BOSNIA | Could It Really Return to Conflict?

Over the course of October and November 2021, there has been renewed talk about the possibility of state collapse and even conflict in Bosnia-Herzegovina. But while such talk has become familiar in recent years, there’s a sense that this is the most serious threat to peace and stability in the country since the end of the brutal war, in 1995. Indeed, there's now a real feeling that the country is in a deep and sustained political crisis. The leading international official in Bosnia has even called the current situation an “existential threat” to Bosnia. So, what had led to this latest crisis? And just how dangerous is it?

Hello and welcome! My name is James Ker-Lindsay. Here I take an informed look at International Relations with a focus on territorial conflicts, secession, independence movements and new countries. If you like what you see, please do subscribe. If you want more, including exclusive content and benefits, consider becoming a channel member. Many thanks!

The conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which ran from 1992 until 1995, was the most bitter and bloody since the end of the Second World War. However, following a peace deal brokered between Bosnia, Serbia and Croatia, the country looked to be on course to rebuild. Although the country was left with two highly autonomous entities - the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, formed between the Bosnian Muslims (now generally known as Bosniaks) and the Bosnian Croats, and Republika Srpska, dominated by the Bosnian Serbs - In the first decade after the conflict, significant steps were made towards reintegration. However, over the past fifteen years the situation has steadily deteriorated. As well as deadlock in the central government, there has been increasing talk of secession by the Bosnian Serb leaders, Milorad Dodik. This has come to a head in late 2021 as Dodik has threatened to pull out of join state institutions and repatriate powers and bodies, including the possibility of re-establishing a Bosnian Serb army. All this has led to worries that Bosnia may be on the verge of collapse and even conflict. But just how likely is this?

CHAPTERS
0:00 Introduction and Titles
0:30 Post-War Peace and Instability in Bosnia
1:28 Geography and Demographics of Bosnia and Herzegovina
2:20 Bosnia: Conflict and Collapse in the 1990s
4:10 Bosnia-Herzegovina: Post-War Rise and Fall
5:19 The Origins of the Latest Crisis in Bosnia
6:51 What Will Happen Next in Bosnia?
8:49 Could There be a New War in Bosnia?
13:34 Conflict and Collapse in Bosnia-Herzegovina

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KEYWORDS

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#Secession #Statehood #Independence #InternationalLaw #Bosnia

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[JamesKerLindsay]

So, just how dangerous is the current situation? Was it avoidable? And how can Bosnia be stabilised in the longer term? I'd be particularly keen to hear views from the region. But let's pleasetry to keep it civil and the discussion intelligent. There are plenty of other places for the usual flamewars!

Also, a quick reminder that if you like these videos, do please consider supporting the channel. Thank you so much!

[vasilzahariev]

Honestly, it's a miracle that the current settlement has lasted for 25 years.

[marionaletilic]

I live in BiH and all this talks about possible war and conflict is simply impossible. Not beacose people that are forced to live together love eachother.
-There isn't any money to fund any war. People are poor and without will to fight anybody
- If there wolud be somekind od skirmishes, it would only give people just one more reason to leave this so called "state" sooner and more often then now

[georgios_]

Polish-Belarussian and Greco-Turkish relations are also at an all time low right now (at least for post 2000 times). Europe as a whole is really on the brink

[stalecoolranchdoritos]

Seems there's a lot of items on the table at the moment:
-Irish reunification potentially in a few years time
-Scottish independence may be possible
-Bosnia potentially collapsing
-Belarus/Poland issue
-Belarus and Russia potential reunification?
-Russian reinforcement for the entity of Novarossiya
-Turkey "unofficially " leaving the West
-Turkish/Greek competition in the Aegean
-Turkish/Iranian/Israeli competition in the Caucasus
-Egypt/Ethiopian competition for the Nile
-Ethiopian de-facto almost civil war
-Sudanese coup
-Multiple French interventions in the Sahel
-The obvious problems in the new Afghan state
-China seeming to choose Pakistan for the Jammu & Kashmir question
-Burmese coup
-American disruption of the NATO alliance with AUKUS
-American disunity at home higher than ever...where Virginia's recent electoral flip indicates what may be an even further gridlocked goverment in 2022
-Leading me to the most important question...China and Taiwan
I feel all of the evidence of the above points to what i feel is an indication that we have arrived at a multi-polar world maybe? All of these various regions are committing to their own actions without the worry of former American hegemonic involvement.

[tnorthrup]

There is a real sense here where these kinds of confederations fail more often than they succeed. There isn't a clean solution to that, really. Bosnia without the Serbs and Croats in its current borders would be a very weak, perhaps unsustainable governing entity. Yet, at the same time, the current situation has too many veto points to really work well and is inherently unstable. Unless and until these groups can work together and see themselves as a singular people, the issues are going to return periodically. But I'm not sure there is a way to force or even really foster that (see Iraq, South Sudan, Cyprus, etc)

[leoflorida]

Bosnia Herzegovina is basically a mini Yugoslavia

[austria-hungary]

*When the worldwide media talks about Bosnia, you know, real shit is about to happen*

[sumitpandey]

If Yugoslavia was destined to break than why should Bosnia be single nation?

[benchang]

I’m a US vet that deployed to Bosnia is support of NATO Operations. This breaks my heart. Peace in Bosnia.

[biglebowsky]

Im a Serb from Republika Srpska and i dont think Bosnia is near a break up. Dodik is for first time in many years threatend by oposition, his popularity is dropping. In last local elections he lost Banja Luka, capital of RS. His counterpart is Draško Stanivuković a young politician who is more liberal and constantly fights corruption, exposes Dodik's corruption etc. He became quite popular among the people.
Now Dodik plays old nationalist card to regain popularity, belive me threatening with seccesion happens quite often when some politician loses popularity, not just Dodik. He isnt gonna do anything about seccesion he is just lying. Also threatening with seccesion happens whenever Bosniaks threaten with abolishing RS and making Bosnia a centralised state (state that they would lead ofc). When Serbs threat with seccesion they threat with centralisation and vice versa. Circle of empty threats just goes on and people are being scared and manipulated by politicians. One more proof that Dodik is an opportunist and liar is that he wasnt always big nationalist like now, quite the contrary he is the first Serb politician that said Srebrenica was genocide and that called Mladić and Karadžić war criminals. Now he denies all that hahahah. He changes agenda based on his needs.
When it comes to returnig RS military and other things you mentioned, that would be also hard to do, but im not completely against it since after all those were the rights RS had according to Dayton agreement and they were taken away by OHR later. I dont think we need a separate army but if it can be done peacefully with agreement than ok. If it cant than no.

[azzz]

LET'S ALL JUST LIVE IN PEACE BROTHERS. We all speak the same language, we are highly diverse people, part Slavs part native Balkan people.
Let's show the world that we are a land of conquerors, explorers, pioneers and inventors. This could only be done by the greatest people on earth🇧🇦🇭🇷🇲🇰🇷🇸🇸🇮🇲🇪

[GamesOfficialYouTube]

Where was the "concern" when albanians were making second state from Serbia?

[andrej]

Why shouldn't the Serbs have a right to self determination? Same for Croats. Even if 50% of Bosnian territory wants to secede it would be undemocratic not to allow it.

[IntrusiveThot]

Hello from Dallas, Texas, USA! You've got a few new subscribers from me and two coworkers who were wondering what I was listening to last week. Keep up the fantastic content.

[truthseeker]

I was waiting for your take on the current situation in Bosnia. Thank you for sharing your thoughts with us!

[МићкоКрстић]

I have been following some of your videos on the Balkan issues. I find them mostly impartial. However, this video was my complete dissappointment, it is not based on facts and lacks analitical approach.

Lets start with secession of Bosnia and Herzegovina from the remains of Yugoslavia. According to the constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, at that time, secession of that federative republic was possible ONLY with mutual consent of Bosnian Muslims, Croats and Serbs. Bosnian Serbs did not want to succede from Yugoslavia. The core issue of Bosnian conflict is that Serbs and Croats do not want to be marginalized by Bosnian Muslims or as they call themselvs nowdays Bosniacs (that is, BTW, an ordinary national construct of Austro-Hungarian historian and minister Benjamin von Kallay. Paradocsically, that word was an Ottoman derogatory word that has it’s roots in the Turkish word boş (null, blank, empty) that has nothing to do with people of Bosnia, Bosnians but was sign of disrespect.)

Although Bosnian Muslims are promoting some (virtual) civil society, reality is quite opposite and some statements from their public figures are quite troublesome. That is creating huge discomfort for both Serbs and Croats.

The last census results were questioned and not recognized by everyone in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Christian Smidth has not been appointed to be UN High representative, he was imposed by western countries and not recognised by all members of the UN’s security council, including China and Russia, furthermore, not recognised by Bosnian Serbs. His report to the UN has not been accepted and was ignored in the Security Council.

High representatives are, actually those who are source of numerous current disputes. It was Baron Paddy Ashdown who stripped some major rights of the Serb republic. Mr Dodik just wants them back since they are part of the Dayton peace agreement. Mr Inzko’s mandate was not to impose “laws”. There are constitutional ways of doing that in a country with a Continental legal system. That “law” is against freedom of speech. Everyone is deeply sad with events in Bosnia and Herzegovina committed by all belligerent sides. However, they can not be catagorized as a genocide, as you stated in the video. Otherwise, many other events in history of other countries (including British) can be “re-evaluated”.

Mr Dodik wants rights granted to the Serbian republic by the Dayton peace agreement, nothing more.

[gattagoblin]

Interesting how in countries of former Yugoslavia everyone is allowed to seceede except Serbs.

[srcolesl]

You missed to show the Serbian point of view in this analysis. The Serbs in Bosnia didn't start seeking independence out of the blue, but because during the years, slowly but steadily, BiH started being more and more centralized mostly by Bosniak and foreign votes and by the decisions of ''high representatives'' (foreigners that come to this country, sign a paper and make it into a law without any approval from the actual population, sounds very democratic ik). By all these actions Republika Srpska is slowly becoming just a mere province losing its rights that are guaranteed by the Dayton agreement. You also didn't mention that Croats are also very unsatisfied by the situation where Bosniaks vote Croatian representatives that later advocate Bosniak interests and not Croatian.
The latest law that the high representative enforced was the last drop in the glass, because not a single Serb believes that the crime in Srebrnica can be classified as genocide and now they can end up in jail because of that. All peoples in former Yugoslavian countries have their own version of what happened and their own point of view and now some foreigner comes and tries to force a different point of view on the Serbs. I know the international court in Hague classified this as a genocide, but you also have to understand that the same court released so many people that were responsible for the crimes against Serbs that no one here believes that the court in Hague is an independent court and not a political one. You just need to look at the numbers where 90% of the convicted by that court are Serbs, even though Serbs make more than 30% of all the casualties. in the end, the so called western democratic world failed to explain to us even after so many years that we are really the only ones to be blamed, probably because it doesn't make sense.
Lastly, there is a continuous pressure on the Serbs where everyone get the rights for self-determination, even autonomous provinces, and when Serbs ask for the same rights they either get ethnically cleansed like in Croatia or they start getting blamed for provoking a war.

[mihailo]

If it is acceptable and reasonable for Bosnia to break away from Yugoslavia, I don’t understand any argument that deems the RS position and it’s people’s desire unreasonable. Welcome anyone to explain here, as my understanding is that Bosnia’s independence declaration was not legal according to Yugoslavia’s constitution at the time.