Tag: serbia

A Most Stubborn Reality

Glitches in Empire’s Matrix In the virtual reality concocted by the Empire, the lynching of Moammar Gadhafi was a splendid victory for NATO. Never mind now that it was the “transitional rebels” who were supposed to be fighting the “kinetic military action” in Libya — or any such inconvenient details. No, insist the Imperial partisans, … Continue reading “A Most Stubborn Reality”

Law and Disorder

Among the many half-successes, pretend-successes and outright failures, until this week the Empire could still plausibly claim that it had scored a victory in the Balkans. Nearly two decades of efforts to dismantle Yugoslavia just so, and install pliant governments in its arbitrarily arranged shards, seemed to have been crowned with a triumph last fall, … Continue reading “Law and Disorder”

Conjuring the Black Hat

In the afternoon hours of May 26, the president of Serbia called a surprise press conference to announce, in Boratesque English, the arrest of General Ratko Mladic, wartime commander of Bosnian Serb forces. Entirely by coincidence, or so President Tadic’s crack team of spin-masters would have everyone believe, this happened on the very day EU’s foreign policy … Continue reading “Conjuring the Black Hat”

Damage Control in the Balkans

In March 2004, tens of thousands of Albanians rampaged across Kosovo, the occupied Serbian province then still nominally under UN and NATO authority. After three days of murder, arson, pillage, and ethnic cleansing, the 1999 myth of the noble "Kosovar" victims looked to be in tatters. Within weeks, however, the media machine was in overdrive and working … Continue reading “Damage Control in the Balkans”