Date: Thu, 12 Mar 1998 12:41:52 +0000 From: James Heartfield <James-AT-heartfield.demon.co.uk> Subject: Re: M-TH: Balkan conflicts In message <l03020919b12d758b5456-AT-[130.244.113.41]>, Hugh Rodwell <m- 14970-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se> writes >The people of Bosnia were forced into this position by the >reactionary chauvinist policies of Serbia and Croatia which wanted nothing >more than to divide Bosnia up between them and cannibalize it. Which 'people of Bosnia'? This state is evenly divided between those who favour independence, union with Croatia and the maintenance of the Yugoslav federation. The referendum for national independence was supported by a minority of the population. Independence was led by a political leadership whose explicit hostility to its Serb minority guaranteed that they could never willingly embrace an independent Bosnia. >The question is not German/US rivalry, although that has a part to play. >The question >is what was the effect on the class struggle in this region with the >collapse of the Stalinist bureaucracy and its capitulation to imperialism? >What leaderships were there with what policies to lead the popular and >working-class struggles against imperialist exploitation and repression? >Thanks to the dereliction of most currents of the left, there was a vacuum >of revolutionary leadership with any understanding of the unsolved >bourgeois democratic issues involved -- national liberation, democratic >rights etc. The vacuum was filled by bourgeois and petty-bourgeois forces >creating the carnage and filth we've been witnessing ever since. Translation: 'The question is not what happened, but how can we force these real events into the strait-jacket of rigid formula taken from the past'. But the class struggle was of a necessarily underdeveloped character in this backward part of Europe, and subject to the excessive influence of the Western powers. Elites in the former Yugoslavia sought out Western sponsorship as Croatia did with Germany and Haris Siladzic did with the US. Trying to force these real-world events into these dry formulae only succeeds in turning class itself into an empty abstraction - and one that lets imperialism off the hook by heaping the blame on 'Serb aggression'. >National oppression can never be justified by the "peace of the graveyard" >argument that at least Soviet, US, British or Yugoslav domination kept >things quiet while it was in place. Here Hugh is letting his imagination get the better of him. There was no popular national movement in Bosnia, Croatia or Slovenia throughout the post war years. What the partisan movement represented was the unity of the South slavs against imperialist intervention. Imperialism sought to divide the Yugoslavs to rule them, but failed. The post-war settlement was built upon the enduring popular appeal of Yugoslav unity. However, Tito's inability to develop the region meant that his authority depended more and more on the distribution of offices and resources along national lines. The national movements within the Yugoslav federation were of an entirely elite character, and only realy emerged in the seventies. The impact of the market under 'liberalisation' policies, and in particular German investment, meant that the wealthier regions of Slovenia and Croatia developed an increasingly hostile attitude to the Yugolsav federation. The principle complaint of these Slovene and Croat nationalists was that they were being bled dry by excessive taxes to fund underperforming regions like Serbia, Macedonia, Montengro and Bosnia. As to Bosnian 'nationalism' this is the most artificial of all movements in the region. Apart from some Islamic movements in the seventies and eighties, Bosnia was relatively free of national sentiment, largely because of its mixed character. The demand for independence was entirely a product of the elites in Sarajevo orienting themselves towards the West. An independent state appealed to them only because it would have made a better platform from which to negotiate aid directly with the Western powers. This weas a movement that was entirely sponsored in Washington, that failed to enjoin the support of even a majority of the population caught within the administrative region called Bosnia. >James is singing a hymn to the >imprisonment of nations and making an implicit demand for the return of the >Raj -- I mean look at all the bloodshed between India and Pakistan, between >Hindu and Muslim that a continued British presence would have avoided! Hugh's rhetoric inverts reality. In the real world, the minority Bosnian 'goverment' appealed to the West to intervene and occupy Bosnia. Today Bosnia is a UN protectorate with the blessing of the muslim leadership in Sarajevo. Under constitution imposed by Siladzic's US sponsors, the highest authority in the land is the 'UN High Representative'. This constitution sets out the proviso that the president of the national bank may not be a Bosnian national. The demand for 'Bosnian independence' turns out to be nothing more than a demand for a UN occupation. >How to organize, how to intervene, what policies to put forward and what >slogans to mobilize around. Well, if we want slogans, lets start with no western intervention. -- James Heartfield --- from list marxism-thaxis-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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