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The Fall of Yugoslavia: The Third Balkan War
The Fall of Yugoslavia The Third Balkan War Author:Misha Glenny Misha Glenny's The Rebirth of History was the authoritative account of the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe. He has now produced an equally vivid and well-informed analysis of the first European war since 1948. — When Croatia and Slovenia declared their independence in June 1991, the fate of federal Yugoslavia was sealed and a most savage ... more »war flared again in the Balkans. The underlying causes go back to business left unfinished by both the Second and First World Wars. Was this latest conflict (as Croats argue) a struggle between a Western free-market democracy and a Bolshevik administration in Belgrade? Or was it (as Serbs insist) a war of liberation against a revived Nazi puppet state in Zagreb? Whatever the truth of such one-sided claims, reawakened enmities led rapidly to tragedy, as peaceful neighbours of four decades took up arms against each other once again.
In his penetrating new book, the BBC's celebrated Central Europe correspondent paints incisive pen portraits of the main colourful - and often utterly ruthless - personalities involved. He offers a sobering eyewitness chronicle of the countdown to war: the stratagems of aggression devised by Milosevic and the federal army leadership; the crass attempts of the Croat authorities to impose their national culture; the violent reaction of the various militias in the disputed territories; the terrible spread of fighting to cities like Dubovnik; and finally the tragic fate of Bosnia-Hercegovina and its capital, Sarajevo. Above all, he shows us the human realities behind the headlines and puts in its true, historical context one of the most ferocious civil wars of our time.« less