THE POWER OF DECEPTION Yugoslavia in the Aftermath of the Confrontation with NATO, Boran KARADZOLE

Abstract

The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia is an aberration in contemporary Europe. The basis for this claim is not in the fact that its economic indicators and trends are among the lowest on the continent albeit they are or in the abhorrent state of international isolation in which the country continues to maintain itself. The justification for the claim at the outset of this paper is in the plain and simple fact that Yugoslavia today is a masterly living example of the almost unlimited force of deceit and manipulation of public opinion. Yugoslavs have been victimised and traumatised, subjected to humiliations and deprivations, divested of numerous basic human rights and liberties, yet at the same time constantly convinced that they are poor but free, needy but upright, impoverished but armed with the sound knowledge that Truth and Justice are on their side. Apparently in the process it has not been explained to them that contemporary international relations are based-as they virtually always have been-on interests and law, two concepts quite distinct from the duet of Truth and Justice.