Serbia’s Old Rhetoric as a New Threat to the Balkans
Prof. Asoc. Dr. Arben FETOSHI
We are increasingly facing the danger of a déjà vu of history: Vučić’s Serbia has revived Milošević’s narrative of “Serb victimhood,” but now with the goal of completing the hegemonic project of the “Serbian World.” In its battle with Kosovo, Serbia has intensified its insidious strategies of mobilization and manipulation, while in Bosnia and Herzegovina it exploits Dodik’s ethno-nationalism, and in Montenegro the identitarian and religious ideology through Serbian parties and the Orthodox Church.
The imitation of the Russian model of “Firehose of Falsehood” by applying familiar techniques such as “emotional hijacking,” aimed at mobilization through the stirring of indignation among citizens, or “gaslighting,” aimed at deceiving the international community through distortion of reality, serves as a tool for “justification” just as in the times of Milošević, or Putin’s military interventions in Georgia (2008) and Ukraine (2014).
War Begins with Words
As we approach the anniversary of “Vidovdan” (a holiday transformed into a Serbian symbol that cultivates the feeling of being a “historic victim”), Serbia’s propaganda and chauvinist messages bring back Milošević’s warning on this same date in 1989 of “a war to defend Serbs.” The course of events afterward is well known: In Croatia, Serbs as “victims” of the “Ustasše,” to “justify” the invasion of Knin; in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbs as “victims” of “genocide,” to “justify” the crimes and the genocide in Srebrenica; in Kosovo, Serbs as “victims” of “Albanian terrorists,” to mask repression, massacres, and ethnic cleansing.
Once again today, 26 years after NATO’s bombings that stopped Serbia, its information warfare threatens the security, stability, and peace of the Western Balkans. By refusing to accept the new reality of an independent Kosovo, confirmed by the International Court of Justice (ICJ, 2010), Serbia continues to orchestrate coordinated disinformation campaigns through a victimhood strategy, portraying an alleged “ethnic cleansing of Serbs in Kosovo.”
Through public diplomacy[1], it has launched on social media a call for resistance (ready to defend their homes with their bodies), while accusing the world of “turning a blind eye.” This video message from the Director of the Office for Cultural and Public Diplomacy, Arno Gujon, follows a synchronized smear campaign from the Serbian List and the so-called Office for Kosovo, spreading stories of “harassment of girls and women,” “usurpation” of buildings, and “attacks on youth,” with the aim of demonizing Kosovo’s institutions and deepening ethnic divisions—setting the stage for scenarios of violence.
By exploiting the tragedy of a Serbian family in Obiliq, Petković fantasizes a “reversal of roles” with his claim that Kosovo has chauvinist projects for the disappearance of Serbs. Not only does he “forget” the Constitution, which guarantees privileged rights to the Serbian community in Kosovo, but also the period of international administration (UNMIK), as well as what his own superior had acknowledged regarding accusations against Albanians. If Aleksandar Vučić declared in 2013 that “the crime in ‘Panda’ was not committed by Albanians, as we had believed until now,” then what does Petković aim to achieve with his dangerous “allusions” about another tragic case—the murder of the Stolić family in 2003? Such baseless allusions, mixed with references to the so-called “pogrom” of March 2004 unrest, represent nothing more than an attempt to reconstruct the “victimhood” narrative from the 1980s and 1990s.
Otherwise, Petkovic and the other crocodiles in Serbia who “mourn” for the Solić family should first think about how many hundreds and thousands of Albanian civilians were killed and massacred by Serbian forces, and how many families of the missing have lived in anguish for 26 years, seeking justice – while facing inhuman mockery, denial, concealment, and “protection” of the criminals within Serbia. If their claims for dialogue, peace and justice, which are so “deafening” how loudly they repeat them, were not clearly a strategy for deception, they would share information on the missing, as they “pledge” in Brussels, cooperate to bring war criminals to justice and hand over, not protect, the terrorist leader Milan Radoicic.
The will for normalization, peace, and justice requires evidence—not tales full of fabrications that once again toll the bells of war in the Balkans.
The “Serbian World” and the Dodik Threat
If those responsible for the bloodshed in former Yugoslavia once “deceived” the world with the peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1995) and now “grieve” over the injustice from the West regarding the state of Kosovo, today they have brought back 1990s Serbia with the project of the “Serbian World” (2020), inspired by Putin’s hegemonic ambitions through the “Russian World” (2014).
Serbia’s expansionist policy, or its dream of a “Greater Serbia,” now hides behind this concept promoted by Aleksandar Vulin (known for his closeness to Putin). Despite condemnation from neighboring states, the Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik has embraced it, evoking the Declaration of the All-Serb Assembly—which was condemned by the United States and the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In a post on X[2] (June 7, 2025), Dodik stated they are “committed to changing the course of history” and that “much has since been done to unify specific acts in the Republika Srpska and Serbia.” This post is not mere political rhetoric—it is a coded call for annexation, similar to Russia’s precedent in Crimea (2014).
Although sanctioned by the United States and indicted and sought by Bosnia and Herzegovina’s judiciary, Dodik continues his separatist agenda, with visits to Belgrade and Moscow. His calls for a referendum imply the de facto secession of Republika Srpska, risking a renewed outbreak of conflict with regional consequences. Thus, he should not be seen merely as a dangerous local leader, but as a regional destabilizing actor operating in coordination with the strategies of Serbia and Russia, aimed at undermining the Dayton Agreement, the state of Kosovo, and NATO’s presence as obstacles to the hegemonic “Greater Serbia” project and Russia’s geopolitical penetration in the Balkans.
Serbia Must Be Stopped Again
Support for destabilizing actors like Milorad Dodik in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the narrative of “victimhood,” the “blessing” of war criminals by the Serbian Orthodox Church, tendencies towards the “Serbization” of Montenegro, and the use of media and parallel structures as sabotage instruments against the state of Kosovo, have reawakened the Serbia of Milošević—now with more perfidious and sophisticated nuances of information warfare (weaponization of information). The “Serbian World” concept is already part of Serbia’s foreign policy doctrine and, according to the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA, 2021), poses not only a threat to the territorial integrity of targeted states in the region, but also to Europe’s stability.
In its information warfare against Kosovo—intensified recently—Serbia has strategically expanded the portrayal of “victims” of “Albanian terror” to include the Roma community[3], despite the facts showing otherwise. By “lamenting” to Brussels with Kosovo’s “list of escalating actions“, Petkovic ignores the truth of Serbia’s brutal intervention with gangs and parallel institutions, but even Sorensen does not respond with Kosovo’s right to sovereignty and the rule of law in the north.
Such an irony of Brussels’ “neutrality” has resulted in a dangerous amplification of deception, with explosive potential.
So, if Serbia is not stopped by the West—by confronting it with its genocidal legacy and reminding it of the bombs—its hybrid war, in the style of Russia’s in the Caucasus, threatens to once again reach a boiling point and unleash a new wave of conflicts in the Balkans.
The author is the Director of the Octopus Institute for Hybrid Warfare Studies
[1] Video message on X, https://x.com/ArnoGujon/status/1930313261351600611
[2]Post on X, https://x.com/MiloradDodik/status/1931405063596990837
[3] Fetoshi on X, https://x.com/FetoshiArben/status/1914765798045856227