The Serbs Chose War, Ruth Mitchel 18. "WE ARE SERBIAN CHILDREN" ON MARCH 23 I gave a poetry reading in a local club. Suddenly there was a great trampling of feet and shouting in the street below. We ran out onto the balcony to watch one of the many demonstration marches of the Belgrade school children. "Bolje rat nego pact," the young voices shouted-"Better war than the pact!" The remarkable behavior of the children of Belgrade has been mentioned by correspondents in their books with something akin to contempt as a "diaper revolution." Little did these men grasp what it really meant. It was the voice of Serbia authentic old spirit of Serbia-breaking its slowly tightening chains. The Serbs are a hardy race; their genius flowers best in hardship. After the last war a mild prosperity had resulted from the sudden exploitation of Serbia's rich resources. Men sent their sons abroad to study, to become "cosmopolitan." Coming from a comparatively backward land, they had been unduly impressed with the wealth and success of other countries. Their Serbian self-confidence and ideals sometimes weakened, resulting in a complete and shocking decay of every moral fiber: they became denatured Serbs. Some of these men, through their foreign training, mostly in Paris and Vienna, had risen to the top in government. They were the "ascendancy class." But their children still were sharp-eyed Serbs, fed by the strong roots of Serbian tradition. They saw well and clearly, and they were disgusted. They despised their un-Serbian fathers. This gave them a fierce, pitiful maturity. The children, in this hour of fateful choice for their beloved homeland, marched the streets of Belgrade, not as children but as Serbs, as standard-bearers of the old Serbian passion for "liberty at any cost whatever." Is there anything more inspiring, more hopeful for the future, in all recent European history? In no other country in Europe did the rising generation take the lead and repudiate the compromising weakness of its elders. If there were nothing else in the record, this behavior of her children alone would be a sufficient star-sign of the destiny of Serbia. Outside of Belgrade, in the provinces, the children did not march. It was unnecessary. There the children and their parents were heart and soul together: the flawed national product had tended to gravitate to Belgrade. I say that after this war nothing in Europe will be more worth doing than to save and build up again the pitiful remnants that will be left of Serbian youth. I say, and my countrymen surely will say with me, that as the children of Serbia were the first and only children in Europe to rise and fearlessly to face the German horror, the Serbian children shall come first. Because they stood most bravely for their national principle the Serbian children have been most murdered, most pitilessly butchered of all in Europe, not excepting the Poles or even the Jews. Don't think they didn't know what they were doing. They knew well not only their own history of massacres under Ottoman rule, but also the much more terrible record of German mass murders in Poland and Czechoslovakia. They knew. But they did not hesitate or waver. For Serbian youth it was: Serbia free or nothing. For thousands upon uncounted thousands of them it has been-nothing. But the rest, undaunted march on. "We are Serbian children. Long live Serbia!" Previous Chapter | Content | Next Chapter The Serbs Chose War, Ruth Mitchel