Page 30 of Tom Clancy Line of Sight

“Help?”

The deputy director stood and turned, jabbing the large paper map on the wall, his finger touching the capital city of Belgrade.

“I think it’s the Serbians.”

“The White Eagles were Bosnian.”

The deputy director nodded. “Yes, BosnianSerbs, but directed by Belgrade and the old Yugoslav counterintelligence service.”

“Greater Serbia again?” Topal asked.

“Yes, of course. The ‘dream’ never dies, does it? Or maybe it’s a nightmare.”

Ambassador Topal shook his head. “It’s hard to believe. I thought we were past such things.”

“The past is prologue, my friend.”

“But why jump to such a conclusion? If what you say is true, the Serbians are engaging in an act of war.”

“Think about it. This is classic New Generation warfare, straight out of the Russian playbook, and you know how close the Serbians and Russians have become in recent months.”

Topal was well aware of the growing alliance between the two countries. In fact, the Russians were holding the Slavic Sword and Shield military exercises just over the border in Serbia at this very moment, over the protests of Topal’s government. It was the largest deployment of Russian Special Forces in a foreign country training exercise ever.

The ambassador was even more familiar with Russia’s New Generation warfare concept, which they had deployed with devastating effect in Chechnya, Georgia, and even earlier in Ukraine.

New Generation warfare was a multidimensional, nonlinear strategy that engineered and exploited social, moral, ethnic, and political tensions within a target country. It included arming and training local civilians as paramilitary units, often seeded and even led by Russian Spetsnaz special operators posing as civilian fighters. New Gen warfare also appealed to ethnic unity, and against ethnic discrimination by the local government, and pushed those narratives out into the public arena through sophisticated mass media campaigns and “fake news.”

False-flag events were also staged to reinforce that narrative with paramilitary factions armed and directed by Russian forces, resulting in further social division and political destabilization. Terrorism, extortion, and crime were also deployed as needed. Anything to disrupt and demoralize the social order.

Finally, sophisticated Russian electronic and kinetic weaponry were inserted to win the battle against organized government forces within the target country.

In short, it was the high-tech Russian version of the old Soviet Cold War model for Third World conflicts: exploit class and ethnic tensions through political propaganda, fifth column action, political subversion, and the support of armed insurgency until revolution was achieved.

“And your government believes the Serbians are engaged in this New Generation style of warfare? Or is that your own opinion?” Topal asked.

“Given the presence of large numbers of Russian Spetsnaz troops next door in a ‘training’ exercise with Serbian Special Forces, the interior minister and I have concluded that it’s a strong possibility. He and I have a meeting scheduled with the security minister within the hour to discuss the matter.”

“Perhaps you are correct,” Topal said. “But I would be quite careful about taking any overt action against Belgrade.”

“We aren’t in any position to do that, frankly,” the deputy director said. “But NATO is.”

“But you know that NATO has lost interest in this part of the world. Brussels is far too occupied with the Middle East and Africa these days.”

“That’s why I was hoping your government would intervene on our behalf. As a member of NATO, Turkey has a great deal of influence in these matters.”

“Not so much as you suppose.” Topal didn’t mention that the German armed forces had withdrawn entirely from Turkey over recent political tensions.

The Bosniak intelligence officer sat down again, folding his hands in front of him on the table. “As I’m sure you know, the number of NATO peacekeepers in the region has fallen from several thousand a decade ago to just a few hundred. A strong NATO presence here in Bosnia along with NATO resources to support our own security forces would be enough to stem this rising tide of ethnic violence.”

Topal shrugged. “Of course, I will raise the issue with my superiors, but I fear the Europeans have no interest in coming back into a conflict that only confuses and frustrates them.”

The deputy’s neck reddened. “It was the Europeans who refused to act when the Serbs began their ethnic-cleansing campaign against my people, and thousands of us died.” His clutched hands flexed. “And it was the Europeans who embargoed arms against us to keep us from defending ourselves. And when the Bosnian Army turned the tide and was finally on the verge of victory, it was NATO that threatened to bomb us—us! The victims! Why? To keep us from winning the war.”

“I know the story well, my friend,” Topal said, nodding in commiseration. Topal didn’t need to remind him that Turkey illegally broke the NATO arms embargo and smuggled weapons in to Muslim fighters during the war.

“And all of that because the Europeans couldn’t stomach the idea of a Muslim majority country on European soil.” The deputy director sighed through his nose as if trying to vent his anger away. “NATO has a moral duty to prevent another war.”

“Since when have we ever been able to count on NATO to protect Muslim interests?”