Partition: Macedonia's Best Lost Hope?
by Christopher Deliso
December 26, 2001

A WHITE CHRISTMAS – BUT WHAT ABOUT THE NEW YEAR?

Trapped indoors by the snowiest winter in a century, Macedonians now have ample time to speculate over what was and what might have been in 2001. While pundits can hypothesize, the citizens of Macedonia themselves have to live with the reality of the decisions that have been made for them, and the actions undertaken, mostly by large international bodies such as NATO and the OSCE, ineluctably present and accountable to no one. The fallout of almost a year of war has been especially harsh on the many displaced persons and refugees in Macedonia, a country that even without violence can count on annual wintertime hardships, due to a combination of poverty and geography. This Christmas, that lamentable reality has been worsened still by the effects of war.

GIVE 'EM AN INCH, AND THEY'LL TAKE A MILE – OR MAYBE NOT

Among the many solutions that have been forwarded regarding the future status of Macedonia, few have been so controversial as last June's proposal (by the Macedonian Academy of Sciences) for a swap of territory and population between Albanians and Macedonians. Back then, the idea that Macedonia could "lose one inch of territory" was extremely unpalatable to many Macedonians who believed, not unreasonably, that there might be a more amenable solution to the crisis. Yet despite Macedonian optimism, it was apparent even then that they would eventually be forced into some painful compromises – ones which would in the process eliminate room for bargaining.

And so it has come to pass. Macedonia has preserved its territorial integrity, though large areas remain off-limits to all non-Albanians. Macedonia has preserved its integrity as a state, though its constitution has been forcibly altered, against the will of the majority of citizens. And Macedonia has narrowly survived economic failure, though the reliance on Western-dominated lending institutions like the World Bank and IMF means that politically Macedonia does not really call the shots on its own turf.

Given this increasingly unfavorable situation for Macedonia, the once-scorned idea of partition is coming back to haunt those who originally deplored it out of pride. For now it seems that time is on the side of the Albanian "ethnic rebels" who are allegedly seeking to unite Western Macedonia with Albania. Even without military pressure, the high Albanian birthrate seems to guarantee that the Albanian population of Macedonia in general will eventually catch up with the Macedonian population – and so in addition to having the western part of the country (as partition would have allowed), they will be able to annex the whole lot. The inevitability of this result is probably what has kept the NLA from prosecuting an outright war to the finish. They are no doubt aware that, given time, their remaining demands will be met without too much effort.

PARTITION: THE GREEK PARALLEL

Had ethnic partition been accomplished, it would not have been for the first time in this part of the world. The Balkan wars and Greek-Turkish war bookended World War I, and remain a textbook study of how the winners divide the spoils. As is the case now, the "Great Powers" of Western Europe all had a hand in the machinations behind each antagonist's campaign. The modern-day boundaries of the South Balkans were all carved out between 1912-1922; Bulgaria, the big loser of the Balkan Wars, conceded to Greece lands in the regions of Macedonia and Thrace. And Greece, after a disastrous attack on the dying Ottoman Empire in 1922, lost its rights to the Anatolian city of Smyrna (Izmir) and, more importantly, to Constantinople (Istanbul) itself.

This particular Greek tragedy is most instructive to the current situation in Macedonia. Greece's military ambitions were at the time legitimized by the presence of a very large Greek community in Asia Minor, going back thousands of years and a last vestige of Byzantium. Gripped by the kind of grandiose, sweeping nationalism so popular at the time, the Greeks jumped at the chance to reclaim their "lost" territories in Anatolia – a military operation known as the megali idea, or "the big idea." They were mimicked by the Western powers, all of whom hovered over the wounded Ottoman beast like so many hungry buzzards, though unlike Greece, they had no historic or popular claim to Turkish soil.

HUBRIS, TRAGEDY, AND HOW A CAUSE WAS LOST

In the end, Greek hubris led to a total disaster that finalized their Turkish ambitions once and for all, because it destroyed the population base that had legitimized the movement in the first place. After taking Smyrna, the Greeks marched on Ankara, only to be repulsed by the Turks and driven back across the sea. In the process, thousands of Anatolian Greeks were slaughtered or expelled, and the physical traces of Greek civilization were destroyed. In the ensuing population exchanges, all of the Greeks in Turkey (with the exception of those in Istanbul) were forced to return to Greece, thus eliminating two very large minority groups (one on the Aegean coast, the other on the Pontic Black Sea coast near Trabzon). With no Greek civilians left to "liberate" in Turkey, no new invasion would ever be sustainable, even in theory.

Turkey, of course, was forced to repatriate its own civilians living in Greece (except for those in Thrace); yet these were proportionally much fewer than the number of Greeks who had been living in Turkey. The population exchanges of 1922, therefore, were of much greater benefit to Turkey, and facilitated Attaturk's homogenization of the country. By the 1950s, most of the Greeks left in Istanbul had been intimidated out of the country, while the Turkish minority in Thrace grew unhindered. The reality today, given Turkey's military superiority and great population advantage, is that the Turkish minority in Greece wins increasing concessions, while the few hundred old Greeks left in Istanbul exert negligible influence in a city founded by Greeks over 2,500 years ago.

APPLICATION OF SOME CONTRARY-TO-FACT HYPOTHESES

Applying this historical model to the Macedonian crisis, one gets a tentative picture of what might have been in 2001. Like the Ottoman Empire 80 years ago, Macedonia is a disorganized, weak state under attack from an expansionistic young power (the pan-Albanian movement) fighting for a dubiously nationalistic agenda. And, as in 1921, the Western powers (some things never change) are also hungrily eyeing the weaker state, because of its value as an economic crossroads and future site of the AMBO pipeline.

The only difference is that the Western governments proved more powerful this time around, in preventing the Macedonian army from achieving the kind of punishing victory that would have allowed Macedonia to negotiate on its own terms. But the Macedonians did not know things would turn out that way in the beginning; and so they rejected partition, which was thought to offer too many concessions to the Albanians.

Under the partition scheme, Macedonia would have lost the territories around Tetovo, but would also have gained other lands near Ochrid. The proposal also would have meant a 1922-style population exchange, requiring all Albanians in Macedonia to leave for these new territories – even those living in Skopje or elsewhere. For their part, Macedonians in the west of the country and in Albanian proper would also have been forced to repatriate. Yet since relatively few of the latter exist, the great advantage would have been on the Macedonian side.

Had this scheme been implemented, Macedonia might have been temporarily humiliated, but the rationale for any future Albanian claims would also have been eliminated. With Albanians no longer living on Macedonian soil, the NLA would hardly be able to claim to be defending the rights of a persecuted minority. Rather, the unprecedented and indisputable victory of winning territory for the "Greater Albania" would have immediately silenced any future Albanian demands. Yet whether out of pride or optimism, Macedonia decided to forfeit the war to win the battle – a most quixotic victory, in any case, because the only ones who had been vanquished were the assuredly nationalistic (but pragmatic) Macedonian advocates of partition.

IRONY, AGGRESSION, AND HOW A LOST CAUSE MAY PLAY OUT

The bitter irony of all this is that partition may indeed eventually occur – but not on Macedonia's terms. If the NLA – and its successor, the ANA – follows up last year's military successes next spring, it will be only a matter of time before some sort of Kosovo-style autonomy sets in for Albanian-dominated western Macedonia. Given that the West is too timid to face down the rebels, and continues to strong-arm Macedonia economically whenever that country tries to defend itself, the fulfillment of further Albanian demands is likely. But this time there will be no population exchange, no matching concession from the Albanians; rather, the loss of Tetovo and the west will be but a prelude to an increasingly aggressive nationalistic agenda that will capitalize on "saving" the Albanians in other regions of the country as well.

Of course, whether or not Macedonia could have achieved a favorable partition last Spring is completely speculative. Yet while the snow continues to fall into 2002, and while the rebels polish their guns in Kosovo, Albania and Switzerland, ordinary Macedonians will indeed have a lot to think about. It remains to be seen whether the skies, which have been so generous with snow, will be as abundant with new big ideas.