Yugoslav People's Army Part IV

Dissolution
During the early stages of the Yugoslav wars, and in general during the breakup of Yugoslavia, there was a great sense of confusion and concern as to the role that would be played by the Yugoslav People's Army.

Due to the fact that roughly 60% of the JNA's upper leadership was ethnically Serbian, when war broke out in Croatia in 1991 (Croatian War of Independence), the Croatians increasingly treated the JNA as a hostile force. During the Battle of Vukovar, the diverse ethnic backgrounds of the JNA's soldiers with no real stake or interest in the war in Croatia led to instances of desertion and confusion in the area. This was primarily caused by a lack of understanding as to where they stood with both the Croatian defence forces and the Serbian paramilitary units who were promoting a purely Serbian agenda in Eastern Slavonia.

The morale in parts of the JNA became very low as the war intensified. On September 29, 1991, the navy admiral Vladimir Barović committed suicide while stationed at the Vis naval base, leaving a suicide letter which stated that he could not reconcile his feeling of honor as a Montenegrin with the aggression of the JNA against Croatia.[citation needed] At the beginning of the war in Croatia, the JNA targeted civilians, killing three children near the Grabovac Campground at Plitvice Lakes.

By the end of 1991, when both Slovenia and Croatia had practically seceded, the JNA was crippled as a joint army of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, and was deprived of its basic fundamentals as a fighting force.

Further complications arose when the Republic of Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina declared their independence and an already unpopular war caused conscription levels in Serbia to drop to only 13% of what was required to maintain a functioning army. Many in Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina felt that the war was none of their concern and that their people should not have anything to do with the conflicts developing in the region. By mid-1992, war spread to Bosnia.

The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was replaced by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, JNA was subsequently dissolved and replaced by the Yugoslav Military (Vojska Jugoslavia) or VJ.

In May 1992, the United Nations Security Council confirmed independence of the new republics and accepted them into the UN. In accordance, the Yugoslav Army was asked to withdraw from Bosnia (as it was now deemed a hostile armed intervention in another sovereign state) or face sanctions. On May 12, 1992, JNA units were split between the Army of Yugoslavia (FRY) and the Army of Republika Srpska (mostly in accordance with geographical location or place of origin), along with the majority of officer staff. In reality, this meant that many units changed nothing except their titles and insignia.

After the formation of militaries in the new republics and the JNA was officially dissolved, the Army of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was reformed with new democratic intentions overshadowing the old socialistic fundamentals of the Yugoslav People's Army. Changes to the Yugoslav Military (Vojska Jugoslavia) were very slow and modernization did not begin until near the war's end. The solidarity of the army cadres helped keep Slobodan Milošević in power, but when he was overthrown, the army did not intervene.

In the end, Serbia inherited most of Yugoslavia's military arsenal, though some of its infrastructure was destroyed or left behind in other Yugoslav republics. Croatians captured some of the arsenal in the Battle of the Barracks. What remained of the navy was left to Montenegro.