Kosova Crisis Center
link to alb-net
By Genc Kortsha (Illyria, 4/5/1999)
When the U.S. involvement in Vietnam was nearing its peak, President Johnson said that once North Vietnam realized that the United States meant business, its emissaries would agree to seek a diplomatic solution to the conflict. He based his reasoning on three premises. One, he was increasing American ground troops to 500,000. Two, the U.S. had assured Hanoi that American forces would not invade North Vietnam. And three, the U.S. would not strive to topple the Communist regime in the North. In his mind, there was thus no reason for Hanoi to continue the war. History proved him wrong and the United States suffered its first military defeat. Not against a superpower like the Soviet Union or the People's Republic of China, but against North Vietnam, a third-rate nation, simply because President Johnson assumed that the enemy would see things his way. It was this miscalculation that brought about military defeat, that introduced drugs to this country on a large scale, and -- through civil discord and dissonance -- almost tore the nation asunder. Today, the country is struggling to understand another conflict --the war in Kosova. NATO bombers are blasting Yugoslavia around the clock as U.S. television networks show pictures at length and in great detail. Film clips of the forced Kosovar exodus are heart-rending and speak for themselves. But the networks are finding it more difficult to give viewers an adequate explanation of the conflict's background. Both CNN's Judy Woodruff and ABC's Peter Jennings have broadcast the Serbian side of the story, namely, that Kosova is the cradle of Serbia and the Serbian Orthodox Church, that the Albanians are newcomers to the area, and that this is a struggle between Christians and Moslems. For the sake of fairness, the networks should also have given their viewers the Albanian side of the story. According to many historians, including the 1999 edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica, the Illyrians, the forebears of today's ethnic Albanians, have inhabited the Balkans from about the 10th century B.C. onward. The Slavs, on the other hand, started their incursions into the peninsula in the 7th century A.D., many centuries later. The first Serbian state was that of Vlastimir founded in 850. So much for Kosova being the cradle of Serbia! Another myth, clung to and vehemently endorsed by the Serbian Orthodox Church, is that of Kosova also being the cradle of the Serbian Orthodox Church. In fact, the Christian faith in the Balkans goes back to St. Paul in the first century A.D. By the year 600, the Balkans, Central and Southern Europe, England and Ireland, Spain and Portugal, and parts of North Africa had been Christianized. The Turks did not bring the Moslem religion into the Balkans till they asserted their military and political supremacy in the 14th century. Thus, many Serb Orthodox shrines in Kosova came into being as Christian churches well before the arrival of the Slavic tribes and were simply adopted and adapted by the invaders. This is another truth that belies the many statements to the contrary coming out of Belgrade. Finally, Serbs link their historical roots to the Battle of Kosova in 1389. In fact, the allied Christian forces facing the Turks consisted not just of Serbs but also of Hungarians, Bulgarians, Romanians, Poles, and, yes, Albanians. The latter fought under Gjergj Ballsha of Shkoder and Theodore Korona Muzaka of Berat. The bloody defeat of the Christian forces opened the gates to Turkish penetration into the Balkans under Sultan Bayazet. Thus, it is false that the Serbs fought this battle alone and that the Albanians fought on the side of the Turks. Generations of Serbs have been fed this self-serving version of history and are utterly convinced of the correctness and justice of their cause. Indeed, the argument that Kosova is the historical cradle of Serbia is the one argument all Serbs, from Princess Elizabeth Karageorgevic to President Milosevic and everyone in between, hold in common. From a historical viewpoint, however, this theory is a sham. There is another flaw in some of our networks' explanation of the conflict in Kosova. According to this version, the clash in Kosova is between Orthodox Serbs and Albanian Moslems. A similar argument was offered as an explanation of the war in Bosnia and was as wrong then as it is now. As a matter of principle, how could a Christian church condone and even take pride in the slaughter of innocents, be they Moslem or of any other persuasion? And second, Milosevic clawed his way into power as a faithful Marxist atheist. As such, why would he favor one "opiate of the people" over another? Anyone who has seen Zivadin Jovanovic, Yugoslavia's foreign minister, on TV, or "Arkan," Serbia's nemesis of the helpless, has clearly observed the difficult time both have had trying to justify Serbia's executions and mass expulsions of Kosovar men, women, and children. To say that Albanians are leaving to avoid NATO bombings is pure fiction. Hundreds of thousands of Albanians had sought refuge in the mountains months before the NATO bombings. How many Serbs shared their fate? Today's mass exodus reveals callous planning on the part of the Serb authorities. Men are being killed. Others are forced to serve as human shields in ammunition plants and other military objectives. A few men, but mostly women, and children, including the sick and the aged, are being forced out of the country as their homes and villages are looted and put to the torch. If the Albanian exodus were prompted by NATO bombings, why are the Serbs destroying archives and repositories of official documents and depriving refugees of ID documents and passports? There can be only one reason: namely, to turn the ethnic Albanians into non-persons should they ever try to re-enter Kosova.
Individual clerics in the West have spoken against NATO bombings during the holy season of Easter and Passover. We would expect them also to raise their voices against the persecutions, killings and mass expulsions of ethnic Albanians by the Serbs. Otherwise, their protests will ring both hollow and partisan. The United States and the NATO allies are fighting Milosevic under a self-imposed handicap, namely, that no ground troops will enter Kosova except as a peacekeeping force once the conflict has been settled. During the war in Vietnam, U.S. ground forces would foray into enemy territory only to return to their bases once the mission was completed. Someone compared this strategy to sea battles where enemy navies clash and then return home without the winner claiming the battlefield. Today NATO bombers strike deep into Serbian territory only to clear the skies and return home while the killings and the exodus in Kosova continue unabated. There can be no doubt that nothing short of a military occupation will keep Arkan and his "Tigers" from continuing their murderous work. So far, NATO air attacks on behalf of the helpless Kosovars have been unable to prevent ethnic cleansing. Furthermore, the lack of visible success against Serbian forces on the ground is threatening NATO credibility as a cohesive and effective military force. President Clinton and his advisers maintain that they and their NATO allies will stay the course until Milosevic has suffered severe losses and has no longer a credible military force at his command. According to this scenario, having brought Milosevic to his knees, NATO peacekeepers will enter Kosova and enforce the Rambouillet agreement. Many observers, including Mssrs. Kissinger and Brzezinski, hold that the Rambouillet formula is no longer viable. Can one, in all seriousness, expect Milosevic to treat the Kosovars with the respect and fairness they would be entitled to as citizens of Yugoslavia? Hasn't Milosevic spread the seeds of ethnic hatred to the point of no return? Can anyone in fairness ask the Kosovars to return under Serbian rule? Can the Kosovars trust their Serbian neighbors, those same neighbors who looted Albanian homes and then set them afire? Can anyone in his right mind expect the Kosovars to forgive and forget? I don't know whether one could ask this much of saints in Heaven. Today's rapidly changing events make long-range planning difficult. Certain conditions, however, can be anticipated and planned for. At the end of the conflict, ethnic Albanians will want to return home. They will need new papers and financial assistance on a large scale. What is more important, they will need to feel safe and secure, under a system of justice and international protection. Eventually, they must be free to choose their future at the ballot box. None of the above can be expected to come about until and unless those who caused such human misery, from one end of Yugoslavia to the other, are brought to justice. In the case of individual law breakers, such treatment is standard procedure. Can it be otherwise for mass murderers and criminals on a grand scale?
The writer is an Albanian-American analyst in Michigan and honorary member of Illyria.
BLURB Big-name broadcasters believe Belgrade's legends