[FONT=arial,helvetica]by Lewis MacKenzie
Maj-Gen. Lewis MacKenzie, now retired, commanded UN troops during
the Bosnian civil war of 1992.
Five years ago our television screens were dominated by pictures of
Kosovo-Albanian refugees escaping across Kosovo's borders to the
sanctuaries of Macedonia and Albania. Shrill reports indicated that
Slobodan Milosevic's security forces were conducting a campaign of
genocide and that at least 100,000 Kosovo-Albanians had been
exterminated and buried in mass graves throughout the Serbian province.
NATO sprung into action and, in spite of the fact no member nation of the
alliance was threatened, commenced bombing not only Kosovo, but the
infrastructure and population of Serbia itself -- without the authorizing
United Nations resolution so revered by Canadian leadership, past and
present.
Those of us who warned that the West was being sucked in on the side of
an extremist, militant, Kosovo-Albanian independence movement were
dismissed as appeasers. The fact that the lead organization spearheading
the fight for independence, the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA), was
universally designated a terrorist organization and known to be receiving
support from Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda was conveniently ignored.
The recent dearth of news in the North American media regarding the
increase in violence in kosovo.netpared to the comprehensive coverage
in the European press strongly suggests that we Canadians don't like to
admit it when we are wrong. On the contrary, selected news clips on this
side of the ocean continue to reinforce the popular spin that those
dastardly Serbs are at it again.
A case in point was the latest crisis that exploded on March 15. The media
reported that four Albanian boys had been chased into the river Ibar in
Mitrovica by at least two Serbs and a dog (the dog's ethnic affiliation was
not reported). Three of the boys drowned and one escaped to the other
side. Immediately, thousands of Albanians mobilized and concentrated in
the area of the divided city. Attacks on Serbs took place throughout the
province resulting in an estimated 30 killed and 600 wounded. Thirty
Serbian Christian Orthodox churches and monasteries were destroyed,
more than 300 homes were burnt to the ground and six Serbian villages
cleansed of their occupants. One hundred and fifty international
peacekeepers were injured.
Totally ignored in North America were the numerous statements from
impartial sources that said there was no incident between the Serbs, the
dog and the Albanian boys. NATO Police spokesman Derek Chappell
stated on March 16 that it was "definitely not true" that the boys had been
chased into the river by Serbs. Chappell went on to say that the surviving
boy had told his parents that they had entered the river alone and that three
of his friends had been swept away by the current. Admiral Gregory
Johnson, the overall NATO commander, further stated that the ensuing
clashes were "orchestrated and well-planned ethnic cleansing" by the
Kosovo-Albanians. Those Serbs forced to leave joined the 200,000 who
had been cleansed from the province since NATO's "humanitarian"
bombing in 1999. The '"cleansees" have become very effective
"cleansers."
In the same week a number of individuals posing as Serbs ambushed and
killed a UN policeman and his local police partner. During the firefight
one of them was wounded which caused an immediate switch from
Serbian to Albanian as he screamed, "I've been hit"! The UN pursued the
attackers and tracked them to an Albanian-run farm where they discovered
weapons and the wounded Albanian who had died from his wounds. Four
Albanians were arrested. Once again, the ambush had been reported in the
United States but not the follow-up which clearly indicated yet another
orchestrated provocation by the Albanian terrorists.
Kosovo is administered by the UN, the very organization many Canadians
have indicated they would like to see take over from the United States in
Iraq. The fact the UN cannot order its civilian employees to go or stay
anywhere -- they have to volunteer -- combined with recent history that
saw the UN abandon Iraq after a single brutal attack on their compound in
Baghdad and the reality that Kosovo, under the organization's
administration, is a basket case, disqualifies it from consideration for such
a role.
Since the NATO/UN intervention in 1999, Kosovo has become the crime
capital of Europe. The sex slave trade is flourishing. The province has
become an invaluable transit point for drugs en route to Europe and North
America. Ironically, the majority of the drugs come from another state
"liberated" by the West, Afghanistan. Members of thedemobilized, but not
eliminated, KLA are intimately involved in organized crime and the
government. The UN police arrest a small percentage of those involved in
criminal activities and turn them over to a judiciary with a revolving door
that responds to bribes and coercion.
The objective of the Albanians is to purge all non-Albanians, including the
international community's representatives, from Kosovo and ultimately
link up with mother Albania thereby achieving the goal of "Greater
Albania." The campaign started with their attacks on Serbian security
forces in the early 1990s and they were successful in turning Milosevic's
heavy-handed response into worldwide sympathy for their cause. There
was no genocide as claimed by the West -- the 100,000 allegedly buried in
mass graves turned out to be around 2,000, of all ethnic origins, including
those killed in combat during the war itself.
The Kosovo-Albanians have played us like a Stradivarius. We have
subsidized and indirectly supported their violent campaign for an
ethnically pure and independent Kosovo.We have never blamed them for
being the perpetrators of the violence in the early '90s and we continue to
portray them as the designated victim today in spite of evidence to the
contrary. When they achieve independence with the help of our tax dollars
combined with those of bin Laden and al-Qaeda, just consider the message
of encouragement this sends to other terrorist-supported independence
movements around the world.
Funny how we just keep digging the hole deeper!
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