Wars Cheetor
‘My Friend Drojti Was Stationed At The Brook Tunnel That Connects To Our Hydroelectric Power Station When The Serbs Came Through It,’ Asserted Our Host, Ante.
While the U. S. marks ten years after the attacks in New York that led on to two wars and basic changes in how Americans view their security, Croatia solemnly recalls the 1991 incursion of Serbian troops and shelling of one of their most loved towns, Dubrovnik. That started a 2 year war on their lonesome soil.
“My friend Drojti was stationed at the brook tunnel that connects to our hydroelectric power station when the Serbs came thru it,” said our host, Ante. “He ran down the hill, leaped into the sea and swam the 20 kilometers to the old city.
“The people who couldn’t leave Dubrovnik went into the old city because they believed that the Serbs would never attack it,” Ante continued, with sourness in his voice. “But over two thousand shells struck the city, and 68 % of the buildings had damage, some completely gutted by fire.”
As Cheri and I walked thru the ancient city, over stone streets that were laid centuries gone, it was tough to fantasize the destruction. Only when we saw the Serbian television photographs did the actuality sink in. Now, lovingly and accurately rebuilt, Dubrovnik is once again a superb illustration of medieval life. And families still live there, doing the majority of the same stuff they did long ago. Only now, the Universal Teen can be discovered even here. While Ante gave us an individual history lesson, a bunch of young people strolled noisily by, dressed pretty much the same as in the US, earbuds wired into their smartphones, giggling at us travellers.
“What’s the economy like now?” I asked Ante.
“Not so good,” he replied. “After the war, we had to reconstruct our industry, but many of our people had sold their property and left to the U.S, to New Zealand, Britain and other places. Many houses were abandoned. After ten years, things started to improve because Continentals began to build houses here, start businesses, and travellers returned. Then in 2008, the world business recession just put everything into reverse. Tourism is just beginning to get better. But we need alternative sources of industry.”
I was thinking about the population emigrating, making a guess that a lot of them would be younger people, people who had not started a family. Looking at the striking natural beauty of the Dalmatian coast, I could see it was a place of great nourishment for the adult soul and really uninteresting for kids.
Ante confirmed that this was indeed the case.
“Our youth are not staying in enough numbers to make our future growth,” he claimed. “Many of them are getting degrees in economics and business, but there are just a few growing industries here to use them.”
This same story was repeated by Samoj (he loved to be called “Sam”), a man we shared drinks and a table with in Korcula, another walled city on an island of the same name further north. Sam is a Slovenian, trained as an attorney and historian, working for a research institute in his home country of 3 million folks. We were lucky to have such a convincing source of information, and we took advantage of it.
“So, Sam, what was the civil war about?” I asked. “It was portrayed by our media as an ethnic war, that so-called ethnic ‘cleansing ‘ was what the Serbians were after.”
Sam explained, “Well, in actual fact Serbs, Slovenians, Croats and Bosnians are ethnically identical. We share the same ancient roots returning to the time of the Illyrians who formed the first regional identity beyond little clans about three thousand years back. The conflict goes back to when the Roman Empire broke up and was divided between an eastern area and a western one. When that occurred, Catholicism under a Roman pope dominated the western empire, while the Eastern Orthodox Church was paramount in what came to be called the Byzantine Empire. The orthodox religion does not recognise the pope as the illustration of Jesus ‘ church, the monks can marry, and the sacraments are different, among many other things. Slovenia and Croatia are on the west side of the dividing line. The Serbian aggression was really about non secular ‘cleansing, ‘ and obviously, it was about money.”
“How did economics play into the war?” I asked.
“Under Tito, when we were all one country, there had been often equality across the bigger nation,” Sam claimed. “But the area of Slovenia was the industrial powerhouse. We had a tiny fragment of the total population, but we were the source of thirty percent of Yugoslavia’s GDP. Croatia had the attractive coast and many beautiful islands where ancient towns still thrived. Croatia was the traveller mecca for Yugoslavians and many European states on each side of the Iron Curtain. Ever since Yugoslavia was first created after World War I, the Serbians, who were the most in number, needed to exercise the best influence over the course of the country. When Tito died, Serbian ambitions re-emerged, and their wish to control the 2 wealthiest areas of the old Yugoslavia drove them to attack when Slovenia and Croatia announced their independence.”
It occurred to me as I listened to Sam that Jesus would find it sad if he knew that in the name of saying sole rights to his legacy, envious people would attempt to take away what others had out of envy and greed. Maybe he does know as reported tagza.com.
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