How It Works In Kosovo
by Julia
Gorin [pundit/comedian] 9/6/07
Chris Deliso’s book The Coming Balkan Caliphate describes the ordeal of former OSCE official and Kosovo whistle-blower Tom Gambill
as he tried to sound the warning about terror groups operating in the
Balkans. In the process, Deliso sheds light on the difference between
the type of soldier my erstwhile KFOR source is and the types of military hacks who muzzled him are:
[Gambill]
knew from police reports and photos that the group [Revival of Islamic
Heritage Society] was active in the central Kosovo village of Malisevo
and was presumed to be dangerous. The security officer made a point of
bringing it up at security meetings and in written correspondence with
the U.S. Department of State throughout 2003. However, he ran up
against a brick wall. “I had this info [about the charities] all the
way back in 2001,” says Gambill. “But the State Department didn’t want
to hear about it.” He recalls:
“I brought it up at every meeting I went to that included [the U.S.] military, but nada.
Many of the American KFOR guys were there for their six months — you
know, get the ribbon, do a few good deeds, and go home. And those who
confided in me didn’t want to rock the boat with their superiors…the
thinking was, ‘hey, we’re here for only six months — let’s get the job
done as assigned and get home.’
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Cases
such as that of the RIHS attracted attention, says Gambill, from a
handful of “motivated” American security officials….However, he says,
“they were held back in some cases by orders from those higher up in
the pecking order. This was much to the disappointment of the lower
echelons — lieutenants, captains, some majors…the same thing with the
CivPol [UN Police].” When Gambill presented photographic evidence of
the RIHS presence in Kosovo, and waved the UN decree outlawing the
group, the FBI representative at the time was “somewhat peeved.” Later,
he claims, “I was verbally attacked via e-mail by an American major…He
said that I was not qualified to make comments, and that neither my
information nor comments were accurate…After forwarding his comments to
my point of contact on the American base, he (another major) was taken
back at this kind of behavior.”
…
Yet most
who dismissed Gambill’s concerns, he contends, only claimed to be
experts — though they visited Kosovo once or twice a year:
“The
ones who did not believe my reports were many internationals who argued
that these things [Wahhabi penetration, etc.] didn’t occur in Bosnia,
and that therefore the Islamic fundamentalists were not a threat. They
claimed that there were no organized efforts on the part of the Islamic
fundamentalists and that the [Albanian] rebel groups causing trouble
were not a significant concern. That line came from many of the U.S.
military commanders who came through the region once every six months.
There was no continuity in the passing of intelligence from one unit to
another — ever.”
These
realities have been only too evident throughout the Bosnian and Kosovo
peacekeeping missions, where arrogant, careerist diplomats and military
men claim to know the situation on the ground better than do those
working there. Yet these were the people shaping policy — by listening
to the underlings who said what they wanted to hear and ignoring those
who, like Gambill, had a less flattering story to tell about the
aftereffects of the Western intervention.
Quietly,
however, some of the whistle-blower’s colleagues were thanking him for
his contributions: “In several meetings of the combined group (U.S.
military, UN, and CivPol), just as many commended me for the
information that I brought to the table,” he recalls. “I was told that
my sources and reports were 90 percent accurate and were appreciated.
In one case, a commander came to me after a meeting and commended me on
my participation in all his meetings and gave me a unit coin for my
contributions. It was done quietly, of course.”
…
The chronic changeover of civil and military staff meant that whereas
the locals had learned early on how to understand and manipulate the
internationals, the latter were always starting from square one… “The
UN didn’t really understand what was going on — and they didn’t want to
know,” he charges, citing cases such as higher-ups’ apparent
disinterest in investigating six Albanian-American radicals with stated
foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks. “There was no continuity of mission,
or pass-on intel.” The endless stream of fresh-faced, ignorant
personnel posed no threat to Kosovo’s powerful criminals and
extremists. Peacekeeping in Kosovo became a thankless and truly
Sisyphysian labor.
But it actually gets more sinister than a Sisyphysian labor, as Deliso continues:
One American special police investigator recalls how, in early 2006,
several wanted men — North African Islamists — with passports from a
Western European country were sheltered in a Kosovo apartment belonging
to local Islamic fundamentalists. “A police buddy and I staked out this
building, and interviewed some people,” he said. “We had photos and
good information that showed these guys should be dealt with. You think
anyone [in UNMIK] cared? No chance. Why do you think I’m leaving?”
Further, the officer charged that the Kosovo Albanian government leaders — the same ones that, according to Jane’s
[Intelligence Review], are supplying the United States with
“intelligence” on Islamic extremists in the province — have blocked
investigations and staffed the civil administration with the often
underqualified friends and relatives of known Islamists. “The Kosovo
Department of Justice won’t act on [counterterrorist information],
because the people inside the institution are from the ‘other side.’
It’s very frustrating — and a very dangerous thing for the future.”
Michael Harrison [UNMIK Field Coordinator for Protection of Minorities]
refers to another case later in 2006, in which an undercover
investigator from a Central European country posed as a mafia figure
interested in buying rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs) from an Albanian
Islamist. “No one cared. No one [in UNMIK] gives a shit. We have
terrorists here, and the Wahhabis coming in from everywhere. Instead of
doing something about it, you have the Germans donating 30 tons of
weapons for Kosovo’s future army, the TMK, now in storage.” Tom Gambill
added in the fall of 2006 that a NATO internal map from 2003 listing
some 17 illegal paramilitary and terrorist training camps was “still
currently valid, to the best of my knowledge.”
There
are jihadists even among the multinational peacekeeping force in
Kosovo, who are there to keep an eye on the internationals more than on
the locals, as witnessable from the April 2004 incident (just a month
after the orchestrated riots and attacks on churches in Kosovo) in
which a Jordanian CivPol officer opened fire on American ones, killing
two female American peacekeepers and leaving 10 others injured — a
story that disappeared from the news almost sooner than it appeared.
I recently heard from a KFOR criminal intel analyst who helped load the
women’s bodies onto helicopters. Apparently, the State Department
suppressed information that the Jordanian peacekeeper had Hamas and
Hezbollah literature in his dorm; as well, the source reports that
“after this incident, there were other weird things that happened —
mostly threats/waving of guns at American CIVPOL by foreign CIVPOL.” He
too paints a grim picture of our “progress” in the region:
March
‘04 riots, Wahhabis and Salafis, Nationalists, Islamist[s], training
grounds for paramilitary stuff, it goes on…KLA begat Kosovo Police
Service and PDK [Democratic Party of Kosovo]…These two REMF’s (OK,
intrepid journalists!) are completely unaware. [He is referring to the Fellenzer-Staggs duo; REMFs stands for “Rear Echelon Mother F–kers” — those who do not venture outside the wire — known in Iraq as FOBBITs.]…The
place is a snake pit…Anyway, glad to see that someone is on it. The
whole existential threat thing just isn’t catching on here in the US.
The
first one, Xhabir Zharku, is a former “soldier” and current politician
in the smuggling town of Kacanik near Macedonia, where his radio
station is influential. Deliso describes the implications of the
non-border between Kosovo and Macedonia (and Albania):
The
danger of Kosovo becoming a terrorist transfer zone has been increased
since the internationals handed over border control duties to the local
Albanian authorities. What this means, in essence, is that there is no
longer a border with Albania itself. While border policing was hardly
stellar during the period of UNMIK’s direct control, it has now
effectively vanished. For the United Nations, relinquishing control of
Kosovo’s borders is just another of the scheduled “transfer of
competencies” from international to local rule. In Macedonia, too,
where an experiment in ethnic coexistence has left the western third of
the country largely in the hands of former NLA [National Liberation
Army, Macedonia] leader Ali Ahmeti’s men, there is no appreciable
border with Albania either. According to one Macedonian military
intelligence officer, even though small militant groups are “smuggling
heavy weapons in every day from Albania,” there is no will to stop the
trade, “because all the local police are Albanian, they are in it
together, and they don’t talk [to outsiders].” The officer feared that
the well armed groups could act to destabilize the country in the case
of any failure to make Kosovo independent — indicating the complex trap
the West has made of the region through its interventions.
Which brings us to last week’s news reflecting precisely this reality:
Macedonia: Ethnic Albanian Leader Calls for Village to Join Kosovo
Macedonian TV Views Security Situation in Ethnic Albanian Village
Tanusevci wants annexation to Kosovo
Two More Albanian Villages to Organize Referendums for Separating from Macedonia
Albanian Commentary: Give us Kosovo or We will Create a Greater Albania
Separation of Kosovo will mean separation of Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Greece: AOK veteran
ANA [Albanian National Army] Sends Threats to all Albanian Politicians in Macedonia
But the Albanian Threat of the Week award goes to Klinaku:
If
the international community fails to recognize the right of the
Albanian people for self-definition, and the status is defined on the
basis of compromises, we would naturally resume the fight…Every other
decision different from [independence] would lead to violence for which
both the politicians and the international community would be guilty.
Serblog’s Melana Pejakovich paraphrases:
“If we have to make any compromises, there will be a war and it will be
the international community’s fault…Give us exactly what we want or we
will start killing people, and YOU will have made us do it!”
Pejakovich further breaks down the Klinaku interview thus:
1.
Albanians consider wherever they live (or have ever lived) to
automatically be “Albania” and the non-Albanian governments of wherever
they live — including the governments of the sovereign countries of
Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Greece — to simply be “Occupiers”. If
Albanians live in a place in significant numbers, they consider it to
be “theirs”, independent of any international borders — and they
consider the non-Albanian governments of those countries to be “the
enemy”…
2.
If Kosovo is granted independence, then that automatically justifies
“the right of self-determination” (and secession) for Albanians in
Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro and Greece.
In
other words, “Kosovo Independence” is just the beginning of a series of
conquests in the “Greater Albania Project” and to grant Kosovo
independence, is to encourage the conquest of the rest…So much for the
delusion that granting Kosovo independence will “bring peace and
stability to the Balkans”…
3.
According to Klinaku, Albanians believe that they fought “a war of
liberation” for Kosovo and part of Macedonia, and they won, so there is
no need for them to compromise with Serbs or anyone else. Albanians
were “the victors” so there is no need to consult anyone else re their
“self-determination” or to “discuss anything in Vienna”. The 1999 NATO
Bombing of Yugoslavia appears to be perceived as irrelevant to
Albanians, because Albanians did it all.
Here
we are faced with the consequences of letting Albanians believe they
can have it all — and for the most part delivering it to them — sans
legality or any kind of established norms of statecraft, while holding
them to none of the agreements governing the region. In fact, just
yesterday we saw what happens when you do something uncharacteristic
and crazy, such as say the words “UN Resolution” to Albanians:
Kosovo Albanian daily slams UNMIK head for saying UN resolution 1244 still valid
[Commentary by Express Chief Editor Berat Buzhala: “This Is Provocation, Mr. Ruecker“]
At
a time when an entire nation is desperately waiting to hear what will
happen to the final status of Kosova [sic], the Kosova [sic] chief
administrator [Joachim Ruecker] returned from holidays and provoked us
openly by saying that no one should be hasty by setting dates for
declaration of independence because the UN Security Council Resolution
1244 is still valid.
…
We have waited beyond
every limit. Besides, I can say that we are about to burst into tears
and it is regrettable that we are being provoked, because we might now
easily fall prey to this provocation. I recall a press statement made
by the Israeli defence minister on the very first day when this country
began the war against Hezbollah troops operating in Lebanese territory.
He has said, “If someone meant to provoke us by kidnapping two of our
soldiers, then they have managed to do so.”
That’s right. To Albanians, rule of law is provocation. On par with kidnapping.
…Leaving
all these things aside, tell me, Mr. Ruecker: What happened inside you
that made you issue such a surprising threat? Will this mean that in
the days to come you will say that, based on that resolution, Kosova
territory is part of Serbia’s sovereignty? Or perhaps, reading
carefully the text of the resolution, will you mention the possibility
of the return of a limited number of Serb forces based on a request
made by Belgrade?
Do
you believe that that resolution, which you mention so improperly, will
be implemented one day? Perhaps it may be, but only through a new war
that would be bloodier and less controllable and have more consequences
for the region. Mr. Ruecker, we have become used to living in freedom
[impunity] — something for which you, your country, and all Western
countries deserve credit — therefore, it will be a very big problem to
convince us to go [back].
Where
have we seen this before? Oh yes — in Bosnia, as Balkans analyst
Neboojsa Malic aptly illustrated when writing about the departure of UN
High Representative Paddy Ashdown in 2005 (emphasis added):
So
used were they to Ashdown’s support, Izetbegovic’s heirs found it
shocking when last month the viceroy quashed their plan to rename the
Sarajevo international airport after the departed First Bosniak
[wartime Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic]. Leaders of Izetbegovic’s
SDA party howled in protest
and denounced Ashdown, forgetting instantly his support for their
agenda, or that his decision didn’t say “no,” so much as “not yet.”
Ashdown thus found himself sharing the fate of every foreign
official who came to Bosnia sympathetic to the Muslim cause, only to
end up an object of invective as soon as he deviated even slightly from
the SDA dogma of Muslim innocence and victimhood.
And now for the Kosovo punch line of the week.
Because it comes from the kings of secession and border-redrawing, the
Albanians: “We can never approve of partition [of Kosovo]. It is
unacceptable. If we start redrawing borders, who knows when and where it will stop.” — Kosovo “Prime Minister” Agim Ceku
Summing up the Kosovo Effect is Deliso:
Indeed,
longtime UNMIK employees in Kosovo who have watched the process
disintegrate over the years express disbelief at how the Western Media
and politicians can get away with calling the intervention a success.
As has been recounted, the direct link between Kosovo Albanians and
terrorist plots, up to and including the London July 2005 attacks, has
materialized in the form of arrests…
For
the American special police investigator in Kosovo, a formidable
ex-military man with long experience in the Balkans, the sluggish
response of Western security services in the Balkans to the terrorist
threat is vexing. “I saw some of the same shit in Bosnia, not going
after the terrorists, letting ‘em hang out and stay comfortable,” he
says. “But seeing this stuff here in Kosovo — it really ripped me out
of the old red-white-and-blue, you know what I mean?
The picture gets more disturbing still, especially when one realizes that Kosovo’s future is a window into our own. Deliso:
The
small semblance of order remaining in Kosovo owes to the fact that the
UN has allowed former KLA leaders and the mafia to control
society…Today, this chaotic situation has moved from the unfortunate to
the scandalous, with the CIA, MI6, BND, and others eager to build
“special relationships” with Islamic extremists bent on killing
Christians, attacking Western targets, and creating a fundamentalist
caliphate.
Western
officials currying favor with extremists, perhaps in subconscious
preparation for a future with Muslims as our masters, is by now a
familiar phenomenon even on our shores. When it interferes with terror
investigations, I call it the Kosovizing of police work in America, and it’s something that first hit home for me when Debbie Schlussel wrote about lasers being pointed
from Dearborn, Michigan at commercial airline pilots in flight, and the
reluctance of our authorities to do much about it. She specifically
cites the terrorist-friendly Brian Moskowitz, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Special Agent in Charge for Michigan and Ohio:
[W]e’ve
heard from several of Abu Moskowitz’s agents, who tell us they’ve
brought to his and his top lieutenants’ attention Arab Muslim smuggling
rings and restaurants in the same Dearborn and Dearborn Heights areas
(from which the laser pointers emanated), which routinely employ
illegal alien Muslims and launder funds from their all-cash businesses,
sending the money “back home.” Mr. Moskowitz and his top underlings
have repeatedly said they are “not interested” in pursuing those cases.
…
[B]oth Moskowitz and Murphy were in fawning attendance at the Hezbollah mosque,
where they gushed over an Islamic cleric who openly praised terrorists,
and they joked with him about why Hezbollah is on the State Department
terrorist list…
We
also note that Murphy, the chief U.S. Justice Department official in
the heart of Islamic America, sought a very light sentence for Nemr Ali Rahal,
a member of the mosque who is a member of Hezbollah and committed fraud
and money laundering to send the money “back home”. Explosive material
was found on the man’s and his young son’s passports. Where was Abu
Moskowitz’s investigation into where the money was going (which is
under his purview at ICE)? Where was Murphy’s press conference on that?
(No charges on the explosives or even money laundering were ever filed
— and won’t be.)…[Y]ou have a giant, radicalized, concentrated Muslim
population located in one single armpit of America, and yet authorities
not only kowtow to it, but put investigations into that community off
limits to law enforcement…
Welcome to Kosovo, USA. ExileStreet
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2007 Julia Gorin
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