fbpx
Politics Foreign Affairs Culture Fellows Program

It Is None Of Our Business, So Why Do We Keep Meddling?

For starters, I’m stunned to see the death of tens of thousands of foreigners caught up in an internecine battle billed by Larison as something suspiciously close to the concern of us Americans. One would have thought that whether or not it was a “bright idea” for Eritrea to secede made as much difference to […]

For starters, I’m stunned to see the death of tens of thousands of foreigners caught up in an internecine battle billed by Larison as something suspiciously close to the concern of us Americans. One would have thought that whether or not it was a “bright idea” for Eritrea to secede made as much difference to foreign governments including ours, in terms of judgment, as whether or not Finland were a part of Russia or Slovakia a Sovereign Nation. Wars might always be lamentable, but what business is it of any good paleocon’s to tell Eritreans what and what not’s the smart stopping point for national satisfaction? ~James Poulos

That’s clever, but not clever enough.  The war between Eritrea and Ethiopia wasn’t “internecine,” for starters, but leave that for now.  I never said it was of concern to Americans.  It wasn’t and still isn’t.  I said that it was a very bad outcome for the peoples involved and for the region.  The origin of this very bad outcome was accepted by the “international community” during the flood of national self-determination movements that erupted after the end of the Cold War.  Perhaps nothing could have been done to prevent Eritrean independence anyway, but it serves as a useful example of what can come from the creation of new nations, even when they are created by way of an African “velvet divorce.”  The Horn of Africa is undoubtedly vastly worse-off because of the Eritrean-Ethiopian conflict.  I don’t think anyone will debate that.  As a non-interventionist, I think that this does not concern me very much, because that conflict does not touch American interests.  It seems to me that it should concern those who bill themselves as realists and weigh policies according to how they will affect regional and international stability. 

If such observers think Kosovo independence will yield a significantly different result, they need to give reasons why they think so.  Dismissing concerns about the expansion of Albania, a land that is just as riven by criminality as Kosovo, is not a good way to start, when James must know that Albanian insurrectionists already exist in Macedonia in that fine, old Balkan tradition of irredentist guerrillas and they have launched, so far unsuccessfully, rebellions against the government in Skopje.  Macedonia was the killing ground of ethnic nationalists before the Balkan Wars of 1912-13, and there is no reason to think that all of the contestants in that old struggle have completely abandoned the old dreams of regaining a territory that at one time or another belonged to their people.  Why else do we have such ridiculous circumlocutions as the name “Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia,” except to soothe the bruised Greek nationalist ego?   

Of course, as a non-interventionist I don’t think America should be telling Eritreans anything, but then I don’t think we should be maintaining Camp Bondsteel in Kosovo or supplying Ethiopia with weapons.  There is a whole list of things that Washington does that I think would be better left undone, but since we’re debating the merits of Meddlesome Policy A or Slightly Less Meddlesome Policy B, I choose the latter.  James seems to be of the view that the political future of Kosovo should be of enough concern to us to court the continued displeasure of Russia, among other potential problems, which seems to make Kosovo a matter of sufficiently great concern that he recommends that we expose our relationship with Russia to still greater strains.  To justify this, it is not enough that he simply prove that Kosovo independence would not be a bad precedent encouraging separatist violence in the rest of the region and elsewhere.  I don’t think he has fully answered this concern, which is very much a live concern.  Central and eastern Europe is full of arbitrary post-Versailles and post-Trianon lines that do not match up the ethnic populations of these territories.  If Albanian Kosovo will be independent, why should the Hungarian Vojvodina or Transylvania remain joined to the lands of the victors of WWI?  Once you begin pulling on the threads of the 1945 borders, as we have been doing for the last 16 years, revisionism could keep cropping up all over the place.  Kosovo’s “exceptional” status is just the opposite–there are numerous territories that belong to certain states despite the demographic realities that make them a readier match with other states.  So far, Albania has been the only one chaotic and lawless enough to serve as a launching pad for insurrection, but that does not mean that other states will not eventually provoke similar crises in the territories of their neighbours.  The point is, clearly, that actively promoting the independence of Kosovo will have real consequences for the security and stability of Europe.  If it is none of America’s business, then American officials should have nothing to do with it and the President should not talk about it.  If he insists on talking about it, he ought not say the wrong, destabilising sorts of things. 

In any case, James has to demonstrate that the change is actually an improvement over Kosovo remaining part of Serbia.  It seems to me that he still hasn’t done this.  This isn’t his fault–no one advocating for the independence of Kosovo has made such an argument.  Yet he and other proponents of Kosovo independence are the ones arguing for the innovation.  The burden of proof is squarely on those arguing for the change.  James wants to tell us that Kosovo is some exceptional case whose independence should not be the cause of anyone’s serious concern.  But if it is indeed none of our business whether Kosovo is independent or not, why would we not leave things in the political status quo or even return things to as close to the 1999 status quo ante as possible?

James comes to the crux of the matter that ought to matter to the realists among us:

And were Serbia truly isolated — that is, if Russia and China were somehow persuaded that the world, particularly the portions of Asia north of India, would not break out immediately into a contagion of insurrectionist hives — then Europe’s most put-upon state might let this last one go and resign itself to a fate which, admittedly, I would not want were I a Serb.  

This is a vital point.  Serbia isn’t isolated, and even if it were entirely on its own it is hard to imagine that Serbian nationalists would simply take the separation of Kosovo lying down forever.  Kosovo independence all but guarantees Serbian irredentism in the future, and it probably also guarantees Albanian irredentism outside Kosovo.  James says:

The issue is what the US ought to do having put itself in the shoes it now wears.   

Just so.  In our shoes, I think it would be very unwise to encourage the formal recognition of a statelet inside Europe, especially when it was one founded by terrorists and criminals.  Why Washington does not return it to the control of Belgrade remains a mystery.  Why would that be an unacceptable solution?  James has not clearly answered that, unless he is suggesting that I, the paleocon, should be concerned about an intercenine battle inside Serbian territory.

Advertisement

Comments

The American Conservative Memberships
Become a Member today for a growing stake in the conservative movement.
Join here!
Join here