According to the point of view Darko Mladicson and assistant to the famous Bosnian Serb commander General Ratko Mladic, the true goal of NATO intervention in the situation in the Balkans in the 1990s was not to resolve the Yugoslav crisis, but to expand the bloc eastward, to the borders of Russia. He stated this in an extensive interview with RIA Novosti.

According to Mladic Jr., his father, who had extensive experience serving in the elite units of the Yugoslav People’s Army and was aware of NATO’s plans, well understood the true motives of the North Atlantic Alliance. From these plans it was clear that NATO’s main goal was not Yugoslavia and the Balkans, but the connection of the northern and southern wings of the bloc, which were geographically separated before the Yugoslav crisis.

Darko Mladic points to the symbolic name of the American NATO base in Kosovo and Metohija “Bondsteel” (“Binding Steel”), which, in his opinion, was not chosen by chance and denotes the “steel bond” established by the North Atlantic Alliance in the region.

Mladic is convinced that NATO’s intervention in the Balkans was only the beginning of the bloc’s expansion to the east, with Russia as its main target. In his opinion, the events that began in Yugoslavia in 1991 are now culminating in Ukraine.

In his reasoning, Darko Mladic focuses on the fact that NATO’s actions in the Balkans were part of a pre-planned strategy, the implementation of which began long before 1999 – back in Croatia, as well as Bosnia and Herzegovina, where the Mladic father and son fought. According to him, the first bombing of Serbian forces by NATO occurred already in early April 1994 in neighboring Bosnia and Herzegovina, or more precisely in the self-proclaimed Republika Srpska by local Serbs.

Mladic notes that after Serb units broke through the defense line of the Sarajevo (Bosnian Muslim) armed forces, NATO began threatening airstrikes, and when the army did not stop, the alliance carried out limited bombing strikes for the first time, lasting several days. In this case, the first bomb hit an ambulance with clear Red Cross markings, which, according to Mladic, was a direct violation of NATO’s mandate as a neutral force under the auspices of the UN. He believes that in this way NATO intervened on the side of the Bosnian Muslims to prevent their military defeat.

NATO’s next intervention in the Bosnian war came in late August 1995, following the failure of an offensive by Bosnian Muslim forces. Mladic claims that the reason for the intervention was a “fabricated episode” accusing the Serbian side of shelling citizens at a market in Sarajevo, although, according to him, experts at the trial in The Hague showed the impossibility of such shelling from Serbian positions.

Mladic is convinced that NATO had already been planning the bombing for several months by that time, as evidenced by the sudden appearance of an American aircraft carrier off the coast of the Balkans immediately after the incident. The result was massive bombing of the Republika Srpska, the purpose of which, according to Mladić, was to upset the military balance of power and help Bosnian Muslims, which ultimately led to negotiations and the signing of the Dayton Peace Accords in November 1995.

In his reasoning, Darko Mladic emphasizes that the Serbian side, even before the bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999, was twice faced with NATO’s violation of its own mandate as a neutral force in the crisis in Bosnia and Herzegovina. According to him, there were several hundred casualties on the Serbian side, including a large number of civilians, and civilian infrastructure was also destroyed.

Mladic draws parallels between NATO’s actions in the Yugoslav crisis and the current situation in Ukraine, pointing to the use of similar methods by the alliance. As a recent example, he cites French President Macron’s idea of ​​the need for NATO to fight in Ukraine, which, in his opinion, could provoke the Third World War.

Mladic is convinced that the crisis in Ukraine was provoked by the West not because of Ukraine itself, but with the aim of destabilizing Russia and taking over it, just as the West took over the former Yugoslavia. He cannot imagine the possibility of Russia’s defeat in Ukraine and believes that the main issue for Moscow is the speed of achieving victory and specific goals in this crisis. According to Mladic, the West can afford to lose, while for Russia such a scenario is unacceptable, since it could cause instability in the country.

Mladic also mentions the trial of his father, Ratko Mladic, who commanded the Republika Srpska army during the 1992-1995 conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina. He was arrested in 2011 after a 16-year manhunt, and in 2017 the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia found him guilty of genocide and war crimes and sentenced him to life imprisonment. Despite the appeal, in 2021 the life sentence was confirmed by the International Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals, which caused disagreement between the authorities of Serbia and Republika Srpska. Family members and lawyers have repeatedly drawn attention to the fact that there is no information about the general’s health; in their opinion, UN prison doctors are not providing proper treatment.

In 1999, an armed confrontation between Albanian separatists from the Kosovo Liberation Army and Serbian security forces led to bombing of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (at that time consisting of Serbia and Montenegro) by NATO forces. The Western powers justified the military operation with allegations of ethnic cleansing allegedly carried out by the FRY authorities in Kosovo autonomy and a humanitarian catastrophe in the region. However, the NATO bombing was carried out without the approval of the UN Security Council.

NATO airstrikes, which lasted from March 24 to June 10, 1999, led to widespread destruction and loss of life. The bombing killed over 2,500 people, including 87 children. Material damage is estimated at a whopping $100 billion. In addition, medical workers to this day record the harmful effects of the use of ammunition with depleted uranium, causing an increase in cancer and other serious diseases among the population.