Along with the Bosnian Serb political leader Radovan Karadzic, he came to symbolise the Serb campaign of ethnic cleansing of Croats and Muslims.
Indicted by the UN war crimes tribunal on charges of genocide and other crimes against humanity, his evasion of justice over 16 years became an embarrassment to Serbia and the biggest thorn in its relations with the West.
Serbian nationalism motivated him during the war, which he saw as an opportunity to avenge five centuries of occupation by Muslim Turks. He even referred to Bosnian Muslims as "Turks", a term he used to insult them.
There may also have been personal reasons for his ruthlessness.
A year before the Srebrenica atrocity, his much-loved daughter Ana, a medical student, shot herself with his pistol in Belgrade, in an act said by people close to Gen Mladic to have hardened his character.
Some believe she had chosen suicide after learning of atrocities committed by forces under her father's command.
'Burn their brains!'
His father, a partisan, was killed that day in 1945 fighting pro-Nazi Croatian Ustasha troops.
Born in the south Bosnian village of Kalinovik and brought up in Tito's Yugoslavia, Ratko Mladic became a regular officer in the Yugoslav People's Army.
A career soldier, he inspired passionate devotion among his soldiers.
As the country began to disintegrate in 1991, he was posted to lead the Yugoslav army's 9th Corps against Croatian forces at Knin, and was promoted to the rank of general the same year.
Soon after taking command of the Yugoslav Army in the Bosnian capital, Sarajevo, he was appointed to lead a new Bosnian Serb army created in 1992.
He is considered to have been one of the prime movers in the bloody siege of Sarajevo.
His arrogant disregard for civilian casualties came through in the commands he issued to his gunners pounding the city in early 1992.
But the most notorious attack on civilians was to come in July 1995, at Srebrenica, a Bosnian Muslim enclave under UN protection.
The worst atrocity in Europe since World War II occurred after Gen Mladic's forces overran the town and rounded up Muslim men and boys aged between 12 and 77.
Hours before the shooting began, the general himself was seen handing out sweets to Muslim children in the main square, even patting one on the head.
Then, over five days, at least 7,500 captives were killed, reportedly machine-gunned in groups of 10 before being buried by bulldozer in mass graves.
Later that year, the UN war crimes tribunal indicted Gen Mladic on two counts of genocide for the Sarajevo siege and the Srebrenica massacre.
Flight and arrest
He could be seen visiting public places, eating in expensive restaurants and even attending football matches.
But when Milosevic was arrested in 2001, the former Bosnian Serb commander disappeared from public view.
In October 2004, former aides to the general began surrendering to the Hague war crimes tribunal as Belgrade came under intense international pressure to co-operate.
Speculation mounted that Gen Mladic would also soon be arrested when Mr Karadzic was detained in Belgrade in July 2008.
But it was not until 26 May 2011 that Europe's most wanted war crimes suspect was finally arrested by Serbian intelligence officers and war crimes investigators in the village of Lazarevo, 100km (60 miles) north-east of Belgrade.
Despite having two guns, the ex-general reportedly offered no resistance.
He was said by Serbian media to be in poor health, having difficulty moving apparently due to a series of strokes.
Some papers reported that he had been living on his own, relying on a neighbour to help him get dressed.
From : BBC News
