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I’d like to revise my judgment yesterday that the
appointment of Richard Grenell as Special Presidential Envoy for
Serbia and Kosovo Peace Negotiations is bizarre. It is likely worse
than that, possibly even tragic. I hasten to add that I have not
talked with the White House about it. There is no point: they lie
too much for me to rely on anything they say.
A few things are nevertheless clear. Grenell is a
John Bolton protege and far right advocate who has gone out of his
way to offend his German hosts. If you wanted to make common cause
with Europe in the Balkans, Grenell is the last American you would
choose for the task. The Germans have made it clear they will not
accept land swaps in the Balkans. Bolton was an advocate of land
swaps between Kosovo and Serbia. The logic was compelling for an
ethnic nationalist: Serbs want to be governed by Serbs and Albanians
by Albanians. Anything else is too hard. Equal rights is liberal
democratic clap trap, at home and abroad.
In addition, land swaps would kill two Clinton
accomplishments with one blow: Kosovo will become the eastern
province of Albania, sooner or later, and Bosnia and Herzegovina
will be partitioned. Don’t worry about how many people will be
displaced or die in the process, or even the radicalization of the
Bosnian Muslims if they are forced into a rump Islamic Republic.
Serbia will be so delighted to gain northern Kosovo as well as
Republika Srpska that it will love the Americans again. It might
even be possible to cut a deal with the Russians to recognize the
annexation of Crimea in exchange for UN membership for rump Kosovo,
which won’t matter for long as it will join Albania in due course.
That is the kind of crude ethnonationalist logic the Administration
is applying elsewhere, in particular to Israel and Palestine. Why
not in the Balkans?
What does this mean for the good people of Serbia,
Kosovo, and Bosnia? Pandora’s box will be opened with the border
changes:
Serbs will leave from south of the Ibar
in Kosovo,
Albanians will be pushed out of Serbia,
Muslims will try to seize Brcko in Bosnia
to prevent partition there,
Bosnian Croats will declare the
re-creation of their Herzeg-Bosna parastate.
In short, this is a formula for destabilization of
the Balkans, precisely what the Russians have sought. Is it any
wonder that the Trump Administration might try to deliver it?
Ironically, Secretary of State Pompeo* has been
visiting Macedonia and Montenegro, the two newest members of NATO.
He’ll get an earful there about the dangers that lurk in any land
swap arrangement. Montenegro, because it has been governed for many
years with the support of minorities, is not so much in danger,
though quite a few of its Albanians might like to join Kosovo and
most of its Serbs remain opposed to its independence. Macedonia is
certainly at risk if some sort of land swap becomes a reality, even
if many Albanians there will be reluctant to lose their sweet
power-sharing arrangement in Skopje.
You might think the Trump Administration has
enough trouble of its own making in the Middle East, Ukraine, North
Korea, China, Venezuela and half a dozen other places, without
reviving the zombie idea of land swaps in the Balkans. But they seem
determined, with Grenell’s appointment, to add the Balkans to the
list of their foreign policy failures.
*The original post said it was Vice President
Pence. Apologies for my mistake.
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