The new year has brought back an old challenge for young men in Croatia. In the first days of 2026, about 1,200 of them received drafts for two months of military service.
They are the first generation to face conscription again after it was abolished in 2008 - a year before Croatia joined NATO.
At that time, the idea was to move to a professional army without compulsory military service. Today, due to the war in Ukraine, the prospect of a military conflict seems increasingly close.
A stray drone, probably Ukrainian, whose affiliation was never revealed, crashed in the Croatian capital Zagreb in 2022. No major damage was done, but the incident showed how real the danger is.
Broad public support for military service
The Croatian government has realized with concern that it can count on fewer than 15,000 active military personnel. Before the parliamentary elections in 2024, it proposed restoring compulsory military service for men of legal age. Defense Minister Ivan Anušić announced at the time that this would help young men change their "bad habits" and prepare them for "any serious threats".
Polls conducted in the country have shown that there is broad support for the return of military service: seven out of ten Croats support the proposal. That's why the law was easily changed in parliament last October - with 84 MPs voting "for" and only 11 voting "against". In turn, the Ministry of Defense, without wasting any time, established contact with the first group of recruits.
"I don't see any challenges to the conscription military service", commented Gordan Akrap, vice-rector of the Croatian University of Defense and Security "Franjo Tuđman". "There will be more applicants than the system can handle, since its capabilities are currently limited," he added.
"Left-wing populists say that we need to invest in kindergartens and so on. But the fact is that someone has to protect kindergartens, our European way of life and democracy - and that can ultimately be done by the army, "says Akrap.
Return to the old days
The introduction of compulsory military service in Croatia is part of a broader trend in the countries that were once part of Yugoslavia. Several of them are considering returning to some form of conscription - such as existed during the socialist regime of Josip Broz Tito.
At that time, young men had to serve for a year in the people's army, which represented a significant fighting force. Before the union began to disintegrate into its constituent parts in the 1990s, two-thirds of the land forces were conscripts, and the army also had a solid reserve of one million trained reservists.
The independent states that emerged after the Yugoslav wars in the 1990s gradually abolished military service. Slovenia was the first to abolish conscription in 2003, and the last Serbian conscripts were discharged from the army in 2010.
The admission of Slovenia and Croatia to the EU further created the feeling that they did not need strong armies and did not need to engage their young people in months of military exercises. But even before the Russian invasion of Ukraine, sentiments began to change.
Soon in Slovenia?
In 2020, the parties that formed the government in Slovenia included the introduction of military service in their coalition agreement. Prime Minister-elect Janez Janša had already made a name for himself as defense minister during Slovenia's 10-day war of independence in 1991.
He said that the country's armed forces, numbering just 7,000, could no longer defend it in the event of an attack, and complained that young people did not know how to handle weapons.
The current center-left government of Robert Golob does not support the idea, but ahead of parliamentary elections in March this year, Janša's party is leading in opinion polls.
Will Serbia follow suit?
In Serbia, the government has been discussing the possibility of introducing conscription for several years. According to Defense Minister Bratislav Gašić, the relevant bill will soon be submitted to parliament.
With the increase in military spending, the question arises whether the dynamics in the Balkans should worry the rest of Europe.
Toby Vogel of the think tank "Council for Democratization" believes that the likelihood of a real conflict remains low: "The military aspect is more about readiness than concrete plans and certainly not plans for an attack", he told DW. "Serbia has no intention of attacking Croatia, Croatia has no intention of attacking Serbia."
Author: Guy De Launi