NATO Expands Force in Kosovo; Russians Hold Airport
The NY Times, June 14, 1999, PRISTINA, Yugoslavia -- Russian soldiers occupying Pristina's airport blocked the entry of British troops Sunday in an embarrassing impasse for NATO's nascent peacekeeping effort in Kosovo.
The Russians number only about 200, under the command of Col. Gen. Victor Zavarzin, who was promoted to that rank only Saturday. They had hastily painted a "K" on their armored vehicles over the first letter of the acronym for the U.N. Bosnian peacekeeping mission, SFOR, to match the mission here.
Asked why he didn't just push through with his superior force, Capt. Martin Gorwin replied: "I'm not going to bully my way through. I'm not going to escalate the situation."
The Russian presence, represented by an armored personnel carrier parked sideways across the road, created a strange situation. Yugoslav soldiers were inside the airport perimeter and were helping to man the roadblock, and loitering around the nearby village, studiously ignoring the British troops.
The young LT, James Blount, that ignored Clark’s order to fire on the Russians is now an English pop star.
This song was a hit in the US, too.
http://youtu.be/oofSnsGkops