No Return HomeAuthor(s): Melanie McDonaghSource: Foreign Affairs, Vol. 78, No. 1 (Jan. - Feb., 1999), p. 135Published by: Council on Foreign RelationsStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20020250 .

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Is Kosovo Real?

Kosovo was the subject of a special policy in the 1920s and 1930s, which included col

onization projects and plans for expulsions, until autonomy was recognized

as a

necessary shield for the Titoist system. The harsh, systematic treatment and seg

regation of the Kosovars for much of the

twentieth century has probably bolstered

their territorial and community identity.

Djilas writes that Malcolm does not understand that the Kosovars have

themselves to blame for not participating

fully in Serbian politics. But who could

they vote for, even in a free election?

The major Serb opposition parties are

much more hardline on Kosovo than

even Milosevic. They have called for

mass expulsions since the mid-1980s.

What petrifies the Serb political class is that within a generation ethnic minorities

combined will outnumber the Serbs; within two generations the Albanians alone

will outnumber them. Three provinces of

southern Serbia already have an Albanian

majority. In a system where legitimacy is

based on extreme nationalism, harsh rule

of the Albanians and the current Serb

dominance over politics, the economy, and the military will be very hard to

maintain as a minority population. The

ultimate dilemma for Milosevic is that he does not want to integrate the Albanians

but he wants to retain Kosovo. Serb elites

will seek to prevent minority Serb status

there by any means.

As Malcolm's work makes clear, this is

a modern nationalist problem, not an issue

that was salient to medieval monarchs, much less a linear result of the Battle of

Kosovo in 1389. norman cigar is a Senior Associate,

Public International Law & Policy Group,

Washington, D. C.

No Return Home MELANIE MCDONAGH

I was not surprised at the nationalist tone

of Djilas' review. During the course of

personal conversations with Djilas, he has

more than once called the massacre of

thousands of Muslims in Srebrenica malign Western propaganda. He has, on the

record, supported the partition of Bosnia.

This view is easy to hold from the comfort of Belgrade, but it is less attractive to those

families who were violently expelled from

their homes in what is now Republika Srpska. They want more than anything else to return home, if they could without

the certainty of violence and intimidation.

Djilas is, quite justly, a supporter of the principle that Serbs who fled the 1995

Croatian army offensive in the Krajina should be entitled to return safely home; if he visited, say, Sanski Most to talk with

people who were ethnically cleansed

from towns like Prijedor and Omarksa, he would find out exactly why it is that

Muslims are unable to return to where

they came from.

MELANIE MCDONAGH is ajoumalist,

formerly with The Evening Standard of London.

Wrong on Albania KATHLEEN IMHOLZ

Djilas' review makes three statements

concerning Albania that are dangerously

wrong.

First, he writes, "An independent Kosovo would immediately unite with

Albania." This is not true, despite the

FOREIGN AFFAIRS -January/February 1999 U35]

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