So-called 'ethical' arguments are often used by the propagandists of
liberal-democratic expansionism. They are accepted without criticism,
especially by so-called critical academics. Gerard Toal (Gearóid O'Tuathail)
uses pseudo-ethical arguments and 'critical' rhetoric to promote
interventionism, using the case of Srebrenica. Like Chomsky in the case of
Timor, he criticises the UN and 'the west' for not being interventionist
enough, for not being tough enough. In both cases, the tough intervention
came.

The ethnic cleansing of a 'safe area": the fall of Srebrenica and the ethics
of UN-governmentality. In Geography and Ethics: Journeys in a Moral Terrain.
(James Proctor and David Smith, 1999).

Toal has written pure propaganda: it could have been paid for by the NATO or
the US government. Perhaps it was. He deliberately distorts the history of the
Srebrenica zone, and conceals the truth about what happened. He can get away
with that, because he has privileged access to the academic circuit (journals,
books and conferences). It is a closed world, which accepts no outside criticism.

Toal's sources are Anglo-American. He took his history of the Srebrenica
enclave from US-published books. He ignored the mass of material available in
Dutch: at the time of its fall, the Srebrenica zone was supervised by Dutch
troops, and it became a national scandal. There is also much material in
French, because of the role of UN commandant Janvier. A parliamentary enquiry
has now started in France, and one is planned in the Netherlands. And of
course there are the sources in Bosnia and Serbia itself, which Toal also
ignored: some relevant material is available online in English.

Toal presents a distorted picture of the Srebrenica enclave, ignoring the
geography of the area. Srebrenica was a mining town, in a mountainous area
which is almost uninhabited by general European standards. Far from being a
Bosniak ("muslim") town in a sea of Serbs, the town's Bosniak inhabitants
dominated the few small Serbs villages near it. Only at the end - when large
RS (Bosnian Serb) forces arrived from other regions - was it threatened.

Toal continually presents Srebrenica as an enclave of victims. He names the
local Bosniak leader Naser Oric, but only in the context of Srebrenica being
surrounded and in dire need of food. Elsewhere he condemns the "horrific
violence" of the Bosnian Serb army. This is a completely false history. There
is not a word about the horrific violence inflicted by Naser Oric and his men,
on the surrounding Serb villages, and on the population of the enclave itself.
Oric, far from being a victim, is a war criminal. Even the pro-NATO Hague
Tribunal had no hesitation in indicting him. Until the closing stages, the
Srebrenica enclave was the source of aggression, not the spatial victim.


Toal says the United States only dropped food to the enclave, but had a policy
of 'circumscribed engagement' and refused to "do anything substantive" as the
fall of the enclave neared. This is a lie. The US was by then dropping arms to
the Bosniak army, and re-arming and training the Croatian army.

Most importantly Toal makes no reference to the geopolitical dealing which
directly affected Srebrenica. The story is very complex, even the apparently
simple decision to commit Dutch troops, had a complex background in internal
Dutch politics. (And it continues to have repercussions: the present
government offered Dutch troops, for the Eritrean ceasefire monitoring, as an
'atonement' for Srebrenica).

What is certain is that the simple version presented by Toal - genocidal Serb
forces overrun enclave - is false.

The most far-reaching alternative version, which originates among dissatisfied
Bosniaks, is in the form of a conspiracy theory. However, it is not
necessarily false for that reason. The story is, that President Clinton asked
Bosniak President Izetbegovic to allow the fall of Srebrenica, in order to
give him a 'Pearl Harbour' justifying western intervention. Izetbegovic tried
to persuade Oric and his supporters to accept this, but at first failed. With
threats and bribes, they were convinced, and left the enclave secretly,
abandoning the rest of the population. This quote from a UN report surfaces
repeatedly in this context:

"115. Representatives of the Bosniac community gathered in Sarajevo on 28 and
29 September to vote on the peace package. A delegation of Bosniacs from
Srebrenica was transported to Sarajevo by UNPROFOR helicopter to participate
in the debate. Prior to the meeting, the delegation met in private with
President Izetbegovic, who told them that there were Serb proposals to
exchange Srebrenica and Zepa for territories around Sarajevo. The delegation
opposed the idea, and the subject was not discussed further. Some surviving
members of the Srebrenica delegation have stated that President Izetbegovic
also told them he had learned that a NATO intervention in Bosnia and
Herzegovina was possible, but could only occur if the Serbs were to break into
Srebrenica, killing at least 5,000 of its people."

There was certainly a proposal to exchange the enclaves for a corridor into
Sarajevo. Similar proposals were in most of the international plans for the
division of Bosnia. Certainly, the Bosniak and RS leaders discussed these: the
international community insisted. So the 'fall of Srebrenica' was not an
isolated event resulting from sudden military action, but an option in
pre-existing wider plans. Toal conceals this geopolitical background entirely,
and omits any reference to deals that were being brokered, including
population exchange.

After the fall of Srebrenica, RS forces did indeed pull back, allowing Bosniak
forces to create a corridor into Sarajevo. Coincidence? Toal omits any
reference to the accompanying changes in the geopolitical situation.

What about the general 'ethics' promoted by Toal? He consistently identifies
the 'moral' position with maximum intervention. Being moral, for Toal, is
being tougher than the NATO, tougher than than the Pentagon. At times the
result is bizarre: the western military are presented as unfeeling
over-professionalised bureaucrats, afraid to do anything except drop food. On
the other side are the Foucault-quoting 'moral' supporters of massive military intervention.

Toal attributes ethnic cleansing and genocide in Bosnia entirely to the
"Bosnian Serb army". This, once again, is an entirely false and caricaturally
pro-western view of the war in Bosnia. Yet Toal says this is the "moral
challenge" to the international community. He rejects humanitarian
intervention as insufficient, a cover-up, and rejects neutrality.

Toal is calling for a crusade, that is the only way to interpret it. And that
is what happened ultimately, although in Kosovo not in Bosnia. Toal calls for
the west to 'transgress geographies...in the name of a responsibility without
limits". That is the language of recolonisation and reconquest, it is the
language of unlimited military intervention. These pseudo-ethical slogans,
like those of other interventionist theorists, are the new equivalent of the
'civilising mission' which was claimed to justify colonialism. There was no
civilising mission, the 'civilisation' consisted of repeated atrocities, but
as an ideology it worked because it was unquestioned.

By maintaining a closed academic circle, and excluding attacks on
propagandists like Toal, 'critical' geographers are complicit in this new
rhetoric of western liberal-democratic expansionism.


--
Paul Treanor

http://web.inter.nl.net/users/Paul.Treanor/