WEEKLY SUMMARY SPECIAL REPORT YUGOSLAVIA: THE POLITICS OF SUCCESSION

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85T00875R001500040034-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 11
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 14, 2004
• Sequence Number: 34
• Publication Date: October 13, 1972
• Content Type: REPORT

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DIRECTORATE OF
INTELLIGENCE
Secfet
WEEKLY SUMMARY
Yugoslavia: The Politics of Succession
Special Report
CIA
U F-Ryun
Secret
N?_ 650
FILE
Copy 13 October 1972
No. 0391/72A
ABQveN0je1CIA-RDP85T00875R001500040034-1
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The succession in Yugoslavia will not be
easy. The problems of a developing nation bal-
anced between East and West and plagued with
ethnic hatreds will compound the difficulties
when President Tito passes from the scene. With
an eye toward helping his countrymen surmount
these obstacles, Tito has created a system of col-
lective leadership in both the party and state. A
hybrid mixture of Western liberalism and Com-
munism, this system is anathema to the Soviets,
an enigma to the West, and not really understood
by all the Yugoslavs.
In fleshing out Tito's blueprint for gov-
erning, Yugoslavia has suffered challenges and set-
backs, notably the bout with Croatian nation-
alism last year. With each challenge to date the
system seems to have matured and gained resili-
ence. In the background stands the military
officer corps, which considers itself the guardian
of the unity of Yugoslavia. The armed forces have
repeatedly expressed a willingness to step in
should the federation's existence be endangered
and will be ready to do so in the succession
period.
As a result of years of carefully planned
personnel shifts, a large number of well-trained
leaders with broad experience are available when
Tito leaves. In spite of personality conflicts,
animosities, and disagreements, most of them
recognize that their home republics and provinces
have no future outside the federation. On bal-
ance, they probably can be expected, even after
Tito's steadying hand is removed, to pull together
and prove that Yugoslavia is not just the impos-
sible dream of an aging dictator.
Tito and His System
Tito has sought to build a nation-state where
only a facade existed before and to ensure that
the Yugoslavia he r as built continues after him.
The postwar record of accomplishments is impres-
sive. Tito, in addition to defying Stal' parlayed
ambiguous terms such as "self-management" and
"nonalignment" into political concepts that
worked, for a while at least.
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A crafty and gregarious self-made man, Tito
possesses rare political talents and skills. He is
dogmatic arid can be arrogant, but Tito has keen
instinct for sensing danger, knows when self-
control is needed and, no less important, how to
neutralize his opposition. Most significant for
Yugoslavia's future, however, is his masterful
ability to employ the skills of those around him.
Critics of the aging leader and his system
argue that Yugoslavia is just a castle in the air that
will be there only so long as he is around. Recog-
nizing the problems that lie ahead, Tito has con-
scientiously sought to lay a solid foundation for
his nation's future. He has created collective
executive bodies in both the party and govern-
ment in which genuine debate and give-and-take
have become part of the decision-making process.
Aware that coilective governing bodies are only as
good as the men who occupy them, Tito has
instituted a system of rotating all major party and
government assignments at two- to three-year
intervals. This accomplishes two things: it pie-
vents a potential political rival from emerging to
challenge Tito's power and authority, and it
brings the nation's most talented leaders to
Belgrade from the republics and provinces for the
benefit of the federation.
The net result is that Yugoslavia has a reser-
voir of well-trained men prepared to take over
and operate the system Tito passes to them. Most
of these men are equally adroit in handling party
and state affairs. Many have held diplomatic posts
in the East and West.
The Party
The real crunch in the succession period will,
of course, come in the party. It is the party that
will determine how power is divided up and
exercised after Tito. In 1969, Tito created a party
executive bureau, designed to bring together in
Belgrade the best talent available from the center
and from each republic and province. It was also
designed to give an equal voice to Yugoslavia's
various ethnic groups at the highe:,t decision-
making level.
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Executive and Legislative Branches of Yugoslavia
EXECUTIVE
FEDERAL ASSEMBLY PRESIDENCY
Chamber of Nationalities
(140 members)
Social-Political Chamber
(120 members)
Social Welfare and Health Chamber
(120 members)
Education and Culture Chamber
(120 members)
Economic Chamber
(120 members)
553668 1~-72
Special Report
23members, three from each republic,
two'from each province, plus Tito
r
FEDERAL EXECUTIVE COUNCIL (FEC)
The Cabinet
PREMIER
VICE PREMIER
VICE PREMIER
SECRETARY
Federal Secretaries for:
(1) Economy
(2) Labor and Social Policies
(3) Finance
(4) Foreign Trade
(5) Foreign Affairs
(6) National Defense
(7) Judicial and General Administration
(8) Agriculture
(9) Internal Affairs
(10) Transportation and
Communications
(28 members in all)
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!n three turbulent years, the executive
bureau has undergone extensive reorganization.
Today, it is the collective body responsible for
taking much of the party work off Tito's
shoulders; eventually, it is expected to provide
the Yugoslav leadership in the succession period.
Today, the bureau is made up of eight men,
one from each of the six republics and one from
each of the two autonomous provinces. The
average age of its members is 50.6 years; four of
them are lawyers or economists, one is a teacher,
one a veterinarian, one a philosopher and one has
a background in political science. They bring
together a wide range of experience and expertise.
Fadil Hodza, for example, is a specialist in Alba-
nian affairs. He is trusted and well liked by the
vast majority of Yugoslavia's nearly one million
Albanians. Kiro Gligorov is the official spokesman
for the nation's complicated economic reform.
On present form the person most likely to
take up Tito's party mantle is the young and
energetic Stane Dolanc. A Slovenian, Dolanc has
both organizational and ideological competence.
He is one of the original executive bureau mem-
bers and has gained Tito's confidence not only
through hard work and devotion to the party, but
also through his ability to tailor party action
quickly to Tito's wishes. On numerous occasions
Dolanc has spoken for Tito. Last December, for
example, Dolanc went on nationwide TV to
explain the action:, taken aga' st the Croatian
leadership. He remained in the forefront through-
out the turbulence of December and January,
translating Tito's words into action. Dolanc's
critics call him a hatchet man. Friends respond
that he genuinely believes in the need for a strong
party capable of holding Yugoslavia together. He
does not, as some critics imply, advocate a return
to Soviet-style centralist rule. Like many of his
fellow Slovenes, Dolanc is greatly concerned that
the centrifugal forces of regionalism endanger the
federation.
Edvard Kardelj, the party's intellectual is not
likely to succeed Tito, but will wield considerable
influence on the next party chief. He is the last of
Tito's close, wartime colleagues to remain in
prominence. Kardelj is the father of the nation's
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peculiar form of socialism, the guiding light
behind Belgrade's nonaligned posture, and the
chief architect of Yugoslavia's current decentral-
izing constitutional reforms.
Two years ago Tito astonished the faithful in
Zagreb with a call for a collective presidency.
Speaking with candor, Tito said the time was ripe
to prepare for the succession.
"There should be a collective president in
Yugoslavia which bears full responsibility for
what is happening," he said. "This is the only
solution to preserve our unity."
Presidium
52 Members
Executive Bureau
8 Members
Party Congr
Under Tito's new scheme, others should
begin to lift the burden of leadership from him,
teamwork and cooperation would be the rule,
Yugoslavia's diverse nationalities would be equal,
no one group would dominate another. In this
manner Tito set in motion a radical t eform
designed to give all the republics and provinces a
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sense of equal participat;-r- in the highest levels
of government.
Tito's collective presidency is modeled after
the Swiss. Twenty-three men make up the col-
lect ve presidency-himself, three representatives
from each of the country's six republics, and two
from each of the two autonomous provinces.
Each mumber of the presidency is charged with
representing his local interests and, in addition,
helps run the government.
With the creation of the collective pres--
dency, Cie position of vice president was estab-
lished. The post is significant because the incum-
bent automatically becomes caretaker president
1971-72 Krste Crvenkovski, a Macedonian
1972-73 Rato Dugonjic, a Serb from Bosnia-Hercegovina
1973-74 A Slovene
1974-75 A Serb
1975-76 A Croat
1976-77 A Montenegrin
1977-78 A Vojvodinian
77re rotation will start aver in 1978 and an illbanian will not hold down
the post until 1933. Presumably, once Tim is gone the titular post of
president will rotate in a similar fashion.
when Tito departs. The vice presidency rotates
annually among the presidency's members ac-
cording to a predetermined pattern. First to be
vice president was a Maced3nia;,, Krste Crvenkov-
ski, who served from August 1971 to August
1972. He is well educated, aggressive, and intel-
ligent, and, during his tour as vice president,
clearly established himself as one who will play a
key role in the succession period. Were Tito to die
this year, the caretaker president would be the
current vice president, Rato Dugonjic, a Serb
from Bosnia-Hercegovina. Dugonjic has experi-
ence in internal and foreign affairs as we!I as in
youth work, an area of prime concern for the
regime.
Special Report - 5
Another feature of Tito's new system of
governance, Yugoslav leaders are expected to
substitute persuasion for coercion and to be
practical instead of pedantic. They must be
articulate, playing to their audiences and main-
taining a good public image. Ideology must not
stand in thi way of getting the job done. They
must be politicians more akin to those in the West
than in the East.
Foreign Minister Mirko Tepavac, Finance
Minister Janko Smole and Vice Premier Anton
Vratusa are examples of the new breed. They will
play important roles in running Yugoslavia after
Tito. The first two are exceptions to the rotation
policy and are serving their second consecutive
terms in office. They have gained respect both at
home and abroad.
Of the three, the most ambitious is Vratusa.
An outspoken supporter of Yugoslavia's self-
managing socialism and nonaligned foreign policy,
the sheer force of his personality assures him a
role in the post-Tito politicking. Smole, a former
depi'ty director of the International Bank for
Reconstruction and Development, is well known
and liked in international financial circles. His
arrogance in dealing with fellow Yugoslavs, how-
ever, could prove his undoing in the politics of
succession. Tepavac is probably the most liberal
of the three. His sometimes unorthodox ideas are
reinforced at home by his actress wife Renata.
She is a far cry from the Mrs. Khrushchev stereo-
type of a Communist reader's wife. This beauty is
a theater buff and has lent her name and talents
to Belgrade's avant garde theater, Atelje 212. Her
poise and charm have been a major asset to
Tepavac on his way up.
Although not in the limelight at present,
Mijalko Todorovic promises to figure prominantly
in the succession period. He has been shuffled off
to the unpromising job of president, but as a
Icng-time confidant of Tito's, will very likely be
back. He captured headlines four years ago with
his virulent criticism of the So".iets for occupying
Czechoslovakia.
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The Military
Yugoslavia's leaders may range from liberal
to conservative, but they are united in a belief
that the nation's future depends on federation.
Nowhere is the federalist feeling stronger than in
the military. The armed forces have long been
faithful supporters of Tito and his policies. The
officer corps has come to view itself as holding a
privileged position in the power structure. They
were confirmed in this belief last December when
d obtained
ndorsernen nr is move to put
down ?oa ian separatism
o mi itary leader as
been more outspoken in opposition to localism
and support of federalism than Colonel General
Viktor Bubanj, who is clearly going piaces in the
armed forces. He is well versed in political and
economic affairs, and an aggressive, natural
leader. He has been chief of staff since January
1970. In this capacity he frequently sees West?arn
diplomats. He has used these encounters to put
out feelers for increased contacts with the West
and for possible purchases of Western armns.
Defense Minister Nikola Ljubicic is another
military figure who will have a voice in what
happens after Tito. He is articulate, and Tito has
used him more than once, both at home and
abroad, to propagate and defend national policies.
Ljubicic is intensely loyal to the federation and
would support the po!itician he felt best able to
hold Yugoslavia together. A third military figure
whose voice will be heard in the succession period
is Colonel General Ivan Miskovic. He has Tito's
ear, indeed, he was made special adviser to the
President on questions of security in the wake of
the Croatian political upheavals. Miskovic's posi-
tion is strengthened by the fact that his brother
Milan is a member of the state presidency. Ivan
Miskovic was an intelligence officer back in 1955.
Some who have met Miskovic describe him as
pro-Soviet. A better description would be that he
is politically conservative and harbors strong
reservations about the value of, and need for,
decentralising power. His views on running a
Communist state are closer to Moscow's than are
those of his colleagues, but this should not be
over-emphasized.
Economic rivalries, ethnic animosities and
foreign meddling plague Yugoslavia now and will
continue to d.) so in the succession period.
The path of Yugoslavia's recent history is
paved with economic problems. The widening
gulf between a relatively affluent urban society
on the one hand and an agricultural population
on the other is a constant irritant. The gap be-
tween the relatively well-developed north and
west and the depressed south and east, is another
critical problem. This regional disparity is a major
source of rivalry, distrust and envy. It feeds the
nation's ancient and bitter ethnic animosities.
Belgrade has worked hard on overcoming
this problem, but it is still there. The government
now admits its program of channeling investment
funds to backward areas will require a consider-
able gestation period before it produces results.
Regicnal squabbling will afflict Yugoslavia as long
as these economic disparities exist. The problem
will not be solved in Tito's lifetime and will be a
major concern to those who follow him.
No nation in Europe is more plagued with
deep-rooted ethnic hatreds than is Yugoslavia.
Tito's leadership and the sheer force of h.s pres-
tige and personality kept the problem at bay
throughout most of the postwar period. Al-
though designed in part to ameliorate these
animosities, the freer political climate accom-
panying Tito's efforts to build for the future has
permiFted them to be expressed more openly and
vigorously. As a result, frictions have increased
instead of declined. The latest and most serious
example was the political upheaval in Croatia. It
showed that, after 27 years in powe,-, Tito had
not managed to build a federation in which con-
stituent ethnic groups put aside regional differ-
ences in the interest of the nation as a whole.
The magnitude of the move against the
Croatian leaders last December left many Yugo-
slavs bewildered and stunned. More than 600
Croats lost their jobs at that time, and many
feared Tito's new system had been endangered by
Tito's own actions. Confusion within party ranks
was heightened by Tito's vacillating and then by
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his highhanded circumvention of the system he
had bu',It, as well as his failure to lay out clear-cut
party directives.
In the wake of Croatia, Belgrade has moved
against regional chauvinists throughout Yugo-
slavia. This summer witnessed trials not only in
Croatia, but in Serbia and Macedonia as well. The
party executive bureau announced in mid-
September that measures to ensure discipline will
henceforth include sending "teams" to local
republic, provincial, and army party units.
A great deal more needs to be done. Time is
needed to correct past mistakes and to heal the
wounds of the Croatian crisis last year. Time is
one thing Tito does not have. He is 80. There is
no easy or quick solution to the complex problem
of regionalism, and it is not likely to be solved
within the aging leader's remaining years. Tito has
brought to the fore leaders who recognize the
need for a federation of equal nationalities, but
the mammoth task of instilling this idea in the
average Croat or Serb still remains to be done. It
will take all the skill and cunning that can be
mustered to guide Yugoslavia through this wilder-
ness that Tito scarcely penetrated.
Tito's successors will be subjected to
machinations from a number of foreign source-,
principally the USSR. The Soviets have learned to
live with, even grudgingly accept, the Yugoslav
heresy. Moscow iopes that Yugoslavia's march
toward orthodox Soviet-style Communism will be
resumed after the heretic Tito leaves. Moscow
may even anticipate that Tito's hard-pressed heirs
will turn to the Soviet Union for advice and help
in dealing with the serious economic difficulties
and nationality rivalries. The Soviets have at least
temporarily patched up their differences with
Tito and are using this opening to jockey for
better position in the post-Tito Yugoslavia. In
return for large development credits Moscow re-
cently joined the West in gaining the right to
bypass federal authorities and deal directly with
focal enterprises. Over the long run, these foot-
holds may prove very useful in insinuating Mos-
cow's views and positions into Yugoslavia.
Special Report - 7 -
Radical, anti-Communist Croatian emigres
have taken heart from Yugoslavia's recent prob-
lems with nationalism and have intensified their
campaign for an independent Croatia through
guerrilla warfare, propaganda, and air piracy.
These actions are part of a pattern of the upsurge
in terrorism that began in 1971 with the murder
of the Yugoslav ambassador to Sweden, Vladimer
Rolovic, and terrorism will continue into the
succession period. Croatian emigres are based in
Austria, Sweden, Canada, West Germany, the US,
and Australia. Belgrade has made it clear that
failure of these host countries to clamp down on
the emigres will have a negative affect on bilateral
relations. The problem may become an even
greater irritant in the succession period than it is
today because the emigres will see Tito's passia
as a green li ht.
Josip Broz Tito, described by some as the first and
last Yugoslav.
Tito kicked off the politics of succession by
calling for the creation of a collective presidency
and for a further decentralization of power from
Belgrade to the republics and provinces. One con-
stitutional reform has been passed and a second is
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being debated. Regionalism last winter presented
Tito with his most serious internal threat since
the conclusion of World War 11. It was a dramatic,
if not traumatic, period for the Yugoslavs. From
it, however, a better picture of the succession
emerged.
When Tito goes, collective leadership will be
accepted. Leadership of the government will pass
to the vice president who will become caretaker
head of state. The presidency is then supposed to
rotate on an annual basis along predetermined
lines. In the shakedown period it may well do so.
In the party, the succession is less clear but proba-
bly will be fought out in the executive bureau.
The best bet is that the., bureau's secretary will be
Tito's heir.
Tito is banking heavily on the common fear
of foreign meddling, and on the accepted wisdom
that Yugoslavia's constituent republics and
provinces cannot go it alone, to draw the nation's
talented leaders together for the common good.
Yugoslavs often fight bitterly among themselves,
but there is a genuine pride in the nation's post-
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war accomplishments. Nothing unites them as
quickly as the threat of foreign intervention.
Collective executive bodies, troikas and
councils of state have not historically proven
durable. For the short run, however, that is what
appears in store for Yugoslavia. At this time no
politician has the prestige or backing to fill Tito's
shoes. Barring the unexpected, howe ,er, the
chances are good that the federation probably
will hold together after Tito's passing, difficult as
that will be, and that Tito's system will function
well enough to keep Belgrade's nonaligned, self-
managing system afloat in the immediate succes-
sion period. The real test will come several years
after Tito is gone. Then, heightened frictions
among the regions or increased foreign meddling
could bring about an informal alliance between
conservative leaders and the military to produce a
more tightly controlled, centralized Communist
state. Then, more than likely, some individual will
emerge to dominate the system.
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