Veche

Interview with Milos Stankovic

February 10th, 2008 by kb

Milos Stankovic, a former Major in the Parachute Regiment, served longer than any other British soldier in Bosnia and was decorated with an MBE for bravery in the conflict. Whilst working in Sarajevo as an interpreter he smug­gled Bosnians of all ethnic creeds out of Sarajevo and into safety. Some dubbed him a ‘British Schindler,’ the MoD dubbed him a spy and he was ar­rested in October 1997. Veche sent John du Preez to leafy Farnham in Surrey to speak of his exoneration, his war, and his new philosophy on life.

Outside Café Rouge a man in his mid-forties wearing a polo-neck was conversing with his friend on the finer things in life. Drinking coffee and smoking roll-ups in the middle of the day, he came across an artist. At this point Mr Stankovic arrived and was greeted by the artist with whom he fell into conversation. It seemed they were friends until a minute in, Stankovic turned and with a look conveyed both exasperation and contempt for the man who was speaking to him. Clearly he didn’t like him; perhaps he didn’t like artists. Either way he did not seem worried about appearing rude.

From Stankovic’s book, Trusted Mole, one could expect a no-nonsense man shaped by the rigours of the British Army. Unexpected however was Stankovic’s fear of entrapment by that same institution. Stankovic was to give a guarded interview, banning the use of a Dictaphone and making sure that my intentions were good, the first five minutes spent answering his question of “what is this whole thing about?” This was probably fair. During the war in Bosnia, Stankovich held the unenviable position of being one of three Serbo-Croat speakers sent by the British Army to work as interpreters. Working under the pseudonym of Mike Stanley, he met some of the war’s key players, including Naser Oric and Ratko Mladic. This was what the whole thing was about; a man and a war.

It was of course understandable, this paranoia. A man whose life had been spent devoted to the armed forces of Britain, had been attacked

by the same force. Arrested under the Official Secrets Act in October 1997 and charged with spying for the Serbs, he was exonerated a year later but left the army in August 2000. “My position in staff college had become untenable, my career was wrecked, the entire arrest had left a shadow in my life, it was impossible for me to stay.” Subsequently Stankovic, already awarded an MBE for bravery, took the MoD to court in a civil case that came to court in 2007. Stankovic refused a payment of £100,000; he claims he won the case, however he was not awarded damages, the judge stating that the MoD were justified in their investigation. At least on the surface, he does not seem to mind that he was left with legal costs of maybe £500,000, “No regrets, it was the right thing to do, it was about justice, the MoD were wrong, they stuck to outmoded, outdated concepts, the money was irrelevant.” Evidently his book Trusted Mole was no money spinner either. Stankovic says he has only received the £10,000 pound advance on his memoirs of the war, published in 2000.

The attitude of “no regrets” extends throughout the meeting. His reflections on Bosnia are the same, “It was a worthwhile thing to do. I had to fulfil my potential; I mean I could speak the language. When you join the army you join to serve, not sit around doing admin.” This is all that Milos seems to feel towards Bosnia and the Balkans. He never displays romantic intimacy or an emotional connection to the region. He maintains this attitude despite the fact that his father was a Serb who fought alongside the Royalists during the Second World War, fleeing only after the rise of Tito. Even his mother saw some action in the Balkans, driving ambulances during that war for the British; she turned down Cambridge to study Russian at SSEES. Stankovic says he has been to Serbia only three times, and only at the behest of Princess Katerina, daughter of the late Prince Tomislav. He has never been back to Bosnia, “Everyone has moved on, the problem was that the MoD factored empathy for sympathy. The whole experience was very intense, you make close friends, but that’s just how it is. It’s very intense but once it’s over, it’s done.”

It was the sort of friends that Stankovic made that perhaps worried the MoD. His role in Bosnia entailed negotiating check points put up by the various factions, often he would show a picture of his father in military uniform to Serbs, actions like this insinuated preference for the Serbs. Stankovic doesn’t think so “read General Rose’s book, it’s all in there, you have to read his book as well. General Rose mentions its value. It was a massive advantage. Trick of the trade, that’s all it was, a trick of the trade.” Admittedly this anger at claims of Serbian favouritism seem justified, he was, to some, the ‘British Schindler’. He is more modest, “everyone was at it, the French, journalists, and there were no lists. At most I’d say I got thirty people out, that’s the number that I gave in court. Anyone who wanted to go was taken. My personal involvement was not that great, I simply inherited the operation from my predecessor.”

Stankovic even raided army stores to help support a Muslim family in the conflict, clearly he had neither prejudice against Muslim, nor against Serb. “Everyone was as bad as each other, the Muslims in Sarajevo were just smarter, they used the media, they had the money. You know you have to buy airtime? It’s money; they call it the CNN factor. The Muslims realised that the war was only ever going to be solved by the West; they got money from Saudi Arabia. The Serbs never grasped the importance of the media, they pushed it away.” When he speaks of the history of the conflict and of Yugoslavia, it is with a detachment and no hint of favouritism or embittered nationalism. He speaks of the importance of land (and the dead within this land) to those in the Balkans, equating this with “paganism running very close to the surface.” He reels off the hypocrisy of a ‘besieged’ city having BMW 7-Series’ driven around by mobsters, of ‘safe areas’ with insufficient troops, and the collective will of the world, the UN, being unwilling to do very much. Clearly he doesn’t see Serbs as worse or better people, Mlatko Mladic is described as a normal man, “you cannot perceive evil” says Stankovic.

Stankovic’s time in the Balkans should have the perfect narrative: the father driven out by Communism, the son’s return, the victimisation of his brother Serbs by the media and finally his betrayal of Britain. Perhaps this is the story the MoD was hoping to bring about. But it didn’t end that way though and he never betrayed the country he had fought for. He is not a Serb; he is a British ex-officer who came across as more professional cynic than pro-Serbian nationalist. Constant references to politicians who are “the best liars in the world”, a corrupt media and a rotten army, indicated that this man is opposed to the modern world, not just the small part called Britain. Now running a ‘leadership transformation consultancy’ engaged with helping those with post-traumatic stress, he looks back at his experiences with a hint of the Buddhist, “whether an experience is good or bad, it is just perceptions, after all, not many people get to take their employers to court.” This view of life is of course valid, but all the talk of “energy meridian systems”, “never be your therapy be your outcome” and “natural pathway programming” seems to show that maybe Mr Stankovic hasn’t really dealt with everything adequately. Perhaps though, that’s just this reporter’s perception.

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