Modern military leaders require solid information, with broad background knowledge, to operate in some of the world's most complex cultures. In the Balkan Peninsula, the overlapping demands of religion, ethnic loyalties, and selfish power-politics are ongoing challenges to any military operation in the region. History leading up to the Twentieth century contained numerous conflicts between nations on the peninsula and the first 50 years of the Twentieth century contained four additional major conflicts. Thus, this research examines the participants of the Balkan War I, Balkan War II, World War I, and World War II, notes the causes of each and describes the results. By extrapolating lessons learned from examining earlier conflicts and comparing those lessons to the actions of these four modern conflicts, this research demonstrates that historical norms are possible to predict. These conclusions stand up to the examples provided by the modern dissolution conflicts in the former Yugoslavia. Based on the conclusions of this research, decision makers should examine the history of an area prior to conducting operations and, in the case of the Balkans, limit their expectations of successful progress as defined by the West.This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
