It was the last combat flight of a Yugoslav Army aircraft during the NATO aggression. But the flight in which Milenko Pavlović died with his heroic death went straight into legend.
“Mother of your children, you don’t want to die, I will” – these were the words of pilot Lieutenant Colonel Milenko Pavlović, commander of the 204th Fighter Aviation Regiment of the Yugoslav Army Air Force (RVVJ), which placed him among the immortal heroes, before he died on this day, May 4, 1999, at exactly four minutes past 12 o’clock, in a clash with NATO aviation over Valjevo.
Born on October 5, 1959 in Gornji Crniljevo near Osečina, Pavlović graduated from the Military Gymnasium in Mostar and the Air Force Academy in Zadar, becoming the commander of the 204th Fighter Aviation Regiment a year before the start of NATO aggression against the then Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
He flew to heroic death instead of his younger colleague
On his last combat flight, the brave pilot took off from the airport in Batajnica, after receiving an alert that a squadron of NATO aircraft was approaching Valjevo, and that the target was the previously bombed military factory “Krušik”.
Instead of the commander, the order to take off was given to the unit’s junior pilot, but Pavlović, who was on duty at the relocated command post in Stara Pazova at that moment, informed his deputy to keep his younger colleague from taking off at all costs and headed towards Batajnica. He approached the “Mig 29”, literally pulled the young pilot out of the cockpit and, with the words “Mother of your children, you don’t want to die, I will”, took off in the direction of Valjevo.
– He was always like that in everything, that he would go, and that nothing would happen to anyone else. He kept saying that he was ready to die for Serbia. And that he would never eject if he was hit, that he would go to victory or crash together with the plane – his mother Radmila Pavlović once told “Blic”.
“They have me”, the last words before the crash
That is exactly what happened after only 12 minutes that the commander of the 204th Fighter Aviation Regiment spent in the air, because he had a much larger enemy against him.
With brave maneuvers, even though the radar on his “Mig” failed immediately after takeoff, he managed to confuse and disperse the NATO squadron.
“They have me,” were his last words heard by the command in Batajnica, and a few moments later his “MiG” was hit by three missiles fired from a Dutch F-16 in the Tuzla area, after which Pavlović’s burning aircraft crashed in Petnica near Valjevo, just 50 kilometers as the crow flies from his hometown of Gornji Crniljevo.
– Fate wanted that on May 4, 1999, Milenko would set off on his last mission to his native region, his Podgorina. It was his last flight, a conscious sacrifice that was not in vain. His suffering, the death of the commander of the legendary aviation regiment, one of the best pilots of the Yugoslav Army, marked the last combat flight of the pilots of our fighter aviation until the end of NATO aggression – said General Milan Mojsilović, Chief of the General Staff of the Serbian Army, about Pavlović’s heroic deed.
Posthumous decorations, a memorial and the naming of the airport in honor of the pilot
Milenko Pavlović, who left behind his wife Slavica and sons Srđan and Nemanja, was not proclaimed a national hero, but was posthumously awarded the Order of Courage and the Golden Flying Badge.
In his hometown of Gornji Crniljevo, there is a memorial room in his honor, in Osečina the central city street is named after the hero pilot, and in Valjevo a memorial was erected where Milenko Pavlović is commemorated every year on this day.
The airport in Batajnica also bears the name of the legendary hero pilot.