As for how many Albanians died, I qon't quibble over numbers. A handful is too many, although I will note that Helsinki Rights watch was using the number 1,500 total in the province prior to the war, 500 of which were Serbs who had died from the KLA. This is precisely the reason why the KLA was officially labeled a terrorist organization by many Western States, including the US and many in the EU.
I know that you believe Seslj or the Serbs had a grand plan for the mass ethnic cleansing of the province. I know that this was reported in the mass media everywhere. But the whole story was a hoax, and it was rather easy to discover. With future echoes of Nigerian Yellowcake, the West's intelligence services conjured up the Serbian genocide plan for Kosovo. They named it Horseshoe, but they gave it the Croatian word for Horseshoe, not the Serbian word, and thus they were tripped up.
I will give you a rather biased expose of this sordid event. Only the bias is a peculiar one. Have a look at this document:
Please read #s 93, 94, 95
As for whether the Albanians would have accepted a Serb presence in Kosovo given their experience, that whole prospect was moot, since Ramby called for the complete withdrawal of all Serbian military and police. Given this fact, it was a massive diplomatic screwup, and the region will very likely pay again for it.
And I never got personal in this discussion, so I will ask both of you to refrain from making assumptions about my experiences and my background. They are really irrelevant to the discussion here.
I'm looking at this from a global political outlook. Given the nature and frequency of the violence in Kosovo in 1999 (the killings had started a year earlier) one might argue--in relative terms--that the US jumped in very quickly. When compared to similar flashpoints all over the world (In Sri Lanka, Kashmir, East Timor, Kurdistan, Sudan, etc.) the Kosovo affair was a rather quick and decisive intrusion.
You're asking me to consider that I am the one with the distorted information. And yet I'm also the one who linked to a discussion of this subject in the UK Parliament. If the UK parliament has already admitted that the Western intelligence services deliberately conjured propaganda that would lead the sides to conflict, then how can I possibly be accused of having a distorted viewpoint? I don't understand your reasoning.
Again, I'm emphasizing the manner in which the West rattled its sabers. I am convinced that had they not done so, we would have had greater peace and fewer deaths, and this same analysis can be carried over to Bosnia. Had Cyrus Vance and David Owen had their way, 90,000 Bosnian Muslims would be alive today.
Whether I believe that the conflict was resolved rightfully, there is no doubt about that. I know that I would not be where I am right now and you would not be reading my comments right now. Am I happy? Yes, very much and I have the West to thank for intervening and giving me the rights and liberties that every citizen of a democratic country enjoys.
Thus, the Serb agreement to hand over autonomy at Ramby (Serb military and police would leave Kosovo and hand it over to the UN) would have resulted in fewer deaths, and a more multicultural Kosovo, under the UN's guidance. Instead, what we got were war, bombs, killings that raised the level of enmity on either side.
Regarding the Ramby agreement, the Serbs did not agree to the terms of the agreement because they did not want an international peacekeeping force present in Kosovo. Albanians DID agree to the peace deal on March 15th. On March 23rd Richard Holbrooke leaves Belgrade with a negative answer for the peace deal. Consequently, the bombing starts on 24th March. IF they would have agreed to completely move its military and police force out of the country and allow international peacekeepers inside Kosovo, they would have never agreed to a referendum on independence. That is what the Albanians would not have agreed on. Here's a quick timeline to the pre-war era and what specifically happened.
Cheers.
During the initial proposal, the Serbs agreed to relinquish Kosovo, and the Albanians rejected the proposal. That's why Albright became so angry.
The difference is, I'm talking about the initial proposal at Ramby, and you're talking about the second proposal which was put into play BECAUSE the Serbs agreed to the first, and the Albanians didn't.
I would note that the second proposal did NOT contain preconditions on Kosovo's final status, but instead it contained unacceptable conditions on NATO's free reign inside Serbia proper. In other words, it not only made it impossible for the Serbs to say YES to an agreement, but the proposal didn't even throw the Albanians a bone for their initial disagreement. It didn't allow them independence. And this should tell you quite a bit about the West's thinking. They were more interested in starting a war with Serbia than in fulfilling the Albanians' needs.
As for the population, I was talking about the numbers BEFORE the war. It's no surprise that most Kosovo Serbs have left the region and thus, the Albanian population now exceeds 90%.
