Serbian Nuclear Weapon - Propaganda or Reality?
19 November 1993 De Telegraaf
By our correspondent, Hans de Vreij
Prague, Saturday - Serbia posesses a number of
tactical nuclear weapons, a usually reliable Serbian
soucre has told this newspaper. Western intelligence
services say they are aware of this allegation, which
is urgently being investigated. Possibly, the
information is false. "But threatening with a
non-existant nuclear weapon is almost as serious as
the actual posession of one", says one expert.
According to our informant, the Yugoslav People's Army
acquired four nuclear warhead for the Scud missiles in
1990 from a nuclear weapons unit of the former Soviet
Army in the then GDR.
But experts argue it is out of the question that a
local Russian commander in Eastern Germany would have
'lost' a number of warheads out of financial or
ideological considerations. The control by Moscow on
its nuclear arsenal would be too stringent to allow
for such an option. On the other hand, if the report
is true, the secret transfer to Yugoslavia must have
had a "green light"from high-level authorities,
experts say.
Montenegro
In the meantime, the warheads are said to have been
fitted to SS-1c/Scud-B missiles, which have a range of
300 kilometers. The missiles and associated TEL's are
said to have been stored in a secret tunnel complex of
the Yugoslav army in the mountains of the republic of
Montenegro*. Depending on the launch site, the Scud
missile can reach targets in Albania, western
Bulgaria, Hungary, Croatia, southern Austria and
eastern Italy. Earlier this week, the Italian
government urgently asked the US to deploy Patriot
missiles on the Adriatic Coast.
Western analysts have noticed that in the past week,
political and military leaders in Belgrade have said
with a remarkable frequency that Serbia "will use all
possible means to deter an attack". A Western military
intervention will lead to a Third World War, the
Serbian leadership says.
On November 20th, the COS of the Yugoslav Armed
Forces, general Panic, told Serbian TV that
Yugoslavia wants to acquire missiles with a range of
between 600 and 1000 kilometers. This statement, too,
made alarms in the West go off, as such missiles are
primarily intended to deliver chemical of nuclear
payloads.
Meanwhile, Western observers so far have not observed
Scud missiles or evidence of their use in the former
Yugoslavia. But the fact that the Yugoslavian army
does posess these tactical missiles can be derived
among others from an internal French Army publication
in the posession of this newspaper.
But again, it is also possible that this is a case of
deliberate disinformation, and that Serbia is using a
non-existant nuclear threat as a means to exercise
political pressure.
-------------------
* Morakovo, East of Niksic, hdv
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