Posted on 05/23/2006 6:33:04 PM PDT by blam
Serbia's navy left high and dry by the vote for independence
By David Rennie, Europe Correspondent
(Filed: 24/05/2006)
Serbia is about to join the select club of former naval powers.
Officers, who remember the heyday of the old Yugoslav navy - it boasted nearly 80 warships - are weighing their options following Sunday's independence referendum in Serbia's sister republic of Montenegro.
The Yes vote means Serbia will lose its sea ports and naval bases.
Gen Radosav Martinovic, a military adviser to the government of Montenegro, said that the Serbian navy would be lucky to end up with some patrol craft on the Danube.
The general invited Serbia's most capable admirals and officers to stay on and help build a new Montenegrin fleet. The offer may not be that attractive, however, as the new-born nation is planning a coastguard-style force, based on fast patrol boats, plus a three-masted, 180-foot sail training ship, the Jadran.
The Montenegrin authorities have started auctioning off some of the most picturesque bases on the Adriatic to tourist developers.
Other nations, from Ethiopia to the Austro-Hungarian empire, have lost coastlines and waved goodbye to their navies. Bolivia, defying the trend, still maintains a "navy" of river boats and a clutch of admirals, despite losing its coastline to Chile in 1884.
Lol, what? I agreed with you. :P
You've got some serious anger issues, FRiend.
Absolutely, and while I'd still support US intervention in the Balkans, this is something that reasonable men can disagree on.
The reason I started posting on this thread in the first place isn't because I think Kosovo is a sacred cow, but because a poster said that he actually supported the Serbs for having the guts to "stand up" to Bill Clinton, as if fighting the US military were what true conservatives should have been doing all along. That's not questioning the decision to go to war, that's supporting America's enemies.
I don't think you understand the gravity of the whole "stealing valor" thing, Lion.
LOL. And you just know that Israel's secret communist sympathies are the reason that the IDF didn't fight alongside him at the Chosin Reservoir, or wherever it he says he was.
I didn't know Serbia was our enemy. When did they attack us? What threat did they pose to our national security? Did they have WMDs as well?
FYI only.
*Not that there's anything wrong with looking at that picture, mind you...
Those terms are not synonymous.
Only because of a lack of means and opportunity, not from motive or want.
That's true about the Croats burning tires. The city is stone and wouldn't burn easily.
It has stone walls all around it and no damage has ever been shown to its famous walls.
You can't see any damage to the walls or buildings in that photo - no crumbling masonry or anything.
It's thick black tire fires.
There was some damage to roof tops between the Croat forces (around 900 were in the city according to Hague trial transcripts) and Yugoslav forces.
By the way, the commander of the navy was an ethnic SLOVENE, who is elderly and I think still imprisoned in the Hague.
He did respond to Croats who initiated attacks by firing at the navy.
But the city is nearly perfectly intact, according to visitors - except for new roof tiles.
Its ancient worn stone paths, its famous walls, and old buildings are standing as they always were.
Some of the money sent for rebuilding was discovered being used to repair old earthquake damage - around Easter 1979 there was an earthquake - which shows that they received in donations much more money than they needed because the damage was quite minimal.
Speaking out against a war does not constitute aid and comfort to the enemy. You need to lay off the Merlot.
"I'd start a Revolution,
Just can't wait,
But...I'm too tired...and its late"
-Mott the Hoople
Only because of a lack of means and opportunity, not from motive or want."
ROTFLMAO!!!!
Excellent retort, but to be fair to Slick, its not really accurate...however, see my tag line...
Hmmm-all's quiet after 11:45. I guess Lion's hospice nurse finally gace him his Prozac and Geritol!;-)
That's a real insult to Walter Mitty!
Get those pancakes ready boy, and we'll help your look for your dentures.
I just noticed your reply, sorry . It seems to me that if you took all the tires in Dubrovnik and threw in all the tires in Venice, you still couldn't properly prepare a small Kentucky tobacco bed.
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