FREEDOM OR HEROIC DEATH!
- ÅSSAY -
1. Who are we and where do we live? That’s a reasonable question if we believe that the way of life determines our mind. A number of climatic, geographical, historical facts and factors, especially if they are analyzed with no prejudice, could be helpful to understand the situation where we found ourselves together. Is it possible to identify a profitable objective and go for it together?!
I hope it is…because it’s about time…there’s no other way, no matter how this may sound!
In prehistoric times, a huge asteroid or a comet- perhaps it was an ice block with the size of Bulgaria- hit the Earth. I don’t mean the cosmic body that hit the planet somewhere around the island of Cuba. What I have in mind is another disastrous collision which occurred much later in time. Entering the atmosphere, this cosmic body was divided into two parts, and then each of them was divided into three more. The first three parts fell over what today is the water area of Black and Azov seas. Two larger parts of the first three, formed the body of the Black sea; on the sea bottom there are two large craters over 2000 m. deep. The smaller third part of the cosmic body formed the sea of Azov.
The second triple of the cosmic alien formed the Caspian sea and the Aral sea. The collision released a huge amount of energy. As a result of the collision, Caucasus mountain and the Balkan mountains appeared. The Balkan is inarguable the youngest formed mountain in our lands, and the Danube plain and the Thracian valley used to be one. There was a complete change in the flora and fauna of the area; hundreds of mineral water sources broke up. Various experts believe that this collision resulted in the significant genetic changes of living beings who inhabited the lands south of the epicenter. These changes are assumed to be the reason for the appearance of ancient civilizations such as the Assyrian-Babylonian, Egyptian and Greco-Roman civilizations. The analysis of these civilizations’ intellectual capabilities is really impressive and indicative. The Greco-Roman civilization has left the most traces in our land, and the study of their experience and solutions in different situations, is likely to become a universal anti-crisis solution - as long as you proceed from purely pragmatic considerations. Moreover, there are numerous reasons that should be taken into account when we analyze the genome of today’s Bulgarians- the way it is. Thus, let’s remember how was ancient Rome established, and what was it like?
The archetype of the states venture, which is the most famous in the world, has arisen as a result of civil conflicts between the Greco-Hellenic city-states and the its settlement foundations were put by the Trojans and their grandchildren after the end of the Trojan War- events described by Homer’s "Iliad" and Virgil’s "Aeneid". Later on, the state organization of ancient Rome was implemented in the first republic, which later became a democratically governed empire, with the intention to liquidate the fragmentation of lands around the Mediterranean once and for all. These separated lands were turned into small countries, which always mired in strife and bloodshed - the memory of the Trojan War has revived some correct at the time political conclusions. The empire was established as an ancient Greek model, almost identical to it in some respect: religion, way of life, navy, military art and other arts, philosophy, rhetoric, etc. There were also differences with respect to grammar, the numerical system and others, however there are more similarities. The imperial rises are followed by falls with Emperors such as Nero, Claude-Albin and Commodus. The Trojan progeny had a special feeling about the areas surrounding their homeland, and especially towards the lands of today’s Bulgaria and European Turkey. Such Roman emperors were Vespasian, Trajan, Adrian, Constantine I, who christened the Romans. What was really necessary for the desired political, territorial and state union, was the spiritual monotheistic unity. It was what triggered the Roman christening. Similar to every young monotheistic religion, Christianity goes through the stages of violence. The result of this violence is the distinguishing, on the basis of theological and other accompanying considerations, of the process leading to the division of the Roman Empire into East and West. There was a split between the eastern orthodoxy and Catholicism.
Such processes have been imprinted deeply in history and have reached us sometimes in misinterpretation, since they had been carried by the Byzantine diplomacy towards the neighbouring nations. Basic and major technique in diplomatic moves of the Byzantines in their relations with the Huns, Bulgarians, Magyars and other nations, was that these nations obtained “federal” status, which was a relative sovereignty. Our nation had had such a status long before the establishment of the First Bulgarian empire. This status was related to agreements between between the suzerain and the vassals, who had to be recruited by the emperor, with remuneration and other special benefits and rights, for military Gendarmerie initiatives and actions throughout the empire. The Bulgarian cavalry was feared by the Arabs. A huge number of historical sources points that the Bulgarians had numerous victories over a superior and outnumbering enemy. Khan Kubrat probably was a Christian, and certainly had been a senior military officer for years - general, a leader of the entire Byzantine cavalry.
This historical information leads to two main conclusions: The Bulgarians had a distinct military confidence and suffered great human losses.
In the period between the reign of Justinian I and Justinian II, Khan Kubrat drew the conclusion that if the Bulgarians were to have physical survival, it was necessary to undertake separatist actions in order to insure safety and integrity of the nation in the Byzantine spiritual aura and territorial differentiation south of the river Danube. As a result, the Firsts Bulgarian Empire was established, following the Roman style of state organization. At the time of Boris I, this process is completed with the christening of Bulgarians, Slavs and some other nations, all united in the young country. With absolute perspicacity, the Byzantines had an ethnicity compromise with alphabet matters in order to establish a spiritual and religious unity of all nations on the territory of the empire. They even started to follow the Hellenic ways under the guidance of orthodoxy. There are military and political reasons for the establishment of the First Bulgarian empire, and yet there is the clear concept that spirituality is a crucial factor! The formation of the Bulgarian country as a relatively independent state can be relevant to the way the Roman empire had been separated several times in order to prolong its existence with another 1000 years. These process are quite intriguing and practically identical. The common features between the First Bulgarian empire and the Byzantine are obvious: military and political structures, trade relationships, culture, literacy, religion, iconography etc. The Bulgarian alphabet is a variation of the Greek one. Yet, there are some main differences in the construction of fortifying facilities, taxations, mandatory military recruitment etc. What follows is a rise, wars, and fall, as it has always been.
The second Bulgarian Empire was established out of economic reasons via separatist actions in Tarnovo- the most advanced city on the Danube territory. Tarnovo (Nikopolis ad Hemus)is a descendent of Nikopolis ad Istrum, which was modeled as ancient Rome. Asenevtsi are Bulgarian Byzantine aristocrats, who follow the example and take the symbol of the most appropriate state, i.e. the First Bulgarian empire. The second Bulgarian empire, however, is a copy of Byzantine, even with respect to construction or palace hierarchy – from Basileus (King), Caesar (heir to the throne), treasurer, curopalate (Chamberlain Marshal) - to stratilat (today, there is a café with the same name in the old shopping street Samovodska Charshia in Veliko Tarnovo). All of these are Byzantine administration hierarchical titles and ranks. A few would remember the origin and additional information about Trapezitsa- the name of one of Veliko Tarnovo hills.
Trapesa in Greek has the meaning of bank. This indicates that the bank of those days was located there( now we call it Bulgarian national Bank). This brings up some other conclusions, but the final one is obvious: all that’s left of Byzantine these days is called Bulgaria.
Prince Ferdinand comes to the same conclusions after a number of archeological ventures; he declares in dependence in 1908 in the Holy Forty Martyrs church near Tsarevets; he also makes a military plan to revive the Byzantine Empire. He was aiming at the military taking( liberation of Constantinople(Istanbul). The martial plan of the Balkan war is a typical blitzkrieg– Istanbul had to be taken over for the short period of approximately 30 days – the time needed for the huge, yet devastated Ottoman empire to transfer its army from Asia to Europe, and it almost succeeds. The fortified region of Chatalja, as a last redoubt before victory, was conquered by the division of Sliven, but their military advances were stopped by the Bulgarian artillery( of course, this was by mistake…but I couldn’t find the strength to comment on this fact!). two more wars followed, and then Europe had its final fragmentation.
In modern times Henry Alfred Kissinger demonstrated and proved that Europe’s fragmentation since the time of cardinal Richelieu, generates all problems in the world. Territorial fragmentation causes the creation of military alliances and militarization, and when money is spent on guns and bombs, " bread is not enough" – until 1890 the Bulgarian army is greater than that of the US (“DIPLOMACY”, page 29, H.A. Kissinger). NATO and EU practically stand for military, political and economic unity and one more thing- peace. It is evident that the Bulgarian diplomacy is not quite effective( Tsar Boris I should be excluded from failures). I am asking myself what should be our expectations under the circumstances of the forthcoming long peace. We are situated on a crossroad, a big one. Without Bulgaria and Romania joining the EU, Greece will be cut off by land from the EU, so shall Turkey be, perhaps. When we are on the crossroad, we shall become passengers and turn into roads that will transfer experience, progress, culture, services and goods. This transfer needs order. Order rules that the governors and the governed have the same objectives.
The objectives of the one and the other side seem to be cut by "scissors" and the metastasis of plutocracy is still traceable. The main reason for the existence of the plutocratic abracadabra phenomena is the unknown ownership. “Communism” forms the so called secondary distribution of national wealth. A monstrous bureaucracy was created to serve this distribution. Instead of decreasing bureaucracy has been recently increasing and still dominates the processes of business by relentlessly hindering everyone everywhere in the old totalitarian fashion. Under the forces of totalitarianism, it turns out that the business serves the state, while it should be the way round. “Everything state-owned is safe!” – says the bureaucrat; most clerks find the private held business wild and barbarian. This not surprising; we know which totalitarian propaganda gave these definitions. Bulgarian people are not wild barbarians, and the Europeans are no cleverer than we are, neither have they our history or possess our genome, yet they are more civilized in the relationships between each other, especially when we are talking about privately held business and state administration .
I will not go into deep discussion of what European culture is, or is it possible to have it. I am sure, however, it should be clear to all that all forms of culture are a function of wealth earned and amassed legally and not obtained through bribes, taxes, or blackmail etc. – all of these being crazy business limitations and impediments. These days all statesmen speak about better control and order, while over a million Bulgarians pay taxes and insurances that do not correspond to their actual earnings; and, as if the state is not capable or is unwilling to “ have what it deserves”(…I wonder why?). What the state should give under the regulations of law has been restrained to the levels of absurdity( I mean the tax incentives over insurances of life and rent; as a result of this absurdity the cash flow is absolutely limited- such incentives are used by only 1% of those who have the right to use them).
What has been given by law seems to be claimed as crime if someone decides to use it. What follows is a sequence of denunciations and curses here and there. It becomes obvious that it is not clear ,for the greater part of society, what wealth and good life standard really means for a nation. I had a chat with a Bulgarian gasterbeiter who was telling me how many countries he has been to and finally said sadly:
“...
There is no nation that has
been so hard up”. It was a really painful statement because Botev, the poet, asked
this nation-“ Answer me, answer me, wretched men,
who rocks your little, thraldom cot...”.
If I were a nationalist, I would probably had to stand up, as Hitler did behind his political pulpit and shout out political “sentences” in his falsetto voice, but I am not…thank God!!! I have no questions or messages for the nation since its poverty is obvious; this poverty initiates mischievousness and Andreshkovtsi”(Andreshko is a character from Bulgarian literature synonym of petty dodger). I think it’s time to define wealth and life standard because many people’s idea of wealth and life standard is deplorable! Some believe that wealth is equal to a gig ship full of money!?!. That’s not true! The wealth of a nation, or a country lies in their ability to multiply its currency as much as possible and more often via business transactions regulated by law and taxes, but please, pay attention- taxes are imposed, but they are also given up. This is a European requirement! We can’t pretend to be blind and deaf when we have to give away, this is applied to the state as well as the business! The public contract between the two is not fair when ,in its realization, one of the parties is to have rights only, and the other is to have obligations only! This is pure cynicism, misanthropy and nihilism! The result of such relationships was that in 2001 the annual average BGN multiplication was about 17 times. When we reached annual multiplication of about 50 times, there was the reluctant evaluation that” we have market economy”- yes, we did, but was really hard for us. Now we are stable at about 60 -70 times, while the annual multiplication of the Singapore dollar is 1000 times; this rate is even greater with the US dollar and the yen. When are we going to catch up? Who will unleash the Bulgarian wealth and life standard, when will the clerk stop pressing the brake with two legs, or apply the hand brake with two hands? The regulated business should be served in a way that the occurrence of goods and services deals, is as frequent and large as possible. Is it really so hard to understand that the unleash of these processes will bring to us infallible and perfect European highways with no hole in them, to fair remuneration of teachers, police officers, military and state clergy, decent pensions, new care pathways, or even new jet fighters, to less littering, better order, more cultural events, happy holidays and peaceful workdays, all of the things we admire about the way of life of the west countries!
That’ s what the wealth of a nation means, and the opposite is that its foolishness is equal to its misery. Do we deserve this?!
2. Two steps forward, one step back! After the Tatar military invasion on the Balkan peninsula and Malaysia was stopped, two new fast developing empires emerge- the Ottoman empire and Moscow Russian empire( Kiev was the first capital of the Russian empire). The ottoman go beyond the Dardanelles and establish their first capital-Edirne. Byzantine reduces to the Constantinople enclave. The religious conflict of the catholic church with the orthodoxy is the reason why the catholic world becomes a silent observer of the Ottoman invasion over the east orthodoxy. The invasion has an instrument that will break the orthodox belief, and later the Catholicism will be accepted as a mission of liberation of our lands( remember dr. Tsankov and the middle of 19th c.). it is cruel, isn’t it? In 1386 Sofia falls;in 1393 ã –Tarnovo ; in 1453 on 29 May Constantinople falls; later, Hadzhi Dimitar was poisoned; Levski was captures- we all know how; Benkovski was killed after betrayal; a number of authors believe Botev was shot in the back, etc. All of this is the black statistics of ours- a lyrical digression. Why did it happen this way?!
In their invasion, the Turks were stopped at Vienna. The initial military and political plans of the catholic countries could not foresee that Wladislaw III (Vladislav Varnenchik) will die on Odessos(Varna), or that orthodox Russia will gather such territorial and military power, or that Alexander Nevsky will defeat the crusaders by the Chudskoe lake.
As a result, cardinal Richelieu would have Germany(no matter what it was called at that time) blood drained for a long period of time, out of colonial considerations, and freedom for Bulgarians- orthodox and/or catholic- would come after 500 years. The internal ottoman politics had been impressive throughout these years. They would keep the rights of the vassal Christian leaders, yet they would introduce a number of assimilation laws and ”rights”. An example of this is the called stone-pit right, i.e. if people needed stones for construction, they had to pay extremely high taxes to get the stones- while, if stones were used for a second time, for instance the stones from Tsarevets, these stones would be tax free. How cunningly and meanly! The Bulgarians began destroying their own history and sanctuaries out of poverty. That is how Tsarevets not only lost its protection walls, but also 30 churches. Those who were on the edge of survival had often thought:” we will die, but hopefully not today”. With the course of time these thoughts were changed to: “ if we are going to die, we hope we will have some music playing”. There are numerous examples of this, but only one motto Ïðèìåðè, êîëêîòî ùåì, ñ åäíî ìîòî – “ If you want to enslave and destroy, you should oppress someone and bring them to a miserable existence”. Nonetheless, these processes can give rise to ideologies based on hatred, which could be based on racial, class or religious differences. Ideologies such as these can trigger monstrous cataclysms because their supporters are waiting for one call only – “ASSAULT”!
Near Veliki Preslav there have been over 100 furnaces for lime from the marble quadrae. They were used to construct the second capital of the First Bulgarian empire. During the ottoman reign over the Bulgarians, they were not slaves. They used to have rights, one of which was the right for self-destruction. Such habits last until now! Byzantine was the empire that managed to have amazing civilization powers- Justinian I was born an ordinary peasant in the village areas between Nish and Sofia, and became emperor of the most spiritually superior and powerful empire: Byzantine. He constructed the wonder of the Middle ages- St. Sofia church in Constantinople, conquered Arabia, south Africa, Sicily and Italy. Yet, he had a democratic ascension to the throne. Do you have something to say about that? Today, the descendents of such a spiritual and historical wealth cannot find a way to live in an organized manner, as if they have been overtaken by a certain Babylonian syndrome. They do not get on well with each other; they don’t even know where to start; their minds are preoccupied with the black atavism to destroy each other. Our misunderstanding of what is first and what is second leads to the lack of civilized relationships. The Bulgarians are the creators of stirrup, composite bow, the piston rings of internal combustion engines, the airplane as a military aircraft, the computer; we find Bulgarians to be world champions of mathematics, check mate and many others.
How come that this full of intelligence genome cannot manage to achieve development in its own country; this indifference shoed away a million young Bulgarians- homeless and friendless- a result achieved by the ottomans. It was not long ago when I heard the president of republic of Bulgaria to claim officially that today the state serves the clerks. Should it be this way?!?! The state and the clerks will have to force themselves and start serving business, so that business deals are more and more frequent and more successful. Those who can have to help those who cannot through the fisc. In cases of crisis, every society gives all opportunities to those who can so that they start making business. The first results lead to enthusiasm, which leads to success, as long as we do not overdo. State must make business escalate, that’s all!
My dear readers, I have tried to have some civilian discussion points. If someone else thinks the same, so the solution is still to come, but we don’t know when. If we try our best, I suppose we will, soon. Those who can see and read, do what you must come what may. We are Bulgarians, so we can!
3. Epilogue. I am looking at a tram heading west, but got stuck in the middle of Vazrazhdane square. It looked just like Bulgaria- old, repainted many times, battered, full of people, who are scared, with torn clothes, powerless and sweating with tension. At both sides the drivers of fancy European cars are watching and wondering whether the tram driver will speed up and take the assigned direction, or the passenger will have to get off with disappointment and keep on walking to…the Russian monument.
Boris Georgiev, chairman of SiVZK
