Balkan Ghosts: A Journey Through History

by Robert D. Kaplan

From the assassination that triggered WW I to the ethnic warfare in Serbia, Bosnia & Croatia, the Balkans have been the crucible of the 20th century, the place where terrorism & genocide 1st became tools of policy. Chosen as one of the Best Books of the Year by The NY Times, & greeted with critical acclaim as "the most insightful & timely work on the Balkans to date" by The Boston Globe, Kaplan's prescient, enthralling & often chilling political travelogue is already a modern classic.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Travel, Politics, European History, War, World History

344 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1993

About the author

Robert David Kaplan is an American journalist, currently a National Correspondent for the Atlantic Monthly. His writings have also been featured in The Washington Post, The New York Times, The New Republic, The National Interest, Foreign Affairs and The Wall Street Journal, among other newspapers and publications, and his more controversial essays about the nature of U.S. power have spurred debate in academia, the media, and the highest levels of government. A frequent theme in his work is the reemergence of cultural and historical tensions temporarily suspended during the Cold War.

Reviews

[Murtaza · Rating 2 out of 5]

Someone once told me that this book was responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of people during the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s. Being a Robert Kaplan apologist I always took this as a bit of colorful hyperbole. After having finally read it however I can see why people feel this way. Bill Clinton was famously seen holding a copy of Balkan Ghosts around the time he made his decision not to intervene in the wars. The book was credited with influencing his thinking that U.S. involvement would be a mistake — stricken as Yugoslavia was with "ancient hatreds".

Seeing what a relentlessly negative picture Kaplan paints of the Balkans I can see how it might psychologically influence someone to steer clear of it. This is an ugly, insulting picture of the people of the region that continues to color the world's perception of Yugoslavia. Needless to say, every place in the world has good and bad. One could also travel across America focusing on its worst aspects and worst people and then write a book based on that. It would be a misleading and potentially even dangerous thing to do however if you are an influential writer who commands the attention of the most powerful people in the world. While Kaplan was actually a proponent of intervening in Yugoslavia on "realist" grounds, he should've thought more carefully before publishing this horrifying travelogue. Focusing purely on the negative is a choice and Kaplan's revolting descriptions of the places and people he sees evince a genuine revulsion for Yugoslavs and even the physical world that they inhabit. In Balkan Ghosts, Kaplan is the demagogue he accuses them of being.

[Hesper · Rating 1 out of 5]

Calling this a travelogue doesn't excuse the abject ignorance that characterizes most of the book. Period.

The fact that most positive responses seem to come from either people without first-hand knowledge of the Balkans, or Greeks and Bulgarians--Greece and Bulgaria being Kaplan's actual area of expertise--is a significant detail, not to be ignored.

There is little historical fact here, and what passes for research might as well have been churned out by a starving Hollywood writer. Kaplan seems intent on perpetuating the most ridiculous stereotypes around, probably because they make better copy than reality.

[Rebecca · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is the most Orientalist, irresponsible and downright dangerous piece of writing about the Balkans ever published. Kaplan sees the region as a nest of ancient ethnic hatreds responsible for all of the evils of the world, including Nazism (Hitler learned hatred from the Balkan inhabitants of the flophouses of Vienna, not the thriving Western tradition of anti-semitism apparently). The Nazism of ethnic Germans living in Romania is excused, almost sympathized with, because they were forced to live next to a barbaric people. The inhabitants are all worn down by their centuries of ethnic hatreds except for the few standouts who are Westernized (if the person in question is a woman, her degree of civilization is marked by wearing fashionable clothing and shaving her legs, because leg hair or lack thereof is a true sign of intelligence).
This book shows nothing of the region I love and that most of my family calls home. Much brutality has happened there, the politics are fraught, our histories are held closer to the heart than in most other places, but there is also much beauty. Kaplan ignores the beauty in the old Orthodox icons, the oral tradition of poetry, traditional music, the ingenuity borne out of poverty and focuses on his agenda which is to prove that the Balkans are the most brutal place on earth. I mentioned at the beginning of the review that this book is dangerous and it is. Beyond peddling tired stereotypes, this book and its description of "ancient ethnic hatreds" was used as justification in the 1990s to allow the Balkan Wars to continue instead of naming what was happening on Bosnia a genocide of innocent people. The logic was that these people have always been killing each other, we might as well continue doing it.
The sad thing is this book will be, for many, the introduction to the Balkans. For many, it will be the only thing they ever know. It will be something I have to argue against for the rest of my academic life. I hope there is a day when it is consigned to the scrap pile of history.

[Jeff · Rating 2 out of 5]

First, the positives.
The author was a very good writer and engaged in the subject. He obviously cared a great deal for the subject, having traveled and lived there extensively for many years.

Now, the negatives,
Granted, the premise of the book was the role of history on the development of current Balkan mindset and culture. However, while Kaplan was a good writer, this is where his background as a journalist really hurt the book. instead of telling a good objective story, he looked for the flashy story or headline. thus every Serb, Croat, Bosnian et al is a hate filled peasant so caught up in the issues of the past that they can't function today. Also it was somewhat offputting the way he described the local communities (to hear him tell it, every Romanian is a sloppy falling down drunk) as well as their grinding poverty.

I'd recommend it just in the sense that there is such little material out there about this region of the world.

[Adela · Rating 5 out of 5]

”România este o amestecătură foarte originală:o populație care pare italiană, dar are expresia țăranilor ruși; un fundal arhitectural care amintește adesea de Franța și de Europa Centrală; servicii și condiții fizice care seamănă cu cele din Africa.”

”Doar în locurile sfinte șiite din Orientul Mijlociu am mai văzut o atmosferă religioasă atât de încărcată și sufocantă, vibrând cu o energie atât de explozivă. M-a înspăimântat.”

”Pentru mine, nici un oraș din Balcani nu este atât de intoxicat precum Clujul, cu acoperișurile sale ascuțite, țuguiate și cu fațadele sale galbene, în stil baroc, aliniate de-o parte și de alta lângă străzi înguste, pietruite, care, la lăsarea serii, când vremea este caldă, miros a praf, ca drumurile de țară.Acest avanpost al Europei Centrale are o calitate de vară indiană. Prinși în conversații strălucite pe vremea când Clujul se numea Kolozsvar, romanticii unguri discutau ore întregi în cafenelele de pe marginea pieței centrale. Pentru mine, fantomele lor bântuie încă, palpabile ca amintirea unei cafele bune sau ca gustul unui sărut special.”

”În pofida distrugerilor sociale și culturale provocate de comunism prin mutarea țăranilor români în orașe și prin evacuarea etnicilor maghiari, spiritul Clujului și al Kolozsvarului a supraviețuit. Starkie, în 1929, vedea Clujul ca .”

”Timișoara este orașul român cel mai puțin românesc.”

”M-am plictisit repede în Timișoara. Deși era un oraș la fel de sărac ca celelalte-cu oameni, prost îmbrăcați, cu fațade dărăpănate și restaurante cu puține feluri de mâncare-în Timișoara nu mă mai simțeam în România. România era un ecou al lui lui Dostoievski: interiorul unei icoane bizantine sumbre, pline de suferințe și personaje pasionale, ale căror minți sunt deformate de propria furie și de credința în adevăruri incomplete și conspirații. În Timișoara, România era mai degrabă o amintire puternică, decât o realitate.”

”Pe partea stângă, în interiorul cimitirului, se înălța o pădure de piatră. Fiecare monument era sculptat în forma unui trunchi de copac, cu ramurile retezate de la bază, ca un tors uman fără mâini și picioare. Monumentele erau de mărimi diferite, fiecare având o formă unică. Efectul era înspăimântător. Am privit inscripțiile, comemorând cei 185 000 de evrei din Bucovina de Nord și din Basarabia masacrsați în Transnistria. Fiecare monument reprezenta un oraș sau un sat.”

[Mikey B. · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting portrayal of this tortured area of the meeting place between Europe, Asia and Russia. Even though it is now somewhat out of date it does provide insights of the developments of the 1980’s and early 1990’s.

The general observations indicate backwardness and poverty in Romania, Bulgaria, Greece and what use to be Yugoslavia. These countries have a long way to go to catch up to Western Europe in their housing, transportation, and educational level. Plus there are overwhelming regional hatreds and these have existed for centuries amongst Croats. Serbians, Bulgarians, Romanians, Greeks – and they all hate Turks. Add to this volatile broth, religious divisions, and we have a primary example of what Samuel Huntington called a fault-line (Orthodox Christianity, Roman Catholicism and Islam). There are many layers to all these regional animosities.

Mr. Kaplan discusses these in his book which is part travelogue and history. I found the travelogue worked better than the history, which was meandering through different centuries and was confusing to follow. One does come away with several variables (language, religion, ethnicity, migrations and invaders) that create a constant rivalry competing for ascendancy. There is a constant sensibility to persecution in these countries.

After twenty years of the dissolution of the communist bloc I don’t know how much has improved. His depiction of Greece as a Balkan country and not a European country was most interesting considering the current Euro-fiscal crisis it is undergoing.

A passage from page 70:
The more obscure and unfathomable the hatred, and the smaller the national groups involved, the longer and more complex the story seemed to grow.

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

There is very much an 'outsiders' perspective in many ways on the cultural turmoil of the region, but the interviews he does with locals during his travels are really interesting. If only the history pieces didn't seem to have some spin or editorial feel to them. I think as I continue to read on the Balkans and former Yugoslavian region, I will work harder to find works from those native to the area.

[Jamie Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Communism would exit the world stage revealed for what it truly was: fascism, without fascism’s ability to make the trains run on time.”

I have read five of Robert Kaplan’s books in the past few years, and enjoyed them all. He is the only writer I know who can combine insightful geopolitical observations with an informed sense of history and a travel writer’s ability to bring people and places to life. Balkan Ghosts, though originally published in 1993, is still so popular that I was on a waiting list for six weeks before a copy became available at my local library.

The book is remembered today for Kaplan’s trenchant analysis of the deteriorating situation in Yugoslavia and the catastrophe he foresaw. “My visit to Yugoslavia was eerie precisely because everyone I spoke with—locals and foreign diplomats alike—was already resigned to big violence ahead. Yugoslavia did not deteriorate suddenly, but gradually and methodically, step by step, through the 1980s, becoming poorer and meaner and more hate-filled by the year.” However, as he points out in the introduction to this edition, only a small part of the book deals with the rising tensions in Serbia, Bosnia, and Croatia. The rest is spent in the other Balkan countries: Albania, Greece, Macedonia, Romania, and Bulgaria.

In most of Europe the scars from the twentieth century’s wars had finally healed by the 1990s. “I began my journey in Central Europe, in Nuremberg and Dachau, but there I felt almost nothing. These places were museums; they no longer lived and breathed fire.” Yugoslavia, however, was still haunted by the memory of the Nazi-affiliated Ustashis, a brutal Croat organization with its own death camps for Serbs and Jews.

While Ukrainians and others openly apologized for their actions against Jews during the Holocaust, Croatian groups only issued denials. The statistics on mass murder in Croatia were exaggerated, I was told. Weren’t the Serbs also guilty of atrocities in World War II? And weren’t the remaining Jews in Croatia being treated well? Undoubtedly, these arguments had a certain validity. What troubled me, however, was the Croats’ evident need to hide behind them, as if a simple apology without qualifiers might delegitimate them as a nation.

Religion is the great divider of peoples in Yugoslavia. “Since Croats are ethnically indistinguishable from Serbs—they come from the same Slavic race, they speak the same language, their names are usually the same—their identity rests on their Roman Catholicism.” Outside forces have found it convenient to stoke the fires of conflict and intransigence to further their own ends. “The Vatican also bears its share of guilt. The greatest stimulus to anti-Serb feeling in Croatia always came from the Roman Catholic Church, which much preferred the Catholic Croats to be under the rule of their fellow-Catholic Austrians and Hungarians, than to be outnumbered in a state dominated by the Eastern Orthodox Serbs, who, for historic-religious reasons, were psychologically aligned with the Bolshevist Russians.”

Moving to Macedonia, Kaplan found himself in the heart of the Balkan cauldron.

Macedonia—from which Alexander the Great had set out to conquer the known world, and where Spartacus had begun his slave revolt—was a historical and geographical reactor furnace. Here the ethnic hatreds released by the decline of the Ottoman Empire had first exploded, forming the radials of twentieth-century European and Middle Eastern conflict. Macedonia was like the chaos at the beginning of time.

It was here that he recognized the issue at the heart of the simmering sense of aggrievement that he encountered throughout the Balkans. “Macedonia...defines the principal illness of the Balkans: conflicting dreams of lost imperial glory. Each nation demands that its borders revert to where they were at the exact time when its own empire had reached its zenith of ancient medieval expansion.”

If the twentieth century truly got its start with the First World War, the seeds of that war were planted in Macedonia. “Bulgarian-financed guerrillas in Macedonia had triggered a revolution among young Turkish officers stationed there, which then fanned throughout the Ottoman Empire; this development, in turn, encouraged Austria-Hungary to annex Bosnia, inflicting on its Serbian population a tyranny so great that a Bosnian Serb would later assassinate the Habsburg Archduke and ignite World War I.”

Romania in the 90s was just beginning to rebuild after the brutal incompetence of the Ceausescu regime. Everything seemed worn out, broken, or polluted, with a population starting to be hopeful about a better future, but still mired in corruption and led by men who had changed their titles from communist to capitalist without changing their ambitions or methods. “Cruel, ugly things throughout the Communist world, factories in Romania seemed to belong to a deeper circle of hell: barbed-wire and concrete-gated enclosures, filled with mountains of coal, garbage, and rusted tractor carcasses, all plastered with dried mud and desultorily picked over by the odd cow or sheep.”

“Traveling in Romania was often like inhabiting the pages of a Dostoevsky novel.”

Like most of the other Balkan countries, Romania once had a flourishing artistic and cultural legacy. “While the plain of Athens below the Parthenon—not to mention Moldavia and Wallachia—dozed under an Oriental, Ottoman sleep, Transylvania was proclaiming the Enlightenment, with freedom and equality for both Catholics and Protestants. William Penn was so impressed that he considered naming his American Quaker colony ‘Transylvania.’”

In Bulgaria Kaplan saw a country rent by its past. “The Balkans is a region of narrow visions, and because the Bulgarians had suffered the most under the Turks, their world view was narrower still.” After the communist takeover Bulgaria felt the need to prove its Socialist loyalties. It is no accident that the plot to assassinate Pope John Paul II was planned there, using their intelligence services to recruit a Turkish killer.

As with the leaders of so many other communist countries, loyalty and a willingness to commit unspeakable acts mattered more than intelligence or competence. Writing of Wilfred Burchett, an idealistic Australian journalist, and comparing him with Georgi Dimitrov, who led Bulgaria from 1946-1949 (until he had outlived his usefulness and Stalin had him murdered), Kaplan writes, “Whatever bad there was in Burchett … was bad only by accident. But with Dimitrov (and with Stalin, too, of course), what was good was good only by accident.”

Kaplan had lived in Greece for years and was most familiar with that country. He includes an interesting description of life under populist leader Andreas Papandreou, a warning for other Western democracies with ascendant populists. Elected by appealing to people tired of the same old corrupt and ineffective politicians, he proceeded to rule like a despot, with bands of thugs to enforce his decisions, and took corruption to a new level as he rewarded his friends and cronies with state largess. The economy and social development of Greece were severely damaged and are still recovering. Populism derails democracy.

Greece is also where East meets West, and Kaplan does not forget its crucial place in history: “Classical Greece of the First Millennium B.C. invented the West by humanizing the East. Greece accomplished this by concentrating its artistic and philosophical energies on the release of the human spirit, on the individual’s struggle to find meaning in the world.” Looking at the grim history and present chaos of the Balkans, it is easy to see that this could have been the fate of Europe everywhere, and we should remember the debt we owe to Ancient Greece. “This, after all, was the ultimate achievement of Periclean Athens (and by extension, of the West): to breathe humanism—compassion for the individual—into the inhumanity of the East, which was at that time emblemized by the tyrannies of ancient Egypt, Persia, and Babylonia.”

This book is a classic, and deservedly so. In the years since Kaplan wrote it the Balkan counties have made progress, but still lag far behind the rest of Europe. Some governments are just covers for organized crime, with no concern at all for their people. The best and brightest of the younger generations flee to Western Europe and America as soon as they are able, further retarding progress. Balkan Ghosts shows us the often tragic, occasionally heroic, histories of these countries, the contributions they made and the struggles they face. By understanding their past we can better understand their present, and can draw lessons for our own societies.

[Brian Griffith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good, in-depth storytelling. Kaplan takes the time to know local people, leaders, places, and historic backgrounds. He captures the way past trauma shapes people over generations.

[Steven Godin · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd been looking for a good book on Balkan history for quite some time, as it's subject that has always interested me, but one I knew little about, apart from the war in the 90's. A GR member recommended this book, and it turned out to be a fascinating read. The American journalist Robert
Kaplan who lived in Athens for a while, and travelled regularly to countries like Bosnia, Croatia, Albania and Moldavia, writes passionately while exploring the exotic and mountainous Balkan peninsula. This vividly documented travelogue mixes the details of his trip with an insightful account of the area's history. Balkan Ghosts traces its way through the historically and geographically rich regions of Kosovo, Albania, Macedonia and Serbia and in doing so outlines how it was that Yugoslavia did not so much as deteriorate suddenly into internecine warfare, but gradually, step by step through the 1980's. He views Romania with it's anguished compromise with invaders, tarnished by years of Turkish rule, Communism, and Nazism, and of Gypsies, deeply woven into the fabric of this region. He tours Transylvania, Bulgaria and Albania, and delves into the Serb-Croat dispute, which he traces partly back to the fascists of WWII. There is simpy a lot going here, with never a dull moment. I have since been told that Rebecca West's Black Lamb and Grey Falcon is another really good book on the Balkans that is well worth reading. So hopefully one day I will find out for myself.

[Fiona · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm glad I persevered with this. The first part which is about Yugoslavia in the late 80s/early 90s is very disjointed and quite difficult to follow in terms of linear events. The second and third sections, about Romania and Bulgaria respectively, are excellent and really informative. The Romanian section visits the country immediately post-Revolution, 1989, and gives a lot of historical background to the different regions which was fascinating. The Bulgarian section covers a period from the early 80s into the 90s, as Kaplan made several trips there during that time. A minor point but I found his statement that male affairs in Bulgaria fulfil 'a deeper need than Western middle-class boredom' difficult to swallow - any excuse, eh? - but he clearly loves the country and has established important connections there. The last section is largely about the politics and cultural ethos of Greece through the 1980s when Kaplan lived there. He goes into quite a lot of detail but it was interesting as I now feel I have more understanding of how Greece has ended up in its current financial crisis. It's only the most recent in a continuous pattern. All in all, this is a very satisfying read and I'm glad I persevered beyond the first section.

There is one glaring error which gave me pause for thought. I had spotted this one but what if there were other inaccuracies or errors which I was accepting as fact? Now I see that other reviewers have spotted some. Twice it is stated that the Danube passes through 7 countries but it actually passes through 8. There is a footnote listing the countries and Croatia is omitted. This is a fairly significant error in a book about the Balkans. I've checked if there were border changes since the 1980s which would explain this but there were not. I was on a river cruise in 2012 which moored in Vukovar, otherwise I may not have spotted this error. At the very least, it's shocking editing.

[Michelle · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm not sure what's worse, Kaplan's ignorance of the Balkans or his arrogance of American superiority and the need for American interventionism.

Here's an actual excerpt of a review of this book by Peter Gwin: "His conversations along the way prove memorable, especially those with an Albanian Muslim on the evils of Serbs; a Romanian prostitute; a Bulgarian palm reader..."

Wow. Just wow. That is just so enlightening (of American master narratives.)

It's horrifying that this polemic, an obvious propaganda piece, is so highly rated. He doesn't even know where fascism and nazism originated from. How sad. He should look it up rather than concocting something. He might learn something for once. This is more like a work of bad fiction.

[Sleepy Boy · Rating 5 out of 5]

Considering that I read this in a day it is safe to say I loved it. It was almost impossible to put down, anyone with an interest or love for the Balkans will find this treatise immensely honest, interesting, and insightful. Excellent book and author.

[Stela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un tărîm al viziunilor înguste

Istoria m-a fascinat de cînd mă ştiu. Nu neapărat pentru „adevărul istoric” pe care mi-l oferă (la urma urmelor acesta e „in the eye of the beholder”, la fel ca frumuseţea sau ca adevărul ficţional), ci în primul rînd pentru personajele ei fascinante, pentru atmosfera ei nostalgică sau terifiantă, pentru problemele etice, sociale şi (mai ales) estetice pe care le ridică. În fond, ce este istoria de azi dacă nu mitul de mîine?

Aşa că nici prin cap nu-mi trece să pun la îndoială exactitatea informaţiilor pe care Robert D. Kaplan le strînge cu acribie jurnalistică în Fantomele Balcanilor – nu numai că-mi lipseşte expertiza necesară dar, ca să folosesc o expresie franţuzească potrivită în context, je m’en fous comme de l’an quarante – în sensul că sînt atîtea chestiuni interesante pe care volumul le pune în discuţie încît las fără nici o remuşcare experţilor sarcina de a vîna micile imprecizii care e posibil să se fi strecurat în text.

Ca o paranteză mai mult sau mai puţin contextuală, se pare că hotărîrea lui Bill Clinton de a nu interveni în războiul din Bosnia s-a bazat pe lectura cărţii lui Kaplan, lectură care l-a convins că este vorba de un conflict interetnic care ar fi mai bine să fie rezolvat de către cei implicaţi. Autorului i s-a reproşat mai apoi (pe nedrept, dat fiind că opera a apărut cu cîţiva ani înaintea evenimentelor) că ar fi oferit o imagine incompletă asupra regiunii (de altfel, el însuşi a deplîns neutralitatea Americii, dar asta-i altă poveste). Ceea ce mi se pare interesant de subliniat aici este puterea cuvîntului bine scris de a schimba sensul istoriei. Numai viitorul poate confirma sau infirma justeţea hotărîrii lui Clinton, deşi ceea ce se întîmplă în ultimul timp în lume dovedeşte încă o dată că ar fi poate mai înţelept să laşi fiecare naţiune în plata ei.

După acest lung preambul, să revenim la oile, pardon fantomele noastre sau în orice caz la ale celor patru ţări balcanice despre care vorbeşte volumul: Iugoslavia, România, Bulgaria şi Grecia. Încă din Prolog, autorul lansează cîteva premise pe care le va dezvolta pe parcursul operei: că aceste naţiuni balcanice constituie „lumea a treia” nu numai prin sărăcie ci şi prin rivalităţile etnice care au condus la acte de terorism şi/ sau de cruzime greu imaginabile, ceea ce l-a făcut pe Karl Marx să le numească dispreţuitor (dar şi rizibil dacă te gîndeşti că aici i-au fost puse în practică ideile) „gunoi etnic”.

Adevărul este că într-o regiune măturată periodic de năvălitori şi asuprită aproape neîncetat de către aceiași nu este greu să găseşti episoade sîngeroase şi gesturi mai mult sau mai puţin îndoielnice, nu numai din partea conducătorilor ci şi a populaţiei, ca, de exemplu, masacrarea sîrbilor în timpul celui de-al doilea război mondial de către croaţi. Nici după 50 de ani de la terminarea războiului, constată autorul, problema cea mai arzătoare nu era asumarea vinovăţiei, ci stabilirea numărului victimelor: sîrbii susţineau că au fost masacraţi 700 000 de oameni, în timp ce croaţii spuneau că „numai” 60 000. Astfel de poveşti, unele crude pînă la neverosimil, altele patetice pînă la absurd şi pe care Kaplan le înregistrează cu uimire stînjenită, creează atmosfera pitoresc contradictorie a unei regiuni greu de înţeles pentru civilizatul vestic, care ascultă cu gura căscată cum un arhiepiscop (Stepinac) poate fi în acelaşi timp un simpatizant nazist şi un apărător al evreilor, cum membrii unei grupări naţionaliste (Garda noastră de fier) îşi beau sîngele unul altuia şi îşi scriu jurămintele de credinţă cu acelaşi sînge, cum o naţiune (Bulgaria) a acceptat cu bucurie comunismul şi chiar i-a iubit pe sovietici pentru că i-a protejat de turci (numai noi l-am condamnat pe Dimitrie Cantemir pentru rusofilia lui 😊), sau cum un prim ministru educat în spiritul valorilor democratice (Andrea Papandreu) se întoarce în ţara sa pentru a o conduce totalitar şi iresponsabil.

De fapt, Papandreu şi Stepinac sînt personajele cele mai fascinante, prin trăsăturile contradictorii pe care le însumează, dintre toate „fantomele” evocate. Andrea Papandreu, care a guvernat Grecia între 1982 si 1989, a fost educat în America, s-a reîntors în Grecia cu familia lui americană şi a devenit brusc antiamerican, dînd sistematic vina pe patria sa adoptivă pentru toate eşecurile economice şi/ sau politice suferite de ţara sa natală, oferind protecţie teroriştilor mai ales arabi, sub pretextul că nu-s altceva decît vajnici luptători pentru patria lor, este un tip straniu de tiran democrat (dacă vă miră cumva oximoronul, amintiţi-vă numai de altul, ajuns celebru: „comunism cu faţă umană”):

Papandreu a fost cea mai originală fantomă a Balcanilor, un om al vremurilor noastre care s-a mutat în adîncurile trecutului întunecat: mai surprinzător decît cardinalul Stepinac, Gotse Delchev şi regele Carol.

Pe de altă parte, arhiepiscopul Stepinac, eroul Croaţiei, care ar fi colaborat cu fasciştii pentru a elibera Croaţia dar a început să protesteze cînd a auzit de crimele acestora, care s-a opus comuniştilor şi a fost persecutat, arestat şi condamnat drept „criminal de război”, care i-a apărat pe ustaşii vinovaţi de genocidul asupra sîrbilor dar care a ascuns un rabin în catedrala sa, este tipul fanaticului religios indecis (zău că oximoronul descrie cel mai bine specificul balcanic!).

Partea cea mai amplă a studiului este consacrată României, pe care autorul o defineşte corect ca pe un amestec nu totdeauna fericit între expansivitatea latină şi spiritul negustoresc slav, preluînd cu admiraţie aproape involuntară consemnările unor corespondenţi de război care îşi aminteau amuzaţi că Athenee Palace fusese singurul hotel din Europa unde naziştii şi aliaţii dormeau la un loc, iar reporterii americani/ englezi discutau cu ofiţerii SS în uniformă la aceeaşi masă.

Evocînd vorbele ţarului Nicolae al II-lea, care spusese în glumă că „România nu este o ţară, este o meserie”, Kaplan trece în revistă alte aspecte de rîsu’-plînsu’ din istoria noastră, ca fascismul şi guvernarea carlistă, sau ca grandomania ceauşistă (văzînd în monstruozitatea numită Casa Poporului „împlinirea dorinţelor unui ţăran răzbunător”), pentru a conchide că ţara noastră este greu de încadrat în nişte tipare anume, fiind mereu, ca să zic aşa, la limita între sublim şi ridicol:

România este o amestecătură foarte originală: o populaţie care pare italiană, dar are expresia ţăranilor ruşi; un fundal arhitectural care aminteşte adesea de Franţa şi de Europa Centrală; servicii şi condiţii fizice care seamănă cu cele din Africa.

O nevoie urgentă de coerenţă în toată această brambureală balcanică îl face pe autor să stabilească, pentru fiecare dintre ţările pe care le vizitează, un simbol al mulţimii, după modelul sugerat de Elias Canetti, care identificase marea pentru englezi, pădurea învecinată pentru germani, revoluţia franceză pentru francezi, ieşirea din Egipt pentru evrei (simboluri sociale asemănătoare cu „matricile stilistice” ale lui Lucian Blaga ca simboluri culturale). Kaplan caută aceleaşi simboluri în Balcani: pentru croaţi, despărţiţi de sîrbi doar prin religie, simbolul ar fi Biserica sau moştenirea arhiepiscopului Stepinac; dimpotrivă, pentru sîrbi ar fi cei doi stîlpi de foc: primul constituit din mănăstirile medievale, al doilea de Kosovopolje (Cîmpia Mierlei), unde au fost definitiv înfrînţi de turci; pentru români este căminul, familia aşezată în jurul mesei umile; pentru bulgari „icoana bizantină, o lume de pasiuni explozive, care conţine un secret adînc”; în sfîrşit, pentru greci ar fi două: unul al turiştilor, Partenonul, celălalt, al nativilor, Hagia Sofia (construită de împăratul Iustinian pe la jumătatea secolului al VI-lea d. Chr., acum „întinată” de turci, care au transformat-o în muzeu).

Opera se încheie cu ieşirea autorului de sub „cerul negru” de conflicte interetnice al Balcanilor spre Adrianopol, şi cu identificarea, cît se poate de justă, a sindromului de care suferă întreaga regiune (şi de care vorbeste, în fond, şi Mioriţa):

...acel sindrom balcanic de recuperare: fiecare naţiune pretinde ca teritoriu naţional toate pămînturile pe care le deţinuse în momentul celei mai puternice expansiuni.

Închizi cartea şi nu te poti abţine să nu te gîndeşti că deşi portretul pe care ni l-a facut Kaplan nu prea ne avantajează, nici pe noi nici pe vecinii noştri, e foarte greu să ne prefacem că nu ne recunoaştem în el. Sîntem şi vom rămîne încă multă vreme, din păcate, doar „o regiune a viziunilor înguste.”

[Maćkowy · Rating 3 out of 5]

3,5/5
Bałkańskie upiory literacko to ekstraklasa. Kaplan jest świetnym pisarzem - eseistą, oddającym klimat miejsc i nastroje ludzi, których spotyka na swojej drodze. Reporter mistrzowsko wyczuwa napięcia i negatywne emocje przez lata nawarstwiające się na Bałkanach: Chorwacja, Serbia, Bośnia, Albania, Rumunia, Bułgaria czy Grecja, pod jego piórem jawią się (słusznie) jako etniczny tygiel, starający się wyjść z cienia Osmańskiego panowania, wymuszającego na każdej nacji podkreślenia swojej odrębności etnicznej - eskalacja wisi w powietrzu.
Literacko super. Mam jednak wrażenie, że to bardziej zbiór impresji, niż rzetelne źródło wiedzy o Bałkanach tuż po upadku Tity, a w przededniu wojny. Kaplan owszem, przedstawia nam losy każdej nacji od czasów najdawniejszych - pokrótce opisuje lata jej świetności, podstawy ewentualnych roszczeń i pretensji względem sąsiadów, pokazuje piętno, jakie na mieszkańcach wywarł komunizm i czytając byłem zachwycony, że wreszcie ktoś mi wytłumaczył czemu oni wszyscy tak się nienawidzą.
Potem przyszło do mnie kilka refleksji. Kaplan to reporter w stylu tych, co to biorą na plecy plecak, do plecaka wkładają książki mające być dla nich inspiracją, wsiadają do pociągu i jadą w nieznane. Problem w tym, że większość szeroko cytowanych przez autora książek, właściwie wszystkie ważne, to pozycje (również reportaże) z lat 1900 - 1930. Rozumiem, że gdy autor pisał swoje reportaże na rynku nie było dostępnych zbyt wiele pozycji o Bałkanach - boom przyszedł dopiero po wojnie, ale czerpać wiedzę o regionie z książek liczących sobie - w najlepszym wypadku - 60 lat, to mimo wszystko trochę przegięcie, szczególnie jeśli za wszelką cenę stara się potwierdzić tezy wysnute przez starszych kolegów po fachu i warto mieć to na uwadze sięgając po Upiory, które zdecydowanie warto przeczytać nie zapominając jednak o lekkim przymrużeniu oka przy niektórych fragmentach.

[Jonathan · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book completely fails to understand the nature of Balkan conflict. It does a disservice to all who read it, perpetuating the false notion of causal "ancient ethnic hatreds." While it has other issues, a good corrective to this general mindset can be found in "The Myth of Ethnic War," by VP Gagnon.

[Corlett · Rating 1 out of 5]

Transparent racism from a reckless imperialist apologist.

[Charly · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bit torn. I eagerly devoured the history between these pages, but at the same time, his writing lacked both balance and technical panache. His view of the Orient was alarmingly one-sided and laughably out-of-date. I did feel, however, that certain essays in here (that's all it really is, a collection of travel essays and op-eds) are worth the price of admission. (I liked most of those on Romania and Bulgaria ... his views on Greece and Albania and especially Kosovo just rubbed me the wrong way.) Very mixed bag.

[stella · Rating 1 out of 5]

absolute bullshit

[Zuberino · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is such a dense, intense and wide-ranging book that I fear unless I chop this review up into several pieces I won’t be able to do it any justice. Robert Kaplan was one of the more prominent members of the neocon faction that pushed for the Iraq War in 2003, alongside such forgotten heroes as Richard Perle and Paul Wolfowitz. (Ah, Richard Perle – no one knows him now but it was impossible to get on the internet in the early 2000s without bouncing across his florid face...) But I digress. Kaplan was one of that bellicose crew, screaming for Saddam's head, and even though he is "reported" to have changed his mind about the war since then, as recently as 2014 he was penning learned screeds in the Atlantic mag in defence of the American empire, etc. *eye-roll*

So much for the author’s bona fides. Before all of that Arab sabre-rattling, however, Kaplan made his name in the early 1990s as an unusually fine reporter, making an especially big splash with this book (Balkan Ghosts) on a region that made no fucking sense to anyone in the rest of the world. All we knew at that time was what Christian Amanpour was telling us; all day long she adorned our TV screens from Toronto to Timbuktu, striding down some godforsaken shell-scarred street in Tuzla or Bihac or Banja Luka, looking impeccable in her CNN-funded flak jacket and intoning in that deliciously posh British-Persian accent that no amount of money can buy.

Why did that war happen? Why was it as bloody and as protracted and as plain fucking puzzling as it was? Turns out that if you had read this book at the time – which plenty of policymakers in DC actually did – the riddle might have proved to be just a little less insoluble. Balkan Ghosts is divided into four main sections, dealing in turn with Yugoslavia and its components, Romania, Bulgaria and finally Greece. By the second paragraph of the preface, Kaplan has set out his stall, signing himself up as a devotee at the temple of Rebecca West, and reasserting the claim that alongside Lawrence of Arabia’s “Seven Pillars of Wisdom”, Dame West’s “Black Lamb and Grey Falcon” constitutes the pinnacle of travel writing in the twentieth century. I can certainly vouch for Lawrence, and it is merely the improbable length of Black Lamb – my copy is literally the size of a brick – that has prevented me from diving into it in the last few years.

For a solid primer, though, Balkan Ghosts is excellent. Kaplan is very strong on the virulent strain of victimhood that turned the Serbians into such killing machines in the Bosnian wars. But what did I, or anyone else, know of the fascist Croatian ustashe, who literally stabbed and clubbed to death a hundred thousand Serbs and Jews and Muslims at the Jasenovac concentration camp in WW2? Like a concertina, history folds up so tightly in the folds of those mountains that the humiliation of a defeat in battle six centuries ago can feel just as real today. (See Knez Lazar's coffin flowing through crowded Serbian streets in the late 1980s.)

No doubt the Turks gave something to the region in their 500-year dominance – but what exactly? Kaplan quotes West: “The Turks ruined the Balkans, with a ruin so great that it has not yet been repaired.” When you think of all the remnants of the Ottoman empire that are still unsettled today - be it in the Balkans or in the Middle East - you have to wonder what the hell they actually left behind. I tried to tie this together with Kaplan's later advocacy of war in Arabia, but the threads at least in this book are too weak. (Kaplan also makes a telling point about the Armenian genocide - it was the Turks' only way of gaining absolute numerical supremacy in central Anatolia, the Armenians being the only other competitors in that region.)

But perhaps anyone who went into the accursed Balkan mountains was always on a hiding to nothing. The Habsburgs realized this to their cost on Sarajevo’s Appel Quay in June 1914. But just consider the countless nationalities – Serb, Croat, Bosnian, Albanian, Macedonian, Montenegrin, plus Greek, Bulgar and Magyar– and the religions – Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim, Jewish – and the competing empires – Ottoman, Russian, Habsburg – packed into this one tiny region, and one wonders how anyone could ever have been so foolhardy! As Kaplan says in despair at the end of an especially fucked up chapter dealing with Gotse Deltchev (Eric Ambler – Judgment on Deltchev!) and Macedonian independence: “The more obscure and unfathomable the hatred, and the smaller the national groups involved, the longer and more complex the story seemed to grow.”

You kinda have to feel for the poor guy... Next stop, Romania!

*

Update: Now done with the book. The chapters on Bulgaria and Greece were short and felt a bit bolted on to be honest, the former seen largely through the medium of a friendship struck up with Guillermo Angelov, a typically compromised journalist going to seed in 1980s Sofia. Even today, Sofia is a pretty seedy place, so it's kind of hard to imagine that it was all that much worse back in the communist 80s. Visiting this time last year, the place and its people felt muted and beaten down in a way that was rather hard to pinpoint. But then, Kaplan quotes Nevill Forbes: "Of all the Balkan peoples, the Bulgarians were the most completely crushed and effaced." The Turks again. There followed wars of independence and of territorial irredentism, which only served to chop up Greater Bulgaria into tiny pieces that were then scattered to the seven winds, leaving behind what was and is in some senses a curtailed country, a resentful rump state that fell eagerly into alliances with the losing side in two world wars.

The most notable recent event in my mind is the expulsion of 300,000 Muslim Turks in the late 1980s; for all its so-called human rights implications, it's hard to fault the Bulgarians for this, especially given the ground realities of Europe today. But even without that rationale, cast your mind back 200 or 300 years, as Penkov does in some of his short stories - I think of those women of Bulgaria, the ancestors of today's dazzling long-legged beauties, that lived in fear of kidnap, of becoming one more trophy in some pasha's harem. Whom can you blame? And for what?

Greece too is explored via the Byzantine politics of the 1980s, namely the bizarre career of Andreas Papandreou, the Harvard-trained economist and Berkeley department head who turned into a classic Peron-style, anti-American demagogue! Kaplan makes the assertion that Greece is in many more ways a Balkan nation than it is a Western one, and one would say that the 21st-century history of Greece, full of cheating and lying leading to economic depression and lunatic politics, has proved the writer abundantly right. Kaplan does make some optimistic noises on the future of the Greek nation at the end of the book, but from the vantage point of 2017, I find it hard to share them - history is a stone of terrible weight on the chest of any nation.

Greece too overreached in the wake of the collapse of the Ottomans, sweeping deep into Anatolia, then being chased all the way by Ataturk back across Asia Minor and back into Europe - I still have to read Panos Karnezis on this, although I did read Bruce Clark a few years ago. Either way, that fatal error led to the extinguishing of 3000 years of Greek culture in Asia Minor, the first mass population transfer of the 20th century, like its first genocide, a gift of the Turks. It's some comfort to know in this 70th year of Partition that Punjab and Bengal were not the only two places to experience such horrors; there was previous. So that nothing remains today of Greek Smyrna, nor indeed of Jewish Salonika. If monoculture is the handmaiden of the nation-state, it has been pursued with a unique ferocity in the Balkans. Last stop remains Romania.

[Erik Graff · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a rather lurid telling of the history of the Balkans by an author invested in the United States military establishment. While it is well written, the perspective is fatalistic and pessimistic, particularly as regards the Yugoslavs.

In other books written since he became popular as a darling of the neocons, Kaplan endorses an amoral approach to foreign policy in the American interest. I personally find this us/them approach highly offensive yet representative of how US affairs are usually conducted.

As regards Yugoslavia, there was no necessity to the violent breakup of the country in the early nineties by my reading of history. It was people like Kaplan and his ilk, petty nationalists, who led it towards their own perceived benefits much like Yeltsin had done to the USSR for his own sake and that of the Russia he identified with.

I first saw this book at my former sister-in-law's home in Sawyer, Michigan and started reading it there before buying myself a copy.

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

A friend gave me this book as I deployed in B-H during SFOR/IFOR. This is essential reading to understand this turbulent area. The book is dark and brooding while not all the Balkans are quite so depressing. Romania was a delight and Bulgaria was a fine stay. Read this but don't write the area off.

[Brent · Rating 2 out of 5]

not as helpful as I would have liked when trying to learn about the history of the Balkans...

[Panayoti Kelaidis · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must read for anyone who has the slightest interest in contemporary history: Kaplan has captured the fantastic complexity of the Balkan politics that have been the root cause of so much world tension and little things like World War I. Each chapter of the book focuses on a key country: Kaplan blends his extensive personal experience there, recapping the threads of historical and cultural issues faced by that country, pointing to future outcomes. Written in the 20th Century, many of Kaplan's predictions have come about since the book was published.

As a Greek American, I was particularly intrigued with his recap of contemporary Greek politics: his analysis of Andreas Papandreou is chilling and seemingly spot on. He nails the "Greek" question. I am swayed by Kaplan's premise, that the Balkans are still mired in the drama of Oriental despotism, that the Balkans have a long way to go to achieve a democratic society where ethnic minorities and the dominant majorities are able to be ruled by law rather than the whim of history and charismatic dictators. Spellbinding: a modern classic.

[Anna · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not the best travel book about the Balkans. I think it got an unfair boost when Clinton was seen reading it. It's jumpy in rhythm and conclusions. Kaplan makes acute observations and extrapolates them to be indicative of an entire culture the way any traveler might, but as a travel writer I think he should have delved deeper before jumping to some of his conclusions.

Also, because the book is really more a composition of articles from the Atlantic than a travelogue, it is often repetitive, using the same details to illustrate and re-illustrate the same point. Maybe his editor fell asleep reading it.

Better than most though, very contextualized and discusses the people of the countries in good detail as he was able to interact with many.

[George · Rating 4 out of 5]

A rather dark overview of the Balkans, but once the book of choice for those venturing into Europe's heart of darkness in the 90's, the former republic of Yugoslavia, and trying to get a basic grasp of the peoples and issues on the plane ride in. I read it on the road to Kosovo, during the war there between the KLA and the Yugoslav Army. There are better books, if you're willing to spend quality time reading them, but if you're just trying to establish a base line to draw from, this will do nicely.

[Clif · Rating 5 out of 5]

Flat lands are invitations to invade. Mountains are fortresses to defend. Conquest beckons the powerful but brings resentment in the conquered.

Central Europe, flat, has been a historic pathway for invasion, with horrors of conquest over the centuries culminating in the invasion of the USSR by Germany and then the invasion of Germany by the USSR in WW2. The book to read on this is Bloodlands.

Balkan Ghosts takes a look at the lands to the south, the Balkans, with the author touring the mountainous regions that often but not always provided refuge from the invasion of one country or people by another. These relatively small countries, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, and the lands that made up the former Yugoslavia (Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Serbia and Macedonia) packed closely together Slavs and Serbs, Greeks and Turks, Eastern Orthodox and Catholic Christians and Muslims in a mix ready to combust.

As Robert Kaplan puts it so well, each group, each nation, has considers the time when it ruled over the most territory as the golden age and longs for that time to return. Unlike the United States and Britain, countries that have enjoyed empire without being overrun by invasion of the homeland, the Balkan states have all been invaded, repeatedly, with hatred planted and nourished by every episode.

As the author travels around interviewing people, he often hears that "you Americans cannot understand our situation" and that cannot be denied, yet in each case the person speaking clearly cannot understand any but his/her own situation. Kaplan visited over a period of years from 1980 through the end of Soviet control in 1990, making his home in Greece at the time, finding a litany of resentment and righteous indignation concerning events from ancient history right up to the time he visited.

With each country he delves into the history of conflict that characterize each, the period of Ottoman rule standing out strongly for oppression though it ended over a century ago. Each nation has a story to tell of slaughter and of alignment with or against now this, now that invading power. The holocaust of the Jews in the 1940's was of course as much a part of Balkan history as it was of central and eastern Europe to the north.

Dictators such as Yugoslavia's Tito, Serbia's Milosovic, and Romania's Ceausescu are covered in full along with the most remarkable character of all, Andreas Papandreou of Greece, a man who went from being a PhD at Harvard to become the chairman of the department of economics at UC Berkeley and then the prime minister of Greece, along the way turning a blind eye to terrorism, enjoying the support of Libya's Ghaddafi and needling the United States at every opportunity.

From the descriptions Kaplan provides from 1990 Balkan life was very bleak, poverty was common and the general lack of joy in life that characterized USSR style communism still smothered all of the countries with the exception of Greece, a democracy open as it is to the West through the Mediterranean. The author doesn't hesitate to analyze cultural issues, relating the great increase in tourism to Greece from America prompted by the movies Never on Sunday and Zorba the Greek. He makes a point of Americans seeing the mystical, exotic, irrational east as an exciting and enticing place of escape from the rational, coinciding with the sexual revolution in the 1960's.

Things have improved for the people of the Balkans since this book was written, though Serbia under Milosovic went on a rampage in the 1990's bringing the military intervention of NATO.

For someone as ignorant of the region as I was, this book enthralled. The complexity of the ethnic and religious scene is impossible for me to convey. The USSR kept a tight lid on it all. Many years ago I would hear shortwave radio broadcasts from the Balkans; Radio Sofia, Radio Bucharest, etc. uniform in the dreary presentation style of Radio Moscow, relating none of the colorful cultures of the countries.

Using the internet to look at street scenes in the Balkans today, it is clear that material life has greatly improved. I can only hope that this will continue as the suffering endured by those living in the Balkans, due to invasions from all sides is matched only by the European countries to the north.

[Gogelescu Ion Petre · Rating 5 out of 5]

Minunată carte.


"Both men were artificers, able to hold off the future by building a fragile present out of pieces of the past.

On the road, when I met people, I asked them always about the past. Only in this way
could the present become comprehensible.

"How do you divide up the past?" the poet Todorovski asked me. "You argue over what was in a dead man's mind," I answered

The present for him was merely a stage of the past moving quickly into the future.

[Tubs · Rating 4 out of 5]

quick thoughts:

1. i expected this book to cover primarily (the former) yugoslavia. while the first section focused on yugoslavia, it was very weak compared to the final sections on romania, bulgaria, and greece. it feels maybe tacked on simply because ethnic conflicts were so obviously escalating in the early 1990s. kaplan is clearly more comfortable and knowledgeable about romania, bulgaria, and greece. thus:

2. the sections on romania, bulgaria, and greece were great, and they helpfully broadened my personal definition of the balkans. romania and especially bulgaria are two countries to which i've rarely given any thought, but kaplan's descriptions of the history and culture of those countries brought them to life for me.

3. he also makes a perceptive and persuasive argument that greece, while known as the birthplace of Western culture, is equally, if not more so, part of the Eastern world. he convincingly portrays greece as being of a piece with its balkan neighbors. his tale of greece in the 80s is frankly shocking. it makes me wonder how greece ever convinced the EU to allow it to join, and it explains a lot about how greece got itself into its current fiscally disastrous situation.

4. this book was depressing in its depiction of the depravities of human behavior (mass rape, mass murder [or more accurately slaughter in the case where 200 romanian jews were literally processed in a slaughterhouse:], mass deportation, mass forced religious conversion, mass corruption, mass poverty, not to mention centuries-old vendettas, border disputes, ethnic and religious conflicts, etc.). but it was also somehow grimly satisfying to see the consistency, if nothing else, in humanity's cruelty over time. kaplan humanizes (if that's the right word - probably not) the long history of these innumerable atrocities by depicting them as an evil yet natural and inevitable outcome of humanity's flawed nature. far from excusing or explaining away these atrocities by citing human nature, kaplan's book uses these atrocities as a damning indictment of human nature. you can't help but wonder what you'd have done, had you been born and raised in the circumstances described in this book. balkan ghosts sadly lays bare the full, ugly truth of what humanity is capable of. it's not pretty, but i feel somehow better seeing the full truth.

5. also, it really makes me want to find out what plum brandy tastes like.

[Sebastian Gebski · Rating 3 out of 5]

I've read it for two reasons:
1. I've heard the anecdote about American politicians "learning Balkans" by reading Kaplan
2. I was actually looking for a good book on the history of the Balkans (esp. countries that were parts of former Yugoslavia) - and this one has popped up very frequently in the recommendations

TBH, I didn't like it, especially the initial 30-40%. It sounds like a chopped travel log, without proper historical background, without a wider context, and chaotic with its jumping across time & events. With time, it gets significantly better as there are specific chapters dedicated to particular countries. Unfortunately, this "covering" doesn't have much in common with history or at least an accurate presentation of facts - I'm not saying Kaplan is lying or twisting; he just presents a very limited scope, like he's painting a single landscape. IMHO, it's VERY FAR from enough when it comes to presenting the complex truth of the Balkan geopolitical situation (esp. in the context of all its history).

2.5-2.7 stars, mainly because the second part of the book is very vivid & picturesque (though the value is in artistic impression, not historical accuracy/detail). For me, it means I need to seek another, better book on the topic.