"Heavely Serbia: From Myth to Genocide" by Bramimir Anzulovic [3]

CHAPTER ONE: HEAVENLY SERBIA

The Birth of the Myth

I'm assuming that most readers of this blog already know about the Battle of Kosovo, the myths that surround it, and the long tradition of Serbian folk poetry and folk singers. Anzulovic briefly details how stories of that battle were transmitted through the ages--and transformed into a mythic/religious version of events, complete with a "Last Supper" and so forth.

Unheavenly Heroes

This section examines the troubling nature and brutal moral code of Milos Obilic (who, according the legend, used deceit to kill Sultan Murat, among other exploits) and the popular folk hero Prince Marko. It is no exaggeration to say that Marko is a bloodthirsty sadist and a stunningly callous misogynist to boot--the few examples Anzulovic provides of Marko's treatment of women, including his own wife, are absolutely loathsome. He was also, it is important to note, a frequent collaborator with the Ottomans.

Anzulovic notes that the Marko songs were popular in Ottoman-controlled regions in the first few centuries after the conquest, when life was actually pretty good and the Orthodox Church was prospering under Turkish rule, while the Obilic songs were popular in areas outside of Turkish control, and then later within those areas as economic conditions for Serbs declined and resentment, and later nationalist agitation, increased greatly. At the same time, folk singers

"...made Marko less brutal and more patriotic, so that both Marko and Obilic were seen as heroes of Serbian resistance against the Turks."

The Byzantine Heritage

Anzulovic considers the effect of the Byzantine legacy on Serbian nationalism. He points out the violence and cruelty in Byzantine culture (the regularity of assassination, mutilation, and the murder of families as a way of changing rulers, for example) but then points out there was violence aplenty in Western Europe; he also notes the high level of culture in the empire, as well as the relatively high status and level of rights afforded to women.

He also notes the important civilizing influence the empire had, and how central Christianity was to that effort. While I prefer not to get into a discussion on the value of religious belief, I will note that I do not agree with the author's premise that the "basic message" of Christianity and other religions, is essentially a good one. Be that as it may, he does believe that moral integrity of a religion becomes threatened once a religion becomes powerful. And in Byzantium, the church became subordinate to the state, losing its independence and therefore much of its moral and spiritual authority.

Not completely, though, since Byzantine society was genuinely and devoutly religious, so that state authorities always had to be somewhat deferential to ecclesiastical authority. The monastic orders had much more freedom from the state than the court-appointed patriarchs and bishops.

The formation of autocephalous Bulgarian and Serbian churches strengthened those growing states and their autonomy from Byzantine control; the Byzantine church increasingly became a "Greek" church. The "national" churches helped encourage division in the Orthodox world, as opposed to the universalist tendencies of the Roman Catholic church in the West.

It is also worth noting that the Serbs took the "state-heaven" relationship of Byzantium one step further; while Byzantines felt that the emperor and his court were heavenly and ordained by God, the Serbs felt that it was the nation itself that held this distinction. Anzulovic concludes this section with this paragraph:

"In authentic Christian thought the Church, that is, the community of believers, constitutes the mystical body of Christ. The identification of the church with the nation favors instead the concept of the nation as the mystical body."

Saint-Savaism: Radical Nationalization of a Church

This final section discusses the legacy of Saint Sava, the founder of the Serbian Church and the Nemanja dynasty; of the fifty-nine saints particular to Serbian Orthodoxy, twenty-six were rulers of members of ruling families.

This identification with the state outlasted the fall of the state itself--the church had a high status under Ottoman rule, and became the repository and conduit for national identity and myth. The church was much more concerned with culture and "quasi-politics" than with theology or spiritual matters. At the same time, the church did lose some power, prestige, and resources, leading to an upsurge in pagan practices and ideas, which became encoded into Serbian society and culture. Pagan notions of anger and revenge became fused with Christianity, so that some saints became celebrated for "unsaintly" behavior.

Anzulovic concludes this section, and this chapter--after a short examination of the irrelgious nature of Serb society from many, many years prior to Communism or even statehood--with a consideration of the propensity of Orthodoxy to accommodate totalitarianism, since the faith has a long tradition of "deifying the state." Among the Serbs, the particular blend of state, church, and nation often referred to by the Serbs themselves as "Saint-Savaism" is the most extreme example of this tendency.

"Heavenly Serbia: From Myth to Genocide" by Branimir Anzulovic [2]

INTRODUCTION

After noting that lamenting the loss of Kosovo has been a genuine element of Serbian culture for quite some time, the author further acknowledges that "significant loss of power is always a traumatic event." This is fair, as is the following observation that the "strong expansionist trend" Serbia displayed after gaining independence was typical of the countries which achieved independence as nation-states in the nineteenth century "after a long period of foreign domination or political fragmentation." It is important to maintain a measure of balance and to avoid demonizing an entire nation or group. One of the primary themes of this blog is the evil of collectivism, specifically collective guilt. Any attempt to deal with recent events in the former Yugoslavia, unfortunately, risks charges of being "anti-Serb" from various hysterical factions. I want to take special care not to lend any legitimacy to such charges.

At any rate, Anzulovic is careful to note that theories of a certain "fascist psychology" are wanting at best; the psychological impulse we need to understand is not some individual pathology shared by many members of a particular group but rather the universal trait of strong group membership, a trait which is not exclusive to our species but which in our case may have outlived its evolutionary usefulness. There is a pathology at work, but it is not an abnormal psychological trait peculiar to members of a particular group. The author notes:

"Thus, the primary driving force leading to genocide is not the pathology of the individuals organizing and committing the genocide, but the pathology of the ideas guiding them."

Anzulovic wants to examine how

"the old myth of an innocent, suffering Serbia, and the concomitant myth of foreign evildoers who conspire against its very existence influened the behavior of Serbs at the close of the twentieth century."

The rest of introduction summarizes each chapter rather neatly; if you ever come across a copy of this book while remaining unsure if you want to read it, I encourage you to at least read the Introduction, which serves to at least encapsulate the theme Anzulovic covers.

"Heavenly Serbia: From Myth to Genocide" by Branimir Anzulovic [1]

I am reading Heavenly Serbia: From Myth to Genocide by Branimir Anzulovic. The inside jacket states:

"In the 1990s Serbs brought death and destruction to Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosovo, and international condemnation on themselves. Heavenly Serbia searches for the causes behind the brutal and futile drive for a Greater Serbia. How did the Serbs rationalize, and rally support for, their genocidal activity?"

As you would guess from the title of the book, Anzulovic explains the violent expansionism of 1990s Serbs as an expression of their peculiar national mythology. Most readers of this blog will most likely already be familiar with the Kosovo myth, of Prince Lazar choosing the heavenly kingdom, the murder of Sultan Murat by Milos Obilic, and so on; as well as the tradition of oral poetry, The Mountain Wreath by Prince Njegos (and its genocidal theme), the the unique melding of nation, church, and state in the Orthodox world ; and so on. Therefore, I will not review this book on a page-by-page or at least section-by-section (within chapters) as I often do.

However, this excellent book does examine some aspects of Serbian and south Slavic culture and history which don't often receive attention in popular Western books on the subject, or at least the author manages to achieve a fresh and novel insight into what might at first seem to be well-trod ground.

Therefore, I intend to touch on and discuss at least a portion of what is novel and uniquely insightful in Anzulovic's book. I will begin doing so in my next post.

"Divide and Fall?" by Radha Kumar--Chapter Five

CHAPTER FIVE: PEACE MAKING 1992 ONWARDS

This chapter details the mostly disappointing peacemaking efforts in Northern Ireland, Cyprus, and Palestine in the years leading up to, during, and immediately after the Bosnian war, and compares the varying failings of partition-based peacekeeping in order to extrapolate lessons which could be applied to Bosnia and for the future.

It's good reading, but time is getting away from me and I think it would be best to stick to Bosnia and simply conclude my brief consideration of Kumar's book by saying, again, that it is a worthy read--not least because she cuts through a lot of the bogus certainties and truisms which served to cloud international debate on Bosnia. Her focus on concrete policy decisions and specific actions taken by domestic and foreign agents would be very instructive to any casual observers who dismiss international mediation in infamous hotspots like Bosnia, Palestine, and so on as being doomed.

Evil Imperialists Plot to Violate Sovereignty of Non-Western Nation...or something

Brief TIME magazine article on the possible need to invade Burma/Myanmar*:

Is it Time to Invade Burma?

After the debacle of Bosnia, the shame of Rwanda, the ongoing disgrace of Darfur, and the stale and outdated debate on Iraq, I was afraid the the ideal of humanitarian intervention--a necessary step on the road to the globalization of human rights and a truly international standard of citizenship--would be tossed onto the scrapbook of failed idealisms.

Yet reality has a funny way of butting into the dialog, so it was strangely thrilling--even in the context of this horrible natural tragedy and the disgraceful way the junta is willing to sacrifice the citizens of that long-suffering nation--to read this comment:

"We're in 2008, not 1908," says Jan Egeland, the former U.N. emergency relief coordinator. "A lot is at stake here. If we let them get away with murder we may set a very dangerous precedent."

In other words, the "dangerous precedent" would not be the invasion of a sovereign nation; rather, it would be allowing the government of that sovereign nation to inflict even greater suffering on its people--and put the world at risk by allowing a huge outbreak of infectious disease.

One can almost feel the rocking of ground underneath; could this tragedy provide the tipping point needed to regain the high ground from the new isolationists and the faux-progressive "anti-imperialists" with their specious defenses of sovereignty and the use of "non-intervention" as the last-ditch justification for anti-Western authoritarian regimes?

I eagerly await reading Diana Johnstone, Michael Parenti, and the rest of that lot jumping on this issue. The legal and moral issues, I am quite sure, will fascinate them all.

Or maybe not.


*I am not comfortable with allowing the vicious junta to rename the country, diplomatic protocol aside.

"Divide And Fall?" by Radha Kumar--Chapter Four [2]

CHAPTER FOUR: ...TO DIVIDE AND FALL?

The second half of Chapter Four details the rather depressing story of the Dayton-sanctioned elections which were (I would say rashly) planned within a few months after the war ended.

Again, my review is very perfunctory, but only because there is little use in summarizing a blow-for-blow version of Kumar's very well-written and comprehensive account; I have no intention of creating a Reader's Digest/Cliff Notes version of her book. I strongly recommend reading it; it's a quick and worthy read.

The elections went about as badly as one would expect given the circumstances; I will only add that the main two sticking points ended up being Mostar, where the Herzegovinan mafia HDZ hardliners were still busy finishing the ethnic cleansing of their half of the city; and Brcko, where the the demographics had been completely altered by ethnic cleansing in favor of Serbs but the Croats and Bosniaks* teamed up, even from exile.

Apologies again if my review has been so brief as to be nearly useless, but I have no qualms with Kumar's analysis or major themes, and the book is rather narrative in format.


*Don't think I'm not reading your comments, Daniel!

"Divide and Fall?" by Radha Kumar--Chapter Four [1]

CHAPTER FOUR: ...TO DIVIDE AND FALL?

The first half of this chapter discusses the violent and discouraging first few months after Dayton, as the international community struggled to implement Dayton with inadequate forces and resources. Jockeying for power between the three main parties--and sometimes within those parties (such as the continuing rift between Izetbegovic and Silajdic)--continued both at the negotiating tables and on the ground, as troops changed uniforms from soldiers to police officers ostensibly enforcing law, order, and the equal treatment of all citizens.

Lawlessness was rampant, and organized gangs of thugs implemented ethnic cleansing in areas marked for transfer from one entity to another. The entrenchment of organized criminal gangs became a real issue, notably--but not solely--in western Herzegovina. And through it all, the international organizations found their mandates limited, sometimes forced to rely on local authorities who had no interest in aiding the successful implementation of Dayton. Sarajevo was further cleansed, as thousands of Serbs--terrorized both by the legitimate fear of retribution and exploitation at the hands of Muslim gangs, and by hysterical propaganda and strongarm tactics encouraging flight by the SDS--left the suburbs due to be returned to the Federation.

The agreement to end the war was furthering, and possibly solidifying, the work of ethnic partition.

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I will summarize the second half of this chapter in my next post.