Slav vs. Slav

Would you comment on the events in the former Yugoslavia, w hich
constitute the greatest outburst of violence in Europe in fifty years
—tens of thousands killed, hundreds of thousands of refugees. T his
isn’t some remote place like East T imor w e’re talking about—this is
Europe—and it’s on the new s every night.
In a certain sense, w hat’s happening is that the British and
American right w ings are getting w hat they asked for. Since the
1940s they’ve been quite bitter about the fact that Western support
turned to T ito and the partisans, and against Mikailhovich and his
Chetniks, and the Croatian anti-Communists, including the U stasha,
w ho w ere outright Nazis. T he Chetniks w ere also playing w ith the
Nazis and w ere trying to overcome the partisans.
T he partisan victory imposed a communist dictatorship, but it
also federated the country. It suppressed the ethnic violence that
had accompanied the hatreds and created the basis of some sort of
functioning society in w hich the parts had their role. We’re now
essentially back to the 1940s, but w ithout the partisans.
Serbia is the inheritor of the Chetniks and their ideology. Croatia
is the inheritor of the U stasha and its ideology (less ferocious than
the Nazi original, but similar). It’s possible that they’re now carrying
out pretty much w hat they w ould’ve done if the partisans hadn’t
w on.
Of course, the leadership of these elements comes from the
Communist party, but that’s because every thug in the region w ent
into the ruling apparatus. (Yeltsin, for example, w as a Communist
party boss.)
It’s interesting that the right w ing in the West—at least its more
honest elements—defend much of w hat’s happening. For example,
Nora Beloff, a right-w ing British commentator on Yugoslavia, w rote
a letter to the Economist condemning those w ho denounce the
Serbs in Bosnia. She’s saying it’s the fault of the Muslims. T hey’re
refusing to accommodate the Serbs, w ho are just defending
themselves.
She’s been a supporter of the Chetniks from w ay back, so
there’s no reason w hy she shouldn’t continue to support Chetnik
violence (w hich is w hat this amounts to). Of course there may be