📋 Tender Overview
On Friday, the President of the Republic of Croatia and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces Zoran Milanovi? hosted a formal reception at the Office of the President of the Republic of Croatia on the occasion of marking the Victory and Homeland Thanksgiving Day, the Day of Croatian Defenders and the 29th anniversary of the Operation Storm.
The speech of the President of the Republic is broadcast in its entirety:
"Ladies and gentlemen, respected commanders, all in turn and honor, as you are greeted - welcome. I take this opportunity to thank you for coming and to congratulate you in advance on Victory Day, Homeland Thanksgiving Day and the Day of Croatian Defenders.
Many years have passed, almost thirty. Once young men and boys, now still people in strength who have not said their last or penultimate in their lives and careers, who still have years ahead of them in which they will be able to work and witness what happened with the power of will, intelligence – as it has been said – synergy, political determination, desire and will to liberate the country.
Today we had the opportunity to witness a similar act in which the head was not lost, but pride and honor were gained, and that is the victory of our rowers in incredible circumstances at the Olympics, and I take this opportunity to congratulate them on that from the bottom of my heart, because it was a special victory and God forbid that our victories in the future will be just like that – without weapons.
But, if it were not so, there is the Croatian Army and all Croatian citizens are ready to contribute to the defense of the country in their own way and certainly not everyone in the same way and everyone with the same strength and merits. Because thirty or more years ago, a small number of good people, a few good people, were still in the lead. Today, as a member of NATO, the European Union, but above all as a modern Croatian state for which all these alliances and friendships are just a welcome upgrade – and I will not say anything more because it is not little, but not more than that – we again in an uncertain world have to think about ourselves, about our needs, about our achievements and about our possibilities.
The Croatia Army is a topic that needs to be discussed in Croatian society, because it is not an alienated or distant power as the Yugoslav People's Army eventually became, if it ever was a people's one. It is the people's army, the army of the Croatian state, the Croatian people. Its needs should be publicly discussed and decisions made, sine ira et studio, with the wisdom and determination to implement them.
I will touch on one or two topics that are topical, not these days, but they are relevant all the time. We decided more than fifteen years ago that we would build a professional army, an exclusively professional army. A difficult and challenging task for countries larger and richer than Croatia, not to mention them. We didn't even start this work thoroughly, we certainly didn't finish it because it's a long-term cost, expensive and expensive again.
And now it is being considered that we are going in the direction of military training, or, as it is popularly said, military service. In this, as the Commander-in-Chief, I am ready to listen and follow the smart and reasoned initiatives of those who advocate it in hope, in the belief that they are doing it in good faith and that they know what they are saying, but this conversation must last. We cannot give up, without a lot of thought and preparation, something that we have been building for fifteen years, to invest resources in time to get something that we don't really know what it is yet. These are not topics that can be treated from election to election, as it suits whom, these are topics that must be seriously discussed, it is often said, with the profession. Yes, the army is a shambles. The army does not make decisions, but it is very much asked before making some far-reaching decisions.
The Army needs resources, it needs equipment. All this costs an enormous amount and when it is said and written in the media – and someone is saying this, speaking on behalf of the government – that the army needs this, that it will be procured, that they are working on the procurement of a third or fourth thing, then these are things that should come from the army, proposals and expressed needs, not from politics. And I don't know about some of those things, about such needs, regardless of the fact that I'm the Commander-in-Chief. I am saying all this in order to remove the taboo from the topic of the army in public, which is a Croatian institution, and to openly talk about things that are important to us and in which we invest in generations in advance.
The Croatia Army must be trained all year round, have exercises. And this is where the army, that is, the profession, the General Staff and the Commands, are crucial. In my five years, or almost five years, as President of the Republic and Commanders-in-Chief, I have never, nor has it occurred to me, to enter into the itinerary, schedule and dynamics of these exercises: when, how and where. There are annual plans that are very precise. They did not even arise in my head, but they are not in the cabinets of political parties either, but in the army. And when they try to make decisions overnight to adjust something on this or that date, it is not good. And I will not allow that.
The Croatia Army will exercise and conduct exercises and preparation, from Umag to Prevlaka, including Prevlaka. But, he will not do it outside of the prescribed and made plans and decisions, outside the existing order, outside the chain of command, and especially not a kilometer from the beach, on August 1 and in the middle of the tourist season. It is an activity from which we unfortunately live too much and invest too much of our hopes and place on tourism.
