On War

We also visited the Serbian National War museum which has one of the most amazing pre-WWII collections I have ever seen. It contains objects from the early conquests of the Ottomans and many rare weapons and pieces of armor from the middle ages. The museum is very plain and minimally maintained yet contains exhibits that the world’s great museums would kill for. The museum is also unapologetically nationalistic, which means it is less true history and more true to the Serbian mindset. While some people might be put off by this, I found it a very helpful window into the Serbian identity. However, the last exhibit is a little hard to stomach for me as an American, as it held the uniform of a captured US soldier and the flight suit and plane wreckage of a downed USAF pilot. The rest of the room was dedicated to the “war crimes” of other NATO members and of the other former Yugoslav republics (excluding Montenegro). Of course there was no mention of Srebrinica.


Am I bitter that the Serbs are displaying US service uniforms like they were Somalis dragging corpses around? No, not really. The people of Serbia, to lesser extent than the Bosnians, have been through hell in the last decade. The pain was mostly economic, as Milošević’s mismanagement of the economy led to record setting inflation. At its worst point, inflation of the Serbian Dinar reached 600,000% annually and 3% hourly (3% is a annual target rate for most countries). This resulted in the printing of bill with 11 zeros! (I’m looking for one of those on EBay when I get back). The NATO bombing campaign definitely destroyed some infrastructure but it is really more an issue of damaged pride and isolation from the west that Serbs cannot forgive.