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myron myron
FemaleFirst Guru
Joined: 07 Sep 2006
Posts: 5863
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 Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 5:02 pm Post subject: |
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| Gibbous Moon wrote: |
It doesn’t necessarily imply that Serbia was intervening in a separate state We intervened in Northern Ireland and the government of the Republic of Ireland took an interest. I think if we’d set about massacring lots of catholic civilians the Republic of Ireland would have been tempted to invade.
The Balkans weren’t the cause of all causes of the 1st World War but they have been a running sore in settling European geo-politics for generations. They act as flash point. In 1914 Russia refusal to treat the Serbian separatist movement as a matter internal to the Austro-Hungarian . and everyone else’s refusal not be dragged in lead the rest of Europe into war. Russia seems to have forgotten nothing and remembered nothing about the last time it got involved in the Balkans.
Spheres of influence is an interestingly 19th Century view of the world. I’m not sure it’s a philosophy I’d like to see continued into the 21st Century.
Anyway who said Kosovo was Russia’s sphere of influence? My view is that Russia has no business getting involved with any state or proto-state that has indicated a desire to accede to the EU.
My view isn’t that we’re bigger than them so they should do as we tell them. My view is that the whole lot of them tend to behave like bandits to each other and that we are right to stop them doing so, especially within or close to the borders of the EU.
GM
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Why are your selective policeman/patriarchal justifications for armed intervention in the domestic affairs of sovereign countries -- international law be damned -- limited to "within or close to the borders of the EU"?
Is NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) a limitation consistent with the self-righteousness you espouse?
Is it right to flout international law in order to avert a civil war that could kill thousands whilst ignoring ongoing mass genocides in the Sudan and elsewhere in Africa that have already killed millions?
Or is disregard for the millions massacred in Africa acceptable because the African people are not white Europeans?
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ILWL
FemaleFirst Guru
Joined: 14 Jul 2006
Posts: 3181
Location: (Grassy) Knowle
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| Posted: Fri Feb 29, 2008 5:50 pm Post subject: |
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| It doesn’t necessarily imply that Serbia was intervening in a separate state We intervened in Northern Ireland and the government of the Republic of Ireland took an interest. I think if we’d set about massacring lots of catholic civilians the Republic of Ireland would have been tempted to invade. |
We were within our rights to intervene in Northern Ireland and lets not forget that the original premise was to actually protect the Catholic Community. As for Eire invading - perhaps that is a fair point however shall we forego playing parlour games with history?
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| They act as flash point. In 1914 Russia refusal to treat the Serbian separatist movement as a matter internal to the Austro-Hungarian |
I can see where you are going with that. However the incident took place in Bosnia and was possibly an act carried out independent of the Serbian state. Also saying that the matter was internal to Austrian . isn't altogether right - I thought that though Sarajevo was within it's 'sphere' this was not Annexed territory but merely territory administered akin to a UN / League of Nations mandate.
That being said:
There was a problem with Nationalism then - why encourage it now?
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| Anyway who said Kosovo was Russia’s sphere of influence? My view is that Russia has no business getting involved with any state or proto-state that has indicated a desire to accede to the EU. |
Russia has a strong connection with the area due to religous and cultural links with the Greeks of Byzantium and the Slavics due to being co-religonists. Western European states have long acknowledged and feared Russia's sentimental designs. Another point is that Yugoslavia was in effect conceeded to USSR under the so called 'Percentages Agreement' which Stalin and Churchill made.
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| Spheres of influence is an interestingly 19th Century view of the world. I’m not sure it’s a philosophy I’d like to see continued into the 21st Century. |
Perhaps so - but you are in effect supporting this concept. I would for the sake of argument surmise that NATO involvement is just a natural evolution of the Sick Man diagnosis. Since you have already mentioned the Ottomans you will know what I mean. |
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Gibbous Moon
FemaleFirst Senior Member (500+ Posts)
Joined: 17 Aug 2006
Posts: 663
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| Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 5:42 pm Post subject: |
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[/quote]
I read that as a long-winded agreement with my point that history is written by the winners.
[/quote]
Naa, as Thucydides might have said, history is written by the literate.
GM |
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Gibbous Moon
FemaleFirst Senior Member (500+ Posts)
Joined: 17 Aug 2006
Posts: 663
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| Posted: Tue Mar 25, 2008 6:01 pm Post subject: |
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| myron myron wrote: |
| Gibbous Moon wrote: |
It doesn’t necessarily imply that Serbia was intervening in a separate state We intervened in Northern Ireland and the government of the Republic of Ireland took an interest. I think if we’d set about massacring lots of catholic civilians the Republic of Ireland would have been tempted to invade.
The Balkans weren’t the cause of all causes of the 1st World War but they have been a running sore in settling European geo-politics for generations. They act as flash point. In 1914 Russia refusal to treat the Serbian separatist movement as a matter internal to the Austro-Hungarian . and everyone else’s refusal not be dragged in lead the rest of Europe into war. Russia seems to have forgotten nothing and remembered nothing about the last time it got involved in the Balkans.
Spheres of influence is an interestingly 19th Century view of the world. I’m not sure it’s a philosophy I’d like to see continued into the 21st Century.
Anyway who said Kosovo was Russia’s sphere of influence? My view is that Russia has no business getting involved with any state or proto-state that has indicated a desire to accede to the EU.
My view isn’t that we’re bigger than them so they should do as we tell them. My view is that the whole lot of them tend to behave like bandits to each other and that we are right to stop them doing so, especially within or close to the borders of the EU.
GM
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Why are your selective policeman/patriarchal justifications for armed intervention in the domestic affairs of sovereign countries -- international law be damned -- limited to "within or close to the borders of the EU"?
Is NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) a limitation consistent with the self-righteousness you espouse?
Is it right to flout international law in order to avert a civil war that could kill thousands whilst ignoring ongoing mass genocides in the Sudan and elsewhere in Africa that have already killed millions?
Or is disregard for the millions massacred in Africa acceptable because the African people are not white Europeans?
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There are three parallel tracks to my support for the intervention in Kosovo. Firstly, there’s a humanitarian argument. One group of humans was being beastly to another and we could stop it. Secondly, there is an internal security and regional stability argument. Tensions in the Balkans tend to get resolved militarily and there is a risk that that will drag EU member states into a war. Civil or otherwise. My view is that anything that happens to an EU state, to a state in the process of acceding to the EU or a state that has declared its intention to accede to the EU is an EU matter. Thirdly, there is a “sit down and shut up” argument which would apply if the Kosovars were raping Bosnian children during a “police action” and should have applied when Croats were putting Serbians in concentration camps.
What distinguishes it from the Sudan is partly the internal security argument but mainly the practicality of the matter. NATO bombers and ground forces can more easily reach the Balkans than the Sudan.
I’m not sure I buy the “civil war” or police action argument. It looked more like banditry to me. Who asked the Kosovars if they wanted to be Serbian? No one is asking England if they mind if Scotland declares independence.
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Cambridge
FemaleFirst Grand Master (1000+ Posts)
Joined: 11 Mar 2008
Posts: 1583
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| Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 4:38 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: |
| The Balkans weren’t the cause of all causes of the 1st World War but they have been a running sore in settling European geo-politics for generations. They act as flash point. In 1914 Russia refusal to treat the Serbian separatist movement as a matter internal to the Austro-Hungarian . and everyone else’s refusal not be dragged in lead the rest of Europe into war. Russia seems to have forgotten nothing and remembered nothing about the last time it got involved in the Balkans. |
The Balkan question goes back far beyond the origins of WWI. The region on the eastern shore of the Adriatic and Ionian seas (i.e., Albania and what used to be lower Yugoslavia) was traditionally the threshold between an Islamic east and a Christian west. A conflict bordering on hatred has always existed between Christian Greeks and Serbs and Muslims in the region. So it’s a kind of no-man’s-land, in which conflict and warfare have gone on in some form for over a thousand years. There are people with doctorates on the politics of this region (the “Balkan question”) and political science departments in universities with sub-specialties in the subject.
When Serbians erupted with their death squads and murderous groups, intent on killing as many Muslims as they could, the civilized world had no choice but to react. Christian Serbs and their compatriots, the Northern Greeks, have always had a program of genocide towards the ethnic Muslims in the region. It’s in their genes (the ugliest insult that a native Serb or Greek can hurl at someone is to call him or her a "turk"). Only Tito kept the lid on the situation in the times that we can remember. However, his death and the dissolution of the Soviet Union unleashed the nasty tendencies of the Christians of the region. With so much study of the question over the past hundred years, it’s a wonder somebody didn’t figure out this would happen before it did. |
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myron myron
FemaleFirst Guru
Joined: 07 Sep 2006
Posts: 5863
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| Posted: Wed Mar 26, 2008 8:25 am Post subject: |
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Talking about genocide in the Balkans without mentioning the Turks is like talking about genocide during World War II without mentioning the Nazis.
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Cambridge
FemaleFirst Grand Master (1000+ Posts)
Joined: 11 Mar 2008
Posts: 1583
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myron myron
FemaleFirst Guru
Joined: 07 Sep 2006
Posts: 5863
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Cambridge
FemaleFirst Grand Master (1000+ Posts)
Joined: 11 Mar 2008
Posts: 1583
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| Posted: Sat Mar 29, 2008 2:05 am Post subject: |
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So you see there has been a long history of violence between the Eastern Muslims and the Western Christians, centering around the Balkan Peninsula. The Christians are in charge now. The Muslims have been driven back east of the Bosporus for many years. The Muslims have no power and are the victims today. The Christians are the ones in charge in the Balkan peninsula…hence, all of the genocide comes from the Serbs and their Northern Greek cousins…realistically, holding more potential danger than the on-going Muslim-American war in the Middle East (although, the Muslim-American war is also Christians attacking Muslims, so the two conflicts might eventually merge).
I find it really curious that Nostradamus actually predicted this, claiming that someone called the Green Turban would come out of Persian or Arabic territory and defeat the Christian races. But I don’t believe in conspiracy theories, so how am I to believe in a silly prognosticator? |
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