As said earlier, in more recent times it is always more difficult to say unambiguously what is happening out there until the refugee testimonies find their way past the restrictive reporting practice that is the censorship of the Mass Media. But it is still nevertheless possible to penetrate the media’s loyal reporting of Foreign Office and Military propaganda and read between the lines as snippets of information emerge. Alongside the identification of our current problems as outlined above, the other real and practical use of such an investigation into the history of U.S. Foreign Policy is in enabling the student to work out what’s going on right now. As someone once said, history is the best guide to politics.
So in this section, I am going to offer a slightly different approach. All we will use are mainstream media snippets. Can we use the information available to us, combined with our understanding of the actions of Imperial Power, to deduce what is happening? Let us use the conflict in Bosnia as an example and try to integrate the random pieces of a jigsaw puzzle offered to us by the mainstream.
Bosnia first appeared in the News as a local struggle between warring provinces (now countries) in the break-up of the former Yugoslavia. We weren’t told at the time that the U.N. entered Bosnia as long ago as Christmas 1991.
The first question of the Foreign Policy student in unpicking the media coverage is “Who else is involved?” The U.S. do have a foreign policy and they are just as keen as anyone else to get what they can from the exploitation of the newly opened Eastern European markets. The record shows that they can’t keep out of other people’s affairs so they must be involved. But how?
Media coverage continues for a few months until finally UK Primme Minister Thatcher causes super-power consternation by being unable to keep quiet. She says that the West should arm the muslims. This slip allows a little more of the picture to be seen. It is the Serbs who are slaughtering the unarmed muslims of Bosnia. Bosnia has been the subject of an arms embargo since the conflict started, the reason given by the West being that they don’t want to inflate the conflict. But hardly fair when the Serbs are armed to the teeth. This is another important pointer to where Western loyalties lie.
We still don’t really know what the U.N. are doing in Bosnia. We are told that they are there to keep the peace and prevent the Serbs attacking the Bosnians, the Croatians and the Herzegovinans. That’s the official line until oops another slip as the Western propaganda line takes another body blow. We pick up the story…
6th March, 1995 – The President of Croatia orders out the U.N. troops. Hello, what’s this? The U.N. are supposed to be protecting the Croatians so why would the President tell them to leave? Answer, because the U.N. aren’t protecting the Croatians, they’re only protecting themselves from the Serbs while letting the Serbs wipe out the Croatians, the Bosnians, the Herzegovinans, the muslims etc etc. It’s a re-run of El Salvador in 1931 – while the President instigates the “Matanza” to slaughter the locals, US and UN troops stand by. They are there to observe the slaughter, not to stop it. They are not there to protect the locals, and in Croatia, the President has finally worked this out.
The President of Croatia is not mad. If the U.N. are on his side he wants them there. If not, he doesn’t. He doesn’t. He can see that the U.N. are even allowing the people in the “Safe Areas” to be murdered. The idea of U.N. safe areas is exposed as a false reason for the presence of the U.N.. The President can see this and tells them to go. He can see Britain’s Douglas Hurd and the U.S.’s Warren Christopher on terms with Karadzic of the Bosnian Serbs. It’s starting to look like the West are supporting genocidal murderers again, as previously outlined, with the usual kick-backs – investment options on exploitation rights from concession treaties. Whole new global chunks of land, capital and labour. Time to make money boys – after the soldiers come the businessmen.
26th May, 1995 – Another two months and none the wiser. Then the Serbs bomb Sarajevo. The West don’t want to look like they support the Serbs so they tell the world’s media that NATO are bombing the Serb airfields. The Serbs take U.N. troops as hostages. So, are NATO doing what they say they’re doing? Not according to one of these hostages, a member of U.N. personnel on the ground in Bosnia. He should know what’s going on so what does he say? More trouble for the Western Propaganda line. The soldier says that NATO are bombing civilians, in other words, they’re not attacking the Serb Army at all. They’re helping the Serbs to slaughter the locals.
And now the media decide to share another little snippet with us – behind the Serbs is the Russian President, Boris Yeltsin.
Cast your mind back to the fall of Gorbachev. Yeltsin from the very beginning was the Western favourite. His party lacked any popular support and yet miraculously he’s suddenly the President of Russia. The West looked on with only mild disapproval while this maniac bombed his own parliament, let his mafia run riot across Russia and weighed in with tanks against Chechen claims for independence. And he’s still hob-knobbing it with Clinton, Major, Mitterand et al.
But, in the classic tradition, the U.S.-backed dictator gets too greedy to handle. Yeltsin has had second thoughts about letting go of Eastern Europe and has his own deal going with the Serbs, and in allowing them to bomb Sarajevo, Boris is beginning to try American patience. Now, because of Boris, the Serbs are running amuck and the British and French are now obliged to send more forces into the area because Boris has messed the plan up by deciding to re-start the Russian Empire and the next Cold War. He’s got to go. And so Boris “goes to hospital” in the classic tactic for removing awkward power brokers from the scene.
11th July, 1995 – Srebrenice. The Serbs attack another “safe area” with Dutch U.N. troops in it (400 we’re told). Some safe area – the Dutch flee along with the muslims. NATO reaction – they knock out one Serb tank.
Now, at this stage, we’re not supposed to be drawing the connection between Yeltsin and Bosnia, and so we see a Media tactic. Bosnia is reported as above and then an item about Ireland is inserted in the running order. Only after this are we told that Boris Yeltsin has had to go to hospital – how easily the client dictator is deposed by his true masters, and of course no connection is made with Bosnia, quite the opposite.
But all of a sudden, Boris isn’t so popular with the Western Media. They remind us that this tyrant bombed his own parliament, is a hopeless drunk who can’t even get off a plane or walk up a flight of steps up to greet diplomats. The media at this point also decide to show us Boris cutting loose from the diplomats at some festival occasion and conducting an orchestra like a wild thing. We get the idea that, all of a sudden, Boris is not fit to govern which leads us nicely into talk of his successor. One minute, Boris is there for the foreseeable future with Western backing and then suddenly he’s ill and has to “go to hospital”. But why now all of a sudden? Boris was never good enough before but they stayed with him. So why now? Answer – Bosnia. The Serbs are running riot with Yeltsin behind them, so get rid of Yeltsin and set up a quick visit from Warren Christopher to spell out the new circumstances to Karadzic in Serbia.
The political message to Karadzic will be this… “You double crossed us by trying to do a deal with Yeltsin. We don’t trust you anymore. The British and the French are bringing large weapons and we’ve told the world that you’re Hitler (who mustn’t be appeased) and you remove muslims for “screening” just like Hitler did with the Jews. In such circumstances, the West will not bat an eye should we choose to nuke you. Fall into line as before or we’re going to have you for Christmas dinner if not sooner. Be sensible. You’ll get a cut out of all this for slaughtering all those muslims for us, as long as you don’t fall out of line again. We’ve replaced Yeltsin with Chernomedin and we don’t want you doing any deals with him.”
The real story is this. The West are in Eastern Europe for the land, the capital and the labour – the money. Saving muslims has already been exposed as bogus by the utterly ineffectual “Safe Areas”. The Western Alliance will deal with anyone regardless of their human rights record. Put another way, Americans support anyone who will concede resources to them, even Nazis.
It would not be surprising if you find this a little hard to swallow. It is not the point of view that our media have saturated us with since you were born. But such inhuman exploitation litters the past of the Western Alliance. At what exact point did their attitude change from chasing property to running willingly to the aid of helpless foreigners?
The West do not run to relieve poverty and suffering. They don’t do that in their own countries and certainly not in other people’s.
France is bearing the brunt of all this, contributing troops to the front line. They’ll be doing it for a cut of the spoils at War’s end. And a spot of nuclear testing in the Pacific will keep the Serbs guessing. And look, there’s the French people at their Jean Michel Jarre “Concert for Tolerance” so easily persuaded that their boys are flying off to protect the muslims from the new Hitler. They’re prepared to believe it because they’ve been waiting fifty years to get their own back on the old Hitler. The fact that they haven’t saved any muslims over the last four years seems to make no difference. The poor French people who don’t even understand that they are standing there celebrating the imminent mass murder of muslims for money. If I was a mole in Bosnia tuning into the Jean Michel Jarre concert, I wouldn’t call it the Concert of Tolerance, I’d call it the Fanfare for Slaughter.
Now it’s 1996. The Americans with control over the Serbs (and Boris) and having destroyed the muslims, invite everyone to Dayton, Ohio for a “peace process”, on American terms of course. American troops enter Eastern Europe (to ensure fair play) and say that they will now arm the muslims in Bosnia. Remember that they said they wouldn’t do so before because it would inflate the conflict? It looks like they found a Bosnian to do business with – someone interested in enforcing the American dream, keeping the muslims down to aid investment opportunities (resource extraction). All in exchange for a little guaranteed protection of course. Client dictators, Latin American style “terror and torture” states here we come.
Military occupation, remove resistance. Arm loyal U.S. favourite. Conduct “free and fair” elections (preferably with no opposition) and there you have it. Mission accomplished. Bosnia with a client dictator armed to the teeth and loyal to American exploitation. I wonder who the new Bosnian leader will be. Marcos and Noriega are out of work at the moment having fulfilled exactly the same role on behalf of the U.S. in the Philippines and Panama. No, of course, the new President will have to be Bosnian… on the outside. And American on the inside.
Look out for the human rights record of the new regime (plus excuses) and also for spectacularly cheap investment opportunities for American businessmen (and favoured allies). The Third World is spreading. Bosnians will be dispossessed and gagged by torture and prison. American elites will profit from usurping sovereignty again.
Remember the Americans instigated the war by encouraging the Bosnian muslims not to conclude negotiations with Serbia and hold out for more. The Bosnians proceeded, believing that the Americans would back them. They were then deserted and left to the Serbs. The Americans then refused to allow them weapons to defend themselves as this would “inflate conflict in the region”. The Americans made the war. Create instability and cash in. Same old story in endless repeat.
The above analysis looks into the future and offers a prediction. This prediction clearly cannot be fact as this history has yet to occur, but it is based on previously recorded U.S. behaviour.
You don’t need a crystal ball to see the future, only a knowledge of previous history. This is history’s most important contribution and is also the reason why its importance is denied. History allows people to foresee exploitation, not to founder in its wake too late to affect the outcome. The muslims have learnt too late that you don’t trust an American diplomat. Now they need to communicate that information to their other East European brothers and sisters before it’s too late for them too.
And so we step forward into 2020 to look at the outcome. Bosnia-Herzegovina was supposed to be one country and it was supposed to join the EU as such in 1992. But the American-brokered “peace deal” divided the country, giving half of it over to the thugs. 49% of the country is now in the hands of 32% of its population.
But hey, now we live in the much-advanced 21st Century of squeaky clean foreign policy and all is above board in Bosnia, right?
This Bosnian Serb Republic (Republika Srpska) is in 2020 led by Prime Minister Radovan Viskovic, a man linked to the transportation of 700 muslim prisoners for mass execution and also, at the end of the war, to concealing the evidence of genocide by his own personal participation in the removal of the mass graves.
Also reported by Dr Suljagic, of the International Relations Department of the International University of Sarajevo, is the fact that in 2017 the Bosnian Serb Government banned schools from teaching children about the ghastly events that occurred in Srebrenica and Sarajevo during the War. And that Viskovic himself appoints the Commissions to “research” the above.
The Bosnian Serb political establishment are to this day unrepentant about the genocide and so this Commission will produce a whiter-than-whitewash to airbrush their crimes from history.
None of the above is seen as any obstruction to doing business in the Bosnian Serb Republic as the World Bank pushes for “structural reforms” (Privatisation).
The US favorite at the next election – probably Viskuvic since the US have a long history of backing thugs – will have some very warm chats at the World Bank and subsequently will be able to guarantee on their successful election much bountiful investment “aid” from abroad. Maybe the people are not fully aware that subsequent spectacular economic performance will be very good for US corporations and line the pockets of very few Bosnian Serbs (mainly Viskuvic’s ghoulish associates) but will also include the “necessary” Public Spending cuts that will have to be endured by everyone else.