An understanding of the Serb side :
San Jose Mercury News
March 25, 1999 Luba Brezhnev
Published Thursday, March 25, 1999, in the San Jose Mercury News
ANOTHER VIEW: LUBA BREZHNEV
It's a serious mistake
BY LUBA BREZHNEV
President Clinton has made a serious mistake, adding to the carnage and suffering occurring in Kosovo. The suffering of the people of Kosovo is truly heartbreaking: ethnic Albanian orphans, hungry refugees in tatters, abandoned houses . . . but not only ethnic Albanians are suffering. Frequently Serbs are the victims.
Most Americans are not aware of the very important reason for the mutual hate between Serbs and Albanians, which has deep roots in history. Americans and the president should be reminded that the Serbs were the only people within Yugoslavia who fought against Hitler during World War II. In 1940, Hitler's Axis included almost all the countries that surround Yugoslavia. Greece and Yugoslavia were the only countries in the area that firmly refused to collaborate with Nazi Germany and fascist Italy.
Massive anti-fascist demonstrations spread through the country. Infuriated by the unwillingness to submit, Hitler, in April 1941, ordered the bombing of the largest Yugoslavian cities, including Belgrade. The Axis army occupied Yugoslavia and divided it into several zones. Bosnia and Herzegovina were made into a part of Croatia, a pro-fascist independent state, ruled by the Ustashi, the fascist movement that controlled Croatia during the war. The Germans awarded control over Kosovo to the devoted ethnic Albanians, who were, at that time, among the most fanatical allies of fascist Italy. In Croatia, the local authorities built death camps, in which 350,000 to 450,000 Serbs, Jews and Gypsies died. The ethnic Albanians played an active role in the policy of genocide against the Serbs and others.
In response to these atrocities, the Serbs organized a powerful partisan movement, the National Front, which was headed by Tito, who was sympathetic enough to allow Albanian refugees to live on Serbian soil after the war.
With help from the Red Army, the Serbs drove the Nazis from Yugoslavia. The Serbs suffered, proportionally, the greatest loses of World War II -- 1.5 million dead, 10 percent of the population.
It was specifically this betrayal that had helped the Nazis to commit their crimes, which laid the foundation for the civil war of 1992.
The declaration made to the Serbs by Secretary of State Madeleine Albright that the airstrike would be fierce is shocking, given that she must know that during World War II the Bosnian Muslims had their own SS battalions, and that it was only thanks to the heroism and courage of this small nation, Serbia, that many Jews avoided a hideous death in Croatia's camps and Gestapo dungeons.
Moreover, the NATO-U.S. attack on Serbia will inevitably cause conflict with Russia. For the Russians not to support the Serbs, at such a dramatic moment, would be a betrayal of their fellow Slavs. Not without reason, the Serbs say that, for them, only God is greater than Russia, and if anybody will help them defend their interests, it will be the Russians.
Even if Russia does not give direct military assistance to Serbia, and the Russian government merely waves its fists in the air, the relationship between Russia and America, already shaky, will deteriorate further.
Taking advantage of its own military might and of Russia's economic weakness, Washington has been attempting, with increasing frequency, to simply impose its will on other nations, departing from its role of peacekeeper and acting as policeman.
For all Serbs, Kosovo is the place where their nation began; it is an inalienable part of their country, on which the ethnic Albanians are making claims. This is the cause for the Serbian aggression against Albanians in Kosovo.
President Clinton must know that bombing Serbia without sanction from the United Nations violates international law. Bringing other nations to their knees with bombings cannot be the policy of a civilized, democratic country.
Luba Brezhnev, author of the book ''The World I Left Behind,'' is former Soviet President Leonid Brezhnev's niece. She has lived in California since 1990 and is now a naturalized American citizen. |
