Ivan Ivanji's last text: Peace is the time between two wars

While this year in one part of the world there will be cheerful conversations on May Day mornings and at Easter dinners, news will continue to arrive from the Ukrainian front about new battles, bombings and casualties, from the Gaza Strip and the so-called West Bank, actually part of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan occupied by Israel. troops, about the humanitarian catastrophe of the Palestinians, the violation of human rights and the bloodshed. It is still an open question what the recent missile war between Iran and Israel will turn into, and the threatening shadow of a nuclear war, the end of the world, hovers somewhere over everything.

War, war... But what exactly is war?

I still use the old lexicons, sometimes I find in them formulations that suit me better than the wisdom I find on the Internet. In one of my encyclopedias, I find a clear explanation: "War is the resolution of conflict by force of arms, greater clarification between nations by military means."

The German general Carl von Clausewitz wrote his theories about war in the middle of the 19th century, mostly relying on Napoleon's campaign against Russia, in which he participated on the Russian side, so he knows the terrain on which a modern war takes place. He claims that "...war is the continuation of state policy by other means".

I would turn that thought around and say that peace is "the continuation of state policy by other means". It seems to me that it is precisely this "our" peace that most of the so-called people currently enjoy. of the Western world in Europe, the USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, and with them Serbia, in exactly such a state - the war continues with state means of peace. Peace? It would be better to say - truce.

Photo: AP photo

TRUTH OF DOCUMENTS AND OBSERVATIONS

I experienced the end of the biggest war in the history of mankind right in the heart of the defeated power, Germany, I saw the losers, the desperate Germans and two different types of winners - the Russians and the Americans. Of course, at that time I could only observe individuals, I only had an insight into the big historical-political picture of the war only later, but based on their behavior a lot could be concluded: smiling or crying face, neat, short-cut or neglected, dirty hair , heavy, uncertain or victorious, firm walk spoke louder than words and documents. Those characters spoke more to me than scientific studies, analysis and statistics. I admit, maybe my problem is that I prefer novels to historical works.

Here is an example. One of the first historians in the modern sense of the word, Josephus Flavius, born Joseph ben Matthias, in the very year that Jesus died, wrote what is considered his most important book. The Jewish War. In it, he describes the war against the Romans in which he participated first on one side, then on the other side, first as the commander of the Jewish fortress Masada, then, after it fell, as a slave, then as a freedman to the Roman emperor Vespasian on the Roman side in the conquest of Jerusalem and the destruction of his temple. Of course he tried to present himself in the best possible light. However, the German writer Leon Feuchtwanger wrote a novel under the same title in 1932, which, in my opinion, not only describes the same events more beautifully, but also more accurately, the character of that Hebrew priest who changes sides and color.

The problem of historians, and to a large extent contemporary analysts, is that they have to write about wars based on documents. A document is a writing or recording that may, I think even probably, proves what someone wants to show. Whoever pays orders the music. And what does the recording made with a modern phone that was released to the public that no one ordered prove? Nothing but a personal, subjective view of the event. How then can we get not only the truth, but "nothing but the truth and the whole truth", as the American courts demand? Mission impossible. Who knows the "whole truth" except God, if he exists? I am left to believe the good writers of historical novels.

The gods of their time, Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill, in Yalta on the Black Sea, shared the world with a lot of whiskey and vodka, Caucasian red wine "tsiandali", roasts and salads on beautiful tables, with music and jokes. At the same time, their hungry soldiers were happy every night at the front to stay alive for another day.

How dare I claim what was happening on the sidelines of the big conference? We can thank the translators who broke their vow of eternal silence for the data. The Russian translator was Valentin Mihailovich Tereshkov, his book was published under the title I was Stalin's translator, and his American colleague Charles Bohlen wrote a memoir Witness of history. Bolen was the American ambassador to the USSR after the end of the war. By reading the relevant books, such as the memoirs of the translators, we learn an important part of the truth, namely, what the warlords thought and behaved. In this case, it is particularly interesting when Tereshkov and Bolen describe the same event, for example, when Bolen was correcting Tereshkov, who softens some of Stalin's particularly drastic, brutal attitudes with his translation. Translators are powerful. Ask Dacic, who can't even run away without them. It was difficult for me because Tito knew German very well; when I sat down to his left for the first time to be his translator, he said to me, looking directly at me for the first time with his often described dangerous eyes: "So, now I will speak our language, you translate, but I control".

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WHO DIES FOR WHOM

In World War II, Russian soldiers certainly had a reason to fight, liberate their country and take revenge on the Germans, but the conscripted Americans may have wondered what devil they were looking for in this country and for whom they should die.

Who are Ukrainians and Russians dying for today as I write these lines? Ukrainians are defending their country, Russians believe they are defending themselves from Ukrainians in Ukraine. And the fighters of Hamas, angry terrorists? More, much more Palestinian women, children, babies, old people die in the Gaza Strip. Some of them may think their sacrifices are meaningful, but does that really comfort them in their moments of death? I don't know.

For whom have Israelis died since October 9 last year, as hostages, but also as soldiers? Israeli soldiers today certainly feel that they are in a similar situation as the Russians during the Second World War, defending their homeland. But are they exaggerating their understandable anger? Absolutely. Did the Russians, conquering Germany bit by bit, exaggerate their revenge on the civilian population? Absolutely. But that was a relatively long time ago, we saw photos and rare film footage afterwards, we watch images of the horrors in the Gaza Strip in "real time" whenever we turn on the television.

MEMORY IN THE HAZE

The people of Belgrade experienced the bombing, the sound of sirens, fire, fear for their bridges (because many other bridges across the country were destroyed) a quarter of a century ago, between March 24 and June 10, 1999. We remember, we remember too well. Such a long period of peace that has survived since then to this day on these meridians of ours is very rare. The gap between World War I and World War II was significantly shorter. My granddaughters who have just come of age did not experience the war. Although they could - and should - find out about him, they are not particularly interested. Such behavior is normal for the post-war generations, they are interested in "their" era. Should we persistently inform them about the evil in this world, which has preceded and is lurking around the corner, or should we leave them alone to be carefree for as long as possible?

It seems to me that even we, who have experienced a war or wars, participated in them as fighters or victims, remember specific battles more often based on the books we have read, the movies we have watched, because they are more impressive than our memory, which is becoming increasingly hazy with time. .

photo: ap photo

WEAPONS OF WARFARE

How did the legions under the command of the emperors of classical Rome fight? With swords, spears, some on fast horses with shields and in heavy armor, others on foot, lightly armored, trained in gladiatorial schools. The invention of the spear gave them a fantastic weapon, an extension of the arm, more dangerous than the hardest fist. However, even then, in addition to tactics, there was also a strategy. Movements of entire legions, sudden attacks from the flank, knowledge of meteorology, brought a huge advantage.

Let's skip the centuries. Consider the trench warfare of the First World War, when the musket was sometimes more important than the rifle and bayonet for building cover. Engineers have already invented tanks, chemists have invented poisonous gases. The battles of the first airplanes seemed chivalrous, a man in an iron aircraft went against a man, as once a horseman went against a horseman. Civilians mostly did not suffer, the homes of the fighters were preserved, waiting for the hosts, the tired warriors, to return. All that changed in World War II. Old men, women and children were now dying in greater numbers than their husbands, brothers and sons on the front lines in the face of bomber attacks. Many warriors could not return to their homes, they were destroyed. The reconstruction of what was destroyed has begun, the building of a new one with the hope of a new eternal peace.

Much of the same or similar is now being repeated in Ukraine and Palestine. Peace will come one day and then the rising from the ashes will begin. Until the next war.

And what will happen tomorrow? The invention of drones is fantastic, like before when someone made the first spear. It changes the image of war. You can't fight a drone with artillery, modern planes, rockets, it would all be like shooting mosquitoes with a Kalashnikov. Tactics for combating drones are being born on the fly, strategically it has already become clear that their mass production is necessary for a type of relatively cheap war.

In all wars, however, it ultimately comes down to the infantry having to occupy the territory. But soon they will no longer have to send people to deal with and kill civilians, they will send robots into battle, and officers will sit in offices or bunkers, holding a joystick in their hands and pressing various buttons. They are sipping coffee and, in order not to be seen by their superiors, maybe some ferocity, like the "big three" in Yalta once upon a time.

REMAINING HAZARD AS A WARNING

We don't have to go to the distant future to discover danger, it is present every moment everywhere, including us. The other day, thanks to the construction works in Niš, a 1000-kilogram aerial bomb was discovered. About 3000 residents had to leave their homes out of caution and move to a safe distance until one brave guy managed to remove the lighter to remove the bomb.

There are still many undiscovered bombs and mines in many parts of the once shared country. Mostly in Bosnia. Every hour they still report from Germany about unactivated bombs left over from the Second World War. It is especially terrible that these deadly devices, which have been lying underground for eighty years or more, are rusted, can burst or explode on their own at the accidental touch of a construction machine when digging foundations for new buildings, and turn the land on which they live into a field of death. builds for the needs of life.

In a figurative sense, landmines are also "small wars" that are being waged today, and they can turn into very big ones until the end of the world. For Ukrainians and Russians, Israelis and Palestinians, "their" wars are of course not small but fateful, but for humanity they are only mines that diplomacy needs to demine. Forgotten mines of that kind lie undiscovered everywhere, on every continent.

DESPITE THE UNITED NATIONS

If in conquering space there are similarities between animals and the species homo sapiens, we still stand out in something - we can think. Some really smart people have long been thinking about what to do "so that there will be no more war".

After the First World War, on January 10, 1919, the League of Nations was founded with the aim of allowing representatives of national governments to agree on all problems. It was believed that this would prevent wars forever. We know nothing helped.

I note in the margin that the "father of modern simultaneous and consecutive translation" Paul Šmit worked for the League of Nations. However, he got a better-paid job as Adolf Hitler's personal translator for English and French, and he also knew Italian, Dutch, Polish, Czech and Slovak, for Arabic and other languages ​​he hired interpreters. He appeared sometimes in the uniform of an infantry colonel, sometimes as an air force officer, sometimes in a tailcoat, as the occasion required. After the war, he was not convicted, at the Nuremberg trial of the main war criminals he was called as a witness, and he also helped as a translator. He then became head of the translation department of the West German Ministry of Foreign Affairs, director of a school for translators, and wrote a book about his work An extra on the diplomatic stage. Again, I am talking about a book by a translator, thanks to which we have a lot of knowledge about the warlords.

After the Second World War, on April 25, 1945, the international organization of the United Nations was founded with the aim of not repeating the mistakes of the League of Nations, including the Security Council, with the idea that the world powers have a common body where they can eliminate global threats. Meanwhile, the UN has 193 member states that have signed to abide by some of the rules. As is well known, world peace is not guaranteed anyway, I'm tempted to use a nice word indeed.

THE BALANCE OF THE NUCLEAR THREAT

Many intelligent people thought about war and peace, created weapons for attack or defense, or searched for a way to eternal peace.

During the First World War, Nikola Tesla offered the American Admiralty "death rays" that could destroy enemy ships. The admirals refused, considering it a phantasmagoria. They accused our great scientist that he didn't care about sailors, that his invention could be used to kill countless people, and he justified himself by believing that the very threat of such a weapon would prevent war. Does it sound familiar to you for today's circumstances and difficulties? It is said that only the threat of nuclear arsenals on both sides of the conflict line prevents the spread of wars in Ukraine, in the Middle East, also between India, Pakistan and China. Is that so?

Two geniuses of the middle of the last century, Albert Einstein, an expert on matter, and Sigmund Freud, an expert on souls, not only dealt with the issue of war and peace, but in 1932 they corresponded vividly on the subject. Their correspondence was published as a book under the title Why the war??. I have not found whether it has been translated into our language, but it is mentioned at the Faculty of Law in Belgrade and other relevant institutions. I'm quoting from that book.

Einstein asks:

"Is there a way to free a person from the fate of war?" He refers to the idea that education in support of peace should begin in early childhood and elaborates: "Is there a possibility to lead the psychological development of a person so that he becomes more resistant to the psychoses of hatred and destruction?"

Professor Freud answers rather bluntly:

"Everything that promotes the development of culture works against war..."

He says he is upset. Einstein emphasizes that he is not only a pacifist, but is ready to fight for peace. In August 1939, he demanded that the United States authorities deal with specific weapons, with reasoning similar to Tesla's when he offered "death rays." In a letter to American President Roosevelt, he points out the possibility that Nazi Germany will build an atomic bomb and that America should overtake it in this. One letter started the work at Los Alamos and the creation of those bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki when the war with Hitler had already ended with the victory of the Allies for months, and Japan was about to surrender.

What will artificial intelligence come up with on the battlefield soon if its creators fail to incorporate some moral principles into it?

HOPE FOR PEACE

The Old Testament, the holy book of the three great religions, largely consists of accounts of wars, the loss and conquest of lands that some claim were promised to them by God himself.

Here, where I am writing, we are currently living in peace. I am suspicious when someone claims to be "fighting" for peace. It is fine to advocate for peace, to negotiate, to discuss, to search for good solutions, but people fight wars. Should I imagine diplomats or even statesmen wearing boxing gloves to fight in the ring, or after changing into white clothes, with foil masks on their faces, they start to "fight" for peace. Language is a traitor, the choice of words says it all.

Did I say we live in peace? Maybe only in a truce. Who knows where mines, old bombs are buried? Let's hope that the truce in our country will last a long, long time, that it will prevail all over the world. Let's hope so. Did someone say that hope dies last?