Serbia and the Kosovo issue: if you want peace, prepare for war

On March 26, armed militants attacked peaceful assembly of Serbs in Kosovska Mitrovica, dozens were beaten up severely. Director of the Serbian Office for Kosovo and Metohija Marko Djuric was detained violently. Later, he was deported from the territory of Kosovo and Metohija.

That violent attack by Kosovo separatists should become the final nail in the coffin with “remains of legally-binding agreement of Belgrade and Pristina.” Hopefully, myths of sooner historical reconciliation of Serbs and Albanians on Serbia’s path to EU will be buried in that coffin as well. Such illusions cherished by Serbs for the recent months have been broken by hardline policy of U.S. and EU in the Balkans.

It is high time to recall another notorious agreement called the Brussels Agreement. On April 19, 2013, U.S. and EU set an ultimatum to Serbia making it remove the Kosovo peace process from UN Security Council and transfer it to the European Union. Moscow silently approved that decision to the strains of well-known political mantra “Russians cannot be more Serbs than Serbs.” Yet, at that moment, Russia was well-aware that such “clean-up of Kosovo issue” would pave the wave towards West’s expansionist aspirations in Ukraine. Eventually, in November 2013, Euromaidan started in Kiev.

What is hidden behind the “legally-binding agreement” on Kosovo’s secession? It is evident that the West’s next tasks to Serbia will be anti-Russian sanctions and start of Serbia’s accession to NATO. Besides, Serbia will have to pass a package of European standards related to gender law and the rights of LGBT minorities. The first two will result in collapse of Serbian statehood and national policy, whereas the last one will ruin principles of the Serbian society.

Evidently, the Serbian-Albanian hasty reconciliation amid ultimatums of U.S. and EU is an illusion and a dangerous trap for Serbia and the Balkans.

What may be further steps and principles in the Kosovo settlement?

The first is transition from diplomatic defense to offensive. It has become obvious during the last five years that Brussels is unable to manage the Kosovo settlement process impartially. New formats will emerge. Serbia has good chances to shift from defensive diplomatic tactics to offensive one. To that end, Serbia will need to stop cherishing illusions about “European integration” and use resources of strategic parties and allies of Serbia, first of all, Russia, China and other countries not recognizing Kosovo.

The second principle is “if you want peace, get prepared for war.” Kosovo separatists should comprehend that any unlawful actions and provocations against the Serbian population of the region will result in inevitable crushing blow by Serbia. Neither U.S. nor other Western patrons will save the Kosovans committing bloody crimes against Kosovo Serbs. Golden rule of inevitable retaliation proved efficient when destroying terrorist groups in the territory of Russia, in Syria. It is a corner-stone of Israel’s policy. Russian-Serbian military and technical cooperation is a good basis for this policy. It is not 1999 now and high-precision weapons, radio-electronic and other weapons are supplied to Serbia on quite different principles. Nevertheless, political will and determination of Serbia’s leadership to ensure territorial integrity of the country and create real security guarantees for the Serbian people remain an overriding factor in this issue.

Victor Kolbanovsky