A New Balkan War: Regional Struggle and Antidemocratic Elements Abroad

The Balkan Legacy 

Winston Churchill supposedly posited that the Balkans produced far too much history for it to be accurately consumed, largely echoing the typical “orientalism” rhetoric that Edward Said aptly pronounced as the ignorance many in the West have of anything the wrong side of Rome. Once more, Western nations have made a deep folly in not fully appreciating the precariousness of the peace following the Homeland War of the 1990s in the former Yugoslavia. Throughout the pages of generations of observers such as Slavenka Drakulic or Ivo Andric, one can catch a glimpse of the delicate national feelings now in the balance between Russian aggression and Trumpian foreign policy. Regional history, religion, and ethnicity are focal points of the Balkans, given its explosive national inception and instability in the recent past. Due to increasing aggravations by the European and American far-right, the peace of the region is at extreme risk, with an overburdened European Union fighting off waves of political extremism. 

As the Ottoman Empire withered with the opening of the 20^th century, it was not long before the ravenous eagle and bear of Austria-Hungary and Moscow, respectively, instantiated nationalist expansionist policies. The Balkans were ripe for the taking, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) was annexed in 1908 by Austria-Hungary. The kingdoms of Bulgaria and Serbia, long enticed by the allure of Russian orthodoxy, were easily lured by military assurances. This Sultan-Tsar tug of war created a power vacuum within which irredentism blossomed and would eventually explode like a powder keg. The Balkan Wars (1912-1913) wars were bloody, spurred by a crumbling Ottoman Empire, Habsburgs buckling under Prussian military supremacy, and vengeful Russians eager to carve limbs off of the “sick man of Europe.” National identity mutations fostered by external powers injected a form of identity politics, crystallising post-WWII before slowly thawing for another series of conflicts in the 1990s. For the Kingdoms of the Balkans, the early 20th century was a chance to ride the wave of industrialisation into a possible autonomous future, but the stakes meant gambling with land-hungry empires. 

Lasting Memories

The Balkan League (circa 1912) was formed among Greece, Montenegro, Serbia, and Bulgaria, in an attempt to address the Eastern Question of how to facilitate the Ottoman Empire’s final demise. Most concerned was the Russian Empire, which made sure to supervise the league. On memory, James Morgan Reed classified the Balkan Wars as the first “atrocity propaganda” staging ground in his book Atrocity Propaganda 1914-1919. Through many forms of media, whether flyers or photographs, the players in this war used captivating imagery to militarise and bolster nationalist aims. Highlighting key events such as the Armenian Genocide, the Balkan States, and eventually the Entente would maintain their own wars of information that would powerfully demonise the enemy. Drawings and caricatures captured the bloodshed and battlefields that would catalyse rising national aggression on the eve of the First World War, but it is important to note that it was largely born out of the conflict in the Balkan Peninsula. 

Crossing the slick cobble of Stari Most (Old Bridge) in Mostar, Bosnia, one has a clear view of the duality that is still palpable in the region; a handful of aged mosque minarets and steeples, both orthodox and catholic, cut into the sky. When I read about the bridge’s demolition during the war, I was inspired by its UNESCO-led reconstruction because I felt it symbolised a legacy of rebuilding peace as well. My guide described the hellish shelling that the city withstood during the 1993-1994 Bosniak-Croat conflict that would divide the city into East and West. Having unfortunately spent his childhood in a basement with his mother and younger brother during the Homeland War, my guide sounded hopeful about the future in Bosnia and Herzegovina, yet he stressed the many hurdles the region still faces. Leaders like Milorad Dodik and Dragan Covic just add fuel to the fire, according to a former police officer of Mostar, “Guma” Mekic. Dodik has certainly used the same rhetoric of historic lands and “greater” nations in his own speeches surrounding Republika Srpska, the entity of the Serb majority population in BiH. And this is precisely what drew blood in the first half of the 20^th century, again in the 1990s, and is currently propelling far-right ‘stabilocracy’ forward through direct support from the Kremlin and the White House. 

Same Motives, New Century 

The Trump Administration’s 2025 National Security Strategy wishes for a capitulated Europe, ripe for plunder through trade deals and contracts. Like the fallen eagle of the Habsburgs, Trump is attempting to disrupt the cooperation championed by the European Union in hopes of having loyal far-right populists answering his phone calls. On the other side, Putin has been mercilessly attacking Europe with hybrid warfare, especially in the Balkans, worsening its spiralling nationalism. TikTok, X, and Russian state media have proven successful weapons against European democracy. It’s the same methods, just new-age technology, that creates increasingly volatile disinformation feeding the requisite violence and hatred for the world’s incorporated autocracies. Anne Applebaum’s Autocracy, Inc., perfectly highlights the necessity of authoritarians propping one another up as they are cast down from the graces of the global world order. As we speak, the United States and Russia, like Austria-Hungary and Russia respectively, are eyeing Europe as a battleground for influence and resources. 

One-hundred years on from the Balkan Wars, Russia under Putin is profusely promoting the ideology of pan-Slavism and orthodoxy, especially as places like Bosnia-Herzegovina and Albania maintain a Muslim majority. The ‘civilisational erasure’ uttered by JD Vance at the Munich conference, unsurprisingly, is echoing the talking points of Kremlin propaganda that suggests the decay of Europe. This is quite rich coming from the Vice President who is ravaging democracy in the United States and an autocratic state, throwing thousands of young men’s lives away for a brutal colonial war in Ukraine. Once more, the people of the Balkans face enemies abroad, and this time they stand toe to toe with a brutal dictator in Moscow and a failed businessman in Washington; both angry, violent, and illogical to an extreme. As these autocrats have already fully begun the dismantling of their own democracies, they are exhausted by the regulation of other world leaders, and thus the choice of target lies in an overlooked region in their common periphery. The secular ideals of peace that were intended to be carried through from the Dayton Accords simply have not held up to the test of time, and Europe must take an aggressive stance here before it is too late. 

Looking Ahead 

As I walked with my partner through the Maximilian Gardens off the coast of Dubrovnik, I pondered the impact of the larger powers' expansionism among the exotic flora and fauna brought by Maximilian, a Habsburg Archduke, to Lokrum Island. How strange it was to walk in the land of Illyria and see the lasting effects of its German conquerors and of its Slavic influence, using Russian as my guide in chatting with locals in Croatian. The Balkans are once again caught between two power-hungry nations in necrotic decay that aim to dismantle the possibility of peace in the future. The War in Ukraine was the first step in a larger advance to continue the degradation of Europe and world democracy. We are in a new age replete with information, but regrettably, the posters and images we see aren’t the same pamphlets distributed by the Balkan League or Great Powers during the first quarter of the 20^th century. One must sift through Trumpian AI, Russian bots, and thousands of supposed social media experts. The truth lies in the integrity of Balkan men and women, still working tirelessly to escape the sand trap of the Soviet Bloc. 

A radiant place with incredibly kind people, the Balkans should not have to relive the past once more, and other nations must take real heed of that. Balkan integrity is European integrity. Balkan Peace is European peace. Absent swift action in European capitals, control will be lost to the Tsarist sicknesses of the Kremlin and indeed Mar-a-Lago.

Image: Zach Rogers, Mostar in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

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