Serbia Wants Its Troops Back in Kosovo in Case of Iraq War

voanews.com ^ | 02 Feb 2003, 20:24 UTC | VOA News

[Destro]

Serbia Wants Its Troops Back in Kosovo in Case of Iraq War

VOA News

02 Feb 2003, 20:24 UTC The Serbian government has asked NATO for permission to send its troops back to Kosovo in case of a war in Iraq.

Serbian Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic says Serb troops would fill any security vacuum in the province if NATO withdraws its soldiers for military action against Iraq, although there are no immediate plans to do so.

Kosovo has been administered by the United Nations since 1999, after a NATO-led air campaign ended then Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's crackdown on the region's ethnic Albanian majority.

A senior advisor to Kosovo's Prime Minister Bajram Rexhepi criticized Mr. Djindjic's request. He said that any tendency to return Serbian forces to Kosovo would be an attempt to destabilize the province and the whole region.

Some information for this report provided by AP.

[SauronOfMordor]

If the US and Britain decide they are no longer interested, then NATO/UN occupation will end. The rest of Europe will have no stomach for it.

[SauronOfMordor]

Around the globe Islamic entente extremists read this as a sign that Allah favours the bold -- and they prepare to strike an unsuspecting and unprepared West with a fury that dwarfs 9/11.

They should be careful they don't finally wake up the people of Europe to the point where they decide the only solution for Muslim expansionism is the Carthage Option

[smokegenerator]

If you know something about terroristic attacks, best come forward with that knowledge. I believe it is a federal crime to withhold information.

Europe trembles from the heavy drugs your donkeys carry on the back roads.

[LenS]

Yup, there's no better defender of Christians than the Serbs -- the only people who defended Christianity by slaughtering Christian Slovenes and Croats. I guess they were just warming up for the Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo with a little practice killing and raping on Christians.

[smokegenerator]

I suggest your reading up on the history of the Ottoman Empire occupation and treatment of the Balkan people. When did the Serbs begin "slaughtering" the Croats and Slovenes?

[LenS]

And the Serbs will keep those Muslim terrorists in line by killing some Christians first, right? Or was it by cooperating with Iraq on air defense? Or by building Saddam his bunker?

Serbia, defending Christianity by killing off those pesky Croats and Slovenes, with their impure Christianity first, and working with that great Christian saint, Saddam Hussein.

If the Serbs move an inch towards Kosovo, Belgrade should be turned into our new bombing range. The B-52's in England could always use an alternate place to dump their bombloads in case of complications. Heck, we could test some of the new tactical nukes there.

[smokegenerator]

So, when did the Serbs begin slaughtering Croatians and Slovenians? was it 1998, 1990, 1991 or 1992? When?

[bobi]

read up your history on World War II,

You will see that the defenders of Catholic Christianity i.e. the Croats slaughtered Serbs in their Nazi camps.

By the way this is not to exuse the Serb actions in Vukovar in 1991 but what the Croats did from 1941-45 was genocide.

[gitmogrunt]

If it talks like a Quran reading, blood thirsty islamofascist, and walks like a Quran reading, blood thirsty islamofascist, then it must be a Quran reading,blood thirsty islamofascist.

Millions of Muslims will die in your scenario, as a matter of fact your islamofascist raghead looks good in the cross hairs of my M-14 right now.

[smokegenerator]

Unfortunately, those same Croat actions led to the bloodletting at Vukovar. The Croats were murdering Serb civilians, thereby creating enncirclement of the town by Serb forces when the Croats refused. The Croats communicated to Zagred regarding the transgressions being committed by the HVO. Tudjman did not care.

Heck, you want my friend who was a Serbian sniper based outside of Vukovar email me so you and a few others hear about what the Croats did?

[Incorrigible]

best come forward with that knowledge

Oh c'mon smokegenerator. Don't question. Enjoy!

[joan]

Vukovar Serbs were being terrorized, ethnically cleansed, tortured and killed starting in the Spring of 1991:

"Between 3 May and 14 September 1991 members of Croatian armed units, as well as Tomislav MERCEP'S bodyguards arrested in Vukovar more than one hundred Serbs whom they subsequently locked up and tortured…"
Source: http://www.balkan-archive.org.yu/politics/war_crimes/vukovar/vukovar7b.html

(After Vukovar, Tomislav Mercep was involved in ordering the torture and murder of imprisoned Serbs in Gospic, according to the confession of Miro Bajramovic)

Serb reports here show the YPA didn't really do anything to help them and was passive while all this was going on, but in certain villages Serbs were able to save themselves from cleansing by putting up barricades. It appears only after Croats directly attacked the army or its members or with great show of force, barricaded them - or tried to -would actual fighting between Croat armed forces and the YPA start:

http://www.balkan-archive.org.yu/politics/war_crimes/vukovar/vukovar8.html

At the beginning of Croatian-Serbian confrontation in Vukovar municipality, YPA troops in the Vukovar garrison, acting upon the order of army leadership and Presidency of SW Yugoslavia, did not interfere in the conflict, but tried to act as a kind of impartial peace force. However, they were inconsistent in these efforts - for instance, they interfered on 2 May 1991 in Borovo Selo to save Croatian policemen, but stayed in the barracks when Croatian armed forces spearheaded forcible "cleansing" actions in Borovo Naselje (4 July) and Luzac (25 July) against the Serb population. Their members, with the exception of reserve troops from Vukovar, moved freely about the town even when Vukovar Serbs could practically no longer get out of their houses. The first major incident between YPA and armed members of the Croatian Democratic Union party militia occurred on 20 August 1991, when privates Dejan LAZAREVIC and Ljubo BRADULJEVIC were attacked in the Vukovar post office, where they used to come every day to pick up mail and money orders for soldiers in the barracks…

The new incident, which led to the first WA intervention against Croatian armed forces in Vukovar, happened on 25 August 1991, when Croatian soldiers, near their barricade on the way out of Borovo Naselje, planted an anti-tank mine under a YPA truck, the passage of which from Vukovar to Borovo Selo had been duly announced to the Croatian police…

Judging by this report, Vukovar was then for a few hours under full control of YPA units, which also took possession of the road towards Bogdanovci, the only way which the Croatian armed forces could use to enter and leave the city. However, at the request of the Croatian party, cessation of hostilities and return of YPA units to the barracks was arranged. This was a trap from which they could not get loose until 18 November 1991.

Descriptions of how Serbs were being killed and thrown in the Danubes along with a couple photos of Serbs dead in the Danube and their names: http://www.balkan-archive.org.yu/politics/war_crimes/vukovar/vukovar7c.html

[foreign policy wonk]

Horrible things were done to the Serbs yes.

However, this doesn't excuse the brutality unleashed upon the Croatians by the Serbs in any way.

The Serbs screwed up in Vukovar, after that the diplomatic tide had turned. Individuals like James Baker III and Lawrence Eagleburger turned on their former protege Milosevic after assuring him of tacit support in keeping Communist Yugoslavia together in June of 1991.

The use of the Serb paramilitaries was Milosevic's way of creating "plausible deniability" which has insulated him from direct responsiblity to this day, no matter how Vojislav Seselj insists that Milosevic directed the entire operation.

However this use was a double-edged sword as the paramilitaries were criminals and their behaviour was atrocious.

The Croat-Serb gripes are at an end, as conservatives on both sides see that the larger enemy is foreign sponsorship of Islamic elements in Bosnia.

Liberals on both sides continue to work as puppets of the international community, exemplified by individuals such as Djindjic and Mesic.

There is no stomach for a fight with Croatia in Serbia, as the objective is and will remain Kosovo.

Be seeing you,

foreign policy wonk

post 0015

[junta]

I personally bet on the Serbs. All this theogical egalistarianism is quickly collapsing to reality, deal with it.

[Ichabod Walrus]

Horrible things were done to the Serbs yes.

Not that you really care either way.... Exactly what does person with your double standards consider sufficient atrocities inflicted on Serbs to warrant the right to defend themselves? Not that I really care for an answer, so if your schedule leaves you pressed for a response, don't bother.

However, this doesn't excuse the brutality unleashed upon the Croatians by the Serbs in any way.

That's one opinion. Another one identifies the Croats as having started a war, as in WWII, and leaves them alone to fight it out to the end. If you're truly appalled by either the Croatian genocide of WWII or their efforts to start a war in 1991, you would appreciate that the targets of their genocide have the right to defend themselves.

If you had any sense of common decency, you would certainly not come on here to defend treasonous Balkan terrorists for starting a war and then having the great moral courage to go running to the US and Germany for help.

[illumini]

SEND THE SERBS IN! ITS THEIR LAND.

[foreign policy wonk]

Mr. Walrus

Your post is full of innuendo and strawmen.

I condemn the actions of the Croatians during the Second World War, and understand the desire of the Croatian Serbs to extricate themselves from an independent Croatia in the early 1990's.

However, they were duped by Slobodan Milosevic, an opportunist of the worst stripe, who willingly sold out the frightened Serbs, after his media under Mitevic fed them incessant propaganda.

Slobo pulled the plug after promising them much.

The Croatian Serbs are true victims, left out to fend for themselves.



Be seeing you,

foreign policy wonk


post 0018

[Ichabod Walrus]

I condemn the actions of the Croatians during the Second World War, and understand the desire of the Croatian Serbs to extricate themselves from an independent Croatia in the early 1990's.

I didn't get that sense from your earlier post and am still not sure what you're trying to say above. Either you are satisfied that the Serbs had reasonable grounds for defending themselves against Croat aggression or you don't. Referring to the Serbs as "Croatian Serbs" suggests to me that whatever happened to Serbs either past or present is not sufficient grounds for them to have defended themselves.

However, they were duped by Slobodan Milosevic, an opportunist of the worst stripe, who willingly sold out the frightened Serbs, after his media under Mitevic fed them incessant propaganda.

You blame Milosevic for not supporting the Serbs (whom you call "Croatian Serbs" although they held Yugoslav citizenship - not "Croatian" citizenship). And yet, Serbs were not sold out by Milosevic to the extent they were sold out by Europe, Russia and the US. Milosevic's role doesn't even begin to compare with the complicity of the UN either, which outright recognized Croatia's claim to territories in which Croats were no more than a small minority. While Milosevic did not support the Serbs, the US and NATO most certainly did support their enemies. I hope none of this is too new for you.

Your suggestion that the Serbs, who had witnessed genocide yesterday, and a unapologetic genocidal mentality on the part of their Balkan opponents for 45 years after that, were duped by "propaganda" indicates full well where your sympathies lie.

Don't try to blame Milosevic for not having acted according to one of those revisionist histories of recent Balkan events which are so much the rage in imperialist circles for the past decade. If Milosevic did not behave like the raging Serb nationalist as he is portrayed in those fantasies you probably have read, it is the Serbs' problem, not yours.

[foreign policy wonk]

My loyalties lie with myself and with the truth, and your strawmen are an attempt to creat a slant.

The Croatian Serbs were duped by Milosevic's media machine, and were left hanging in the wind.

If I were a Serb from Croatia, I'd be calling for his head after the promises he made to them.

The Belgrade regime had the support of the West, especially Britain, France, and the US, as evidence by James Baker III's trip to Belgrade in June 1991.

Germany's moves to recognize Slovenia and Croatia were it's first attempts to throw some weight around post-unification.

Germany's diplomatic muscle certainly couldn't overpower that of the aforementioned Big 3.

Where does the blame lie then for the switch?

Obviously, it lies with the methodology of the Serbian actions in Slovenia and Croatia through poor media action, through arrogance, and partly with the fact that they were still communist (if only in name) and communism was very unpopular since the Wall had only come down so recently.

I assume that you are Serbian.

I trust that you won't fall into the trap of blaming the "NWO" for the abandonment of the Serbs of Croatia.



be seeing you,

foreign policy wonk


post 0020

[merak]

I'm all for it.