On Abu Gurayb, Balkans, Media and Society
World Bulletin interviewed with Stejpan Gabriel Mestrovic on Abu Gurayb, Alija Izetbegovic, Balkans, Islamic world and West.
Thursday, 23 October 2008 11:08
World Bulletin / News Desk
An Interview with Stejpan Gabriel Mestrovic, On Abu Gurayb, Balkans, Media and Society
Interviewer: Ertugrul Aydın
Ertugrul Aydin: What was the reality behind of the circulation of videos and photos from Abu Gurayb?
Stejpan Gabriel Mestrovic: The media made one soldier, Joseph Darby, into a hero - They say he was a hero - He submitted a compact disc of photographs under the door of criminal investigation unit. In fact, the other soldiers hated Mr. Darby. And Darby did that as a kind of personal anger, and was seen as a traitor by his fellow soldiers. Darby testified in court. But he was not portrayed as a hero at all in court, only by the media. The simple human answer to your question is that according to my research, his act was interpreted as an act of betrayal by the other soldiers. Now, there were some truly heroic and kind soldiers at Abu Gurayb, but they are not as well known.
EA: Some prominent figures in the Bush administration had to withdraw from their offices after the release of abuses. Might there be something more behind the release of them? Further, some kind of power or ideological struggle in US behind the releases?
SGM: I don't think so. Once some of the photos were broadcast on the American TV program, "60 Minutes," the government had a public relations problem on its hands. It had to act, and had to hold trials in order to repair the damage to its image. I studied thousands of pages of documents and I was in the court room during the testimony. So I can tell you what is factual; in my interpretation there is no need for speculation. There were over 16.000 photos. Of those 1-6-.0-0-0 photos only about 200 were released to the public by the government and the media. Most people don't know that there are 16.000; it is not a secret because this was stated in open court. But the media did not report this particular fact from what was said in the open court. I am stating a fact that was not reported by the media. So once you consider the facts 16.000 exist and two hundred circulated, it's my interpretation that they released a small number of facts to minimize the damage of the photos. And of course, one hopes that one day all the photos will be released and the full story will be told.
The government controlled which photos were released. That was revealed in testimony and there is no ideological struggle because the government made the fact known but the american journalists did not report all those facts. So the real question is why the american journalists did not cover the story and the trials thoroughly or deeply. It's not just a matter of American government but a matter of journalism and the cultural industry. The more important question is why the media did not report and pursue the matter further once the government made the facts known in open court.
EA:How was the media attention to the trials?
SGM: The trials were from 8:00 am to 17:00 pm everday. I stayed the whole time because as a researcher, I took notes of every single thing that happened. And I noticed the journalists sitting at the back row and I got to know them later. They were from AP, UPI, Reuters, New York Times and even Rolling Stone magazine. Their routine was to come in around 10:00 am and leave before lunch at noon in order to be the first to break that day's story, and capture that day's headline before their competitors did. It seemed as if in their minds, there was no need to come back after lunch. Most of the testimony that came after lunch was simply not reported. In summary, I witnessed the media as extremely competitive with each other for grabbing headlines and for meeting deadlines, but not for deep, investigative reporting. I published the full account of the trials as I experienced them in my book, The Trials of Abu Ghraib.
EA:You didn't mention the name of al -Jazeere while counting media organs.
SGM: Al Jazeere never came; If the Islamic world wants to say that West behaves unfairly they should have sent somebody. It was open to everybody so you know it was your fault, it's everybody's fault for not getting the full truth out. It is a fact that Muslim news outlets didn't show up; yet Rolling Stone magazine, which deals with popular culture, showed up.
But I want to go back to the system. In the journalist system there is intense pressure and competition with each other to be the first. That's how they work. They seem to think, "I must be the first to break the story then I get the credit and all the other people must cite me." I think there is a need to go back to old-fashioned in depth investigative journalism where you spend a long time, you tell, you write everything down, you talk to as many people as you can.
So one can not just blame governments; you have to blame the journalistic profession, the system under which it runs. Like everything else now it is also driven by profit and fierce competition. I want to give some concrete examples. At one of the trials, there was a Captain Fishback who wanted to testify, an Army captain, that there was another camp twenty miles from Abu Gurayb where they were doing exactly the same thing. The judge would not allow him to testify. It was very important testimony because it would have shown that Abu Gurayb was not an isolated event. I was present at the judge's decision, it was open to everybody but it was five clock in the evening and all the journalists had gone home long before that. The judge did not allow the testimony into the trial, but his hearing and decision were public. Where were the journalists? They were drinking at a bar, I found out later. Unbelievable. This is real human drama. They seem to like to think that the government engaged in conspiracy but the whole system is broken including journalism. I just saw so much more than this narrow picture. The real story of Abu Gurayb is an incredibly complicated, intricate, human story of good and evil (both), but most people know only a few stereotypes.
EA: In an interview conducted with you, you say that somebody must ask the question of whether the West is a threat against Islam and/or Muslims. Is West a threat against Islam?
SGM: I was trying to explain in my speeches that the West were portraying Alija Izetbegovic's book on muslims in general or Bosnian muslims in particular as fundamentalism, as a threat. There is no way to find fundamentalism in Alija Izetbegovic's book. It is a beautiful, deep book. And again the facts are that Bosnia Herzigova is the most tolerant nation in former Yugoslavia. Careful sociological studies found that Bosnian tolerance is not a mythology, but it is a fact. On the other side you see many books like Samuel Hungtington's "Clash of Civilizations" which is completely intolerant. In that book he says the West ends where Islam begins. Some intellectuals in the West write in an intolerant way; while some Islamic intellectuals like Izetbegovic write and use the language of tolerance. Then, others in the West change the language of tolerance into the language of intolerance and again I am not blaming governments but the entire cultural industry; I call it cultural industry because I think corporations are involved in selling certain messages to people for the sake of profit.
EA: As a sociologist, do you believe in the existence of World Society?
SGM: No, I don't. I am closer to Alija Izetbegovic because he is closer to Emile Durkheim, who was sociology's founding father in France in the 1890s. Any society is a particular group of people, with a particular faith and language that has to be something concrete and specific to that group. You can talk about how those particular groups mesh or work together or clash, but the idea of a uniform society is a kind of fascism. No, I don't believe it. There will always be resistance to fascism of any sort.
EA: I see that different societies and civilizations may co-exist in your conception. Then there is a ground to ask you whether a new Islamic Civilization possible when looking at the dynamics of Islamic World from out side?
SGM: I think it is possible but it requires some will. For example after World War II there was the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) led by Tito of Yugoslovia. NAM included Indonesia, Egypt and much of the Islamic World. Of course it was done in relation to the two major superpowers, USA and USSR. Not Russia but USSR has gone and some say today that the US empire is in decline. NAM is not an organized unit but I think a new version may be established of countries that don't want to be part of a bipolar world.
EA: From your perspective, are the dynamics of Islam able to create an Islamic civilization again as it was in the history ?
SGM: To me dynamics of Islam seem to be peace, tolerance, forgiving, humility and these are not practical approaches to the Machevillian and realpoitik schemes of the modern world. I don't think that Islamic culture is well suited because it is too forgiving and too kind. Just look at Izetbegovic: until the last moment, he was talking about tolerance, and did not believe that the Belgrade regime would attack Bosnia. When the inevitable happened, he was not prepared, and it was too late.
EA: Islamic threat conceptions are circulating in the West but you say that Islamic culture is too kind.
SGM: If someone took a British or American soldier and stripped him naked, put women's panties on his head and forced him to engage in sexual acts they will never forgive. It is too humiliating. These are the exact things that happened at Abu Gurayb. But Islamic culture seems to be very forgiving. I always try to stay true to the facts so let me give another example. I testified at the trials; they showed videos of several Abu Gurayb prisoners. And you know what? That testimony was to defend the soldiers who were on trial. The muslim prisoners of Abu Gurayb were saying my American soldier is kind, is good; Allah bless him; my goodness! One video after another the victims were saying "please don't punish." I am referring to facts that I witnessed. I was very surprised in the court room and again the journalists didn't report this incredible testimony.
EA: Which particular traits of "Postemotional West" do jeopardize mutual co-existence in the planet?
SGM: I define postemotionalism as the artificial manipulation of emotions by the culture industry for false goals. For example, the West went along with the Serbian propaganda that Serbs were fighting "the Turks" in Bosnia in the 1990s as a reaction to their defeat at the Battle of Kosovo to the Ottoman Empire in the year 1389. It is an incredible story, but it was believed by most people in the West. More recently, Greece blocked Macedonia's admission to NATO last year on the grounds that Macedonia's name belongs to the memory of Alexander the Great, which belongs to Greece. Or, the U.S. attacked Iraq in response to the al-Qaida attack in New York City in 2001 even though Iraq had no connection to al-Qaida at all at that time. There are countless other examples. The danger of postemotional manipulation is that the culture industry is more able than ever before to twist and distort the emotions of ordinary people into doing things that are not logical and that go against common sense.
EA: How to save societies from manufactured emotions and synthetic feelings? Except for electiricity cut what is/are the solution/s?
SGM: I honestly do not know. I do not want to propose shallow solutions just to make people feel better about a terrible situation. The first step is to recognize the problems. If political leaders, intellectuals, and the cultural industry were authentic in what they say and do, postemotionalism could not work. But we are all so used to "fake sincerity" in all the media, that it is extremely difficult to recognize genuine sincerity.
EA: What are your reflections about Alija Izetbegovic both as a thinker and as a political leader?
SGM: I have a very high opinion of him. His book, to me, is a very deep sociological one like Durkheim's The Elementary Form of Religous Life because Alija is looking at what is truly, authentically religious that doesn't matter if you are a Christian or Muslim or anything else; he writes about Christ, Mohammad and Moses; and tolerance and forgiving. So it is very deep book. As a leader, precisely because he was so humble, so forgiving and tolerant his enemies exploited those virtues and remember that Bosnia paid the heaviest price. Until it was too late Alija Izatbegovic didn't think that the Serbs would attack. If you are just a nice and sincere man and dealing with people who use realpolitik, they will win because they do not play fair. Alija was a decent and fine man who was exploited by the realpolitik people.
EA: What were the signs of coming Serbian attack and what measures could be taken in advance?
SGM: The signs were obvious. Milosevic traveled to Kosovo as early as 1989 to make his fiery and hate-filled speeches. Belgrade attacked both Slovenia and Croatia in 1991. Karadzic was making his threats during this entire time period. But it's not all the fault of Izetbegovic for apparently being naïve. Clearly, the West did not want Yugoslavia to break up into little pieces, and allied itself, in a way, with "our man in Belgrade," as they called Milosevic. There are many books out there that document all this now, when it is too late, in great detail. But the key point is that at the time this was all happening, Belgrade's propaganda worked, that it was "defending" itself against "the Turks" in Bosnia, and that's the incredible part that I call postemotional manipulation.
EA: Some people say that Karadzic was captured but his vision succeeded. Do you share this opinion?
SGM: Yes correct. I will say more on that. Milosevic also captured, he was put on trial; he died before the final decision of the court but he made the trial drag for three years by objections, delays and so forth.and the judge died before Milosevic. Karadzic's trial will most likely be similar. He will drag the system out so long that public can't pay attention until the final judgement is given. So I think that it is a strategy that former little dictators use: Drag it out, exhaust the courts and the public, and in the end, no one will be certain what the trials were really about.
EA: Is it possible one day Balkans no more represent Balkanization term and be a peaceful zone in the future?
SGM: I wrote a book called "Balkanization of the West"; I think the West balkanized the balkans. Don't forget the Vance-Owen peace plan. Who drew that map? Vance-Owen- the West drew the map, and it was a formula for eventual ethnic cleansing. It was the West that gave each of the three ethnic groups, Serb, Croat, and Muslim, their own territories, and the West acted surprised that ethnic cleansing occurred..Balkan nations fought each other but the West ingited the fire and then stood back and said "look at those people of the Balkans fighting each other." Again, I call this postemotional manipulation.
Republica Serbska is % 70 of Bosnia and under the Serbian control – it is still under Serbian control – and the West just does not want to talk about it. The Dayton Peace Accords stopped the fighting, but did not solve the problem. What I am saying is that balkanization is a program of propaganda to break those people in Balkans into the smaller units and hate each other. Realpolitik of the West is to create balkanization and this happens all the time; it's not just in the Balkans. The West creates the same thing in Iraq. Yes there was a little dictator but before the war it was a unified state; however after the war, now, Shia and Sunni's are etnically cleansing each other; Kurds, their passions are inflamed and it is a threat now toward Turkey, Iraq and whole region. Who caused it?
EA: Can EU membership bring peace to the Balkans?
SGM: I want to remind you that it was always possible for the Balkans to be a peaceful region. Careful, numerous sociological studies show that the people in Balkans are very tolerant, very peaceful; and Serbians, Croatians and Bosnians married each other freely before the 1990s. The clash comes from outside power's interference that create certain stresses because of the geopolitical models. The West is playing a strange game; it is dragging out the process of EU integration so long for Croatia. Slovenia was the first one breaking away from former Yugoslavia and the first one in Balkans joining EU. But for Croatia they keep saying "you can come in 2006...no, no you can come in 2008 oh no in 2008...2011...or maybe in 2014." Bosnia and Macedonia may be members of EU in 2020. Who knows? They are delaying it and what they do is creating new tensions and divisions within those people; Slovenia is well off and protected by NATO but the others are left out because of geopolitical reasons. Again, for example, Macedonia was turned down this year by Greece from NATO membership. So Macedonia will not feel safe. Macedonia is part of the west but it was blocked. Croatia was put on the path but Bosnia was not. What are you doing? You are again creating ethnic tensions. My suggestion is to do the integration quickly; sign them all up. However I am not a politician but a sociologist.
EA: What were your feelings when you heard that Mostar Bridge was destroyed by shellfire of Croatian Army?
SGM: My first feeling when I heard was cynicism because I know the media does not always report the full truth. And actually it is not so clear who opened fire or why; but the blame was put on the Croats. I am very cautious with information that comes only from the media. I worked with the media enough to know that media headlines are not necessarily completely true. I also know from my research as an expert witness at the Hague that the full story of the fighting in Yugoslavia in the 1990s is an incredibly complicated story, for all sides in the conflict, and also the Western powers that were involved. Authentic reality is always complex, while postemotional propaganda is always simplistic.
worldbulletin
An Interview with Stejpan Gabriel Mestrovic, On Abu Gurayb, Balkans, Media and Society
Interviewer: Ertugrul Aydın
Ertugrul Aydin: What was the reality behind of the circulation of videos and photos from Abu Gurayb?
Stejpan Gabriel Mestrovic: The media made one soldier, Joseph Darby, into a hero - They say he was a hero - He submitted a compact disc of photographs under the door of criminal investigation unit. In fact, the other soldiers hated Mr. Darby. And Darby did that as a kind of personal anger, and was seen as a traitor by his fellow soldiers. Darby testified in court. But he was not portrayed as a hero at all in court, only by the media. The simple human answer to your question is that according to my research, his act was interpreted as an act of betrayal by the other soldiers. Now, there were some truly heroic and kind soldiers at Abu Gurayb, but they are not as well known.
EA: Some prominent figures in the Bush administration had to withdraw from their offices after the release of abuses. Might there be something more behind the release of them? Further, some kind of power or ideological struggle in US behind the releases?
SGM: I don't think so. Once some of the photos were broadcast on the American TV program, "60 Minutes," the government had a public relations problem on its hands. It had to act, and had to hold trials in order to repair the damage to its image. I studied thousands of pages of documents and I was in the court room during the testimony. So I can tell you what is factual; in my interpretation there is no need for speculation. There were over 16.000 photos. Of those 1-6-.0-0-0 photos only about 200 were released to the public by the government and the media. Most people don't know that there are 16.000; it is not a secret because this was stated in open court. But the media did not report this particular fact from what was said in the open court. I am stating a fact that was not reported by the media. So once you consider the facts 16.000 exist and two hundred circulated, it's my interpretation that they released a small number of facts to minimize the damage of the photos. And of course, one hopes that one day all the photos will be released and the full story will be told.
The government controlled which photos were released. That was revealed in testimony and there is no ideological struggle because the government made the fact known but the american journalists did not report all those facts. So the real question is why the american journalists did not cover the story and the trials thoroughly or deeply. It's not just a matter of American government but a matter of journalism and the cultural industry. The more important question is why the media did not report and pursue the matter further once the government made the facts known in open court.
EA:How was the media attention to the trials?
SGM: The trials were from 8:00 am to 17:00 pm everday. I stayed the whole time because as a researcher, I took notes of every single thing that happened. And I noticed the journalists sitting at the back row and I got to know them later. They were from AP, UPI, Reuters, New York Times and even Rolling Stone magazine. Their routine was to come in around 10:00 am and leave before lunch at noon in order to be the first to break that day's story, and capture that day's headline before their competitors did. It seemed as if in their minds, there was no need to come back after lunch. Most of the testimony that came after lunch was simply not reported. In summary, I witnessed the media as extremely competitive with each other for grabbing headlines and for meeting deadlines, but not for deep, investigative reporting. I published the full account of the trials as I experienced them in my book, The Trials of Abu Ghraib.
EA:You didn't mention the name of al -Jazeere while counting media organs.
SGM: Al Jazeere never came; If the Islamic world wants to say that West behaves unfairly they should have sent somebody. It was open to everybody so you know it was your fault, it's everybody's fault for not getting the full truth out. It is a fact that Muslim news outlets didn't show up; yet Rolling Stone magazine, which deals with popular culture, showed up.
But I want to go back to the system. In the journalist system there is intense pressure and competition with each other to be the first. That's how they work. They seem to think, "I must be the first to break the story then I get the credit and all the other people must cite me." I think there is a need to go back to old-fashioned in depth investigative journalism where you spend a long time, you tell, you write everything down, you talk to as many people as you can.
So one can not just blame governments; you have to blame the journalistic profession, the system under which it runs. Like everything else now it is also driven by profit and fierce competition. I want to give some concrete examples. At one of the trials, there was a Captain Fishback who wanted to testify, an Army captain, that there was another camp twenty miles from Abu Gurayb where they were doing exactly the same thing. The judge would not allow him to testify. It was very important testimony because it would have shown that Abu Gurayb was not an isolated event. I was present at the judge's decision, it was open to everybody but it was five clock in the evening and all the journalists had gone home long before that. The judge did not allow the testimony into the trial, but his hearing and decision were public. Where were the journalists? They were drinking at a bar, I found out later. Unbelievable. This is real human drama. They seem to like to think that the government engaged in conspiracy but the whole system is broken including journalism. I just saw so much more than this narrow picture. The real story of Abu Gurayb is an incredibly complicated, intricate, human story of good and evil (both), but most people know only a few stereotypes.
EA: In an interview conducted with you, you say that somebody must ask the question of whether the West is a threat against Islam and/or Muslims. Is West a threat against Islam?
SGM: I was trying to explain in my speeches that the West were portraying Alija Izetbegovic's book on muslims in general or Bosnian muslims in particular as fundamentalism, as a threat. There is no way to find fundamentalism in Alija Izetbegovic's book. It is a beautiful, deep book. And again the facts are that Bosnia Herzigova is the most tolerant nation in former Yugoslavia. Careful sociological studies found that Bosnian tolerance is not a mythology, but it is a fact. On the other side you see many books like Samuel Hungtington's "Clash of Civilizations" which is completely intolerant. In that book he says the West ends where Islam begins. Some intellectuals in the West write in an intolerant way; while some Islamic intellectuals like Izetbegovic write and use the language of tolerance. Then, others in the West change the language of tolerance into the language of intolerance and again I am not blaming governments but the entire cultural industry; I call it cultural industry because I think corporations are involved in selling certain messages to people for the sake of profit.
EA: As a sociologist, do you believe in the existence of World Society?
SGM: No, I don't. I am closer to Alija Izetbegovic because he is closer to Emile Durkheim, who was sociology's founding father in France in the 1890s. Any society is a particular group of people, with a particular faith and language that has to be something concrete and specific to that group. You can talk about how those particular groups mesh or work together or clash, but the idea of a uniform society is a kind of fascism. No, I don't believe it. There will always be resistance to fascism of any sort.
EA: I see that different societies and civilizations may co-exist in your conception. Then there is a ground to ask you whether a new Islamic Civilization possible when looking at the dynamics of Islamic World from out side?
SGM: I think it is possible but it requires some will. For example after World War II there was the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) led by Tito of Yugoslovia. NAM included Indonesia, Egypt and much of the Islamic World. Of course it was done in relation to the two major superpowers, USA and USSR. Not Russia but USSR has gone and some say today that the US empire is in decline. NAM is not an organized unit but I think a new version may be established of countries that don't want to be part of a bipolar world.
EA: From your perspective, are the dynamics of Islam able to create an Islamic civilization again as it was in the history ?
SGM: To me dynamics of Islam seem to be peace, tolerance, forgiving, humility and these are not practical approaches to the Machevillian and realpoitik schemes of the modern world. I don't think that Islamic culture is well suited because it is too forgiving and too kind. Just look at Izetbegovic: until the last moment, he was talking about tolerance, and did not believe that the Belgrade regime would attack Bosnia. When the inevitable happened, he was not prepared, and it was too late.
EA: Islamic threat conceptions are circulating in the West but you say that Islamic culture is too kind.
SGM: If someone took a British or American soldier and stripped him naked, put women's panties on his head and forced him to engage in sexual acts they will never forgive. It is too humiliating. These are the exact things that happened at Abu Gurayb. But Islamic culture seems to be very forgiving. I always try to stay true to the facts so let me give another example. I testified at the trials; they showed videos of several Abu Gurayb prisoners. And you know what? That testimony was to defend the soldiers who were on trial. The muslim prisoners of Abu Gurayb were saying my American soldier is kind, is good; Allah bless him; my goodness! One video after another the victims were saying "please don't punish." I am referring to facts that I witnessed. I was very surprised in the court room and again the journalists didn't report this incredible testimony.
EA: Which particular traits of "Postemotional West" do jeopardize mutual co-existence in the planet?
SGM: I define postemotionalism as the artificial manipulation of emotions by the culture industry for false goals. For example, the West went along with the Serbian propaganda that Serbs were fighting "the Turks" in Bosnia in the 1990s as a reaction to their defeat at the Battle of Kosovo to the Ottoman Empire in the year 1389. It is an incredible story, but it was believed by most people in the West. More recently, Greece blocked Macedonia's admission to NATO last year on the grounds that Macedonia's name belongs to the memory of Alexander the Great, which belongs to Greece. Or, the U.S. attacked Iraq in response to the al-Qaida attack in New York City in 2001 even though Iraq had no connection to al-Qaida at all at that time. There are countless other examples. The danger of postemotional manipulation is that the culture industry is more able than ever before to twist and distort the emotions of ordinary people into doing things that are not logical and that go against common sense.
EA: How to save societies from manufactured emotions and synthetic feelings? Except for electiricity cut what is/are the solution/s?
SGM: I honestly do not know. I do not want to propose shallow solutions just to make people feel better about a terrible situation. The first step is to recognize the problems. If political leaders, intellectuals, and the cultural industry were authentic in what they say and do, postemotionalism could not work. But we are all so used to "fake sincerity" in all the media, that it is extremely difficult to recognize genuine sincerity.
EA: What are your reflections about Alija Izetbegovic both as a thinker and as a political leader?
SGM: I have a very high opinion of him. His book, to me, is a very deep sociological one like Durkheim's The Elementary Form of Religous Life because Alija is looking at what is truly, authentically religious that doesn't matter if you are a Christian or Muslim or anything else; he writes about Christ, Mohammad and Moses; and tolerance and forgiving. So it is very deep book. As a leader, precisely because he was so humble, so forgiving and tolerant his enemies exploited those virtues and remember that Bosnia paid the heaviest price. Until it was too late Alija Izatbegovic didn't think that the Serbs would attack. If you are just a nice and sincere man and dealing with people who use realpolitik, they will win because they do not play fair. Alija was a decent and fine man who was exploited by the realpolitik people.
EA: What were the signs of coming Serbian attack and what measures could be taken in advance?
SGM: The signs were obvious. Milosevic traveled to Kosovo as early as 1989 to make his fiery and hate-filled speeches. Belgrade attacked both Slovenia and Croatia in 1991. Karadzic was making his threats during this entire time period. But it's not all the fault of Izetbegovic for apparently being naïve. Clearly, the West did not want Yugoslavia to break up into little pieces, and allied itself, in a way, with "our man in Belgrade," as they called Milosevic. There are many books out there that document all this now, when it is too late, in great detail. But the key point is that at the time this was all happening, Belgrade's propaganda worked, that it was "defending" itself against "the Turks" in Bosnia, and that's the incredible part that I call postemotional manipulation.
EA: Some people say that Karadzic was captured but his vision succeeded. Do you share this opinion?
SGM: Yes correct. I will say more on that. Milosevic also captured, he was put on trial; he died before the final decision of the court but he made the trial drag for three years by objections, delays and so forth.and the judge died before Milosevic. Karadzic's trial will most likely be similar. He will drag the system out so long that public can't pay attention until the final judgement is given. So I think that it is a strategy that former little dictators use: Drag it out, exhaust the courts and the public, and in the end, no one will be certain what the trials were really about.
EA: Is it possible one day Balkans no more represent Balkanization term and be a peaceful zone in the future?
SGM: I wrote a book called "Balkanization of the West"; I think the West balkanized the balkans. Don't forget the Vance-Owen peace plan. Who drew that map? Vance-Owen- the West drew the map, and it was a formula for eventual ethnic cleansing. It was the West that gave each of the three ethnic groups, Serb, Croat, and Muslim, their own territories, and the West acted surprised that ethnic cleansing occurred..Balkan nations fought each other but the West ingited the fire and then stood back and said "look at those people of the Balkans fighting each other." Again, I call this postemotional manipulation.
Republica Serbska is % 70 of Bosnia and under the Serbian control – it is still under Serbian control – and the West just does not want to talk about it. The Dayton Peace Accords stopped the fighting, but did not solve the problem. What I am saying is that balkanization is a program of propaganda to break those people in Balkans into the smaller units and hate each other. Realpolitik of the West is to create balkanization and this happens all the time; it's not just in the Balkans. The West creates the same thing in Iraq. Yes there was a little dictator but before the war it was a unified state; however after the war, now, Shia and Sunni's are etnically cleansing each other; Kurds, their passions are inflamed and it is a threat now toward Turkey, Iraq and whole region. Who caused it?
EA: Can EU membership bring peace to the Balkans?
SGM: I want to remind you that it was always possible for the Balkans to be a peaceful region. Careful, numerous sociological studies show that the people in Balkans are very tolerant, very peaceful; and Serbians, Croatians and Bosnians married each other freely before the 1990s. The clash comes from outside power's interference that create certain stresses because of the geopolitical models. The West is playing a strange game; it is dragging out the process of EU integration so long for Croatia. Slovenia was the first one breaking away from former Yugoslavia and the first one in Balkans joining EU. But for Croatia they keep saying "you can come in 2006...no, no you can come in 2008 oh no in 2008...2011...or maybe in 2014." Bosnia and Macedonia may be members of EU in 2020. Who knows? They are delaying it and what they do is creating new tensions and divisions within those people; Slovenia is well off and protected by NATO but the others are left out because of geopolitical reasons. Again, for example, Macedonia was turned down this year by Greece from NATO membership. So Macedonia will not feel safe. Macedonia is part of the west but it was blocked. Croatia was put on the path but Bosnia was not. What are you doing? You are again creating ethnic tensions. My suggestion is to do the integration quickly; sign them all up. However I am not a politician but a sociologist.
EA: What were your feelings when you heard that Mostar Bridge was destroyed by shellfire of Croatian Army?
SGM: My first feeling when I heard was cynicism because I know the media does not always report the full truth. And actually it is not so clear who opened fire or why; but the blame was put on the Croats. I am very cautious with information that comes only from the media. I worked with the media enough to know that media headlines are not necessarily completely true. I also know from my research as an expert witness at the Hague that the full story of the fighting in Yugoslavia in the 1990s is an incredibly complicated story, for all sides in the conflict, and also the Western powers that were involved. Authentic reality is always complex, while postemotional propaganda is always simplistic.
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