Preparing for Tito's Departure

...Bosnia, with 18 per cent of Yugoslavia's total population, provides 12 per cent of the country's gross national product...

...Communist ideology is also being heavily stressed again, but at the same time economic liberalization and decentralization are being vigorously advanced...

...There is, of course, a personal element heretito's sentimental memories of the glories of the Nehru-Tito-Nasser nonalignment triumvirate at Bandungbut the main thrust is securing Arab backing and the weight it presumably carries in Asian and African capitals...

...Most church-going Serbs adhere to the Orthodox rite...

...Nevertheless, the growth rate is about 6 per cent, a statistic that has made itself felt in the number of goods and services available...

...Despite some misconceptions to the contrary, the West is not Yugoslavia's main source of military hardware...

...The Yugoslav police's expulsion of a group of West European women who wanted to demonstrate for the rights of Soviet Jews during the Helsinki Follow-up Conference was seen as a sign of Yugoslav anx-iousness to placate the Russians...

...On the domestic political scene, a reorganization of top Party organs is reportedly in the offing, continuing the policy of administrative decentralization and Party centralization...

...Since Brezhnev's trip, steps have been taken to ease Yugoslav dependence on the Soviet Union and allay the threat of a Kremlin takeover...

...During his visit to Belgrade last November, Brezhnev asked (in the Cominform jargon perhaps better understood in Yugoslavia than in the West) for "improved cooperation" between Belgrade and the comecon, closer contacts with the Warsaw Pact and more "ideological coordination" with Moscow...

...most of the rest comes from the Soviets, who are paid hard cash for the shipments...

...This country's longstanding pro-Arab policies are similarly related to the drive for wider support...

...Rotation is another aspect of the Tito system: A person can hold a managerial post for at most eight years, and then only with an extension from Belgrade after the first four...

...Kardelj, however, is now 67 and therefore his rule, if and when it happens, will be transitory, too...

...Scarcely anyone in Belgrade, moreover, thinks that Brezhnev's Kremlin has abandoned hopes of bringing Yugoslavia back into the fold...

...The most significant actions to improve Yugoslavia's defenses in the post-Tito era are occurring in the domestic sphere...

...Belgrade is often filled with rumors of some kind of nationalist (usually Croatian) conspiracy, and these are always supposedly hatched by fascist emigres abroad...

...This division represents not merely geographic boundaries but religious, national, linguistic, cultural, and economic differences, too...

...In Slovenia, the most "Western" member of the federation, for example, a scant 1.2 per cent of those over age 10 are illiterate...

...A fourth component, the contrast between high Party centralization and a growing decentralization in the areas of local public administration and the economy, is frequently and proudly cited...

...Strong efforts are being made, for example, to renew the uncertainty over possible United States reaction in the event of Soviet aggression against Yugoslavia...

...would not fight to protect Yugoslavia...

...Whether Moscow will sit back and allow such a development will depend, analysts think, on how the transitory regime functions and how effectively the nationalistic pulls are kept in check...

...About 60 per cent of the country's weapons are manufactured locally...

...and in Kosovo the figure is as high as 31.5 per cent...

...Yugoslavia is a federated nation of six republics bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, Croatia, Macedonia, Slovenia, and Serbiaplus the two autonomous regions of Kosovo and Vojvodira (in Serbia...

...The Follow-up Conference itself, meanwhile, served to strengthen Yugoslavia's image as a leading member of the Third World and, it is hoped, thereby bolstered Belgrade's international support...

...Ideological considerations vis-a-vis the Eastern European Communist parties and Eurocommunists, on the one hand, and strategic considerations in the Mediterranean and in Europe, on the other, are too evident to be discounted...

...Individual companies and enterprises have considerable freedom to make economic decisions, while authorities in the republics and regions have wide leeway in governing, budgeting and even taxation...

...The eye of the secret police, diplomats here have noticed, is more watchful now than in recent years...

...American) reaction to any Soviet move as having the greatest impact on the Kremlin's course of action once Josip Broz Tito is no longer President of Yugoslavia...

...Unlike the Executive Committee, the Politburo will not be designed to reflect regional differences...

...A third component, rarely discussed publicly, is Tito's sharp eye...

...Indeed, Moscow has made no secret of its ultimate interests...

...It is generally assumed that the first among equals of the six will be Ed-vard Kardelj, the Party's chief ideologist and Tito's closest associate, who is believed to be his destined successor as well...

...When a politician becomes too strong an independent force in one of the republics, he gets promotedtransferred to one of the government institutions in the capital...

...Tito reportedly rejected each of these suggestions, but the dangers lurking in them were not lost on the nation's political and military chiefs, who have not yet recovered from the shock of Jimmy Carter's in-eptness in publicizing, during his candidacy, that the U.S...

...the Croats are traditionally Roman Catholic...

...During World War II, Croatia became an "independent" state under Hitler's aegis...

...Related to this is the plan to loosen ties with the comecon and tighten them with the Common Market...

...Slovenia, with 8.7 per cent of the population, supplies 16 per cent of the GNP...

...True, too, there is serious overemployment in agriculture, leading to waste and high production costs, and the approximately 100,000 Yugoslav workers who have lost their jobs in Western Europe because of the slowdown there are having trouble finding suitable employment here...

...Observers say that the Yugoslavs have developed some fairly effective missiles, but that better antitank weapons are needed if the strategy for resisting a Soviet offensive is to be effective...

...it will be composed of bureaucrats trusted by Tito who have proved their mettle in the central institutions in Belgrade...

...At the same time, to prevent the occasion from arising, Belgrade will not allow any actitivy the Kremlin could conveniently interpret as a provocation...

...On the whole the economy is relatively stable, though, which accounts for the population's evident contentment...

...WITH AN EYE TOWARD MOSCOW Preparing for Titers Departure BY ELIAHU SALPETER Belgrade President Josip Broz Tito, the last great survivor of the generation of Roosevelt, Churchill, de Gaulle, and Stalin, turned 85 this summer...

...in Bosnia-Herzegovina the proportion of an alphabetics is 23.2 per cent...

...The same strategy motivates Belgrade's defense of Eurocommunists, particularly Spain's Santiago Carrillo, and Tito's new opening to post-Mao Peking...

...Besides strengthening the country's political independence, the shift would address Yugoslavia's major financial worry: How to recapture markets lost to the European Economic Community and redress the deepening foreign-trade deficit...

...The period of "semicollective leadership" should offer enough time for the emergence of a younger group of leaders, though, or possibly of a single younger leader...

...He has developed an intricate system of checks and balances that, aided by an intelligence network, takes into account national jealousies, traditional Balkan suspiciousness and a bent toward conspiracy resulting from centuries of foreign domination...

...For besides its impact on this country, in varying degrees his departure will have an effect on the Balkans, Western Europe and relations between the superpowers...

...But most foreign diplomatic observers here feel that real trouble of this sort, if it comes, will originate in Moscow rather than the West...

...These will presumably serve as guidelines for Tito's successors...

...These moves may remind Brezhnev that Tito's heresy, 30 years ago, was the root of all evil, but the Yugoslavs (Tike the Rumanians) hold that supporting each Communist party's right to its individual road to Socialism increases their own protection...

...The aim is to leave enough room for nationalistic sentiments, yet not enough for nationalist flareups that Moscow could use as an excuse to provide its "assistance...

...Part of the central budget is financed by a tax on business volume, and another part by allocations from the republics, whose funds come from taxes levied by local officials...

...True, business managers want even more freedom to make decisions and small entrepreneurs would like an expansion of "minicapitalism," a policy that allows for the employment of up to 12 people in private enterprises...

...On the military front, the effort to head off a Soviet invasion calls for changes in arms procurement policies...

...Although the Serbian and Croatian languages are similar, the first uses Cyrillic script, the second Latin...

...Inflation runs at about 15-16 per cent, but wages rise faster...

...Hardly anyone can make out what the Albans (a Yugoslav nationality) are saying...

...Accordingly, Belgrade is interested in establishing relations with West German, British and French arms manufacturers...

...the rest of the country was divided into Italian, German, Hungarian, and Bulgarian occupied territorieswhere Tito, who had returned home earlier against Moscow's wishes, raised the flag of partisan resistance in 1941...

...Slovenia and Croatia formed part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire until it disintegrated in 1918, when the Kingdom of Yugoslavia was created...

...Tito alone, thanks to his towering stature, unquestionable leadership ability and juggling skill, has held together the disparate elements which form the Yugoslav mosaic...

...But many diplomats here see restoring the fear ofor at least uncertainty aboutnato (i.e...

...The belief is that fanning nationalistic impulses would be a prime weapon in any attempt to reim-pose Soviet control on post-Tito Yugoslavia...

...A major feature of this system is the implementation of quotas corresponding to the relative size of the national communities: Every government service is subject to them, from the foreign office, where there are quotas for ambassadorships, to the Army, where soldiers and officers are mixed according to nationality ratios...

...in addition, the Macedonians and the Slovenes each have their own distinct tongues...

...Furthermore, Serbia and Montenegro were already independent by 1878...

...Though his walk shows occasional signs of stiffness, his general health and vigor belie his years...

...The most drastic change expected to emerge is the replacement of the 12-member Executive Committee-the Party's present ruling bodywith a resurrected Politburo of six...

...Eliahu Salpeter, a regular NL contributor, is currently a European correspondent for Israel's Ha'aretz...

...The strategy involves attempts to halt any massive armored attack from the norththe open country along the Hungarian borderplus partisan activity in the mountains...

...Nonetheless, his age is the dominant factor in virtually all Yugoslav domestic and foreign policy...

...What will happen when he is finally forced to relinquish the reins of power is also the number one topic of diplomatic conversations here...

...Maintaining this delicate balance once Tito's firm hand is no longer present will be one of the chief tasks facing the future Yugoslav leadership...

...And Yugoslavia is probably the one country in the world where "Moslem" denotes an official nationality, for reasons having to do with domestic sensitivities, as well as religious affiliation...

...And the workers remaining in Western Europe still send home around $1 billion annually, improving the nation's balance-of-pay-ments position and the standard of living in the thousands of towns and villages where their families live...

...Other steps aimed at preserving Yugoslavia's independence after Tito's departure are also being taken...