Shekicromaster
Posts: 70
Joined: 4/5/2008
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Being Croatian I'm obviously biased (in every country local sources of information are always subjective) but I'll try my best :D
quote:
ORIGINAL: meatcleaver
Didn't the Croats attempt genocide too?
Short answer: Yes :D Detailed answer: I don't know. No doubt there were unnecessary killings of civilians but it's not that easy to be sure when it is a localized „ war madness“ and when it was an organized attempt. I would say there was a little of both, but even courts (local or international) can't give much light on what was happening and we (common civilians that is) certainly don’t have even a small part of information and documents they have. I’m actually more concerned about Croatia’s interventions in Bosnia. As in Croatia the army never left the country borders, that is it was attacked from Serbia and the war was going on on Croatian territory and was initiated by Serbian/Yugoslavian forces it is not really possible to compare the two sides on equal terms. Killing civilians is always a crime. But you can’t measure war from a chair. As all other institutions the army was formed quickly and in war. Made mostly of volunteers and with little professional solders at first. Such a situation easily becomes a playground for local “sheriffs”, criminals etc. I don’t think it was actually avoidable. Besides when people witness their12y old daughters gang-raped by solders, members of the family (and sometimes of the same sex) forced to have intercourse with each other, people tortured, killed – I still vividly remember a story from a concentration camp where they supposedly used to cut open the bellyes of prisoners while tied and leave them to die slowly their intestine out.. people witnessing it and having members of the family killed or tortured are not always able to keep their balance and when in position to do so want to take their revenge. Might be wrong and not resolving anything.. but results of war are almost never clear and clean, it is just the history written by winners that makes it look like that. But obviously there were also a lot of wrong political decisions. The president at the time (and the first Croatian president) was a too obsessed with nationalism and history. I would also presume that strong ties with nationalistic groups especially abroad played their role too. But a lot of financial support for the war came from there so… However in Bosnia the politics and activities were obviously and intentionally wrong (for the same nationalistic and historical but also some more pragmatically reasons) even though it is not that easy to prove the presence of Croatian army in Bosnia, they would just change uniforms for those of military forces of Bosnian Croats.
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How come the Craoats are rewarded by abeing allowed to join the EU and the Serbs are rewarded by having part of their country taken away from them?
Croatia is not in the EU yet. However if ot is closer to that I’d say the reasons are much more pragmatical than ideological. It is the present situation in those countries (and that eventually includes the attitude towards war and war crimes), not necessarily what happened during the war. Kosovo was looking for independence from long ago. It always complained that Serbia was exploiting them. And if I’m remembering correctly Serbia abolished their autonomy (it was an autonomous region in Yugoslavia).. conflicts escalated.. It is never just black and white.
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Could it be one is historically pro western and the other isn't?
Of course.. as Serbia for same reasons has the support of Russia, USA of the UK etc… EU is a western organization so as ties with this countries are generally stronger in Croatia than Serbia while ties with Russia are stronger in Serbia you might look at it that way.. but again I’d say that’s not as important as more pragmatic political motives.
quote:
Let's be honest, if one wanted to be cynical, the whole Balken saga was started by the Germans recognizing their old Nazi allies the Croats as an independent country.
Let's be honest, this is a rather stupid statement. The Balkan saga started before forming of Yugoslavia, it was going on during the Yugoslavia, had a short escalation in 70's and finally exploded with the general fall of communism. Germany is so afraid of it’s own Nazi history that it would be highly improbable to do anything even remotely connected to that. The Croatian pre WWII state was a Nazi allay but also the future Yugoslavian communist/partisan/antifascist leader Tito was Croatian. In my part of the country nationalism/fascism was virtually nonexistent while antifascist movements were strong. If I were looking for historical ties it would be centuries old and much stronger pre WWI ties to Austria (from the times of Habsburgs and Austro-Hungarian monarchy of which Croatia was a part) . Some other parts of the country (mine included) are historically, culturally and linguistically more inclined to Italy.. as for Germany a strong presence of Croatian immigrants there was probably more important than anything historical :D
Btw the first to recognize the independence was Island, Germany did it that day, but it was entering into force with the recognition of the (than) members of EU.
< Message edited by Shekicromaster -- 4/5/2008 9:03:32 PM >
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