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Mssage from Serbia to grieving Americans
By Aleksandar Pavic
� 2001 WorldNetDaily.com
According to the Julian Calendar used by the Christian Orthodox Church in
Serbia, September 11 is one of four "Days of the Cross" observed during the
year, calling for strict fasting and prayer. This specific Day of the Cross
is devoted to the Beheading of St. John the Baptist, and one is not supposed
to wear anything of red color, in piety for the innocent blood spilled on
that day. The fact that the new American Day of Infamy occurred on the Day
of the Cross observed by the oldest Christian church cannot be an accident.
Living in Serbia and feeling great piety for the innocent blood spilled in
America on that same day, one cannot help but remember the innocent blood
spilled during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999, or the innocent blood
spilled during the preceding wars of the Yugoslav secession. Because,
whenever great human disasters happen, one needs to think of one fundamental
question: Why?
Living through the war, sanctions and all the real or imagined injustices
that can be brought upon a country during the past 10 years have given many
here in Serbia a chance to reflect on the reasons. Actually, it has taught
many the necessity to look for reasons and the lesson that nothing happens
without a reason. If one has learned anything, it has been that such stock
answers as "madness" or "insanity" or "evil" just aren't adequate. Even more
so, if one has learned anything, it is that finger-pointing isn't the
ultimate answer either. Ultimately, free men and free nations cannot accept
the notion that the causes of their fortunes or misfortunes lie outside of
themselves.
The Serbs were not able to gain their freedom from communism on October 5,
2000, until they found the strength in sufficient numbers to look within and
recognize the true nature of the shackles that were binding them from
without. Americans will regain their true, God-given freedom and strength
only when they do the same in sufficient numbers.
The Serbs' problem was the fact that real, eternal Serbia was hijacked from
them, and made to stand for things it was not under former president
Milosevich. That, of course, had its own roots as well - roots that go back
decades. The point is, especially during the years of Clinton, that the
real, eternal America has been hijacked from the Americans and made to stand
for things it is not. Serbia's punishment from Above came in the ensuing 10
years of war, sanctions, international pariah status and poverty. It started
with the killing of innocents on all sides.
Regrettably, America's turn for punishment has arrived, and it has also
started with the killing of innocents. The evil sent out by Clinton
unfortunately had a return address. Those that doubt such things as cosmic
punishment need only come to Belgrade and look at the similarity in
architecture between the NATO-bombed CK tower and the WTC buildings, or
drive by the ruins of the Army General Staff Headquarters in the center of
Belgrade and think of the Pentagon building now.
Speaking from a Balkan perspective, the following questions may be asked:
Was it the real America that encouraged Muslim fundamentalists in Bosnia to
turn down a peace plan that would have prevented a bloody civil war from
breaking out in 1992?
Was it the real America that armed and logistically supported Croat
neo-fascists in cleansing the last 250,000 Serbs from Croatia in 1995?
Was it the real America that instigated and led the 78-day bombing of
Yugoslavia, a country on which it never officially declared war, in order to
help Muslim Albanian fundamentalists cleanse several hundred-thousand Serbs
from their spiritual cradle, Kosovo - and is it the real America that is now
helping these same Albanians expand their narcotic and white-slavery empire
to neighboring Macedonia, all in the name of "human rights"?
If this was and is the real America, then the Americans should listen to the
shrill voices directing them to lash out in all directions and bomb all
their enemies into submission. If that is the real America, then the
Americans should stay true to this new identity to the end and take all the
ensuing consequences of choosing such a course.
However, if the real America is somewhere else, buried in the Federalist
Papers, George Washington's Farewell Address and the innocence and wise
practicality of its pre-Empire days, then those who still feel its presence
under the debris need to reclaim it as quickly as they can. Otherwise, the
days of punishment have only just begun. Perhaps Serbia's own road of
disaster may be instructive of what happens to those who forget what they are.
Serbia voluntarily gave up its identity in 1918 and let itself be absorbed
into a physically larger, multi-ethnic entity called "Yugoslavia." The Serb
leaders gradually gave up their Christian Orthodox identity - they forgot
their religion and values in the name of abstract "tolerance." They forgot
their historical roots and started calling themselves "Yugoslavs." And,
worse, they started acting as "Yugoslavs," disregarding true, natural Serb
interests and strivings for the sake of an abstract entity. (The abstract
identity being imposed upon the Americans at present is that of the
"international community," under whose guise America has turned into a
cynical Empire-builder with guiding lights no higher than those of raw power
and ephemeral economic interest.)
Punishment for Serbia came in several stages:
First, the architect of Yugoslavia, King Alexander Karadjordjevich, was
assassinated by anti-Yugoslav secessionists in 1934.
Second, the country was invaded by Nazi Germany on April 6, 1941, and
defeated after only 12 days, after its multi-ethnic army disintegrated and
most of its non-Serb elements went over to the side of the Axis.
Third, a genocide of Serbs ensued at the hands of these same former countrymen.
Fourth, a communist insurgency broke out as well and was eventually brought
to power near the end of World War II by the Allies (yes, the Allies) who
were guided by their own interests of the moment. These communists, led by
Josip Broz Tito, reconstituted Yugoslavia and partitioned the Serbs into as
many smaller political entities as possible.
Fifth, 40 years later, when the Berlin Wall fell, the other non-Serbs took
advantage of the situation, seceded and carried away as much Serb-inhabited
territory as they could. At the same time, the Serbs were stuck with a
former Party apparatchik, Slobodan Milosevich, who took up a false mantle of
Serb nationalism only to keep himself in power, and who brought the Serbs
international pariah status, war, sanctions, poverty and crime.
When it most needed to be heard, the voice of the true Serbia could not be
heard. And the worst that could possibly happen kept happening and no decent
Serb seemed to be able to do anything about it. Such are the nature of
curses that one brings upon oneself. They tie one's hands when one most
needs them and take away all control over one's actions and choices. Just
like that.
The Serbs' decades-long wandering through the spiritual desert of their own
making finally ended in October of last year, when more than a half million
Serbs took to the streets and said, "Enough! Serbia is not Milosevich,
Serbia is not Communism, Serbia is not isolation, Serbia is not sanctions,
Serbia is not an abstraction." Now the battle for reclaiming Serbia has just
begun. It took decades of war, genocide, tyranny, more war and loss of land
for Serbs to realize that one cannot, in the long run, be anything other
than what one truly is. It was a punishment that hurt terribly and swept
away hundreds of thousands of innocent lives.
Milosevich was not the cause of the national misfortune, he was only the
last instrument of a decades-long punishment, the last wake-up call. Perhaps
Clinton can be looked at in an analogous way: He was the chief architect of
the American loss of identity and straying, and the criminals that carried
out the Day of the Cross carnage in America were the brutal instruments of
the ensuing punishment. One can only hope that what George Bush does next
will be the first step on the road back - a road which is now blocked by the
legacy of the years past, a legacy America needs to learn to overcome, as
quickly as possible.
The message for Americans is: Start digging through the debris, not only for
the bodies of the dead, God rest their souls, but for the roots of what you
really are and have lost. Once you find yourselves, you'll find your
enemies. They are the same enemies as that of eternal, awakened, Christian
Orthodox Serbia - who is waiting patiently for you to rejoin the ranks, as
American-aided fundamentalist terrorists continue gnawing at its southern
flank.
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Aleksandar Pavic a U.C. Berkeley graduate, quit his job and went back to
Yugoslavia in 1990 to take part in ending 50 years of communist rule in
Serbia. During the past decade, he has worked as a member of the Serbian
opposition, gone through the war in the formerly Serb parts of Croatia and
in Bosnia, coordinated aid efforts and served as a senior presidential
adviser in the Serbian entity in Bosnia. He is presently working as an
investment consultant in Belgrade and has almost completed writing a novel
entitled, "Prince of the Balkans."
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Balkan hands on FR know this for too long, bump other FReepers for this
memorable quote:
However, if the real America is somewhere else, buried in the Federalist
Papers, George Washington's Farewell Address and the innocence and wise
practicality of its pre-Empire days, then those who still feel its presence
under the debris need to reclaim it as quickly as they can. Otherwise, the
days of punishment have only just begun. Perhaps Serbia's own road of
disaster may be instructive of what happens to those who forget what they are.
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