in particular: (1) Who should be blamed for all the misery that took place? (2) Who is obliged to find ways of repairing damage where necessary, rebuilding relationships where demanded, and assuring a peaceful future where possible?
Framing the Question
The issue of guilt and responsibility in contemporary Serbia involves generating persuasive historical accounts, which are likely to be generally accepted, that establish what happened in the recent past and which individuals, institutions, or forces are responsible. The wars of succession that followed the dissolution of Yugoslavia in 1991 were a source of trauma for residents of the region and also a topic of global political controversy.4 Both the trauma and the controversy derive from the same source: the commission of war crimes,5 crimes against humanity,6 and genocide,7 in the course of the wars. Consequently the challenge of generating historical accounts carries a political burden. Historical accounts are expected to help in determining who is guilty, how social responsibility is to be distributed, and how peace and reconciliation can be developed. Neighboring countries and international institutions take an interest in this process—they will measure the progress of the country according to how far public opinion in Serbia is willing to accommodate the grievances of its recent enemies and break with its recent past.8
This challenge would already be difficult enough were it not for some unique problems: a historical problem, a problem of balance, and a problem of precedence of jurisdiction.
When Does the Past Begin?
If it is necessary to break with the past, when does the past that needs to be rejected begin? This question is particularly sensitive in the former Yugoslavia, since the instrumentalization of historical memory played an important role in the mobilization of nationalist sentiment and, eventually, nationalist violence. Four answers are most commonly offered.
1. Resolution of guilt from World War II (1941–1945). The war saw on the territory of Yugoslavia an international war between Allied and Axis powers, a guerrilla war between Partisan and occupation forces, and a civil war between Partisan communists, Croatian Ustaše, and Serbian Četnici (including a number of subordinate, smaller, and some forgotten forces).9 In addition to severe war-related damage, this period saw genocide committed by the Ustaša regime in Croatia,10 massacres of Croatian prisoners of war by the Partisans,11 and numerous crimes against civilians by all forces. The postwar Yugoslavian government never seriously investigated or confronted these crimes, and debating them was treated as taboo throughout the Communist period.12 A strong case can be made that among the factors that made nationalist mobilization possible in the last years of SFRJ was the continually unresolved problem of guilt, and hence unsettled grievances, from World War II.13
2. Grievances from the Communist period (1945–1990). Although the Yugoslav Communist regime was less repressive than other European Communist regimes, especially after 1965, there nevertheless remain serious grievances against it. These include grievances involving expropriation of property, forced resettlement (including expulsion of ethnic Germans and Italians), arrest and imprisonment of political opponents, and abrogation of political and civil rights. The largest-scale act of repression was the imprisonment of pro-Soviet Communists after the break with the Soviet Union in 1948.14 Though not as dramatic or violent, a case can be made that the potential of Yugoslavia to become a democratic state was severely hampered by the marginalization of the “liberals” from the Communist hierarchy after 1972.15 The wars that followed the breakup of SFRJ in 1991 directed attention away from these events, meaning that issues arising from the Communist period have never been comprehensively addressed. Other former Communist countries have approached these questions through a variety of means, including “rehabilitation” of former political opponents, restoration of expropriated property, and restrictions on political rights of former domestic intelligence and security officers (“lustration”).
3. Determination of responsibility for the breakup of SFRJ (1980–1992). Over the past decade there has been considerable debate on this theme,16 and when Vojislav Koštunica named his ill-fated Commission for Truth and Reconciliation,17 in 2001, it was posed as one of the themes for the commission to address. Legal and political issues are at stake in this debate. Namely, if one accepts the position that SFRJ was a state broken apart by secession, then the wars would have to be regarded as civil wars over minority rights and the distribution of territory. If one accepts the position that SFRJ dissolved into its federal elements and ceased to exist, then the wars would have to be regarded as international conflicts assisted by Serbia. This issue is, of course, while possibly relevant to questions of the criminal accountability of states and the applicability of international agreements,18 not relevant to questions of individual accountability for crimes.
4. Addressing crimes of the wars of succession (1991–present). The conduct of the wars of succession shocked many, as the wars produced the greatest numbers of deaths, refugees, and incidents of violent abuse seen in Europe since 1945. In most cases, justification for atrocities was offered by nationalist programs seeking control of territory, and in many cases establishing control of territory involved killing, intimidating, and forcibly moving local residents. At the same time, rigid control of public information led to a situation in which even now many people say they are not well informed about the wars. Feelings of guilt, victimization, and resentment are widespread, and are very likely intensified by the failure to produce reliable accounts. Establishing facts and taking appropriate legal action are widely viewed as necessary to put a symbolic end to the atmosphere of war.
The wars of succession take priority for most international observers. The other three variants, while important in their own right, can be read in this context as distractions or signs of ideological obsession. Nonetheless, all the levels of concern enumerated here are very much alive in public debate throughout the former Yugoslavia. Sometimes the themes are raised in a transparently instrumental way, as with efforts in Serbia to document the collaboration of other ethnic groups in World War II, or efforts in Croatia to demonstrate that the Yugoslav federation always operated to Croatia’s disadvantage. But the interrelation of these issues is clear, as one set of unresolved grievances feeds into subsequent conflicts.
The Question of Balance
War crimes, crimes against humanity, and acts of genocide were committed by ethnic Serbs, in the name of Serbian interests or the Serbian state, with the involvement of Serbian institutions, and with some degree of support (how much is an object of controversy) from Serbian people. These crimes are generally regarded as constituting the majority of crimes committed in the wars of Yugoslavian succession.19 The accounts and responses provoked by these crimes constitute the bulk of material of this study.
However, these crimes were not the only crimes committed during the wars. Corresponding with feelings of guilt and responsibility in Serbia are senses of grievance and victimization. At least 200,000 Serbs were forced to emigrate from Croatia after the reconquest of the self-declared RSK in 1995. Almost as many were forced to leave Kosovo in the period after the signing of the Kumanovo agreement in 1999, and violence against the Serb population remains a concern.20 Serbs were victims of massacres, inmates of prison camps (for example, Čelebići),21 and objects of forced migration during the wars. When Serbian politicians complain that these instances are investigated and prosecuted less intensively than crimes committed by Serbian forces, their complaints resonate in domestic public opinion. ICTY declined to pursue charges against NATO for bomb strikes against civilian targets in 1999, while charges against the Bosnian Muslim authorities for abuses and killings perpetrated against the Serb population in Sarajevo during the war remain uninvestigated. Weak prosecutions against Bosnian militia commander Naser Orić (convicted of minor charges and sentenced to time served, then acquitted on appeal), or the Kosovo politician Ramush Haradinaj (acquitted after a series of incidents of witness intimidation),22 also contributed to a sense of imbalance.
