The Dismantling of Yugoslavia: A Study in Inhumanitarian Intervention

The Dismantling
of Yugoslavia: A Study in Inhumanitarian Intervention (and a Western
Liberal-Left Intellectual and Moral Collapse)

Edward S. Herman and David Peterson

Part I | Part II | Part
III | Part IV | Notes | Glossary | Timeline

Part I :

The breakup of Yugoslavia provided the fodder for what may have been the
most misrepresented series of major events over the past twenty years. The
journalistic and historical narratives that were imposed upon these wars have
systematically distorted their nature, and were deeply prejudicial, downplaying
the external factors that drove Yugoslavia’s breakup while selectively
exaggerating and misrepresenting the internal factors. Perhaps no civil
wars—and Yugoslavia suffered multiple civil wars across several theaters, at
least two of which remain unresolved—have ever been harvested as cynically by
foreign powers to establish legal precedents and new categories of
international duties and norms. Nor have any other civil wars been turned into
such a proving ground for the related notions of “humanitarian intervention”
and the “right [or responsibility] to protect.” Yugoslavia’s conflicts were not
so much mediated by foreign powers as they were inflamed and exploited by them
to advance policy goals. The result was a tsunami of lies and
misrepresentations in whose wake the world is still reeling.

………… “Why would Serbs be expelling Croatians
from Croatia if they’re not expelling them from Serbia?” Markovic asked the
court. “Why would Serbs be expelling Albanians from Kosovo if they’re not
expelling them from Belgrade and other parts of Serbia?.........

CONTINUED: http://www.monthlyreview.org/1007herman-peterson1.htm

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