Review of Noel Malcolm's Bosnia: A Short History (New York: New York University Press, 1994).
As is well known, Bosnia is a largely artificial creation, the product of a long history of Turkish oppression and ancient ethnic hatreds. Yugoslav communism, whatever its other contributions, did manage to exert a valuable discipline over these seething enmities, until the break-up of the Soviet Union and the collapse of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia unleashed them anew. The Bosnian war that followed was an inevitable consequence of these factors; it is thus a classical civil war, deriving its dynamic from elements within Bosnia. While the Serbs bear considerable responsibility for the numerous atrocities, the Croats and especially the Muslims deserve a large share of the guilt. Muslim leader Alija Izetbegovic, through a policy of population growth and Islamic fundamentalism, has tried to turn Bosnia into a Muslim state. His declaration of independence in the spring of 1992 was the first major attempt to challenge the Bosnian status quo, stranding Serbs and Croats alike in a hostile, oppressive environment and leaving them no recourse except force.
The above observations, several of which have been made by such statesmen as John Major, Lord Carrington, and Bill Clinton, have one thing in common. They are all totally wrong. Noel Malcolm, in his extraordinary book--the best available in English on the background of the Bosnian war--nails every one of them, and dozens of other shibboleths besides. One must hope that Malcolm subjects himself to the rigors of the talk shows. This can only generate more light, if not less heat, in the American debate on Bosnia.
