Doug Bandow: Closing the books on Kosovo

BANGKOK POST (THAILAND), Monday 25 July 2005 OPINION

Solving the problems of the Balkans should be Europe's responsibility, not
America's, and the United States should step back, withdrawing its 1,800
soldiers from Kosovo

By DOUG BANDOW

President Bill Clinton inaugurated a new era in American foreign relations when he launched an unprovoked war of aggression against Yugoslavia, which had attacked neither the United States nor any American ally. Six years later, the Yugoslav (now Serbian) province of Kosovo remains in limbo.

Nicholas Burns, the US undersecretary of state for political affairs, recently told Congress: ``The status quo of Kosovo's undefined status is no longer sustainable, desirable or acceptable.''

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan has appointed a special envoy to assess the province's governance and start international negotiations on Kosovo's final status.

Little good has happened since the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) stopped the bitter guerrilla conflict. America's allies, the Albanian majority, conducted ethnic cleansing on a grand scale, kicking out most Serbs, Jews, Roma, and non-Albanian Muslims.

UN rule has allowed endemic violence, crime and instability, including brutal anti-Serb riots last year.

At the same time, the local population is disatisfied with its indeterminate status: still formally part of Serbia but ruled by Western occupiers.

Unfortunately, it will be easier to start the process than to deliver a good result.

The only hope for finding a solution is to abandon the many illusions that long have tainted American Balkans policy.

First, consent of all of the parties is impossible. No agreement will satisfy everyone.

After seeing other parts of Yugoslavia secede, why would Albanian Kosovars accept less than independence?

But why would Serbia accept dismemberment at the hands of countries _ America, Britain, and Turkey, to start with _ that ruthlessly suppressed their own secessionist movements?

And why would surrounding nations with their own restive Albanian minorities back Kosovo's independence?

Second, Western nations must abandon the naive illusion that they can forcibly engineer a federal state that protects minority rights. This fantasy should have disappeared long ago.

No Albanian Kosovar cares to trust his future to Serb governance. But no Serb, Jew, Roma or anyone else would want to be ruled by the ethnic Albanian majority, irrespective of the promises made by whomever.

It also is important to abandon expectation of a just and principled settlement. The US and its European allies support the sovereignty of nation states in the face of ethnic pressures _ except when they support groups that wish to secede and establish ethnically-based states.

In the case of the Balkans, everyone got to secede from Serb-dominated territories and Serbs were never allowed to secede from territories dominated by other groups.

This might be consistent policy, but it should not be confused with a principled moral stand.

None of the proposed solutions is pretty. Independence would please Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority, but would leave the few remaining Serbs vulnerable, inflame nationalism in Serbia, unsettle neighbouring states, and create a statelet likely to become the regional fount of crime, instability and perhaps even terrorism.

Leaving Kosovo with Serbia, whatever the form of autonomy, has no support among Kosovo's Albanians.

Moreover, this approach would be inherently unstable, creating a sense of unfinished business, looking like a mere way-station to independence.

Independence with partition _ really big partition minus little partition _ would come closer to satisfying ethnic Albanians, by giving them a country, and Serbs, by leaving most of them in Serbia.

Such a system would generate its own difficulties, but would best discourage future conflict.

Certainly, this option should not be ruled out as the Bush administration has attempted to do, effectively prejudging any ``negotiations''.

Although Clinton administration officials who unnecessarily entangled America in the Balkans demand continued US ``leadership'', solving the region's problems always should have been Europe's, rather than America's, responsibility.

Washington should step back, withdrawing its last 1,800 soldiers from the province.

Europe then could wield its various tools of influence _ from economic aid to a continued military presence _ to push a settlement.

Most important, the US should say never again. Never again will Washington base its foreign policy on ideological fantasies. Never again will Washington intervene in a distant civil war of no geopolitical concern. Never again will America attack another nation that poses no threat to the US.

The world is filled with tragedy, and the Balkans _ even before Iraq _ demonstrated how difficult it is for outsiders to resolve ancient and intractable conflicts. The US should stop trying to do so.

Who can and should govern Kosovo, and can they do it fairly and effectively? It is time to let the local inhabitants try. And to let them deal with the consequences if they fail.

Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute in Washington.