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Post by CroatianSerbAbroad on Apr 22, 2005 11:26:37 GMT 1
The BBC News website published a new article regarding the new "integrated" Bosnian Army. Highlighting the fact that the Bosnian Serbs booed the Bosnian anthem. In light of this, can we truly expect real integration between the ethnic group to take place?. I have recently had a friend who is a Croatian Serb who did his Croatian military service with no problems to my knowledge but it would appear that with two ethnic states in Bosnia this integration is more of an issue. Please visit the link below to read the full article: news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4457631.stmI would be interested in peoples thoughts on this matter?
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Post by irac on Apr 22, 2005 12:57:18 GMT 1
That's an interesting one Croserb. I have an acquaintance, I'd hesitate saying friend as Mika's not even a friend to himself, but he fought with Kap Dragan's mercenaries (or was trained when he was a boy) in Knin during the war, and then did his military service with the new Croatian Army, and won medals for marksmanship, and in fact was invited to stay on to be a trainer.
Bosnia is still an accident waiting to happen, allowing country's have their own little governments stripped the power away from the progressive thinkers and gave credence to the mad mullahs shipped in from Saudi and the ignorant serbs and Croats who want to dominate the country. How long until the next outbreak? 5 years?
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Post by Ribaric on Apr 22, 2005 13:08:09 GMT 1
This is scary stuff.
I wonder if these recruits reflect the true sentiments of the vast majority of.......err......umm....... How should I describe this group? "Serbs in Bosnia" or perhaps "Bosnian Serbs" ..... I really don't know, please advise me.
Or:-
Are they the noisy but insignificant rantings of a tiny thuggish minority.
If the the former is true, then I agree with you irac, I hope the latter is the real case though (but somehow I doubt it).
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Post by irac on Apr 22, 2005 13:15:03 GMT 1
Ribaric, you'd never know, but I'm with you hoping that the right will win out, but each time I'm in the country I find extremism creeping in more and more, especially from the Muslim side.
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Post by Old Guest on Apr 22, 2005 13:28:27 GMT 1
Yes ... it is completly "messed up". You have two "fedeal units", one country ... One unit completly ethnicaly cleansed ... and other two "fighting over power", and fact that Croats are participating in anything very little.
If I mentioned Muslim fundamentalism a year ago . probably I will be called bloody Croatian nationalist, and muslim hater ... But sad fact is that process of 3 national/religious extremisms started at same time and developed at point when nobody see what is going on in Bosnia, but everybody see that Bosnia indeed is divided and that Serbs did "achieved" their "ethnicaly clear" state inside Bosnia, and that other two will fight to gain more (or in case of muslims - all) power in "what has left" of multinational Bosnia ...
I don't know how this will finish, and how "protector" plans to keep balancing something which is completly unbalanced, by default.
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Post by CroatianSerbAbroad on Apr 22, 2005 14:16:09 GMT 1
I worry for the future of Bosnia, i feel that the solution put in place was nothing more than a quick solution that many hoped would flourish into a lasting peace agreement.
The truth is that Bosnia is actually a Christian state, if the Croatians and Serbs combined they would form a majority of the population, as such i think it is unreasonable for Bosnia to be percieved as a "muslim" country.
The future of Bosnia looks worrying, Republika Srpska is ethnically pure and increasingly isolated with only interests in relations with Serbia. Whilst the Bosnian entity becomes more fundamentalist and leans away from its Croat minority.
It may seem a very controversial point to make, but i feel that the Bosnian solution would have been to divide the country between Croatia and Serbia and provide the muslims with equal minority rights in the two republics. I can see this as being the only way forward for the country. Of course, this is made even more difficult considering the recent wars.
Croatia will never face any similar issues, the Croatian Serbs were even before the war very integrated into Croatian society, they were then completely betrayed and tricked by there incompitent leaders and Serbia, finally the solution now is to either live within an integrated Croatian society or out of it - simple. The end result is that I believe re-integration will occur much quicker and smoother in Croatia, in the majority of cases of feel this is already evident.
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Post by irac on Apr 22, 2005 14:47:52 GMT 1
Croserb, that's what has caused the problem in the first place. From having an integrated and progressive muslim population, the imperial interests of the two war criminals, tudjman and miloosevic, saw them trading cities and looking to divide the newly independent Bosnia in two. They each played the ethnic card, and the Serbs, initially, saw themselves faced by a united force of intelligent moderate progressives from the Serb, Croat and Muslim hopefuls. But of course "undercover" Croatian army units massacring Muslim civilians, Serb militia doing the same, and the call went out for Mujaheddin, and of course the Saudi's had the time and money after Afghanistan. An important thing to remember is that when the war was finally called to a halt after so long, the foreign fighters and Bosnian muslim militia were retaking ground and overrunning the opposition. But of course, there was no place for a dominant muslim state in Europe, just like after WWII when jews were "shipped" off to Palestine, thus ridding Europe of guilt and the worry of resettlement, and starting the confilt that is now allowing America an excuse to run the rule over democracy.
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Post by star on Apr 22, 2005 15:03:46 GMT 1
I read once that the UN was trying to deport all the mujahadeen out of Bosnia but with only limited successs. Some of them have even established villages run according to fudamentalist Islamic principles. Scary stuff.
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Post by CroatianSerbAbroad on Apr 22, 2005 15:54:36 GMT 1
Irac, my point of dividing the country in two is the only way I can see a peaceful future. Tudjman and Milosevic saw the division as an expansion of territory for the two respective countries and as such excluded the Muslims from having any say in the matter. My belief is that a mult-cultural society in the current format is impossible, too much hatred and two seperate entities within one country and a poor economy - its all going to errupt again eventually.
You must understand that Bosnia has never previously been a seperate country, the history has involved Ottomans, Austro-Hungarian etc, indeed even the muslims were not recognised as a peoples before 1970's.
I am not saying that the existence of the country is wrong or in question but the way to achieving a lasting peace may not be in a united multi-ethnic Bosnia. Whatever the outcome, it can only be achieved by the agreement of all three peoples.
My arguement for a divided country is that at the moment you have three ethnic groups, two of which (Constituing for the majority of the population) probably do not want to live in a united, multi-ethnic Bosnia - only the muslims want this and i feel it is unfair.
If two of the three ethnic groups and thus the majority want to align themselves with Croatia and Serbia then i feel they should and as long as they respect the minority rights of the muslims would this be wrong? and why?.
Otherwise, we face the scenario of today which is nothing more than the US implementing a plan that created a Muslim state in Europe, as a sign they were not anti-islamic.
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Post by Ribaric on Apr 22, 2005 17:05:37 GMT 1
If I draw a parallel with Switzerland:-
Three linguistically and historically diverse peoples, at least for the most part. German, French and Italian. There is little religious interest by any of them so I guess that's one key difference. The other is that Switzerland is a rich land, very rich in fact.
Is the reason they all regard thenselves as Swiss and get along nicely...?
A) They don't have comparable money worries B) The people are mostly secular
Maybe the comparison isn't a good one, maybe it is. I have to admit, I'm finding it difficult to think of a peaceful and truly multi-cultural / multi-national society. I'm not including countries will small-ish ethnic/religeous minorities.
Spain (Spanish & Basque) Moldova (Ehtnic Romanian and Russians) Cyprus (bloody obvious) Israel (even more obvious) USA (Black & White) Iraq (Sunni & Shia) Turkey (Turks & Kurds) Countless multi-tribe African states (e.g: Khosa & Zulu)
Bosnia...............
Jeeez, there must be somewhere....... Brazil?
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Post by CroatianSerbAbroad on Apr 22, 2005 20:30:42 GMT 1
Ribaric, the other point about Switzerland is that they have had a long period of stability, in addition to low religous adoption and high economic stability and prosperity - this all makes a case for the countries multi-culturasim.
But this makes the sheer fact that the multi-cultural Bosnia that existed for forty five years after the second world war an enormous achievement, what a shame it couldnt carry on after 1992. But now that it cant carry on i think it is best to look for alternatives.
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croam
Full Member
Posts: 71
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Post by croam on Apr 22, 2005 21:02:13 GMT 1
anyone who thinks that christians and muslims can live together in Bosnia is living in a fantasy world. That place will reach a boiling point sooner or later. It may be ten years from now..who knows...but the states of croatia and serbia will be largely unaffected. There's no reason the war would spill over into other countries. Its sad for the serbs in Bosnia though...they will have to fight again and thats terrible. Maybe they could seek refuge in Serbia/Montengro? I wonder what Old Guest thinks of that scenario...
Sad sad situation. Makes your really wonder about the creation of states and governments and where its all heading. I guess its best to live your life the best you can while its not happening in your back yard.
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Post by Ribaric on Apr 22, 2005 21:24:27 GMT 1
You make you points well.
Does it follow then that:-
(A) Solvency + (B) Secular govt. + (C) A long period of stability = Possibility for multi-culturism?
There are few states who can boast all three.
Your point CroSerb about Jugoslavija and the 45 years of stability in Bosnia. My Cro friends give me mixed messages. Some say that everything was fine and those were the "good ol' days" when everyone was a sot. Others say it was only peaceful because everyone was scared of a Serb dominated government/police etc. They are split roughly 50-50 in number. I find it hard to decide if there is a majority view, one that could be decribed as the "Croatian peoples' will". I do know that each side is incredibly emotive about it.
croam, I have the same view about Christian/Muslim society. I hope I'm wrong but it's hard to find evidence to support the multi-cultural view.
I expect someone will call us fascists now.
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Post by Ghost Writer on Apr 22, 2005 21:29:33 GMT 1
Croatia could potentially have problems in the future if we allow a large amount of muslims in.
I think that we should follow some other european coutries and have very strict, high standards for immigration.
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Post by irac on Apr 22, 2005 21:33:48 GMT 1
point agreed, Croserb.
What's important right now is that the yanks pull out of Saudi and allow the country to piecefully (that's a deliberate mistake) disintegrate, and within a year we'll see this rabid brand of Islam fall by the wayside, what can be done with the extreme Christianism is another matter.
The malcontent we see throughout the Caucasus, Middle East, North and East Africa, Islamic Asia, can all be traced back to the mentally stunted fools who are let run riot in Saudi Arabia. I witnessed the way they do business first hand and despite the very liberal, progressive and decent people there, they are being kept down by a joint French/Italian/British/US backed regime and their hand in the growing problems in Europe can be easily seen. Like the British, US and French before them, the Saudi's are lending a hand, but to Islamic fundamentalism, by proxy.
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