According to the recently published Balkan Defense Monitor 2024, most countries in the region saw a rise in international military exercises last year, while Serbia, on the other hand, has maintained a ban on military exercises since the start of the war in Ukraine, reported the European Western Balkans (EWB) portal.
It added that Serbia lifted the ban only once in 2023 – to participate in “the Platinum Wolf 2023”, co-organized by the United States.
NATO and the US remain the dominant exercise partners for all the countries in the Western Balkans, it said.
In 2023, North Macedonia participated in 31 exercises, compared to 20 in 2022. In the case of Croatia, the number of exercises rose sharply from 14 in 2022 to as many as 66 in 2023, said the portal.
Albania participated in 20 international military exercises, three more than in 2022, which also continues a trend of steady rise. Montenegro saw an increase in the number of exercises as well, holding 25 in 2023 compared to 17 in 2022 and just 10 in 2021, reported EWB.
“This rise in the number of military exercises can be attributed to the increasing vigilance of NATO. It is primarily happening in a context of four of the six monitored countries being NATO members”, EWB quoted Vuk Vuksanovic, Senior Researcher at the Belgrade Centre for Security Policy (BCSP) and a co-author of the Balkan Defense Monitor as saying.
In addition to these four NATO members, the Balkan Defense Monitor also analyzed Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia. The former country held 14 international military exercises in 2023. While this number is lower than in the NATO members in the region, it is still higher than in 2022, when only nine were held, reported EWB.
Serbia is the only country which is not following the regional trend. It held only one international military exercise last year – “the Platinum Wolf 2023” – and none in 2022, it said. The decision of the Serbian Government to suspend military exercises with international actors was made shortly after the start of the war in Ukraine.
What does the lack of international exercises mean for Serbia?
Before the decision on the moratorium, Serbia conducted exercises with both NATO and Russia, although always more with NATO members. For example, in 2021, Serbia participated in 14 exercises with NATO members and partners and 4 with Russia. In 2019, there were 23 exercises with NATO members and 5 exercises with Russia, reported the EWB portal.
According to Vuk Vuksanovic, the ban on military exercises raises the question, from the perspective of the Western decision-makers, of where Serbia wants and plans to go, said the EWB.
Vuksanovic adds that, while it is impossible to predict how much longer the ban on military exercises will be in place, it is indicative that, when Serbia assessed it needed to move closer to Washington, it lifted the ban for “Platinum Wolf 2023” without any problems, reported the portal.
“Therefore, if at some point the elites in Belgrade decide that they need gestures of goodwill towards the West, I would not bet against more such exemptions,” the portal quoted Vuksanovic as saying.
Will the Serbian Army suffer any consequences for missing out on international military exercises? Vuksanovic believes that this can be problematic, saying that exercises and training are usually the third item of the resources that the military invests in, reported the EWB.
“The first two items are, of course, manpower and equipment. We also have the paradoxical situation that, while Croatia had almost 70 exercises in 2023, Serbia had only one. Granted, we have no insight into the nature of all those exercises. In some cases, only one member of the Croatian army may have participated. But in any case, while Croatia has a diverse overview of different categories, Serbia had only one military exercise. And that’s a difference that is already noticeable”, Vuksanovic says, reported the EWB.
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