In 1992 , writing in London 's '' Jewish Chronicle '' , Sherman warned against " the lapse of logic " in confusing the Bosnian Muslims with the European Jewry under Hitler . " It does us no good to claim a locus standi in every conflict be equating it with the Holocaust " , he wrote , " or when third parties in their own interests take the name of our martyrs in vain ; Bosnia is not occupied Europe ; the Muslims are not the Jews ; the Serbs did not begin the civil war , but are predictably responding to a real threat . ... Since 1990 , the independent Croatian leadership — with its extreme chauvinist and clericalist colouring — and the Bosnian Muslim leadership — seeking , in its Islamic fundamentalist programme , to put the clock back to Ottoman days — have threatened to turn the Serbs back into persecuted minorities " . By the end of the decade Sherman saw the U.S. policy in the Balkans as inseparable from the drive for global hegemony . In 1997 , he noted that the American century began with the Spanish – American War , and that it was ending with American penetration of the Balkans . But in contrast to the Spanish – American War , he argued , U.S. intervention in the Balkans has no clear strategic aim , but is allegedly a moral crusade on behalf of the " international community " : " This begs many questions . First , is there such a thing as ' the international community ' ? Do people in China , which accounts for a fifth of the world 's population , and the Buddhists , who account for another fifth — among others — really want the U.S. and its client states to bomb the Serbs or Iraqis ? And who exactly , and when , deputed the U.S. to act on behalf of this ' world community ' ? ... Secondly , can the blunt weapon of force , of whose use U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright boasted , balance conflicting and competing ethnic , religious , economic and political interactions over this wide and conflictive region ? Can the U.S. raise the expectations of the Albanians and Slav Moslems without affronting Macedonians , Greeks , Italians , Bulgars and Croats , as well as Serbs ? ... Thirdly , can force be a substitute for policy ? It was a wise German who said that you can do anything with bayonets except sit on them . The same goes for gunships , the modern equivalent of gunboat diplomacy . Bomb and rocket once , and it has an effect . But if the victim survives , the second bout is less effective , because the victim is learning to cope . " Well before the September 11 attacks and the Iraq War , Sherman argued that Washington had " set up the cornerstone of a European Islamistan in Bosnia and a Greater Albania , thus paving the way for further three-sided conflict between Moslems , Serbs and Croats in a '' bellum omnium contra omnes '' . ... Far from creating a new status quo it has simply intensified instability . " The U.S. may succeed in establishing its hegemony , in the Balkans-Danubia-Carpathia and elsewhere , " but it will also inherit long-standing ethno-religious conflicts and border disputes without the means for settling them . " As he wrote in May 2000 , " The power and prestige of America is in the hands of people who will not resist the temptation to invent new missions , lay down new embargoes , throw new bombs , and fabricate new courts . For the time being , they control the United Nations , the World Bank , most of the world 's high-tech weapons , and the vast majority of the satellites that watch us from every quadrant of the skies . This is the opportunity they sense , and we must ask what ambitions they will declare next . ... Instead of rediscovering the virtues of traditionally defined , enlightened self-interest in the aftermath of its hands down cold war victory , America 's foreign policy elites are more intoxicated than ever by their own concoction of benevolent global hegemony and indispensable power .
September 11 attacks
September 11 attacks
Alfred Sherman