It'll Serbia Right

In an excellent article in the July issue of Chronicles, Thomas Fleming makes a point that we tend to forget, in our chronic state of provincialism and egotism as to the "importance" of the American political process. It is that "few foreigners seem to realize that the United States is not a unified nation with a common will." Well, part of this, historically, is our own fault since the leading edge of "America" to most people overseas is a division of Marines landing on the nearest beach, with Old Glory flying high and bullets flying every which way. The Marines typically don't bring along a token group of peaceniks and antiwar protesters to balance things out -- although it could be argued that "embedding" members of the press corps amounts to the same thing. But to go on with Fleming's presentation: "In addition to the usual distinctions of race, region, and religion, we are divided ideologicallly between an anti-American, anti-Christian, anti-Western elite class that panders to racial minorities and uses multiculturalism as a weapon to destroy our heritage, and a naive and patriotic majority that would gladly support the Serbs in their struggle with Islamic neighbors, if only they were properly informed. The leadership of the Democratic Party, which entirely belongs to the former group, would like to destroy or at least corrupt Serbia, whose traditions represent everything they hate: patriotism, Christianity, and self-reliance."

I guess I should have mentioned that Fleming believes we have been on the wrong side in the ex-Yugoslavia conflict all along. And in fact I found it awfully damned funny that, in the midst of "World War IV" against militant Islam, we were busy defending the Moslems of Bosnia against the Serbs and the other Bosnians -- and that bit of foreign-policy wisdom has now morphed into our defense of, and support of, Kosovo, which I challenge any Americans who are not perennial National Geographic readers to even find on a map. But by the esoteric magic -- the smoke and mirrors -- that forms the basis for American foreign policy, it is easy to see how this absurd situation came about. Both Croatia and Serbia were puppet states of the Nazis during World War II, but Serbia at least had the distinction of being the birthplace of World War I, and thus had a certain degree of nostalgic cachet for American foreign-policy buffs. Add to which, Serbia tends to be Serbian Orthodox whereas Croatia tends to be Roman Catholic. You would think that these factors would favor Serbia among our foreign-policy elite. Albania, on the other hand, doesn't really "count", religion-wise, since the Albanian regime for 50-odd years was militantly athiest. But when Christianity is suppressed, Islam can continue to thrive, for some reason (a good lesson for American liberals, in fact). And, according to the topsy-turvy nature of our foreign policy these days, a Christian nation is automatically identified as the "oppressor", even when the conflict involves Islam on the other side. (Say, maybe the way for Iran to get into our good graces is for them to pick a fight with Armenia. Hey, it could work.) Add to which, the Moslems in the Balkans have identified themselves as a quivering, terrorized, persecuted minority, and as we know, nothing melts the hearts of American politicians more than a group that presents this image -- unless they happen to be Palestinians, of course. So clearly the time was ripe to show these Medieval religious nuts a thing or two, and also "support diversity" -- i.e. Islam -- at no cost, just to show the Moslems that we really don't hate their guts all the time, honest.

So Fleming goes on to say that "the anti-American left hates the Serbs as a rooted people who cling to their traditions... The simple equation is that Serbs equal Confederate Southerners who equal Nazis." And then he adds a real bell-ringer: "Whoever is elected president in November will undoubtedly be the worst president in American history." Wow -- does he really mean, worse than Carter, worse than "W"? That's a tall order. That will take more than just random incompetence -- it will take determination, focus, perseverance... but hey, our politicians can handle it, you can be sure of that. So Fleming sees our recent, present, and undoubtedly future policy in the Balkans as part and parcel of the larger folly of American meddling and chronically taking the wrong side, mainly at the behest of liberals or of those contaminated by the liberal "internationalist" mindset, which works against rootedness, sense of place, and sense of ethnic identity every time. To which -- it might be argued -- don't the Kosovars also have roots, a sense of place, and a sense of ethnic identity? Undoubtedly so. They can enjoy those things just as readily -- and more authentically -- in Albania as in Kosovo, I would imagine, but that recommendation will not be coming forth from our foreign policy solons. Their watchword is, always stand up for the "little guy", even when he's dead wrong.