Fetoshi: Vučić revives Milošević’s rhetoric through the “Serbian World” project

According to Arben Fetoshi, director of the OCTOPUS Institute, Aleksandar Vučić, Milorad Dodik, Marko Knežević and Patriarch Porfirije demonstrated in Mrkonjić Grad that the “Serbian World” project is continuing in a disguised form, similar to the policy of Slobodan Milošević. According to him, this was preceded by Paunović’s signaling and the “heroization” of criminals through the monument erected for the 37th Motorized Brigade in Raška.

During the commemorative ceremony for Croatia’s 1995 “Storm” operation, the leaders of this project articulated, according to Fetoshi, a hybrid approach. It is based on portraying Serbs as victims, positioning Serbia as a protective force, and accusing the United States, the European Union and the West of causing the suffering of the Serbian people.

Fetoshi says that Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, through an emotional speech, used language even more advanced than Milošević’s rhetoric. He declared that “Serbia will never again allow ‘Storm’ to be repeated anywhere and that it is powerful enough to protect its people.”

His assessment is that denying Serbian responsibility for the wars of the 1990s and calls to “protect” Serbs wherever they live go beyond justifying the policies pursued. According to Fetoshi, this rhetoric aims to deny state responsibility for crimes, ethnic cleansing and genocide in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosovo, as well as to legitimize the objectives of the “Serbian World.”

Fetoshi’s analysis emphasizes that Milorad Dodik conveyed the same message. He accused Croatia of “genocide” and declared that the “Storm” operation had been planned by “American experts.”

Rhetoric against the European Union was also continued by Marko Knežević, whom Fetoshi describes as a representative of this strategy in Montenegro. Knežević described Podgorica’s orientation toward the West as a “knife” against the Serbian people.

Meanwhile, according to Fetoshi, Patriarch Porfirije gave this interpretation a religious conclusion by describing the Serbian people as “a single people.” In this way, the “Serbian World” project also received a form of legitimacy from the Serbian Orthodox Church.

The director of OCTOPUS argues that Vučić in Serbia, Dodik in Republika Srpska, Knežević in Montenegro and Porfirije through the Serbian Orthodox Church constitute the four main channels of strategic communication for this project.

Fetoshi considers the rewriting of history a key element in advancing the “Serbian World.” According to him, in this narrative Serbia must be portrayed as a victim, while Serbs are depicted as a people persecuted and betrayed by the West.

He emphasizes that, even in the face of historical facts and international justice rulings, the strategy of denial seeks to “reverse the roles.” In this context, victimization is used to present the project as a defensive mechanism and to give it legitimacy.

“The same pattern of violence and destruction was seen by the world under Milošević, because denial, the falsification of history and chauvinistic rhetoric cannot produce any other result,” concludes Arben Fetoshi’s analysis.