Winston Churchill – Croatia, the War, and the Future

Left: General Ante Gotovina - Right: General Mladen Markac - at the Hague, September 2011

The Croatian Jutarnji List published an article by Neven Sesardic “The Hague is Wrong – Beyond any reasonable doubt” in the newspaper’s 24-26 December issue.

Sesardic examines the ICTY April 2011 judgment on Croatian General’s Ante Gotovina and Mladen Markac with no stones unturned when it comes to the ICTY’s conviction regarding the so-called “joint criminal enterprise” – i.e. alleged mass expulsion of Serbs from Croatia in 1995.

He points out with compelling arguments, refering to points of evidence, how the ICTY in the Hague was wrong in its judgment (currently on Appeal). It’s a “must read” and, hence, the author’s text is translated into English.

While most of the article is taken up in demonstrating why the Hague was wrong beyond any reasonable doubt in its April 2011 verdict, Sesardic concludes his article with a painful truth:

“ Double Standards

… Here is how Churchill openly advocated such a mass expulsion of Germans from areas in which they had been living for centuries: “Expulsion is a method which, insofar as we have been able to see, will be the most satisfactory and lasting. There will be no mixture of populations to cause endless trouble. A clean sweep will be made. I am not alarmed by these transferences, which are more possible in modern conditions.”
(Churchill’s speech in the British Parliament in 1944)

And indeed, things went according to plan and soon the “clean sweep” was made. According to unbiased sources, somewhere between 12 and 14 million Germans were forced to leave forever their homes in a movement that a historian of that period called “probably the largest forced migration in modern history.” At least half a million people lost their lives in the process.

No one was ever held accountable for those crimes and no politician (except
Vaclav Havel) has ever expressed regret on behalf of his country for these crimes of mass ethnic cleansing in which a number of politicians were demonstrably involved.

On the other hand we have The Hague Tribunal, which attributed to the Croatian political leadership and the Croatian army the responsibility for the same kind of crime even though this charge is in fact nothing but an unproved and arbitrary accusation”.

Neven Sesardic, (born 1949, Belgrade) is a leading Croatian Philosopher, Academic, author of numerous articles in leading Philosophy Journals, author of books, writer of many newspaper articles. His work has taken him to all sides of the world. Currently he is a Professor of Philosophy, Lingnan University, Hong Kong. His previous academic and research posts are: Associate Professor of Philosophy, Lingnan University, Hong Kong, Research Fellow, Department of Philosophy, King’s College London, Professor of Philosophy, Miyazaki International College, Japan, NSF Research Fellow and Fellow of the Center for Philosophy of Science, University of Minnesota, Visiting Professor, Department of Philosophy, University of Notre Dame, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, University of Zagreb, Fellow of the Center for Interdisciplinary Research, University of Bielefeld, Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, University of Giessen, Assistant Professor, University of Zagreb, Lecturer, University of Zagreb, Croatia.