Quoted: Hindsight, hmmmmmmm. We were wrong, again! There is no valor in defending muslims. They say they are a ROP, their own bible (Quran/Koran) preaches differently. Our world will be a safer place if we just cleaned the slate of them all. Slobo was onto something, too bad we are the worlds police force, to bad.

These days, being right is considered WRONG!

It's too bad really.

Quoted: Judging from your screen name, you have a dog in this fight.

Judging from his avatar, too!

I believe that's Vlad the Impaler.  He had some run-ins with the Ottoman's himself.

Quite a guy.

Quoted: I am not posting this to start a argument, and  I am sure I do not know all the facts but. At one time Bosnia was a large majority Christian . Then Muslims over time kept immigrating in very large numbers. Then  they declared that this was their country now that they were the majority. So Milosevic's started a war with them. Now Clinton sends troops there to defend the Muslims  , and to knock Milosevic's out of power. Question , what would you do if this happened here, would you not pick up arms and stop the muslims from declaring this their country. Were we on the wrong side in that war?

The Slavs living in the area were Christian or members of heretical Christian faiths. Some were Catholic, some Orthodox, depending upon where they lived.  When the Turks conquered the area over 600 years ago, many of the Slavs converted so as to rise within the Ottoman Muslim hierarchy.  There have been Muslim Slavs in the region for centuries.

Serbs, Muslim Slavs, Bulgarians, Macedonians had largely adopted Turkish customs in housing, food, manners, etc.  A traditional Serbian house looks like..a traditional Turkish house.  All have a history of inflicting misery upon one another. West notes (below) that every foreigner who visits tends to adopt a pet group to champion. They are passionate, fascinating, physically beautiful and romantic people and it is easy to get sucked in to their web of confusion, myths, and lies.

Bosnia's major city, Sarajevo, in particular, had a high rate of intermarriage (about 40% before 1991) and a tradition of not really caring much about religion at all.  Only a very few (the Bosnian President, Izetbegovic) really were religious or cultivated contacts with other Muslims.  Sarajevans had been described all the way back to Rebecca West's 'Black Lamb and Grey Falcon' (still the best history/guide to the region) as dreamy and sensual and concerned with looking good and having a good time.  For the most part, they still are.

All parties bear roughly equal guilt for the miseries of the dissolution of Yugoslavia, although the Serbs committed the bulk of atrocities in Bosnia.  I've stood at the edge of a number of excavations and seen the bones of children executed in 1992, for example.  The jihadists came to fight on behalf of the Muslim Slavs. Some were welcomed, but largely the locals didn't know what to do with them. Good resource on the topic is 'Al-Qaeda's Jihad in Europe' by Evan Kohlmann.  However in terms of the jihadist/salafist ideology/mythology, Bosnia was their 'Spanish Civil War.'  The Serbs were painting all Muslims in the region with this brush in order to create a larger state that had all their people in it. Wasn't accurate, but it may become accurate - see below.

The Albananians are 'different' from the other groups.  Their language is unrelated (to anything!) and they displaced the Serbs in Kosovo, a province that is sort of like the Alamo is to Texas in terms of psychic regard.  Whether they displaced via birthrate or migration depends upon whom you believe. Maybe both.  They run a lot of drugs and human trafficking and were well organized. They've inflicted plenty of suffering upon the Serbs - and vice versa. Chicken and egg.  It's a cycle.  The Albanians are, of course, frequently passionate, charming, etc. etc.  like all other Balkan peoples.  The gulf Arabs have been trying to export their Islam to the region - a cell was taken out in Tirane - but the Kosovar Albanians recognize them as somewhat alien generally.

Milosevic was one among several who manipulated the power vacuum following Tito's death and the realization that semi-socialist Yugoslavia was a bit of an economic fraud/shell game and was $20 billion in debt.  Tudjman (Catholic Croat) was another.  The Bosnian war was complex and a dirty mess - Silber's 'Death of Yugoslavia' is the most honest, well documented reference.  Slobo was one bastard among many.

So there is a connection between the salafist/jihadist Islam and Bosnia; if there's any sympathy for that there, it is a residue of the war - being shot at for years, the arms embargo and concommittant sense of injustice, and most important, the crummy economy and tradition of corruption that made life suck for the average Muslim Slav there.  Someone tells you it happened because you liked chasing *pie*, chain smoking, and drinking beer too much, you're likely to believe him sooner or later. And oh, does everyone like *pie* in that region!  (and it's first-class pie!)

Everyone there lies to you, lies to themselves, and it's...complicated.

Interestingly (to me), the Serbs always complained about feeling on the 'outs' relative to the Bosnian Muslims. The Muslims never seem to get this - they were the aristocracy for hundreds of years and considered the Christians 2nd-class citizens and pig farmers, regardless of ability or skill. It's sort of a grudge the Serbs hold.  

The Croats are strongly linked culturally to their Italian and Germano-Austrian neighbors and kind of resent being Slavs, I think.  

There are also significant little minority groups - most of the ethnic Germans are gone, but there are a lot of Hungarians in Vojvodina, and some tiny groups in Serbia and Kosovo proper - people who speak only Turkish at home, but it's Turkish circa 1600 - imagine people in the Applachians speaking pure Shakespearean English!  (Some think they do ;)  ) and some other little groups like the Gorani and Roma (gypsies).  I had some sort of baked dish - sac (sach) I think, I've forgotten - served in a gypsy camp and cooked on what appears to have been sheet metal from a Zastava car.

It's a mess. That's why "Balkan" is also an adjective and a verb. ;)

To further muddy the waters, a lot (most? many) Turks drink Efes beer, have pretty decent pop music, and subscribe to a state founded by Ataturk; while 'Valley of the Wolves' is popular, most urban Turks are relentlessly secular, even if 'Muslim,' like to party and are fond of *pie.* And Turkey has very good *pie.*  

Turks = Muslims - but it's complicated.