AN OLD-FASHIONED SCANDAL
U.S. AMBASSADOR IN
SERBIA DEPARTS UNDER THE CLOUD
by Srdja Trifkovic
The announcement from the American Embassy in
Belgrade on January 22 was bland: “U.S. Ambassador to Serbia and Montenegro,
William D. Montgomery, will retire from the U.S. Foreign Service at the end of
February after a 30 years career.” The story behind Mr. Montgomery’s premature
departure from the key Balkan post is interesting in a rather scandalous way,
and—so far—unfit to print in the U.S. (the cat is out of the bag in Europe). It
combines power, greed, sex, jealousy, corruption and violence.
William
Montgomery (58) was a very powerful man in Serbia, to which he came after
several tours of duty elsewhere in the region (Zagreb, Sofia, Budapest). His
views of the Balkans were formed during this period in the late 1990s, when he
served in the region during Mrs. Albright’s tenure at the Department of State.
As a prominent Serbian political commentator noted recently, those views “bear a
permanent imprint of the enitre Clinton team’s prejudices and mistakes in
ex-Yugoslavia to this day.” He supported the interventions in Bosnia and Croatia
(1995) and the war against the Serbs over Kosovo (1999).
Afetr
Milosevic’s fall (October 2000) Montgomery was able to ensure the continuity of
the previous Administration’s policies by relying on the compliance of
Milosevic’s successors. This compliance was forthcoming because the late prime
minister Zoran Djindjic and the rest of the “pro-Western, reformist” DOS
coalition—who used Vojislav Kostunica to come to power but then marginalized
him—went out of their way to earn brownie-points with the Ambassador by being
“cooperative” and “moderate.” “They vied for Montgomery’s approval as a means of
improving their rating in Washington,” our source says, and to that end they
accepted his “line” on The Hague war crimes tribunal, on Kosovo, Bosnia, and a
host of other issues. The U.S. Ambassador also became a key arbiter in domestic
politics, most recently by threatening Kostunica (in his current role of prime
minister-designate) with a host of unspecified sanctions if he were to include
the nationalist Radical Party in a future government coalition.
In the
words of a Western diplomat who was posted to Belgrade until recently and who
spoke on the condition of anonymity, Montgomery managed to “impose himself on
Serbia as in imperial proconsul” because the local politicians were willing to
treat him as one. “He was a very big fish in a rather small tank.” The power,
status, and attention, so disproportionate to a middle-level bureaucrat’s
experience and personal mindset, proved to be too much for Montgomery, more than
he—and, far more damagingly, his wife—could handle.
Lynne Montgomery is a
vivacious woman fond of partying and media attention. She was born in Norfolk
(England) 45 years ago to a family of modest means and social standing. Her
lifestyle in Belgrade reflected her refusal to come to terms with either her
middle age or her status as a diplomatic wife. As the Sunday Times of
London put it fairly tactfully on February 8,
“She has been a popular
figure on the Belgrade cocktail circuit, but her penchant for low-cut dresses
and late-night carousing has caused as much comment as her charity balls for
children’s cancer units… [T]he platinum blonde raised eyebrows by writing a
controversial column in a local newspaper in which she described dancing on
tables in restaurants.”
In one of those columns the diplomat’s wife
regaled her Serbian readers with the story of her husband beating time on her
bottom with a spoon as she danced to a Gypsy band on a barge on the
Danube.
Mrs. Montgomery may have been born in Norfolk but she is a
quintessential Essex Girl. She was a married junior staffer at the British
embassy in Dar-es-Salaam (Tanzania) when she met the up-and-coming American
diplomat, Bill Montgomery. It was in the summer of 1986, just as he was
expecting the arrival of his fiancee from the United States. A steamy affair
apparently ensued, with Montgomery calling off the wedding and Lynne leaving her
husband.
She could have continued with her lording over Belgrade’s social
scene for another year at least, had it not been for an ugly incident in the
first week of July last year when she was involved in a violent fracas with her
husband’s personal secretary, Biljana Jovic (38). The ensuing scene is believed
to be the main reason for Montgomery’s premature retirement. As the embassy made
arrangements for its Independence Day celebrations—a key date in Belgrade’s
social calendar—Mrs. Montgomery unexpectedly came back from the Croatian coast
where she was enjoying a break at the family summer home. She called her
husband’s cell phone number from the Belgrade airport; to her surprise and
chagrin the call was answered by Miss Jovic, who cut her off. Mrs. Montgomery
ordered the driver to take her to the embassy instead of the family residence in
the leafy suburb of Dedinje, marched through the front office, and allegedly
attacked Jovic, whereupon Marine guards had to be called to separate the women.
The Sunday Times says that Montgomery bit Jovic and continued her tantrum
in her husband’s office, scattering papers. When it was all over, Ms. Jovic—an
American citizen—flew to Washington to lodge a formal complaint. State
Department investigators went to Belgrade to and their findings are said to have
been extremely detrimental to Mrs. Montgomery. She was told to stay away from
her husband’s assistant, which effectively barred her from the Embassy. As the
gossip spread through Belgrade Montgomery’s position grew
untenable.
Lynne Montgomery is said to be shattered at the thought of her
high-profile life ending. She enjoyed herself tremendously in the Balkans: when
her husband was posted to Croatia, she gained a doctorate in philosophy from
Zagreb University. Her thesis, “The Philosophy of Marriage,” remains described
as a “work in progress,” but it nevertheless enabled her to obtain the position
of a part-time lecturer at the private Brothers Karic University in Belgrade at
a salary of $ 2,500 (roughly five times the salary of a full-time tenured
professor at the University of Belgrade). The proprietor of the university is
Bogoljub Karic, Serbia’s wealthiest oligarch, who made his fortune—measured in
hundreds of millions, if not billions—during the reign of Slobodan
Milosevic.
These shinenigans end the career of a diplomat whose
activities proved to be deeply detrimental to the stability and lasting peace in
Southeastern Europe. That region is not an inherently important part of the
world, but it is significant because American policies there throughout the
1990s have come to embody all that is wrong with the fundamental assumptions,
values, and modus operandi of the decision-making community in Washington. With
the fall of Slobodan Milosevic a thorough revision of those policies became
possible. William Montgomery, more than any other individual, has contributed to
the maintenance of a negative continuity of the Clintonian-Albrightesque Balkan
mindset on the Bush Administration. In particular it was his fervent insistence
on Serbia’s compliance with the demands of The Hague war crimes tribunal that
proved to be counterproductive. It undercut the legitimacy of the “reformist”
government in Belgrade, which played right into the hands of the nationalist
opposition: the Radical Party is now the most powerful political force in the
country.
Montgomery’s successor should try to make a fresh start. With
the focus of the Administration’s attention on the Middle East, the Caspian
basin, the Korean peninsula, and the war against terror, the United States
should pursue pragmatic policies in the Balkans that will make further
disengagement possible, at no cost and with least risk of fresh instability. The
only obstacle to such policy is the maintenance of a regional pax
Americana—until now doggedly pursued by Montgomery—that entailed Serbia’s
submission to The Hague, support for Montenegro’s secessionist cleptocracy
embodied in Milo Djukanovic, Bosnia’s ever-tighter centralization favored by its
Muslim plurality, and the treatment of Kosovo’s eventual independence as an
inevitability.
By the time the new ambassador arrives there will be a new
government in Belgrade, less likely to follow “suggestions” from the U.S.
Embassy at No. 50, Kneza Milosa Street. By standing firm on the key issues that
affect its own national interest, that government will also help promote a new
Balkan policy in Washington. If it refuses to be drawn into another round of
Montgomery’s combinazioni, Belgrade will best defend its own interests
while at the same time contributing to the long-overdue review of the U.S.
policy in the Balkans.
