Croatia 2: The War and Mostar

Every silver lining has a cloud.  Dubrovnik is another European city that has been touched by war.  It's ironic and fitting that a Balkan area was chosen for some of the filming of the Game of Thrones; a series about the 7 kingdoms of Westeros fighting for the throne of a united Westeros. The Croatian-Serbian War was less than 30 years ago, from 1991-95.  It resulted in the former Republic of Yugoslavia, a country cobbled together after World War I, being broken into 7 "kingdoms" after the Balkan Wars. 

Seeing the Old City's war scars from the Serbian bombing and siege of Dubrovnik in 1991 during our initial dazed walk lead us to try to understand how a war between two groups, the Serbs and the Croats, involving three main religions (Roman Catholic, Orthodox Christian and Muslim) resulted in the former Republic of Yugoslavia  being divided into 7 separate countries:  Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Serbia, and Bosnia/Herzegovina.  It just shows how lasting ethnic memory can be.




It was beyond our outsiders’ ability to sort out the ethnic and religious differences and centuries old animosities that resulted in over 100,000 dead and 2.2 million being displaced as refugees. We were fortunate to hear  2 different lengthy  discussions on the region from our tour guides (one Croatian Catholic, the other Bosniak Muslim) on our day trip to Mostar, Bosnia/Herzegovina, The admittedly oversimplified lessons by the guides helped us (slightly) better understand the history.  Bosnia/Herzegovina, one of the "kingdoms" of the former Republic of Yugoslavia, lies in the middle of the area. It has always been an unstable mix of  Muslim Bosniaks, Orthodox Christian Serbs,  and Catholic Croats, and remains so.


Mostar along with Sarajevo were the epicenters of the "war within a war" in Bosnia/Herzegovina. The Croatian-Bosniak War began in 1992 when Croatia and Bosnia, initially fighting together against the Serbs, started fighting each other. This was central to the "ethnic cleansing" primarily against the Bosniak Muslims by both the Serbs and the Croats; the Serbs in Sarajevo and Serbs and Croats in Mostar.  Many of the Serbian and Croatian military leaders overseeing cleansing atrocities were later arrested and tried in The Hague, receiving lifetime imprisonment.  The Serbian Slobodan Milosevic, the president of Yugoslavia and instigator of the initial Serbian-Croatian War, died while awaiting trial-felt to be a slow suicide when he declined medical care and stopped taking his medication dying of a heart attack in 2006.  Last year during The Hague trials, the Croatian general Slobadan Praljak drank poison and died as his conviction was read in court.  He was accused of ordering the destruction of the Stari Most bridge (see below) and a mosque amongst many other war crimes. He is still considered a hero to many Croats despite his conviction. As is Milosevic to many Serbians.  It seems that people can rationalize their  hatreds.

Mostar was almost entirely destroyed by first the Serbs and then finished by the Croats, including  it's Balkan-Islamic iconic 16th century Ottoman era bridge, the Stari Most over the river Neretva.    The city still is recovering with visible abandoned bombed out buildings and bullet scarred walls.  The destroyed bridge was rebuilt, an exact copy, even using some of the original stone. It took seven years to rebuild the bridge, completed in 2004, along with the tourist area immediately surrounding it.  The bridge links two sides of the city and serves as a major tourist draw, a scenic postcard shot.  

Mostar is a poor, raw-nerved multi-cultural city living uneasily together with the bombed out buildings a reminder of the lack of capital, of the refugees who have chosen not to return and of the people continuing to leave. Mostar needs every coin it can collect as it is a mess of a tourist site. Mostar was the first place we were warned to be careful not to stray far from the tourist center areas, be aware of pickpockets and restaurant credit card scams.

Mostar is a microcosm of the residual poverty and confusion resulting from the cultural identity issues of the entire dysfunctional country of Bosnia/Herzegovina.  The ineffectual government  (as described by our native guide) has three heads of state,  one from each ethnic background, who rotate every 8 months as leader.  Fascinating and frightening.  Our Bosniak guide frequently referred to Bosnia/Herzegovina’s efforts to join the EU, pointing out various examples of ethnic harmony, which we later better understood upon reading that their membership is being blocked by their continued difficulty in managing their multi-ethnic society. 

So Mostar continues to mine tourism for much needed funds.  It is the only country we have visited to accept virtually any currency--Croatian kuna, Euro or Bosnia/Herzegovina convertible mark. They also have created novel tourism opportunities.  Bridge jumpers wait for tourists to collectively pitch in 50 euro then they jump from the Stari Most. During a 90 minute period, one jumper jumped three times. Tourists can also pay the city 50 euro to jump, but after two tourists (one Australian the other German)  died attempting it is heavily discouraged. 

Tourists still use the bridge but not for jumping - taking silly pictures, oblivious to the history of tragedy around them-  far less risky.  

Just up the hill from the bridge, we walked thru a Muslim cemetery where almost every tombstone ended in -1993, when the worst fighting occurred. 

While Mostar looks to be years away from recovery, Dubrovnik with UNESCO preservation funds, EU investment and tourism money has recovered.  Dubrovnik has had a starring role in both Game of Thrones and Star Wars which contributes to it's tourist draw.

Our ignorance of this region, as well as other tourist’s historical ignorance was best summed up by an anecdote from one of our tour guides.  After completing a Game of Thrones tour, the tourist said it was so generous of HBO to have left all the sets, including the magnificent castle walls of the Old City!

Since visiting and writing this post, this story was published in NY Times which provides much greater insight and detail to this post.  https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/19/world/europe/mostar-bosnia-ethnic-divisions-nationalism.html?action=click&module=News&pgtype=Homepage 

Kravica Falls on our way from Dubrovnik to Mostar