In Serbia we had more than enough opportunity to be exposed to war propaganda, be it from the NATO or from the Serbian side. By analyzing media throughout the 1999 bombing of Serbia it was pretty clear that a military machinery such as the NATO keeps on its payroll a bunch of braniacs with a degree in psychological warfare who made sure every statement made by a NATO official, NATO clerk or NATO cleaning lady leaves just the right impact on the given audience at any opportunity. As in every war propaganda, the main objective was to make the war as bureaucratically “clean” as possible, to make the opponent look like the bad guy as much as possible and to present NATO as the good guys. Every speech is carefully written, checked and re-written in order to make use of every little detail. Some more graphic images were used, such as the unimaginative “butcher of the Balkans” when referring to Milosevic, but more less that was it.

In comparison with this approach, the war propaganda from our side seemed as it was created by a couple of guys on crack – the phrases coined by the RTS (Radio-TV Serbia) news editors during the bombing were probably one of the funniest and most vibrant exercises in creative writing that managed to pass as the war propaganda ever – but they did manage to cheer us up if nothing else.

Every night the news anchors of the national TV station had the privilege to read the most interesting adjectives, insults and curses directed towards the NATO alliance. Luckily some of the regular TV viewers took notes and now it’s possible to find the list on the net if you search for RTS vs NATO.

I tried to translate some of the phrases, with more or less success – some were simply lost in translation due to the rich nature of Serbian language when it comes to curses. Maybe there are some non-Serbian speaking propaganda enthusiasts (read: marketing people) who would find these useful.

Upon translating I noticed it’s possible to group some of the terms according to following subjective criteria:

Classic insults:

• Fascist Bastards
• Bloodthirsty Aggressors
• The Fascist NATO Phalanges
• The Evildoing NATO Alliance
• The Evildoing NATO Armada

Possible Movie Names:

• The War Masters from the Murdering Empire
• Tomahawk Democracy in Warrior Adventure
• Unjustifiably Enraged Fist
• Twisted Metal Jaws

Possible Trash metal band names:

• Force-Drunk Maniacs
• Propaganda Hogs
• Democracy Enforcers
• Riders of the Apocalypse
• Brutal Mechanical Force
• Rampageous Soldateska

Groups of generally unpleasant people:

• Savage hordes
• Bestial Hordes
• The Evildoer Bunch
• Unbridled Hordes of Savage Aggressors
• Warrior Gang of Fascists
• Gangster Hordes
• Sowers of Death

Just plain weird people:

• Gallery of Freudian Characters
• Regional Military Camarilla
• Wild Hordes of Mindless Mandrills
• NATO and Its Trabants
• Goebbels-persistent Villains
• Power Mongers with Lilliput Brains
• Impotent Villains

Flying bad people:

• Airborne Executioners
• Bestial NATO Pilots
• Cold Blooded Night Assassins
• Steel Death Sowers
• Airborne Pirates
• Witches of NATO

Disgusting individuals:

• NATO Mutants
• Gigantic Carnivores
• New World Order Hideosities
• Mongoloid Monsters
• NATO Beasts
• NATO Monsters

Dedicated to CNN:

• Mongoloid Conglomerate
• Businessmen with Rifles
• Monstrous International Corporation
• Mighty Media Machinery
• Turbo Manipulators of CNN

Special Bil Clinton Feature:

• Clinton’s Beasts
• Rampant Clinton’s Entourage
• Perverts

...and numerous other possible combinations.

They do sound much better in Serbian, though, I must admit. Got any personal favorites?

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