Kosovo, with its primarily Moslem population, has been of unique
importance to the United States. Proving to the Islamic world that
America would fight for the rights of a Moslem-dominated community
in Europe has become one of the few foreign policy initiatives
shared by the Clinton and Bush administrations.
Of course it wasn’t always such an easy transition. Clinton’s
adventure in Balkan politics, and subsequent commitment of NATO air
and ground forces in 1999, initially was condemned by many leaders
of the conservative wing of the Republican Party. The Russians,
however, helped shift conservative thinking.
Moscow’s adamant defense of its Orthodox Slav cousins and the
Serbian sovereignty argument of Slobodan Milosevic smelled too much
of a revival of earlier communist alignments. This became even more
clear when the Russian army units supposedly under UN command
actually acted to block British and American forces seeking to
secure key positions.
By the time George W. Bush settled into office, Secretary of
State Colin Powell and National Security Advisor Condi Rice had
decided that with a minimum commitment of American ground forces
and consequent little danger to American life and limb,
considerable political propaganda use could be made of the U.S.
effort to protect a majority Moslem homeland. The only trouble has
been that al Qaeda, Afghanistan and Iraq came along and the
American/EU/NATO/UN good works toward Moslems in Kosovo were
essentially ignored by the Islamic world.
At this point, both Kosovars and Serbs are in agreement that
they still hate each other. It has been said that virtually all
Serbia believes Kosovo must remain Serb — even though most of the
rest of the world disagrees. Generously, Serbia’s Foreign Office
has indicated that Belgrade would not be making efforts to
destabilize Kosovo “by physical, military or security means.” It
will only use legal means, it said, to prevent a unilateral
declaration of independence. This has satisfied no one.
The fact is that Kosovo’s leadership has made clear that it
intends to establish UDI by December 10 if the negotiations next
planned for September 18 do not produce agreement. This has sent
the EU into a frenzy of activity with suggestions that such action
would precipitate a return to the bloody warfare of the '90s.
Facts don’t seem to matter too much in the Balkans where
hundreds of years of imperial exploitation, foreign invasion, and
bloody conflict are the historical norm. The approximate 2.1
million population of Kosovo is made up now of nearly 90% ethnic
Albanians, virtually all of whom are Moslem.
This province ekes out an existence with 40-50% unemployed
living through subsistence farming and cross border smuggling.
Forty-five percent of its revenue is made up of remittances from
abroad and UN in-country programs. Kosovo has a marginal
agriculture and a very small basic manufacturing capability,
although its construction industry thrives on exporting both
products and workers to neighboring Balkan states. Other than some
local coal mining, its mineral deposits are largely undeveloped.
Serbia, nonetheless, is determined to hang on to this impoverished
province. Tradition is a powerful motivation in that part of the
world.
There have been various proposals for the partition of Serbia
that would spin off the portion south of the Ibar River as a new
Kosovo. The problem is that United Nations Resolution 1244 itself
states Kosovo is a Serbian province. While such details might seem
to be able to be worked out by some delicate UN negotiation, the
acceptance of the concept of partition might reopen a vast
number of historical ethnic border conflicts throughout the
multiple nations of former Yugoslavia.
The Russians have recently reiterated their firm stance in
support of their Serb cousins. Putin’s very modern ambitions do not
dissuade him from using the oldest of pseudo-legitimate ethnic
identities to buttress his foreign political actions. The Serbs, in
turn, while happy to have Russian support for their point of view,
are ultimately most interested in keeping clean their EU copybook
in hopes of eventual full membership in that union.
Meanwhile Washington appears to have downgraded the political
importance of aiding Kosovo for Islamic political propaganda
purposes. It’s not so much a matter of losing interest as it is a
willingness to turn the sticky problem of Kosovo over to the UN and
European Union. The Bush Administration is basically sitting with
its fingers crossed hoping the United Nations’ special envoy,
Martti Ahtisaari, will be able to devise a plan that satisfies both
Belgrade and Pristina sometime before the December 10 deadline.
No one wants any more trouble around the Kosovo corner — except
the bad guys.
