A Disaster In The Making

WHEN THE LEADERS OF KOSOVO'S NEARLY 2 MILLION Albanians met with President Clinton on May 29, he repeated a favorite administration mantra--that the United States would not let Kosovo become another Bosnia. In truth, America and its allies are replicating exactly the failed approach they took in the early 1990s, when Yugoslavia began to fall apart. Every day the death toll in Kosovo climbs. The U.S. government has used neither force nor diplomacy in dealing with the problem, only procrastination, incessant meetings and endless and frequently changing rhetoric.

During the past decade Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic has removed Kosovo's autonomy, imposed a repressive Serbian police rule, and encouraged the development of an apartheid society meant to drive ethnic Albanians from the region. The Clinton administration shrugged. So, in the past three months, the independence-seeking Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) has stepped up its insurrection, and Serb forces have responded with wholesale violence. Finally, the violence has produced some Western attention.

For all of its massive failure in Bosnia, the Bush administration recognized the implications of a Kosovo explosion and drew a red line there. In his Christmas warning of 1992, Bush told Milosevic not to unleash his military force against the Albanians. Milosevic did not cross the line. The Clinton administration has not sent a similar clear-cut message to Milosevic.

Instead, Clinton has adopted a strategy that failed in Bosnia: lots of fulminating, some carrots but no real sticks. The United States persuaded Milosevic to begin direct talks with the Albanian nonviolent movement by promising to lift some sanctions on Yugoslavia. Clinton did not make ending violence against the Albanians a part of the deal. In effect, Milosevic felt free to continue his brutal crackdown. The result: Right now, Milosevic's forces are trying to seal off the border with Albania and to destroy Albanian villages in mid-Kosovo. Albanians are being killed and ethnically cleansed by the same methods the Serbs used in Bosnia. Thousands of refugees have been created.

The basic truth is that Milosevic has virtually lost Kosovo for Serbia. Milosevic can effectively control the territory for the long term in only one way--by driving out the bulk of the 2 million Albanians who live there. He may still try to do that. Meanwhile, his focus on destroying the Albanian insurgents by force keeps driving more of the Serbs--already fewer than 200,000--out of Kosovo, reducing even further the rationale for holding on to the province.

For the West (and for the Balkans) Kosovo represents an enormously difficult problem. Independence for Kosovo would be a mortal threat to the stability of Macedonia, with its large Albanian population, to the Bosnian peace settlement and to the southern Balkans in general. That is why the West insists on keeping Kosovo in Serbia. Unfortunately, that policy collides with the reality on the ground. Kosovo also raises the issue of NATO. Does the alliance have the will to deal with the real security issues of Europe?