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Title: Another Way For Kosovo? Author: Noam Chomsky Date: March 14, 2000 Language: en Topics: Kosovo, NATO, former Yugoslavia Source: Retrieved on 22nd June 2021 from https://chomsky.info/20000314/ Notes: Published in Le Monde diplomatique.
Kosovo was an extremely ugly place last year. About 2000 people were
killed according to NATO, mostly Albanians, in the course of a bitter
struggle that began in February with Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA)
actions that the United States denounced as “terrorism” and a brutal
Serb response. By summer the KLA had taken over about 40% of the
province, eliciting a vicious reaction by Serb security forces and
paramilitaries, targeting the civilian population. According to Albanian
Kosovar legal adviser Marc Weller, “within a few days [after the
withdrawal of the monitors on 20 March 1999] the number of displaced had
again risen to over 200,000,” figures that conform roughly to US
intelligence reports [1].
Suppose the monitors had not been withdrawn in preparation for the
bombing and diplomatic efforts had been pursued. Were such options
feasible? Would they have led to an even worse outcome, or perhaps a
better one? Since NATO refused to entertain this possibility, we cannot
know. But we can at least consider the known facts, and ask what they
suggest.
Could the Kosovo Verification Mission (KVM) monitors of the Organisation
for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) have been left in place,
preferably strengthened? That seems possible, particularly in the light
of the immediate condemnation of the withdrawal by the Serb National
Assembly. No argument has been advanced to suggest that the reported
increase in atrocities after their withdrawal would have taken place
even had they remained, let alone the vast escalation that was the
predicted consequence of the bombing signalled by the withdrawal. NATO
also made little effort to pursue other peaceful means; even an oil
embargo, the core of any serious sanctions regime, was not considered
until after the bombing.
The most important question, however, has to do with the diplomatic
options. Two proposals were on the table on the eve of the bombing. One
was the Rambouillet accord, presented to Serbia as an ultimatum. The
second was Serbia’s position, formulated in its 15 March 1999 “Revised
Draft Agreement” and the Serb National Assembly Resolution of 23 March
1999 [2]. A serious concern for protecting Kosovars might well have
brought into consideration other options as well, including, perhaps,
something like the 1992–93 proposal of the Serbian president of
Yugoslavia, Dobrica Cosic, that Kosovo be partitioned, separating itself
from Serbia apart from “a number of Serbian enclaves” [3]. At the time
the proposal was rejected by Ibrahim Rugova’s Republic of Kosovo, which
had declared independence and set up a parallel government; but it might
have served as a basis for negotiation in the different circumstances of
early 1999. Let us, however, keep to the two official positions of late
March: the Rambouillet ultimatum and the Serb Resolution.
It is important and revealing that, with marginal exceptions, the
essential contents of both positions were kept from the public eye,
apart from dissident media that reach few people.
The Serb National Assembly Resolution, though reported at once on the
wire services, has remained a virtual secret. There has been little
indication even of its existence, let alone its contents. The Resolution
condemned the withdrawal of the OSCE monitors and called on the United
Nations and OSCE to facilitate a diplomatic settlement through
negotations “toward the reaching of a political agreement on a
wide-ranging autonomy for [Kosovo], with the securing of a full equality
of all citizens and ethnic communities and with respect for the
sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Republic of Serbia and the
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia [FRY].” It raised the possibility of an
“international presence” of a “size and character” to be determined to
carry out the “political accord on the self-rule agreed and accepted by
the representatives of all national communities living in [Kosovo].” FRY
agreement “to discuss the scope and character of international presence
in [Kosovo] to implement the agreement to be accepted in Rambouillet”
had been formally conveyed to the negotiators on 23 February, and
announced by the FRY at a press conference the same day [4]. Whether
these proposals had any substance we cannot know, since they were never
considered, and remain unknown.
Perhaps even more striking is that the Rambouillet ultimatum, though
universally described as the peace proposal, was also kept from the
public, particularly the provisions that were apparently introduced in
the final moments of the Paris peace talks in March after Serbia had
expressed agreement with the main political proposals, and that
virtually guaranteed rejection. Of particular importance are the terms
of the implementation Appendices that accorded to NATO the right of
“free and unrestricted passage and unimpeded access throughout the FRY
including associated airspace and territorial waters”, without limits or
obligations or concern for the laws of the country or the jurisdiction
of its authorities, who are, however, required to follow NATO orders “on
a priority basis and with all appropriate means” (Appendix B).
The Annex was kept from journalists covering the Rambouillet and Paris
talks, says Robert Fisk: “The Serbs say they denounced it at their last
Paris press conference – an ill-attended gathering at the Yugoslav
Embassy at 11pm on 18 March”. Serb dissidents who took part in the
negotiations allege that they were given these conditions on the last
day of the Paris talks and that the Russians did not know about them.
These provisions were not made available to the British House of Commons
until 1 April, the first day of the Parliamentary recess, a week after
the bombing started [5].
In the negotiations that began after the bombing, NATO abandoned these
demands entirely, along with others to which Serbia had been opposed,
and there is no mention of them in the final peace agreement.
Reasonably, Fisk asks: “What was the real purpose of NATO’s last minute
demand? Was it a Trojan horse? To save the peace? Or to sabotage it?”
Whatever the answer, if the NATO negotiators had been concerned with the
fate of the Kosovar Albanians, they would have sought to determine
whether diplomacy could succeed if NATO’s most provocative, and
evidently irrelevant, demands had been withdrawn; the monitoring
enhanced, not terminated; and significant sanctions threatened.
When such questions have been raised, leaders of the US and British
negotiating teams have claimed that they were willing to drop the
exorbitant demands that they later withdrew, but that the Serbs refused.
The claim is hardly credible. There would have been every reason for
them to have made such facts public at once. It is interesting that they
are not called to account for this startling performance.
Prominent advocates of the bombing have made similar claims. An
important example is the commentary on Rambouillet by Marc Weller [6].
Weller ridicules the “extravagant claims” about the implementation
Appendices, which he claims were “published along with the agreement,”
meaning the Draft Agreement dated 23 February. Where they were published
he does not say, nor does he explain why reporters covering the
Rambouillet and Paris talks were unaware of them. As was, it appears,
the British parliament. The “famous Appendix B,” he states, established
“the standard terms of a status of forces agreement for KFOR [the
planned NATO occupying forces]”. He does not explain why the demand was
dropped by NATO after the bombing began, and is evidently not required
by the forces that entered Kosovo under NATO command in June, which are
far larger than what was contemplated at Rambouillet and therefore
should be even more dependent on the status of forces’ agreement. Also
unexplained is the 15 March FRY response to the 23 February Draft
Agreement.
This response goes through the Draft Agreement in close detail, section
by section, proposing extensive changes and deletions throughout, but
includes no mention at all of the appendices – the implementation
agreements which, as Weller points out, were by far the most important
part and were the subject of the Paris negotiations then underway. One
can only view his account with some scepticism, even apart from his
casual attitude toward crucial fact, already noted, and his clear
commitments. For the moment, these important matters remain buried in
obscurity.
Despite official efforts to prevent public awareness of what was
happening, the documents were available to any news media that chose to
pursue the matter. In the US the extreme (and plainly irrelevant) demand
for virtual NATO occupation of the FRY received its first mention at a
NATO briefing of 26 April, when a question was raised about it but was
quickly dismissed and not pursued. The facts were reported as soon as
the demands had been formally withdrawn and had become irrelevant to
democratic choice. Immediately after the announcement of the peace
accords of 3 June the press quoted the crucial passages of the “take it
or leave it” Rambouillet ultimatum, noting that they required that “a
purely NATO force was to be given full permission to go anywhere it
wanted in Yugoslavia, immune from any legal process,” and that “NATO-led
troops would have had virtually free access across Yugoslavia, not just
Kosovo” [7].
Through the 78 days of bombing negotiations continued, each side making
compromises – described in the US as Serb deceit, or capitulation under
the bombs. The peace agreement of 3 June was a compromise between the
two positions on the table in late March. NATO abandoned its most
extreme demands, including those that had apparently undermined the
negotiations at the last minute and the wording that had been
interpreted as calling for a referendum on independence. Serbia agreed
to an “international security presence with substantial NATO
participation” – the sole mention of NATO in the peace agreement or
Security Council Resolution 1244 affirming it.
NATO had no intention of living up to the scraps of paper it had signed,
and moved at once to violate them, implementing a military occupation of
Kosovo under NATO command. When Serbia and Russia insisted on the terms
of the formal agreements, they were castigated for their deceit, and
bombing was renewed to bring them to heel. On 7 June NATO planes again
bombed the oil refineries in Novi Sad and Pancevo, both centres of
opposition to Milosevic. The Pancevo refinery burst into flames,
releasing a huge cloud of toxic fumes, shown in a photo accompanying a
New York Times story of 14 July that discussed the severe economic and
health effects. The bombing itself was not reported, though it was
covered by wire services [8].
It has been argued that Milosevic would have tried to evade the terms of
an agreement, had one been reached in March. The record strongly
supports that conclusion, just as it supports the same conclusion about
NATO – not only in this case, incidentally; forceful dismantling of
formal agreements is the norm on the part of the great powers [9]. As
now belatedly recognised, the record also suggests that “it might have
been possible [in March] to initiate a genuine set of negotiations – not
the disastrous American diktat presented to Milosevic at the Rambouillet
conference – and to insert a large contingent of outside monitors
capable of protecting Albanian and Serb civilians alike” [10].
At least this much seems clear. NATO chose to reject diplomatic options
that were not exhausted and to launch a military campaign that had
terrible consequences for Kosovar Albanians, as anticipated.
[1] Marc Weller, “The Rambouillet Conference,” International Affairs,
London, April 1999. See note 8.
[2] On the first text, see Marc Weller (ed), International Documents &
Analysis, vol. 1, The Crisis in Kosovo 1989–1999, Cambridge University
Press, 1999, from p. 480. On the second, New Military Humanism.
[3] Miranda Vickers, Between Serb and Albanian: A History of Kosovo,
Columbia, 1998.
[4] See New Military Humanism for details; International Documents, 470;
Mark Littman, Kosovo: Law and Diplomacy, Centre for Policy Studies,
London, November 1999.
[5] Robert Fisk, The Independent, London, 26 November 1999; Littman, op.
cit.
[6] Marc Weller, International Documents, p. 411. As noted, the
commentaries are barely-concealed advocacy of the bombings.
[7] Steven Erlanger, New York Times, 5 June 1999; Blaine Harden, ibid.,
oblique reference; Guy Dinmore, Financial Times, London, 6 June 1999.
See New Military Humanism for further details.
[8] Wire services, 7 and 8 June 1999; Chris Hedges, New York Times, 14
July 1999.
See also Los Angeles Times, 6 July 1999.
[9] On the recent US record, see New Military Humanism and sources
cited.
[10] Editorial, Boston Globe, 9 December 1999.