Posted on 03/02/2006 5:31:44 AM PST by Banat
Bosnian Serbs Sullen and Defiant
Bosnian Serbs talk to the BBC News website's Neil Arun of fear, faith and football, 10 years after their army lifted its siege of the capital, Sarajevo.
"You must have two sides to wage war, as you have to make love," says Slavko Jovicic, stubbing out a cigarette as a snowdrift smudges the windows of his office in Pale, on the outskirts of Sarajevo.
He is on a mission to show the world a side of the war he believes it ignored - the atrocities committed against the Bosnian Serbs.
Slavko says he lost a kidney and more than 40kg in weight during four years of torture and mistreatment at wartime prison camps run by Bosnian Muslims.
"They were the longest days of my life," says the 52-year-old former intelligence officer, who now campaigns for Bosnian Serb former prisoners.
"No poet has the power to describe what I endured."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
The quicker Europe understands this, the better will be Europe's chances of surviving...
Wait 'til the EUdhimmi read the article.
A bump for truth in the Balkans.
The eastern Europeans fought off the Turks and Islam many centuries ago and the West forgets that and looks only at the Serbs as the bad guys. Thus is their role in Europe and America. I think that's a total mistake!
Germany was the repository of the Holy Roman Empire from 806-1806, when Napoleon's 1806 invasion of German states abolished the Holy Roman Empire.
Europe and America will forget that completely and remember all Germans for ONLY the 13-year span of 1932-45, while forgiving and forgetting JAPAN'S very same 13-year span where they invaded China and killed 34 million Chinese.
The West also forgives and forgets Italy's and the USSR's part in WWII -- where Japan, Italy and the USSR marched lockstep with Hitler and his 3rd Reich.
The Germans are America's bad guys forever. Sleazywood will NEVER stop making WWII movies because of their continuing hatred of everything German. Hogan's Heroes was boobtubeland's version of anti-German. Lol. Imagine the screeching of racism if there had been a "Hirohito's Heroes" where everything Japanese was mocked and ridiculed. No, Sleazywood, the MSM and the West have decided who the bad guys are -- and the Serbs and Germans head their list.
The anti-Serb agenda (forever bad guys) won't go away. They are way too convenient as whipping boys -- like the Germans.
The voices against Turkish re-invasion of Europe, via the EU, are few. Pope Benedict is against the Turkish entry into the EU. I'm with him.
Hard to fight terrorism (Muslim) when the black/white hats are mixed up. Hard to fight the enemy when the USA NEEDS the oil that comes from so many who are against us. Ironic, innit?
It was hard to fight the IRA terrorism as well because so MANY of the IRA terrorists were funded from the USA.
Some Americans have some very strange ideas about terrorists. I don't. Terrorists are monsters who kill innocents for their own agenda. They have neither the brains or moral backbone to do it any other way. MORAL RELATIVISM is their faith.
When Muslim terrorists blow up innocent Christians they show what kind of monsters they are. When their government or police DON'T adequately respond and protect Christians, it's difficult for Christians NOT to retaliate in kind. But, when Christian civilians retaliate with the same methods as the Muslim terrorists, they become no better than the terrorists. Those who think so are moral relativists who think the exact same way as terrorists themselves. It's a HARD decision NOT to retaliate and one that requires SOME kind of moral backbone.
I remember (VIVIDLY) the Koreans in L.A. defending and protecting themselves against the black mobs....Rodney King era. They didn't go out and shoot and kill but the young Korean men armed themselves with assault weapons, got on the rooftops of their stores and buildings and held off black looters and gangs who would attack them for no more reason than racism.
I can recall vividly the young Korean men with their white scarves tied around their foreheads, with assault weapons aimed at the streets below. It was a horrible sight, Americans versus Americans, but one I never forgot.
The Koreans kept their cool, killed no one, but protected themselves and their property. A lesson for anti-terrorism.
We have to keep the black/white hats in their right places. We are, I think, dealing with the terrorists in the correct way, via the military and all the weapons it has at its disposal: Guantanamo, stopping illegals, racial profiling, technology, freezing assets, eavsdropping, troops in Afghanistan, etc.
My two cents.
Anyway, I think we should stop isolating the Serbs. Enough already. The Bosnian Muslims are not innocent either. Black/white hat mixup yet again.
Sorry to make this too long.
I thought that was suppose to be your job Hoppy? The rent-a-cop business go sour for you old man?
Partition along ethnic and religious lines makes the most sense both in the Balkans and in Iraq but......there is no way that the State Department will ever do it.
But which line do you draw? The one before the KLA launched their ethnic cleansing campaign or the current one as the pogroms near their completion?
You can bet Mr. Soros will only permit the current one to be discussed...if he allows it to be discussed at all.
I guess we'd better get prepared for a whole new slew of postings from Soros-funded websites telling us what horrible human beings Serbs really are!
Is that BBC talking about massacres over Christians?
BBC?
BBC talking about Muslim death-camps?
BBC?
White guy is world`s most famous rapper..
Black guy best golfer...
BBC talking of islamic violence over Christians...
Judgment day is near....
When we went to Kosovo, we sided with Muslims against Catholics. What a stupid move.
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Actually we went to war against Orthodox Christianity. That said, I hope that at some point in the near future Christians will re-unite finally again.
Yes, it was a horrendously wrong move...one that will haunt this nation for decades. We owe most of the violence going on to the Clinton goons.
BUMP!
Gee, and I always thought Germany declared war on Russia and France in WWI. Silly me!
Well, silly you, re-read the history of WWI. The Serbians started it with Austria ... and Germany joined them, not the other way around. Must've been a while since your last history class.
The explosive that was World War One had been long in the stockpiling; the spark was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914.
Ferdinand's death at the hands of the Black Hand, a Serbian nationalist secret society, set in train a mindlessly mechanical series of events that culminated in the world's first global war.
Austria-Hungary's Reaction
Austria-Hungary's reaction to the death of their heir (who was in any case not greatly beloved by the Emperor, Franz Josef, or his government) was three weeks in coming. Arguing that the Serbian government was implicated in the machinations of the Black Hand (whether she was or not remains unclear, but it appears unlikely), the Austro-Hungarians opted to take the opportunity to stamp its authority upon the Serbians, crushing the nationalist movement there and cementing Austria-Hungary's influence in the Balkans.
It did so by issuing an ultimatum to Serbia which, in the extent of its demand that the assassins be brought to justice effectively nullified Serbia's sovereignty. Sir Edward Grey, the British Foreign Secretary, was moved to comment that he had "never before seen one State address to another independent State a document of so formidable a character."
Austria-Hungary's expectation was that Serbia would reject the remarkably severe terms of the ultimatum, thereby giving her a pretext for launching a limited war against Serbia.
However, Serbia had long had Slavic ties with Russia, an altogether different proposition for Austria-Hungary. Whilst not really expecting that Russia would be drawn into the dispute to any great extent other than through words of diplomatic protest, the Austro-Hungarian government sought assurances from her ally, Germany, that she would come to her aid should the unthinkable happen and Russia declared war on Austria-Hungary.
Germany readily agreed, even encouraged Austria-Hungary's warlike stance.
So then, we have the following remarkable sequence of events that led inexorably to the 'Great War' - a name that had been touted even before the coming of the conflict.
*Austria-Hungary, unsatisfied with Serbia's response to her ultimatum (which in the event was almost entirely placatory: however her jibbing over a couple of minor clauses gave Austria-Hungary her sought-after cue) declared war on Serbia on 28 July 1914.
*Russia, bound by treaty to Serbia, announced mobilisation of its vast army in her defence, a slow process that would take around six weeks to complete.
*Germany, allied to Austria-Hungary by treaty, viewed the Russian mobilisation as an act of war against Austria-Hungary, and after scant warning declared war on Russia on 1 August.
*France, bound by treaty to Russia, found itself at war against Germany and, by extension, on Austria-Hungary following a German declaration on 3 August. Germany was swift in invading neutral Belgium so as to reach Paris by the shortest possible route.
*Britain, allied to France by a more loosely worded treaty which placed a "moral obligation" upon her to defend France, declared war against Germany on 4 August. Her reason for entering the conflict lay in another direction: she was obligated to defend neutral Belgium by the terms of a 75-year old treaty.
*With Germany's invasion of Belgium on 4 August, and the Belgian King's appeal to Britain for assistance, Britain committed herself to Belgium's defence later that day. Like France, she was by extension also at war with Austria-Hungary.
*With Britain's entry into the war, her colonies and dominions abroad variously offered military and financial assistance, and included Australia, Canada, India, New Zealand and the Union of South Africa.
*United States President Woodrow Wilson declared a U.S. policy of absolute neutrality, an official stance that would last until 1917 when Germany's policy of unrestricted submarine warfare - which seriously threatened America's commercial shipping (which was in any event almost entirely directed towards the Allies led by Britain and France) - forced the U.S. to finally enter the war on 6 April 1917. *Italy, although allied to both Germany and Austria-Hungary, was able to avoid entering the fray by citing a clause enabling it to evade its obligations to both.
*In short, Italy was committed to defend Germany and Austria-Hungary only in the event of a 'defensive' war; arguing that their actions were 'offensive' she declared instead a policy of neutrality. The following year, in May 1915, she finally joined the conflict by siding with the Allies against her two former allies.
The Tangle of Alliances
Such were the mechanics that brought the world's major nations into the war at one time or another. It's clear from the summary above that the alliance system was as much at fault as anything in bringing about the scale of the conflict. What was intended as a strictly limited war - a brief war - between accuser and accused, Austria-Hungary and Serbia, rapidly escalated into something that was beyond the expectations of even the most warlike ministers in Berlin (and certainly Vienna, which quickly became alarmed at spiralling events in late July and sought German reassurances).
Agreed.
That's the fate of whipping boys. They are always wrong, past, present and future.
Not fair. That's the American view of Serbs. It's not mine.
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