Book review: How U.S. managed to occupy Bosnia
By John Catalinotto
"NATO in the Balkans- Voices of Opposition," published by
the International Action Center, New York, 1998, 240 pages,
index. $15.95.
TIt's no surprise that the Clinton
administration's spokespeople and the big-business media use
lies and distortions to defend having U.S. troops in Bosnia.
But even magazines like the Nation that often dissent from
government policies have produced apologies for State
Department directives regarding the Balkans.
Some social democrats even circulate unsubstantiated charges
that Serbs set up concentration camps and used rape as a
conscious weapon of war. They argue that "ethnic strife" is a
permanent condition in the Balkans. And they paint the NATO
occupiers as peace keepers.
A strong antidote
Lies like these call for a strong antidote. They call for
"NATO in the Balkans."
The book is an anthology of 13 articles that oppose U.S.
military intervention in the Balkans from various angles. It
rips apart the lies and exposes the machinations of the major
world powers that tore apart Yugoslavia and brought a new
calamity to the people of the region.
The book documents how the German government promoted the
secession of Croatia and Slovenia. It shows how the Pentagon
planned to display its power in the region and gain dominance
throughout Eastern Europe.
Among the writers are former Attorney General Ramsey Clark,
novelist and filmmaker Nadja Tesich, the late economist and
political analyst Sean Gervasi, and freelance journalist and
researcher Thomas Deichmann. The book is dedicated to Gervasi,
who died in 1996 in Belgrade, Yugoslavia. He was there working
to expose the U.S.-German-NATO plans to recolonize the
region.
Four of the writers are regular contributors to Workers
World newspaper-Sam Marcy, Sara Flounders, Gary Wilson and
Richard Becker. Their pieces lend the book a firm
anti-imperialist and pro-working-class character, as they
analyze and expose U.S. imperialism's aims and tactics in the
Balkans.
The book exposes specific lies about U.S. intervention.
Anyone who paid attention to the news at the opening of the
Bosnian civil war will remember repeated television and
front-page coverage showing an emaciated man behind barbed
wire. This man, the Bosnian Muslim Fikret Alic, was described
as a prisoner in a Serb-run concentration camp-"Belsen '92,"
one British paper headlined it.
Thomas Deichmann was an expert witness at the so-called War
Crimes Tribunal in Brussels. In his article-originally
published in Germany and published here for the first time in
the United States-Deichmann exposes how a television crew shot
the refugee camp behind a small area of barbed wire so as to
fake its concentration-camp appearance. This distortion was
used to promote anti-Serb sentiment at the time.
Several writers note that Jim Harff, the president of the
public-relations firm Ruder Finn Global Public Affairs,
admitted that his firm specifically targeted U.S. Jewish
opinion with anti-Serb propaganda. It identified the Serbs with
the Nazis, even though it was Croatian President Franjo Tudjman
who was openly anti-Semitic.
Harff bragged of his firm's success, saying, "We outwitted
three big Jewish organizations."
As a first step toward mobilizing opposition to U.S.
occupation of the Balkans, it is vital to counter the
propaganda of the government and its agents, and to expose the
real reasons U.S. troops are in the region. Flounders is on
target in asserting in her introduction that the book "will
help to arm a new generation of anti-war militants who will
surely emerge" as the consequences of Washington's intervention
become clear.
For that reason it is vital that opponents of the occupation
get this book-and get it into the hands of anyone asking
questions about the Balkans.
[NATO in the Balkans (240 pages, indexed), $15.95 plus $4
shipping & handling. Credit card, invoice and bookstore
orders: 800-247-6553 (24 hours). Or send prepaid orders to
International Action Center, 39 W. 14th St., Suite 206, New
York, NY 10011.]
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011
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