The newest rotation of US soldiers with the NATO occupation of Kosovo arrived in the small Balkan nation on Wednesday, part of up to 5,600 multinational troops based there.
The US force “comprises roughly 750 soldiers from the 218th Maneuver Enhancement Brigade out of South Carolina and eight smaller Guard units; Army reservists; and multinational troops,” according to Stars and Stripes.
US troops entered Kosovo following a severe US-led NATO bombing campaign in 1999, without proper approval for the use of force from the US Congress or the United Nations Security Council.
In fact, President Clinton’s “action to commit forces to the NATO Kosovo operation led to a suit in Federal District Court for the District of Columbia by some Members of Congress seeking a judicial finding that the President was violating the War Powers Resolution and the Constitution by using military forces in Yugoslavia in the absence of authorization from the Congress,” according to a recent Congressional Research Service report.
If sending in troops was legally dubious then, surely they have no business being there 13 years later.
The continuing presence of US forces in Kosovo is justified by lingering tensions in the country’s north, where ethnic Serbs refuse to recognize the Kosovo government and in order to train Kosovo’s security forces. But this military presence is entirely unjustified and is merely another outpost in America’s empire, serving to retain military dominance and project power in eastern Europe.
This is the first comment for this article written today often I compete for attention on such topics other time I do not. More often the question is the quality not the quantity of discussion as after 40 something years of street debate and rough talk what I can add is this:
40 years ago for the most part when we spoke on the street or in a cafe or a home if it was not organization we very much could be sure that that conversation was between two people. Today that is no longer the case where the East German police the Stasi are said to spy on 1 out of 7 citizens, and the Greek Junta employed 1 out of 5 Greek workers today America as the USA can be said to spy on every one and has the capacity to copy all electronic communications.
So in this divide between government and people there is common ground except that too can be questionable as the government as in the countries of NATO have created the very same extremist groups that right wingers complain of. So what is the problem the left wing or what the government and its right wing toadies say is the left wing? Or what exactly should be the approach when the issues become contrived by the manner political groups are knowingly treated and manipulated by government as puppets of a corporate elite?
My tax dollars at work?
Does having troops in Kosovo get me a better job? Nope
Does having troops in Kosovo put money in my pocket to help pay my bills? Nope
Does having troops in Kosovo keep the evil Kosovorans from invading the US and burning down my home and raping my sister? Nope
But it does cost me a lot of tax-payer dollars.
Does having troops in Kosovo prevent plots to attack fort dicks by albanians (read kosovars)? Nope
Does having troops in Kosovo prevent albanian (read kosovar) gangs running havoc all over NYC? Nope
Does having troops in Kosovo prevent albanians (read kosovars) plotting against american interests all over the world? Nope
i could gon on
Kosovo is not even a state, much less a nation.
And why the talk of "ethnic Serbs"? These would be loyal citizens of Republic of Serbia, present on the territory of Republic of Serbia. So wouldn't they be just Serbs? What is that is ethnic about Serbs in Serbia?
Lovely. Making sure no corner of the planet is untouched by the Empire.