Croatia Felix

Jonathan Edelstein writes about Cyprus referendum and says that Turkish Cyprus should be recognised by international community.

That reminded me of an article written by one Slovenian military analyst in early Spring of 1992, published in Croatian Danas magazine. In the article the author compared situation in Cyprus (Cypriot Turkish minority, backed by their ethnic brethren from Turkey proper, snatched some 30 % of territory and maintained status quo with the help of UN peacekeeping) with situation in Croatia and drew some disturbing parallels (Croatian Serb minority, backed by their ethnic brethren from Serbia proper, snatched some 30 % of territory and maintained status quo with the help of UN peacekeeping).

Needless to say, when that analysis was published, it looked very disturbing to Croatian readers. Thankfully for Croatia, war erupted few weeks later in Bosnia and changed the equation completely. Serbian hold on much of their 1991-92 conquests became untenable in the long run and the only issue was when rather than if Croatian forces would retake "Krajina".

With Bosnia remaining peaceful, either as formal part of rump Yugoslavia or Serbian de facto ally, Croatians would have to face dilemmas very similar to those of Greek Cypriots.