still, Djukanovic is not the type to go off into the night quietly. It’s expected that he’ll give his all to poach that all-important single MP from the opposition’s ranks as a last-ditch attempt to keep the reigns of power securely in his hands, and that his security services and underworld allies might engineer various, potentially destabilizing incidents. But there is a consensus that, this time, that simply won’t fly. The three opposition blocs have been so adamant in their opposition to the ruling party that any defection from the ranks would be clearly seen for what it is – a straight buy-off, after which all the grievances, emotions and resentments that had been pent up for decades, and which the Church-inspired uprising managed to discipline and channel in a positive, proactive direction, would finally explode out of control.

Unfortunately, if all else fails, après moi, le déluge does not seem like an option that Djukanovic and at least some of his domestic and foreign partners in crime would shy away from. So, the Montenegrin parliamentary elections may be over, but not the West’s traditional geopolitical game in the Balkans, according to which Montenegro is a key barrier to Serbia’s – and, by extension, its traditional ally and Orthodox Slavic cousin Russia’s – access to the warm Mediterranean and the (re)establishment of a sovereign bulwark against perpetual, Western-inspired “balkanization” that has made the area into a perpetual “tinderbox.” If that project, which includes not only the completion of NATO’s “unfinished business” in the region, but also the consolidation of an artificial Montenegrin, anti-Serbian identity – i.e., the Ukrainization of Montenegro – is seen to be endangered, then all bets are off and, in the eyes of certain Western swamp-dwellers, even damaged goods like Djukanovic might be preferable to any further inroads made in the region by dreaded Russia and the new(est) Western bogeyman, China.

The epicenter of this externally induced commotion is at this moment in Montenegro, NATO’s latest “catch” in its persistent effort to secure or at least neutralize the Balkan rear, with a view to the projected conflict with Russia. One of the major remaining targets in Montenegro is the country’s Metropolitanate of the Serbian Orthodox Church, the institution which according to the latest survey is the most trusted by the country’s population. The Orthodox Church, which saw Montenegro through its centuries of confrontation with the Ottoman Empire, is literally the repository of Montenegro’s identity and culture. Russia’s traditional ally Montenegro – just like the Ukraine, which finds itself similarly targeted – cannot be reconfigured and turned into a compliant instrument of the impending Western crusade unless its identity shaped by the Church is first suitably redesigned.

The issue which brought the crisis into the open and moved it to the verge of physical confrontation was the unprecedented law, allegedly to secure “freedom for religious confessions,” which the regime rammed through the rubber-stamp parliament on December 27, 2019, complete with the almost routine arrest of about twenty opposition parliamentarians who objected vociferously to its Orwellian provisions. The core of this legislation is the requirement that all religious property dating back to before 1918 (when Montenegro joined what later became Yugoslavia) would be taken over by the state, which then, from the goodness of its heart, might allow the dispossessed religious community to use it for the performance of its rites. Given Montenegro’s ethnic, historical, and religious landscape, although not explicitly so stated, the new law’s brunt will be borne exclusively by the local Metropolitanate of the Serbian Orthodox Church in that country. The Serbian Church is the only significant religious community with a broad following and any property to be seized, the other faiths’ presence being relatively minor and symbolic.

Unexpectedly for all concerned, once reality sank in that with the passage of the new law the dispossession of the Church, with an intensified assault on the identity of the majority of the population, was becoming imminent, a massive expression of popular outrage erupted and continues on a daily basis. It is possible that the regime simply miscalculated the potential of such a seemingly arcane issue to quickly mobilize vast numbers of the citizenry. Their NATO sponsors surely did, and obviously failed to duly caution their stooges, which is perfectly understandable because religious concerns ceased long ago to play a significant social role in the West. (Both regime stalwarts and their jaded Western mentors must have found this Montenegrin procession, outlining a human “cross” made up of lighted torches, extremely annoying and awkward.)  In the event, in all parts of Montenegro tens of thousands of Orthodox believers took to the streets during the holiday season to manifest their disapproval. In a very small country, with an official  population of about 600,000, at least a quarter of the citizens defied bitter winter cold and snow to vote with their feet and send the pro-NATO clique the clear message that they are not on board.

Curiously, or perhaps not, the regime’s appalling religious intimidation campaign found resonance only in the confused silence of usually quick-on-the-draw Western embassies and human rights defenders.

But as accurately explained by Alexander Mercouris, the pressure that has been brought on the Church in Montenegro is not an isolated phenomenon but part of a “broader pattern.” That includes unbridled meddling by the Ecumenical Patriarch in Istanbul throughout the Orthodox world, and not just in the recent high profile example of the Ukraine. It also includes high-pressure State Department “religious diplomacy” aiming to align major centres of Orthodox religious authority in the Balkans and the Middle East with Western strategic goals. That can ultimately be reduced to but a single element: politically isolating and blocking Russia by rupturing its ties to the rest of the Orthodox communion because, in the perception of Western strategists, the Russian Orthodox Church is a key lever of Russia’s “soft power” influence.

The pretentious Ecumenical Patriarchate, confined to a few buildings in the Fanar neighborhood of Istanbul, without laity of any consequence to give it weight, chronically strapped financially, with decrees of “canonical recognition” for schismatic sects designated by NATO as future components of its “nation building” operations as its only salable commodity, and dependent entirely upon the toleration of the Turkish government hosting it, is an ideal tool for such geopolitical manipulation and blackmail.

Ukraine, and the infamous “Tomos,” or letter of recognition, granted by the Patriarchate to certain break-away Orthodox factions on its territory, is of course a vivid case in point. But it does not exhaust the subject.

Just recently, in Macedonia the Patriarch in Istanbul became involved in an analogous situation when he officially received a delegation from Skopje and agreed to “consider” granting autocephaly (independence) to the dioceses there that decades ago, as part of a “nation building” scheme promoted by the former Communist regime, had broken away from the Serbian Orthodox Church. The mere fact that Patriarch Bartholomew would have taken such a step (unfortunately no longer unprecedented after the Ukrainian episode) and would have gone over the heads of Serbian church authorities in Belgrade to publicly contemplate such a disruptive step, is highly indicative. With all due respect for Orthodox believers in Macedonia, the advancement of this agenda, in the context of the installation of a slavishly pro-Western government and impending incorporation into NATO structures, is simply too much to be regarded as a mere coincidence. It more likely is part of another political project, only now under different auspices.

Furthermore, a recent scholarly conference held in Salonica, Greece, in October of last year, also demonstrates just how  unsubtly the Ecumenical Patriarch is prepared to render valuable political services, again to the Western power block, in disregard of church canons or even the sentiments of his Orthodox coreligionists. Organized by Greek NGO “Byzantine Salonica,” which is close to the Patriarchy and officially is tasked with promoting the Byzantine civilization, the gathering asserted as its official view that Serbia’s breakaway province of Kosovo historically was one of the focal points of the Orthodox faith, but clearly represented as an independent country, separate from Serbia. To drive the point home, the conference began with a liturgy which included the commemoration, and thus official recognition, of the schismatic Ukrainian “metropolitan” Epiphaniy Dumenko, who recently was recognized by the Patriarch in Istanbul as a separate entity in disregard of the views and arguments of the Russian Church.

The slaps in the face of the Serbian Orthodox Church are perhaps best understood in the context of intensifying pressure on Serbia, which is now the only remaining major non-NATO country in the Balkans and also Russia’s traditional ally.

The analogies in the high-handed treatment of the Russian and Serbian churches are striking, even to the politically untrained eye. That, among other things, is what makes this situation particularly tragic because a trained political perspective should never be a prerequisite for accurately assessing the conduct and motives of religious institutions and dignitaries.

They failed. In many though not all parts of the former communist bloc Christianity not only survived but provided the impetus for national and social revival. In some countries, like Poland, Hungary, and Lithuania, this meant Roman Catholicism. In others, like Russia, Ukraine, Serbia, and Georgia, this means Orthodoxy.

For the no-less-godless successors of the commissars now ruling most of Europe through the twin bureaucracies of NATO and the European Union, religion – or at least Christianity – remains a retrograde force that needs to be overcome. They are helped by the fact that in western Europe (and increasingly in the United States) consumerism, feminism, LGBT, multiculturalism, and other materialistic post-modern alternatives have proved to be far more corrosive of Christianity than dynamite, bullets, concentration camps, and punitive psychiatric hospitals.

There is also a geopolitical element. Because NATO/EU’s biggest target is Russia, and because revival of the Orthodox Church is central to Russia’s revival – including its military determination to resist western aggression as it has so many times in the past from Germany, Sweden, Poland, France, etc. – the Orthodox Church is itself in the crosshairs. From the soulless perspective of western bureaucrats Orthodox Christianity is nothing more than an instrument of the Kremlin’s soft power. According to one person rather new to the relevant issues but nonetheless considered authoritative by the State Department:

‘The Church, for its part, acts as the Russian state’s soft power arm, exerting its authority in ways that assist the Kremlin in spreading Russian influence both in Russia’s immediate neighborhood as well as around the globe. The Kremlin assists the Church, as well, working to increase its reach. Vladimir Yakunin, one of Putin’s inner circle and a devout member of the ROC, facilitated in 2007 the reconciliation of the ROC with the Russian Orthodox Church in Exile (which had separated itself from the Moscow Patriarchate early in the Soviet era so as not to be co-opted by the new Bolshevik state), which reconciliation greatly increased [Patriarch of Moscow] Kirill’s influence and authority outside of Russia. Putin, praising this event, noted the interrelation of the growth of ROC authority abroad with his own international goals: “The revival of the church unity is a crucial condition for revival of lost unity of the whole ‘Russian world’, which has always had the Orthodox faith as one of its foundations.”’

Thus the 250-million-plus-member Orthodox Church needs to be brought to heel, or better yet, broken. Over the past few years we have seen several episodes pointing to that end:

• Removal of Bishop Artemije of Raška and Prizren, the Serbian Orthodox eparchy that includes the NATO-occupied province of Kosovo and Metohija. In 2010 Vladika Artemije, an outspoken opponent of ecumenism, was accused on spurious corruption charges for which he’s never been brought to trial, expelled from his eparchy without an ecclesiastical trial, and later reduced to the status of a simple monk. (He insists that he is the true Bishop of the Raško-Prizrenska Eparchy in Exile, leading to his being falsely being accused of schism.)

The real reasons for this were transparently political. Vladika Artemije was punished for his forthright opposition to US, NATO, and EU policy in Kosovo and his spearheading a Washington lobbying effort to oppose creation of that terrorist-mafia pseudo-state (and hotbed of Islamic jihad) under NATO protection. In addition, he sued the NATO powers in the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, and in 2009 sought to bar a visit by then-US Vice President and current 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden (a belligerent proponent of war against Serbs in Bosnia and Kosovo and of detaching Kosovo from Serbia, not to mention a Ukraine profiteer via his son Hunter Biden) from visiting Visoki Dečani monastery – a decision overturned by the Serbian Church at the behest of the Serbian government, then headed by western quisling Boris Tadic. The Biden snub reportedly prompted a high NATO official (probably US Admiral Mark P. Fitzgerald, then Commander, US Naval Forces Europe and Africa, and Commander, Allied Joint Force Command (JFC) Naples) to demand: “What we need here is a more cooperative bishop.” The soon got it, with the shameful submission of the Serbian Church under pressure from Washington, Brussels, and Belgrade officialdom. (As noted below, the Serbian Church leadership’s betrayal of Vladika Artemije has now come back to haunt them in Montenegro.)

• The Ukrainian Orthodox Church schism. A year ago His All-Holiness, Bartholomew I, the Patriarch of Constantinople, recognized as a new “autocephalous” (entirely self-ruling) “Orthodox Church of Ukraine” (“OCU”) persons who had up until then been universally shunned as schismatics and frauds by all Orthodox jurisdictions. Since then Constantinople, with the overt help of the US State Department and the Greek government, has been able to round up a few additional endorsements, notably from the Patriarch of Alexandria and All Africa and the Archbishop of Athens (both dependent on Greek state subsidies) but pointedly rejected by many of the bishops, clergy, and faithful in the African and Greek jurisdictions. A number of Churches, notably Antioch and Serbia, have been outspokenly supportive of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which remains an autonomous part of the Russia Orthodox Church.

US officials who wouldn’t know Orthodoxy from orthodontia have taken a keen interest in the Church’s internal canonical arrangements, insisting that creation of the bogus “OCU” is an exercise in human rights and “religious freedom,” despite violence against clergy and believers of the canonical Church and plans to seize churches and monasteries. Among the outspoken supporters of the OCU are celebrated theologians like US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (who placed a personal call to the “newly elected head of the “OCU” “Metropolitan Epifaniy” (Dumenko), Geoffrey Pyatt (current US Ambassador to Greece, who was also Ambassador to Ukraine during the 2014 regime change operation), Sam Brownback (US Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom), and – recognizable to many Americans from their impeachment testimony – US Special Representative for Ukraine Kurt Volker and US Ambassador in Kiev Marie Yovanovitch (noted for her over-the-top LGBT promotion in Ukraine). Pyatt and Brownback are notable for their round-robin visits to Orthodox Church leaders, notably in the Balkans, to “encourage” their recognition of the Ukrainian schismatics.

• Violence over LGBT in Georgia. Governments of formerly Christian countries in North America and Europe have made LGBT ideology an integral element of their promotion of “human rights” and “democracy” in formerly communist countries where the locals generally have a far less “progressive” view than is common in western Europe or “blue” America. This includes pressuring compliant governments of European countries recently emerged from communism to hold “Pride parades” that offend local sensibilities. The message to traditional societies still grounded in Christian morality but with elites committed to “a European course,” meaning membership in NATO and (perhaps someday…) the European Union is that it’s a package deal. You don’t get to pick which part of western “democracy, human rights and free markets” you want and which you don’t. You can’t have transatlanticism without transgenderism. So shut up, grit your teeth, and take it . . .

The sexual social subversion campaign arrived in Georgia this summer, when the usual suspects – foreign embassies and their controlled NGOs, working in concert with George Soros’s Open Society groups – were determined to hold Tbilisi’s first Pride parade. With strong opposition from Orthodox faithful led by activist businessman and father of eight children Levan Vasadze, the parade was cancelled. Forced to back down, the pro-western, pro-LGBT forces responded with violence, using as their pretext a visit by international (including – Russian!) lawmakers to the Georgian parliament under the auspices of the Athens-based Interparliamentary Assembly on Orthodoxy (IAO). Endorsed by Tbilisi Pride organizers, the parliamentary attack was spearheaded by the United National Movement, the party of disgraced former president and Western favorite Mikheil Saakashvili (who is in self-imposed exile, fleeing from his conviction on corruption charges). The Georgian parliamentary Speaker was compelled to resign and questions were raised as to whether the ruling Georgian Dream reformist party could retain power – which surely was the point in the first place. The country’s politics continue to be unstable, with forces defending Georgia’s Orthodox Christian integrity denounced as “far right” by hatemongers in the west.

• Montenegro’s new anti-Serbian Orthodox Church law. Now in the crosshairs is the Serbian Orthodox Church in spanking new NATO member and EU aspirant Montenegro, with passage of a new law (with the approval of the Council of Europe’s Orwellian-named “EUROPEAN COMMISSION FOR DEMOCRACY THROUGH LAW.” a/k/a the Venice Commission) that requires religious bodies to prove their ownership of properties before 1918. As reported by RT’s Nebojsa Malic:

‘Montenegro’s ruling regime rammed the controversial law through the parliament in the dead of night between Thursday and Friday. Every single amendment of the opposition Democratic Front (DF) – proposed to alleviate concerns that the bill was deliberately targeting the Serbian Orthodox Church (SOC) – was rejected. When some DF members disrupted the session in protest, all of them were arrested and jailed. [ … ] [JGJ: Some of the detained legislators have declared a hunger strike.]

‘The government in Podgorica has waved off criticism, saying that the law is in line with the highest EU and international human rights standards. [JGJ: A de facto endorsement from the Vienna Commission says it all.] Most journalists have been happy to take that at face value. Not being most journalists, I actually read its text.

‘Article 11 mandates that any religious community in Montenegro must be headquartered there and cannot extend outside its borders. That’s absurd for a country that’s about the size of Connecticut, with a population estimated at around 620,000.

‘Article 16 says that no religious community may have in its name “an official name of another country or its emblems.” Article 7 bans “abuse of religious feelings for political ends,” whatever that may mean. And Article 24 says that the state can seize the property of any religious community that is determined by police to have violated the terms of its registration and been stricken from the rolls, without appeal. Need one go on?

‘Now consider that President Milo Djukanovic has recently accused the SOC of “promoting pro-Serb policies that are aimed at undermining Montenegrin statehood,” as Reuters phrased it, and it becomes blindingly obvious for whom the bell tolls.’

In a close replay of the Ukraine situation, the new Montenegrin law sets the stage for state seizures of Church properties and turning them over to an unrecognized schismatic group, the so-called “Montenegrin Orthodox Church,” sponsored by the corrupt regime of President Milo Djukanovic. Protests have broken out in both Montenegro and Serbia, with Montenegrin police very democratically beating some protesters, including a Bishop of the canonical Church. In Belgrade, the ruling Holy Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church denounced the new law and stated its support for the canonical Church. (Belgrade has been stalwart in its support for the legitimate Church in Ukraine. But perhaps, now that they’re being targeted themselves, some of the Serbian hierarchs may remember how shabbily they treated Vladika Artemije in their vain attempt to appease western demands – and will take steps to remedy that shameful mistake?)

It remains to be seen what western governments will do, but based on the Ukraine precedent it isn’t hard to guess. Comments Malic: “Adopting a ‘religious freedom’ law that opens the door to persecuting a particular faith would normally be seen as a horrifying breach of human rights, but when done to Orthodox Serbs in Montenegro, the West doesn’t seem to mind.” As of this moment, except for a non-specific demonstration alert, there is no posted statement from the US Embassy in Podgorica, either in English or in some language written exclusively in the Latin (not Cyrillic) alphabet called “Crnogorski,” evidently a reference to Serbian. (Foreign embassies in Washington take note! Start posting your websites in “American,” not English!)

Now all that’s needed to ice the cake is for the State Department’s human rights, religious freedom and democracy mavens and the US Commission on International Religious Freedom – which, with Your Working Boy’s culpability, has long since become little more than another subjective standard under which countries the Washington apparat wants to hammer can be cited (accurately or not) – to hail Montenegro’s latest step into the radiant, post-Christian, post-national future of Euro-Atlantic integration.

But who knows. Maybe we’ll be pleasantly surprised and Washington and Brussels will demand that their Montenegrin flunkies back off. Don’t bet on it though. There’s still a lot more of the Orthodox Church left to disrupt.

While the immediately targeted states in this case are Montenegro and Ukraine, i.e., especially the parts of their populations that identify themselves as Serbs and Russians, respectively, the ultimate targets in question are Serbia and Russia. These two ethnically and religiously closely related states and majority peoples are being targeted for a single essential reason: their resistance to further NATO-led expansion of Western-based globalist/corporate/ interests – the main difference being that Russia’s reach and, thus, resistance potential is global, while Serbia’s is regional (although the symbolic significance of its existence as the last non-NATO outpost in Southeast Europe potentially reaches far beyond regional boundaries).

Thus, just as, following the Euromaidan coup of 2014, the Western-installed regime in Kiev has engaged in a deliberate policy of “de-Russification” and “language genocide,” so has the Montenegrin regime, ever since its Western-supported exit from its state union with Serbia in 2006, on the basis of a controversial referendum that eliminated up to a third of potential voters that might have opposed secession (Montenegrin citizens residing and registered to vote in Serbia at the time) – engaged in a deliberate policy of “de-Serbization,” in order to eliminate the influence of neighboring Serbia and, by extension, Russia, and facilitate Montenegro’s Euro-Atlantic integration and “evolution” into a wholly new, ahistorical identity.

After declaring the local dialect of Serbian as the new “Montenegrin” language in its first-post independence constitution in 2007, the tiny new country’s pro-Western rulers have gradually marginalized the Serbian language and its declared speakers (although they still form a majority in Montenegro), changing school curricula in the process, often amidst fierce opposition on the part of both parents and pupils, eliminating the Cyrillic script from official and public use, and drastically reducing school children’s exposure to the country’s most famous poet, Petar II Petrovich Njegosh, a 19th century Prince-Bishop of Montenegro, universally considered to be the greatest Serbian poet of all time.

What’s more, this process has been palpably accelerated and radicalized since Montenegro joined NATO’s “community of values, committed to the principles of democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law,” in June 2017:

– The trial for an alleged Russian and Serbian-backed October 2016 coup has basically turned into a farce, failing to produce results even after two years of “actively searching for irrefutable evidence,” in the words of a recent Russian Foreign Ministry statement. (However, the “coup” served its purpose, as it allowed the regime to whip up anti-Russian hysteria and push the country into NATO half a year later without a referendum, despite protests and massive opposition.)

– Miras Dedeic, a former defrocked priest and present “metropolitan” of the canonically unrecognized Montenegrin Orthodox Church – originally registered as an NGO in the Montenegrin Ministry of the Interior in 1997 – has recently called for a “Ukrainian scenario” to resolve the church question, and is urging the government to adopt a controversial law that would nationalize the pre-1918 churches and monasteries of the Serbian Orthodox Church, which has been present on the territory of Montenegro for 800 years, and subsequently transfer them to the jurisdiction of his schismatic “Church.” Dedeic has already paid a visit to fellow defrocked priest and leader of the schismatic Ukrainian Orthodox Church – Kiev Patriarchate, Filaret Denisenko (whom the Patriarch of Constantinople has recently reinstated, as part of his controversial, US-backed drive of creating an autocephalous Orthodox Church in Ukraine) in July 2016, and has received his support.

– As part of the government-led drive against the canonical Orthodox Church, Montenegrin Prime Minister Dusko Markovic has recently threatened to remove a mountaintop church built by the Montenegrin Metropolitanate, claiming that it was illegally built. The Metropolitanate has repeatedly denied this, having erected the church on the site of an older church destroyed by the Turks in 1571. This threat is part of the regime’s broader goal of placing the Serbian Orthodox Church – and other religious communities – under state control, through the above-mentioned draft law.

– The Montenegrin government has recently banned a group of Serbia-based intellectuals – a poet, two historians and a law professor – from entering the country (and, in the case of the latter, from visiting his childhood home and mother) on the pretext that they could “pose a danger to national security,” and “undermine its reputation and dignity.” Indicatively, some of those on the list were scheduled to participate at a gathering celebrating the centennial of the unification of Serbia and Montenegro at the end of World War I, while all of them have been outspoken supporters of the two states’ unity and critics of the artificial “Montenegrin” identity and language.

In a recent interview for Serbian Sputnik, historian Aleksandar Stamatovic saw the processes in Montenegro and Ukraine as practical “twins… founded on the Leninist-Bolshevist theory on nations and national identities… with the basic goal of breaking up the Eastern Slavic and Orthodox corps…,” and noted that the seeds were planted in the USSR and communist Yugoslavia, respectively, within which the Ukrainian and Montenegrin identities were nurtured and enforced from above.

What is new is that the said Leninist-Bolshevist processes are now being aggressively supported and, indeed, promoted, by none other than the “democratic West.” It turns out that, for the geostrategists in Washington, London, Berlin, Paris and Brussels, communism wasn’t all that bad, after all, and that it had many quite useful features – from internal, administrative borders that could be easily be recognized as country borders, to newly manufactured national identities and even religions that could be exploited within a broader divide et impera policy. Or, in the immortal words of Chairman Deng Xiaoping: “It doesn't matter whether the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice.” As far as NATO and its “community of values” are concerned, a red one will do just as well, as long as it catches geopolitical mice.

The region is largely viewed as a testing ground in new Cold War with Moscow. The West is engaged in efforts to spread its influence in the Balkans and weaken Russia’s position there. That’s what the EU strategy adopted in February calls for, emphasizing that the western Balkan states are geographically surrounded by the bloc’s members.

The “Albanian factor” is used to advance the West’s course. The activities of Kosovo separatists, including the interethnic violence in Macedonia, and Albanians in Serbia’s Preševo Valley seeking union with Albania and Kosovo are links on the same chain. The idea of creating Great Albania is not dead. And Albania is a NATO member.

The pressure is strong enough to make Serbia make concessions in relations with Kosovo, though only 26 per cent of Serbs now think EU membership would be a good thing. The policy boils down to reforms in exchange for possible membership. From the West’s point of view, good relations with Moscow would be an obstacle but Serbia remains a neutral state, maintaining friendly ties with its historical ally.

80 percent of Serbia’s gas comes from Russia, which is a link to the EAEU’s big market with 180 million consumers. Serbia receives Russia’s military assistance, including a batch of MiG-29 fighters delivered gratuitously. In 2015, Russia prevented Serbia’s conviction of genocide in Srebrenica by the UN Security Council. According to a 2017 public opinion survey conducted by the Serbian Demostat research center, 41 percent of respondents perceive Russia as the greatest friend. The people remember Moscow’s support of Belgrade’s stance on Kosovo. Serbian and Russian leaders meet frequently. Unlike the US, Russia never tried to exert pressure.

Meanwhile, Croatia, Slovenia, Albania and Montenegro have joined NATO. Croatia and Slovenia have joined the EU. Macedonia’s NATO membership bid will be considered at a NATO summit in July, despite the fact that this nation struggles with rampant corruption and ethnic tensions. NATO has actually taken Kosovo away from Serbia. Macedonia may also lose some areas with predominant Albanian population in the north-west of the country. The EU accession is also a goal. Russia is one of its most important trade partners. If Macedonia enters the EU, it will have to join Russia sanctions to deprive its economy of profits.

Bosnia-Herzegovina’s membership is on the agenda but it has an obstacle – the Bosnian Serbs oppose the move. Their opposition is explained by “Russia’s influence” of course, the reason remembered each and every time something goes wrong.

Both countries are a far cry from any “standards” but this principle is somehow forgotten. There is an exemption to any rule but extending membership to anyone for the sake of rolling Russia back is a very wrong idea to make the alliance weaker as an amalgam of nations, which have few things in common and contribute very differently. The alliance will have more free riders making other nations pay more.

Western efforts to reduce the region’s energy “dependence” on Russia are part of the “squeeze Russia out” policy. The completion of the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project and the plan to construct a floating liquefied natural gas terminal on Krk, a Croatian island, are to bolster the political ends. The Krk project is to encompass Slovenia and Hungary, Bosnia and Serbia. The TAP will stretch from the Caspian Sea to Albania and northwards to other Western Balkan countries as well as Italy. Interconnector pipelines between Bulgaria and Serbia also meet the West’s policy goals.

Macedonia will become rich if the Turkish Stream gas project is expanded as planned. The country is the best direction as the Vardar River transportation route links Central Europe and the Aegean Sea. The pipeline will cross Greece, Macedonia, Serbia, and Hungary to reach Central Europe. Of course, becoming a member of NATO and the EU, it’ll have to forget about these lucrative prospects in favor of paying higher prices for the US shale gas.

Voices have been raised in the US recently calling for paying more attention to the Balkans. The influential Atlantic Council calls for permanent military presence in the region. The think tank wants Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo to be transferred into “the first permanent military base in southeastern Europe”. The plan includes the construction of a runway to operate large aircraft. “Belgrade can and should be a close partner and ally in the region, but it can only become one if it begins to meaningfully distance itself from Russia,” the Atlantic Council’s experts emphasize in the report issued in late 2017. The Heritage Foundation followed suit offering guidelines for American policy to oust Russia from the region to make it dominated by the US.

Congress wants the Defense Department to prepare a report on “cooperation between every single Western Balkan country and the Russian Federation.” Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, the top US and NATO commander in Europe, has just told Congress that “Russia is at work in the Balkans and we have kind of taken our eye off the area.” Last month, the general was blasted by Serbia for meddling into its internal affairs in an effort to warn Belgrade against developing cooperation with Moscow. American experts working for European think tanks call for working out joint measures to counter Russia in the Balkans.

Being a battlefield in the geopolitical game will hardly benefit the countries of the region. Lured into the NATO and EU, they risk becoming pawns in big powers’ games.

Montenegro faces no threats from neighbors and needs no NATO umbrella. Article 5 of the NATO Charter is irrelevant in this case. Podgorica boasts friendly relations with the surrounding countries and also with more distant states. The membership will not protect the country from terrorist attacks as history shows.

Nobody stands in the way of developing cooperation between Montenegro and NATO. Anything can be done without full-fledged membership, including contribution to operations beyond the national borders, training of personnel and joint exercises or moving ahead to achieve higher standards.

With the tiny defense budget of around $70 million and the armed forces’ strength of roughly two thousand men, Montenegro is rather a burden than an asset for the alliance. Its contribution into the NATO Afghanistan mission was only 45 men! The Navy is just a token force with two obsolete frigates and two fast attack craft in storage and overhauled. The Air Force has 15 planes kept in storage since 2012 and 13 utility/scout helicopters.

The personnel is trained and equipped primarily for internal security operations. The military needs more young officers. The average age of an officer from Montenegro is 39 compared to 29 for most NATO countries. All in all, the Montenegro’s military is a far cry from what they should be.

Bringing the armed forces up to NATO standards requires significant investments, something which Podgorica cannot afford. NATO countries’ taxpayers will have to contribute into modernizing the Montenegrin military. The question is why should a country that is so far from meeting the standards become a member so fast? What all this talk about so-called standards is about if anyone can join?

The Washington Treaty’s Article 10 holds that any European state seeking membership must be in a position to «further the principles of this Treaty» and «to contribute to the security of the North Atlantic area.» In which way can Montenegro fulfill this obligation?

The membership will make the decision making-process more difficult. The more members, the more difficult it is. Montenegro will pursue its own interests, which may not align with the interests of NATO leading members.

Not all Montenegrins support the idea of joining the alliance. A poll held last December showed only 39.5% of the Montenegrins are in favor of the country's entry into the Alliance, and 39.7% are against, with as many as 20.8 percent of those polled being still undecided. No referendum has been held to let the people express their will. Many Montenegrins realize that NATO presupposes involvement in faraway conflicts Montenegro has no relation to. The country’s soldiers will risk their lives for uncertain goals.

The country can hardly be called a democracy. Since 1989 and the end of Communism in East-Central Europe, Montenegro has been ruled by one political party – Democratic Party of Socialists – and its leader Milo Djukanovic. For instance, Freedom House also slammed the country for its poor record on fighting corruption, upholding judicial independence, and permitting freedom of expression. The organization believes it is only partly a democratic state. The Freedom House’s report says corruption is overwhelming.

Amnesty International cites mass violations of human rights. Human Rights Watch says there is no press freedom in the country. Willy-nilly, NATO will be culpable in promoting a regime violating human rights instead of pushing for democratic reform before the nation joined the alliance. So, democracy and human rights are not standards anymore.

The country is unstable. Internal unrest is frequent. It’ll be a headache for NATO. Last year, the election ended indecisively. The event was accompanied by violence at polling stations, intimidation of opposition members, and an attempted coup. The Muslim ghetto in Montenegro may become a source of terrorism. The country’s government is planning to legalize the participants of radical Muslim organizations.

Actually, no criteria are met to make Montenegro a member. NATO lets its standards slide to allow the entry of an ill-prepared state. The alliance is extending its security umbrella over a country that cannot make any noteworthy contribution. NATO stands to gain nothing by admitting a new member whose citizens are largely indifferent to membership and whose government remains largely dysfunctional.

The policy of extension for the very sake of extension means that anyone who is anyone belongs to NATO! The alliance will become weaker, not stronger. The EU experience shows that an alliance of states with wide gaps in development and interests to divide them is doomed to be loose and short-lived. NATO is to shoot itself in the foot. Probably, US President Donald Trump had a reason dismissing the bloc as an obsolete alliance.