ALWAYS ON SUNDAY: HISTORY WAS MADE MANY TIMES OVER ON THIS DAY, SEEMINGLY ALWAYS ON SUNDAYS
Remember the famous Melina Mercouri movie and the song, “Never on Sunday?”
Well, when it comes to Serbian history, momentous events seem to have taken place “always on Sunday.”
June 28, 1389 – BATTLE OF KOSOVO
It was a Sunday June 28, 1389 when two mighty armies faced each other on the Field of Blackbirds (Kosovo). Reliable historical accounts of the battle are scarce. The invading Ottoman (Turkish) army, led by the 70-year old Sultan Murad, numbered between 27,000 to 40,000 fighters. The defenders’ Serbian Prince Lazar’s army had from 12,000 to 30,000 troops, according to historians.
The bulk of both armies were wiped out in the ferocious battle to the death. Both the Serb leader Lazar and the Ottoman Sultan Murad lost their lives in it. So did most of my Djurdjevic ancestors who fought at Kosovo. Those who survived, retreated with Queen Milica, Lazar’s wife, to Zeta (today’s Montenegro).
The Serbs withdrew, bleeding. The Turks withdrew, bleeding. King Tvrtko of Bosnia (whose troops fought on the side of Serbia) proclaimed the Battle of Kosovo a great victory.
The bells of the Notre-Dame in Paris rang for four days to celebrate Serb victory at Kosovo.
Alas, the celebrations across Europe were short-ilved.
After the battle, Lazar’s son, Stefan Lazarevic, raced to fight a Hungarian invasion and to put down a rebellion of certain nobles. He accepted to be a Turkish vassal so he could solidify his rule (which he did).
His sister and Lazar’s daughter, Olivera, became Bayazit’s (Ottoman ruler after Kosovo) favorite wife and wielded great influence over him. Serbia regained its independence in 1402, only to fall to the Turks again in 1459 (other Serbian states: Bosnia – 1463, Herzegovina – 1482, parts of Montenegro – 1499). Serbia was subjugated by the Ottoman Empire for 345 years (1459-1804).
Despite the defeat, the Battle of Kosovo on the Field of Blackbirds has been etched in the hearts and minds and consciousness of every child born to a Serbian mother. Serbian kids suckle it with mother’s milk. Kosovo is Serbia’s Alamo. And today, on St Vitus Day, the whole country remembers it.
By the late 17th century, the Ottoman Empire expanded as far west as Vienna. The Turks laid a siege of the Habsburg Empire capital from July 17–Sept 12 1683. The expedition by the Turks eventually resulted in their defeat by a combined force led by John III Sobieski of Poland. The end of the siege of Vienna marked the beginning of the end of Turkish domination in eastern Europe.
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June 28, 1519 – SPAIN’S CHARLES V CROWNED AS HOLY ROMAN EMPEROR
On this day, Charles V a.k.a Charles I of Spain, who by birth already held sway over much of Europe and Spanish America, was elected the successor of his late 
grandfather, Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I. Charles, also the grandson of Ferdinand II and Isabella of Spain, had bribed the princes of Germany to vote for him, defeating such formidable candidates as King Henry VIII of England, King Francis I of France, and Frederick the Wise, the duke of Saxony.
Crowned as Emperor Charles V, the new Holy Roman emperor sought to unite the many kingdoms under his rule in the hope of creating a vast, universal empire. However, his hopes were thwarted by the Protestant Reformation in Germany, a lifelong dynastic struggle with King Francis, and the advance of the Ottoman Turks into Europe. In 1558, after nearly four decades as Holy Roman emperor, Charles abdicated the throne in favor of his brother, Ferdinand. He had already granted much of the other European territory under his rule to his son Philip II.
Ironically, on this same day in 1491, England’s King Henry VIII was also born.
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1797 – France occupies Ionian Islands of Greece.
1812 – Napoleon Bonaparte’s army crosses Vilna River as Russian forces retreat.
1881 – Immigration Act of New Zealand restricts Japanese immigration.
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JUNE 28, 2014: 100TH ANNIVERSARY OF “WAR TO END ALL WARS”
AUSTRIA’S ARCHDUKE FERDINAND ASSASSINATED IN SARAJEVO
On June 28, 1914, St. Vitus Day, an event took place in Sarajevo, Bosnia, which shook the world to its core. Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie were shot to death by Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb nationalist, during an official visit 
to the Bosnian capital of Sarajevo. The killings sparked a chain of events that led to the outbreak of World War I by early August (see 100 Years Ago, 6-28-14).
The assassination of the Austrian Archduke Ferdinand unleashed the forces that led to World War I. It was called the Great War at the time. Others named it “a war to end all wars.
After more than four years of bloodshed in which over 39 million people died, the Great War ended on November 11, 1918, after Germany, the last of the Central Powers, surrendered to the Allies. At the peace conference near Paris in 1919, Allied leaders would state their desire to build a post-war world that was safe from future wars of such enormous scale.
June 28, 1919 – VERSAIILES TREATY SIGNED IN PARIS
The Versailles Treaty, signed on June 28, 1919 in the Hall of Mirrors, tragically failed to achieve this objective. U.S. President Woodrow Wilson’s grand dreams of an international peace-keeping organization faltered when put into practice as the League of Nations.
Even worse, the harsh terms imposed on Germany, the war’s biggest loser, led to widespread resentment of the treaty and its authors in that country – a resentment that would culminate in the outbreak of the Second World War two decades later. More than 55 million dead.
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1942 – British 8th Army in North Africa retreats from Germans to El Alamein; German forces launch counterattack against Soviets in Kharkov region.
1948 – Yugoslavia is expelled from Communist group Cominform for hostility to Soviet Union.
1950 – North Korean soldiers capture Seoul, as South Koreans retreat south of Han River.
1956 – Labor riots are put down in Poznan, Poland, with many casualties.
1976 – The Seychelles, an Indian Ocean island group, become independent after 102 years under British rule.
1988 – U.S. military attache to Greece is killed by powerful car bomb that blows his armor-plated car off road.
1989 – In Slobodan Milosevic’s shining moment, one million Serbs gather in Kosovo, Yugoslavia, to mark the 600th anniversary of their defeat by the Turks and cheer their nationalist leader.
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In the 101 years since June 28, 1914, over 160 million people who have died in more wars and more brutal ways mankind has ever experienced. Which would make the noble 1919 idea of a “war end all wars” a laughable notion, were it not so tragic.
TRUTH IN MEDIA: TRUTH TRUMPS POWER EVERY TIME! 
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