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February 22, 2001
How many buses, libraries and police officers must one bomb, burn or kill to be labeled a terrorist? How much aggression does it take to understand that a conquering army cannot be a neutral, or even friendly, peacekeeper? And how much idiocy are people willing to tolerate before they stand up and say "Enough!"?
Apparently, not quite enough.
Friday, February 17, 2001. A convoy of buses trudges down the road in northern Kosovo, the only one left open by the Albanian militants in the "demilitarized" zone just outside the occupied province. Escorted by two Swedish armored vehicles, it approaches the town of Podujevo [Poduyevo]. Suddenly, a spot on the road that the Swedish vehicle had just passed explodes, ripping through a bus full of Serb refugees. The bus is left a charred wreck. Not so long afterwards, another convoy – this time near Strpce – suffers the same fate.
The death toll from two bombing attacks that day was 11, and could still rise as many of the injured teeter on the brink of death.
Three days earlier, when an Arab bus driver killed eight Israelis at a bus stop near Tel Aviv, the Washington Post ran the story on the front page. News of the premeditated murder of a dozen Serbs merited Page 21 in the Saturday paper. Even then, no assumptions were made about the attackers’ identity. The attacks were blamed on carefully planted bombs. The reporters did not even try to guess who placed and detonated the bombs. Of course, some officials had their "suspicions," but the Post never once mentioned Albanians and the attack in the same sentence. What it did do, however, was to pepper the article with references to "the death of an estimated 10,000 ethnic Albanians, mostly civilians, at the hands of Serb-led security forces." While working very hard to divest Albanians of any responsibility for terrorist acts so brazenly committed, they were making sure to level unproven murder accusations at their victims.
Britain’s Guardian made sure to mention that – though again ignoring them as possible culprits – the Albanians suffered Serb "repression for some 10 years," hastening to add that their demands for independence were dismissed by international officials, "seeking to reestablish a multiethnic Kosovo."
USA Today also carried the story, never mentioning that the perpetrators might have been Albanian – but making sure to suggest that they were merely "getting even."
A report from Agence France-Presse quoted Jay Carter, UN deputy administrator in Pristina, who said that the "Serbs understand they cannot fall into the trap of Kosovo Albanian extremists, which is designed to ethnically cleanse the region of Serbs." [emphasis added] Though the harshest condemnation of Albanian "extremists" so far, the quote was relegated to the very bottom of the story, usually reserved for enlightening but irrelevant background facts – and even then, accompanied by editorial guidance: "following the Serb expulsion of 800,000 Kosovo Albanians," as the Serbs "tried to purge the region of Albanians."
So there you have it: Serbs killed and expelled Albanians; now a few extremists among the Albanians might be engaging in justified revenge; even so, there is no connection between any Albanians and these attacks; Serbs "were killed" [note passive] by an inanimate object, the identity of whose operator is so irrelevant it does not even merit speculation; the truly deplorable thing is the "escalation of violence." All in all, a normal – if slightly upsetting – day on the Eastern Front.
The bombing of buses was also interpreted as a message to KFOR and NATO not to interfere with Albanian goals. After it "freed [the Albanians] from the terror of Serbian ethnic-cleansing by an 11-week air war, " NATO is now a potential target for the "violent few" who are ready to "squander the commodity" of having the Alliance win their wars.
Duly noted and emphasized were reactions from "Kosovo Albanian Leaders," who feared "the attack could inflict a lasting damage to the province’s image" as it suffered to rebuild from "Belgrade’s expulsion of 800,000 Albanians"…
Sounds familiar? Just so the people do not forget who the real victims are here – anyone but the charred corpses of Serbs in the bombed buses.
Given the reaction by NATO and its media, the message was received and duly noted.
NATO countries officially responded with strong verbal condemnations. The US State Department, in a written statement by its spokesman, called on "all parties in Kosovo to remain calm," and avoid "violent acts of reprisal." As for the attack itself, that "heinous crime must not be allowed to undermine the very purpose of the U.N. mission and NATO-led peacekeepers, to bring peace and stability to all the people of the region."
And since the Albanians are peace-loving allies of the stability-seeking United States… well, you get the point.
The night before the Serbs would be blown to smithereens, Kosovo’s former occupation governor Bernard Kouchner told CNN that NATO should continue to "maintain our position, backing the Kosovar Albanians because they were, they’re still the victims." [Emphasis added] He also said that the issue of Kosovo’s independence might be resolved in about "20 or 30 years." Given the long rap sheet of murders and assaults ("unsolved," of course), wiping out the Serbs and all other non-Albanians in Kosovo will have long since been accomplished by then.
British General Fry, who earlier described the attacks as "premeditated acts of mass murder," said for the BBC on Monday that KFOR was trying to "take something that was an utterly failed state and to try and establish it as a pluralistic, liberal democracy in the 21st century." But Kosovo never was a state (and hence never a "failed" one), while KFOR certainly never said it aimed to create a "pluralistic, liberal democracy." Yet to General Fry, expulsions, murders, arson and terror-bombing – in addition to gunrunning, blood vengeance, drug-smuggling, slavery and prostitution rampant throughout the occupied province under its new management – are apparently signs of progress in a liberal democracy.
Attacks on Serbs inside Kosovo were quickly followed by renewed attacks by the Albanian bandits in southern Serbia. Three Serb policemen were killed when their car hit a mine in the middle of the road Sunday. But the Albanian militants quickly sent Reuters their own explanation: the Serbs hit their own mine, and the "UCPMB" had absolutely nothing to do with the attacks in Kosovo – which "hurt the peace process" in territories they control.
After repeatedly claiming that what happens in the bandit-occupied buffer zone is out of their reach, NATO was quick to send three officers into the zone to investigate the firefight in which Serb security forces killed one bandit commander. Greeted and shown around by the local warlord Shefket Musliu, NATO officers listened as the militants complained about the fact that the Serbs refused to stand still and be shot at.
NATO is likely to take this complaint very seriously. After all, Britain’s official media have publicized a confession by a NATO diplomat that the Alliance is in fact training the militants. This might also explain why NATO HQ in Brussels reacted with lightning speed to the Yugoslav government’s mention of possible anti-terrorist actions – warning Yugoslavia not to even think about it.
Meanwhile, Serbia’s top cop Zoran Zivkovic – quoted by the daily Glas Javnosti – said that the "well-intentioned" KFOR let the separatists into the buffer zone, and seemed very angry that the police had not reacted to the incursion. He claims Milosevic held back the police and allowed the insurgency "in order to hurt the new government." Unless Glas somehow got it wrong, Zivkovic assumes the good intentions of NATO-dominated KFOR, and the treachery of Milosevic. But isn’t that what NATO has been saying for years? All that aside, one question still begs to be asked: why is restraint criminal when practiced by Milosevic, but a stroke of genius when practiced by Zivkovic and his boss, Prime Minister Djindjic?
The behavior of Serbia’s new government is manifesting clear symptoms of unbridled stupidity. Despite the history of KFOR’s inaction, the avalanche of rationalizations in the Western press and the inescapable fact that NATO did, after all, attack Yugoslavia in 1999 in gross violation of every international law – they are still criticizing KFOR and NATO, not for occupying a part of their territory and allowing the armed insurrection in another, but for "failing to stop the escalation of violence."
Whether naïve, ignorant or willingly masochistic, such statements can hardly produce anything more than derision and disdain among the NATO leaders. Serbia’s unwillingness to protest the violation of its rights – indeed, the plea to stop this violation to the very people whose transgressions far surpass it and are largely responsible for it to begin with – what greater sign of pathetic impotence can there be?
That NATO fully understands this is testified to by the response of its leader, George Robertson, who "condemned the escalation of violence" and called for "maximum restraint on both sides." Urging negotiations, Robertson said Sunday that "problems of the region cannot be solved by violence." Why, then, did he so enthusiastically pursue the 78-day war against Serbia just two years ago?
What may be the most important clue in this entire puzzle cannot be found in Kosovo or its bandit-infested border, however. That clue indicates that Washington is less than sincere about its "support" to the current Yugoslav government, and has other plans for the region…
It’s been noted on numerous occasions that Montenegro’s president Djukanovic has accelerated and hardened his demands for secession after the ouster of Slobodan Milosevic, as well as that Djukanovic’s state coffers are filled on a regular basis with funds from the United States. When Djukanovic was not received by Secretary of State Colin Powell two weeks ago, this was interpreted as a sign that he and his policy are out of favor in Washington.
Yet if Djukanovic is out of favor, how come that the money keeps coming? How come that he is pressing on with the independence referendum and a general election? This does not look like the behavior of someone who has been told by his political masters to shut up and stuff it. After all, does a plan not supported by the US government get a sizable space for an op-ed pitch in Saturday’s Washington Post?
But more of this in a separate column, later.
Of course, it could be that Djukanovic really wants independence, and that all of his reasons are perfectly valid. It could be that the "UCPMB" is really fighting for the rights of oppressed Albanians in southern Serbia, and that its parent, the "UCK", has fully demilitarized and is ready to fully comply with the plans of KFOR and UNMIK, which includes giving up the goal of Kosovo’s independence. It could be that NATO is really doing its best to create peace, stability and prosperity in the region, and honestly regrets having to use tanks, depleted uranium bombs and cruise missiles in the pursuit of its humanitarian motives. But given the preponderance of evidence that proves all of the above to be total and complete hogwash, it really takes a leap of faith to buy into any of it.
Not that that’s stopping many people, mind you.
Despite all the claims to the contrary, it is now clear that the United States has not changed its Balkans policy. Certainly, the rhetoric may have been modified to better exploit recent developments, but when one gets to the bottom of things, there are good, solid reasons to keep thousands of well-armed American troops in a major military base in the region, supporting Albanian separatism and continuing the hostility against the Serbs. Britain’s Guardian – though quick to act as NATO’s apologist when called upon, nevertheless unearthed what might prove to be NATO’s real motive for Balkans conquest. And it has very little to do with whomever sits in power in Belgrade…
Not realizing this – or not wanting to – most of the current Belgrade leadership seems to pursue the policy of appeasing its enemies and talking tough to the domestic public. Well, old dogs can’t really learn new tricks. Such a policy has achieved remarkable results before, in the form of 1992’s Vance Plan, 1993’s Vance-Owen plan, 1994’s Contact Group Plan, 1995’s Dayton Agreement, restraint during the bombing of Republika Srpska and Operation Storm in 1995, and the Holbrooke agreement of 1998. All these times, restraint and cooperation were trademarks of… well, Slobodan Milosevic. And it would probably not be too far-fetched to claim that this history of submission and restraint nurtured the belief of NATO commanders that Milosevic would either sign the 1999 Rambouillet ultimatum, or cave in after a few days of bombing.
To paraphrase Santayana, those who do not understand history are doomed to suffer through it again – only this time, it may leave no one behind to perpetuate the curse.
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