Kerry Gives Russia An Ultimatum On Ukraine - And Forgets Something

US Secretary of State John Kerry delivered an ultimatum to Russia today, warning of 'serious repercussions if Russia doesn't reverse course by Monday.'

What he wants, apparently, is for a referendum scheduled in Crimea for this Sunday over whether to secede from Ukraine and join the Russian Federation to be canceled.

Secretary Kerry is meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Serge Lavrov in London tomorrow to discuss things further, or to be non-diplomatic about it to tell Lavrov what the U.S. and EU plan to do if the Russians don't comply.

As Kerry put it, “There will be a response of some kind to the referendum itself,” Kerry said. “If there is no sign [from Russia] of any capacity to respond to this issue ... there will be a very serious series of steps on Monday.”

While what Kerry means is remains to be seen, a few things here are a given.There's no doubt that Russia wants the Crimea back, if for no other reason than to continue to control its warm water naval base at Sebastopol. They are also obviously stage managing the referendum, although since over 60% of the Crimea's population is ethnic Russian, it's questionable whether they even need to.

It's also true that back in 1994, Bill Clinton, John Major, Boris Yeltsin and Leonid Kuchma – the then-leaders of the USA, UK, Russia and Ukraine - signed a treaty, The Budapest Memorandum, that guaranteed Ukraine's borders in exchange for Ukraine giving up its nuclear arsenal.

So on the face of it, it certainly does seem like Russia is totally in the wrong - and then, I remembered something that occurred after The Budapest Memorandum that almost certainly changed things in Russia's eyes.

Let's go back a few years...remember Kosovo?

For those of you who have forgotten, this was a mixed Muslim and Serb Orthodox enclave that became part of Serbia when Yugoslavia imploded, and was later the scene of heavy fighting between Serbia and the Saudi,Libyan and Iranian funded and armed Kosovar Liberation Army(KLA). The fighting stopped in 1999, due to heavy intervention on America's part that occurred, just by coincidence, right in the middle of President Clinton's problems with perjury and obstruction of justice. As part of the agreement that ended the fighting, Kosovo's sovereignty was likewise guaranteed in international law, UN Security Council Resolution 1244, passed in June of 1999.

That UNSC resolution stated explicitly that Kosovo would remain part of Serbia under any circumstances while allowing Kosovo a large degree of internal autonomy. It also stated that there would never be any kind of unilateral settlement enforced on the Serbs without their agreement.

Meanwhile, the ethnic cleansing of Christian Serbs in Kosovo by the Muslim KLA continued without the NATO peacekeepers doing much to stop it. And in February of 2008, Kosovo declared its independence from Serbia in defiance of UNSC Resolution 1244. Both the EU and the U.S. recognized Kosovo within one day.

The Russians and Serbs were absolutely livid at America and the EU not only breaking the agreement that ended the fighting in Kosovo, but the blatant disregard for international law. As the Russians pointed out at the time, this set a horrible precedent, and they called on the UN to enforce UNSC Resolution 1244 and the 1999 treaty they had signed. They were ignored.

This cost America a huge of amount of credibility and political capital with the Russians, and affected their willingness to cooperate with us on issues like Iran. And it turned Serbia, historically an ally of the U.S. into a relatively hostile country.

When Vladimir Putin hears John Kerry talk about the sacredness of international law, Putin undoubtedly remembers what happened with Kosovo when the shoe was on the other foot.

While I don't particularly care for Putin's stage managed referendum in Crimea.I like even less what we did in Kosovo just to pander to the Saudis and GCC countries and distract from the fallout over the games Mr.Bill was up to in the Oval Office. We didn't even bother to hold a referendum in Kosovo...we just allowed the Kosovars and the KSA to ethnically cleanse the Serbs, recognized them as a country and that was that.

Anyone whom thinks that wasn't what Kosovo was about ought to take a good look at who financed most of the Clinton presidential library and examine how ex-President Clinton became a multimillionaire after he left office due to his business connections with the Emir of Dubai.

The whole idea of 'international law' tends to be fairly flexible, depending on what and who is involved and the willingness to enforce it, especially when it comes to the UN. After all, one of the foundations of any law is that it applies equally to everyone. The Israelis, who have consistently been the recipients of that kind of blatant bias could tell you quite a bit about that.

I realize that bringing this up is unpopular just now. But if we're going to talk to the Russians about breaking treaties and international law, it might be better to acknowledge, at least to ourselves that our own hands aren't exactly clean and that instead of ultimatums, some honest horsetrading might yield a better result.

UPDATE: Apparently the ultimatum tactics didn't work so well. Especially not coming from Kerry via the likes of Barack Obama.

Kosovo

There's big news in the Balkans today as Kosovo declared its independence today, with the tacit backing of much of the EU and the US.

Kosovars in Mitrovica watched Prime Minister Hashim Tachi on television as he spoke at the parliament in Pristina during an extraordinary session where the unilateral independence of Kosovo was pronounced.

The Serbs and Russians are livid over the event, and it might be worthwhile to take a look at the reasons why.

For the Russians, it amounts to yet another instance of US interference in what it considers its turf as the historic ally and protector of the Serbs.

For the Serbs, it marks the finish of a long process of ethnic cleansing against Christian Serbs in the region and the creation of a Muslim enclave in a place that resonates in their history.

The Balkans were in the front lines during the Islamic invasion of the Balkans and Southern Europe in the 14th century, and Kosovo was the site of the Serbs' defeat by the Ottoman Turks under the brutal Murad I in 1389 when the Turks invaded Europe. The battle of Kosovo Field figures prominently in Serbian poetry and history and has great national significance to the Serbs.

To put it in western terms, giving Kosovo back to the Muslims for the Serbs is roughly the equivalent of the US ceding the Alamo back to Mexico or more closely,like the French ceding Alsace-Lorraine back to the Germans.

With the breakup of Yugoslavia, Kosovo was autonomous for a decade or so,but in 1989 came under the control of Serbia. The Bosnian War saw the establishment of the Kosovar Liberation Army(KLA)in 1996 with financing, arms and training from places like Saudi Arabia, Iran and Libya. The KLA began killing Serbs and burning churches in Kosovo with their main goal being to drive the Christian minority out of the province, and eventually the KLA was able to establish control over areas within the Kosovo,which did not sit well with the Serbs.

In February 1998, Serb President Milosevic sent Serbian troops to take back KLA-controlled areas, at which point NATO and the Clinton Administration got involved,bombing Serbia for 78 days in an aerial campaign starting in March 1999 designed to break the Serbs. Coincidentally, the air bombardments just happened to occur at the height of President Clinton's problems with perjury and obstruction of justice in the Monica Lewinsky affair, giving rise to the phrase 'wag the dog'.

The Serbs finally gave in on June 9th, 1999.

Since then, NATO forces have essentially acted as a buffer between Kosovo and Serbia,while doing little to halt the ethnic cleansing of Christian Serbs from the region by the KLA.

Which brings us up to today's events.

Following the unilateral declaration by the Kosovars,Russia immediately called for a session of the UN Security Council. “We expect the United Nations’ and NATO’s mission in Kosovo to fulfill their mandate swiftly … and annul the decision of the Pristina organs,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement posted on its web site.

The 'mandate' the Russians are talking about is UN Resolution 1244,which calls for Kosovo to remain under Serbian sovereignty in Kosovo while providing for the province's "substantial autonomy" and rejects a unilateral settlement enforced on th eSerbs without their agreement.

And Serbian President Boris Tadic said Sunday that his country would never accept Kosovo’s “unilateral and illegal” declaration.Little wonder at that one..there are small Muslim minorities in other parts of Serbia and in places like Bosnia, Macedonia, Abkhazia and South Ossetia. And Tadic himself,who was billed as pro-Western only won the recent elections by a bare 51% based on the idea that he could reverse the decade and a half long policy trend in the US and EU to appease Muslims world wide at Serbia's expense.

That slim hope is gone now, and Serbia is essentially lost to the west,while the US can expect no gratitude from the Muslim world.

What the ill thought out US support for a Muslim enclave in Kosovo has done is to expend a great deal of political capital with Russia,who we can now expect to be less cooperative on issues like Iran, energy supplies to Europe and North Korea if the Bush Administration continues its backing of Kosovo and the KLA.

Aside from that, an independent Kosovo would essentially become another Gaza, supported by the International community and EU and American taxpayers to the tune of a few billions a year. And since it has no potential for a functional economy without close ties to Serbia, Kosovo would mainly exist as a corrupt recruiting depot and staging area in Europe's underbelly for crime and for Jihad terrorism. Remember Osama bin-Laden's remarks on 'white Moors' and where the jihadis who planned to kill US troops at Fort Dix came from.

If an independent Kosovo is endorsed by the US, we might just sow something we'll be sorry for later.