There is no longer the slightest doubt as to the ultimate goal of the policy that Milorad Dodik has been demonstrating for the last ten years. As is clear to anyone familiar with it, it is a devastating allegation bomb in the hands of official Moscow and President Vladimir Putin.
The plan is dangerous and apocalyptic from the perspective of people living in B&H and the Western Balkans, because it hints at new sufferings and civilizational collapse, but from geopolitical heights it seems quite simple to its authors – B&H as a state and its multiethnic society should be destroyed and thus shake the fundamentally ethnically intertwined Western Balkans.
The second phase of Russia's ambitious plan is to demotivate and turn NATO away from these areas, in response to the rapprochement of Ukraine, Georgia and other former Soviet republics with the Western military alliance. In the third phase, it is calculated that the European Union, burdened by internal changes and wanderings, will lose the will to intervene financially every now and then and treat its soft belly in the Western Balkans.
In the final act, a wide space is opened on the Balkan ruins for the arrival of the Russian bear to put together state and geopolitical cubes in its own way.
What is happening in Montenegro, where pro-Russian elements have been in power for a year, strengthened by a strong alliance of the Russian and Serbian Orthodox Churches, and what we have been seeing in B&H for a decade, are just fragments of that aggressive Russian mosaic.
Dodik's statements today about nails in the coffin of B&H, the High Representative who falsely presents himself and does not exist, the need for Christian Schmidt to have a Russian stamp so that he can work in B&H, are essentially a practical demonstration exercise for pro-Russian players around the world. they need to work in the field.
Many experienced observers, former high representatives and influential statesmen and analysts warn that it is time for the West to wake up from its lethargy, rub its eyes and look soberly at the danger looming over the Western Balkans.
The arrival of Joseph Biden in the White House has raised hopes that the policy of stabilocracy, occasional concessions and retreats before Dodik and similar political kabadahs will change very quickly, but there are no concrete indications of a new Western policy towards the Western Balkans.
Time, however, is inevitably leaking. Ten years ago, no one could have imagined that the story of redrawing borders in this part of Europe would legitimately go out into the public space and that it would be seriously discussed. Ten years ago, Dodik did not even think of "kicking" the German, American or British ambassador, and even the High Representative himself, and today he does that every day. Without any sanctions, without a meaningful answer and without fear that he will have political or economic damage due to their behavior.
Of course, for the general bad situation in B&H, the rest of the ruling tripod should not be amnestied from responsibility, because they all function according to the system of connected vessels, but the ultimate priority is Dodik.
From a fresh breath in the Balkans, it has become a deadly tornado in just twenty years. We are not comforted by the fact that the international community and some important Western addresses, together with some domestic actors, have been feeding the wrong wolf for years. A wolf who is politically bloodthirsty and ruthless. A wolf that changed both hair and temper.
