Ah, Those Journalists

[Sarmatian]

Ah, I stand corrected, it did take until 1992, though. That more or less proves my point. Whether or not he should have a statue is an entirely different question.

Well, the fact that Brits welcomed the unveiling of the statues with boos and jeers and that the statue has to be guarded 24/7 proves your point even better. Even though some politician decided erecting the statue was a good idea, many Brits didn't and still don't agree. And this gives a great deal of credit in my book to the British, if I may add.

As to whether anyone will answer for the WMD, I would point out that the Republicans are out of the White House and Labour is soon to be obliterated from the House of Commons.

Suffering a political defeat and facing responsibility is not the same. They'll be back in 5 or 10 years.

Louis point is, I think, that you fail to recognise the Serbian bias and the narrative of victimisation that bias creates.

I understood his point but I think he's barking up the wrong tree. Once again Louis wants to be a shrink of an entire nation. Serbs certainly aren't the biggest of nations, but twelve millions, give or take, is still to much, even for Louis, but that's a minor point. The major point is, even if Louis is right, that it doesn't change the anything. I agree with him to a point. There was rampant nationalism (it exists even today, on a much lesser scale, but still too much for my liking) and there is a narrative of victimisation, but not even close to what he was saying. I say not even close for two reason - because it's not nearly on that scale and because parts of it are justified. That doesn't, or shouldn't excuse, the other sides. It shouldn't be an excuse for their mistakes, blunders and crimes just like crimes against Serbs can't be an excuse for crimes committed by Serbs.

Since we mentioned Bomber Harris - his strategy of pursuing terror bombing was done in a total war. It was literally us or them. It doesn't justify it in my book, but at least it gives some more food for thoughts.
In case of NATO vs Serbia... Serbia's entire GDP comes to what... few percents of NATO combined military spending. Technologically, Serbia was decades behind. It wasn't a total war, heck it wasn't a war at all. It was an action against "Serbian mechanisms of repression", or something like that, I'm not sure how exactly Clinton phrased it. It makes the rules even more strict.

I'm sorry that I'm always returning to Serbia, it wasn't my intention when I started this thread, it's just that I'm naturally more familiar about that than about Iraq or Afghanistan or other events. The point still remains that anything not fitting the accepted image was ignored by the media and the politicians. Reports on the internet are scarce, too. Unless you know exactly what you're looking for, you won't find it. I'm sure we could find many similar examples about Afghanistan or Iraq, and more importantly, I'm sure that there are many more that we couldn't find, which is kinda a point of this thread...

EDIT: Exceptional documentary that covers what I'm trying to say. Made in Netherlands, I believe. Among other things it deals with the infamous "concentration camps" photographs made in 1992 that very most influential in turning the public opinion in the western countries against Serbia. I strongly encourage watching because it's exactly about what we're talking here...