Vraćanje balansa u politici Jugoslavije prema supersilama krajem 60-ih godina 20. veka
Bringing Back the Balance to the Yugoslav Policy Toward Superpowers in late 1960s

Summary/Abstract: The balance in political relations with superpowers on which the international position of Tito’s Yugoslavia was founded, was significantly disturbed after the military intervention of USSSR and four other countries of the Warsaw Pact in Czechoslovakia in August 1968. After a severe condemnation of this act by the Yugoslav government to which the Soviet side reacted in kind, a period started in which political relations between the two countries were virtually frozen. Already during the fall of that year both parties showed interest in improving their relations, but they undertook the first steps in that direction in the spring of 1969 when Tito positively replied to the initiative of the Soviet leadership to improve the political atmosphere in bilateral relations. By the exchange of messages between the two leaderships and by the visit of the Soviet minister for foreign affairs, Andrei Gromiko in Yugoslavia in September of that year, the Yugoslav-Soviet relations reached the mutually satisfactory level. From the standpoint of Tito and the Yugoslav leadership, by the Soviet confirmation of acceptance of the existing Yugoslav position, the basis was created again for continuation of the policy of balance in the relations between the superpowers on which the stability of the international position of the country was founded. In the meantime, the political relations between Yugoslavia and the other superpower – USA – were passing through one of the most successful periods since WWII. The administration of Lyndon Johnson and he personally, reacted very positively to attitudes of Tito and of the Yugoslav government toward the events in Czechoslovakia. Without giving formal guarantees, they clearly and publicly made it known that the interest of USA was the preservation of Yugo slavia’s independent position, which was of capital importance for the Yugoslav leadership which, after the intervention in Czechoslovakia, feared for some time, Yugoslavia could become the object of some future Soviet action. The new administration of Richard Nixon which took over in early 1969, continued the same political course toward Yugoslavia. A very positive relation toward Yugoslavia was expressed in Nixon’s messages to Tito, as well as in talks on high political level, so that during that and at the beginning of the following year, Yugoslav-American political relations have reached the degree which opened the vista of long-term stability, which reflected the interests of both parties. The favorable atmosphere in political relations created conditions for significant improvement of economic and other cooperation between the two countries.

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