David Rohde,

David Rohde, Srebrenica and the New Justice
by Jared Israel (7-24-00)

www.tenc.net

Introduction: An Internet exchange with Srebrenica Media star David Rohde (See note #1 at the end) culminated in his printing the last word in the 'New York Times.' Only a few years ago, Mr. Rohde was merely a reporter for the 'Christian Science Monitor' in Boston, but he ascended to 'NY Times' status by broadcasting Clinton-Albright-et al's attacks on the Bosnian Serbs. This got him a Pulitzer Prize and a job at the "Times' and therefore the ability to finesse our Internet argument by answering us to an audience of several hundred thousand.

The only thing missing from Rohde's 'NY Times' answer to our argument is...our argument.

Will we get to reply to Rohde in the 'Times?' I don't know, but we're going to try. In the meantime, here are some thoughts on the 'Times' piece which, frankly, I found shocking. [Note: A week after this was written, Australian public radio, SBS, delivered a challenge from David Rohde to debate Jared Israel. A transcript of that debate will be posted as soon as possible.]

www.tenc.net

David Rohde's latest article is entitled "The Battle of Srebrenica Is Now Over the Truth," and reading it one wonders, "Is he trying to be funny?" For it is precisely truth that suffers at Rohde's hands. Instead of presenting facts and analysis he manipulates prejudicial language. In so doing he tells us a good deal more about himself than he does about Srebrenica: he is not a journalist at all; he is a pitchman. Though he writes his copy for the richest of clients, the American Elite, it is ad copy nonetheless and though the outfit he works for is the powerful 'NY Times' it is still only the most powerful advertising agency in the world.

In the article, Rhode has two goals: First, to leave readers with the impression that the Srebrenica massacre story has been proven beyond reasonable doubt and, second, to discredit those of us who have used the Internet to ferret out and disseminate information about Srebrenica, information which has raised a whole mess of doubts concerning the Srebrenica charges, out of which Mr. Rohde has constructed a lucrative career. These Internet Critics include Emperor's Clothes, perhaps especially Emperor's Clothes, for a couple of us just had an unpleasant exchange with David Rhode. Unpleasant for Mr. Rhode that is; he doesn't like losing. And why should he? He is paid to win.

A bit later we have reprinted an excerpt from Rohde's article. In it he takes on his critics in the customary manner; that is, he smears us.

An Appeal to prejudice

Rhode writes that the Srebrenica Critics are "some American and European leftists." In fact we include people from all over the political spectrum. It is not political ideology that unites us but rather a distaste for lies. But if the leftist label is inaccurate it is nonetheless handy; for it allows readers to dismiss the Critics as ideological zealots who need not be taken seriously.

Appeal to prejudice # 1: Rhode asserts that our views "radiate out from Belgrade." This is pretty silly stuff. Does Rohde view Belgrade as the hub of some political Empire, dispensing billions of dollars and employing an army of agents to subvert other countries and the mass media? Has he confused Belgrade with Washington? The articles that launched the Internet critique of Srebrenica didn't come from Yugoslavia at all, they came from George Pumphrey (an American political analyst in Berlin), Abe de Vries (a journalist in the Netherlands) and Diana Johnstone (an American political analyst in Paris.)

Appeal to prejudice # 2: Rohde misrepresents our arguments, saying we support "Serb nationalist claims that Western governments and journalists exaggerated Serb war crimes." Aside from the pointless "Serb nationalist" bait - who cares if the people being framed by Mr. Rohde and his friends are nationalists or prohibitionists or dentists - aside from this silly bait, we do not in fact argue that Mr. Rohde's claims are exaggerated. We argue something quite different. We argue that NATO has produced no evidence that Serbian forces massacred anyone at Srebrenica. We say that a person (or a people) should be viewed as innocent until proven guilty, that this business of positing a crime and then spending five years failing to produce any evidence that it occurred is nightmare Justice. Meanwhile, we have done a little looking ourselves and discovered that there is real proof that Islamist terrorists (the 'Bosnian Muslim Army') used the UN safe haven in Srebrenica to launch raids on nearby villages, mutilating and killing several thousand Serbs and moderate Muslims. Here is the confession of the commander of that 'Muslim Army,' one Nasir Oric:

"[On the video tape I saw] burning houses, dead bodies, severed heads, and people fleeing. [Commander] Oric grinned throughout, admiring his handiwork. 'We ambushed them,' he said when a number of dead Serbs appeared on the screen.

"The next sequence of dead bodies had been done in by explosives: 'We launched those guys to the moon,' he boasted. When footage of a bullet-marked ghost town appeared without any visible bodies, Oric hastened to announce: 'We killed 114 Serbs there.' Later there were celebrations, with singers with wobbly voices chanting his praises." ('Toronto Star,' 7/16/95)

Note that Oric's ' troops' slaughtered villagers, that is civilians, not soldiers. In this they are rooted in venerable tradition. During War II, the Nazi Islamists in the same area killed Serbian, 'Gypsy' and Jewish civilians by means of mutilation, using so-called "cold weapons" - knives, hammers, axes. They liked to be photographed displaying 'trophies' acquired in this manner, that is, holding the severed heads of their victims.

Here again is Commander Oric:

"Nasir Oric's war trophies don't line the wall of his comfortable apartment. They're on videocassette tape: burned Serb houses and headless Serb men, bodies crumpled in a pathetic heap.

'"We had to use cold weapons that night,' Oric explains as scenes of dead men sliced by knives roll over his 21-inch Sony...Reclining on an overstuffed couch, clothed head to toe in camouflage fatigues, U.S. Army patch proudly displayed over his heart…commander Oric is the toughest guy in this town the Muslim [of Srebrenica], which the U.N. Security Council has declared a protected 'safe area.'" ('Washington Post,' 16/02/94)

Note, first of all, that the above articles were written during the period (1993-1995) that Srebrenica was a so-called UN safe haven, when the Muslim 'Army' was supposedly disarmed and at the mercy of the bad Serbs. Second, note that the Bush and Clinton administrations strongly supported (and still support) the so-called Muslim regime in Sarajevo and that Commander Oric's killers were an official part of the Muslim regime's army. Is that why Oric wore a US army patch? Note that the Post expresses no horror over Oric's unbelievable crimes. Is that because the victims were Serbs?

Proof by definition

Getting back to Rohde, he also attempts to dismiss the Critics by calling us "revisionists." This is a big word which shows Rohde has been studying. Here's the dictionary definition:

re·vi·sion·ist - re·vi·sion·ist (rî-vîzh¹e-nîst´) noun 1. One who advocates the revision of an accepted, usually long-standing view, theory, or doctrine, especially a revision of historical events and movements

Despite their control of the Western media, despite their control of NATO's armed forces, despite hiring an army of forensic experts and a full stable of War Crimes Tribunal employees - despite all this, the US elite has yet to provide a shred of evidence that the Bosnian Serbs committed war crimes at Srebrenica. But Mr. Rohde finesses this problem: he names us revisionists. Since a revisionist is one who revises the "accepted" view of "historical events," by so defining us Mr. Rohde 'proves' the Srebrenica charges are true. Neat, huh?

Having thus flailed his opponents with a variety of labels ("leftist", "Belgrade", "nationalists" and of course "revisionists") Mr. Rohde concludes with the following coup de grâce:

"In the case of Srebrenica," says Rhode, "the slow pace of efforts to recover and count bodies has created an opening for denials of what occurred five years ago."

Indeed.

One might think that the failure to produce evidence that a crime has occurred should lead one to question the validity of the criminal charge; but that is old fashioned . In the New World Order system of Justice, NATO need only charge an individual or group with criminal guilt for guilt to be assured and the nonexistence of the crime in question in no way mitigates the guilt of the accused, especially if said crime is heinous. Thus fictional murder is a good deal worse than fictional theft and fictional Genocide is the worst crime of all, putting one in the category, 'similar to Hitler.'

A lack of evidence of guilt, or the presence of evidence of innocence, in no way constitutes legal remedy for a criminal charge; it is simply an annoyance since it encourages in some people (such as writers at Emperor's Clothes) a psychological aberration: the denial of guilt.

Here's the excerpt from Rohde, followed by further comments. A link to the entire article is provided at the end.

"In that uncertain atmosphere, the bodies have become part of a broader propaganda battle, being waged across the former Yugoslavia, Europe and the United States. Aided by the Internet, a revisionist interpretation of the war has begun to radiate out from Belgrade; some American and European leftists, who a year ago took exception to NATO's bombing of Kosovo, are now backing Serb nationalist claims that Western governments and journalists exaggerated Serb war crimes not only in Kosovo but in Bosnia as well.

"In the case of Srebrenica, the slow pace of efforts to recover and count bodies has created an opening for denials of what occurred five years ago. After Bosnian Muslims turned their heavy weapons over to United Nations peacekeepers in exchange for having Srebrenica declared a protected "safe area" in 1993, Dutch peacekeepers and United Nations commanders did little to protect the town when Bosnian Serb forces attacked in 1995." ('NY Times, Week in Review' July 9, 2000)

A Loaded Deck

Aside from the attacks on us revisionists, Rohde's article is structured so that the casual reader will leave with a comfortable reaffirmation of Serbian guilt. He begins:

"For two years, thousands of bodies packed in white plastic bags have been awaiting burial in central Bosnia."

This sensationalist sentence sets the tone. In the next paragraph he informs us that "rats were allowed to feast on the bodies" (note, they didn't just knaw on the cadavrs, horrible enough; they feasted). Another paragraph refers to "7000 Muslim soldiers" who were definitely massacred. It is only later that we learn a) the very existence of a massacre is challenged by "revisionists" and b) "to date, 1,866 bodies [not thousands] have been recovered from mass graves, according to tribunal investigators." And Rohde never mentions that: "After five years we have found 160 mass graves, but we have no idea who the people are." ("Mail on Sunday," June 18, 2000).

Five years of digging. Five years of Rohde slandering the Serbs. No idea who the bodies are. They could be massacred Muslims. They could be massacred Serbs. They could be dead Serbain soldiers, or dead terrorists, or just dead people, just poor souls who died, as we all die, sooner or later.

There you have it, folks. Five years. No evidence. So what?

The full text of Rohde's article is accessible at www.nytimes.com/library/review/070900srebrenica-review.html