Kosovo

Increasingly, there are signs that the United States is looking for a way to reposition itself in Kosovo, nearly a year after leading NATO forces into a conflict over the province. Last week in Europe, U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen suggested that U.S. forces are facing "mission creep" which neither military commanders nor political leaders want. In addition, a case is building in Washington that blames Europe for doing too little to help control Kosovo. And in the last week, the city of Mitrovica in Kosovo has been the scene of the very violence and chaos that NATO has always sought to avoid.

Ever since NATO intervened in Kosovo nearly a year ago, one of the most interesting exercises has been the attempt of serious analysts and Balkan residents to uncover the hidden reason behind the U.S.- led intervention last March. The official reason for the conflict was that the United States wanted to stop genocide in Kosovo. Particularly in Europe, this was seen as a public justification masking a hidden agenda. Theories suggested that hidden mines or even the control of the telecommunications industry were the true reasons for intervention. An entire industry was spawned to uncover the motives behind the two and a half month-long conflict.

The reality, however, is far more prosaic and, in some ways, more alarming. The U.S.-led intervention was prompted precisely by what the U.S. government said. There were reports of an impending holocaust in Kosovo. Criticized for failing to prevent genocide in Rwanda and accused of sitting idly by in Bosnia, the Clinton administration was afraid of another public relations nightmare - at a time when domestic scandals were tarnishing the administration anyway.

The administration viewed Kosovo as a low-risk, high-yield operation. The administration did not expect an extended conflict, having drawn the belief in Bosnia that Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was incapable of enduring an extended bombing campaign. Expecting a repetition of events in Bosnia - when a brief bombing campaign was followed by quick capitulation - the administration was caught flat-footed when the war dragged on. The United States had been suckered into a war of limited strategic interest from which the United States could not withdraw. Milosevic, after all, had been portrayed as a monster. And the administration could not negotiate with a monster.

NATO and the United States ultimately engineered a victory, of sorts, last June when NATO forces occupied Kosovo. But their arrival did not bring anything like closure. Quite to the contrary, the alliance began an open-ended occupation in which the mission did not correspond to the reality on the ground. The mission of NATO forces was to ensure the security of all residents. The reality was that NATO forces were, quite against their intentions, acting as the agents of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). The ethnic Albanian guerrillas used the NATO peacekeeping mission as a means for institutionalizing KLA rule in the province. The effect was to turn victims into victimizers and NATO peacekeepers into unwitting tools of ethnic Albanian revenge.

In this situation, NATO has never managed to find its balance or its center of gravity. NATO troops have managed to alienate all sides - a fact underscored by the ongoing violence in Mitrovica. On a larger scale, neither Washington nor Brussels had ever faced a simple fact. In the region, the prevailing view is that neutral benevolence is impossible; for NATO troops, there was no neutral standpoint from which to mount their operation. It was inevitable that the peacekeepers would find themselves caught in the crossfire between Albanians, determined to keep what they think they have won, and Serbs, increasingly determined to recover what they have lost. Milosevic remains in control in Belgrade. Nothing has been settled.

For the United States, the Kosovo experience violates the key lessons of the Vietnam experience. Withdrawing from Southeast Asia nearly 20 years ago, the United States swore never to again become embroiled, on the ground, in a civil war in another country. In Kosovo, the United States has been involved in something worse: a civil war that offers no clear exit strategy. The war, after all, cannot truly end until one warring ethnic group, or the other, is completely expelled from the region. Worse, this civil war is one in which the United States has no real stake. In Vietnam, at least, some sort of strategic logic could be asserted. But this has not been the case in Kosovo, where the driving motive for U.S. involvement has been based on humanitarian motives.

The humanitarian question is now cutting the other way as peacekeepers are turned from saviors into confused bullies in the minds of even the Albanians. This transformation is not the fault of the troops, who are still mostly combat soldiers, trained to respond to threats with overwhelming force. Keeping the peace, particularly in a chaotic situation, requires a very different sort of training - the sort that is given to police, of which there are still precious few in Kosovo.

More than having the right training, a policeman is someone who is local. NATO has taken people who were never trained as police in the first place, tossed them into an utterly alien culture - and is now discovering that the solution is not working.

It appears that the administration is slowly recognizing the insanity of the situation. In Munich last week, Cohen reportedly said, "I think it has reached the level of concern on the part of not only members of the U.S. Congress, but military commanders. They are concerned about the possibility of mission creep - that the military is being called upon to engage in police functions for which they are not properly trained and we don't want them to carry out." The administration has acknowledged that the situation is getting out of hand, that forces are not trained for the mission and that no one now wants them to carry out the mission.

Most intriguing is Cohen's reference to mission creep; there has, of course, been none. The nature of the mission has remained the same. But increasingly, there is perception of creep: the administration's perception has finally caught up with the reality of the mission it so enthusiastically undertook nearly a year ago.

As a result, administration officials and Congress members are looking for the exit. Since total withdrawal of NATO forces is impossible without even more chaos, another solution is appearing: Blame the Europeans and demand that they shoulder more of the burden. Sen. John Warner, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has claimed that the real problem in Kosovo is that Europeans have not fulfilled their obligations. They were supposed to send police, as well as $35 million for policing functions, but only a few of the former and none of the latter have arrived.

European countries have agreed to take command of the peacekeeping operation. By April, a Eurocorps contingent is scheduled to command the NATO-led peacekeeping force (KFOR). More than 350 personnel from the five Eurocorps countries - Belgium, France, Germany, Luxembourg and Spain - are to take command of the 50,000 troops in Kosovo. This of course does not solve the core problem. It may even compound it. The United States, desperately wanting to minimize exposure and casualties, will now find its forces under the control of a headquarters with its own agenda.

The Europeans, however, are not eager to undertake full responsibility for KFOR. Except for the British government, the rest of Europe was more than a little restrained in enthusiasm for the war. Most European governments foresaw precisely the situation that has developed. The European view has always been that the United States stumbled into a situation for which they had counseled caution.

But there are far deeper issues for European governments at this point. One is Russia. The emergence of acting President Vladimir Putin and a much more assertive, anti-Western Russia is a result of last year's war. European governments regard the end game of Kosovo, in which the Russians were outmaneuvered and humiliated, as a Pyrrhic victory. The Germans in particular now must deal with an increasingly truculent Russia - in which they have invested billions that they will never again see - and are not eager to be the flag-bearers of an operation that continues to irritate the Russians.

Indeed, the Russian factor is likely one reason that the United States wants out. Washington's relationship with Moscow is increasingly dangerous. Rhetoric aside, the upcoming Sino-Russian summit in March presents a serious threat to global American interests. The United States does not want to see a deepening of the Sino-Russian relationship. Instead, Washington needs to signal that the U.S. presence in Kosovo does not present a strategic threat to the Russians. Beginning the process of withdrawal would help enormously. The problem with this strategy is that Europeans are not likely to replace Americans as the objects of Russian ire.

As U.S. troops are caught in the crossfire between Kosovo factions, the basic irrationality of the operation becomes apparent. Having entered a civil war, the United States lacks both the will and resources to impose a settlement. The settlement at hand, a fully Albanian Kosovo, cleansed of Serbs, is intolerable. A NATO withdrawal, and the re-entry of the Yugoslav Army, is unthinkable. In addition, U.S. forces are strained by their dispersal around the globe with little strategic reason.

An exit from Kosovo will emerge as an issue in the months to come, particularly in the context of an American presidential election. The Clinton administration is setting the stage for the withdrawal of at least some forces from Kosovo, leaving the Europeans to handle it. It is far from clear that the Europeans will do it. With both strategic and political considerations coinciding, Clinton seems likely to try to trim the military commitment in Kosovo. However, having stumbled into it, it is not clear that he will now be able to stumble out. Nevertheless, he seems to be cranking up to give it his best shot.

We would be very surprised if the Clinton Administration attempted another humanitarian intervention after Kosovo. Indeed, one of the lessons learned by all future administrations is that interventions should never be casually undertaken until, and unless, the military is given time to plan and implement the intervention, as Bush permitted in Desert Storm. Moreover, since the implementation of an intervention in Eurasia is always costly and time-consuming, what appeared to be a good idea at first glance, might well turn out to be a very bad idea in the long run. Merely wanting to do something does not mean that something can be done. Moral obligations are easy to assume. They are sometimes impossible to carry out. This is a hard lesson to learn. Put differently, talk is cheap. War is hard.

We expect two parallel processes to emerge after Kosovo. We will see a much more passive, indeed, isolationist United States. The hair-trigger assumption of responsibility for Eurasian problems will be replaced by a much more cautious calculation not only of moral considerations, but also of costs and the national interest. The second process, paradoxically, will be a substantial increase in American defense spending. The Kosovo exercise has clearly demonstrated that the draw-down in U.S. military forces has limited American military effectiveness. Military options that were available to President Bush are simply not available, in anywhere near as lavish a quantity, to President Clinton. There is no question of any further cuts in defense spending. The only issue now is how

We have argued for the past several weeks that the basic outlines of a settlement are in place and that domestic politics have been holding up a settlement. Neither NATO nor the Serbs could afford to let it appear that they were defeated. Thus, a delicate ballet had to be acted out in which a settlement could be portrayed by each side as a victory or, at the very least, as something other than a defeat. That is why the G-8 agreement hammered out in Bonn was so important. It was a document that allowed both sides to claim that they had not been defeated. For that to work, however, each side had to avoid being greedy. Like a couple sharing a bed in a bad marriage, each had to leave enough cover for the other. What happened this weekend seems to be that NATO could not resist the temptation to take Milosevic's cover away from him. Worse yet, NATO tried to steal Yeltsin's cover. The result is a settlement in trouble, at least for now.

Let's begin by reviewing the core issue separating NATO and Belgrade. Serbia had refused to sign at the Rambouillet agreements because of two core issues, both having to do with the concept of Serbian sovereignty over Kosovo. First, Serbia would not agree to the withdrawal of all troops from Kosovo. Some troops, numbers unspecified, had to remain. Second, Serbia was not prepared to allow a heavily armed NATO force to occupy Kosovo. It was prepared to allow a United Nations peacekeeping force into Kosovo. There were other issues, but none were as central as these two. NATO told the Serbs to take it or leave it. Serbia left it.

The Russians, essentially supporting the Serb position, entered the discussions. After intense negotiations between primarily the Germans and Russians, followed by broader discussions, the G-8 accords were established in Bonn (the text is available at http://www.stratfor.com/crisis/kosovo/specialreports/special62.htm? section=3 ) The G-8 accords constituted an agreement between NATO and Russia. It was the price that Russia demanded in order to attempt to negotiate a settlement with Belgrade. The G-8 accords were a redefinition of the NATO demands into terms that Moscow felt Belgrade would accept and which could fit into Russia's and Belgrade's core concept of Serbian sovereignty over Kosovo. It was never conceived of by anyone, at the time it was negotiated, as a Serbian surrender. Rather, it was perceived as a center-point between NATO and Serbian demands that would allow for a workable settlement. Russia agreed that an armed force would occupy Kosovo. NATO agreed that that force would be under United Nations and not NATO command. The force was not defined but it was clearly intended that the force would include large numbers of non-NATO troops.

It should be remembered that the G-8 accords were pressed on the Americans and British by the Italians and in particular by the Germans. Fearful of an extended bombing campaign, completely opposed to a ground war, and terrified of long-term Russian hostility, the Germans and Italians were the architects of the G-8 agreement. They wanted that agreement in order to find some way out of what appeared to be a hopeless deadlock. They were the driving force behind the G-8 accords and they clearly saw them as a compromise between the Serb position and Rambouillet.

The G-8 agreement accepted the principle of the return of Kosovo Albanians to their homes and the creation of an autonomous Kosovo under Serbian sovereignty. But the important price NATO paid in the Bonn G-8 talks was the agreement that the United Nations and not NATO would command and control troops moving into Kosovo. It was not clear what the command structure would be beyond this, nor was it clear what precisely the composition of the occupying force would be. However, it was clear that it would be a United Nations force with significant non-NATO presence. When the Russians first brought the agreement to the Serbs, they focused on the composition of the forces, demanding that no NATO country that had bombed Serbia participate in the peacekeeping force. That is where the negotiations stood before Chernomyrdin and Ahtisaari went to Belgrade last week. On one side, there were the G-8 agreements; on the other side were the Serb demands that only limited NATO forces be admitted to Kosovo.

Thus, when Milosevic agreed to the G-8 agreement, he did not see himself as surrendering to NATO or as agreeing to Rambouillet. Rather, he was agreeing to the proposal negotiated by NATO with the Russians in Bonn. He was agreeing to a substantial NATO presence, but not to an exclusive NATO presence or to de facto NATO control of the province. At least that is what anyone familiar with the original G-8 agreements would have imagined him to be agreeing to. It is not clear what went on at the meeting between Viktor Chernomyrdin and EU representative Martti Ahtisaari in Belgrade last week, but Milosevic's agreement to the G-8 terms was not surprising or stunning. It appeared to us to be the logical result of the Russian peace process, which seemed to have reached a compromise between the Rambouillet position and the Serbian position. We had been expecting a move by the Serbs to accept a United Nations force containing large numbers of NATO troops.

It was, therefore, quite surprising to hear NATO officials and the Western media talking about Milosevic's capitulation. It was also surprising to hear the terms to which NATO thought Milosevic had agreed. According to NATO's account of things, Milosevic had simply surrendered. Apart from a purely formal nod to the United Nations, it became clear that NATO saw itself as occupying Serbia. Indeed, it was not clear that any non-NATO troops would be coming in and if they were, whether they would be permitted outside of NATO command. Thus, NATO's take on what Milosevic had agreed to was pretty much the old Rambouillet terms. It was not surprising to us that Milosevic had agreed to the G-8 agreements. We were very surprised that he had, in effect, agreed to the Rambouillet accords.

What seems to have happened was that NATO reinterpreted the G-8 agreement into the Rambouillet agreement and Milosevic's acceptance of the G-8 formula as his capitulation to the Rambouillet accords. NATO was also making it clear that Russian participation, an essential element of the G-8 agreements, was both of marginal importance and only on NATO's terms. In other words, NATO was basically asserting that there were no G-8 accords independent of the Rambouillet formula.

That created a major crisis inside of Serbia over the weekend. Why had Serbia endured two months of bombing simply in order to give in to the original terms? The bombing was endurable and NATO was not capable of invading. What was the point of this sacrifice if the only outcome was to accept what could have been had without any sacrifice? Indeed, that was extremely confusing. If Milosevic had in fact agreed to the terms that NATO was now dictating, his behavior was in fact inexplicable. Therefore, by Sunday, the real question was this: just what had Milosevic agreed to during his meetings with Chernomyrdin and Ahtisaari? If he had agreed to the G-8 proposals, as all three participants had agreed, then how had the G-8 agreements transmogrified into the settlement NATO was now trying to impose? Was the Bonn G-8 formula simply a phantom of our imagination or was it a substantially different formula than Rambouillet?

It seems to us that NATO deliberately chose to interpret Milosevic's agreement to the G-8 proposal in the most extreme form imaginable-a form not easily drawn from the G-8 proposal. Even the document purportedly presented to Milosevic was not as extreme as NATO's interpretation. NATO's motive in this conversion was, of course, to demonstrate that Milosevic had not compromised but capitulated. This was critical in order to demonstrate that the air campaign was successful and that the war was not pointless. Clearly, NATO believed Milosevic's decision to accept the G-8 was driven by the fact that he was desperate and, being desperate, he would now accept any interpretation of the G-8 accords that NATO placed on him. NATO read Milosevic as too badly beaten to resist the reinterpretation.

More interestingly, NATO seemed to feel that the Russians would accept the reinterpretation as well. Remember that the G-8 accords were not negotiated between NATO and Serbia. They had nothing to do with Serbia. They were negotiated between NATO and Russia, and NATO's concessions were Russia's price for beginning the mediation campaign. By turning G-8 into Rambouillet and the Russian compromise solution into a Serbian surrender, NATO put the Russian government into an incredibly difficult situation. As a result, political pressure began to rise in Moscow against the agreement and the treatment of Russia by NATO. Last week's compromise turned into this weekend's surrender. By Sunday night, both Milosevic's capitulation and the compromise were up in the air.

What in the world happened? There are several possible explanations.

* NATO's leaders, particularly Clinton and Blair, and also the Brussels bureaucracy felt themselves under tremendous pressure to produce what appeared to be a victory. They tried to "spin" the G-8 into a Serbian surrender for domestic political purposes, either unaware of the consequences in Belgrade and Moscow or convinced that they could get Serb acceptance of NATO's reinterpretation of G-8. They stole Milosevic's cover for their own use, gambling that he was too badly beaten to reverse course.

* Chernomyrdin was telling different things to different sides in order to get a settlement. The Russian role has been ambiguous at times. It is possible that Chernomyrdin's transmission of the meaning of G-8 to the various parties differed substantially. NATO may well have had a private understanding that G-8 meant Rambouillet, with a wink and nod to the UN. Milosevic may have had a private understanding from Chernomyrdin that G-8 meant the UN with a wink and nod to NATO. By the time everyone compared notes, they were on the Serb-Macedonian border. It is particularly interesting to find out what Chernomyrdin told the Russian leadership.

* Russia has sold out the Serbs. We predicted a crisis in Kosovo on January 4, 1999 precisely because of Russo-American tensions. When Primakov fell, we stated that this represented a major geopolitical setback to Milosevic. We have always argued that the Russians made possible Milosevic's position. The Russians began to weaken their support for Milosevic when the IMF's $4.5 billion loan was made available. Perhaps one of Strobe Talbott's missions in Moscow was to negotiate a side deal with the Russians for delivering Milosevic to NATO. If so, it is not clear what the quid pro quo is. It is also not clear what the response in the Duma will be if it is revealed that Yeltsin approved a sell-out of Milosevic for unspecified goodies later on.

What is certainly clear is that the G-8 agreements are not merely a restatement of the Rambouillet accords. When Milosevic realized NATO thought that they were, it appears that he balked. Now, if the Russians have truly abandoned him, if the third possibility is really what happened, then the Russians are now quietly telling him the game is up and Serbia stands alone. Milosevic will really have no choice but to capitulate. If, however, the first possibility is true, and NATO has spun the agreement to make it appear to be a surrender then NATO may well have sown the wind. If Serbia genuinely rejects the G-8 reinterpretation and is backed by Russia, then American and British spin-doctors will have to answer to NATO partners who are sick of the war. If this is Chernomyrdin's ego or incompetence getting in the way of the settlement, then we may be back to the beginning of a long, miserable haul.

Whatever happened, the G-8 Ministers are going to meet tomorrow and NATO will get a chance to explain to the Russians how they got from here to there. Ahtisaari has postponed his trip to China and will have an opportunity to explain what he thought Milosevic was agreeing to when he said he accepted the G-8 agreements. All of the strings can be untangled. It will be an interesting few days while they are.

President Bill Clinton had a sign taped to his desk at the beginning of his first term in office that read, "It's the Economy, Stupid." He should have taped one on his desk at the beginning of the Kosovo affair that said, "It's the Russians, Stupid." From the beginning to the end of this crisis, it has been the Russians, not the Serbs, who were the real issue facing NATO.

The Kosovo crisis began in December 1998 in Iraq. When the United States decided to bomb Iraq for four days in December, in spite of Russian opposition and without consulting them, the Russians became furious. In their view, the United States completely ignored them and had now reduced them to a third-world power - discounting completely Russia's ability to respond. The senior military was particularly disgruntled. It was this Russian mood, carefully read by Slobodan Milosevic, which led him to conclude that it was the appropriate time to challenge the West in Kosovo. It was clear to Milosevic that the Russians would not permit themselves to be humiliated a second time. He was right. When the war broke out, the Russians were not only furious again, but provided open political support to Serbia.

There was, in late April and early May, an urgent feeling inside of NATO that some sort of compromise was needed. The feeling was an outgrowth of the fact that the air war alone would not achieve the desired political goals, and that a ground war was not an option. At about the same time, it became clear that only the Russians had enough influence in Belgrade to bring them to a satisfactory compromise. The Russians, however, were extremely reluctant to begin mediation. The Russians made it clear that they would only engage in a mediation effort if there were a prior negotiation between NATO and Russia in which the basic outlines of a settlement were established. The resulting agreement was the G-8 accords.

The two most important elements of the G-8 agreement were unwritten, but they were at the heart of the agreement. The first was that Russia was to be treated as a great power by NATO, and not as its messenger boy. The second was that any settlement that was reached had to be viewed as a compromise and not as a NATO victory. This was not only for Milosevic's sake, but it was also for Yeltsin's. Following his humiliation in Iraq, Yeltsin could not afford to be seen as simply giving in to NATO. If that were to happen, powerful anti-Western, anti-reform and anti-Yeltsin forces would be triggered. Yeltsin tried very hard to convey to NATO that far more than Kosovo was at stake. NATO didn't seem to listen.

Thus, the entire point of the G-8 agreements was that there would be a compromise in which NATO achieved what it wanted while Yugoslavia retained what it wanted. A foreign presence would enter Kosovo, including NATO troops. Russian troops would also be present. These Russian troops would be used to guarantee the behavior of NATO troops in relation to Serbs, in regard to disarming the KLA, and in guaranteeing Serbia's long-term rights in Kosovo. The presence of Russian troops in Kosovo either under a joint UN command or as an independent force was the essential element of the G-8. Many long hours were spent in Bonn and elsewhere negotiating this agreement.

Over the course of a month, the Russians pressured Milosevic to accept these agreements. Finally, in a meeting attended by the EU's Martti Ahtisaari and Moscow's Viktor Chernomyrdin, Milosevic accepted the compromise. Milosevic did not accept the agreements because of the bombing campaign. It hurt, but never crippled him. Milosevic accepted the agreements because the Russians wanted them and because they guaranteed that they would be present as independent observers to make certain that NATO did not overstep its bounds. This is the key: it was the Russians, not the bombing campaign that delivered the Serbs.

NATO violated that understanding from the instant the announcement came from Belgrade. NATO deliberately and very publicly attacked the foundations of the accords by trumpeting them as a unilateral victory for NATO's air campaign and the de-facto surrender of Serbia. Serbia, which had thought it had agreed to a compromise under Russian guarantees, found that NATO and the Western media were treating this announcement as a surrender. Serb generals were absolutely shocked when, in meeting with their NATO counterparts, they were given non-negotiable demands by NATO. They not only refused to sign, but they apparently contacted their Russian military counterparts directly, reporting NATO's position. A Russian general arrived at the negotiations and apparently presided over their collapse.

Throughout last week, NATO was in the bizarre position of claiming victory over the Serbs while trying to convince them to let NATO move into Kosovo. The irony of the situation of course escaped NATO. Serbia had agreed to the G-8 agreements and it was sticking by them. NATO's demand that Serbia accept non-negotiable terms was simply rejected, precisely because Serbia had not been defeated. The key issue was the Russian role. Everything else was trivial. Serbia had been promised an independent Russian presence. The G-8 agreements had said that any unified command would be answerable to the Security Council. That wasn't happening. The Serbs weren't signing. NATO's attempt to dictate terms by right of victory fell flat on its face. For a week, NATO troops milled around, waiting for Serb permission to move in.

The Russians proposed a second compromise. If everyone would not be under UN command, they would accept responsibility for their own zone. NATO rejected this stating Russia could come into Kosovo under NATO command or not at all. This not only violated the principles that had governed the G-8 negotiations, by removing the protection of Serb interests against NATO, but it also put the Russians into an impossible position in Belgrade and in Moscow. The negotiators appeared to be either fools or dupes of the West. Chernomyrdin and Ivanov worked hard to save the agreements, and perhaps even their own careers. NATO, for reasons that escape us, gave no ground. They hung the negotiators out to dry by giving them no room for maneuver. Under NATO terms, Kosovo would become exactly what Serbia had rejected at Rambouillet: a NATO protectorate. And now it was Russia, Serbia's ally, that delivered them to NATO.

By the end of the week, something snapped in Moscow. It is not clear whether it was Yeltsin who himself ordered that Russian troops move into Pristina or whether the Russian General Staff itself gave the order. What is clear is that Yeltsin promoted the Russian general who, along with his troops, rolled into Pristina. It is also clear that although Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov had claimed that the whole affair was an accident and promised that the troops would be withdrawn immediately, no troops have been removed. Talbott then flew back to Moscow. Clinton got to speak with Yeltsin after a 24-hour delay, but the conversation went nowhere. Meanwhile, Albright is declaring that the Russians must come under NATO command and that's final.

The situation has become more complex. NATO has prevailed on Hungary and Ukraine to forbid Russian aircraft from crossing their airspace with troops bound for Kosovo. Now Hungary is part of NATO. Ukraine is not. NATO is now driving home the fact that Russia is surrounded, isolated and helpless. It is also putting Ukraine into the position of directly thwarting fundamental Russian strategic needs. Since NATO is in no position to defend Ukraine and since there is substantial, if not overwhelming, pro-Russian sentiment in Ukraine, NATO is driving an important point home to the Russians: the current geopolitical reality is unacceptable from the Russian point of view. By Sunday, Russian pressure had caused Ukraine to change its policy. But the lesson was not lost on Russia's military.

Here is the problem as Stratfor sees it. NATO and the United States have been dealing with men like Viktor Chernomyrdin. These men have had their primary focus, for the past decade, on trying to create a capitalist Russia. They have not only failed, but their failure is now manifest throughout Russia. Their credibility there is nil. In negotiating with the West, they operate from two imperatives. First, they are seeking whatever economic concessions they can secure in the hope of sparking an economic miracle. Second, like Gorbachev before them, they have more credibility with the people with whom they are negotiating than the people they are negotiating for. That tends to make them malleable.

NATO has been confusing the malleability of a declining cadre of Russian leaders with the genuine condition inside of Russia. Clearly, Albright, Berger, Talbott, and Clinton decided that they could roll Ivanov and Chernomyrdrin into whatever agreement they wanted. In that they were right. Where they were terribly wrong was about the men they were not negotiating with, but whose power and credibility was growing daily. These faceless hard-liners in the military finally snapped at the humiliation NATO inflicted on their public leaders. Yeltsin, ever shrewd, ever a survivor, tacked with the wind.

Russia, for the first time since the Cold War, has accepted a low-level military confrontation with NATO. NATO's attempts to minimize it notwithstanding, this is a defining moment in post-Cold War history. NATO attempted to dictate terms to Russia and Russia made a military response. NATO then used its diplomatic leverage to isolate Kosovo from follow-on forces. It has forced Russia to face the fact that in the event of a crisis, Ukraine will be neither neutral nor pro-Russian. It will be pro-NATO. That means that, paperwork aside, NATO has already expanded into Ukraine. To the Russians who triggered this crisis in Pristina, that is an unacceptable circumstance. They will take steps to rectify that problem. NATO does not have the military or diplomatic ability to protect Ukraine. Russia, however, has an interest in what happens within what is clearly its sphere of influence. We do not know what is happening politically in Moscow, but the straws in the wind point to a much more assertive Russian foreign policy.

There is an interesting fantasy current in the West, which is that Russia's economic problems prevent military actions. That is as silly an observation as believing that the U.S. will beat Vietnam because it is richer, or that Athenians will beat the poorer Spartans. Wealth does not directly correlate with military power, particularly when dealing with Russia, as both Napoleon and Hitler discovered. Moreover, all economic figures on Russia are meaningless. So much of the Russian economy is "off the books" that no one knows how it is doing. The trick is to get the informal economy back on the books. That, we should all remember, is something that the Russians are masters at. It should also be remembered that the fact that Russia's military is in a state of disrepair simply means that there is repair work to be done. Not only is that true, but the process of repairing the Russian economy is itself an economic tonic, solving short and long term problems. Military adventures are a psychological, economic and political boon for ailing economies.

Machiavelli teaches the importance of never wounding your adversaries. It is much better to kill them. Wounding them and then ridiculing and tormenting them is the worst possible strategy. Russia is certainly wounded. It is far from dead. NATO's strategy in Kosovo has been to goad a wounded bear. That is not smart unless you are preparing to slay him. Since no one in NATO wants to go bear hunting, treating Russia with the breathtaking contempt that NATO has shown it in the past few weeks is not wise. It seems to us that Clinton and Blair are so intent on the very minor matter of Kosovo that they have actually been oblivious to the effect their behavior is having in Moscow.

They just can't get it into their heads that it's not about Kosovo. It is not about humanitarianism or making ourselves the kind of people we want to be. It's about the Russians, stupid! And about China and about the global balance of power.

On July 20, the Daily Telegraph reported that a major opposition march on Belgrade had been postponed until late August or early September due to a lack of popular support. The march was organized by the Alliance for Change opposition movement and was to have been a climatic event following recent protests held across Serbia calling for the ouster of Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. The march was expected to bring more than a million Serbs to Belgrade from all parts of the country. The Alliance for Change has also circulated numerous petitions calling for the resignation of Milosevic, and has accumulated hundreds of thousands of signatures, according to the independent Beta news agency. Yet opposition leaders Zoran Djindjic of the Alliance for Change and Vuk Draskovic of the Serbian Renewal Movement both admitted on July 18 that they had a long way to go before they could muster enough people to force the resignation of Milosevic.

The United States, Germany and other NATO countries have touted the impending collapse of the Milosevic regime and have increased their support to the Yugoslav opposition to hasten that outcome. German Foreign Ministry spokesman Andreas Michaelis said July 17 that within the next week his office would conduct further "rounds of dialogue" with Serb opposition politicians. U.S. State Department spokesman James Rubin has also previously called for Milosevic's resignation and has vowed that international aid would not be given to Yugoslavia under Milosevic's control. In early July President Clinton authorized the CIA to engage in electronic warfare to meddle in bank accounts of President Milosevic and has also approved funds to support various opposition groups.

However, despite Western optimism about Milosevic's downfall, the rumors of that downfall appear to be greatly exaggerated. Three major things stand in the way of Milosevic's ouster. The first is the power of Serbian resentment and sense of martyrdom. Milosevic did fight to keep Kosovo, while the NATO countries now actively supporting the Serbian opposition bombed Serbia for two and a half months. And now that NATO is arbiter of justice in Kosovo, it appears to be doing little to halt Albanian attacks on Serbs. Serbs feel that Western Europe ganged up on them to strip their country of a historically significant province on behalf of hostile Moslems in Albania, after similarly supporting Serbian foes in Croatia and Bosnia. And now Western Europe is attempting to dictate democracy to Serbia through the overthrow and trial of the Serbian president and his replacement with pro-Western stooges. Serbs may not like Milosevic, but they are not ready to forgive NATO or back its allies.

The second factor, openly acknowledged by the opposition, is that Milosevic is still firmly in control of the military and the police. On July 21, Yugoslav government officials moved to address the single weak link in the security apparatus -- quiet, angry army reservists who fought against NATO and have yet to receive their back pay. 1,000 reservists are blocking roads in central and southern Serbia and have said they will not move until they are paid. Many of the reservists have reportedly brought their weapons home and said July 21 that they would go to Belgrade if they were not paid within 48 hours. Defense Minister Pavle Bulatovic told a government session July 21 that payment of the reservists was a top priority, but that it would be in their best interests to wait until August 1 to receive their first installments. Milosevic has already paid the police force, and the opposition has acknowledged seeing no other sign of impending mutiny in the ranks of the military.

Finally, the opposition itself is fractured. Djindjic told the Montenegrin daily Vijesti July 19 that the Alliance for Change had "no reason" to cooperate with Draskovic's Serbian Renewal Movement. Djindjic said the two sides disagreed over the need to oust Milosevic from power, and also "Draskovic's offer [of cooperation] is not acceptable because it places a roof before building a foundation." Meanwhile, Draskovic, who is more a weathervane than a true opposition leader, has continued to toy with the idea of rejoining the Milosevic government. Milosevic is undoubtedly already exploiting and exacerbating rifts in the opposition, and will leap at the prospect of co-opting opposition factions.

With a fragmented Yugoslav opposition, continued NATO-accepted Albanian pressure in Kosovo, and the tools of power firmly in Milosevic's hands, U.S. calls for his resignation or ouster are falling on increasingly deaf ears. The opposition has admitted it is incapable of ousting Milosevic, and lacking a groundswell of popular support, it is having little impact on the balance of power in Belgrade. The lack of support for the march on Belgrade illustrates a general reluctance on the part of the Serbian people to risk bloodshed either to remove Milosevic or to enthrone the opposition. If he can appease the army reservists, police forces, and regular army troops, thus securing himself from the threat of ouster by a fellow Serbian hardliner or an opportunistic and charismatic opposition leader, Milosevic may manage to remain in office long enough to strike a deal on his future. For now, Western Europe appears stuck with a Milosevic regime in Serbia, and with its own embargo on the Serbs. In short, it has a secure, hostile, and embattled regime in the heart of the region it is attempting to stabilize and rebuild. For Milosevic, that is a serious bargaining chip.

Two Serb opposition leaders - Vuk Draskovic and Momcilo Perisic - on August 17 announced their decisions not to take part in a major opposition rally scheduled for August 19 in Belgrade. Draskovic's split with the opposition is understandable. He is more a political weathervane than a devoted opposition leader, sees little chance of defeating Milosevic's ruling party and so is hedging his bets. Perisic's decision to opt out of the rally suggests something more. While the former general is new to the organized opposition and may be reluctant to join the rally until he establishes his power base, there are two alternative explanations for his withdrawal. One, as the man most likely to unite a real threat to Milosevic - disgruntled soldiers - he may have been co- opted by the Yugoslav president. This is unlikely, as any unification of opposition in the ranks is prone to backfire. More likely, Perisic has seen the opposition discredit themselves as tools of the West and is seeking to distinguish himself as a patriotic and independent opposition force. In this role, he could very quickly become a serious threat to Milosevic.

Analysis:

Two Serb opposition leaders - Vuk Draskovic and Momcilo Perisic - on August 17 announced their decisions not to take part in a major opposition rally scheduled for August 19 in Belgrade. The rally was announced on August 4 by opposition leaders from Serbia's economic Group 17. An ambitious gesture by the economic organization's leader Mladjan Dinkic, in so far as the rally is supposed to comprise all opposition parties. At the top of the guest list was Democratic Party president and Alliance For Change leader Zoran Djindjic, Serb Renewal Movement president Vuk Drascovic, and former Yugoslav Army General Momcilo Perisic. At the time, General Perisic was a dark horse among the fractious opposition groups and had made no decision to participate at the rally. On August 9, Perisic launched his Movement for Democratic Serbia, though more a call to arms than a political party. Perisic explains it as open to all political parties, though not one itself, with the primary goal of ousting President Milosevic.

Reports on August 17 that both Perisic and Drascovic declined to participate in the rally indicate the reluctance of the two to commit to pan-opposition posturing. The two leaders' decisions may have been the same, but their motivations were very different. Draskovic is more a political weathervane than a devoted opposition leader. He currently sees little chance of defeating Milosevic's ruling party, and so is hedging his bets. Perisic's decision to opt out of the rally suggests something more.

The latest incarnation of Vuk Draskovic is as the opposition leader of the Serb Renewal Movement, or more specifically 'the other democratic party.' A one-time communist and then nationalist, Draskovic was for a time a deputy prime minister in the Milosevic government. He was fired after failing to broker an end to the NATO bombing campaign, though at the time he was apparently floating a trial balloon for Milosevic. He then joined the fractious opposition, taking his share of the limelight and foreign support. But Draskovic always takes risks cautiously. Draskovic guards his language carefully, gauging before he speaks the potential severity of retribution, while retaining flexibility of position. Last week Milosevic reshuffled his cabinet to favor a majority of hard-liners, threatening to use force against rally protesters on Thursday. Now, with the opposition admitting it has little chance of ousting Milosevic or his ruling Socialist Party any time soon, he is again urging for a coalition against Milosevic between the opposition and the president's own party.

Momcilo Perisic's decline remains a mystery, as unclear as his bid to join the carnival of opposition groups. In November 1998, Perisic was the last in a sequence of ministers and security chiefs sacked by Milosevic for public dissent. Milosevic appointed Perisic as chief of staff of the Yugoslav Army in 1993 and was since then harassed by this apparently unexpectedly professional soldier. During the winter of 1996-1997, Perisic refused to send his force in to quash protests against the regime, saying, "It is the army of the people, not the army of one party." Again in 1998, when Milosevic's candidate for president of Montenegro refused to recognize the election of rival Milo Djukanovic, Perisic balked at requests to send troops into Montenegro. Perisic rebuffed Milosevic again in 1998 when the president sought to repel NATO, stating curtly, "We suggest to the politicians not to go to war with the rest of the world." Perisic was at last dismissed in November on account of his distaste for Milosevic's ultra- nationalist sympathies and the growing influence of the president's wife, Mirjana Markovic, over the military. Overall, the Yugoslav Army has long been indignant to Milosevic, who allocated most defense funds to the Interior Ministry's police units.

Perisic's longstanding disregard for Milosevic's policies and his most recent outspokenness against the regime makes the general an ally to many who are unimpressed with the Western subsidized Djindjic and the doppelganger Draskovic. Perisic stands in sharp contrast to remaining senior officers who, both in sympathy and in the interest of their careers, have rallied behind Milosevic. Keep in mind, however, that army dissent is coming from the middle ranks and officers who have not received pay or promotions in months. If the other voices in the Milosevic camp seem louder, it is only because a silent majority has been stewing. It is quite possible they have chosen their leader. Jovica Stanisic, secret police chief dismissed by Milosevic just days before Perisic, shares Perisic's sentiments and may also join the opposition. Perisic may be figuring a means to gain more than tokenism at the rally, given his movement is a mere seven days old. Still, it doesn't require an organized following to appear at an opposition rally. There had to have been more to his withdrawal than waiting for his followers to appear.

Discontent within the army is a potent and as yet unharnessed force. The Yugoslav opposition admitted that it is powerless to unseat Milosevic without the participation of at least part of Yugoslavia's security apparatus [ http://www.stratfor.com/SERVICES/GIU/072299.ASP ]. Milosevic, too, knows the greatest threat he faces come from those in his own regime more radical than himself and from disgruntled soldiers and police. The fact that this opposition has yet to have coalesced around an opposition leader clearly drove Perisic to step forward. But was he pushed?

When fired, Perisic was moved to a meaningless post as adviser to the federal prime minister while his replacement, Milosevic loyalist Dragoljub Ojdanic from the First Army, performed ceremonial duties at the president's residence. Though not commanding any forces, Perisic did remain a figure in Serbia's political machine. It is unclear if his contacts with Milosevic were as strained as the latest reports suggest or if his offense amounts to a series of high profile, warranted criticisms of the regime. Compared to other generals from the First and Second Army, Perisic is an elite with junior officer sentiments. He is committed to Yugoslavia and to Serbia and to the political institutions of both. To that end, he wants neither a palace coup by hard-liners nor a Western puppet opposition to oust Milosevic.

To this end, there is a possibility that he was co-opted, or even set up by Milosevic to harness and redirect opposition from within the ranks. But such a strategy would have been terribly risky for Milosevic. If the opposition within the Yugoslav security apparatus is stronger than Milosevic or even the opposition has calculated, propping up Perisic could quickly backfire. The general could decide he does not need Milosevic and move against him on his own or could be won over, with his troops, to either the hard-line or the pro-West opposition. No, Milosevic is unlikely to set up a potentially powerful opponent. Better to keep dissent in the military diffuse.

So if Perisic is not a tool of Milosevic, why distance himself from the opposition? Quite simply, the already fractious Serbian opposition has discredited itself by accepting the overt backing of the West. Perisic has the opportunity to tap a deep sentiment in Serbia, opposed to Milosevic for submitting Yugoslavia to NATO bombardment only to capitulate to a NATO diplomatic doublecross, and opposed to the Western-backed opposition for pimping themselves out to NATO. Perisic can stand as the leader of a patriotic, independent Serbian opposition. He can bring out the dissidents in the military and a portion of those who would otherwise not join the opposition. He can tap into those in the opposition with a distaste for Western manipulation and can tap into those in the government with a distaste for Milosevic. He could very quickly become a serious threat to Milosevic. As such, unless Perisic finds his following quickly, Milosevic will undoubtedly act soon.