Desperation

I am almost certain that there is an inverse relationship between the actual level of Empire's power and the hysteria of its propaganda cadre. Never mind that we're constantly bombarded with the mainstream media's proclamations that an independent "Kosova" is just around the corner, about to happen any minute, etc. - but as the propaganda leverage on Serbian minds continues to slip, the propaganda is getting shrill to the point of absurdity.

One amusing case study is Vesna Peric-Zimonjic, a long-time correspondent for the Independent and Inter Press Service, who easily gives Marlise Simons a run for her money as the worst Serbophobe of the West.

I could spend a sea of pixels and hours of your time dredging up examples of VPZ's Serbophobic rants, but I won't. There's Google, there's your keyboards, give them a workout. Suffice to say that I'm plenty convinced of the veracity of my statement above.

So when I read this, I could not help but laugh. Heartily. Propaganda doesn't get more pathetic than her December 26 piece, pompously titled, "EU Abandons Borders, Serbia Wants Them."

VPZ uses the occasion of the EU officially abolishing its internal Iron Courtain towards the Eastern members to blast Serbia for threatening to blockade its occupied province of Kosovo if it secedes. Never mind that Kosovo's secession would be contrary to Serbian and international law, or that the Serbian blockade would be a legitimate response. I mean, here's the United State, self-proclaimed champion of democracy and human rights, blockading Cuba since 1959. You don't see VPZ criticizing that, now. Might interfere with the paycheck.

To support her claim, VPZ quotes several personages - each and every one belongs to a tiny sliver of Serbian political and media spectrum, the self-proclaimed "liberal democrats" (a.k.a. the Red Guards of Globalization). She starts off citing an op-ed by Vladimir Gligorov (whose father, Kiro, was president of Macedonia, but Junior likes it better being "citizen of the world") in the "largest circulation daily" Blic. What she doesn't say is that Blic is a German-owned tabloid paper, whose circulation may be large but reputation is certainly not.

She also quotes "historian" Nikola Samardzic, who scoffs at Russia, conveniently omitting the fact that he's a high-ranking member of the Liberal Democratic Party. At the end, she gets a statement from a 43-year-old shopkeeper, which sounds as if written by Samardzic, and passes it off as the opinion of "many Belgradians."

I don't really have to explain the incongruity of these people objecting to a blockade of Albanian separatists and a friendly policy towards Russia, even though they used to call for a Western blockade of Serbia and still continue to argue for utter submission to the West. That's self-evident.

VPZ's cheap tricks can't fool anyone remotely acquainted with the situation in Serbia. But that isn't her target audience anyway; she's after the average Westerner, in whose mind the Empire has to replant the notion that the Serbs are somehow extraordinarily evil, so they deserve to have their country occupied and partitioned. For that purpose, it uses "Serbs" such as VPZ, Gligorov, Samadrzic, and other "liberal democrats," who serve willingly and enthusiastically. They have less decency than Judas; after all, he tried to give the 30 pieces of silver back.

Manufacturing Guilt

Commenting on Shirking Duty, Predrag writes:

The Serbs are generally conflict shame [sic] people, which will say it is very important for us not to offend even our enemies (up to a certain point). It may sound ridiculous but here are a couple of examples.
Even after all this wars that happened during the past decade I still have some “friends” of other Balkan nations. When I visit them at their homes, it is totally normal for them to have dozens of items showing their national insignia in their homes and they are proud about it. Serbs are different, when they are having a visit from a friend of another Balkan nationality; they tend to hide their national insignia so their visitor is not offended by it.

I've observed this phenomenon firsthand. It's perfectly OK to be a Slovenian, Croat, Albanian, "Bosniak" (whether with the lilacs or with the crescents, "Montenegrin" (of the Doclean kind) or whatnot, but God forbid you have an icon on the wall, let alone a flag or anything actually remotely national. It's perfectly OK for them to talk how they were "oppressed" and "victims of genocide," but when a Serb mentions politics that's "hurting their feelings."

Well, too bad. For them, I mean.

Here's how I riddle this. The whole conflict-avoidance/shame thing is an inferiority complex manufactured after WW2 to make the Serbs governable. Historically, Serbs are a tough lot to rule. Those princes and kings that ended up merely in exile were fortunate.

Consider also that the Communist Party of Yugoslavia had an overtly anti-Serb platform; their principal enemy was "greater Serbian bourgeoisie," i.e. the crown and the merchants/free peasants that supported it. Originally (at least since its 1928 congress in Dresden), the CPY championed the abolition of Yugoslavia and the "liberation" of Croats, Slovenians, Macedonians, Montenegrins... oh, and the annexation of "Kosova" to Albania (that's a subject for another article...). The Nazis did exactly that in 1941, but by 1945 - thanks to Soviet and British support - the Communists found themselves in possession of Yugoslavia. Suddenly dividing it up did not seem like such a good idea. But how could they hang on to power in Serbia, where they were extremely unpopular?

The answer was to manufacture guilt. Long before the term "moral equivalence" was coined, the children in socialist Yugoslavia learned that Chetniks (Serbian royalists who fought for the king) were no different than the Ustasha (Croatian Nazis who conducted a mass extermination of Jews and Serbs so brutally even the German Nazis were disturbed by it). Anyone familiar with "political correctness" of today will recognize the matrix along which the Serbs - defined as "oppressors" of everyone else by the virtue of their existence - were treated in comparison with Slovenes, Croats, Macedonians, Muslims and Montenegrins (the latter three given nationhood by Tito).

The reason Slobodan Milosevic became so wildly popular in the 1980s is because he dared challenge that matrix. When he said "No one is allowed to hit you" to the Serb demonstrators in Kosovo Polje (at the time getting clobbered by ethnic Albanian police) April 1987, Milosevic tapped into a vein of popular resentment that ended up bringing him to power.

Ironically, the West labeled Milosevic "the last Communist" and answered him with - Communist propaganda! The whole "genocidal Serbian aggressor" line, peddled since the early 1990s, reeks of it. Considering it originated with Slovenian, Croat and Bosnian Muslim separatists (who were the product of Tito's system), that should not be surprising.

Currently the torch-bearer for the notion of Serb Guilt are the so-called "reformers" - the media, NGOs, and political parties composed of erstwhile Reds who simply switched masters, and now work for the Empire (or the EUSSR). Every day, in every way, they peddle the line that Serbs are evil as a people, that they need to "reckon with the past" and "embrace the future" and atone and apologize and repent...

For sixty years (at least) the Serbs have been trapped in a matrix that insists their very existence is evil, abominable and shameful. This is how they've been kept enslaved. No man or woman who accepts being inferior can truly be free. But they are not kept in bondage by chains and whips, but by the force of ideas implanted into their minds.

Only by rejecting this manufactured guilt and by understanding who made it and with what purpose can the Serbs begin their path to freedom.

Archive: Serbia's Missionary Intellectuals

(originally published on Balkanalysis.com, 3/16/2004)

Serbia's Missionary Intellectuals

A guest article on Serbia’s politico-intellectual heritage from Nebojsa Malic.

Alter the victory of the Radicals in the December elections, a chorus of condemnations arose from Western governments, press and think-tanks. Serbia was going “fascist,” they said; the Radicals’ strong showing was a “return to nationalism” and a “turning back the tide” of progress achieved under the ever-so-pure DOS. Reality, of course, was nothing of the sort. Certainly, organizations and governments with vested interest in perpetuating certain policies in Serbia might have been expected to react this way. But such proclamations also came from people who fashion themselves Serbia’s “intellectual elite” � the self-proclaimed activists for democracy, human rights, and peace who happen to be just the opposite. Similar groups exist in most post-Communist societies, composed of people who replaced their erstwhile Marxist zealotry with similar fervor in propagating “open society” and other dogmas of the modern managerial state. This phenomenon, like many others, is simply more pronounced in Serbia.

Extremists in Defense of “Virtue”

Prominent sociologist Slobodan Antonic wrote about a year ago [Serbian original here] about the phenomenon of “Missionary intellectuals,” which he described as “a group that perceives itself as missionaries of the Atlantic world and its values in Serbia.” He offers examples, among which are - unsurprisingly - people such as Sonja Biserko and her entourage (Teofil Pancic, Latinka Perovic, Nebojsa Popov, etc.) known for almost pathological disdain for Serbian ethnicity, tradition, history and culture.

Antonic underscores several character traits of the Missionaries. Their dogmatism produces “intolerance towards criticism, and even any disagreement, however reasoned… all those who exhibit even the slightest differenceof opinion are politically demonized, while the debate about ideas is replaced by name-calling denunciations.” Their “cognitive exclusivism” takes after Marxism, so “their epistemology is so epistemologically superior it is beyond criticism… They are immune to criticism because they have defined all other positions as nationalist [and therefore evil] by definition.” And their language is that of intolerance (surprise!), exemplified by streams of invective aimed at political opponents (i.e. just about everybody who is not “worthy” of their elevated wisdom), e.g. “selfish, fucked-up bastards in the Silent Majority”, “feeble-minded advocates of anti-democracy, nationalism and chauvinism,” etc. The last, but not least, is their call for increased repression, such as banning books, political parties, music and organizations whose authors and ideas they disapprove of. Obviously, here’s a group that believes extremism in the quest for “Atlantic values” (whatever they may be) is no vice, but the highest virtue.

Antonic’s analysis is the best explanation yet of this particular movement in Serbian society (which is also present in other countries in the Balkans, and generally anywhere the Empire has promoted “civil society”). It does suffer from one serious flaw, which is that Antonic shares the missionaries’ values, and objects only to their methods. He describes them as people who “truly want the best for their environment, and desire to share the best values with their community.” Yet they have a mighty strange concept of “sharing,” as Antonic notes just a little further down in the text:

“Their lives end up being spent in constant, tedious and fruitless denunciation of their own people (town, or province), or even in openly calling for occupation by ‘civilized foreigners.’ Unfortunately, if such occupation does come, and they get a chance to participate in the government, their zealotry in violence, prohibitions, impositions, persecution and exclusion is matched by no one…”

Reading between the lines is not necessary here: Antonic clearly believes that the DOS regime was the equivalent of foreign occupation, where the Missionaries ran amok with overt support of the authorities (and in some instances, they were the authorities).

The “Mondialist Pasdarans”

It is worth noting that the article originally appeared on the pages of Vreme (Time) weekly, a paper known for its backing of the very globalist “liberals” that Antonic criticized. In fact, this was a public manifestation of the conflict between the zealous liberals (e.g. Biserko, Kandic, et al.) and their more “moderate” brethren, who felt uncomfortable with their violent and hateful rhetoric. While the “moderates” are still the majority of Serbia’s globalists, the West continues to pay attention to the fringe - but oh so very loud - proclamations of the “Mondialist Pasdarans” (as Antonic dubs them, referring to the fanatical Iranian Revolutionary Guards).

Antonic’s critique of Missionaries appeared in February 2003, in the midst of a clash between these extremists and the mainstream Serbian “liberals” (counterparts to American and British parties of that persuasion, not the true, classical liberals of the XIX century or today’s libertarians). Just over a month later, Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic was assassinated, and the Missionaries took over the helm of government. But while they seemed triumphant in the debate (which, of course, was nothing of the sort) the repression and naked power grab they indulged in over the next nine months demonstrated to Serbians the true colors of their would-be “saviors.” Those who called most loudly for “de-Nazification” of Serbia turned out - unsurprisingly, if one may note - to be most like the Nazis in their thoughts and deeds.

Unfortunately, such is the delusional character of their fanatical dogmatism that they absolutely did not understand the message Serbian voters intended to send them, when they threw out the DOS regime in the December elections. Instead, the crushing defeat of the Missionaries’ nine-month dictatorship was condemned as the “return of fascism.” Today, the missionaries spout identical nonsense as they did a year ago. Entrenched in their contempt of reason and dialogue, they seem to be completely beyond persuasion.

A Communist Origin

While similar groups can be found throughout the former Communist bloc, the “missionaries” in Serbia have a peculiar distinction in their overt hatred of their own ethnic identity. They explain it in terms of shame over the atrocities allegedly committed in the wars of the 1990s, but that does not explain why they choose to believe the foulest atrocity stories even after they’ve been proven false. Antonic’s explanation, linking their dogmatism to Marxism helps clarify things a bit. Having come from that system, most of these “intellectuals” have never abandoned Communism except in name. Latinka Perovic, for example, was a major figure in Serbian party leadership in the 1970s, when she was purged for ostensibly “liberal” tendencies (which bore little resemblance to actual, classical liberalism). Other major figures in the missionary movement are all scholars of social sciences who were educated by the Communists, and retained Marxist methods of thinking and even many Marxist beliefs, albeit under different names nowadays.

What’s important to note at this point is to which extent Yugoslav Communism was anti-Serb in nature, ever since the Yugoslav Communist Party emerged in the 1920s under Moscow’s aegis. Soviets hated Yugoslavia - and its Serbian monarchy - for the support and refuge it offered the Tsarist “Whites.” They resurrected the Austrian bogeyman of “Greater Serbian hegemony” in an effort to destroy the country and the Serbian monarchy in particular, in order to re-create a miniature Soviet Union on its ashes. To that purpose, the Communists backed Croat fascist separatists (Ustashe) and Kosovo Albanian irredentists, and even applauded the Nazi invasion of 1941, which resulted in Yugoslavia’s dismemberment (it helped that Hitler and Stalin were still allies, too). The Communists’ virulent Serbophobia was somewhat tempered by Tito, who needed Serb support to fight the Germans, but he nonetheless proceeded to re-create Yugoslavia precisely along the pre-war lines of Sovietization. One important difference was that Stalin and is successors sought to Russify the USSR and crush individual ethnic identities in an effort to stamp out regional resistance and head off Russian opposition, while in Yugoslavia the drive was in the opposite direction, encouraging ethnic nationalism of others at the expense of Serbian identity, which was perceived as the primary peril. Slobodan Milosevic was vilified by leaders of other ethnic Communist parties precisely because he dared question the sacred precept of Tito’s Yugoslavia that everything was somehow always the Serbs’ fault. The accusation that he was a “nationalist” originated not with Franjo Tudjman and Alija Izetbegovic, actual nationalist leaders of Croats and Bosnian Muslims, but with their Communist predecessors!

Therefore, when Serbia’s missionary intellectuals violently loathe the Serbian ethnicity, culture, tradition, history and faith, they are drawing on almost eight decades of Serbophobia nurtured by their ideological forefathers. Back then, they invoked it in the name of Socialist Revolution; today, they use it in the name of “democracy” and “Euro-Atlantic integration,” but the change is purely cosmetic.

Another One Bites the Dust

AKI reports:

Deputy chief of the United Nations administration in Serbia’s breakaway Kosovo province, Steven Shuck [sic] who is being probed for corruption and 'unprofessional behaviour' has stepped down from his post...

Shuck, a retired American general, is being investigated by the UN internal commission over his alleged ties with some Kosovo businessmen, politicians and sexual relations with UN staff as well as two ethnic Albanian popstars, the reports said.

Further citing local (i.e. Albanian) media, AKI claims that Shuck [edit: the name is spelled "Shook"] was close to KLA commander Ramush Haradinaj (one of the rare KLA leaders indicted by the Hague Inquisition), and had "suspicious dealings with Kosovo energy minister Ethem Ceku in connection with a multimillion dollar project to build electric power plants."

As Lord Acton famously wrote, absolute power corrupts absolutely. As occupiers of the southern Serbian province, UNMIK officials had as close to absolute power as one gets in this day and age (except, perhaps, the viceroy of Bosnia). Their lavish wages and connections with the Albanian mafia and separatist leaders (or am I repeating myself?) ensured unlimited access to pleasures of the flesh. No wonder UNMIK officials have become the very paragon of corruption.

It's unclear whether Shook's departure will halt the UN investigation. Allegations of his wrongdoing (and knowing UNMIK's modus operandi, this is probably just the tip of the proverbial iceberg) are too serious to just be dropped. No matter what the punishment, it will not fit the crime of occupation, with all the ills it has brought. Even a morsel of justice, however, is better than nothing.

Albanian "Truth"

I can expend thousands of words and millions of electrons trying to explain what Albanian separatists think, say and do. Ultimately, those who do not wish to believe me will merely shrug and say "Well, you're an ethnic Serb, so how can you be objective?"

Fine. Don't listen to me. Listen to an Albanian instead. Here's a commentary written by one Mehdi Hyseni (who may or may not be related to Skender Hyseni, spokesman for the provisional government). Hyseni currently lives in Boston, Mass. (USA) where he moved in 1999. Prior to that, he "earned a doctorate in international affairs at Pristina University" and "held professional positions in the Department of Translation, Information and Foreign Affairs in Belgrade" from 1978 to 1999, according to a 2003 bio.

It was posted in a Serbian translation by Nova Srpska Politicka Misao (NSPM), which often publishes opposing viewpoints, without editorial guidance. I'm not that magnanimous, so I'll note beforehand that Hyseni not only had access to a doctoral degree under the "evil Serbian regime," but he also worked for the said regime even after 1989, when thousands of Albanians were supposedly disenfranchised and sacked from government jobs. And in Belgrade, no less. Keep this in mind as you read on.

The translation from Serbian is mine, and is faithful as far as I can attest. If there are any discrepancies between the Albanian source material and the Serbian text, talk to the NSPM translators.

Without further ado, here's Hyseni:

KOSOVO BETWEEN TWO PHILOSOPHICAL AND POLITICAL EXTREMES

Mitrovica PRESS – Mitrovica

Boston/Mitrovica, December 10, 2007 - The first extreme is the "philosophical and political" thesis of Serbian ethnocentrist (nationalist, racist, fascist, colonialist and genocidal) collective paranoid notion that "Kosovo belongs to Serbia", while the other reflects the abstract nihilism of official Tirana that "Kosova belongs to Kosova," instead of at least saying it belongs to Albania.

Both of these contradictions will be clarified only when Kosovo achieves independence.

The polished philosophical, utopian, decadent, existentialist and conceited speculation by dilettante analysts, reflected through the spirit and times of Communist philosophy of "brotherhood and unity" (that is, the Tito-Rankovic Yugoslavian "brotherhood and murder"), one cannot correctly interpret, or understand, let alone fight the colonialist and genocidal Serbian policy aimed against Albanians and ethnic Albania. Rather, it further clouds and obscures the theory and practice of the practical historical, political, philosophic, diplomatic and legal justifications for the solution of the colonial Albanian question in the Balkans.

We should clearly understand the fact that decadent political philosophy cannot achieve the liberation, freedom and independence of Kosova and other territories of the colonized ethnic Albania. It is now a decisive historical moment (as Hasan Prishtina, our famous patriot and fighter for the liberation and unification of ethnic Albania, once said) for the president of Albania Bamir Topi and Prime Minister Sali Berisha openly say to Belgrade's face that "Kosova is Albania, not Serbia!" Otherwise, Serbia and the Greaterserbs will not stop howling and will never give up their anti-Albanian thesis that "Kosovo is Serbia."

Until Albania officially declares that Kosova is Albania, both Kosova and Albania, as well as our loyal ally and savior the United States, will have disputes, misunderstandings and serious problems with the colonialist Serbia and the racist, fascist Greaterserbs, who believe "Kosovo is Serbia."

That Belgrade and the Greaterserbs make the colonialist and genocidal claim that Kosova is Serbia does not surprise us. However, that some Albanian "philosophers" in power still lack courage to defend the truthful counterclaim that Kosova is Albania, both to Serbia and to the world, not only upsets us, but urges us to suspect that the Albanian political philosophy still fails to understand that the cruel colonial and hegemonic Serbian rule cannot be rejected through pseudo-philosophical declarations that Kosova "belongs to those who live there"! Such political and national hypocrisy! Such an euphemism! Philosophical colorblindness! It is a lack of human and national consciousness, this lack of courage to tell the truth that Kosova does not belong to Serbia, but ethnic Albania.

This truth needs to be defended by all legitimate legal, national and international means.

The unmasking of many centuries of Greaterserb history, politics, propaganda, diplomacy, colonial and genocidal practice against the Albanians and ethnic Albania in the Balkans cannot be accomplished through thumb-twiddling and empty talk, using dilettante euphemisms and disgraceful, anemic, terrifying, speculative, moralizing, anti-philosophical, unrealistic and anti-pragmatic vocabulary. They need to be revealed before the world and called by their proper names, fully describing their anti-Albanian character.

No people in the world achieved freedom and independence through the exercise of speculative concepts of colorblind and decadent philosophy, fed to the readers of mass media. So long as we Albanians in the Balkans are happy to be fed such anti-philosophical and anti-realistic produce (which are essentially nothing but imaginations of a false, romantic ,symbolic, "dialectic" philosophy of Nietzche's absolute individualist concern), we will live with slavery and Serbo-Slavic colonialism in the Balkans.

No one in the history of Serbia and Serbs has ever given a more objective, humane and precise definition of Serb ethnocentrism than the great French philosopher Andre Glucksmann, when he said, "When Serbs say they are innocent, they express their utmost racism."

This is true in every way - anthropological, historical, psychological, human and propaganda. The entire psychology and practice of world anti-Semitism can evolve, but not that of the Serbs. Its genesis is hereditary, passed from one generation to another and cultivated systematically and through institutions, from the family to the Orthodox Church, the academia, literature, poetry, drama, politics, diplomacy, the military, etc. In other words, Serbian anti-Semitism is not imported, but is an original manifestation of collective Serbian anti-Semitic paranoia, "Made in Serbia".

This is the prime reason the Serbs even today cannot free themselves of the centuries-old muck of their maniacal philosophy that they are supposedly the "most peaceful, most democratic, most just, most cultured, most enlightened, most progressive and most civilized" people in the Balkans. All these negative concepts are organically part of the Greaterserb mythological ethnocentrism.

This essential doctrine and practice of self-destructive, anti-Semitic ethnocentrism and Serbocentrism is the reason Serbia, in its historical, political, colonial and militarist continuity, has committed over ten genocides against Albanians and ethnic Albania (1842-1999).

In this traditional ethnocentric (racist and fascist) style, the propaganda of modern Serbia began an official campaign against the independence of Kosova in Belgrade, on December 4, 2007.

The initiator, overseer and director of this all-Serbian populist campaign, under the slogan "Kosovo is Serbia" is the Serbian government's Ministry for Kosovo and Metohija, headed by Slobodan Samardžić (member of the Serb negotiating team during the shuttle diplomacy efforts of Martti Ahtissari and Wolfgang Ischinger's "troika"), which "forgets" the truth that Kosova belongs to Albania, not Serbia, even though Tirana still lacks courage to say so.

Now, some might say that this is by no means a mainstream Albanian argument, but a rant of a madman. Fair enough. Only trouble is, I've heard these "arguments" over an over from Albanians; they are all over Albanian websites, peddled by Albanian lobbyists and "advocates," openly preached to the general Albanian public (in Kosovo, at least). As far as they are concerned, all of this is gospel truth.

Tell you what. Replace "Serbs" here with "Jews" and "Albanians" with "Germans." See how it sounds to you.

Yeah, I thought so.

Shirking Duty

Robert E. Lee called duty the "most sublime word in the English language," and urged everyone to "Do your duty in all things. You cannot do more. You should never wish to do less.”

But as Julia Gorin reminds us, many fall short when faced with what needs to be done:

"By shining a light on our Kosovo mischief, I am merely doing my duty as an American. But there are Americans who have a greater responsibility than I to save the U.S. from this bipartisan treachery, Americans who should be most on the case at this eleventh hour: Serbian-Americans."

So, where are they? I don't count; I'm not an American citizen, just someone who's lived in this country for almost a dozen years. Besides, I've definitely not kept silent, what with having been a columnist for the past eight. Yet I'm an exception, rather than a rule.

Why is this? Julia has a theory:

"I understand the reasons that Serbs shy away from this duty. They want finally to be liked, and more than anything else to fit in; indeed, the modern Serb rejects his Serbhood. As well, a Serb knows he will instantly be painted with the “Oh, but this is coming from a Serb; of course you’d say that” brush. Notice this is never a consideration or stumbling block for the Serbs’ enemies..."

While true to a great extent, it's not the whole reason. I personally know people who fear that any sort of public expression of opposition to the current U.S. policy in the Balkans would have negative consequences to their careers, wealth, property, and even lives. I know people who believe their voice can't change anything. But they are saying something, with their silence: they are saying that their cause is not worth speaking out for, much less fighting for.

I, quite obviously, disagree.

Now, here's the real kicker: most of these Serbs who don't dare so much as whisper in public have no qualms about bemoaning the current situation in private, lamenting the state of the Serbian nation today and wishing for someone to step in and save it. Which brings me to the point I want to make, using the words of a brilliant American playwright:

"Look, if you think we're wrong... then I respect that. But if you think we're right and you won't speak up because you can't be bothered, then God... I don't even want to know you."

Ah Yes, Peacekeepers

I haven't said a whole lot in this blog about my experience in Sarajevo during the 1992-95 Bosnian War. I intend to, eventually - at a time and in a manner of my choosing. Today, however, I was looking for some maps showing the boundaries of Albania in 1941, after the Nazi invasion resulted in what Albanian sympathizers term the "first liberation of Kosova" (sic); while searching, I stumbled upon this:



Source:
Bosnian Army Offensive Operations in Sarajevo Region, June 1995 (238K)
Map N from Balkan Battlegrounds: A Military History of the Yugoslav Conflict, 1990-1995. Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Russian and European Analysis. Washington, D.C. 2001.

What is this? It is the map of the infamous 1995 "summer offensive" by the Muslim-dominated ARBiH that was supposed to break the siege of Sarajevo. Even those most casually acquainted in military arts can see that the direction of Muslim attacks makes little sense: only the 16th Division, attacking from the north, is actually moving towards the city, yet it eventually gets rolled back. Instead of attacking northwards from the city to help the 16th, the 12th Division is striking out eastwards, to... nowhere. And the 14th Division is attacking eastwards as well, to Mt. Treskavica (a barren piece of rock that claimed hundreds of Muslim lives without the Serbs so much as firing a shot). The whole operation was a strategic fiasco, with massive casualties.

Now for the reason I'm posting this. Notice the starting positions for the 14th Division's attack, down south. Two of the arrows start out not from green-shaded ARBIH-controlled area, but from the "UN patrolled" blue area. This was territory captured by the VRS (Bosnian Serb army) in a 1993 counterattack, which threatened to cut Sarajevo off completely from the rest of Muslim-held Bosnia. The Izetbegovic regime howled for help from the West; NATO and the U.S. threatened to bomb the Serbs; Serb leadership offered to cede the territory to the UN peacekeepers and keep it demilitarized. Of course, the moment the Serb troops withdrew, ARBiH forces poured in.

Oh, and did I mention that at this point Sarajevo was supposed to be a UN-designated "Safe area"? Yes, alongside Tuzla, Srebrenica, Zepa, Gorazde and Bihac, Sarajevo was supposed to be a demilitarized "safe haven" for civilians. There's even a 20-kilometer "exclusion zone" for heavy weapons, clearly seen on the CIA map. But see, "safe havens" were only sacrosanct when Serbs violated them; if Muslims deployed tens of thousands of troops, artillery and tanks within those areas, that was just fine.

The hypocrisy is just sickening.