The question of autonomy of Bosnia and Herzegovina as Serbian self-defence

Abstract

This work discusses the historical struggle of Serbian people in Bosnia and Herzegovina for the autonomous freedom, through numerous rebellions and uprisings in the 19th century, such as rebellions and uprisings of Serbs in Šumadija. After its success in Serbia under the rule of Miloš Obrenović, Serbs' struggle for the autonomous freedom in Bosnia and Herzegovina in the last period of the Ottoman and later Austro-Hungarian authority was a 'categorical imperative of Serbian self defence'. Resistance to foreign occupiers in Bosnia and Herzegovina was repeated after the disintegration of Yugoslavia in 1991, with the struggle for the autonomous freedom in the Republic of Srpska, for its achievements, challenges and perspectives. On both of these occasions, Serbian people remained and fought for their freedom and unity in the community with other nations. On both of these occasions, destiny and outcome of this successful struggle with opponents were earlier in hands of great powers and later in hands of powerful states. Their earlier and later attitudes towards Serbs were different. Compared to Bulgarians and Bulgaria, or Cretans and Crete, after whose uprisings the great powers awarded them the autonomy, they only promised the same to Serbs while some of them opposed it and corrupted, up until the end of the First World War. It was similar with the struggle of Serbs in Bosnia and Herzegovina for freedom in the achieved Republic of Srpska, up until the United States of America took Bosnia and Herzegovina in its own hands. The States, in cooperation with the Contact Group members, ended the civil war in Bosnia and Herzegovina at the meeting in Dayton in the USA in 1995, while at the same time legitimizing the Republic of Srpska within the two-entity Bosnia and Herzegovina.