Louis Proyect review of Diana Johnstone's "Fools' Crusade"

A couple of weeks ago, American Marxist Louis Proyect left a short and rather cryptic comment, on my blog. I was curious to see what I might have written to draw his attention, since while he has written from time to time on the Balkans (from a predictably far-left Serbian-apologist perspective), he hasn't been particularly active in the Balkan revisionist project. Then I stumbled across his review of Diana Johnstone's "Fools' Crusade from the "Swans" website.

I had originally planned to consider this review at length, but considering that I devoted several months of my life to critiquing the original book, and considering that I have been so busy lately I have waited over a week to begin this review (despite the date of this post, I am actually writing this on Wednesday, March 19), I thought it best to simply make a note of his review and move on.

I am not sure how much of this chapter-by-chapter review represents Proyect's own "understanding" of the breakdown of Yugoslavia as opposed to simply a synopsis of Johnstone's text. I suspect that the distinction is pointless--they are clearly drinking from the same well, although Proyect's take on matters is more explicitly Marxist. He is honest enough to label Johnstone's portrayal of ethnic Albanians as "unsentimental," which is putting it rather mildly.

There may be little point in linking to this article now that I've chosen to pass on an extended rebuttal (at least for now), except an yet another piece of evidence that an alternate narrative of the Yugoslav wars has indeed taken root in certain intellectual circles. I mention this because I was reading the introduction to Christopher Hedges seemingly dreadful I Don't Believe in Atheists out of curiosity, and I was struck by Hedges angry denial that religion played any part in the Yugoslav wars; rather, he insisted that they were entirely a product of the economic decline of Yugoslavia. When a somewhat-mainstream liberal is parroting the Susan Woodward/Diana Johnstone line, we know we have a problem.

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I hope to return to more regular and substantive blogging in the very near future.

"Fools' Crusade" Closing Thoughts

Reading "Fools' Crusade" has not been an enjoyable experience, but it has been an enlightening experience--although not, you may be assured, for the reasons author Diana Johnstone intended. I think I understand the motivations behind Bosnian revisionism better than I did before--and they have nothing to do with the truth, or even with defending the cause of Serbian nationalism. As I said before, I don't think Diana Johnstone gives a damn about Serbia or Serbs.

The motivation behind "Fools' Crusade" is simply naked, unrefined anti-Western propaganda. After reading her entire book, painstakingly, and going over each section repeatedly, I detect no other unifying theme. She thinks that her theme is "anti-globalization," yet I have no doubt that Johnstone would be hard-pressed to express what anti-globalization is, other than opposition to alleged American hegemony in the service of global capital.

This is a depressing book, and that is why--Johnstone has no vision of How Things Should Be. Actually, that's not completely accurate, since by reading this book the reader can fairly confidently work out a vision of global order that Ms. Johnstone would approve of.

It would be a world in which the power of the United States and its allies is curtailed at every turn; but various anti-Western rogue nations and petty autocratic regimes are free to act against captive populations at will, and to poison the stability in their regions without fear of reprisal. It is a world in which a vigorous and forceful response by Western-led coalitions to world crises is simply not possible, but instead an ineffective United Nations has a monopoly on the right to intervene in world affairs.

It is a world in which the sovereignty of states is the highest moral good, and trumps the rights and indeed the lives of individuals and populations within a dysfunctional or genocidal nation-state.

It is a world in which the best thing that can be said about a nation's political leadership is that it remains outside of American influence. Where standing up the United States and the West is an automatic good, no matter what atrocities are committed.

It is a world in which competing centers of power are to be applauded, no matter what methods or ruling methods such a challenge to the USA embodies.

We don't have to try very hard to imagine such a world. We don't have to try at all. If you want to see the world as Diana Johnstone thinks it should be, you need only to find images from yesterday's news in Darfur. In the westernmost province of Sudan, a genocide has been carried out under the world's eye; carried out by a regime that knows that the United Nations will always give it one more chance as long as they make token moves and symbolic compromises. A regime that knows that, with Chinese capital behind it, it does not need to kowtow to American pressure or pay lip service to Western sensibilities.

At one point, I believed I would be summarizing this book by saying that it ultimately amounted to no more than a long series of random negatives--that Diana Johnstone knows what she is against, and knows how to take frequent potshots at the West she so clearly despises. But now I see that I was wrong. It was bad enough when I thought this book was simply a reductionist manifesto; a paean to reflexive anti-Americanism. And yet, it's even worse.

"Fools' Crusade" is a book-length attack on secularism, individual rights, and the ambiguities and complexities of truly tolerant and cosmopolitan living. As disheartening and ugly as those sentiments are, the implicit message of the book is even worse. The most damning thing you can say about "Fools' Crusade" is simply to articulate and clarify the implications of her critique. In her turgid chronicle of revisionist lies, we saw all that Johnstone holds in in contempt. In the burning villages of Darfur, we see a terrifying vision of the world ordered as she believes it should be.

"Fools' Crusade" Postscript: Perpetual War [3]

POSTSCRIPT: PERPETUAL WAR

PARTNERS IN CRIME

The "partners" in the title of this section refer to the NATO allies allegedly duped into cooperating with the United States; the "crime" refers to the plot to "destroy Yugoslavia." If that seems more than a little off, wait until you read the opening sentence:

"The NATO war against Yugoslavia might be studied by ethnologists as a contemporary example of the familiar role of blood rituals in sealing the unity of groups."

Feel free to re-read that sentence again; I'm sure most of you experienced some sort of double-take. I certainly did. Please note--I am not discounting the possibility that modern nation-states are incapable of participating in pre-modern rites and rituals. There are continuities of human existence and human societies which can and should humble the hubris of contemporary humanity. That is not the point--the point is more specific--is this true? I think that anyone with even a shred of respect for the facts and the truth knows that the answer is 'No'.

This imagined blood ritual, Johnstone believes, bound the NATO countries into a collusion with an aggressive United States "even if they secretly knew better." She compares this enforced, guilt-ridden solidarity to the racist imperial ideologies of the 19th Century.

Having established the self-evident truth of this thesis in her own mind, Johnstone then proceeds to detail a "dangerous precedent" set by NATO involvement in Yugoslavia. She goes so far as to call this delusional pattern a "formula for transforming contemporary internal conflicts into pretexts for military intervention." The "formula" is as followed [each point is the first sentence from the original text; this is all quotes]:

1. Economic "reforms" weaken the state.
2. The weakening of the central state aggravates ethnic or regional particularities and conflicts.
3. The ethnic troubles are interpreted as a "human rights crisis."
4. The United States and/or NATO go to war to resolve the alleged "human rights crisis."
5. The resulting chaos is turned over to an "International Community."

If you have been following me through the preceding 261 dreary pages, you can fill in the rest of the text on each point (each are a short paragraph). We have already seen this entire "argument" developed at length throughout this book. There is no point in slogging our way through her twisted logic and revisionist retelling one more time; instead, ask yourself one question--what would Johnstone's reaction be if the United States and NATO did what should have been done years ago, and gone into Darfur to put a stop to the genocide there? Would she apply the same "formula" to a Western-led intervention to save the impoverished black Muslims of western Sudan?

Here's hoping we find the answer soon, by the way.

The section closes with a long paragraph that asserts that:

"The unilateral procedures adopted by NATO for Yugoslavia amounted to asserting a Western monopoly on determining what is a "humanitarian catastrophe" and what should be done about it. A genuine, unquestioned humanitarian emergency could be dealt with legally through the United Nations."

The first sentence involves an odd sort of circular reasoning--there is apparently something wrong with Western societies determining how they interpret and respond to global events. The second sentence is, of course, highly ironic given the counterproductive and anemic actions of the United Nations in Bosnia, Rwanda, and now Sudan. While Johnstone parses factually unsubstantiated hypothetical situations and abstract legalisms, people continue to die under the watchful eye of the "lawful" United Nations.

The section ends with Johnstone asking:

"What is to stop a ruthless group, ready to sacrifice some of its own people to reach its goals of taking power over a territory, from staging fake massacres in order to gain the prinze of being able to "use NATO as its air force"?

No bonus points for whoever guesses what she's implying here. General MacKenzie and her should do lunch sometime.