Poor old Yugoslavia. First Croatia, Slovenia and (the Former Yugolsav / Republic of) Macedonia (1991), then Montenegro (June 3, 2006), now Kosovo. The recent declaration of the Kosovo state (February 17, 2008) — approved by the US and NATO, rejected by Russia and its Eastern European allies — has been greeted with widespread protest by Serb nationalists, including in Melbourne.
For fascists, Kosovar independence is a product of a ZOG/NWO (Zionist Occupation Government/New World Order) conspiracy, to divide the White, Christian West, so as to render it less able to resist the impositions of ZOG/NWO. Or at least, that’s what the local tinfoil helmet brigade thinks: “KOSOVO IS SERBIAN! SAY NO TO ILLEGAL ZIONIST SPONSORED ISLAMIC STATES IN EUROPE!”
Reaction on the left has ranged from largely supportive to extreme wariness if not outright opposition. In Australia, the DSP reckons Kosovars are an oppressed nation, so that an independent state might be supported on that basis; in the UK, the SWP is far more cautious, emphasising the limited nature of the supposed political autonomy of the newly-formed state, and the role of the US and the UN in seeking to weaken Russia’s ally Serbia by supporting its creation (Kosovo is a pawn on the imperial chessboard, Vladimir Unkovski-Korica, Socialist Worker, March 1, 2008).
The KRudd Government has already indicated it will give diplomatic recognition to the new state, despite protests here (see below) and there: ‘Bosnian Serbs try to storm U.S. Consulate during Kosovo protest’, Reuters / The Associated Press, February 26, 2008: “The police fired tear gas at Bosnian Serb rioters Tuesday to prevent them from storming the U.S. Consulate during a rally to protest Kosovo’s declaration of independence… The protest Tuesday began with participants gathering peacefully at the main square in central Banja Luka, carrying Serbian flags, pictures of President Vladimir Putin of Russia and banners reading “No America.” At least one U.S. flag had a swastika drawn on it.” The body of one young protester, Zoran Vujovic, was later found among the debris caused by a fire at the US Embassy in Belgrade.
Poor bastard.
Elsewhere in the diplomatic world…
An end to Balkan national states
Jean-Arnault Dérens
Le Monde diplomatique
February 4, 2008Kosovo is likely to declare unilateral independence this month, to which the probable EU response will be an agreed statement accepting the change and allowing individual European countries to recognise Kosovo if they want to. The Serbian government intends to break off diplomatic relations with those who do. There are proposals to redraw the border maps, but another round of conflicting aspirations could cause worse chaos
When Kosovo declares independence, as seems likely, there will be serious consequences for the whole region. The Serbs of Bosnia and Herzegovina will regard the event as a precedent that confirms their own right to secede from a state that has never really functioned. Independence will also disrupt neighbouring states, especially Macedonia and Montenegro, and play havoc with the map of the Balkans.
Despite this prospect Balkan specialists and diplomats now suggest that it is time to break the taboo of untouchable borders. The conflicts of the 1990s were waged in the name of Greater Serbia and Greater Croatia, and Kosovo’s claims to independence raise the ghost of a Greater Albania. Has the time come to re-examine territorial grievances, and define new, fairer borders, more representative of ethnic geography? A lasting peace in the area may require a new map for the Balkans, indeed for Europe. The idea is not new, but it won’t go away.
During the troubles in Macedonia in 2001, the French writer Alexandre Adler called for “surgery rather than homeopathy” (1) and suggested the division of the post-Yugoslav republic into distinct Albanian and Macedonian regions. That year David Owen, co-chairman of the International Conference on the Former Yugoslavia, also made proposals in Le Monde for redefining Balkan frontiers (2). These were echoed by a key figure in the Albanian nationalist movement in Macedonia, Arben Xhaferi, who called for the creation of “ethnic” states (3).
The failure of the negotiations on Kosovo’s future and the impossibility of an Albanian-Serbian compromise have resuscitated old ideas of partition, though this has long been considered taboo by the international community. Last August Germany’s Wolfgang Ischinger, the European Union’s envoy on the diplomatic troika leading the talks, said that any option capable of uniting the parties would have to be taken seriously; if Belgrade and Pristina could reach an agreement on the division of Kosovo – it hasn’t happened – the EU would have to endorse partition.
The idea seems logical: if people do not want to live together, why not let them live separately, even if that means displacement as populations reshuffle to adjust borders to ethnic distribution in the area? Imagine that, by waving a wand, an international conference led to a peaceful agreement on new frontiers for the western Balkans, drawn up on lines of ethnicity.
Unite and truncate
Plans would need to be made to unite the areas with an Albanian majority – Albania, Kosovo, and the northwest part of Macedonia, as well as the Presevo Valley in the south of Serbia and the eastern fringes of Montenegro, around Vusanje and Ulcinj. (However, none of these redivisions of territory and people will deal with such practical matters as power generation and distribution, which will remain cross-border in many cases: the Serbian government has already threatened to cut electricity supplies should Kosovo become independent and is hardly likely to offer any resources to a Greater Albania.)
This would leave Macedonia truncated and barely recognisable as a state, unless the pro-Bulgarian lobby succeeded in attaching the country to its eastern neighbour. Then there would be the question of minorities in Albania: the Greeks in the south could claim attachment to Greece, while Albanians expelled from Epirus in the north of Greece after 1945 (Çamëria as it is known in Albania) would also stand up for their long-neglected rights. Montenegro could seek compensation in the Shkoder region where there are still Serbian-Montenegran minorities, and Macedonia could reclaim the Slav villages around Lakes Ohrid and Prespa.
Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Serbs would return to their mother country. This would destroy Bosnia, especially if the Croats in western Herzegovina, central Bosnia and Bosanska Posavina (Orasje, Odzak) returned to Croatia. What remained would be a microstate, Muslim Bosniak, centred around Sarajevo, Zenica and Tuzla. This would be just like the famous plan to divide up Bosnia and Herzegovina devised in 1991 by Franjo Tudjman and Slobodan Milosevic (4). Bosnia would make efforts to defend the eastern enclave of Gorazde, and would claim the Sanjak of Novi Pazar, today shared between Serbia and Montenegro (5).
The state of Montenegro would no longer exist within its present borders. Apart from the secession of its Albanian and Bosniak regions, it would also be likely to lose its Serbian regions in the north. As Bosniaks and Serbs in this area are totally intermingled, a period of conflict would be inevitable, as the different communities reorganised and new borders took shape. Croatia would gain the Bay of Kotor, which has a long Catholic tradition and only became a part of Montenegro in 1918. Montenegro would soon find itself back at its mid-19th century borders, although it might have a hope of a maritime outlet at Budva.
Serbia’s position would be equally strange. Although it would have lost its Albanian and Bosniak regions, it would have gained Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Republika Srpska, as well as the Serbian areas in the north of Montenegro. It would also have to deal with Vojvodina. This autonomous region in the north of Serbia is home to some 20 different minorities, nearly 50% of the overall population. Its largest community is Hungarian (some 350,000) and the communes of Subotica, Senta and Kanjiza would return to Hungary, unless Vojvodina decided to declare independence and become the only island of multiethnicity remaining in the Balkans.
Countries within the EU would also be affected by the reorganisation. There are minorities in Greece, and not just the Albanians: the Muslims of western Thrace (Turks and Pomaks) would demand their return to Turkey and Bulgaria, cancelling the Lausanne treaty of 1923 (6). The issue of the Slav population in Greek Macedonia would also need attention, although this has always not been spoken about in the country. Slovenia would finally obtain satisfaction in its micro-territorial conflicts with Croatia (7). It would demand the cancellation of the 1918 plebiscites (8) and expand its territory into Austria’s Carinthia where there are still a number of Slovenian communities. Slovenia could also be awarded a part of Italy’s Friuli, given the positive attitude it has shown in its management of the region’s conflicts – perhaps it would get the town of Gorizia (which is currently crossed by the border), or even Trieste (9).
This reorganisation would not satisfy everyone – the Gorani of Kosovo, the Ruthenians in eastern Croatia’s Slavonia, or the Aromanians in Macedonia, Albania and Greece. And the 3,000-4,000 Roma in the western Balkans would remain (as they have always been) a people without a state.
It is unlikely that such changes would come about peacefully. The emergence of armed conflicts of medium intensity seems more than probable and a regional task force would be required to command EU troops with a mandate to keep the peace. But population displacement could not be seen as collateral damage as it would be the whole point. The UN High Commission for Refugees would supervise the operation, assisted by NGOs. The emergency aid budget available for the western Balkans would have to surpass by far the funds raised after the Asian tsunami in December 2004.
Not so farfetched
This scenario may seem far-fetched but parts of the script have already been written, as far as Bosnia and Herzegovina or the Albanian nationality questions are concerned. The proponents of independence for Kosovo stress that it should not set a precedent; even so, it is inevitable that any solution to the issue will be seen as a precedent if those with a grievance, in the Balkans or elsewhere, feel they can use it as such. The main problem with the proposals submitted by the UN’s special envoy, Martti Ahtisaari, early in 2007 is that they detach the Kosovo issue from its regional context: there can be no lasting solution for the region if no mention is made of the Albanian communities in Macedonia or the south of Serbia.
The idea that nationality issues can be solved by rearranging borders is based on the illusion that borders can be accurately redefined along ethnic lines. All national borders are historical artefacts, the legacy of political and military manoeuvre. Borders are no more fair and accurate than they are natural.
The use of the term “Balkans” spread in the 19th century. As the Ottoman empire began to break up, the irreconcilable claims of its former subject peoples shook this region of Europe. The Balkans became synonymous with nationalist sentiment, complex conflict, upheaval and fragmentation – “balkanisation”. “The Balkans” was an ideological concept, not a geographical location. In this melting pot of cultures, contradictory claims and aspirations, border conflicts were bitter.
The emergence of states and the definition of their borders marked the entry of the Balkans into modern politics. The new states were generally nationalist, based on and adapted from the models provided by the specific history of western Europe. In the early 19th century Greece and Serbia established themselves through ethnic cleansing, organising the expulsion or assimilation of populations considered exogenous (on religious grounds: the Turks, meaning Muslims, whether Slav, Albanian or Turkish-speaking, were expelled from both states).
The definition of borders gave the impression that the confusion in the Balkans was being managed, that it could be transformed into a European ideal of order, based on the coincidence of a people, its national borders and the state. The diversity that had characterised the Ottoman era, the multiple identities of language, “nationality” and religion, began to fade.
The process accelerated during the wars in Yugoslavia in the 1990s: the Serbian population in Croatia dropped from 12% to about 4%, and the Bosnian mosaic was reorganised into broad mono-ethnic zones under the control of one of the three communities.
Remains of empire
In the 19th and 20th centuries Austria-Hungary and Russia, also France, Great Britain and Italy, battled to extend their zones of influence over what remained of the Ottoman empire. They supported and encouraged the national aspirations of the Balkan peoples. The politics of these states were relayed by journalists or travellers. In the 1930s the British writer Rebecca West chided the “humanitarians and philanthropists” supporting the nationalist causes (10).
There have been key moments in the definition of the borders since 1878. The “great Eastern crisis” was first settled with the Treaty of San Stefano, providing for the creation of a Great Bulgaria under Russian protectorate. The plans caused ructions in London, Paris and Vienna, neglecting as they did Serbia and Romania. They were reversed a few months later at the Congress of Berlin, when Austria-Hungary gained control over Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Sanjak of Novi Pazar.
The 1912-13 Balkan wars and the first world war are key episodes, too. In 1918 Serbia and Romania were handsomely rewarded for their fidelity to the Allies: the Serbian House of Kara-or-evi was able to proclaim the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later to become Yugoslavia), while Bucharest established Greater Romania.
Despite Wilsonian principles announced after the first world war, none of these states recognised the rights of the individual peoples to any autonomy. They enclosed a large number of communities within their new borders and transformed them into national minorities. In the 1920s the Comintern denounced the kingdom of Yugoslavia as a new “prison of the peoples”. It is true that the centralised state created by the Karadordevic bore little resemblance to the romantic dream of a unified state for the Slav peoples of the south (the Yugoslavs) (11).
The internal borders drawn up in 1945 for the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia were the least bad of all compromises according to the principal politician responsible for them, the Montenegro-born dissident, Milovan Djilas. The system depended on maintaining a clear distinction between citizenship and nationality and had its origins in Austrian Marxist thinking (12). Yugoslavs were citizens of the federal republic in which they lived (and of the Socialist Federation), but they remained free to choose their national community: there was no obligation in the Yugoslav census.
The Balkan experience shows that the demands of the different peoples cannot be presented in terms of statehood without engendering strife and confrontation. In Kosovo there can be only two solutions to the mutually exclusive demands of those sharing the same territory: either the victory of one people over the other, with frustrations and quests for revenge, or the invention of new forms of political coexistence and co-sovereignty. The European context could surely generate new political opportunities capable of surpassing these territorial conflicts.
The great powers have always played an essential role in determining Balkan borders: Kosovo is now a pawn in the planetary battle between Russia and the United States, so little attention will be paid to the real interests of the Albanians, Serbs and others living in Kosovo.
Any attempt to settle the problems with new plans for partition would affect the whole of Europe. It is time for a better response than just redrawing lines on the map.
TRANSLATED BY ROBERT CORNER
________________Jean-Arnault Dérens is editor of the Courrier des Balkans and author with Laurent Geslin of Comprendre les Balkans: Histoire, sociétés, perspectives, Non Lieu, Paris, 2007
(1) Alexandre Adler, “Pour les Balkans, chirurgie ou homéopathie?”, Courrier international, Paris, 12 April 2001.
(2) David Owen, “Redessiner la carte des Balkans”, Le Monde, 21 March 2001.
(3) Arbën Xhaferi, “Les États multiethniques ne sont pas une solution”, Le Courrier des Balkans, 28 April 2003
(4) The Serbian president Slobodan Milosevic and his Croatian counterpart Franjo Tudjman agreed on a secret plan for the division of Bosnia as early as 1991.
(5) See “Le Sandjak de Novi Pazar”, Le Courrier des Pays de l’Est, 1058, November-December 2006.
(6) The treaty signed on 24 July 1923 provided for major population exchanges between Greece and Turkey, and the recognition of the existence of a “Muslim” minority in Greek western Thrace.
(7) These conflicts concern the Gulf of Piran, where Slovenia’s land border determines its access to international waters, and the small region of Prekmurje.
(8) The votes determined the attribution of disputed border territories to either Austria or Slovenia.
(9) The Free State of Trieste was established in 1947 and only divided in 1954. Zone A and the town was given to Italy, Zone B to Yugoslavia. It is part of Slovenia today.
(10) Rebecca West, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, Macmillan, London, 1942.
(11) The Yugoslav concept was first developed by Croatian intellectuals, notably Ljudevit Gaj (1804-1872) and the bishop Josip Strossmayer (1815-1905).
(12) This distinction was set out by Otto Bauer in The Question of Nationalities and Social Democracy, University of Minnesota Press, 2000.
Meanwhile, in Melbourne:
Storming the streets
Christopher Bantick
Herald Sun
February 27, 2008WHEN the city square used to be on the corner of Collins and Swanston streets, a group of anti-immigration protesters in Hitler’s storm trooper uniforms were holding forth. Suddenly, two elderly men, their coat tails flying, ran across Collins St and tried to rip the swastika armbands from the protesters. The resultant scuffle ended up with one old man receiving a cut head and the protesters scattering after an angry crowd gathered.
The swastika and the intimidating dog returned to Melbourne’s streets on Friday night in an anti-independence rally over Kosovo separating from Serbia. The irony was inescapable.
Seventy-five years ago, Hitler came to power and his swastika-wearing bovver boys crushed dissent. The swastika is a symbol of terror and totalitarianism. Therefore, it is difficult to see how the Serb protesters can appropriate the swastika and expect public support.
To understand the convoluted logic of the Serbs who took to Melbourne’s streets is a challenge.
An Australian flag and placard covered in swastikas was confiscated by police. To besmirch an Australian flag with swastikas is not only an act of breathtaking ignorance, but inflammatory.
I wonder what my late father, a World War II veteran, would have thought. He fought under the Australian flag. He watched his mates die under the Australian flag. He would have been outraged that the Australian flag was desecrated with symbols of hate.
Melbourne is a city with an international reputation for its racial harmony, and was ranked third in a UN report last year as the most desirable country in which to live.
Peter Schneemann, from Switzerland’s Berne University, was in Melbourne last month for the 32nd International Committee of the History of Art Congress. He praised the city’s “extremely open and tolerant culture”.
As a mark of this democracy and tolerance, Serbian demonstrators are free to march and chant in Melbourne’s streets.
But what they are protesting about bears closer examination.
At its heart, this protest was about nationalism and the Serbian refusal to accept Australia’s recognition of the now independent Kosovo.
What do we make of the veiled threat contained in the words of Father Milan Milutinovic of Melbourne’s Serbian Orthodox Church?
He asked Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to reverse Australia’s decision to recognise Kosovo independence from Serbia. “Countries, unfortunately including Australia, have recognised Kosovo unilaterally as a sovereign state,” said the cleric. “This is something we cannot accept and we are here to protest what’s going on.”
But, while such nationalistic claims directed at the Australian Government are cause for unease, Father Milutinovic was partly correct when he added: “I don’t know what connection Australia really has to Kosovo — it’s a European problem.”
Kosovo’s independence is accepted by the United Nations Security Council and the council universally condemned Nazi-like violence in Belgrade.
But there’s the rub. European ethnically derived hate has no place on Melbourne’s streets, and I’m with Father Milutinovic when he says: “It’s a European problem.”
But not when Serbian bullying is crystallised in the mark of a swastika.
It is a symbol that destroys whatever cause the Serbs may declare.
See also : The case of Kosovo: “Self-determination” as an instrument of imperialist policy, Peter Schwarz, wsws, February 20, 2008: “The support of the US and the major European powers for Kosovo’s unilateral secession from Serbia, in the face of fierce opposition from Serbia and Russia, as well as China, marks a turning point in international politics…” | Freedom Fight (English) | Andrej Grubacic, an anarchist from Serbia, seems to have some interesting stuff to say about politics in the Balkans
While this article (or rather, collection of articles) is very informative, it does little to shed any light on the geopolitical manipulations surrounding recent events in the Balkans. In fact, it serves to confuse the issues. What is certainly a concern is that a thoroughly disinformative article from Rupert Murdoch’s Herald-Sun – designed to portray the Serbs as Nazis – has been posted in full without any critical commentary. I’ve noticed that this article has also been posted at the ostensibly anti-fascist site “Fight dem back” again, without any critical analysis, commentary or context given. Does “Fight dem back” really think that an *opinion piece* from the Herald-Sun (of all papers!) actually proves anything? Do they really think the Herald-Sun is credible? Do you, @ndy? I’ll tear that odious piece of propaganda written by one Christopher Bantick apart shortly.
First of all, some context.
During WW2, the Serbs were the only Europeans who gave their lives to defend their Jewish and Roma (Gypsy) neighbours from the genocidal Axis assault. Furthermore, a strong case could be made that it was the rebellion by Serbs and Montenegrins against their own government which made the defeat of the Axis powers possible.
Extracts from http://tenc.net/a/times410326-t.htm begin:
End of extracts from http://tenc.net/a/times410326-t.htm
————
It can seem ironic (to say the least) that the New York Times now engages in Holocaust denial of a kind that makes David Irving and Ernst Zundel look almost like committed anti-fascists. See “How the New York Times Doctored its Count of Croatia’s W.W.II Victims” [here]. From over 800,000 Serbs, Jews and Roma at the Jasenovac death camp complex down to 80,000. A *90%* downgrading!
It should be noted that the Croatian Ustashe were probably the most brutal of the Axis forces – even the German Nazis were frequently horrified by what they were doing. The Islamic forces in the Balkans were utilised by the Axis powers, also. This was the job of one Haj Amin Al Husseini, the British appointed Mufti of Jerusalem who:
a) Was given increasing powers by the British every time he organised a successful murderous riot against the Jews (Zionist or otherwise, not that that should matter). It should be noted that he was responsible for the murders of far more Arabs for “collaborating with the Jews” – a euphemism for wanting to live in peace with the Jews.
b) As WW2 began, moved more towards the Axis powers – he played a major role in orchestrating a pro-Nazi coup in Iraq (an event which Saddam Hussein’s uncle played a role in).
c) When the British eventually defeated that, fled to the Japanese embassy in Teheran, then to Italy and then to Berlin where he met with Hitler.
d) Was put in charge of the Islamic forces in the Balkans, particularly the Bosnian Muslim Waffen SS.
e) Significantly – was *co-architect with Adolph Eichmann* of the “Final Solution”.
f) Was captured at the end of WW2, but “mysteriously escaped” – thus avoiding the Nuremberg trials – and popped up in Egypt…
g) …where he – significantly – mentored Yasser Arafat, Mahmoud Abbas and others. It is no exaggeration to say that he is the father of the “Palestinian Movement”.
To find out more about this particularly enthusiastic Genocidalist, see Part 4 of “Understanding the Palestinian Movement”.
Now, moving back to the Balkans and fast forwarding to the 1990s…
While all the various players in the hideous Balkan wars of the 1990s received criticism in the Western media, the reality is that the Serbs were demonised while those attacking them were whitewashed. If George Orwell were alive and observing this, he might say, “War is peace. Freedom is slavery. The ethno-cultural group who played a crucial role in the defeat of Nazism are genocidalists. The ethno-cultural groups who enthusiastically supported the Nazis are victims.”
It really is that Orwellian. A detailed analysis of the 1990s Balkan wars is unfortunately beyond the scope of this post, so I’ll simply provide a list of links for those who wish to do further research. Anyone wishing to push the line that the Serbs were “genocidal ethnic cleansers” or similar will need to refute the abundance of evidence I’m providing, or alternatively explain why they’re insisting on acting as NATO propagandists.
Numerous articles on Yugoslavia
http://emperors-clothes.com/yugo.htm
http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/guide-yugo.htm
“The Movie Judgment! Exposes the Phony ‘Death Camp’ Pictures that Fooled the World”
http://www.emperors-clothes.com/film/judgment.htm
Gives an overview of how the Bosnian-Serb “death camp” (in reality, a refugee centre for displaced Bosnian Muslims) hoax was pulled off. Within *20 minutes* of this hoax being unleashed on unsuspecting Western audiences in August 1992, an “outraged” George Bush Snr. held a press conference.
“A Reporter’s Account of an Evening Spent with Nasir Oric, the Muslim Commander in Srebrenica”
http://emperors-clothes.com/analysis/oric.htm
“The real Srebrenica Genocide”
http://www.israpundit.com/2008/?p=232
WARNING – Contains graphic pictures of Bosnian Serbs tortured to death at the hands of NATO-sponsored Alija Izetbegovic’s Islamofascist terrorists – many of whom were imported “Afghan Arab” Mujahedeen (created by the CIA in the 1980s), shipped in in an operation coordinated by Pentagon Intelligence with Iran, Saudi Arabia and others.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h2DLa_XM7yQ
My video on this topic.
“U.S. & Iran: Enemies in Public, but Secret Allies in Terror: How the US and Iran worked together, supporting Islamist terror in Bosnia”
http://emperors-clothes.com/analysis/deja.htm
“A Rare Glimpse at the Reality of the Bosnian War”
http://emperors-clothes.com/analysis/gorazde.htm
What really happened in Bosnia?
Were the Serbs the criminal aggressors, as the official story claims, or were they the victims?
http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/ihralija1.htm
“Pro-Yugoslav Muslim Leader Put on Trial”
http://emperors-clothes.com/docs/abdic.htm
The story of Fikret Abdic, a popular and genuinely moderate Muslim leader who’s resistance to the Islamofascists was rewarded with “a coordinated offensive combining NATO airstrikes and a ground offensive by the 5th Corps of Alija Izetbegovic’s army and the Croatian regular army (trained and led by the CIA and the privatized CIA-linked company, MPRI) thereby launching an ethnic-cleansing operation that drove 250,000 Serbs and some 50,000-80,000 Muslims from their traditional homes.”
“MEET THE NAZIS THE CIA MARRIED: THE CROATIAN USTASHI”
http://emperors-clothes.com/docs/backin.htm
“The Trail of Tears”
http://emperors-clothes.com/croatia/tears.htm
“Though a US ally, the UK felt it necessary to distance itself from the grisly and unprovoked Croatian onslaught, which virtually emptied the Krajina of 250,000 Serbs, leaving only some old people whom the Croats finished off without a second thought. But US Ambassador to Croatia Peter Galbraith denied ‘ethnic cleansing’ had taken place. Apparently ‘ethnic cleansing’ only happens when the victims are not Serbs.”
“The roots of Kosovo fascism”
http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/thompson/rootsof.htm
“The Serbs Were Not Oppressing the Kosovo Albanians… Quite the opposite”
http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/kosovo.htm
“The Road to Jenin
The Racak “massacre” hoax, and those whose honesty it places in doubt: Helena Ranta, NATO, the UN, The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN, The Associated Press, and Human Rights Watch.”
http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/ranta.htm
This is the hoax which NATO used as an excuse to bomb Serbia in 1999
“The Freezer Truck Hoax
How NATO framed the Serbs”
http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/freezer1.htm
“It was an extraordinary claim for NATO, but so was NATO’s embarrassment: the Hague Tribunal forensics had found exactly zero bodies of Albanian civilians murdered by Milosevic’s forces (as opposed to, say, 100,000, or 500,000, which had been the earlier NATO claims). So which is it? Did the Serbs carry out a spectacular cover up? Or did NATO simply lie?”
“To see where Israel is headed, visit Kosovo”
http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/kosovo_junger.htm
OK, that’s enough links for now – there are plenty more accessible via the two primary links at the top of this list. Of interest is the role of Slobodan Milosevic in all this. He was a political opportunist and an appeaser, but the notions that he was a “Genocidal ethnic cleanser”, “racist agitator”, “Advocate of ‘Greater Serbia’ ” etc. become utterly absurd when the relevant facts are absorbed and understood.
——
Onto the article…
“For fascists, Kosovar independence is a product of a ZOG/NWO (Zionist Occupation Government/New World Order) conspiracy, to divide the White, Christian West, so as to render it less able to resist the impositions of ZOG/NWO. Or at least, that’s what the local tinfoil helmet brigade thinks: “KOSOVO IS SERBIAN! SAY NO TO ILLEGAL ZIONIST SPONSORED ISLAMIC STATES IN EUROPE!” ”
Careful @ndy – this is a smokescreen. Most fascists are radically anti-Serb. Furthermore, there has been a – fortunately, largely unsuccessful – campaign to foster antisemitism among the Serbs. There are certainly many Serbs who feel betrayed – this is understandable considering that Establishment “Jewish leaders” such as Eli Weisel were wheeled out – as many people internally associate “Jews” with “experts on genocides” – to support NATO’s propaganda war against the Serbs. I have also noticed a number of “pro-Serb” Muslims on the web who say things along the lines of “We were both used! The Zionist Jews played us off against each other!” Sigh!
“Should Jews support an independent Kosovo? A short guide to what they should know.”
http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/suicide.htm
It should also be pointed out that the Islamisation of the West is a reality. I resisted this notion for a long time however the sheer weight of evidence forced me to concede. The website http://thereligionofpeace.com/ has much on this. Unfortunately it discredits itself somewhat by endorsing the absurdist ONYA conspiracy theory of 9/11, and it fails to realise that Islamisation is a process being driven primarily by Western Establishments rather than Muslims per se, but it is nonetheless a useful source of information on Islam and Jihadist operations around the world.
Why would Western ruling elites wish to Islamise the West? In a nutshell – they are cynically using hard fought for principles (pluralism, tolerance, multiculturalism, etc.) to sneak in a trojan-horse ideology to reverse these important gains. An alternative hypothesis is that they are setting the stage for a Western-style fascist counterattack against Islamofascism – with much the same result. If they succeed, it will be a disaster.
Onto Bantick’s nonsense…
“The swastika and the intimidating dog returned to Melbourne’s streets on Friday night in an anti-independence rally over Kosovo separating from Serbia. The irony was inescapable.”
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Swastikas painted on one Australian flag (possibly intended to symbolise Australian Establishment support for Islamofascism and the Croatian Ustashe) indicate inescapable irony in the context of a 1930s/1940s anti-immigration protest. Protesters averse to seeing a bunch of gangsters and fascists recognised as a state are “anti-independence.”
“Therefore, it is difficult to see how the Serb protesters can appropriate the swastika and expect public support.”
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. One confiscated swastika-ised Australian flag is evidence that “the Serb protesters” have “appropriate[d] the swastika”.
“I wonder what my late father, a World War II veteran, would have thought. He fought under the Australian flag. He watched his mates die under the Australian flag. He would have been outraged that the Australian flag was desecrated with symbols of hate.”
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Someone who suffered fighting Nazis (or was it the Japanese? Oh well, never mind…) would be “outraged” at people opposing fascists for desecrating a flag.
“But what they are protesting about bears closer examination. At its heart, this protest was about nationalism and the Serbian refusal to accept Australia’s recognition of the now independent Kosovo.”
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. A protest against recognition of a fascist gangster state is “At its heart… about nationalism”. This NATO-dependent fascist gangster state is “now independent Kosovo.”
“What do we make of the veiled threat contained in the words of Father Milan Milutinovic of Melbourne’s Serbian Orthodox Church? He asked Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to reverse Australia’s decision to recognise Kosovo independence from Serbia. “Countries, unfortunately including Australia, have recognised Kosovo unilaterally as a sovereign state,” said the cleric. “This is something we cannot accept and we are here to protest what’s going on.” ”
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. A perfectly calm and reasonable objection to Australian policy is a “veiled threat”.
“But not when Serbian bullying is crystallised in the mark of a swastika. It is a symbol that destroys whatever cause the Serbs may declare.”
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. “Whatever cause the Serbs may declare” (and who cares what that is anyway? They’re only Serbs, right?) is “Serbian bullying… crystallised in the mark of a swastika”.
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. A blatantly Serbo-phobic propagandist who writes for Murdoch’s Herald-Sun is a “journalist” who is genuinely concerned about Nazism in Melbourne and whose scribblings are worthy of being uncritically reproduced on anti-fascist websites.
One wonders how many people who read Bantick’s poison will *actually read* it.
One wonders if “Fight Dem Back” *actually read* it.
Did you, @ndy?
The struggle against the forces of global totalitarianism continues…
Changeling,
Briefly.
I don’t think that Bantick’s article is “designed to portray the Serbs as Nazis”. That said, the fact that I’ve posted it in its entirety, minus any commentary, really leaves it up to the reader to draw their own conclusions (if any). One question that occurs to me upon reading it is: is it true that “an Australian flag and placard covered in swastikas [were] confiscated by police”? If so, what is the significance of this fact? Bantick takes it as an opportunity to recall a previous such incident, and to proceed to offer his opinion on the subject of the local Serbian response to the declaration of the new state of Kosovo. His argument may stand or fall on its own merits, but in relation to the appearance of an “Australian flag and placard covered in swastikas”, he claims that the presence of such symbols detracts from the legitimacy of the Serbian protest. Depending on the exact use to which these swastikas were being put — which isn’t clear from the article — I’d tend to agree with him. In other words, the use of the swastika as a positive symbol of nationalist sentiment, in my opinion, is a usually reliable indicator of fascist sentiment; sentiment which I, as an anarchist and as a human being, find objectionable. Further, that such expressions are tolerated — which is allegedly the case — reflects badly on the protest as a whole, at least to the extent that other participants are aware of their existence, do nothing to remove them, or otherwise make clear their repudiation of Nazism and fascism.
I don’t know if most fascists are radically anti-Serb, or radically pro-Serb. Certainly, there are fascists, some of them Serbian, most of them not. Further, insofar as the Serbian nation-state is associated with the maintenance of a White, Christian Europe, fascists of one sort or another tend to express political support for the Serbian cause over and above that of the Albanian / Muslim. Whatever the case may be, it’s my opinion that the response of Serbian fascists to Kosovar independence has been more or less along the lines I articulated. “KOSOVO IS SERBIAN! SAY NO TO ILLEGAL ZIONIST SPONSORED ISLAMIC STATES IN EUROPE!” is a quote, and the source of this quote is a Serbian-Australian on the white supremacist forum Stormfront. The thread from which it’s drawn is titled “Melbourne Aussie Serbs fight back against ZOG-NWO!”, the subject matter of which is public protest by Serbs in Melbourne over the issue.
“Well done Melbourne Serb brothers!” says one meathead in response to the Melbourne protest; “Well [d]one Serbs! Bloody [A]lbanians and [M]uslims in general. They can[‘]t actually conquer anyone so they have the US and others … do it for them. SCUM!” says another. A man made of marshmallows adds “Let me remind you of the glorious day where [sic] White Australians said NO MORE to [L]ebanese gangs in Cronulla or have you already forgotten?”
And so on.
“During WW2, the Serbs were the only Europeans who gave their lives to defend their Jewish and Roma (Gypsy) neighbours from the genocidal Axis assault…”
This is an extraordinary claim. As far as I’m aware, in all the territories the Nazis conquered, there was resistance; inspired, in part, by revulsion at the barbarism of the Nazi regime. Yad Vashem provides the following statistics on the Righteous, (that is, men and women who risked their lives in order to save those of persecuted Jews):
Righteous Among the Nations – per Country & Ethnic Origin January 1, 2008
I don’t know whether or not this includes those who died trying to avert the emergence of the Nazi regime — I doubt it. Among this number would be included (among many others) the anarchists of the FAUD — Emil Mahnert, Wilhelm Schmitz, Ernst Holtznagel, Michael Delissen, Anton Rosinke and dozens of others — as well as the Edelweiss Piraten:
And of course, Georg Elser, the bloke who tried to blow Hitler to pieces in Munich in 1939.
Then there’s the case of armed Jewish resistance, and the movements of partisans, both Jewish and non-Jewish. One of the better-documented examples is that of the French resistance. A review of one account reads:
Is Kosovo Serbia? We ask a historian
Noel Malcolm
The Guardian
February 26 2008
“Kosovo is Serbia”, “Ask any historian” read the unlikely placards, waved by angry Serb demonstrators in Brussels on Sunday. This is rather flattering for historians: we don’t often get asked to adjudicate. It does not, however, follow that any historian would agree, not least because historians do not use this sort of eternal present tense.
History, for the Serbs, started in the early 7th century, when they settled in the Balkans. Their power base was outside Kosovo, which they fully conquered in the early 13th, so the claim that Kosovo was the “cradle” of the Serbs is untrue.
What is true is that they ruled Kosovo for about 250 years, until the final Ottoman takeover in the mid-15th century. Churches and monasteries remain from that period, but there is no more continuity between the medieval Serbian state and today’s Serbia than there is between the Byzantine Empire and Greece.
Kosovo remained Ottoman territory until it was conquered by Serbian forces in 1912. Serbs would say “liberated”; but even their own estimates put the Orthodox Serb population at less than 25%. The majority population was Albanian, and did not welcome Serb rule, so “conquered” seems the right word.
But legally, Kosovo was not incorporated into the Serbian kingdom in 1912; it remained occupied territory until some time after 1918. Then, finally, it was incorporated, not into a Serbian state, but into a Yugoslav one. And with one big interruption (the second world war) it remained part of some sort of Yugoslav state until June 2006.
Until the destruction of the old federal Yugoslavia by Milosevic, Kosovo had a dual status. It was called a part of Serbia; but it was also called a unit of the federation. In all practical ways, the latter sense prevailed: Kosovo had its own parliament and government, and was directly represented at the federal level, alongside Serbia. It was, in fact, one of the eight units of the federal system.
Almost all the other units have now become independent states. Historically, the independence of Kosovo just completes that process. Therefore, Kosovo has become an ex-Yugoslav state, as any historian could tell you.
· Noel Malcolm is a senior research fellow at All Souls College, Oxford. He is the author of Kosovo: A Short History
[NB. This comment was originally marked as spam…]
Thankyou for your responses, @ndy. They have forced my research to go in certain directions which have led to important factoids.
I considered that too, but decided to give Bantick the benefit of the doubt on that one.
But that’s not what he was really saying. If he was claiming that “the presence of such symbols detracts from the legitimacy of the Serbian protest”, he would have explained what he thought that legitimacy was – he didn’t do so. Instead – not even really concealing his anti-Serb bias – he clearly makes an association between the (alleged) actions of one Serb protester and “a group of anti-immigration protesters in Hitler’s storm trooper uniforms”. He waffles about a “veiled threat” and dispatches various Orwellianisms which I’ve already highlighted – and there are others.
There is nothing new about what Bantick is doing. There have been implications and sometimes outright assertions that “The Serbs are the new Nazis” in the Western media since the 1990s which – as the samples of abundant evidence I’ve provided above clearly demonstrate – is a claim which is utterly false.
Thought experiment: What are most people who read Bantick’s article – most of whom will have little if any knowledge of Balkan history apart from what’s been blasted from the Western media since the 1990s – likely to come away with? Will they likely be thinking along the lines of “Those silly Serbs! They have such a legitimate cause – why are they allowing a few idiots to diminish their proud anti-Nazi heritage by displaying swastikas?”, or is it more likely they’ll be thinking along the lines of “The Serbs? You mean those people who were ethnic cleansing? Not surprised they like swastikas. Not surprised they don’t want others to be independent. The AUSSIE FLAG?! Bastards! Send them home!”
Bantick’s article clearly tars the Serbs with a Nazi brush, and unless Bantick is completely ignorant of the issues surrounding the protest he was writing about, it is virtually inconceivable that it wasn’t deliberate.
I will say for the record that I think placing swastikas on an Australian flag – regardless of the intentions of the (alleged) protestor(s?) – is at the very least a foolish act, for the simple reason that it will quite obviously be likely interpreted much the way Bantick would have us interpret it. The Serbs don’t appear to have *been given an opportunity* “to make clear their repudiation of Nazism and fascism” (or, if it were the case, support of) – Bantick’s article makes no reference to any discussion by Serbs on this issue whatsoever. Given that most Serbs would be aware of their culture’s history of “repudiation of Nazism and fascism”, I doubt many of them generally feel the need to prove it, particularly if not asked about it.
As for repudiating Nazism, one wonders if there were any Chris Banticks waxing moralistic in the corporate press about this lovely sign at this “peace” protest in Melbourne – http://melbourne.indymedia.org/news/2006/07/118241_comment.php – “Firstly: “Mel Gibson for PM”. And what’s that down the bottom? Yes. You read it right: “Let Melbourne make portable gas ovens”. Surely given the supposed “pro-Israel bias of the Western media” (which, while a popular notion across the political spectrum, is a demonstrably absurd one), *someone* would have picked up on this in order to discredit this protest? Alas, no. If one Googles “Let Melbourne make portable gas ovens” no corporate media or “progressive left wing antizionist” media can be found. I’ll leave it to readers to decide what the character of those who *are* exposing this is.
The fascists *who matter* are radically anti-Serb, @ndy. Some Serb on Stormfront has absolutely no sway over the NATO sponsored fascists – and would under the right circumstances be slaughtered by – the Croatian Ustashe, the Bosnian Islamists or the KLA. Having said that, upon further investigation it appears that the NATO/Nazi-esque infection of the Serbian body politic/culture may be even more extensive than I realised. I bring the reader’s attention to the homepage of (ostensibly Serbian Orthodox) Youtuber “orthodoxdog”. Plenty of nationalist slogans and sentiment, virtually no analysis or explanations/interpretations of what Serbian culture is supposedly about beyond its more violent elements, and – yes – antisemitism. I’ll likely produce a video response to his “Zionist genocides on Serbs” at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nk6hDkjuZwo in the near future – my main theme will be that any Serb who’s buying that kind of crap is falling right into a NATO propaganda trap.
Much information and analysis on how NATO is interfering in Serbia’s affairs including how it installed the current regime in Belgrade are available via the links in the footnote at http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/freezer6.htm#_ftn16
Also, see under the sub-heading “NATO’s Belgrade boys” at http://emperors-clothes.com/docs/fools.htm
It is only an extraordinary claim in that I was probably too general, and thus my statement was open to interpretation. Yes – of course there were brave individuals and networks who resisted the Nazis. This is certainly not to be trivialised. However, no other Europeans overthrew their government for appeasing the Axis like the Serbs and Montenegrins did. No other European ethnic group (other than the Jews obviously) were slaughtered en masse in concentration camps in the way the Serbs were (often, simply for *being* Serbs) and – to the best of my knowledge – no other European country was virtually devoid of antisemitism like Serbia was.
Extracts from footnote #31b at http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/ihralija3.htm#31b follow:
======
The following is from the book “Serbs Chose War” (by Ruth Mitchell, Garden City Publishers, New York, 1943, pp. 260-264.)
“Source: Letter written by a Jewish physician, a professor in the Department of Medicine in the University of Belgrade, to a friend in London on his escape from Yugoslavia in 1942. As the writer is a Jew, for the sake of relatives who remain in Yugoslavia his name cannot be used.
In Yugoslavia there were 85,000 Jews, including Jewish émigrés from Germany, Austria, Poland and Czechoslovakia. Thanks to the Serbs, the Yugoslav Jews had succeeded in saving and rescuing many of their compatriots from Germany and German-occupied countries. Service rendered and assistance given to Jews by Yugoslav consular officials in Austria and Czechoslovakia has specially to be recognized. Of the total number of Jews in Yugoslavia about 7,500 were refugees.
————————
The ‘solution’ of the Jewish question in the Independent Croatia devolved upon the Croatian Ustashis. [This was the clerical-fascist regime set up in Croatia with Nazi approval.] In Serbia, however, the Jewish problem was not dealt with by the Serbs themselves. This the Germans reserved for themselves. There are special reasons for this. When they occupied Serbia, the Germans did not find any anti-Semitic feeling in the country. They could not persuade either the local population or the local authorities to take any anti-Semitic measures.
The fact that Nedich [the Serbian quisling government, installed after the Nazi invasion] twice demanded from the German commanding officer in Serbia and the Banat that he and his government should be given the right to settle the Jewish problem, against whom no drastic measures should and could be taken in Serbia, shows the feeling of the Serbian people toward the Jews. The following reasons were given by Nedich to the Germans for this demand. If the Germans wanted the Serbs to calm down, it would be of first importance to stop the terrible persecution of the Serbian Jews. The Serbian people could not and would not accept such treatment ‘of their compatriots of the Jewish religion.’ The Serbs consider Jews as their brothers, only of a different religion. The answer which Nedich received from the Germans regarding this demand was ‘that the Serbs have not attained a culture to the degree necessary to enable them to deal with the Jews. We ourselves shall settle the Jewish question in Serbia.’
————————
During Yugoslavia’s twenty-three years of existence, Serbia has always professed the free democratic tradition existing in the former Kingdom of Serbia. There in the nineteenth century, and later in the twentieth, the Jews always had full civic rights and complete equality with their Serbian compatriots. This equality was not only granted in various constitutions of the Kingdom of Serbia and later of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, but it was also a true expression of the relationship between the Orthodox Serbs and the Jews in their everyday contact. This friendly and amicable relationship also existed in the economic, financial, and political life in Serbia. The small group of Jews living in Serbia gave their contribution towards the cultural and political life in Serbia’s struggle for the formation of a state of South Slavs. The Jews had in Serbia members of Parliament. In Serbia’s struggle for liberation, the Jews gave their contribution. Several were awarded the Karadgeorge Star for bravery in the battlefield – equivalent to the British V.C.
————————
In all the schools and universities, numerous restrictions were applied by circular, but in Serbia, Serb teachers and professors succeeded in avoiding or sabotaging the regulations.
In this regard Serbia completely differed from Croatia under Dr. Machek and the district governor or Ban, Shubashich. In Croatia anti-Semitism was inherited from Austria-Hungary. Anti-Semitic centers had always existed. Dr. Shubashitch’s Croatia had even prepared elaborate laws and regulations just before the war broke out in Yugoslavia in 1941. A large part of the industries in Jewish hands in Croatia was to be confiscated and nationalized. Anti-Semitism was particularly stressed in Croatia by the right wing of Dr. Machek’s Croatian Peasant Party.
————————
No German measures in Belgrade were able to upset the friendly relations between the Serbs and Jews. During the forced-labor period Serbs talked to their Jewish friends in the streets even in front of the German soldiers and police. During the period well over 300,000 Serbs were massacred by the Croat Ustashi in Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Lika and some 60,000 shot by the Germans in Serbia, during the period when Serbian students and peasants were hung in the main square in Belgrade, the Serbs of the capital had sufficient courage to protest publicly their indignation at the treatment of the Jews.
When Jewish women were transported in lorries to the concentration camps, Serb shopkeepers in the streets through which these processions passed closed their shops and their houses, thus expressing not only their protest, but also emphasizing the fact that the entire population of Serbia, yesterday and today, does not and cannot participate in the extermination of their Jewish neighbors.
The example of the Serbian people with regard to the Jews is unique in Europe, particularly in the southern part of the continent. In spite of intensive German propaganda in writing and through the wireless, the Serbs remained unaffected. When we consider what happened to the Jews in neighboring countries, in the “Independent State of Croatia,” Hungary, Rumania, and Bulgaria, the Serbian example shines out.
======
End of extracts from http://www.hirhome.com/yugo/ihralija3.htm#31b
This is *astonishing* history, @ndy! It sheds a great deal of light on *why* the Serbs have been so utterly slandered in the Western media; why the most regressive forces in the Balkans have been sponsored by NATO; why NATO have invested 100s of millions of $US in bribing Serbian officials and setting up fake grass roots Serb groups; why a concerted effort to drive a wedge between the Serbs and the Jews has occurred; why the same networks and often the same personel who specialise in attacking the Serbs also specialise in attacking the Israelis; and why many of the propaganda techniques deployed against the Serbs are almost identical to those directed against the Israelis. It all starts to become *even more* congruent when one starts to look at these networks (beyond the scope of this post, but it is relatively trivial to document the role of members of the CFR, RIIA, Trilateral Commission and Bilderberg group among others), who the major powerbrokers behind these networks are and that these major powerbrokers are the same people who gave the world Nazism in the first place.
See “Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler” at http://www.reformation.org/wall-st-hitler.html
As for Noel Malcolm’s nonsense – I realised he was lying when I read “Until the destruction of the old federal Yugoslavia by Milosevic…”
This is blatant nonsense, @ndy – and Noel Malcolm as a “historian” who is the author of “Kosovo: A Short History” – simply *must* know it’s nonsense.
Furthermore, the whole “Kosovo is Serbia” line – while for most intents and purposes is historically accurate – is not the *real* issue at stake here. The real issues at stake I have already mentioned and alluded to – and there are more.
It is essential that those opposing fascism are exposed to this important history and related information, and not allow themselves to be distracted from seeing the *real fascists* by focussing on certain elements of Serbian nationalism which they may find distasteful – things such as nationalist sloganeering, images of “intimidating dogs”, apparent glorification of militarism, etc.
Having said that, I will advise any Serb who’ll give me a hearing that focussing on nationalist sentiment will ultimately lead to failure, as I allude to in my video “The Pro-Islamist Agenda of the Australian Government Pt.1” at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttAPwXVjSJw