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- Useful Snapshot of Conflict in the Balkans
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War and Change in the Balkans: Nationalism, Conflict and Cooperation
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
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Endgame in the Balkans: Regime Change, European Style
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Peace at Any Price: How the World Falied Kosovo (Crises in World Politics)
ASIN: 0521677734 |
Book Description
The violence following the break-up of the former Yugoslavia has lasted for more than a decade and continues to mark the region. This volume analyses the causes of the conflict and describes its course from the onset of war in Croatia to intervention in Kosovo. The book concentrates on four key transformations: the demise of Yugoslavia and the creation of new states; the importance of nationalist ideologies in the preparation of war and their subsequent decline in the post conflict era; the role of international actors as policy makers, implementing agencies, and arbiters; and the process of democratization and integration into European structures. With contributions from some of the world's leading scholars of the Balkans and personal accounts from journalists, diplomats, and civil servants drawing upon their own experiences of war and transition, War and Change in the Balkans provides an unparalleled insight into contemporary European history.
Customer Reviews:
Useful Snapshot of Conflict in the Balkans.......2006-12-15
I was particularly pleased when this volume went to press as I direct a summer program on Conflict in the Balkans so naturally keep my eyes wide open for any texts that may be useful for my university students. This book certainly fits their needs and I intend to make it required reading.
20 chapters in just over 200 pages gives a good indication of the brevity of most. Yet this is appropriate for anyone (student or otherwise) looking for a snapshot of the region and its recent problems rather than detailed studies of specific issues. Contributors come from a variety of fields including academia, diplomacy, NGOs, journalism and law. Their nationalities are also quite diverse. End result? Good mix of perspectives that help the reader examine and dissect supposedly 'common knowledge' about the causes and consequences of conflict in the former Yugoslavia.
The last quarter of the book looks at the near neighbours and their practice and policies toward the former Yugoslavia, which I found useful.
Overall very good.
Customer Reviews:
The definitive work on Bosnia.......2000-06-14
Burg and Shoup's book will stand for some years as the definitive work on the Bosnian war and the missteps of international intervention there. It is a must read by anyone interested in what happened in that mountainous Balkan country.
This book is rather detailed and is not meant to be a 'quick read' for the casual reader. Instead, it uses a vast array of sources from the region as well as the Western press and interviews to make its case about the goals of the three sides as well as the desire of the 'West' to stay out of the conflict. Furthermore, it provides a much-needed and accessible overview of the various peace plans and maps which aimed at stopping the carnage in Bosnia.
It is an excellent book which sets a new standard for research on ethnic conflicts and international policy.
Book Description
Exposing the true scale and significance of the deployment of air power in the Balkans, this book details the activities of NATO and UN aircraft as well as local pilots in the former Yugoslavia. From bombing by B-2 stealth bombers to air-to-air combat; from moving ground troops by helicopter to 'food-bombing' for refugees, air power has played a vital role in 'Europe's Vietnam', and there is little sign that the fires of conflict are being extinguished. Debate amongst air power practitioners has yielded little agreement as to the degree of damage inflicted on the Yugoslav 3rd Army in Kosovo, the Balkans continue to be a region of conflict and ethnic hatred.
Customer Reviews:
Great book about smal people.........2006-01-15
Agression on Bosnia 1992-1995. This book is giving extraordinary testimonies about small everyday people who helped others, cherishing compassion and human kindness, even many times putting them-self in deadly situations, crossing the lines of ethnic divisions, religions or political opinion. All stories are proof that human goodness must prevail over human darkness, that human being alone and small as it look,can make huge difference in our world. Bosnian story can happen anywhere, so it is highly recomended in todays world, where more compassion is needed in our every day life.
Thank you Svetlana for your great work.
Outstanding book.......2004-11-15
Bottom line, this is a great book. The introduction alone,
by editor Laurie Kain Hart, is absolutely extraordinary,
and the author's own preface is exceptional. But the text,
and the heart, of "Good People in an Evil Time" is simple
accounts by ordinary Bosnian people of their experiences
during the war.
Many other books have addressed political, military, and
historical aspects of that war, but frankly few of them
seem to help in understanding the human side and the
present day. For those who did not experience the war first
hand, answers to the human questions have been very slow in
coming, but this book has them by the dozens in the voices
of ordinary people.
For the creation of this book Broz was exceptional in
several ways. She is a granddaughter of Josip Broz,
commonly known as Marshal Tito, Yugoslavian hero of World
War II and head of state of the communist post-war
Yugoslavia. Her family name carried respect that
undoubtedly gave her entree to pass many gates that would
have closed to others and provided a foundation for trust.
Her status as a doctor gave her standing to request entry
to combat zones to try to help those who were suffering,
and her personal qualities brought her to act where most
others would not.
In Broz's own words, "Treating people of all three religious
traditions, I felt their need to open their souls and tell
me, shyly at first, what had happened to them during the
war. From these brief stories on cardiology wards, I
realized how thirsty people were for a truth that was subtle
and nuanced where the shells were falling, in a way that it
wasn't in Belgrade or in the worldwide black-and-white
coverage."
A great achievement of this book is to show so clearly how
people are more than their membership in an ethnic group.
Hopefully, it will also remind us to look beyond
caricatures of ethnic groups in conflict and to search for
victimizers and power seekers who hide themselves or profit
by casting blame everywhere but on themselves.
For the Bosnians and those near to them, this book also
helps to confirm that goodness among them was not isolated,
to remember and honor some of those who practiced it. My
wife and her family came to America from Bosnia as refugees
during the war, and many members of their extended family
still live in different parts of Bosnia. While without
doubt there are bigots, villains and crooks as well as
decent people in the former Yugoslavia, the voices in this
book echo the many experiences and first-hand accounts of
the mutual understanding and simple unconcern over ethnic
differences among ordinary people of the region.
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NATO's Balkan Interventions (Adelphi Papers, 347)
Dana H. Allin
Manufacturer: Routledge
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ASIN: 0198516762 |
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The terrorist mass murders of 11 September 2001 transformed transatlantic priorities, drawing a line under a decade in which the wars of Yugoslavia's collapse dominated the transatlantic security relationship. Yet, despite progress in the region, Balkan instability retains the capacity to punish Western inattention, much as it did in the early 1990s. This Adelphi Paper examines NATO's Balkan interventions over the entire decade starting with the break-up of Yugoslavia in 1992. Focusing on the wars in Bosnia and Kosovo, it traces the record of early transatlantic failures and later successes as once bitterly divided allies were able, finally, to unite around some basic principles. By the time of the Kosovo intervention in spring 1999, the allies agreed on the necessity of taking sides and using military force in conflicts that were complicated, but far from morally opaque. The paper concludes with some lessons around which the transatlantic allies might reasonably hope - despite other pressing concerns - to stay engaged and stay united.
Book Description
In this book, the author has tried bridge the gap between the common perception of the Yugoslav conflict as portrayed in the media and the actual grim reality with which he was dealing as an EU monitor on the ground. Drawing on original material from both UN and ECMM sources, he has identified the true origin of Former Yugoslavia's wars of dissolution, and critically examines the program of violence which erupted in 1991 and eventually culminated in 1995 in the vicious dismemberment of a sovereign federal republic with seat at the United Nations. In doing so, he highlights the duplicitous behavior of all parties to the conflict; the double standards employed throughout by the United States in its foreign policy; the lengths to which the Sarajevo government manipulated the international media to promote a "victim" status; the contempt in which UN peace-keepers were ultimately held by all sides; and the manner in which Radovan Karadzic was sacrificed at the altar of political expediency, when the real culprits were Slobodan Milosevic and his acolyte, General Ratko Mladic. This book, the first by an EU Monitor with actual experience of the conflict, tells the real story of the modern Yugoslav conflict, 1991-1995.
Average customer rating:
- Interesting look at Just War Theory but Weak on Nationalism
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Religion and Justice in the War Over Bosnia
G. Scott Davis
Manufacturer: Routledge
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ASIN: 0415915198 |
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Bosnia and Hercegovina emerged in the wake of the Second World War as a melting pot for the cultures that had determined the history of the South Slavs since the middle ages. Catholic, Orthodox, and Muslim all shared in and contributed to the political and cultural life of Yugoslavia's most diverse republic.
In 1992, this life was shattered as separatist militias brought war to Bosnia and Hercegovina.What is the religious heritage that drives the warring factions and how does it relate to the nationalist aspirations of many of the participants? From diverse academic and philosophical perspectives, the works of Jean Bethke Elshtain, James Turner Johnson, Michael Sells, John Kelsay, and G. Scott Davis will inform not just scholars of ethics, politics and religion, but everyone concerned with the prospects for justice in the post-Cold War world.
Customer Reviews:
Interesting look at Just War Theory but Weak on Nationalism.......2002-09-26
In Religion and Justice in the War over Bosnia, editor G. Scott Davis compiles essays by five professors of religious ethics who consider the current Bosnian conflict within the schema of the "just war" theory. This "just war" tradition, as described by noted theorists Paul Ramsey and Michael Walzer, outlines the "just" reasons for engaging in warfare, and the proper manner in which war should be conducted. The former includes proper authority, just cause, just intent, last resort, and reasonable hope of success. The latter pertains to the use of proportion and discrimination in the prosecution of warfare (16).
Davis admits that, before undertaking this project, he "had scant knowledge of the cultural and political history of Eastern Europe, much less of the Balkans" (viii). Davis assumed the role of a student in preparation for this enterprise by consulting such works as Fred Singleton's "A Short History of the Yugoslav People" and Barbara Jelavich's two-volume history on the Balkans. Two convictions on the part of Davis enters into this work--a distrust of nationalism, and an insistence that the West (particularly, the United States) should intervene militarily to end the hostilities against the Bosnian Muslims.
Michael Sells' contribution to the study, "Religion, History, and Genocide in Bosnia-Herzegovina," is a critical account on Western views towards the Balkans. First, Sells establishes that war tactics on the part of the Bosnian Serbs is, in fact, genocide. The "unjust" intent of the Bosnian Serbs is to destroy the cultural memory of the Bosnian Muslims (26). Second, Sells analyzes the prevailing attitude of the West towards the war in Bosnia. Sells cites an appearance by then president Bill Clinton on Larry King Live during which Clinton referred to the hostilities in Bosnia as "age-old antagonisms" which "go back five hundred years, some would say almost a thousand years" (23).
Robert Kaplan's "Balkan Ghosts" is criticized for repopularizing the idea that the Balkan peoples and cultures are "unamenable to civilized standards of behavior and locked in unchanging, perpetual tribal hatreds" (40). This belief that the Balkan peoples will always be involved in warfare is coupled with the idea that "there are no angels in the conflict" (41). According to Sells, the denial that civilized society is possible in the Balkans, and the prevailing conclusion that all sides in the Bosnian conflict are guilty causes the West to ignore the practices of cultural genocide against Muslim populations.
In "Nationalism and Self-Determination: The Bosnian Tragedy," Jean Bethke Elshtain explains another reason for the lack of direct action by the West to stop atrocities in Bosnia. The problem is that the United Nations, for a time, did not recognize Bosnia as a sovereign nation. According to Elshtain, "the United Nations Charter [only] makes provision for response to violation of the territory of a sovereign state" (46). To Elshtain, this stand is unacceptable. He also criticizes the West for regarding international conflicts with "national security interests, first and foremost, in mind" (47). Using the "just war" theory, both principles and interests would be considered in assessing whether intervention in a given conflict is or is not warranted. As Elshtain maintains, "if our [United States] policy makers had been guided by just war principles, my hunch is that, under the Nuremberg precedent, genocidal political aggression cannot be permitted to stand" (49). Like Davis, Elshtain notes the problem of nationalism in Bosnia and recommends a "middle way" between multicultural absolutists, who insist that different identities cannot mix, and civic pluralists, who preach universal solidarity (50-3). Elshtain, however, does not explain the ways in which this "middle way" can be achieved.
James Turner Johnson, in "War for Cities and Noncombatant Immunity in the Bosnian Conflict," describes the element of "double effect" in the "just war" theory. The idea of "double effect" asserts that, although deliberate and direct attacks on noncombatants is considered unjust, noncombatants can be legitimately harmed or killed if they are the unintentional victims during an assault on a military target. Considering the war in Bosnia, Johnson uses an important example to illustrate the weakness of the "double effect" idea in protecting noncombatants from unjust harm. In Sarajevo, Bosnian Serbs would cut off the water supplies to the civilian Muslim populations. As the inhabitants left their homes to attain water from a limited number of public taps (most likely, near military institutions), the Bosnian Serbs would fire upon them. According to Johnson: "If the besiegers employ means of attack that are by nature indiscriminate or disproportionate in their effects, then I am less willing to grant the double effect excuse, and if these means are chosen so as to increase the burden of possible harm on the noncombatants present and may be judged so because they are likely to have their primary effect against these and not the combatant defenders, then double effect reasoning emphatically does not apply" (84). Johnson maintains that international law, which establishes civilized war tactics, does not sufficiently address the problems associated with siege warfare.
Unlike the other essays, which condemn the West for its lack of response to the Bosnian conflict, G. Scott Davis' contribution includes a criticism of the actions employed by the West. In "Bosnia, the United States, and the Just War Tradition," Davis charges the United States and the European Community with violating the "just war" theory through their arms embargo. The purpose of the embargo imposed in September 1991 was to minimize the violence and contain the war in Croatia. The embargo, however, shifted the balance in favor of the Serbs, who inherited munitions and material from the Yugoslav National Army. Davis maintains that the embargo, which favored Serbia, "should have been particularly offensive given the conduct of the Serbs, who had already displayed a willingness to attack civilian targets and to condone atrocities" (113). Davis concluded that the proper response of the West would have been to lift the embargo and supply aid directly to the Bosnian government (114).
In the final essay, John Kelsay condemns the Western media for portraying the Muslim culture as barbarian and hostile to modernizing influences. In "Bosnia and the Muslim Critique of Modernity," Kelsay compares the Bosnian Muslims' situation to that of the Jews during the Second World War. Kelsay uses the observations of Richard L. Rubenstein to explain that, by disregarding the Muslim community as being incapable of modernization, the West defines the Bosnian Muslims as "outside the universe of moral obligation" (125). Thus "the United Nations, the European Community, and NATO all function as 'silent partners' in the efforts of the Serbians to create an 'ethically pure' region for themselves in Bosnia-Herzegovina" (125).
By using the "just war" theory to analyze the conflict in Bosnia, this compilation is an important work. It is critical to have a criterion whereby "just" or "unjust" war practices can be clearly defined. Terms, such as "genocide" and "unjust," are often used so loosely that their meanings become ambiguous and less useful. Zachery T. Irwin, who reviewed the book for Library Journal (November 15, 1996, p. 75), criticized the analogy for a lack of a conclusion. This reviewer disagrees. The conclusion of this work is that, through an understanding of the "just war" theory, the West should become more directly involved in stopping the atrocities committed in Bosnia. The argument itself, however, is weak. All contributors have little regard for nationalist feelings in the Balkans and elsewhere. Nationalism is important for producing a healthy identity for a people and instilling in them a sense of dignity and self-worth which can prompt an oppressed people to fight for their place in the world. Certainly, there are negative aspects of nationalism, however, Elshtain's insistence on retooling nationalist feelings to find a "middle way" seems very naïve. The contributors consider the Bosnian conflict as would many international journalists. Such journalists often take a global stand on many issues. Such a stand, however, underestimates the power and importance of nationalist aspirations which can determine whether a conflict, no matter how morally "unjust," warrants the risk of Western lives.
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- Porrly written
- Sremac's Fantasy
- Subjectivity vs. Objectivity
- Serb Propaganda
- Engineering the destruction of Yugoslavia: A Blueprint
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War of Words: Washington Tackles the Yugoslav Conflict
Danielle S. Sremac
Manufacturer: Praeger Publishers
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ASIN: 0275966097 |
Book Description
Sremac argues that there is a process and ideology that guides Washington in the post-Cold War era, and any special interest group that understands how Washington works can put forth a message that appeals to the media and the U.S. foreign policymaking establishment. The Yugoslav conflict was one of the first and most important examples of how certain foreign interest groups and their supporters in the United States, were able to tap into this system and play out a war of words in Washington that greatly influenced U.S. actions in the Balkan region. Sremac goes behind the rhetoric and propaganda to reveal how Yugoslavia's Bosnian Muslim, Croat, and Albanian ethnic factions sought to win the heart of Washington and draw U.S. military intervention to help them fight a war against their foe -- the Serbs. The U.S. media was more than willing to promote the cause of these warring parties and, as a result, had a profound influence on Washington's view of Yugoslav ethnic clashes. The author offers a penetrating look at how media-generated images of Yugoslav ethnic conflicts from 1991 to 1999 hindered Washington's ability to understand the region's complex problems and made U.S. foreign policy a reflection of sound bites rather than sound reasoning. A controversial look at Washington, the media, and the Balkans, this book will be of interest to all concerned individuals, scholars, and others who want to gain a behind-the-scenes understanding of what really happened in the Yugoslav conflict, and explore more alarming trends in Washington that continue to encourage U.S. interventionism in ethnic conflicts today.
Customer Reviews:
Porrly written.......2007-10-03
Nothing in this book references back to the historic facts about the Bosnian right to independence, freedom, and democracy. Book has failed on numerous accounts to provide the overview of true causes of war and agression on Bosnia.
Sremac's Fantasy.......2004-02-15
War of Words is an amazing piece of racist propaganda matched only by the fantasy-laden accounts of the wars in Yugoslavia which came from Belgrade's state-run media, or the version of the war in Iraq as told by the Iraqi information minister. Sremac is not only a representative of the Serbian government, hardly making her account unbaised, but fails to account for aspects of the Bosnian war (such as the starvation and murder of Muslim prisoners in detention camps) which were confirmed by witnesses from dozens of relief organizations and media groups, as well as thousands of tesitmonials at the UN warcrimes tribunals. Sremac further claims that Washington's motivation for supprting the Muslims was based on some crazy desire to intervene in countires after the cold war (laughable is you know anything about Clinton's record of intervention, or if you examine how long it took Washington to intervene in Bosnia and under what conditions). She relies on the accounts of the war from such indicted criminal murderers as Radovan Karadzic, and subscribes to common Serbian attempts to blame the victim of genocide for Serbia's vile crimes. If you want to know what it is like to read some nice racist fiction, or experience Balkan duplicity firsthand, pick this work up, glance it over, burn it, and then scold yourself for having put money in the pockets of somebody like Sremac. Further, the people on this site who wrote rave reviews of this book are probably either ultranationalist members of the Serbian parliament or themselves indicted war criminals hiding in Pale.
Subjectivity vs. Objectivity.......2004-02-01
Danielle Sremac was a registered agent lobbying on behalf of a foreign government, namely, the Yugoslav (Serbian and Montenegrin governments) during the wars of the 1990s. This can be looked up in public records, as proscribed by law.
She is more than entitled to write a book about the wars, but one must exercise caution as to the content of her book. If this woman was lobbying on behalf of indicted and convicted war criminals, then much of her case would be higly suspect from the beginning.
Serb Propaganda.......2000-06-30
This is a great book if you prefer to hear the Serb version of the Bosnian War and the Kosovo conflict. Sremac does a great job of painting a picture of innocent Serbs and blood-thirsty Muslims and Croats. She condemns Western media for their "tendencies" to report from only one side(Muslims and Albanians), yet she nelects to find error with the reporting of the wars from the Serb propaganda machine in Belgrade. This book goes so far to claim that the death toll of Muslims and Croats was exaggerated and that the seige of Sarajevo was more detrimental to the innocent Serbs rather than the many citizens who lost their lives on Sniper Alley . The Serb mentality of Us Against the World is blatantly lined through all aspects of this book.
Engineering the destruction of Yugoslavia: A Blueprint.......2000-01-22
Sremac concisely and without any sign of "nationalism" documents the campaign which led to the breakup of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Those of us who have closely followed these events have had our memories refreshed. It is to be hoped that those who were totally sold on the media version may once they have read the book enjoy a change of perception of these events. The book can certainly act as a primer to assist readers in translation of popular media stories in the future.
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- Bomb Scare: The History and Future of Nuclear Weapons
- Chief of Station, Congo: Fighting the Cold War in a Hot Zone
- Chief of Station, Congo: Fighting the Cold War in a Hot Zone
- Cold War Submarines: The Design and Construction of U.S. and Soviet Submarines, 1945-2001
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