(np) Croatia today

[Kevin Dunn]

When one hears about Srebrenica and barns full of imprisoned Bosnian  
Muslims (men, women & children) being grenaded willfully it is hard to  
feel any sympathy for the Serbs. Though their hatred was instilled  
five hundred years earlier after the Ottoman Turks occupied the area  
and forced the local christians to convert or at best be second class  
citizens, at worst be exterminated. Their Christian religion became  
taboo, and the insurrectionists fighting for the liberation of their  
homeland were violently suppressed. A favored method of capital  
punishment was to publically impale a man along his spine  from rectum  
to nape with a wooden pole, obstensibly avoiding vital organs and  
vessels to prolong suffering and spectacle. The Ottomans that stayed  
after the fall of their empire became the Bosnian Muslims of today, so  
it seems no one's ancestry has clean hands. At least we remember and  
discuss these atrocities, because the Nazis went forth with their  
extermination plans & thought they could get away with it in part  
because no one remember(s)(ed) the Armenian Genocide of 1915,  
incidentally also perpetrated by the Ottoman Empire. How many  
centuries of pain and destruction has religious intolerance brought  
us? A-and the recent Bosnian conflict shows that one atrocity will  
breed another when the pendulum of dominance swings toward the  
formerly oppressed - who are waiting for their chance to get even,  
passing down their resentment from generation to generation.

Kevin

Sent from my iPhone

On Mar 22, 2009, at 6:45 AM, Carvill John <johncarvill at hotmail.com>  
wrote:

>
> Michael. You seem to be doing your learning in public.
>
>
>> so lemme get this straight, the Serbs were oppressing the Bosniaks,  
>> so
>> we helped the Croats wail on the Serbs?
>
> The Croats and Bosnians were both victims of the Serbs. At one  
> stage, the Croats - led by the Fascist Tujdman - saw the chance to  
> sieze some territory for themselves and took it, thus turning on  
> their fellow victims, the Bosnians. So the Bosnians, having been  
> victims of teh Serbs, then also became victims of teh Croats who, as  
> victims of the Serbs themselves, you might think would have behaved  
> differently.
>
> Despite this appalling act by the Croats, you should not lose focus  
> of the fact that teh Serbs were the agressors. Don't be fooled by  
> stories that 'both sides were in teh wrong' they are simp,y not  
> true. That 'ancient, inevitable ethnic hatreds on all sides' were  
> the cause of teh conflict was a myth perpetuated, mainly by the  
> British (politiciuans and media) as an excuse for non-intervention.  
> Douglas Hurd famously approved an arms e3mbargo against Bosnia  
> because he said he wanted to avoid "an even killing field", in other  
> words he wanted to kepe the existing un-level killing field. Hurd  
> and his ilk reckoned that the Serbs wer going to win, so best to  
> just let them have their bloodbath and stability will return to teh  
> region.
>
>
>> apparently many Serbs  have returned...
>
> How nice for them! Pity so few Bosnians can return to the homes they  
> were 'Ethnically Cleansed' out of, or if they do return they return  
> to a Serb mini-state, with reminders of teh genocied everywhere,  
> with denial endemic, with Karadic, Mladic, Milosevic etc. hailed as  
> heroes and plastered on posters in the streets. The Serbs are a  
> people in denial, and it will take generations for this to improve.
>
>
>> I dunno, the Croats seem to be heavy into bad-assery:
>
> No offence, but you're right - you don't know!
>
> Being 'even handed' in your consdieration of Bosnia is a mistake  
> from the get go. It's like saying, yes, the Jews suffered many  
> atrocities, but spare a thought for all the sufferings endured by  
> teh Nazis.
>
>
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