VETERANSKE ORGANIZACIJE – ALI JIH SPLOH POTREBUJEMO?

When discussing veterans and veteran organisations, one usually first thinks of the past. We first think of different wars and their consequences. We think of all those who participated in those wars and were lucky enough to stay well and unharmed. And we think of all those who came out with different issues, be it physical or emotional; however there are even more of those who have had to deal with both.Although we are today very lucky and the wars on the flanks of the European Union are mainly the subject of historical discussions, we in the Editorial Board of the Contemporary Military Challenges decided to dedicate one of the thematic issues to veteran organisations and their role in the modern society.Military veterans form a constituent part of Slovenian, broad European and global society. They are identified according to different wars and individual armed conflicts. In different settings, they are treated and organised in very various ways; even their impacts on the formation of the modern society vary. Still, to some of them, nothing of this applies, because they fought on the wrong side. However, the wrong side no longer represents a problem everywhere, as it used to be the case, since the perceptions of conflict from the past have been transformed into fruitful cooperation for the future.The question of veteran organisations or the question whether or not they are even needed, thus remains a rhetorical one, especially considering the emergence of new veteran organisations comprising veterans of different international operations and missions, even in the countries, which otherwise do not even have other (war) veterans. The thematic issue in front of you was prepared in cooperation with Vladimir Prebilič as guest editor and some of the participants of the international panel discussion held in Ljubljana last summer.