Name:	copperline -	Reply
Subject:	A rant to bring in the New Year
Date:	1/3/2016 7:34:46 AM

       I am just back from spending 3 weeks in the Balkans (Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, and Serbia) where I was traveling with my wife and friends Barb & Leo. Going into Eastern Europe has been on my bucket list for a while now, I have always wanted to see for myself this place where East meets West and waves of historic cultural clashes seem to be never ending. It’s a place of tremendous diversity because of all that history… dating back to the Illyrians, the Greeks and Romans… invaded by the Ottomans, the Austro-Hungarians, Nazi Germany and Soviet Communists. Every one of them left their mark.
        It’s a place of contradictions to outsiders like me. They are people with a whole different perspective on history than I have, you can feel the strained alliances between people who at various points in time could be friends and then enemies. The Bosnian Serb who assassinated Archduke Ferdinand (thus leading to WWI) is considered to be a national hero by Serbians, and you can buy T-shirts honoring Vladimir Putin as well as Marshall Tito in the square. These people have a really different historical memory than I do and can identify themselves within histories that date back centuries… and not just a few decades like us.
        They are now just 20 years post-civil war, barely enough time for one generation to begin to reflect on what happened… and it was really interesting to me to see how they are attempting to knit together all those points of view into some sort of reconciliation. No one I talked to thought their differences were resolved, only that the necessary agreements had been made to end their violent national psychosis. To this end, the Croats still think that the Serbs were invaders, the Serbs thought they were fighting for national unity after Yugoslavia broke apart, & the Bosnians feared both of them. It must have been chaos and remains horribly complex today… the contradictions are everywhere. Croats joined the Serbs in attacking Kosovo & Bosnia, then split apart to fight each other. Montenegrins fought with the Serbs but still wanted to separate into their own country. Sarajevo was surrounded and under siege for a year by the Serbs who bombed ancient cities like Mostar into rubble even though there seemed little military reason to do so. The tiny Montenegrin Navy shelled the beautiful old city of Dubrovnik with it’s 15th century fortress for the sole purpose of forcing people to flee. In Mostar, I sat for a while in a small children’s park that had become a graveyard during a time when there were too many snipers to risk burying the dead anywhere else. And in Belgrade, I met the US Air Force Attaché whose job is repairing relations with the same Serbians his forces were dropping bombs on just a few short years ago.
        National prejudices still remain. Croats resent the Serbs’ violence, Serbs will tell you that the Croats operated concentration camps. Everyone thinks the Montenegrins are lazy, while at the same time will tell you they are passionate fighters who have successfully fought back invading armies for centuries. Croatian Catholics still look askance at Serbian Orthodox Christians, and Muslims hold on to their traditions while dressing like everyone else….remembering that no matter which type of Christian comes to kill you, you are just as dead. One thing is for sure, these people understand that their cultural differences can create a violent storm that won’t spare anyone when it erupts. They get that, they remember how old hatreds killed their families and left nothing gained.
       They are just like us, but then not like us at all. They understand war in ways we do not, this leads them to carefully discuss their disagreements in terms that leave an opening for reconciliation. Many of the questions like “who was responsible for this?” remain unanswered for the simple reason that pressing for a conclusion will lead them right back into the hell they are trying to avoid. They accept that much is not resolved, live with their differences, and are sensitive about how they present their Point of View to neighbors and strangers alike.
        Their common ground seems to be that they all know how much is at stake.

         The visit into rural Serbia was the most powerful for me. We set out to visit Pranjani, a small village about 3 hours south of Belgrade which was the site of the largest successful evacuation of downed airmen in WWII. Our friend Leo’s dad had been shot down there in 1944, and at 27 years old found himself the commanding officer of around 250 men who were sheltering in the mountains with the help of villagers and Chetnik resistance fighters. Interested readers can google “Operation Halyard” for details. Leo wanted to return to the site where his father’s career got off the ground, so to speak.
           Pranjani is a small village surrounded by farm land and pastures, where the average family lives on about $300 (US) per month. They raise sheep & vegetables in the best soil I have even seen in my life, make some really good cheese and a potent plum brandy they call Rakia. Everyone loves Rakia, and no glass remains empty for long.
           It was a surprise to me that when we contacted the Embassy for advice on visiting Pranjani, the Air Force Attache’ volunteered to take us there. (This was more fortunate for us than we knew, since his skills as a jet jockey were absolutely necessary for driving on Serbian roadways). In arranging our visit, he sent word to the village that we were coming and this caused a fair stir in an otherwise quiet day as they prepared to celebrate Orthodox Christmas on January 7. We were greeted by the Mayor, led to a visit of the school by the Principal, discussed the history of the Halyard Mission with surviving sons of the village, got a blessing from the Orthodox Priest, shown thru the school gymnasium and health center that had been funded by the Embassy and on to the corn field that was a disguised airstrip during the evacuations. Pranjani is justifiably proud of their efforts to save all those airmen, ultimately some 450+ were airlifted out under the noses of German occupiers during the Fall of 1944. That’s 450 guys who went on to father children and grandchildren, allowing perhaps thousands of descendants to have lives today.
           I have to admit the visit was overwhelming. Just being around people who described risking everything to save complete strangers, who put their children’s lives on the line to provide food & shelter for those foreigners …. I don’t think I have ever been in the presence of such generosity and bravery. Hugs and Rakia were everywhere. It was definitely not the tough & aggressive Serbians I had prepared myself for.
          It is odd to think that just 70 years after this kind of sacrifice & generosity, that these same people were fighting their Bosnian & Kosovo neighbors just to their south and west in the 1990’s. When you ask them about it, they will tell you that the people were persuaded by ambitious politicians who ginned up old fears & prejudices until they took up arms against one another. Each side then slaughtered and inflicted as much damage as they could until they were exhausted. Left alone, they had been living together for centuries… intermarriage between Christians and Muslims was as high as 35% in the region before the war broke out. But partisan politics led them to war with each other, and never settled any differences between them at all. The best they could do was to stop fighting, and go back to living day to day in spite of their differences.
         That was the lesson of Pranjani to me. These people understand in the most direct terms what political divisions can do to their world and how people can fool themselves into following leaders off cliffs. They understand that the peace they enjoy is not so permanent nor so solid that it can’t be ripped away, replaced by chaos and horror. Clearly, it’s not that they have resolved their differences, they are focused on avoiding the next war with each other. Peace requires them to be tolerant and measured in their reactions to one another.     Rakia tastes good to everybody and makes for good company when shared liberally.

          Peace & Happy New Year to all.     End of rant.

Name:	Buteye -	Reply
Subject:	A rant to bring in the New Year
Date:	1/3/2016 10:30:19 AM

What a wonderful summation of your trip. I was never into understanding very much about ancient history, but your story makes me want to spend some time in my later years to learn more. I intend to give a copy to each of my five grandchildren in hopes it will help instill in them a desire to be a little more receptive to their study of ancient history. Thanks for sharing your experiences!

Name:	rude evin -	Reply
Subject:	A rant to bring in the New Year
Date:	1/3/2016 5:34:10 PM

Enjoyed your "rant"and observations. I guess we're all getting to the age when we have finally begun to appreciate the study of history years after our teachers and professors tried in vain to teach us something other than dates and events!

Just back from a trip (this summer) from France and a cruise on the Med that caused me to do some crash course reading so I could at least understand the broarder world......funny thing this did.......I have just picked a small book from the library on the French Revolution. I do not remember any courses on this from any of my schooling, so it has been an interesting read so far.

Also, as to the subject of your rant.......I will try to post an article I just read today on the Bosinian conflict that will shed some light from the stand point of what our gov't did in the '90's on this conflict. This is not to make a political point, but to simply add some info to your journey.

If this fails, go to americanthinker.com and look for "Clinton's Bosnia Adventure goes South".  

Cheers.americanthinker.com