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It passed ten years of the last stage of dismemberment of ex-Yugoslavia – the Kosovo War (1998-1999) and NATO intervention (March 24th – June 10th, 1999)

Владислав Б. Сотировић, 13.02.2010

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against Serbia and Montenegro. In this context, we can say that at the end of the 20th century the fate of ex-Yugoslavia was being determined by several international organizations but not decisively by the Yugoslavs.

NATO military intervention against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) in March-June of 1999 (led by the US) marked crucial step toward finishing the process of creation of the global „Pax Americana“ in the form of NATO’s World Order (NWO). As NATO used force against  Yugoslavia without UN Security Council sanctions and without official proclamation of the war we can call this military intervention in fact as pure „agression“ against one sovereign state. In the Balkans NATO acquired not only big military experience and an opportunity to exhaust old and use new weapons but also managed to enhance its activities, making its way to a global organization.

Ten years have passed since the NATO intervention/aggression against a sovereign European state. The crucial questions are:

1) What goals did NATO pursue?

2) Whether it managed to cope with its tasks in the following (10) years?

3)  What did these years bring to those who threw bombs and those who were attacked?

It has to be made clear that NATO did not achieve a military victory as they failed to destroy the army of Yugoslavia and tame the soldiers’ morale. However, they got the right political atmosphere for destroying Serbia (purposly not so much Montenegro) and for imposing their conditions on the Serbian government, including the rules of cooperation with the EU, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (in the Hague) and with the NATO. After the 1999 Serbia lost almost all opportunities to control its sovereignty and national security.  After long years of injustice and punishment the Serbs lost the will to fight, to resist as they were practically alone when tried to repel the attack of the powerful Western military alliance. So, after June 1999 it became easier for NATO to continue destruction of Yugoslavia and carry out power shifts.

In 2000 Slobodan Milosevic, who had been ruling the country for ten years, was ousted. At first sight, the move came as unexpected, easy and legal, in the other words – Yugoslavia’s home affair. However, the „Revolution of Fifth October“ 2000 in Belgrade, in fact, had been very thoroughly prepared by special divisions („Otpor“ or „Resistance“) sponsored by the West. The method proved to be so successful that, according to one French documentary movie based on the testimonies by members of Serbian“Otpor“, it was later used in Georgia („Rose Revolution“ in November 2003) and Ukraine („Orange Revolution“ from late November 2004 to January 2005) but failed in Moldova and Iran in 2009. The same source claims that the Georgian opposition were taught in Serbia, while their Ukrainian colleagues of „Orange Revolution“ were drilled also in Serbia and in Georgia.

From the time of the end of the Cold War (1989) Serbia remained as a symbol of independence and disobedience to the NATO World Order. However, the new authorities in Serbia after October 2000 obeyed to the NATO World Order and everything went smoothly. The dismemberment of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia started when having arrived in Belgrade in February 2003, Javier Solana, a top EU representative and official, suggested to a group of officials from Serbia and Montenegro to admit that the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia ceased to exist, and adopt the Constitution charter, written in Brussels. Its text was proclaiming, for the beginning, the appearance of a new country. Solana did not face any resistance.  Consequently, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was renamed to the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro, and officially abolished the name “Yugoslavia“ that was in official use from 1929. In 2006 Montenegro and  Serbia declared independence, thereby ending the common South Slavic state (only Bulgarians have been out from this state as the South Slavs) established in 1918 under the original name of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (this name was used till 1929). And it was Javier Solana who did it regardless the fact that he up today remains a war criminal for majority of the Serbs as he bombed their country in 1999 as the General Secretary of NATO killing 3.500 citizens of Serbia including and children and women with a material damage to the country arround 200.000 billion of the US dollars.

After 2000 it was easier to implement the NATO plans which seemed simply fantastic under Slobodan Milosevic. Yugoslavia was undermined, its integration slowed down, its strength exhausted. What NATO, USA and EU failed to achieve in Ramboia (in France) in 1998 (during the ultimatum-negotiations with Milosevic on Kosovo) and through 78 days of cruel bombings in 1999, they got on July 18th, 2005, when Serbia and Montenegro signed a deal with NATO „On Lines of Communication“. This is a technical agreement which allows NATO personnel and equipment to transit through the country. Under the deal, the NATO could enjoy such opportunities for quite a long time- „until all peacekeeping operation in the Balkans are over“. Thus NATO was given the green light to enlarge its presence in the region and control the army of both Serbia and Montenegro.  On April 1st, 2009 Albania and Croatia have completed the accession process, and have joined the NATO as full members and a such a way surrounding Serbia and Montenegro by NATO members from all sides except from Bosnian. Today the Balkans are NATO’s permanent base. For instance, in October 2008 Serbia’s Defense Minister and NATO officials signed a deal on information security, which allows the NATO control everyone who deals with their documents or just cooperates with them. For the very reason NATO insisted on secrecy of the negotiations with Serbs.

The aftermath of the 1999 aggression for NATO was the most favorable. Nobody condemned NATO and they felt even more confident. In recent years the world has witnessed NATO making several attempts of expansion. Currently NATO military bloc is occupying its position on the Balkans, using old and building new military camps.  The level of regional security on the Balkans is lowering. Huge NATO military camp „Bondsteel“ in Kosovo is being illegally operated in this region. In the center of Macedonian capital Skopje the USA is going to build an embassy, but its architecture is more likely to resemble a military base or a CIA office like in Vilnius, Lithuania (a bunker-building).

The most disapointed fact in post-war Kosovo reality is an ethnic and cultural cleansing of all non-Albanians and not-Albanian cultural heratage. The proofs are evident and visible on every corner of Kosovo territory. For instance, on the arrival of KFOR (international but in fact NATO „Kosovo Forces“) and UNMIK („United Nations Mission in Kosovo“) to Kosovo in 1999, all the names of the towns and streets in Kosovo were renamed to have (Muslim) Albanian names. The monuments to Serbian heroes like the monument  devoted to duke Lazar (who led Serbian Christian army during the Kosovo Battle on June 28th, 1389 against the Muslim Turks) in Gnjilane, were demolished.
Serbs are getting killed, assassinated, wounded and abducted, their houses burned to the ground. The most infamous ethnic cleansing was done between March 17th and 19th 2004 – „The March Pogrom“, which resulted in the loss of several dozens of lives, several hundreds of wounded (including and the members of KFOR), more than 4.000 exiled Serbs, more than 800 Serbian houses set on fire and 35 destroyed or severely damaged Serbian Orthodox Christian churches and cultural monuments. For those readers who does not have time or financial support to visit Kosovo in order to check those evidences we recommend to visit free of charge You Tube web page searching the videos under the tags „Albanian terror“ and/or „Stolen Kosovo“ (the last one is the Czech documentary movie made in 2008 but originally banned by the Czech authorities to be shown in the Czech Republic that was a reason why the authors put it on the You Tube).

As of today, the number of Serbs that were killed or went missing in Kosovo after KFOR arrived, is measured in thousands, the number of demolished Orthodox churches and monasteries is measured in hundreds, and the number of burned down Serbian houses in tens of thousands. Even though KFOR had as much as 50.000 soldiers in the beginning as well as several thousand of policemen and civilian mission members, none of the above mentioned crimes have been solved.
Murdering a Serb in Kosovo is not considered as a crime, on a contrary, the murderers of children and the elderly are being rewarded as heroes. The province is almost ethnically cleaned as around 250.000 ethnic Serbs left the territory of Kosovo. For the matter-of-fact, according to the last pre-war oficial Yugoslav census of 1991 there were 13% of non-Albanians in Kosovo. However, it is estimated that today 97% of Kosovo population is only Albanian. In the light of the main goal – the establishment of another Albanian state in the Balkans and Europe, as the first step towards pan-Albanian state unification – we can „understand“ why it is important to destroy any Serbian trace in the „territory defined by the aspirations“.

On February 17th, 2008 Kosovo Albanians received Washington’s permission to proclaim its formal independence what happened later than expected by Russia and China. At the UN Security Council Moscow said „no“ to Kosovo’s independence as Russia respects interests of Serbia and officially condemns all attempts to impose decisions on other members of the international community by breaking the international law (in Kosovo case it is the UN Resolution 1244). The fact is that the Serbs have not forgotten Kosovo, but have not done much about it either. Now there are 65 states that recognize Kosovo independence, including 22 EU and 24 NATO members (out of 192 UNO members). Almost all of them are the neighbours of Serbia and with the exception of Bosnia and Herzegovina all the ex-Yugoslav republics have recognized Kosovo. Bosnia and Herzegovina did not regognize it for the very reason: the Republic of Srbska, as autonomous political unit of Bosnia and Herzegovina alongside the Muslim-Croat Federation according to the Dayton Peace Agreement of 1995, has the veto right. At the moment, in Kosovo there is the EULEX (European civil mission) and the Kosovo issue is gradually being moved out of UNO jurisdiction and out of reach of the Russian veto in the UN Security Council. There is and the so-called „Kosovo Security Force“ (in fact redressed members of the Kosovo Liberation Army), which is formed according to Martti Ahtisaari’s plan with active support from the NATO.

An active US President Barrack Obama congratulated at the very beginnig of his presidential mandate the leaders of „multiethnic, independent and democratic Kosovo“ regardless to the facts that those leaders (especially Hashim Tachi – the „Snake“ and Ramush Haradinay) are proved to be notorious war criminals, that the region is not either multicultural, nor really independent and particularilly not democratic. However, there are several official EU declarations and unofficial political statements encouraging Belgrade and Prishtina to cooperate and „develope neighborly relations“ what practically means for Serbia that Belgrade has firstlly to recognize Kosovo independence in order to become the EU member state. The another fact is that the process of recognizing Kosovo independence is much slower that Prishtina and Washington expected at the beginning. From the time of Kosovo self-proclamation of independence Serbia’s greatist diplomatic „success“ is the majority of votes in 2008 of the UNO General Assembly supporting the decesion that the case of Kosovo independence should be considered by the International Court of Justice in the Hague (established in 1899). The Kosovo reality on the other side is that there is not a single Albanian party at the deeply divided Kosovo political scene which would be ready to accept „peaceful reintegration“ into Serbian political sphere and there is no Albanian politician who is not concerned about the danger posed by the „division of Kosovo“ (Albanian part and Serbian part) and does not oppose slightest suggestions of Serbian autonomy for the northern portion of Kosovo. But, what is more important: Kosovo Albanian leaders and even citizens of Albanian ethnic origin do not even consider national dilema „Europe or independence!“ There is no doubt what their answer is going to be in that case. On the other side, what is going on about Serbia? The answer is that a nation unable to make a choice between territorial integrity on the one side, and membership in an international association (although an important one) on the other, i.e. a nation who cannot choose between these two „priorities“ really deserves to lose both.

At the end, if the international law and fixed order are broken on the one side of the globe (ex. Kosovo, Afganistan, Iraq) it is nothing strange to expect that the same law and order are going to be broken somewhere else (ex. at the Causassus) following the logic of the so-called „domino efect“ reaction in the international relations. Finally, it has to be noted that if Albanian extremism is not stopped, Macedonia and Montenegro will have to give parts of their territories populated by Albanians (Western Macedonia and Eastern Montenegro). In this case, Europe will have to decide how to discuss the issue of borders’ revision and how to recognize a new enlarged state of (the Greater) Albania.

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Владислав Б. Сотировић

Оснивач и уредник онлајн магазина

Serbian Patriotic Front

http://srbskipatriotskifront.webs.com