American Council for Kosovo - Growing International Opposition to Imposed Solution

Kosovo and the myth of liberal intervention

'The United States of America and the Kosovo Liberation Army stand for the same human values and principles ... Fighting for the KLA is fighting for human rights and American values." So declared the neocon US senator (and current foe of WikiLeaks) Joseph Lieberman back in 1999 at the height of the US-led military intervention against Slobodan Milo�evic's Yugoslavia.

It would be interesting to hear what Senator Lieberman makes of the report of the Council of Europe � Europe's premier human rights watchdog � on his favourite band of freedom fighters. The report, which cites FBI and other intelligence sources, details horrific rights abuses it claims have been carried out by the KLA, the west's allies in the war against Yugoslavia 11 years ago.

The council claims that civilians � Serbian and non-KLA-supporting Kosovan Albanians detained by the KLA in the 1999 hostilities � were shot in northern Albania and their kidneys extracted and sold on the black market. It names Hashim Tha�i, the former leader of the KLA and Kosovo's prime minister, as the boss of a "mafia-like" group engaged in criminal activity � including heroin trading � since before the 1999 war. The report is a damning indictment not only of the KLA but also of western policy. And it also gives lie to the fiction that Nato's war with Yugoslavia was, in Tony Blair's words, "a battle between good and evil; between civilisation and barbarity; between democracy and dictatorship".

It was a fiction many on the liberal left bought into. In 1999 Blair was seen not as a duplicitous warmonger in hock to the US but as an ethical leader taking a stand against ethnic cleansing. But if the west had wanted to act morally in the Balkans and to protect the people in Kosovo there were solutions other than war with the Serbs, and options other than backing the KLA � the most violent group in Kosovan politics. They could have backed genuine multi-party negotiations, or offered to lift sanctions on Belgrade if a peaceful solution to the problem of Kosovo could be found.

Instead, a virulently anti-Serb stance led the west into taking ever more extreme positions, and siding with an organisation which even Robert Gelbard, President Clinton's special envoy to Kosovo, described as "without any question, a terrorist group". In 2000 the Sunday Times revealed that, prior to the Nato bombing, US agents had been training the KLA. Shaban Shala, a KLA commander, claimed he had met British and US agents in north Albania in 1996.

It was the KLA's campaign of violence against Yugoslav state officials, Serbian and Kosovan civilians in 1998, which led to an escalation of the conflict with the government in Belgrade, with atrocities committed on both sides. We were told the outbreak of war in March 1999 with Nato was the Serbian government's fault, yet Lord Gilbert, the UK defence minister, admitted "the terms put to Milo�evic at Rambouillet [the international conference preceding the war] were absolutely intolerable � it was quite deliberate".

The subsequent 78-day "humanitarian" bombardment of federal Yugoslavia massively intensified the ethnic cleansing of Kosovan Albanians by Yugoslav forces. Between 2,000 and 10,000 Kosovan Albanians were killed by these forces, with between 500 and 1,500 people killed by the Nato bombing.

But even after Russian pressure forced a Yugoslav withdrawal from Kosovo, ethnic cleansing and rights abuses in the region continued. Under the Nato occupation an estimated 200,000 ethnic Serbs, Roma and other minorities from south Kosovo, and almost the whole Serb population of Pristina, have been forced from their homes.

A report on Kosovo by Minority Rights Group International claimed: "Nowhere [in Europe] is there such a level of fear for so many minorities that they will be harassed or attacked, simply for who they are." And in October 2010, a report by Human Rights Watch stated that "Roma and related minority groups deported from western Europe to Kosovo face discrimination and severe deprivation amounting to human rights abuse". As for democratic advances, Sunday's elections in Kosovo, boycotted by the Serbian minority, have seen widespread allegations of fraud, with a turnout of 149% reported in one area.

Far from being Tony Blair's "good war", Nato's assault on Yugoslavia was in its own way as immoral as the assault on Iraq. But as the Iraq war has become discredited, so it is even more important for the supporters of "liberal interventionism" to promote the line that Kosovo was in some way a success. The Council of Europe's report on the KLA's crimes makes that position much harder to maintain. And if it plays its part in making people more sceptical about any future western "liberal interventions", it is to be warmly welcomed.

THE COURT PRESIDENT�S DREAM

Introduction

On July 22, 2010, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) delievered its long-awated opinion on the proposition referred by the U.N. General Assembly: ". . . the declaration of [Kosovo's] independence of the 17th of February 2008 did not violate general international law." By a vote of 10 to 4, with ICJ President Hisashi Owada voting with the majority, the Court concluded that it did not. Four of the judges appended stinging dissenting opinions, describing how that Court had not only avoided the question put before it but had gone out its way to do so.

Predictably, the countries (led by the U.S.) favoring Kosovo's independence pounced on the ruling as a vindication of their position. On the other hand a flood of recognitions -- which many observers though would ensue in the wake of an opinion favorable to Kosovo's secession -- has yet to materialize.

An aspect that has received far less attention than it deserves is one ruse central to the Court's opinion (such as it is): that when the Albanian members of the Provisional Institutions of Self-Government (PISG) operating under, and subject to, United Nations authority issued their declaration, they somehow were not really the PISG, but a generic representative of the will of the non-existent nation of Kosovo. To anyone familiar with the specifics of legal authority in Kosovo (such as it is), the assertion is no less than surreal.

It is precisely in that spirit of surrealism that the ICJ opinion -- as personified by Judge Owada -- now receives its most penetrating analysis. Ambassador Anton Smitsendonk is former career diplomat of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, including among his postings Ambassador to China. Transcending usual legal analysis Ambassador Smitsendonk adds an artful approach in order to point out the legal weakness of the Court�s ruse in its Kosovo advisory opinion.

James George Jatras
Director, American Council for Kosovo
September 2010

THE COURT PRESIDENT�S DREAM

It had been an unpleasant morning for His Excellency the President of the International Court of Justice: a staff conference about personnel problems followed by a discussion of the budget which would not increase in line with the expanded workload. Those topics had been followed by a short, now nearly daily, update on the Kosovo Unilateral Declaration of Independence. The International Court of Justice in The Hague at the request of the United Nations General Assembly was expected to issue an Advisory Opinion shortly.

It was a difficult matter. Judging by outward visible facts, the Kosovo Assembly when it voted on that Declaration had clearly acted against the legal settings which were binding it. The Assembly was one of the Provisional Authorities set up by the United Nations under Security Council Resolution 1244. That Resolution and all the rulings under it were made with the intent of giving the Kosovo people an opportunity to achieve a decent degree of self government, pending an ultimate peaceful negotiated solution to which both parties were asked to cooperate. Kosovo would in the meantime remain under Serbian sovereignty, but Serbia would not exercise such authority.

The negotiations however, both between the two contrasting parties involved and in the UN Security Council were experiencing a long stalemate. Could then the Court realistically now issue an advisory opinion along the classical lines of international and UN law?

Some judges thought they saw a better way to accommodate the aspirations of the Kosovo people. They had a �brainwave�: The UDI (Unilateral Declaration of Independence) might � in their line or arguing - look like voted upon by the Kosovo provisional Assembly. In reality, however, - those judges said - the makers of the Declaration acted in a very different capacity, one might say different personal identity. How can that be? At the hour of voting on the UDI � the judges continue - they acted in an entirely new capacity, as leading citizens, in full freedom, mandated in some way by their friends and local communities only bound by an implied mandate they felt they had from the population at large.

A daring invention. A brainwave. Could it pass criticisms in the world�s legal community? In academia? Would its implications not create havoc in the world? Scotland, Catalonia, the Hungarians in various countries, Tibet, Georgia, you name it . . . ?

The judges were by no means united behind the idea. Nearly all of them followed the position of their nation�s government. Such a line-up could well undercut the Court�s independence and global authority for a long time to come. The Court�s President felt he would have to operate with caution. But a decision could no longer be delayed.

After that wary early morning session the President felt the need for a break out and a quiet hour of reflection. With only two of the Kosovo case drafts he left his office and made his way to the �Japanese Room� in The Hague�s Peace Palace.

The room is spacious and in great style with tropical wood panelling on the walls and very fine Japanese silk mural embroideries. It was a gift from the Japanese Emperor, like other precious objects in the Palace had been sent by the Tsar of Russia, the German Emperor, the President of the United States.

The hall had the quietness appropriate for a moment of reflection.

On a day when no visitors were crowding the corridors only a few dependants of the Court greeted the President. The Japanese Room was empty, except for a cleaning woman, who, when she understood the intention of the Chief Judge, left the room quietly

The President sighed, looked a moment at the papers he had taken with him, But he did not feel an urge to delve again into the documents. He pretty well knew them by heart. He needed to reflect on the wider picture.

From his comfortable chair on the rostrum he looked into the dark corners at the far end of the hall and tried to guess what would be the impact under various directions which the court could take. On Kosovo, but also on the world at large.

The Kosovo case would also count as important in the Chief Justice�s biography, when he should have to leave at the end of his twelve years� stint in the World Court. For His Excellency Owada not a matter of indifference.

Now was not the moment to focus on the more technical legal sides. Hisashi Owada had been always involved in the much bigger picture, as a young professor in Japan, and in the United States, as a high diplomat in various countries and in the OECD in Paris. Always close to the centres of power, and now also - by marriage - also to the Imperial House of his own country. This was not a moment to retreat to the technical corners of legal thinking. Core issues should be boldly addressed. Owada felt he needed to let his thoughts fly freely, soar wherever they would take him. The majestic silk embroidered butterfly on the wall would be his inspiration. He felt already the daily noises ebb away, and the broader waves of world history streaming in.

The two papers he shoved brusquely aside. He rested his head a moment on his arms. And now he noticed how the hall was becoming larger, and at the same time more spare and sober in construction, nearly like a railway station. The rows of seats in front of him were not any more the fine craftsman�s work of a century ago, the gift of an Emperor or a President, but more like sober, modern factory products. The chairs were also arranged in a different way, not in straight rows, but in semi circles, one behind the other until the far end of the hall. He noticed that many seats had been taken by boisterous men in dark suits, with only a few women present. From three sides more people were streaming in as for an urgent political session.

The rostrum where he was sitting now felt also different. It was at a higher level appropriate for a parliament. Clearly people awaited him to perform a function. He was to preside over a meeting of the Kosovo parliament.

Parliamentary assistants were looking towards him. He had to act. Trusting his good star, the President rang the bell. People were now looking up to him and he started as follows:

�Ladies and Gentlemen!

�We have one highly important task in front of us today. Yet I have to start with a few matters which seem only household matters. They may seem unimportant for a moment, but you will easily understand how they might deeply affect the outcome of today�s action.

�We cannot risk that our Declaration of Independence be found illegal and conflicting with the UN rulings and with SC 1244.

�Therefore I am with your permission to close this hall and withdraw this building for three days from its normal destination as the official seat of the Kosovo National Assembly. For these three days our building will bear another name: the �Kosovo Independence Memorial Hall.�

�Signing now with your permission that decision this will be the last act I shall perform for three days as Chairman of the Assembly. Our work as Assembly will resume on the fourth working day from today.�

Astonishment was visible on the faces turned to him, and some of the members were turning to each other with questions, but silence returned remarkably quickly, since nobody could find any explanation from colleagues for this unexpected presidential action.

The president proceeded by handing to an usher the signed decision to be copied and to be posted immediately on all outside doors of the building.

While taking the document in his hands the usher whispered a word in his ears.

The President nodded and continued:

�In order to make our convening today as the makers of Kosovo�s independence completely transparent and legal I request you not to sit at your usual places in this hall. Choose any other place. Do not to sit by your party affiliation. Sitting by region or at free choice is fine.

�We are today to operate outside any parliamentary proceedings.

�We today assume another identity, being nothing else than a group of concerned leading citizens who find thrust upon them, by popular mandate, an urgent task which does not brook any further delay.�

It was as if the crowd in front of the President was heaving a sigh of relief.

After the first moments of hesitation the parliamentarians realized that their chairman was still their true leader concerned to bring the declaration of independence into safe harbour.

In him, the major legal expert in their nation confidence among the group was fully intact. Sensing that even simple modalities were now important they even refrained from asking questions, since any show of difference might alter the way how the outside world was going to see their action of the day.

There were around the hall even moments of laughter, of people walking and getting to sit in unaccustomed seats sometimes next to a former party opponent. Some were even exploring whether they found some relinquished papers in the desk of their new seat, at the same time hoping they had not left any compromising paper or items in their own desks.

The president continued:

�As to the text which we have prepared, that can remain unaltered, but I must warn you that when the moment of signing comes in no circumstance you must sing as members of parliament. You may add to your name leader of a group of citizens from Prizren, Blace, Pec, Glogovac, Klina or whatever place you are comfortable with.

�In this way it will be clear to the world and for the future that today we act outside the present legal structures which had been imposed on us.

�You know full well that under those structures of the Provisional Authorities we can never get the independence which Ahtisaari promised us.

�As long as we are acting under the banner of Security Council Resolution 1244 of 1999 our declaration of independence would be killed in the bud or rejected by the Special Representative, to be further attacked as null and void in international legal courts.

�We must make history not by continuation but by irruption, like today we are assembled here by irruption, not as the Kosovo parliament but as citizens of Kosovo, irrupting into a building which was until yesterday our Parliament, and now is the Independence Memorial Hall.

�Think of yourselves more in the fashion of the nobles and merchants of Holland when irruption in a monastery of Utrecht to sign their declaration and make themselves free from Spanish domination, or like the American revolutionaries disconnecting their country from the British Crown, or if you just like Sukarno and Hatta who signed a paper in a simple suburban house. We make a rupture with history. Only then we can hope to rupture the bonds which otherwise might tie us to Security Council resolution 1244. We shall be free.�

After their earlier surprises the assembly quieted down. Some were already feeling for the various fountain pens or ballpoints brought from home in order to give later to their children as the �pens with which the Kosovo Unilateral Declaration of Independence was to be signed�.

The rays of sunshine in the smaller Session Room of the Peace Palace in the Hague had shifted, and were now directly on the white papers in front of the President.

He made deep sigh and lifted his head.

He felt no need anymore to take a look at those papers he had brought with him.

He stood up, walked down the two steps from the rostrum. With a brisk pace he left the audition hall, passed the cleaning woman who could now resume her work, and entered his modern office where people were waiting for him.

People were happy to see a smile on the face of the man who looked often stern and seemed so often abrasive.

It seemed the President now knew what to do . . .

POSTSCRIPT

Had the various prudent measures which appeared in the dream of Justice Owada been followed by the Kosovo Assembly as it prepared itself for its Unilateral Declaration of Independence, there might have been a chance that the world would see them in their new true �identity� as free national leaders mandated to call for independence. Free from all the links which bound them to the UN, its SC-1244 resolution which otherwise might put them on collision course with international law.

But were those measures taken? No. They were not:

The Kosovo Assembly was NOT closed for the day. The parliament was really in full official session.
The name of the building had not been changed from �Assembly� into �Independence Memorial Hall�. It was still the Assembly.
The parliamentarians were sitting in their normal places by parties around the hemicycle and not broken up in any effort to show they were now assuming a totally new configuration.
The Declaration of Independence was signed by the participants in their usual quality as members of the Assembly, not as members of a radically new group of leading citizens mandated by the Kosovo people for an entirely new enterprise, outside the existing legal framework of Serbia and of the United Nations.

The Kosovo parliament therefore did not succeed in breaking the links which tied it irrevocably to the SC 1244 resolution.

The ICJ�s �Advisory Opinion� contains only a very weak reflection of the strong dream of the Court�s President. The Court�s attempt to show the assembly members in totally new clothes as leaders of a brand new legal entity remains unintelligible. The court does not get beyond a weak attempt to assume an �intent� which remains without tangible proof.

None of the legal objections against the UDI of Kosovo is therefore put aside.

Nothing has changed in the status of Kosovo as a province of Serbia, and the Provisional Administration continues under the ruling of the Security Council.

The butterfly on the wall in the Japanese Room of the Peace Palace had indeed inspired President Owada mightily. But it had wilted on the wall.

The Court�s advisory opinion offers no guidance for those countries which feel they have to make decisions.

Anton Smitsendonk
Beijing � Paris
August 2010

John R. Bolton: International Court decision could encourage separatists

Last week's International Court of Justice decision on Kosovo could have a significant global effect. While there is less there than meets the eye in legal terms, how the ruling is read politically may be quite different.

The ICJ decided that Kosovo's 2008 declaration of independence from Serbia "did not violate any applicable rule of international law." Although the world media first headlined that the court had approved Kosovo's actual independence, the real result was much more limited. The ICJ made it very clear it was merely providing an "advisory opinion" to answer the United Nations General Assembly's question whether Kosovo's declaration of independence was valid.

And indeed, the ICJ decision has not really clarified the situation in the Balkans. While Kosovo's declaration of independence, according to the court, did not violate the applicable international law, the underlying, and far more important, issue is still unresolved: Is Kosovo legitimately independent or not?

Serbia immediately rejected both the ICJ opinion and any broader conclusions about Kosovo's status. Belgrade held firm to its long-standing view that Security Council Resolution 1244 of 1999 expressly reaffirmed "the commitment of all Member States to the sovereignty and territorial integrity" of former Yugoslavia, and did not decide the "final status" of the province. T

Therefore, Serbia argued, Kosovo remains part of Serbia until and unless the parties to the dispute agree otherwise. Russia and China, echoing Belgrade's position, have consistently said that Resolution 1244 simply provided a political framework to allow the parties to reach their own conclusions.

By contrast, the European Union and the United States welcomed the ICJ decision. Unfortunately, Brussels and Washington have long held confused and inconsistent positions, simultaneously holding that Serbia and Kosovo should resolve the status issue by negotiation, while at every opportunity encouraging and assisting Kosovo's leaders to make their country independent.

Small wonder that Kosovo has never shown much inclination to negotiate. With the kind of external political support it has received for unilateral independence, why should it compromise on anything less?

Politically, Kosovo's continued de facto sovereignty means it has achieved essentially what it sought by declaring independence. But because Kosovo's independence was imposed on Serbia, rather than negotiated mutually, there is a basis for yet another unresolved Balkan conflict that could later return to haunt us.

The larger, global implications are even more troubling, despite the very limited nature of the ICJ's advisory opinion. Even the Palestinian-Israeli conflict might be affected.

Separatist regions in Europe and around the world will draw their own conclusions from the decision, thus precipitating unnecessary confrontations between separatists and central governments, but without any real guidance beyond the specifics of the Kosovo situation.

Concerns about these potential ramifications undoubtedly shaped the positions not only of Russia and China, but even those of European nations like Spain, which faces several regional separatist movements.

The real conclusion is that lasting, peaceful solutions to separatist conflicts ultimately can only emerge from agreements among the parties themselves. Until and unless they find the means to do so (or to live with them until a better idea arises), they are only postponing the day of reckoning.

The blunt truth is that some will only be resolved by military conflict. But as its Kosovo opinion makes clear, the artificial and inadequate ICJ is probably the least useful approach of all.

John R. Bolton is the former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

"Kosovo can attend only under UNMIK auspices"

BELGRADE -- Spanish Ambassador Inigo de Palacio Espana today addressed the issue of participation of Kosovo Albanian officials at EU-organized gatherings.

The top Spanish diplomat in Belgrade said the authorities in Pri�tina can be present at international conferences organized by the EU only under the UNMIK auspices and in accordance with UNSC Resolution 1244.

Espana added that this will be the condition for the Kosovo authorities to be invited to the conference planned for early June in Sarajevo.

"Spanish Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos has repeated several times since January that at the conference organized by Spain, as the country currently presiding over the EU, the Kosovo authorities can only be presented in accordance with the conditions and frameworks set by all EU member states," Espana told Tanjug news agency in Belgrade on Thursday.

"Taking into account that there is no consensus within the EU on Kosovo's independence, the only possibility to reach a consensus is to maintain the practice that the Kosovo authorities are presented under UNMIK and in accordance with Resolution 1244," the ambassador stressed.

GORIN: The blackmail of America

Something happened after President Clinton's 1999 war in Kosovo: It never ended. Its continuation was characterized by anti-Serb arson, kidnappings, bombings of NATO-escorted civilian buses and efforts to kill everyone from schoolgirls to octogenarians, plus the rare peacekeeper who tried to prevent any of this.

Toward the end of 1999, several major newspapers reported on findings that mass graves such as the infamous Trepca zinc mine turned up empty, as did the stadium we were told was being used as a concentration camp. Anyone reading this one-time follow-up also would have learned that the "cleansing" of 800,000 Albanians had more to do with NATO bombs and Kosovo Liberation Army orders than with the outrageous claim that Serbia was trying to empty the province of 90 percent of its population.

But the bombshell postwar story had no legs. No media outlet, human rights organization or congressional subcommittee launched an investigation, and the press moved on, taking the public with it. So Americans don't know that within months of our serving as the Kosovo Liberation Army's (KLA) air force, the Albanian insurgents also tried to seize the Presevo Valley area in southern Serbia and by early 2001 started a civil war in Macedonia, which had sheltered 400,000 refugees during the Kosovo war.

At the same time, the Albanian fighters started to engage NATO troops openly. In February 2000, the U.N. and NATO in Kosovo issued a joint statement that "two young French soldiers, who came here as peacekeepers, are lying in hospital beds suffering from gunshot wounds inflicted on them by the very people that they came here to protect," the CATO Institute's Gary Dempsey reported. He added, "As a candid intelligence officer with the U.N. Mission in Kosovo [UNMIK] explained to me in November, 'We are their tool, and when we stop being useful to them, they will turn against us.'"

In March 2000, The Washington Post reported, "A senior Pentagon official warned yesterday that U.S. troops in Kosovo this spring may have to fight their former allies, ethnic Albanian guerrillas who are rearming themselves and threatening cross-border attacks against Serbia. 'This has got to cease and desist, and if not, ultimately it is going to lead to confrontation between the Albanians and KFOR [NATO Kosovo Force].' "

But that didn't happen. Instead, we came around to seeing things the Albanian way. In November 2005, CNSNews.com explained why: "Rebels have blown up several vehicles belonging to UNMIK and the Kosovo [Police] Service, leading UNMIK to warn employees to check their vehicles for bombs before starting the engines. ... [G]raffiti across Kosovo warned 'UNMIK get out!' ... NATO's Kosovo Force has an emergency plan called 'Operation Safe Haven' in place to evacuate internationals. ... [Ex-OSCE security chief Tom] Gambill believes that Albanian frustration over the independence issue could lead armed rebels to forge an alliance with al Qaeda. Both groups want the international presence out of Kosovo and al Qaeda has a history of attempting to destabilize the Balkans region. ... The threats are played down, Gambill said, because 'it does not suit the internationals to have a serious crisis such as this at the time when they are sending out reports on how much improvement has been made in Kosovo.' "

We didn't want Albanians to start killing us, so we let them keep killing Serbs. Rather than see what would happen if we tried saying "no" to Albanian demands and designs, and risk Americans discerning the real nature of their new best friends - which of course would compound the domestic terror threat - we guaranteed ourselves a bigger, more entrenched and more global problem.

When Kosovo re-entered the headlines in 2008, some started catching on. In March 2008, Northwestern University law professor Eugene Kontorovich wrote in the New York Sun, "An important ingredient of Kosovo's success in achieving self-determination seems to be their constant threats of violence. The Kosovar prime minister ... often warned of 'dangers' and 'unforeseeable consequences' if the province were not allowed to secede. ... As a result, NATO and America have become parties to the carve-up of a sovereign state that they subdued by force. ... For international law, the entire process is a string of humiliations ... peacekeepers are hostages; and sovereignty is trumped by the threat of terror."

"Hostages" precisely describes the West in Kosovo. If anyone wonders why the George W. Bush administration joined the Clintonites in the belief that "independence is the only viable option" and "there can be no compromise," it's because in the gangster's paradise of Kosovo, the United States alternates between hostage and gangster. The Albanians give us ultimatums, and we give the Serbs ultimatums. Our government toes the Albanian line, and our press toes the government line. United Press International's Robert M. Hayden gave a glimpse of it in March 2008: "The problem is not that 'Serb nationalists' are resisting 'the West,' as it is put by those U.S. journalists who honor the First Amendment by parroting the State Department. ... [A political solution] could have been reached with Serbia, but neither the Clinton administration nor that of George W. Bush wanted one."

A clearer picture emerges of the "failed" negotiations between Belgrade and Pristina, to which the Serbian delegation would come with lists of various broad compromises, and the Albanian delegation would look at their watches. Sabotaging the "negotiations" before each round - and redefining the term - Mr. Bush or Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would announce that the end result would be independence.

An excerpt from a 1999 Q&A in Time magazine illuminates how far we swerved from our original goals: "The alliance wants Kosovo to be given autonomy within the Yugoslav federation, but opposes the full independence that the KLA is fighting for, fearing that creating a new Kosovar-Albanian state would further destabilize an already volatile region."

Today, however, even the language is reversed: that which we knew would destabilize the region is now promoted as what is needed to "stabilize" the region. And so our military is being used to enforce KLA directives and make the last of the resisting Serbs comply with the new reality.

Most of the last resisting Serbs are in the only remaining part of Kosovo where it is still safe to be Serbian, Northern Kosovska Mitrovica, along the boundary with Serbia. The Serbs there have been open to a partition that would allow them to stay within the internationally recognized borders of their country, Serbia. But we were informed by our Albanian "partners" that a partition was out of the question, ironically invoking "territorial integrity" - which our leaders then repeated.

Rather than Kosovo's diabolical path to statehood, our bureaucrats and media point to Belgrade as the problem, because it backs Northern Mitrovica, where Serbian institutions are still in place. We are warned that the real threat is Belgrade's refusal to recognize the land grab, its turning to Moscow for support and its creation of "parallel institutions." A rich admonition indeed, given that Kosovo's parallel Albanian institutions within the host society were what brought us to the hailed secession itself.

NATO troops have been amassing around Northern Mitrovica, and in a few months, with or without Belgrade finally selling out the Kosovo Serbs (always a looming possibility), we will witness the next act of war by U.S.-led NATO against an ally that has never been a threat to America. We will be enforcing borders that only one-third of U.N. member states even recognize to deliver nothing less than the full territory that our masters demand.

This time, when Americans watch our military "contain" the Serbs, they should recognize it for what it is. The troops themselves would do well to understand what is being enforced with their hands. And when the images gracing American TVs are again exclusively of the "wild" Serbian reaction, meant to depict Serbs as violent and therefore justifying the aggression that caused it, Americans should ask themselves how they might react if coerced to secede from their country by an ethnic group that reached majority status in their area.

In February 2007, Jim Jatras, a former senior analyst for the Senate Republican Foreign Policy Committee, asked a Hungarian member of the European Parliament, "Why are you rewarding Albanian violence with state power?" The member replied, "Because we're afraid of them."