All Out Weakness

The British Ministry of Defense informed the public a couple of days ago that certain lessons can be drawn from the Kosovo conflict: a part of the British army is on a low level of combat readiness and patrol and intelligence activities should also be improved. The well known US brain trust Rand Corporation made up an analysis in May on the future of NATO, which states that the Alliance, "despite its recent successes in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo", must transform itself from the structure intended to stand against the Soviet Union into a force equipped with the most modern computers and communication equipment, i.e. that it must move its focus from territorial defense to a projection of power.

It isn't known, one year following the signing (10 June 1999) of the Military-Technical Agreement in Kumanovo by which NATO' s bombardment ceased, whether Serbia has drawn any political lessons from it.

At the moment when the agreement was signed between the Yugoslav Army  (VJ), the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MUP) and KFOR (i.e. NATO) the public was less concerned with the contents of that Agreement and more with the fact that the war was finally finished. Claiming their victory, the government structures did not overly try to present that Agreement to the public, they especially avoided analyzing what consequences it would have on the country - due to totally understandable reasons.

Generals Svetozar Marjanovic from the General Staff of VJ and Obrad Stevanovic from MUP Serbia were involved in the talks for five full days under the army tents in front of the government of FRY and Serbia with British general Michael Jackson, in front of KFOR. They didn't shake hands at the end.

Our country agreed that all Serbian and Yugoslav forces would, in the time limit of 11 days and following a precise schedule, pull out from Kosovo, that some fifty or so thousand soldiers would take their place under the command of NATO generals with the broadest possible authorization. The KFOR commander is authorized by the Agreement to undertake any sort of measures and use any type of force in order to "secure peace" and prevent VJ and MUP from returning to Kosovo. Kosovo is surrounded by a five kilometer wide buffer zone which our forces are not allowed to enter and which is divided into five sectors, each under the command of one great power. "The governments of FRY and Serbia have understood and accepted that international forces for the protection of peace (KFOR) can organize and operate without any restrictions inside Kosovo, with the authorization to undertake all necessary steps." The key sentence of the Agreement states that the KFOR commander is in charge of its interpretation. As stated in the Agreement, "his decisions are binding for all parties and individuals", while neither he nor KFOR have any obligations towards the Yugoslav nor Serbian government, not towards the state itself nor its citizens: "Neither KFOR nor any of its members are responsible for any damage caused to public or private property which can occur in the course of duty."

The final status of Kosovo - now de facto a UN protectorate, although under official Yugoslav sovereignty - is nowhere near. Resolution 1244 of the UN Security Council which had legalized the end of the bombing campaign and the establishment of KFOR and UNMIK (civil administration) missions doesn't show any indications in that direction, while influential international structures are more occupied with doing their utmost to prevent the collapse of the entire operation in front of the entire world than with long-term plans for the future of that province.

The factual state on the terrain is well known: violence hasn't been stopped (although NATO's general secretary George Robertson in his March report on Kosovo bragged that in June of last year there were fifty murders a week in comparison with on average only five per week now). Non-Albanians are being murdered, primarily the Serbian population - despite claims, according to western sources, that one KFOR member is in charge of the security of three Serbs, protected with armored vehicles and helicopters.

Organized crime has broken from all control. The first international judges for Kosovo were inaugurated a few days ago even though a judicial system is far from existent. One policemen from Northern Ireland told the New York Times recently: "Without a judicial system we can arrest people all day long, they only walk out of prison later. There is nothing to stop them..." The head of the civil mission Bernard Couchner has become a man-law: he can abolish (and abolish he does) any regulation of this state on the territory of Kosovo, he can produce (and does) every day as many enactments as he wishes which have to be observed. UNMIK has taken over state and public property in Kosovo without any legal arrangements or compensations to the Yugoslav, i.e. Serbian side. Tax and customs duty are collected for Kosovo, without a single percent going to Serbia or Yugoslavia.

Theoretically, there are four structures of government: the expelled Serbian government; the parallel government which was, prior to the armed combat - if anyone recalls now - established by Ibrahim Rugova; the real local government which KLA established on the basis of war merits (therefore, without any democratic legitimacy) even prior to the moment when the KFOR forces were deployed in Kosovo; the UN administration. According to a certain Swedish analysis, the so-called international presence in Kosovo is made up of KFOR, UNMIK and the UN organization (UNHCR and others), OSCE and EU members and around 300 non-government organizations - all together, around 70.000 foreigners whose activities are more or less (as in most cases) coordinated.

Such a scheme is the result of the mechanism and manifestation of the interest of the most powerful international forces which, whatever we may think of it, clash on this very territory. Western Europe hopes to establish stronger political and economic ties with Russia - which in a large measure depends upon finding a joint approach to the Balkans. Russia shall use this trump card in its relations with the West as it sees best for itself, and hardly anyone knows what Vladimir Putin plans in that sense. China, due to its own reasons, is fortifying its relations with Milosevic (Li Peng's upcoming visit is a huge bonus for him). The US is sending out more and more signals that it would gladly pull out of Kosovo, leaving it to the Europeans to make do (and supply the funds) as best as they know how.

London's The Guardian has recently, analyzing the movements of these cog-wheels of power, concluded that "Europe must find a way to pull out of this Russian-Chinese-American gorge".

In Serbia - at least as far as the public is aware - no one is posing the question of what to do in the aforementioned gorge, especially not how to pull out of it.

The government is mostly shooting off verbal arrows in Couchner's direction (while Vladan Batic, the leader of the Demo-Christian Party of Serbia has recently sent him an open letter asking for his resignation). Slobodan Milosevic has demanded that international forces withdraw from Kosovo - while they are showing absolutely no intention of complying with this request (all the world leaders are saying that they can't even surmise how long their mission in Kosovo could last). The illusion is still being harbored that our forces will return there to establish order and democracy - even though up to now not even a symbolic number of soldiers and policemen as promised by the UN Resolution have been allowed to guard the borders and Serbian monasteries.

The impression is formed that the regime doesn't have another concept other than to wait for Bill Clinton to step down and for someone else to come who shall, so to say, return Kosovo to us - and everything will be like it was before. Those against the government, absorbed in their own sorrow, are waiting for Milosevic to fall - who isn't showing the slightest inclination towards falling.

Due to everything that was mentioned, a picture of general helplessness is all that results in which no one can discern that any of the important political factors in Serbia truly care about the fate of the state. Therefore, this torture will go on and on.