On March 31, 2010, the Serbian Parliament adopted a resolution formally paying reparations to the victims of Srebrenica.
Serbia's decision once again reminded people of a war more than a decade ago - the Bosnian War.
The Bosnian War, fought from April 1992 to December 1995, was the largest war in Europe since World War II.
280,000 civilians and soldiers died, and more than 2 million civilians became refugees, representing half of the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina at that time.
What shocked the world even more was the murderous methods involved, which were as cruel as those of the Nazis.
What caused this war? And how did the war stop?
The history is far away - it is born from the same root, why is it too urgent to fry each other
During the Cold War, the Soviet Union, as a well-deserved "big brother" of the socialist camp, was able to wrestle with Western countries, and in addition to being strong enough, it also had the support of "comrades" in the same camp.
Among them, there is the Yugoslav Federation.
The Yugoslav federation was born thanks to the help of Stalin in the Soviet Union, and their former leader, Tito, was a world-famous politician at that time.
It was also because of Tito that the "good-looking" Yugoslav Federation was brought together.
This alliance has coexisted for more than forty years, but the concept of "southern Slavs" has a history of thousands of years.
Historically, the peoples of Europe can be roughly divided into three groups: the Germanic peoples represented by Britain, Germany and other countries, the Slavic peoples in Eastern Europe, and the Latin peoples represented by Italy and France.
Among them, there are many Slavic people in Eastern Europe, and the history is extremely long, and today's Russia, Ukraine, Serbia, etc. are all Slavic evolutions.
Although it is a people, in history, the Slavic peoples were miserably "divided".
This was mainly because of two events in Europe - the division of the Roman Empire and the division of Christianity.
The division of the Roman Empire occurred in the 4th century AD, when the vast empire was divided into Eastern and Western empires, which led to the division of the Slavic ethnic group into East Slavic, West Slavic and Yugoslavia.
In 1045, the Great Schism gave birth to two churches, Catholicism and Orthodoxy.
Among them, the Eastern Slavs believed in the Orthodox Church, while the West Slavs were predominantly Catholic.
As for Yugoslavia, because both divisions passed through their regions, this also led to the division of Yugoslavia into two factions: Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Bulgaria and East Slavic closeness; Croatia and Slovenia are close to West Slavs.
The geographical separation, combined with religious differences, led to the division of the Slavic peoples into three, each of which lived a stable life at first.
However, the difference in religious beliefs, coupled with cultural differences, is good without contact, and once contact, it is bound to cause contradictions, the most serious of which is the Yugoslavs.
Bosnia, located between East and West Slavs, is a dead end.
The culture here is relatively mixed, and most of the residents believe in Orthodox Christianity, but they have little influence on Eastern and Western cultures.
Everyone spent hundreds of years in peace with each other.
Until an opportunity arose and added fire to this ostensibly stable situation.
The five ethnic groups, three religions, and chauvinism intensified contradictions
In the 15th century, the Ottoman Empire expanded into the Balkans.
The inhabitants of Bosnia, under the invasion of the Ottoman Empire, began to come into contact with Islam and chose to convert to Islam and become Muslims.
The expansion of the Ottoman Empire upset the original balance in the Balkans, and a large number of civilians left their homelands in search of new homes.
As a result, Serbs originally in Serbia moved to Bosnia and settled there.
Ethnic groups from Croatia, Slovenia and Albania also came to Bosnia, and the place has once again become a multi-ethnic region.
Under the evolution of history, they have long forgotten that everyone was a Slav more than a thousand years ago, and only remembered the Mu ethnic group composed of Croats, Serbs, Sides, Albanians and local Muslims.
This has led to a very grim situation - "five ethnic groups and three religions".
In tiny Bosnia, there are five ethnic groups and three religious beliefs, which naturally leads to many contradictions.
But fortunately, everyone has another thing in common, that is, they still speak the same language, which eases the relationship between all parties to a certain extent.
In the 19th century, the Western Industrial Revolution gave rise to the revival movements in Serbia and Croatia, and the slogan "Yugoslav unity" began to appear.
However, both the Serbs and the Croats want to establish the state with themselves as the main body, which leads to a lot of contradictions between the two sides.
It was not until World War I, when Alexander I of Serbia established the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, that the region was finally united.
Alexander I also believed that his own nation should be the main body, and he promoted Greater Serbianism in the country, which once again intensified the contradictions between the two peoples.
During World War II, the German Nazi Party took advantage of the religious and ethnic antagonism between the two ethnic groups to keep the two ethnic groups fighting.
Under the influence of racism and religiosity, a horrific massacre broke out in this place.
At this time, Tito, the leader of the Yugoslav Communist Party, stood up, he accused the Nazis of the behavior of the war and called on the Yugoslavs to rise up in the war against aggression.
Under the leadership of Tito, the Yugoslavs were rarely united, and after years of hard fighting, they finally achieved the independence of the country.
The Yugoslavs were very grateful to Tito's contribution, so when Tito proposed the creation of a Yugoslav federation, no one objected.
And Tito, as his name shows, under his leadership, there was harmony in Yugoslavia, and the once unpleasant relations between the ethnic groups gradually dissipated.
Yugoslavia under Tito's rule did not promote the monopoly of that nation like Alexander I, and he "leveled the bowl of water" and attacked the big clans to support the small ones.
His actions gradually calmed down the contradictions among the various ethnic groups in Yugoslavia and lived in harmony for decades.
But Tito is also a person, and people have a time when they "end their lives".
In 1980, Comrade Tito died, and the leadership of Yugoslavia lacked the control of a strong man who could be trusted by all parties.
Neither ethnic group trusts the other, fearing that the other will continue to be nationalist after taking office.
As a result, the long-dormant national struggle seems to be ready to move again.
Especially after the drastic changes in Eastern Europe and the collapse of the Soviet Union, all ethnic groups in Yugoslavia chose independence.
This federation completely dissolved under the referendum of various countries.
However, Milosevic, a Serb who was the leader of the FRY, did not approve of the disintegration, which led to a quarrel among the representatives of various nationalities in Parliament.
Croatia, Slovenia and other countries forced referendums despite the opposition of Serbs.
But there are also Serbs in these countries, who voted against in the referendum.
Milosevic hoped that the disintegration would be resolved in this way, but he underestimated the attitude of independence such as Croatia.
War broke out, civil war in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Croatia was the first to break out of civil war.
Following the declaration of independence by the Croats, the Serbs in Croatia also declared independence and established their own regime.
One country, two regimes, this was obviously impossible, so civil war broke out.
The war soon spread to the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (the former Bosnian region was dominant).
The problems in Bosnia and Herzegovina are more complex, and all parties are at peace with each other in a stable environment.
But after the outbreak of war in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina also split.
The majority of Muslims, who declared themselves president, pushed for things related to independence.
In the parliament, the same quarrels broke out, and the more everyone quarreled, the more angry they became, and in the end, the parliament did not pass, and the Mu and Croats forcibly pushed for the referendum.
Despite strong opposition from the Serbs, the outcome did not have much impact and Bosnia and Herzegovina declared independence.
However, the Serbs saw no success in stopping them, so they took armed attacks against the Croats and Muslims.
After all, the Serbs were once the majority of the Yugoslav federal government and also had the vast majority of the Yugoslav government army.
This led to the civil war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where Serbs had only 100,000 troops while the other side had 200,000 coalition troops.
However, because military equipment was far superior to that of the other side, the war was fought at the beginning with Serb superiority.
Wars have always been accompanied by bloodshed, coupled with the historical contradictions between these races, which makes the bloodshed continuous.
Serbs in Bosnia and Herzegovina remembered the Croat massacres during World War II and began wielding knives at civilians.
Of course, it is never only Serbs who wield knives at civilians, but also Muslim and Croats.
As early as the beginning of the referendum, the Muhammads took action against Serb civilians in Sarajevo, intensifying the contradictions between the two communities.
Therefore, when the Serbs gained the upper hand and laid siege to Sarajevo.
Some soldiers sneaked into the city and shot Mu civilians with machine guns.
Both sides have red eyes, and various ways of killing people are endless, and their cruelty is no worse than that of the Nazis.
By this time, the Croats and Muslims were still united against the Serbs, which means that this was still a contradiction between the two sides.
However, in 1993, the Croats betrayed the allies, which led to the intensification of the conflict between the Muslims and the Croats.
Thus, the situation of tricommunal fighting in Bosnia and Herzegovina was officially formed.
And they fought without a bottom line, and a large number of civilians were slaughtered, and the way they were slaughtered shocked the international community.
The United Nations was quick to mediate the matter, but it turned out that it was a contradiction between ethnic groups who did not listen to the words of the United Nations.
In desperation, the United Nations had to send peacekeepers into Bosnia and Herzegovina to establish a civilian assembly security zone, hoping to protect civilians from war.
However, Muslim and Croat troops prefer to hide in the safe zone, and then run out of the safe zone to attack the Serbs.
This made the Serbs itch their teeth with hatred, and eventually rushed into the safe zone under the impact of hatred, causing tragedy.
The massacre before the eyes of the peacekeepers — the Srebrenica massacre
In April 1993, the Council declared Srebrenica a safe zone in Bosnia and Herzegovina and sent troops to carry out peacekeeping.
However, the bias of the United States and European countries in favor of the Muhams and Croats, coupled with the above-mentioned Muslim and Croats hiding in the safe zone, caused the Serb army to become angry.
With the support of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Serb forces attacked Srebrenica despite warnings from the United Nations.
Despite the constant international public opinion, this has not stopped the anger of the Serb army.
A large number of residents were forced to flee their homes and escape Serb pursuit, and they tried to enter the camp of the peacekeepers, who at the time allowed only a part of them to enter.
This caused the rest to fall into the hands of the Serb army.
There is no exact account of their fate to this day, but the peacekeepers later discovered that tens of thousands of Mu armed men were shelled and their bones were scattered on the battlefield.
The fact that the peacekeepers found that Muslim men were the majority of these bodies proves that Serbs only prey on men and spare women and children.
But that's tens of thousands! Tens of thousands of people died tragically in front of the peacekeepers.
After the Srebrenica massacre, the international community was in an uproar, and the United Nations finally agreed to NATO's military action against Bosnia and Herzegovina.
NATO sent a large number of troops into Bosnia and Herzegovina to mediate the war.
Finally, in November 1995, the leaders of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina signed an armistice agreement in the presence of the United States.
The agreement stipulates that Bosnia and Herzegovina will be a unified state consisting of two separate entities, the Muslim Federation and the Republic of Serbia.
This civil war in Bosnia and Herzegovina has finally come to an end.
Although the war stopped, the results of many years of war have forever left a bloody mark in history.
The site of the massacre is now a memorial center and cemetery for the victims of the Holocaust.
Here, a shocking sight shocked the tourists who came here:
4,749 white tombstones are densely packed here, all of whom died in March 1995 and are all male.
Their tombstones are all oriented east, because that is the direction of Mecca, a holy place for Muslims.
A little understanding will find that these 4749 tombstones are confirmed by DNA, and on a large tombstone, the number "8372" is written proudly, and after this string of numbers, it is a "..."
The ellipsis means that there are far more victims than this number.
This massacre still left a cruel mark on Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia.
To this day, the Serbian nation is still burdened with the accusations of history.
Wars, in all eras, are brutal and bloody, with the cost of displacement of people.
And the civil war in Bosnia and Herzegovina is absolutely the number one cruelty in human history, just because of nationalism.
Under nationalism, how inhuman and cruel is it that all ethnic groups carry out massacres against other ethnic groups in disregard of civilization and humanity?
And such a tragic ethnic hatred has always accompanied history, making it difficult for all ethnic groups to move towards harmony and unification.
To this day, there are still deep contradictions between Serbs and Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In areas where Serbs live, they still fly the Serbian flag instead of the Bosnian flag.
For them, Serbia is more like their homeland than Bosnia and Herzegovina.
And after that massacre, the Mu people were also afraid of the war.
Perhaps, only when all races are afraid of war can the world remain at peace.
Resources:
Srebrenica Koon, where the tragedy occurred in the Bosnian War, is cold
The National Origins of the Bosnian War "Overseas Nebula"
Bosnia and Herzegovina: War and Peace Cai Tianxin
The war in Bosnia and Half - for whom does the death knell sound? Wang Chunyu