Some Damn Fool Thing in the Balkans

I know everyone is busy and all ... but you need to keep an eye on the usual problem areas.

You would think one war in Europe at a time would be enough, but you should never underestimate the Serbs.

As with most of us who were on active duty in the 1990s, I have more than a passing interest in the former Yugoslavia - and invested my quota of effort in its wars.

Later in my career I later served in NATO with Slovenes, Croatians, and N. Macedonians. I've vacationed a few times in Slovenia and Croatia. One of my daughters has studied, twice, in Serbia.

I keep an eye on it ... and thankfully so are some smart people in The Pentagon.

The Balkans is always on the edge and has been for centuries, so it is only natural that now and then it bubbles over.

You may have missed with all the other news that the frozen conflict in Kosovo was throwing sparks again. That is why on Friday I tilted my head a bit with this announcement;

Two U.S. Air Force B-52 Stratofortress aircraft assigned to the 23rd Bomb Squadron currently operating out of RAF Fairford, United Kingdom, will conduct low approach flyovers over Southeastern Europe scheduled on August 22.

The purpose of each flyover is to demonstrate U.S. commitment and assurance to NATO Allies and partners located in Southeastern Europe. Additionally, this will provide citizens an opportunity to take photos, videos, and enjoy the aircraft flying overhead.

That told me that the Balkans desk has run their concerns up the chain and whatever they briefed was enough to greenlight a not insignificant display.

Sure enough, off it went Monday;

A pair of U.S. Air Force B52 strategic bombers on Monday flew low over the Croatian resort of Dubrovnik and three other NATO-member states in the region as a sign of support amid the Russian aggression in Ukraine.

In addition to the walled Croatian tourist resort of Dubrovnik, the aircraft flew over the government headquarters in Skopje, North Macedonia, the downtown Skanderbeg Square in the Albanian capital, Tirana, and up the Adriatic coast of Montenegro.

The Balkans and the Adriatic Sea have lately seen increased military, intelligence and propaganda activity by Moscow, which considers the region of its strategic interest because of its access to the Mediterranean.

Serbia is about Russia's last friend in Europe and make no mistake ... the Serbs do not consider borders settled anywhere - they are just waiting for the moment to be ripe.

This too came out yesterday;

Serbia’s president called on NATO on Sunday to “do their job” in Kosovo or he says Serbia itself will move to protect its minority in the breakaway province.

The fiery televised address to his nation by President Aleksandar Vucic followed the collapse of political talks between Serbian and Kosovo leaders earlier this week mediated by the European Union in Brussels.

Serbia, along with its allies Russia and China, has refused to recognize Kosovo's 2008 declaration of independence. A NATO-led intervention in 1999 ended the war between Serbian forces and separatists in Kosovo and stopped Belgrade’s bloody crackdown against Kosovo's majority Albanians.

The EU has overseen years of unsuccessful talks to normalize their ties, saying that’s one of the main preconditions for Kosovo and Serbia’s eventual membership in the 27-nation bloc.

“We have nowhere to go, we are cornered,” Vucic said. “We will save our people from persecution and pogroms, if NATO does not want to do it.”

The successor states of the Serbian dominated Yugoslavia were Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, and North Macedonia. Bosnia itself is a spot-welded confederation of Bosnian Muslims, Croatian Catholics, and Orthodox Serbians who all have a blood feud against each other. It was, is, and will be a mess.

In the three decades after the wheels came off Yugoslavia, we now find Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro, and North Macedonia all inside NATO. 

How may Americans know they are obligated to throw the bodies of their children in to an eventual Balkan bloodbath? Not many, I guess.

So, the intel is such that we feel the need to throw a B-52 brushback pitch against the Serbians.

The Serbians. 

At moments like this, I always seem to remember the words of German Field Marshal August von Mackensen;

You are going into a fight against a new enemy who is dangerous, tough, brave and sharp. You are going to the Serbian front, to Serbia, and Serbs are the people who love their freedom and who are willing to fight for it to their last. 

2022. What a year.

Pray for peace.

The Ghosts of Gadaffi and Milošević Haunt Syria

I think I’ll keep on the Syria topic for another day just for an observation that bubbled up again after yesterday’s post; why Assad isn’t going anywhere.

There is a strange amnesia coming from the internationalist nomenklatura as to why Assad has held on so long, why the war has gone on so long, and how steadfast the Syrians are to keep moving towards eliminating the last Islamists holdouts in their territory.
Assad is no fool - he’s an ophthalmologist after all - and from day-1, there was zero reason for him to do anything but go for the win in his civil war.

All he had to do is look to his northwest and southwest to see examples where the internationalist West was not to be trusted when they called for peace or negotiation short of total victory.

First, there is what happened to the former head of the former Yugoslavia when the West's benighted "Smartest-People-In-The-Room" convinced him that it was in his best interest to agree to peace.

As the former Yugoslavia consumed itself, some version of peace was reached via the Dayton Peace Agreement.

There they are, signing the agreement.

Slobodan Milošević (third from left), Alija Izetbegović (fourth from left), and Franjo Tudjman (sixth from left) initialing the Dayton Accords at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, outside Dayton, Ohio, November 21, 1995.

What did Milošević for his efforts?

On 11 March 2006, former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milošević died in his prison cell of a heart attack, while being tried for war crimes at the ICTY in The Hague...

Less than a decade after Dayton with the Iraqi invasion still in the shock phase, another strong man decided he wanted to no longer be on the bad side of the West. What did he do?

On December 19, 2003, long-time Libyan President Muammar Gaddafi stunned much of the world by renouncing Tripoli’s weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs and welcoming international inspectors to verify that Tripoli would follow through on its commitment.

Following Gaddafi’s announcement, inspectors from the United States, United Kingdom, and international organizations worked to dismantle Libya’s chemical and nuclear weapons programs, as well as its longest-range ballistic missiles. Washington also took steps toward normalizing its bilateral relations with Tripoli, which had essentially been cut off in 1981.

Libya’s decision has since been characterized as a model for other states suspected of developing WMD in noncompliance with their international obligations to follow. Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control Stephen Rademaker stated May 2, 2005 during the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference that Libya’s choice “demonstrates that, in a world of strong nonproliferation norms, it is never too late to make the decision to become a fully compliant NPT state,” noting that Tripoli’s decision has been “amply rewarded.”

And what did Gadaffi get for his efforts?

...a jerky three minutes and more shot by fighter Ali Algadi on his iPhone and acquired by a website, the Global Post – that describes those moments in the most detail. A dazed and confused Gaddafi is led from the drain where he was captured, bleeding heavily from a deep wound on the left side of his head, from his arm, and, apparently, from other injuries to his neck and torso, staining his tunic red with blood. He is next seen on the ground, surrounded by men with weapons shouting “God is great” and firing in the air, before being lifted on to a pickup truck as men around him shout that the ruler for more than four decades should be “kept alive”.

There are other clips that complete much of the story: Gaddafi slumped on a pickup truck, face smeared with blood, apparently unconscious; Gaddafi shirtless and bloody on the ground surrounded by a mob; Gaddafi dead in the back of an ambulance. What is not there is the moment of his death – and how it happened – amid claims that he was killed by fighters with a shot to the head or stomach. By Friday, the day after he died, the body of the former dictator once so feared by his Libyan opponents was facing a final indignity – being stored on the floor of a room-sized freezer in Misrata usually used by restaurants and shops to keep perishable goods.

When the usual suspects wonder why people like Assad hold on so long, they should perhaps ask themselves what they and their friends at Davos and Munich have messaged to the bad players in the world over the last couple of decades or so.

Trust is a hard currency. 

A bunch of smug people looking for scalps and headlines have spent their currency and then some - and then wonder why no one is interested in doing business with them.

Gadaffi of Milošević in their time knew that even Idi Amin was left in peace to die of old age in Saudi Arabia.

What does Assad see?