When Slovenian Prime Minister Robert Golob held a meeting with US President Joseph Biden in the Oval Office of the White House ten days ago, part of the media from the region reported the news with envy towards Slovenia, while part simply kept it quiet.
Slovenian prime ministers from the 1998s to the present have been received at the White House more times than representatives of any other Balkan country. Janez Drnovšek, who marked the nineties of Slovenian politics more strongly than any other Slovenian politician, was in the White House twice, in 2002 and 1999. Drnovšek's first visit to then US President Bill Clinton was soon followed by Clinton's first visit to Slovenia in 2001, but the real sensation happened in XNUMX, when Brdo kod Kranj was the meeting place between US President George Bush Jr. and the then new Russian President Vladimir Putin. Bush also hosted Drnovšek during the period when Slovenia was finishing accession negotiations with the EU and preparing for NATO membership, both of which it achieved two years after Drnovšek's second working visit to the White House. Before Golob, another Slovenian prime minister was received in the Oval Office: Janez Janša was received by President Bush four years after Drnovšek.
Not even Biden received a Slovenian prime minister for the first time these days. In 2011, he hosted the then Slovenian Prime Minister Borut Pahor, at the time after the conclusion of the arbitration agreement on the border with the Republic of Croatia, and before the start of the ad hoc arbitration. True, Pahor was then hosted by Biden as vice president of the USA, which was a kind of sign of the reduction of Slovenia's international influence on American politics, although it is true that President Barack Obama also hosted Pahor for a short time.
The Croatian prime minister was received in the Oval Office only once, in 2006. At that time, Prime Minister Ivo Sanader was with Bush, and the meeting took place at a time when Croatia was beginning its process of joining NATO and the EU, and was a symbolic sign of American support. Croatia in that process.
Vučić in a subordinate position
Unlike Slovenia and Croatia, which have always functioned as an open ally of the USA and Euro-Atlantic structures, only the current president of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, was in the White House. He was received in the Oval Office, although not as an equal interlocutor, visibly placed on a low stool in a subordinate position, and actually not alone, but with the Prime Minister of Kosovo, Avdullah Hoti, when this duo signed the Washington Agreement, another of the unimplemented agreements on the normalization of relations those two countries.
In 2005, President Bush received Vlad Buckovski, the Macedonian Social Democratic Prime Minister, and this was an expression of American support for granting Macedonia the status of a candidate for EU membership.
The Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina was received in the White House, but at much lower levels, because there was never a guarantee that after a meeting at a high level, there could really be a political change and a favorable result for European integration and accession to Euro-Atlantic structures.
The context of Golob's visit
It is interesting to observe the context in which Golob's visit to the White House took place. There are few countries that have proven to be such a successful ally of the USA and such an important part of the Euro-Atlantic structures as Slovenia. In December 2022, the Slovenian secret services, naturally in an operation coordinated with the American services and the services of other NATO countries, arrested a married couple of elite Russian spies. During this year, those spies were first convicted in a secret trial before a Slovenian court, and in August they were exchanged in a major exchange, when the USA sent a group of Putin's spies to Russia, and journalists, American citizens and a group of important Russian dissidents were released from Russian prisons. , scattered throughout the camps in Siberia. Alexei Navalny was supposed to be in that group, but he was killed in a Siberian camp before the exchange.
Biden's thanks for Slovenia's participation in this process would in itself be reason enough to receive him in the Oval Office, but America had another reason to show the highest state honor to the current head of the Slovenian executive. Namely, Slovenia begins planning the construction of the second block of the Krško Nuclear Power Plant (NEK). The first unit was built using Westinghouse technology. It is clear that Slovenia will not even think of applying the Hungarian solution and building that second block in cooperation with the Russian state-owned Rosatom, just as the new block of the Paks nuclear power plant is being built. But, of course, French and some other companies are also interested in selling their technology. By meeting with President Biden and talking with him about the nuclear power plant, it is clear that the Slovenian prime minister has opened the door for the US advantage in getting that job. In conditions where neighboring Slovenia could face problems due to the expansion of the NEK, an alliance with America is a rational choice and a winning combination.
Finally, Golob is in the third year of his mandate, and his support in the body politic is seriously declining. Accepting an ally whose home turf does not bloom is a clear American message in Golob's favor.
Diplomats as administrators, not the elite
Today's diplomacy and international politics differ dramatically from that of the last century, especially its earlier stages. The world is globalized, diplomacy is no longer an elite, but an administrative job. Today, ambassador jobs are not performed by people with great insights into historical processes, recognizable people from science or culture, recognizable as personalities in the receiving country. Today, in the globalized world, politics is conducted much faster than in the past, at a time when ambassadors participated in the creation of public policies, and when relations were resolved in long diplomatic talks. Today, diplomatic trips by statesmen are far less frequent, there is no longer a need for "fact finding" missions that would be performed by the top government itself, information arrives from different channels, and communications are fast. Within the alliances, as well as the international community in general, there are numerous global forums, where political priorities are periodically coordinated, and the margin for acting outside such agreed policies is getting smaller and smaller.
It does exist, and Prime Minister Golob showed that it exists in the White House, clearly representing the Slovenian policy, for example towards the Middle East and the Palestinian issue, which is significantly different from the American one, without calling into question the fundamental affiliation of Slovenia to the North Atlantic Alliance .
This is precisely where the answer to the question why Slovenia, although a small country that quickly got out of the conflicts, fairly painlessly avoided the aggression of the Milošević regime on the other republics of the former Yugoslavia, is disproportionately more strongly represented in the center of the Euro-Atlantic alliance than all the other states formed on the territory of the former Yugoslavia. The key is the excellence of policies and the precise respect of alliances and commitments in important matters. After Janez Drnovšek, no one in Slovenia did it so skillfully, but it is certainly not a coincidence that today's Slovenian Prime Minister is one of Drnovšek's students and successors, admittedly, more from the generation of "grandsons" than "sons", because during Drnovšek's administration he was considered important and a promising political actor, but from the "second echelon" of Drnovšek's party. Such a Slovenia could afford to oppose President Bush's intervention in Iraq, and not lose credibility within NATO. Similarly, today Slovenia can afford to recognize Palestine and be a valued member of NATO.
The Slovenian pattern is clear: there is no room for neutrality in globalized politics, as the regime in Belgrade dreams of, but under the condition of excellence, under the condition of respect for common values and consistent implementation of assumed obligations, a successful politician has enough space to express his special opinion on every relevant international question. At the same time, such a policy ensures the stability of the state and brings relevant benefits to its citizens, economic stability, development and growth of standards.
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