I have argued before on this blog--in my review of Diana Johnstone's "Fools' Crusade" for example--that one reason why so many Serb ultra-nationalists and their Western enablers so vigorously deny basic facts about events during the wars in the former Yugoslavia is because the collectivist nature of the nationalist myths they used to fuel and justify those wars erase any concept of individual conscience or accounatability. Because these myths fully embrace a collectivist notion of collective guilt on the part of the "enemies of the Serb nation", they also implicitly accept the notion of collective action, and guilt, on the part of the Serbs themselves.
In this article from The Guardian, Ratko Mladic essentially makes my point for me:
What has been visible since then is a more familiar Mladic, arrogant and demanding, insisting not only on his own innocence but on the shared guilt of all of the Serbian people. "He said: 'You elected [Slobodan] Milosevic, not me. You are all guilty, not me'."
On one level, this is ridiculous. One of the core principles of this blog is that individuals are not primarily or solely members of a collective ethnic, national, or religious group, but rather sovereign individuals who should be equal before the law. But on another level, Mladic is merely taking the collectivist mentality of Serbian ethno-nationalism to its logical conclusion. If ethnic national groups rather than individual citizens are the core foundation of states, then individuals can only be judged as members of their ethnic group. It takes more than elections to make a democratic culture, and in that regard Mladic is speaking more truth than he most likely realizes.
9 comments:
Kirk, Ratko Mladic killed thousands if his own fellow ethnic Serbs in Sarajevo. He bombarded civilian targets without worrying who will get killed. Some 11,000 died in Sarajevo due to Mladic's sniping and shelling -- why doesn't he apologize to his own people?
I liked the report that one of the placards that protesters at the Belgrade rally were carrying said "We are all arrested".
Your post reminded me of the exchange that took place today at Mladic's initial plea hearing:
At one point in the hearing, Mr. Mladic straightened himself and told the court, "I am here defending my country and my people, not Ratko Mladic."
That drew a quick response from Judge Orie: "I would like to remind you that you are charged as an individual."
I find your point well taken. I knew several Serb survivors of the Siege of Sarajevo. They could be and were hit by the četnik snipers the same as anyone else. They were as trapped.
Where is the apology? We only apologize if we think we have done wrong. Mladić does not think he did wrong.
Some of Ratko Mladic video:
http://www.worldwartube.com/video/128/Ratko-Mladic
Why Is NATO In Yugoslavia?--:http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/GER108A.html
Philippe Morillon:
The fall of Srebrenica in 1995 was the "direct reaction" to the massacres of Bosnian Serbs by Naser Oric's forces in 1992-1993. Morillon acknowledged that Oric's troops had committed war crimes in eastern Bosnia. Morillon personally witnessed the exhumation of the bodies of Bosnian Serb civilians and soldiers who had been tortured, mutilated, and executed. He saw with his own eyes the Serbian villages that had been burned to the ground in the Srebrenica pocket. More than anyone else, Morillon understood the level of devastation in eastern Bosnia and the extent and nature of the massacres of Bosnian Serbs.
Max, you're playing the tired old game of blaming the victim for resisting annihilation. Morillon is not an unimpeachable witness.
@Owen:http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO110A.html
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