> http://www.wpb.be/lalkar/lalkar11/1102.htm
Kosovo - Another Victim of Predatory Imperialism
Introduction
As our television screens are filled with pictures of horrible
atrocities
that have been committed against innocent Kosovan Albanians, just as not
so long ago they were filled with even worse atrocities committed
against
Bosnian Muslims, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that the
imperialist media expect people to draw: that the Serbian leader,
Milosevic, is an inhuman monster cast in the mould of Adolf Hitler,
which
the `international community' (i.e., US imperialism, backed up by
British
imperialism) has a right – a duty even – to overthrow by any means
necessary. The means being advocated is bombing of Serbian
infrastructure
– though most of the quality newspapers are not at all sure what that
would achieve, other than to unify the Serbian people more firmly than
ever behind Milosevic.
While imperialism is appealing to our humanitarian instincts, our hatred
of human suffering, we must never lose sight of the fact that
humanitarianism is entirely alien to imperialism. As we look around and
see the suffering and thousands of deaths of the innocent occurring in
Iraq, for example, as a result of the blockade imposed by US
imperialism,
and its attempts to strangle North Korea and Cuba, to say nothing of
bombing raids on Libya, Sudan, Afghanistan, as we remember imperialism's
genocidal wars of aggression in Korea and Vietnam, we can find no basis
for US imperialism to condemn anybody as war criminals unless it first
starts with itself. Its `humanitarianism' is obviously just a propaganda
ploy to mobilise people and nations in its support.
Knowing all this, should we nevertheless support US imperialism in its
determination to interfere in Yugoslavia's affairs, regardless of what
might be its real motives, in order to bring an end to the horrible
suffering of Kosovan Albanians? Subjected to the Pax Americana, would
they
not at least be relieved of the horrors of Serbian misrule?
This article will argue quite categorically that imposition of the Pax
Americana should be fought at any cost since for the masses of people,
life under imperialist domination would be far harder than ever it was
under Serbia. The bloodshed would not stop, since US imperialism is far
more ruthless in wiping out its opponents than the Serbians could ever
be.
All that would change is that we would not see these massacres on the
television, which rarely, if ever, shows us pictures of the atrocities
committed by US allies: for instance, the atrocities committed against
the
Serbs by the Croatians and Bosnian Muslims or the Kosovo Liberation
Army.
Even to the extent that extreme Serbian nationalism has been guilty of
provoking bloodshed, the scale of the bloodletting has been made
possible
only by the intervention of outside forces, principally western
imperialism, in supplying armaments and finance to rival nationalists
from
Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia. Had it not been for this outside
interference, Yugoslavia's domestic feuds would never have escalated and
spiralled out of the control of the local protagonists in the way that
they have done. The Serb leadership is certainly to blame for fanning
the
flames of nationalism, but it is western imperialism that has poured
petrol on these flames and set the whole region alight.
Background to the Balkan crisis
Let us endeavour, then, to try to understand how the present parlous
situation has arisen in Yugoslavia, blowing up seemingly out of nowhere
when only 15 short years ago "Yugoslavia could, and did, walk tall in
the
world boasting of the cultural diversity which made their country
unique"
(Bennett, C., Yugoslavia's Bloody Collapse, Hurst & Company, London,
1995,
p. 7). Moreover, far from nationalism being on the increase, and
despite
the best endeavours of nationalist politicians, "Yugoslavia's last
census,
which was carried out months before fighting broke out, registered a
jump
in the numbers of people who considered themselves Yugoslav, rather than
Croat, Serb or any other nationality" (ibid. p. 9).
There was a great deal within Yugoslavia which favoured the emergence of
a
Yugoslav national identity to take the place of `national' identities
based partly on religious difference and partly on which feudal empire
happened to have ruled the different regions inhabited by South Slavs.
The
Serb and Croat spoken languages are very close: in fact they are in
effect
the same language adulterated in different regions by a heavy input of
different neighbouring languages. Both Serbs and Croats have a history
of
struggle against foreign rule, and of mutual co-operation during those
struggles, although the oppressor in the case of the Serbs was the
Ottoman
empire while in the case of the Croats it was the Habsburg
(Austro-Hungarian) empire. In Yugoslavia Croats and Serbs had a common
territory incorporating all those areas, such as Bosnia Hercegovina,
where
neither Serb nor Croat nor anybody else constituted a majority of the
population. Muslims, incidentally, were originally Serbs who converted
to
Islam during the Ottoman empire. Their conversion took them out of the
Orthodox Christian community to which most Serbs belonged and which was
under Ottoman rule a self-governing entity. Muslim converts came under
different laws and a different system of governance, leading Muslims to
cease to identify with the Serbs. But there was no reason why in a
strictly secular society Muslims should not identify with Yugoslavia,
for
they had so much common history with Serbs that only religion really
stood
between them once the peculiar forms of Ottoman self-governance were
removed.
>From the point of view of nascent capitalism, it made much more sense to
create a home market over a geographical area of the size (and
containing
the natural resources) of an average European country at least, rather
than try to make one's mark in some Serb, Croat or Bosnian
mini-statelet.
The ousting of the Ottoman empire by the Serbs, and the break-up of the
Habsburg empire as a consequence of its defeat in the First World War,
made the realisation of Yugoslavia possible, although tensions between
Serb and Croat within the new state (which came into being in 1918) were
inevitable, if only to the extent that they had been pitted against each
other in the war by the Austro-Hungarian empire.
The marriage of Serb and Croat, however, foundered on major
incompatibilities. Serbs considered themselves superior as having fought
for, and won, their own independence from imperial rule, and having
fought
for, and won, the liberation of their territory from Austro-Hungary,
which
had invaded it in the First World War. Croats, on the other hand,
considered themselves superior because their territories were
economically
more developed, and because their proximity to the imperialist powers
enabled them to participate in the culture and sophistication that
accompanies wealth. In fact, Croatia's relative wealth was a major
sticking point as far as the unity of Yugoslavia was concerned, for the
Croatian bourgeoisie naturally thought that wealth should remain in
Croatia, while the dominant Serbian bourgeoisie thought it should be
more
evenly distributed – in their favour! As a result, the Serbs used their
dominance in the state organs to achieve this. Finding a formula in
which
Serb ambitions and Croat ambitions could be harmoniously accommodated
for
their mutual benefit proved impossible at the time, and relations
between
the two communities soured throughout the marriage. Yet nevertheless
there
was sufficient common interest for the parties to keep the marriage
going
and continue to look for ways to patch up their differences.
The Second World War
"The first Yugoslavia was not an unmitigated disaster doomed to end in
the
slaughter of the Second World War. That it did so has more to do with
foreign intervention and the exceptional circumstances of 1941 than any
innate desire of Serbs and Croats to wipe each other out." (Bennett,
p.33).
When the Second World War broke out, Yugoslavia initially came to an
accommodation with Hitler's Germany to allow German supplies (though not
troops) to pass through Yugoslavia to supply the German war effort in
Greece. This agreement, apparently designed to save Yugoslavia from
German
invasion, was unpopular amongst both Serbs and Croats and led to an
immediate coup d'etat, which overthrew the government. Axis forces
promptly invaded. Yugoslavia was carved up among Axis partners – Italy,
Bulgaria, Albania and Hungary all acquired sizeable portions, while
Germany took control of what was left through quisling governments –
that
of Ante Pavelic's Ustasi in Croatia and of Nedic in Serbia. The Ustasi
were a right-wing extreme Croat separatist organisation with little
popular support among Croats (their membership being estimated at 40,000
at most). Historically the organisation had opposed Croatia ever
becoming
part of Yugoslavia, and, by the outbreak of the Second World War, most
of
its membership was based in Bosnia Hercegovina rather than in Croatia
proper. It was the Ustasi who first introduced ethnic cleansing to
modern
Yugoslavia as they set about razing Serb villages in Croatian territory
with the express aim of `killing a third, forcing a third into exile and
converting the remaining third to Catholicism.' In the event, one in 6
Serbs living in the part of Yugoslavia handed over by Hitler to the
Ustasi
(the major part of Croatia and Bosnia Hercegovina) were slaughtered.
This murderous activity, however, did not lead to undying enmity between
Serbs and Croats, because Tito's partisans, who fought the German
occupation of Yugoslavia as well as Serb and Croat quislings alike, was
made up of both Serbs and Croats, even if, as might be expected, Serbs
predominated – for it was after all the Serbs who were suffering most
under the German occupation. Tito himself was half Croat (the other half
Slovene).
Tito's Yugoslavia
Once the war was over, Tito's partisans seized control of the whole of
Yugoslavia from the defeated Axis powers. To reconcile the communities
that had been set against each other in the war, the new government
copied
from the Soviet Union's constitution all those elements which guaranteed
the fullest national rights to each and every one of Yugoslavia's
communities. The new constitution of Yugoslavia was adopted on 31
January
1946, setting up a federation of 6 Republics (Bosnia Hercegovina,
Croatia,
Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Slovenia), with full rights of
secession, plus the autonomous province of Vojvodina and the autonomous
region of Kosovo within Serbia.
Although the constitution was copied from the Soviet Union, Tito's
`communism' was but a thin veneer for bourgeois Yugoslav nationalism.
What
was set up in Yugoslavia was not a communist system, but a system of
`workers' control' – i.e., production for profit, but profit to be
shared
among the workers at the production plants. Such a system was designed
to
enable a new Yugoslav bourgeoisie to emerge from among a meritocratic
elite - the production managers, who would of course take a
disproportionate share of the profits in question. Practice, however,
proved that (as indeed it had proved several times previously in world
history) that production for profit (i.e., capitalism) is incompatible
with the well-being of the majority of the workers. To the extent that
Yugoslavia of necessity had to provide civilised living standards for
the
workers who `controlled' production, it ceased to be sufficiently
profitable and would have collapsed but for one thing – the support of
foreign imperialism – above all, US imperialism. The latter was quick to
seize the opportunity, presented by the widespread belief that
Yugoslavia
was `communist', to use it as a propaganda weapon against communism
proper. Business Week of 12 November 1950 openly bragged that for the US
in particular and the West in general, supporting Tito had turned out to
be one of the least expensive ways of containing Russian communism. The
cost of western aid to Tito had amounted, at the time, to $51.7 million
–
far less than the billion dollars that the US had spent in Greece to
achieve the same result. And, in an interview in the Daily Telegraph of
12
December 1949, Anthony Eden foresaw that Tito's example and influence
would be able decisively to alter the course of events in central and
eastern Europe. The Truman administration decided to ensure that Tito's
experiment with `market socialism' was to appear to be successful, as a
means of supporting `market socialists' attempting to seize control in
the
USSR and eastern Europe. This was all part of the propaganda drive to
try
to prove to the proletariat of the whole world that scientific socialism
was wrong to claim that only a centralised planned economy can replace
and
do away with the dangerously outmoded capitalist system of production,
with its inevitable crises arising from the anarchy of production
inherent
in the capitalist system, and that only a centralised planned economy
can
guarantee to the working masses an ever-increasing standard of living.
Imperialism's ploy was to `disprove' this not only by economic blockade
and maintaining a state of constant threat of war which would hold back
the living standards of those living in communist societies, but also by
providing an apparent `living proof' that market socialism can be
successful.
Thus Bennett notes (p. 59): "Without western economic support Yugoslavia
would probably have crumbled in the face of a concerted economic
blockade
by the Soviet bloc [despite the fact that there was no economic blockade
by the western bloc!]. In September 1949, the Truman administration
granted Yugoslavia a $20 million aid package and by 1960 Yugoslavia had
consumed more than $2 billion worth of non-repayable western aid. Aid
became fundamental to Yugoslavia's development and allowed Yugoslavs to
live way beyond their means "
During these years of relative prosperity for all, underpinned by a
Constitution providing for strict equality and fairness between
Yugoslavia's communities, the Yugoslav `national question' became
quiescent. Everybody profited from being a Yugoslav. According to
Bennett
(p. 65):
"Great winners in Tito's Yugoslavia were the country's smaller and more
backward peoples, the Macedonians, Muslim Slavs, and to a lesser extent
Hungarians and Albanians. The security provided by the Titoist system
allowed Macedonian and Muslim Slavs to thrive culturally as never before
and to evolve a modern and confident national identity."
Imperialism withdraws support
Once market socialist revisionism had been planted in the Soviet Union
and
had irreversibly taken root under the aegis of Khrushchev and those who
followed him, US imperialism's enthusiasm for spending billions of
dollars
to prop up the Yugoslav economy rapidly vanished. As Bennett notes, "The
crunch came about the time of Tito's death [1980], when the loans dried
up
and Yugoslavia had to begin repaying the national debt [this had risen
from $3.5 billion in 1973 to $20.5 billion in 1981]. It coincided with
the
recession in western Europe stemmming from the Second Oil Shock of 1979,
while the debt burden was aggravated by high interest rates and an
exceptionally strong dollar. Between 1982 and 1989 the standard of
living
fell nearly 40% and in December 1989 inflation peaked at more than
2,000%."
As imperialist contributions to the Yugoslav coffers declined, so did
Yugoslav living standards. In these circumstances the bourgeois
leadership
of the Yugoslav `communist' party did what all bourgeois leaders do,
namely, find a diversion for the anger of the masses – a scapegoat to
take
the blame for the failures of the capitalist system. Hence the revival
of
Serb and Croat nationalism within Yugoslavia. In Croatia workers were
told
that their plunging living conditions were caused by unfair favouritism
within the Yugoslav state towards the Serbs. This led to a surge in the
Croatian nationalist movement, which was allowed to flourish and
propagate
its views openly. In Serbia workers were encouraged to blame the
parasitism of all other Yugoslav communities for the fall in Serbian
living standards. Yet all this propaganda, though it undoubtedly gave
rise
to virulent nationalist movements, did not prevent most ordinary people
from wanting to identify with Yugoslavia rather than their `nation', as
we
have seen from their responses to the census carried out shortly before
the fighting broke out. Ordinary people, having savoured the advantages
of
co-existence, have no interest in communal violence, but have to be
dragged into it by force.
Imperialism finally pulled the plug on Yugoslavia as eastern Europe
defected from the communist camp. Thus Bennett (p.11): "As communism
collapsed in the rest of Europe and the threat of Warsaw Pact invasion
disappeared [`Warsaw Pact invasion' is an imperialist euphemism for the
revolutionary effect that communist example has on the working masses in
capitalist countries], Yugoslavia lost the unique geopolitical position
it
had occupied in world politics for more than four decades. Diplomatic
activity and foreign investment shifted away from Yugoslavia towards
Eastern Europe's emerging democracies, and, without the Eastern bogey to
bind the country together and Western money to bail out the economy,
Yugoslavs found themselves for the first time entirely on their own."
It was at this point that Yugoslavia's ruling elites gave up their
attempts at co-operation. The relatively advanced Slovenes and Croat
bourgeoisies decided that their futures were better secured under the
aegis of German imperialism than within Yugoslavia's economic shambles
and
they bailed out. Only the Serbian bourgeoisie resisted the pressure to
become an imperialist stooge and sought to contine to battle for
economic
independence. This goal, however, was being sabotaged by the secession
of
republics, deserting to the enemy bearing with them much of Yugoslavia's
most precious assets. This is why Serbia went to war to try to prevent
the
secessions, while Europe and the US laboured to encourage them. The more
Serbia tried to halt the process of Yugoslav fragmentation by reversing
constitutional freedoms and increasing police and army control, the
louder
the howls of protest against Great Serbian chauvinism, suppression of
national rights, etc., etc., the more the masses were drawn into
communal
politics. Imperialism had Serbia caught in a bind, a trap that tightened
its hold with every attempt on Serbia's part to escape.
As is now known, Serbia was defeated in the civil war unleashed to
retain
Croatia within Yugoslavia, and again in the war to retain Bosnia
Hercegovina – largely as a result of massive assistance provided by
imperialism in the form of armaments and credits, and, in the case of
Bosnia, actual military intervention. The West's intervention ensured
that
what should have been a local difficulty requiring brisk suppression of
a
small band of frustrated compradors with little popular support actually
became a full scale war in which thousands perished and massive
destruction of homes and economic infrastructure took place – all grist
to
the mill of imperialist multinationals which looked forward to lucrative
reconstruction contracts when the war was over.
Kosovo
Kosovo is just the latest example of imperialist-inspired disintegration
of Yugoslavia. The majority Albanian population settled in the area
after
it became under-populated following the Serbian defeat by Turkish
warlords
at the battle of Kosovo Polje (the field of blackbirds) on 28 June 1389!
This battle, heavily mythologised, is the basis of Serbia's claim that
Kosovo is, despite its 90% Albanian majority, an integral part of
Serbia!
That claim, in turn, is bound to antagonise the overwhelming majority of
Kosovo's population, since there has been no Serb majority in the region
for over two centuries.
After Tito took power in Yugoslavia, there was originally no attempt
made
to win the hearts and minds of Kosovo's Albanians, who were far from
happy
to be part of Yugoslavia. They had been treated as a subject people in
pre-second world war Yugoslavia – Kosovo having been annexed by
Yugoslavia
from Albania, as a result of the latter being on the losing side in the
First World War and being too weak to prevent the loss of that
territory.
The inevitable result of this discrimination and oppression was that at
the time of the Second World War, Kossovars by and large sided with
Germany in that War. As a result of this they were poorly regarded by
Yugoslavs, who saw no reason to devote much in the way of resources to
this backward region. By the late 1960s, however, Kossovars began taking
to the streets to protest at their oppression. Tito accepted that their
grievances were justified and set about providing them with the same
rights as were enjoyed by other minority communities in Yugoslavia,
stopping short only at recognising that they had any right of secession.
Thus Albanian was recognised as the principal official language of the
region, a university was set up in Pristina as well as an institute for
promoting Albanian culture. With imperialist funds flowing freely into
Yugoslavia at the time, it was possible to direct some of this money
towards Kossovo, perhaps to dampen down any interest Kossovans might
otherwise have had in transferring their allegiance to socialist
Albania.
Hence "funds began to flow into Kosovo to finance a crash programme of
economic expansion. Albanians were encouraged to join the League of
Communists, the state administration and even the police force. Between
1971 and 1975, 70% of Kosovo's budget and investments were paid for out
of
federal sources." (Bennett, p. 72).
But the investment that flowed into Kosovo built large modern plants
that
yielded relatively few jobs. To the extent that living conditions
improved, this was largely aid-dependent.
It follows then that from 1980 onwards, as imperialism cut back its
funding of Yugoslavia, which then had to start repaying its massive
debts
from its own resources, Kosovo suffered badly. By March 1981 Kosovo
students were already demonstrating against poor living conditions and
job
prospects. Because living conditions were deteriorating all over
Yugoslavia and its government had no solution to this problem
whatsoever,
it had absolutely no way of coming to terms with the students' demands,
without encouraging like demands from other parts of the country. Its
only
possible response in the circumstances was to suppress the protests by
force. Troops and police moved into Pristina University campus to quell
the unrest. At least 12 people died and 150 were wounded. Heavy jail
sentences were imposed on demonstrators. The net effect of this was that
most of the goodwill created by the years of financial investment in
Kosovo was wiped out practically overnight.
The nationalist card
It was against Kosovo that the Yugoslav government first started playing
the nationalist card in earnest, in order to divert the anger of the
Yugoslav masses, particularly the Serbians, away from the bourgeoisified
`communist' elite (who were really responsible for the country's parlous
state):
"Articles written by [Serb] nationalists which would never have been
published during Tito's lifetime began to appear in the aftermath of the
unrest in Kosovo in 1981." Kosovan Albanians were accused of
perpetrating
genocide against Serbs, with a view to terrorising them into leaving the
region. Bennett considers that there was no truth in this allegation,
but
whether it be true or false, what cannot be denied is the fact that the
basis of Serb/Albanian co-existence began irretrievably to break down.
In
fact, Milosevic's rise to power was, in its final stages, effected
through
his willingness to encourage the most rabid Serb nationalism. His
popularity was based on telling the Serbs the lies that his party rivals
did not care tell them – i.e., that the explanation for their falling
living standards was their merciless exploitation by ungrateful
minorities
such as the Albanians. Once this nationalist analysis was unleashed,
however, it came to be directed at all Yugoslavia's non-Serb people,
turning the non-antagonistic contradictions between them into
antagonistic
ones and opening up a weakness in the fabric of the body politic which
laid Yugoslavia to decimation at the hands of imperialism as soon as the
moment for this was ripe.
The growth of nationalism was further encouraged by the conditions of
market socialism that of necessity pitted one region against the rest.
Each region sought to benefit at the expense of the rest, with the
result
that:
"All republics and provinces were guilty of pursuing their own
`national',
rather than Yugoslav, economic goals, often at the expense of the rest
of
the federation. Double capacity and even protectionism between republics
were features of Yugoslavia's economic landscape " and "instead of a
single economy, Yugoslavia was fragmenting into eight mini-states."
(Bennett, p. 75).
This was hardly the type of capitalism that was likely to thrive in a
world where to an ever larger extent it is monopolies which rule the
roost. This fragmentation went in the opposite direction of what
Yugoslavia needed to thrive, if it was ever going to thrive at all, as a
capitalist economy.
It is in this context that Milosevic resorted to the concept of Greater
Serbia to build an economic base of viable size. If minority communities
could not be maintained within Yugoslavia willingly, then they must be
retained forcibly, using as the instruments for their retention the Serb
communities scattered throughout most of the country. The English,
French
and Spanish nations were created this way, and, had there been no
outside
interference, no doubt the Yugoslav nation might have been created this
way as well. Nowadays, however, as the example of Yugoslavia shows, it
is
not possible to open up such antagonisms without powerful imperialist
predators taking advantage of the situation in order to enslave
oppressor
and oppressed alike.
Imperialism's interest in Yugoslavia
Imperialism's interests in Yugoslavia are manifold. Both European and US
imperialism want to exploit it, and disputes have arisen between them as
to the sharing of the booty. As we have seen, it was European
intervention
in recognising seceding states in the first place that lit the flames of
war. This fact is recognised even by the imperialist media. In fact the
International Herald Tribune of 20 September 1995 commented that the
whole
situation had been inflamed by imperialism, stating that western Europe,
led by Germany, had recognised Bosnia's Muslim government, knowing full
well that the Serbs would fight to overthrow it, and that from the start
the West had thrown its weight against the Bosnian Serbs. The wars were
then very greatly prolonged by US imperialism intervening just as peace
terms had been accepted on European terms to enable it to snatch victory
from European jaws and secure a good part of the booty for itself. Colin
Powell, the former US general, considered that the war in Yugoslavia was
perfectly avoidable and had taken place largely because of the
involvement
of the United States on the side of the Bosnian Muslims, whose
preponderance in Bosnian government the Bosnian Serbs could hardly be
expected to tolerate (see the New York Times of 19 September 1995).
Europe
is nevertheless forced to put up with US imperialism foraging in its
`back
yard', for, as Martin Walker of the Guardian reminded us on 9 October,
1998, (`The Kosovo Crisis: This is not the time to back down'), the US
Congress bears a great deal of the cost of rich Europe's security. Were
European imperialism to confront the US, there would be a real danger
that
"an increasingly isolationist US Congress" might no longer be prepared
to
do so. In other words, Europe is largely dependent on the United States
to
use its war machine to protect European imperialist interests all over
the
world. So long as US imperialism only demands a `fair share' and does
not
snaffle the whole of the loot, it is probable that Europeans will
continue
to put up with the situation, albeit not with any great enthusiasm.
Imperialist interests in Yugoslavia are based on a number of
considerations. First, it is another useful base from which to launch
military strikes against the oil-producing countries to the south,
should
they take it into their heads to challenge imperialism's right to drain
their oil wells at prices largely dictated by imperialism. It serves
equally well as a useful military base to launch military strikes
against
Russia to the north, should either its bourgeoisie stop co-operating
with
Western imperialism or should the proletariat rise up to make revolution
once again.
Second, Yugoslavia – and in particular Serbia – stands on the most
favoured route for an oil pipeline to convey Caucasian oil to the west.
It
is therefore crucial that Serbia be governed by a government responsive
to
Western imperialist demands.
Third, imperialism is interested in exploiting local resources and
markets. Control of the government means control of government
contracts.
For this reason also, every imperialist wants its own men installed in
each of the ex-Yugoslav states.
As far as Kosovo itself is concerned, Christopher Hedges in the New York
Times positively drooled over the wealth of the Stari Trg mining
complex,
containing glittering veins of lead, zinc, cadmium, gold and silver.
"The
Stari Trg mine, with its warehouses, is ringed with smelting plants, 17
metal treatment sights, freight yards, railroad lines, a power plant and
the country's largest battery plant", says Hedges. Lignite deposits in
the
Kosovo mines are sufficient for the next 13 centuries and the capacity
of
the lead and zinc refineries rank third in the world. The Trepce mining
complex, also in Kosovo, is "the most valuable piece of real estate in
the
Balkans worth at least $5 billion." Kosovo also has 17 billion tons of
coal reserves. These mines alone are sufficient to explain the interest
of
imperialism in prising Kosovo out of the Serbian grasp and the equal
determination of the Serbians never to let go of the `cradle of the
Serbian nation'.
In order to get their hands on Kosovo, European and US imperialism have
both been playing games in the region and, as with Bosnia, it seems that
once again US imperialism may be stepping in to secure a larger share of
the spoils than European imperialism considers is justified by US
imperialism's previous commitment to the cause. Nevertheless, joint US
and
Europeah efforts had been directed through the so-called Kosovo
Liberation
Army (KLA), trained and financed by US imperialism: the US Public
Broadcasting Service of 15 July reported that US Vietnam war veterans
were
training the KLA at bases in Albania and Kosovo. And at the scene of a
KLA
atrocity (the abduction, murder and incineration of 10 Serb civilians),
reported by the Guardian of 5 September 1998, a freshly-abandoned KLA
camp, there were left behind "several hundred yellow humanitarian aid
packages with an American flag on the label." along with a massive
arsenal
of expensive weaponry. There seems little doubt that the KLA massacres
were designed to inflame Serb nationalism and invite reprisals. In fact,
even Mark Almond in the Independent on Sunday of 4 October 1998 – as
great
an opponent of Serbia as can be found anywhere - writes: "There can be
little doubt that the KLA has pursued a policy designed to provoke
reprisals from the Serbs ..." (`Never again' again).
Much to the disgust of imperialism, the KLA collapsed in just seven
weeks
when faced with Serbian troops, thus giving lie to its alleged popular
support. Despite the millions of $US poured into it, the KLA proved
unequal to the task of capturing Kosovo for US imperialism.
As a result US imperialism determined on the course of forcing Milosevic
to open up Kosovo to imperialist exploitation by threatening to bomb
Serbian infrastructure to smithereens should he fail to surrender, in
the
same way as Iraqi infrastructure was smashed at a huge cost in human
suffering to the Iraqi people simply because Iraq would not bow to US
imperialist demands.
America's European allies, apart from Tony Blair who does not have a
scruple to his name, have been highly critical of the US intention to
use
NATO to effect the bombing raids, in blatant disregard of international
law to which the Europeans are in the habit of at least paying lip
service. Even the Daily Mail's Stephen Glover, in an article entitled
`British bombers must NOT go in' felt constrained to point out that
"legally speaking Kosovo is as much part of Serbia as Northern Ireland
is
part of the United Kingdom.
"I can't think of another example of British troops attacking a regime
for
mistreating its own citizens within its own borders.
"Do we think there is a sufficiently good justification for throwing
away
the rule book that has governed relations between states? My own test
would be one of proportion. I can imagine supporting action against a
regime that was committing mass genocide against its own people. But the
example scarcely holds good here. Most estimates suggest that the Serbs
have been responsible for some 1,000 deaths in Kosovo ...
"Moreover, Milosevic's main enemy, the Maoist-inclined KLA, is hardly a
bunch of angels. Its followers have used terrorist methods against
Serbian
targets"
This article draws attention to some very important factors: the sheer
illegality of NATO's proposed interference in the internal affairs of
sovereign states; the relatively small scale of atrocities committed by
Serbia in the course of putting down an armed rebellion. The allegation
that the KLA is `Maoist-inclined', however, should be taken with a pinch
of salt, for US imperialism, which certainly supported the KLA, does not
support `Maoists'. Such `Maoism' as the KLA may profess could at best be
purely cosmetic.
In face of the collapse of the KLA, imperialism would appear to have
abandoned for the time being the aim of setting up an independent
Kosovan
entity, or of joining Kosovo to Albania, in favour of simply
pressurising
Milosevic to do their bidding in return for letting Kosovo remain within
Yugoslavia. Ian Bruce in the Herald of 8 October (`When the talking
stops') claims that this is because "No Western country wanted a rogue,
uncontrollable Islamic state gaining independence on its southern flank,
a
potential haven for militants and terrorists. There still exists the
risk
of a wider ethnic war uniting people of Albanian descent against Greeks,
Macedonians and Bulgarians. The shock waves from that might easily push
Turkey and Russia into a conflagration that could shatter NATO itself."
David Buchan of the Financial Times (5 October 1998) advances a
different
reason for not favouring the secession of Kosovo: "The West," he says,
"does not want to see any re-drawing of international boundaries in the
Balkans. It does not want to endorse independence for Kosovo for fear
that, once it happened, the ethnic Albanian minority in Macedonia might
want to join up with the Kosovar Albanians and both might want to merge
with Albania proper".
If Kosovo were allowed independence, then there would be absolutely no
basis, he argues, for refusing the Bosnian Serbs the right to secede and
join Greater Serbia, an outcome he considers unthinkable.
It is probable, however, that the one and only reason why imperialism is
no longer pressing for Kosovo's independence is that the KLA has
collapsed, no `credible' and reliable potential puppet government can
therefore be identified, and imperialism has decided it can in any event
achieve its aims by putting pressure on Milosevic, at least for the time
being. No doubt it will take advantage of the next few months to regroup
a
force of loyal quislings in the province, and if successful, worries
about
upsetting the regional balance of forces should Kosovo secede will
disappear.
Our view is that of the two enemies facing the people of Kosovo,
imperialism is infinitely more dangerous and brutal than Serb
nationalism.
All imperialist intervention in Kosovo and elsewhere in Yugoslavia must
be
vigorously opposed, and the people of Yugoslavia and former Yugoslavia
must be left to settle their differences by themselves. Now, as in 1913,
the people of Yugoslavia can expect nothing from the bourgeoisie for, as
Lenin explained in The Balkan War and Bourgeois Chauvinism written in
March of that year:
"What was the real historical reason for settling urgent Balkan problems
by means of a war, a war guided by bougeois and dynastic interests? The
chief cause was the weakness of the proletariat in the Balkans, and also
the reactionary influence and pressure of the powerful European
bourgeoisie. They are afraid of real freedom both in their own countries
and in the Balkans; their only aim is profit at other people's expense;
they stir up chauvinism and national enmity to faciliate their policy of
plunder and to impede the free development of the oppressed classes of
the
Balkans..."
Kosovo - Another Victim of Predatory Imperialism
Introduction
As our television screens are filled with pictures of horrible
atrocities
that have been committed against innocent Kosovan Albanians, just as not
so long ago they were filled with even worse atrocities committed
against
Bosnian Muslims, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that the
imperialist media expect people to draw: that the Serbian leader,
Milosevic, is an inhuman monster cast in the mould of Adolf Hitler,
which
the `international community' (i.e., US imperialism, backed up by
British
imperialism) has a right – a duty even – to overthrow by any means
necessary. The means being advocated is bombing of Serbian
infrastructure
– though most of the quality newspapers are not at all sure what that
would achieve, other than to unify the Serbian people more firmly than
ever behind Milosevic.
While imperialism is appealing to our humanitarian instincts, our hatred
of human suffering, we must never lose sight of the fact that
humanitarianism is entirely alien to imperialism. As we look around and
see the suffering and thousands of deaths of the innocent occurring in
Iraq, for example, as a result of the blockade imposed by US
imperialism,
and its attempts to strangle North Korea and Cuba, to say nothing of
bombing raids on Libya, Sudan, Afghanistan, as we remember imperialism's
genocidal wars of aggression in Korea and Vietnam, we can find no basis
for US imperialism to condemn anybody as war criminals unless it first
starts with itself. Its `humanitarianism' is obviously just a propaganda
ploy to mobilise people and nations in its support.
Knowing all this, should we nevertheless support US imperialism in its
determination to interfere in Yugoslavia's affairs, regardless of what
might be its real motives, in order to bring an end to the horrible
suffering of Kosovan Albanians? Subjected to the Pax Americana, would
they
not at least be relieved of the horrors of Serbian misrule?
This article will argue quite categorically that imposition of the Pax
Americana should be fought at any cost since for the masses of people,
life under imperialist domination would be far harder than ever it was
under Serbia. The bloodshed would not stop, since US imperialism is far
more ruthless in wiping out its opponents than the Serbians could ever
be.
All that would change is that we would not see these massacres on the
television, which rarely, if ever, shows us pictures of the atrocities
committed by US allies: for instance, the atrocities committed against
the
Serbs by the Croatians and Bosnian Muslims or the Kosovo Liberation
Army.
Even to the extent that extreme Serbian nationalism has been guilty of
provoking bloodshed, the scale of the bloodletting has been made
possible
only by the intervention of outside forces, principally western
imperialism, in supplying armaments and finance to rival nationalists
from
Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia. Had it not been for this outside
interference, Yugoslavia's domestic feuds would never have escalated and
spiralled out of the control of the local protagonists in the way that
they have done. The Serb leadership is certainly to blame for fanning
the
flames of nationalism, but it is western imperialism that has poured
petrol on these flames and set the whole region alight.
Background to the Balkan crisis
Let us endeavour, then, to try to understand how the present parlous
situation has arisen in Yugoslavia, blowing up seemingly out of nowhere
when only 15 short years ago "Yugoslavia could, and did, walk tall in
the
world boasting of the cultural diversity which made their country
unique"
(Bennett, C., Yugoslavia's Bloody Collapse, Hurst & Company, London,
1995,
p. 7). Moreover, far from nationalism being on the increase, and
despite
the best endeavours of nationalist politicians, "Yugoslavia's last
census,
which was carried out months before fighting broke out, registered a
jump
in the numbers of people who considered themselves Yugoslav, rather than
Croat, Serb or any other nationality" (ibid. p. 9).
There was a great deal within Yugoslavia which favoured the emergence of
a
Yugoslav national identity to take the place of `national' identities
based partly on religious difference and partly on which feudal empire
happened to have ruled the different regions inhabited by South Slavs.
The
Serb and Croat spoken languages are very close: in fact they are in
effect
the same language adulterated in different regions by a heavy input of
different neighbouring languages. Both Serbs and Croats have a history
of
struggle against foreign rule, and of mutual co-operation during those
struggles, although the oppressor in the case of the Serbs was the
Ottoman
empire while in the case of the Croats it was the Habsburg
(Austro-Hungarian) empire. In Yugoslavia Croats and Serbs had a common
territory incorporating all those areas, such as Bosnia Hercegovina,
where
neither Serb nor Croat nor anybody else constituted a majority of the
population. Muslims, incidentally, were originally Serbs who converted
to
Islam during the Ottoman empire. Their conversion took them out of the
Orthodox Christian community to which most Serbs belonged and which was
under Ottoman rule a self-governing entity. Muslim converts came under
different laws and a different system of governance, leading Muslims to
cease to identify with the Serbs. But there was no reason why in a
strictly secular society Muslims should not identify with Yugoslavia,
for
they had so much common history with Serbs that only religion really
stood
between them once the peculiar forms of Ottoman self-governance were
removed.
>From the point of view of nascent capitalism, it made much more sense to
create a home market over a geographical area of the size (and
containing
the natural resources) of an average European country at least, rather
than try to make one's mark in some Serb, Croat or Bosnian
mini-statelet.
The ousting of the Ottoman empire by the Serbs, and the break-up of the
Habsburg empire as a consequence of its defeat in the First World War,
made the realisation of Yugoslavia possible, although tensions between
Serb and Croat within the new state (which came into being in 1918) were
inevitable, if only to the extent that they had been pitted against each
other in the war by the Austro-Hungarian empire.
The marriage of Serb and Croat, however, foundered on major
incompatibilities. Serbs considered themselves superior as having fought
for, and won, their own independence from imperial rule, and having
fought
for, and won, the liberation of their territory from Austro-Hungary,
which
had invaded it in the First World War. Croats, on the other hand,
considered themselves superior because their territories were
economically
more developed, and because their proximity to the imperialist powers
enabled them to participate in the culture and sophistication that
accompanies wealth. In fact, Croatia's relative wealth was a major
sticking point as far as the unity of Yugoslavia was concerned, for the
Croatian bourgeoisie naturally thought that wealth should remain in
Croatia, while the dominant Serbian bourgeoisie thought it should be
more
evenly distributed – in their favour! As a result, the Serbs used their
dominance in the state organs to achieve this. Finding a formula in
which
Serb ambitions and Croat ambitions could be harmoniously accommodated
for
their mutual benefit proved impossible at the time, and relations
between
the two communities soured throughout the marriage. Yet nevertheless
there
was sufficient common interest for the parties to keep the marriage
going
and continue to look for ways to patch up their differences.
The Second World War
"The first Yugoslavia was not an unmitigated disaster doomed to end in
the
slaughter of the Second World War. That it did so has more to do with
foreign intervention and the exceptional circumstances of 1941 than any
innate desire of Serbs and Croats to wipe each other out." (Bennett,
p.33).
When the Second World War broke out, Yugoslavia initially came to an
accommodation with Hitler's Germany to allow German supplies (though not
troops) to pass through Yugoslavia to supply the German war effort in
Greece. This agreement, apparently designed to save Yugoslavia from
German
invasion, was unpopular amongst both Serbs and Croats and led to an
immediate coup d'etat, which overthrew the government. Axis forces
promptly invaded. Yugoslavia was carved up among Axis partners – Italy,
Bulgaria, Albania and Hungary all acquired sizeable portions, while
Germany took control of what was left through quisling governments –
that
of Ante Pavelic's Ustasi in Croatia and of Nedic in Serbia. The Ustasi
were a right-wing extreme Croat separatist organisation with little
popular support among Croats (their membership being estimated at 40,000
at most). Historically the organisation had opposed Croatia ever
becoming
part of Yugoslavia, and, by the outbreak of the Second World War, most
of
its membership was based in Bosnia Hercegovina rather than in Croatia
proper. It was the Ustasi who first introduced ethnic cleansing to
modern
Yugoslavia as they set about razing Serb villages in Croatian territory
with the express aim of `killing a third, forcing a third into exile and
converting the remaining third to Catholicism.' In the event, one in 6
Serbs living in the part of Yugoslavia handed over by Hitler to the
Ustasi
(the major part of Croatia and Bosnia Hercegovina) were slaughtered.
This murderous activity, however, did not lead to undying enmity between
Serbs and Croats, because Tito's partisans, who fought the German
occupation of Yugoslavia as well as Serb and Croat quislings alike, was
made up of both Serbs and Croats, even if, as might be expected, Serbs
predominated – for it was after all the Serbs who were suffering most
under the German occupation. Tito himself was half Croat (the other half
Slovene).
Tito's Yugoslavia
Once the war was over, Tito's partisans seized control of the whole of
Yugoslavia from the defeated Axis powers. To reconcile the communities
that had been set against each other in the war, the new government
copied
from the Soviet Union's constitution all those elements which guaranteed
the fullest national rights to each and every one of Yugoslavia's
communities. The new constitution of Yugoslavia was adopted on 31
January
1946, setting up a federation of 6 Republics (Bosnia Hercegovina,
Croatia,
Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Slovenia), with full rights of
secession, plus the autonomous province of Vojvodina and the autonomous
region of Kosovo within Serbia.
Although the constitution was copied from the Soviet Union, Tito's
`communism' was but a thin veneer for bourgeois Yugoslav nationalism.
What
was set up in Yugoslavia was not a communist system, but a system of
`workers' control' – i.e., production for profit, but profit to be
shared
among the workers at the production plants. Such a system was designed
to
enable a new Yugoslav bourgeoisie to emerge from among a meritocratic
elite - the production managers, who would of course take a
disproportionate share of the profits in question. Practice, however,
proved that (as indeed it had proved several times previously in world
history) that production for profit (i.e., capitalism) is incompatible
with the well-being of the majority of the workers. To the extent that
Yugoslavia of necessity had to provide civilised living standards for
the
workers who `controlled' production, it ceased to be sufficiently
profitable and would have collapsed but for one thing – the support of
foreign imperialism – above all, US imperialism. The latter was quick to
seize the opportunity, presented by the widespread belief that
Yugoslavia
was `communist', to use it as a propaganda weapon against communism
proper. Business Week of 12 November 1950 openly bragged that for the US
in particular and the West in general, supporting Tito had turned out to
be one of the least expensive ways of containing Russian communism. The
cost of western aid to Tito had amounted, at the time, to $51.7 million
–
far less than the billion dollars that the US had spent in Greece to
achieve the same result. And, in an interview in the Daily Telegraph of
12
December 1949, Anthony Eden foresaw that Tito's example and influence
would be able decisively to alter the course of events in central and
eastern Europe. The Truman administration decided to ensure that Tito's
experiment with `market socialism' was to appear to be successful, as a
means of supporting `market socialists' attempting to seize control in
the
USSR and eastern Europe. This was all part of the propaganda drive to
try
to prove to the proletariat of the whole world that scientific socialism
was wrong to claim that only a centralised planned economy can replace
and
do away with the dangerously outmoded capitalist system of production,
with its inevitable crises arising from the anarchy of production
inherent
in the capitalist system, and that only a centralised planned economy
can
guarantee to the working masses an ever-increasing standard of living.
Imperialism's ploy was to `disprove' this not only by economic blockade
and maintaining a state of constant threat of war which would hold back
the living standards of those living in communist societies, but also by
providing an apparent `living proof' that market socialism can be
successful.
Thus Bennett notes (p. 59): "Without western economic support Yugoslavia
would probably have crumbled in the face of a concerted economic
blockade
by the Soviet bloc [despite the fact that there was no economic blockade
by the western bloc!]. In September 1949, the Truman administration
granted Yugoslavia a $20 million aid package and by 1960 Yugoslavia had
consumed more than $2 billion worth of non-repayable western aid. Aid
became fundamental to Yugoslavia's development and allowed Yugoslavs to
live way beyond their means "
During these years of relative prosperity for all, underpinned by a
Constitution providing for strict equality and fairness between
Yugoslavia's communities, the Yugoslav `national question' became
quiescent. Everybody profited from being a Yugoslav. According to
Bennett
(p. 65):
"Great winners in Tito's Yugoslavia were the country's smaller and more
backward peoples, the Macedonians, Muslim Slavs, and to a lesser extent
Hungarians and Albanians. The security provided by the Titoist system
allowed Macedonian and Muslim Slavs to thrive culturally as never before
and to evolve a modern and confident national identity."
Imperialism withdraws support
Once market socialist revisionism had been planted in the Soviet Union
and
had irreversibly taken root under the aegis of Khrushchev and those who
followed him, US imperialism's enthusiasm for spending billions of
dollars
to prop up the Yugoslav economy rapidly vanished. As Bennett notes, "The
crunch came about the time of Tito's death [1980], when the loans dried
up
and Yugoslavia had to begin repaying the national debt [this had risen
from $3.5 billion in 1973 to $20.5 billion in 1981]. It coincided with
the
recession in western Europe stemmming from the Second Oil Shock of 1979,
while the debt burden was aggravated by high interest rates and an
exceptionally strong dollar. Between 1982 and 1989 the standard of
living
fell nearly 40% and in December 1989 inflation peaked at more than
2,000%."
As imperialist contributions to the Yugoslav coffers declined, so did
Yugoslav living standards. In these circumstances the bourgeois
leadership
of the Yugoslav `communist' party did what all bourgeois leaders do,
namely, find a diversion for the anger of the masses – a scapegoat to
take
the blame for the failures of the capitalist system. Hence the revival
of
Serb and Croat nationalism within Yugoslavia. In Croatia workers were
told
that their plunging living conditions were caused by unfair favouritism
within the Yugoslav state towards the Serbs. This led to a surge in the
Croatian nationalist movement, which was allowed to flourish and
propagate
its views openly. In Serbia workers were encouraged to blame the
parasitism of all other Yugoslav communities for the fall in Serbian
living standards. Yet all this propaganda, though it undoubtedly gave
rise
to virulent nationalist movements, did not prevent most ordinary people
from wanting to identify with Yugoslavia rather than their `nation', as
we
have seen from their responses to the census carried out shortly before
the fighting broke out. Ordinary people, having savoured the advantages
of
co-existence, have no interest in communal violence, but have to be
dragged into it by force.
Imperialism finally pulled the plug on Yugoslavia as eastern Europe
defected from the communist camp. Thus Bennett (p.11): "As communism
collapsed in the rest of Europe and the threat of Warsaw Pact invasion
disappeared [`Warsaw Pact invasion' is an imperialist euphemism for the
revolutionary effect that communist example has on the working masses in
capitalist countries], Yugoslavia lost the unique geopolitical position
it
had occupied in world politics for more than four decades. Diplomatic
activity and foreign investment shifted away from Yugoslavia towards
Eastern Europe's emerging democracies, and, without the Eastern bogey to
bind the country together and Western money to bail out the economy,
Yugoslavs found themselves for the first time entirely on their own."
It was at this point that Yugoslavia's ruling elites gave up their
attempts at co-operation. The relatively advanced Slovenes and Croat
bourgeoisies decided that their futures were better secured under the
aegis of German imperialism than within Yugoslavia's economic shambles
and
they bailed out. Only the Serbian bourgeoisie resisted the pressure to
become an imperialist stooge and sought to contine to battle for
economic
independence. This goal, however, was being sabotaged by the secession
of
republics, deserting to the enemy bearing with them much of Yugoslavia's
most precious assets. This is why Serbia went to war to try to prevent
the
secessions, while Europe and the US laboured to encourage them. The more
Serbia tried to halt the process of Yugoslav fragmentation by reversing
constitutional freedoms and increasing police and army control, the
louder
the howls of protest against Great Serbian chauvinism, suppression of
national rights, etc., etc., the more the masses were drawn into
communal
politics. Imperialism had Serbia caught in a bind, a trap that tightened
its hold with every attempt on Serbia's part to escape.
As is now known, Serbia was defeated in the civil war unleashed to
retain
Croatia within Yugoslavia, and again in the war to retain Bosnia
Hercegovina – largely as a result of massive assistance provided by
imperialism in the form of armaments and credits, and, in the case of
Bosnia, actual military intervention. The West's intervention ensured
that
what should have been a local difficulty requiring brisk suppression of
a
small band of frustrated compradors with little popular support actually
became a full scale war in which thousands perished and massive
destruction of homes and economic infrastructure took place – all grist
to
the mill of imperialist multinationals which looked forward to lucrative
reconstruction contracts when the war was over.
Kosovo
Kosovo is just the latest example of imperialist-inspired disintegration
of Yugoslavia. The majority Albanian population settled in the area
after
it became under-populated following the Serbian defeat by Turkish
warlords
at the battle of Kosovo Polje (the field of blackbirds) on 28 June 1389!
This battle, heavily mythologised, is the basis of Serbia's claim that
Kosovo is, despite its 90% Albanian majority, an integral part of
Serbia!
That claim, in turn, is bound to antagonise the overwhelming majority of
Kosovo's population, since there has been no Serb majority in the region
for over two centuries.
After Tito took power in Yugoslavia, there was originally no attempt
made
to win the hearts and minds of Kosovo's Albanians, who were far from
happy
to be part of Yugoslavia. They had been treated as a subject people in
pre-second world war Yugoslavia – Kosovo having been annexed by
Yugoslavia
from Albania, as a result of the latter being on the losing side in the
First World War and being too weak to prevent the loss of that
territory.
The inevitable result of this discrimination and oppression was that at
the time of the Second World War, Kossovars by and large sided with
Germany in that War. As a result of this they were poorly regarded by
Yugoslavs, who saw no reason to devote much in the way of resources to
this backward region. By the late 1960s, however, Kossovars began taking
to the streets to protest at their oppression. Tito accepted that their
grievances were justified and set about providing them with the same
rights as were enjoyed by other minority communities in Yugoslavia,
stopping short only at recognising that they had any right of secession.
Thus Albanian was recognised as the principal official language of the
region, a university was set up in Pristina as well as an institute for
promoting Albanian culture. With imperialist funds flowing freely into
Yugoslavia at the time, it was possible to direct some of this money
towards Kossovo, perhaps to dampen down any interest Kossovans might
otherwise have had in transferring their allegiance to socialist
Albania.
Hence "funds began to flow into Kosovo to finance a crash programme of
economic expansion. Albanians were encouraged to join the League of
Communists, the state administration and even the police force. Between
1971 and 1975, 70% of Kosovo's budget and investments were paid for out
of
federal sources." (Bennett, p. 72).
But the investment that flowed into Kosovo built large modern plants
that
yielded relatively few jobs. To the extent that living conditions
improved, this was largely aid-dependent.
It follows then that from 1980 onwards, as imperialism cut back its
funding of Yugoslavia, which then had to start repaying its massive
debts
from its own resources, Kosovo suffered badly. By March 1981 Kosovo
students were already demonstrating against poor living conditions and
job
prospects. Because living conditions were deteriorating all over
Yugoslavia and its government had no solution to this problem
whatsoever,
it had absolutely no way of coming to terms with the students' demands,
without encouraging like demands from other parts of the country. Its
only
possible response in the circumstances was to suppress the protests by
force. Troops and police moved into Pristina University campus to quell
the unrest. At least 12 people died and 150 were wounded. Heavy jail
sentences were imposed on demonstrators. The net effect of this was that
most of the goodwill created by the years of financial investment in
Kosovo was wiped out practically overnight.
The nationalist card
It was against Kosovo that the Yugoslav government first started playing
the nationalist card in earnest, in order to divert the anger of the
Yugoslav masses, particularly the Serbians, away from the bourgeoisified
`communist' elite (who were really responsible for the country's parlous
state):
"Articles written by [Serb] nationalists which would never have been
published during Tito's lifetime began to appear in the aftermath of the
unrest in Kosovo in 1981." Kosovan Albanians were accused of
perpetrating
genocide against Serbs, with a view to terrorising them into leaving the
region. Bennett considers that there was no truth in this allegation,
but
whether it be true or false, what cannot be denied is the fact that the
basis of Serb/Albanian co-existence began irretrievably to break down.
In
fact, Milosevic's rise to power was, in its final stages, effected
through
his willingness to encourage the most rabid Serb nationalism. His
popularity was based on telling the Serbs the lies that his party rivals
did not care tell them – i.e., that the explanation for their falling
living standards was their merciless exploitation by ungrateful
minorities
such as the Albanians. Once this nationalist analysis was unleashed,
however, it came to be directed at all Yugoslavia's non-Serb people,
turning the non-antagonistic contradictions between them into
antagonistic
ones and opening up a weakness in the fabric of the body politic which
laid Yugoslavia to decimation at the hands of imperialism as soon as the
moment for this was ripe.
The growth of nationalism was further encouraged by the conditions of
market socialism that of necessity pitted one region against the rest.
Each region sought to benefit at the expense of the rest, with the
result
that:
"All republics and provinces were guilty of pursuing their own
`national',
rather than Yugoslav, economic goals, often at the expense of the rest
of
the federation. Double capacity and even protectionism between republics
were features of Yugoslavia's economic landscape " and "instead of a
single economy, Yugoslavia was fragmenting into eight mini-states."
(Bennett, p. 75).
This was hardly the type of capitalism that was likely to thrive in a
world where to an ever larger extent it is monopolies which rule the
roost. This fragmentation went in the opposite direction of what
Yugoslavia needed to thrive, if it was ever going to thrive at all, as a
capitalist economy.
It is in this context that Milosevic resorted to the concept of Greater
Serbia to build an economic base of viable size. If minority communities
could not be maintained within Yugoslavia willingly, then they must be
retained forcibly, using as the instruments for their retention the Serb
communities scattered throughout most of the country. The English,
French
and Spanish nations were created this way, and, had there been no
outside
interference, no doubt the Yugoslav nation might have been created this
way as well. Nowadays, however, as the example of Yugoslavia shows, it
is
not possible to open up such antagonisms without powerful imperialist
predators taking advantage of the situation in order to enslave
oppressor
and oppressed alike.
Imperialism's interest in Yugoslavia
Imperialism's interests in Yugoslavia are manifold. Both European and US
imperialism want to exploit it, and disputes have arisen between them as
to the sharing of the booty. As we have seen, it was European
intervention
in recognising seceding states in the first place that lit the flames of
war. This fact is recognised even by the imperialist media. In fact the
International Herald Tribune of 20 September 1995 commented that the
whole
situation had been inflamed by imperialism, stating that western Europe,
led by Germany, had recognised Bosnia's Muslim government, knowing full
well that the Serbs would fight to overthrow it, and that from the start
the West had thrown its weight against the Bosnian Serbs. The wars were
then very greatly prolonged by US imperialism intervening just as peace
terms had been accepted on European terms to enable it to snatch victory
from European jaws and secure a good part of the booty for itself. Colin
Powell, the former US general, considered that the war in Yugoslavia was
perfectly avoidable and had taken place largely because of the
involvement
of the United States on the side of the Bosnian Muslims, whose
preponderance in Bosnian government the Bosnian Serbs could hardly be
expected to tolerate (see the New York Times of 19 September 1995).
Europe
is nevertheless forced to put up with US imperialism foraging in its
`back
yard', for, as Martin Walker of the Guardian reminded us on 9 October,
1998, (`The Kosovo Crisis: This is not the time to back down'), the US
Congress bears a great deal of the cost of rich Europe's security. Were
European imperialism to confront the US, there would be a real danger
that
"an increasingly isolationist US Congress" might no longer be prepared
to
do so. In other words, Europe is largely dependent on the United States
to
use its war machine to protect European imperialist interests all over
the
world. So long as US imperialism only demands a `fair share' and does
not
snaffle the whole of the loot, it is probable that Europeans will
continue
to put up with the situation, albeit not with any great enthusiasm.
Imperialist interests in Yugoslavia are based on a number of
considerations. First, it is another useful base from which to launch
military strikes against the oil-producing countries to the south,
should
they take it into their heads to challenge imperialism's right to drain
their oil wells at prices largely dictated by imperialism. It serves
equally well as a useful military base to launch military strikes
against
Russia to the north, should either its bourgeoisie stop co-operating
with
Western imperialism or should the proletariat rise up to make revolution
once again.
Second, Yugoslavia – and in particular Serbia – stands on the most
favoured route for an oil pipeline to convey Caucasian oil to the west.
It
is therefore crucial that Serbia be governed by a government responsive
to
Western imperialist demands.
Third, imperialism is interested in exploiting local resources and
markets. Control of the government means control of government
contracts.
For this reason also, every imperialist wants its own men installed in
each of the ex-Yugoslav states.
As far as Kosovo itself is concerned, Christopher Hedges in the New York
Times positively drooled over the wealth of the Stari Trg mining
complex,
containing glittering veins of lead, zinc, cadmium, gold and silver.
"The
Stari Trg mine, with its warehouses, is ringed with smelting plants, 17
metal treatment sights, freight yards, railroad lines, a power plant and
the country's largest battery plant", says Hedges. Lignite deposits in
the
Kosovo mines are sufficient for the next 13 centuries and the capacity
of
the lead and zinc refineries rank third in the world. The Trepce mining
complex, also in Kosovo, is "the most valuable piece of real estate in
the
Balkans worth at least $5 billion." Kosovo also has 17 billion tons of
coal reserves. These mines alone are sufficient to explain the interest
of
imperialism in prising Kosovo out of the Serbian grasp and the equal
determination of the Serbians never to let go of the `cradle of the
Serbian nation'.
In order to get their hands on Kosovo, European and US imperialism have
both been playing games in the region and, as with Bosnia, it seems that
once again US imperialism may be stepping in to secure a larger share of
the spoils than European imperialism considers is justified by US
imperialism's previous commitment to the cause. Nevertheless, joint US
and
Europeah efforts had been directed through the so-called Kosovo
Liberation
Army (KLA), trained and financed by US imperialism: the US Public
Broadcasting Service of 15 July reported that US Vietnam war veterans
were
training the KLA at bases in Albania and Kosovo. And at the scene of a
KLA
atrocity (the abduction, murder and incineration of 10 Serb civilians),
reported by the Guardian of 5 September 1998, a freshly-abandoned KLA
camp, there were left behind "several hundred yellow humanitarian aid
packages with an American flag on the label." along with a massive
arsenal
of expensive weaponry. There seems little doubt that the KLA massacres
were designed to inflame Serb nationalism and invite reprisals. In fact,
even Mark Almond in the Independent on Sunday of 4 October 1998 – as
great
an opponent of Serbia as can be found anywhere - writes: "There can be
little doubt that the KLA has pursued a policy designed to provoke
reprisals from the Serbs ..." (`Never again' again).
Much to the disgust of imperialism, the KLA collapsed in just seven
weeks
when faced with Serbian troops, thus giving lie to its alleged popular
support. Despite the millions of $US poured into it, the KLA proved
unequal to the task of capturing Kosovo for US imperialism.
As a result US imperialism determined on the course of forcing Milosevic
to open up Kosovo to imperialist exploitation by threatening to bomb
Serbian infrastructure to smithereens should he fail to surrender, in
the
same way as Iraqi infrastructure was smashed at a huge cost in human
suffering to the Iraqi people simply because Iraq would not bow to US
imperialist demands.
America's European allies, apart from Tony Blair who does not have a
scruple to his name, have been highly critical of the US intention to
use
NATO to effect the bombing raids, in blatant disregard of international
law to which the Europeans are in the habit of at least paying lip
service. Even the Daily Mail's Stephen Glover, in an article entitled
`British bombers must NOT go in' felt constrained to point out that
"legally speaking Kosovo is as much part of Serbia as Northern Ireland
is
part of the United Kingdom.
"I can't think of another example of British troops attacking a regime
for
mistreating its own citizens within its own borders.
"Do we think there is a sufficiently good justification for throwing
away
the rule book that has governed relations between states? My own test
would be one of proportion. I can imagine supporting action against a
regime that was committing mass genocide against its own people. But the
example scarcely holds good here. Most estimates suggest that the Serbs
have been responsible for some 1,000 deaths in Kosovo ...
"Moreover, Milosevic's main enemy, the Maoist-inclined KLA, is hardly a
bunch of angels. Its followers have used terrorist methods against
Serbian
targets"
This article draws attention to some very important factors: the sheer
illegality of NATO's proposed interference in the internal affairs of
sovereign states; the relatively small scale of atrocities committed by
Serbia in the course of putting down an armed rebellion. The allegation
that the KLA is `Maoist-inclined', however, should be taken with a pinch
of salt, for US imperialism, which certainly supported the KLA, does not
support `Maoists'. Such `Maoism' as the KLA may profess could at best be
purely cosmetic.
In face of the collapse of the KLA, imperialism would appear to have
abandoned for the time being the aim of setting up an independent
Kosovan
entity, or of joining Kosovo to Albania, in favour of simply
pressurising
Milosevic to do their bidding in return for letting Kosovo remain within
Yugoslavia. Ian Bruce in the Herald of 8 October (`When the talking
stops') claims that this is because "No Western country wanted a rogue,
uncontrollable Islamic state gaining independence on its southern flank,
a
potential haven for militants and terrorists. There still exists the
risk
of a wider ethnic war uniting people of Albanian descent against Greeks,
Macedonians and Bulgarians. The shock waves from that might easily push
Turkey and Russia into a conflagration that could shatter NATO itself."
David Buchan of the Financial Times (5 October 1998) advances a
different
reason for not favouring the secession of Kosovo: "The West," he says,
"does not want to see any re-drawing of international boundaries in the
Balkans. It does not want to endorse independence for Kosovo for fear
that, once it happened, the ethnic Albanian minority in Macedonia might
want to join up with the Kosovar Albanians and both might want to merge
with Albania proper".
If Kosovo were allowed independence, then there would be absolutely no
basis, he argues, for refusing the Bosnian Serbs the right to secede and
join Greater Serbia, an outcome he considers unthinkable.
It is probable, however, that the one and only reason why imperialism is
no longer pressing for Kosovo's independence is that the KLA has
collapsed, no `credible' and reliable potential puppet government can
therefore be identified, and imperialism has decided it can in any event
achieve its aims by putting pressure on Milosevic, at least for the time
being. No doubt it will take advantage of the next few months to regroup
a
force of loyal quislings in the province, and if successful, worries
about
upsetting the regional balance of forces should Kosovo secede will
disappear.
Our view is that of the two enemies facing the people of Kosovo,
imperialism is infinitely more dangerous and brutal than Serb
nationalism.
All imperialist intervention in Kosovo and elsewhere in Yugoslavia must
be
vigorously opposed, and the people of Yugoslavia and former Yugoslavia
must be left to settle their differences by themselves. Now, as in 1913,
the people of Yugoslavia can expect nothing from the bourgeoisie for, as
Lenin explained in The Balkan War and Bourgeois Chauvinism written in
March of that year:
"What was the real historical reason for settling urgent Balkan problems
by means of a war, a war guided by bougeois and dynastic interests? The
chief cause was the weakness of the proletariat in the Balkans, and also
the reactionary influence and pressure of the powerful European
bourgeoisie. They are afraid of real freedom both in their own countries
and in the Balkans; their only aim is profit at other people's expense;
they stir up chauvinism and national enmity to faciliate their policy of
plunder and to impede the free development of the oppressed classes of
the
Balkans..."