CNN has posted a gallery of powerful images marking the twentieth anniversary of the 1992 Bosnian conflict, an event that was merely the beginning a decade-long nightmare.
Coincidentally, I've been reading David N. Gibbs's superb book First Do No Harm: Humanitarian Intervention and the Destruction of Yugoslavia. Gibbs traces the history of the country's dissolution, couching it in an informative discussion of US foreign policy. A clear, easy-to-read book for those going in cold - and only 200 pages (not counting the extensive endnotes and backmatter).
In trying to understand today's international (and domestic) affairs, especially US involvement in the Middle East, it's always helpful to examine other historical events. Reliably, the patterns make themselves available.
And just like discussion of Middle Eastern issues, talk of what happend in Yugoslavia from 1991-99 is commonly inaccurate, ideological, uninformed, and so on.
Twenty years later, these photos still bear serious reflection. What happened to those people and Yugoslavia in general was unnecessary, against public opinion, the product of decision-making by local elites, and encouraged and aggravated by the West and the United States. Not an unfamiliar tale.
http://cnnphotos.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/31/remembering-the-bosnian-war-20-years-later
http://www.vanderbiltuniversitypress.com/books/333/first-do-no-harm
