There is no parallel there. Russia had only one demand - respect for agreed and signed principles of indivisible security.
Parallel is with NATO expansion.
Same as Hitler, NATO acquired access to Russia step by step
“We just want to restore unified Germany”
“We just want to get Czechia and Slovakia”
“We just want to have to balkanize Balkan to destroy Serbs”
“We only want Hungary and Poland”
“We invaded to protect Bulgaria and Romania against certain foreign elements (or whatever the justification was), we intend to keep them safe”
“All we need is a corridor to Baltics”
“Lets just add Ukraine and Georgia (they are not even close to Atlantic, but hey what is bit ow water between friend”
Except in the case of Yugoslavia, right?
On the other hand it could have been a show of how quickly and easily it could be done, if that was the aim.
However, they failed to mention any territorial transfer is draft peace proposal in December 2021? All they are worried are security guarantees against US/NATO.
> As Russia’s massing of military power near Ukraine prompted a crisis, President Vladimir Putin has demanded legally-binding security guarantees for… Russia.
Minsk Accords was for that, UNSC resolution 2202 was there for seven years. Ukraine and the West chose not to implement it. They chose to prepare Ukraine for the war and even threaten with arming them with nuclear arms.
Some parts of Ukraine already decided.
Can we ask North American natives if they would want their lands back? Oh, we can’t, mostly eliminated.
Hitler or NATO were not involved in the unification of Germany, it started in East Germany with unarmed civilians and it ended (outside Germany) with a treaty between the 4 allies (inckuding the SU) and the two German states. The rest of your alternate history story is on the same level:
Russia is invading a sovereign country, murdering many of its citizens, kidnapping others, chasing locals who don’t support them out so they can hold fake referendums in which they also let Russian soldiers vote.
Oh, and Serbia (or rather, the Yugoslav government running on a Serb nationalist agenda) was found guilty of using violence and engaging in ethnic cleansing to remove Croats, Bosnians, and Albanians from large parts of Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosovo with a view to seizing parts of those territories for themselves. The same thing what Putin is doing now for Russia. No wonder you love Putin. Serbia was no victim, but rather an aggressor perpetrating genocide. Just like Russia today.
Repeat: Serbia was not a victim, but the chief aggressor of the socalled Yugoslav civil wars.
Perhaps we should ask him if he supported the Serbs committing genocide against Bosnians back then and ethnic cleansing against ethnic Albanians and Croats. The answer might be very telling.
Much like any supporter of bloodthirsty tyrants, he seems to think they are the victim, rather than the aggressor which Serbia was throughout most of the Yugoslav civil wars.
His love for mass murderer and war criminal Putin kind of gives away what the answer would be. Which is something to the degree of “its not genocide when we Serbs do it”.
NATO certainly was.It was the first step of its expansion eastwards.
Besides, we are talking about parallels - similar moves in different times. I find that “Drang nach Osten”, Nazi’s “Lebensraum” and NATO’s eastward expansion are suspiciously similar concepts.
It might be a nonsense for you. Not as much for Serbs. And Russians who saw what’s on the cards for them too.
Technically and legally not entirely correct. Donbass and Crimea have voted few times to separate from Ukraine. Russia has just recognized their status of independence and accepted their invitation to provide protection.
That was all after all other attempts to secure safety for ethic Russians in Ukraine failed, and after 8 years of genocide.
Again, completely incorrect on so many levels.
Serbs created Yugoslavia after being on a winning side in both World Wars. Nationalist Serbs say that Yugoslavia was the biggest mistake for Serbs, accepting losers like Slovenians and Croats - no, Serbs don’t want other people’s territory.
Yet, Serbs were the only ones that were not allowed self-determination in Yugoslavia.
Serbs have been cleansed from Coratia (from 15% of population to under 4%) large portions of Bosnia (specially Sarajevo) and Kosovo-Metohija (from 25% to under 5%).
Those are simple facts that you can easily check.
This is [NYT article from 1982 about ethnic cleansing of Serbs from Kosovo-Metohija](https://Russia is invading a sovereign country, murdering many of its citizens, kidnapping others, chasing locals who don’t support them out so they can hold fake referendums in which they also let Russian soldiers vote.). It was going on for very long time.
Civil wars are called that way because they are between civilian population of particular territory, so technically, there are no aggressors. And yes, Serbs were the victims. They don’t complain, though. All will get into its place eventually.
Talking of genocide: > On April 30, 1941, the Ustaše proclaimed the main race laws, patterned after Nazi race laws – the “Legal Decree on Racial Origins”, the “Legal Decree on the Protection of Aryan Blood and the Honor of the Croatian People”, and the “Legal Provision on Citizenship”.[26] These decrees defined who was a Jew, and took away the citizenship rights of all non-Aryans, i.e. Jews and Roma. By the end of April 1941, months before the Nazis implemented similar measures in Germany, the Ustaše required all Jews to wear insignia, typically a yellow Star of David.[27] The Ustaše declared the “Legal Provision on the Nationalization of the Property of Jews and Jewish Companies”, on 10 October 1941, and with it they confiscated all Jewish property.[28]
*> * > The Ustaše enacted many other decrees against Jews, Roma and Serbs, which became the basis for Ustaše policies of genocide against Jews and Roma, while against Serbs – as proclaimed by an Ustaše leader, Mile Budak – the policy was to kill a third, expel a third, and forcefully convert to Catholicism a third,[29] which many historians also describe as genocide. The decrees were enforced not only through the regular court system, but also through new special courts and mobile courts-martial with extended jurisdiction.[30] Almost immediately the first concentration camps were set up, and in July 1941 the Ustaše government began clearing ground for what would become the Jasenovac concentration camp. - Wikipedia
Have in mind that Croatian “independent” state in WWII included Bosnia and parts of Serbia all the way to Belgrade.
Same as Ukrainians, Croats, Bosnian Muslims and Albanians on Kosovo-Metohija had their own SS divisions actively exterminating Serbs. Croats also fought with Nazis in Russia, very prominent in battle for Stalingrad.
Ustase came to power in Croatia in 1990s again. Policies have successfully carried out with great support from the West.
My father’s family was lucky - they were among the third that were expelled to Serbia. Millions were not as lucky.
All in all, Serbs are used to Western bulling and lies. Same story repeats for centuries. Empires come and go. American Empire will go too. It’s the matter of inevitability. No hatred from Serbs.
In East Germany I’m sure there were some who liked their USSR overlords and that they could have some power over their neighbours but a lot of Germans did not like to be a 2nd class citizen in their own country and were glad that the Soviet occupation was over after 40 years.
The transition was not easy for a lot of people and there were those who profit more since but at least they have more freedom now then during the Soviet occupation.
And yes the west also got a lot out of the German unification with also a lot of individuals making a profit of it.
The Federal Republic of Germany was involved, but not as a member of NATO. The NATO institutions were not involved. Only in your fantasy NATO was involved. NATO is an organisation of independent memberstates, not a superstate. And the expansion of NATO was a “Drang nach Westen” of East European states.
The political protests started as a pro Soviet protest. The GDR goverment was anti Perestroika and Glasnost. So the “Gorbi, Gorbi” chants became an anti GDR goverment protest. The most “2nd class citizens” in East Germany have been the Soviet conscript soldiers (the non Russians at the bottom). And the Soviets were very much carefull not to bee seen as an occupier. The suppression of opposition was done by the Stasi (Staatssicherheit).
I do not deny that Serbs became victims in the Yugoslavian Wars, but not because “the West” started the mess to harm Serbians. Blame Serbian nationalists and Kroatian nationalists not “the West” (exept Dr. Helmut Kohl for supporting Tudjman, he deserves that).
Germany is still under the occupation. It is not sovereign nation. It can’t defend its infrastructure, choose who to do business with, choose not to be spied on. It has to do as it is told by the overlords.
Part of the Germany was lucky to to be occupied by a country that profiteered from the war the most. Other part was occupied by a country that suffered and was devastated the most. It’s not reasonable to expect that both sides could enjoy similar treatment.
The other option is that Yugoslavia was a bad example in ideological battle that was going on - it was a successful example of socialism and “dictatorship”. Didn’t fit in the “end of history” narrative that liberal democracy is the only way forward.
At the critical moment, in May 1990, US has adopted its H.R.5114 - Foreign Operations, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act, 1991 that among the other things deny any support for Yugoslav Federal Government and provides support for individual republics if they are assessed as having had free and fair and elections (meaning not Socialists in power):
Prohibits, six months after this Act’s enactment, the expenditure of funds made available pursuant to this Act to provide assistance to Yugoslavia. Directs the Secretary of the Treasury to instruct the U.S. executive directors to international financial institutions to oppose any assistance to Yugoslavia. Exempts from such prohibition assistance to support democratic parties or movements and emergency and humanitarian assistance. Makes such prohibition inapplicable if: (1) all the individual republics of Yugoslavia have held free and fair elections and are not engaged in a pattern of human rights violations; or (2) the Secretary of State certifies that Yugoslavia is making significant strides toward complying with the Helsinki Accords and is encouraging any republic which has not held free and fair elections to do so.*
Federal government of a Croat Ante Markovic couldn’t conduct economic reforms without aid from international organizations. Obviously federation has collapsed and two “democratic” republic have separated and been recognized as independent by the West same as Donbass has been recognized by Russia.
That is what broke Yugoslavia.
No, nationalism broke the already struggling Yugoslavia. But thanks for the video, I spent two summervacations in the real Yugoslavia in the late 1980th. I had a Yugoslavian landlord and liked Yugoslavian restaurants in Germany. And Yugoslavia was not on the right of Italy but south of Klagenfurt. The video is an advertisement made for Americans, not for Germans like me. Unless you are a US “Serb” you should know better then throwing nonsense about Yugoslavia in my direction. There are a lot of “Yugoslavian” Germans who became Germans because they have not been “Ustace” or Tschetnik" enough.
But:
Greetings from the British Occupation Zone.
Nationalism was there from the very start. Nationalism existed (and still does) in other federal states - US, Belgium, USSR, Spain, France, India, China, even EU. It is always a balance between federal powers and individual states/nations. West has clearly chosen to undermine Federal side in Yugoslavia.
It was tourist advertisement aimed at educating Americans and everyone else with black-and-white image of Yugoslavia. It has presented facts. Life was good in socialist Yugoslavia under “dictatorship”. That was very dangerous to those selling liberal democracy as the only way.
Interestingly, similar idiotic black-and-white simplifications on Russia, China, India and the rest of the world are prevalent even here on this forum.
If Germany is under occupation, presumably by the USA, then pls explain
why it maintains such deep ties to China expressly against the wishes of the USA?
why it maintained such deep ties with Russia expressly against the wishes of the USA?
why it failed an continues to fail to contribute sufficiently to the joint NATO defence budget against the expressed wishes of the USA?
why the Biden administration did in the end follow the German demand to send Abrahams tanks to Ukraine in January, even though their unwillingness has been confirmed by members of the administration?
why the USA feels the need to fight a trade war with the EU, including Germany, if it actually occupies Germany?
I am sure, 99% of the readers are knowledgeable about to identify the nonsense about the “genocide in the Donbas” and for those wishing to dive deeper, I will leave the following here:
The German defence budget is 100% NATO and (some) UN. The US military spending is worldwide.
In case of the NATO defence budget:
Cost share arrangements for civil budget, military budget and NATO Security Investment Programme (2021-2024)
Nation Adjusted cost share further to accession of North Macedonia
“at 30”
Applicable as from 1 January 2021 to 31 December 2024
Albania 0.0908
Belgium 2.1043
Bulgaria 0.3656
Canada 6.8789
Croatia 0.2995
Czechia 1.0558
Denmark 1.3116
Estonia 0.1248
France 10.4913
Germany 16.3444
Greece 1.0573
Hungary 0.7595
Iceland 0.0642
Italy 8.7812
Latvia 0.1595
Lithuania 0.2566
Luxembourg 0.1693
Montenegro 0.0291
Netherlands 3.4506
North Macedonia 0.0778
Norway 1.7771
Poland 2.9861
Portugal 1.0491
Romania 1.2279
Slovakia 0.516
Slovenia 0.2276
Spain 5.9908
Türkiye 4.7266
United Kingdom 11.2823
United States 16.3444
TOTAL NATO 100.0000
Only the same as the US.
From:
That the US is spending money because the Europeans are not so is a US media story. The EU (has been) is outspending Russia. After a year, Putin has lost, but Ukraine is far away from winning.
