Waiting for the Bombs to Fall

PRISTINA: War is a dirty thing and that is something I didn't find out only today as Kosovo awaits NATO's bombs. I first learned of it when I saw the faces of refugees in all of the wars of the former Yugoslavia. I was aboard the last flight from Croatia before war exploded there, and although I had a regular plane ticket, I found myself at the end of the queue to get on a plane. Men pushed women and children out of the way to get aboard. Everyone wanted to flee war, even if that meant leaving anonymous women and children behind.

I write seated in my office in Pristina, virtually hours before NATO strikes will hit Serbian positions. War today seems no better looking than before in Zagreb. I know that the fighting here (slaughter, really) will end sooner than I had thought, because, for the first time, Milosevic's war machine confronts a much stronger one, the NATO alliance. I know that one of the results of the coming air strikes will be the destruction of Milosevic's war machine, to the extent that it will never arise again as did the Serb machinery in this century.

I also know that this fact itself may change the Balkan people's behaviour towards war; we in Southeastern Europe will be confronted by the fact that there is a security umbrella over them created by NATO . The warfare of the past centuries, in particular the bloody ethnic cleansings of the past decade, is not valid anymore.

Given technology, war here may be over in a matter of weeks, and it may bring a dramatic change in our society. As a negotiator on the Kosovar side during the recent talks in France, I have signed an agreement that will give Kosovo three years of self-rule guaranteed by NATO, with the possibility of the people of Kosovo deciding their future status after that period of interim rule has finished. NATO has sufficient power to impose such a settlement.

What worries me now is that these kinds of political arrangements need war both to catalyse them, and to drive them forward. Only war's bloodshed, sad to say, can seal such a diplomatic bargain. The need of Kosova to be freed from Milosevic's grip has been so evident for a whole decade. Two million Kosovars suffered from Milosevic's rule in every aspect of their lives, from basic security to education. For years they tried to express their grievances through peaceful means.

As a political activist in the final days of Yugoslavia, I tried to build upon the philosophy of nonviolence, leading demonstrations and other forms of peaceful forms of dissent. But the powers who made decisions in the former Yugoslavia had contempt for such restraint. They did not deal with Kosovo precisely because Kosovo had not taken arms. Only when the first guns were heard from the Kosovar side did the Big powers react. As was demonstrated in Daytona few short years ago: a problem is dealt with only when it becomes an armed one.

Subscribe to PS Digital
PS_Digital_1333x1000_Intro-Offer1

Subscribe to PS Digital

Access every new PS commentary, our entire On Point suite of subscriber-exclusive content – including Longer Reads, Insider Interviews, Big Picture/Big Question, and Say More – and the full PS archive.

Subscribe Now

And, yet, despite Bosnia, Kosovo only drew blanks in the minds of the leaders of the world's democracies until violence spread. No need to explain what was behind the act of women and children fleeing in their villages in tractors; there was a vicious force from which these people were escaping. An additional lesson: a problem is recognised as a problem if it is preceded by one that is similar.(After Rwanda, it will be difficult to see similar cases of tribal slaughter in Africa and not think the very worst possible.)

So here I sit, expecting Kosovo's problems to be solved through arms, arms more powerful than those Milosevic possesses. Differing from Bosnia, the solution to the Kosovo problem in the next hours is the line of confrontation now drawn in the air. Serbian forces, squatting right outside my office can be defeated by NATO planes. Whenever I leave for home, if I do, I will be fully unprotected, as well as all of my compatriots here who do not have arms.

I have chosen to be here at this historic moment, for I was out of the country until three days ago and had plenty of invitations to continue my trip abroad. Having signed the Peace agreement in Paris last week, I also agreed that there would be consequences for the people of Kosovo. If the Serbian side did not agree to it, the agreement would have to be imposed, and that act of imposition would certainly endanger the civilian population. Since we signed the agreement, indeed, there have been more than 30 thousand new refugees. Only God knows how many civilians will be hurt in the days ahead. Having assumed responsibility for my signature, I think that it is only right to be here in these critical days, trying to expand on the list of arguments which explain, by virtue of nature, why war is a dirty thing.

https://prosyn.org/fdrV9zp