So I'm very pleased to introduce today's speaker coming to us all the way from Sam Cross College,
Oxford, but has actually wandered a lot further than from one side,
from one part of Oxford to another, but extremely well travelled in the Balkan region and has written not only academic
articles and books but also travel guides for most countries of the region.
But his last book is on the Kosovo Liberation Army, looking at his underground war to Balkan insurgency, 1948 to 2001,
looking at the prehistory of the organisation that some of the people in this room only learned
about themselves when they were asked to take take to use armed force on their behalf back in 1999.
So this should be a really interesting introduction to who these people really were,
what their goals are, and, yeah, what effect the 1999 intervention actually had.
So thank you. Thank you very much and thank you very much for the program.
Also giving me the opportunity to talk about some aspects of this.
What I plan to do is, in the time honoured phrase, divide everything into three parts like Caesar's School.
The first part I like to summarise what I see as a value in trying to understand the immediate past
history of this organisation and what the history means in terms of wider Balkan modern history.
Then secondly, as we are also here in this building,
I was going to say something briefly about what seems to me to be the inheritance of the organisation in terms of current Kosovo security concerns.
And thirdly, to indicate one or two points which I think will lead to future avenues for academic research.
The question, of course, is in a way, with all these movements, as Patrick Lee fellow,
the Helena put it in something he wrote many years ago of what happens when you turn warriors into waiters.
He was thinking of the people he'd known who fought against the Italian invasion of Greece,
and then also many of them fought subsequently in the civil war in Greece afterwards.
Let's just look, therefore focus our minds perhaps at this picture, because on the one hand,
this is a genuine, authentic photograph that was taken by by somebody in Prishtina in the war in May 1999.
And you have this sort of half day retreat of time, immense landscape, and you have this little resistance for their guns against the great landscape.
In that way, it could be a picture taken anywhere in the French Resistance or in the Italian mentions of
fighting partisan warfare against Mussolini or many other recent modern history contexts.
But these people, in fact, are nearly all doctors. And today doctors in Prishtina and this lady here is one of the chief gynaecologists in Prishtina.
And what we're actually looking at is a KLA medical unit.
So these people in a way you could say, offer an exemplary justification for international intervention because they've taken up arms,
because you see some of them are armed even by their doctors in what was seen as a good cause.
And they've now returned to civilian life in an important profession and are rebuilding a new Kosovo.
So this is paradigm one. Now let's look at my second illustration, Patrick, and as I say, it's very much to focus our thoughts on the issues.
This is a picture of a KLA unit in action at almost exactly the same time as the other photograph was taken.
This unit was in the Koshyari Valley, on the borders of Kosovo and Albania,
and it was being formed and looks like a fairly reasonable little infantry unit,
largely thanks to British help, because the people who trained this unit were British Special Forces soldiers.
Those who are posted undercover to crew in Albania to help improve the military efficiency of the KLA.
So I show this picture for two reasons. Because this conveys to us the image of a proper innocence rather than a rural improvised defence force.
But it also conveys, I think, the sense that a certain sense of fabrication, I think in the previous image, there's nothing fabricated.
This is an image. They march towards the photographer to look good.
And for all we know, they may perform well in Kesari Kesari.
That's one of the better aspects of the Colonel's history in the NATO bombing period.
Now the third picture here is a very different group of people.
This is taken in Macedonia and near Tetovo at a village called Shape of It.
So in 2001.
And the main figure to focus on is this man here in uniform, Ali Maté, who was in the war.
Head of the Class Munitions and Logistics Procurement Unit in Albania, but of course,
is deputy prime minister of Macedonia and has been regularly in power ever since.
And he is the per diem, if you wish, of the KLA or another leader who turned themselves successfully into a respectable politician.
He travels where he wishes and is involved in all sorts of conventional political practice.
So the idea of the question, what is the inheritance of the Kosovo Liberation Army?
We have to ask these three preferred images, if you wish.
The doctors in uniform who became doctors and nurses, and now these men, one of whom is actually dead, was killed later in the war.
Bearded men on the right that were where the political leadership has evolved.
And of course, the most prominent of these people is Hashim Tzachi,
who is currently prime minister of Kosovo and also takes part in normal political practice in the leadership of his country.
The origin of my book lay really in a conversation with Mr. Thatcher at a period when Kosovo was still under U.N. administration, but 2001, 2002.
And we had become quite close friends, and we were involved in all sorts of political dialogue about the future of Kosovo.
And he wanted me to write a history of the War, which was basically a biography of Adam Jan, the founding father of the KLA, who was killed.
It is with most of his family and Prakash in March 1998.
I thought about this a lot. Mr. Thatcher is an educated and intelligent man and also a history graduate and pupil of my friend.
Pupil, I should say my friend. None of us golfs who runs the East European History Seminar in Zurich,
and I did do some work on the subject and it didn't come to fruition for various reasons.
I think mainly because I felt a biographical study of a leader of this kind wasn't the right way to try to write the history of the war.
And I think that that was a correct decision in retrospect when I started to undertake the book, like many other books,
I think that you you this comes up if you are writing contemporary history,
you find that the sources of events go back much further than you originally thought.
Again, I think this is why it would have been a mistake to base the book around January,
because the causes of the careless growth and ultimately the relative success lie much further back in history.
And my book traces what happened from the break between Tito and Stalin in 1948.
With new documents that have emerged I was able to get hold of in Moscow.
It was clear that there had been Russian interest in creating an insurgency against Tito,
based primarily on the Albanian minority in the south as early as 1950.
And there was this genesis of a possible insurgency for us along the lines of what would eventually become the KLA as early as the autumn of 1951.
Bennett, Shea, Hugh and Burgess, number two, was very closely involved in a lot of these discussions.
Shehu was in some ways Hodge's alter ego, who had been a senior partisan commander in the Spanish Civil War.
And then he became head of. The Albanian armed forces. After the establishment of communism in Albania in 1945.
Stalin's ambassador in Albania, Chou Alkan,
was also very interested in this possibility and some of the dialogues which I've
used based on documents and discussions he had this year in Moscow in that period.
But of course, the Russians had many different fish to fry and they wanted a good relationship.
After a while with Tito, they felt Russian influence could be maintained, at least to a degree,
in Belgrade, and they didn't want to put all their eggs in the Albanian basket.
And like many other people from very, very different political traditions,
they found Enver Hoxha a very difficult and tricky person to deal with and a very unsatisfactory ally.
But nevertheless, some underground work started.
I was able to conduct oral interviews with survivors from this period who were living in exile in the United States,
one of whom in particular became a key figure in the genesis of the KLA support mechanisms in the Albanian American diaspora.
And these people were veterans of long periods of incarceration in Tito's jails,
and they were a wonderful guide to the world of the political underground, which was essentially in that period, a prison based world.
I won't trouble you with recapitulation of recent Kosovo history, but I would just mention that during the Cold War,
of course, Kosovo was a forgotten and neglected by the international community.
The United States is the only potential serious new friend and protector of Albania, as it ever had always been since Woodrow Wilson's time,
was preoccupied with relations with Tito in Belgrade and also with the Adriatic coast as a focus for Seapower.
But this began to change a little as time went on,
but in particular after the violent demonstrations in 1968 and 1981 in Kosovo against Belgrade rule.
After 1981, about 1500 people were imprisoned, in some cases for long periods as a result of taking part in the demonstrations.
And in 1982, partly in prison and partly outside it Lavezzi, a popular concern was formed that the Kosovo People's Movement,
which was a Marxist-Leninist underground organisation, which sought to open up the issue of armed resistance again against Belgrade rule.
But the heart of my book is really tracing Lempicka and its influence over subsequent events as early as 1980th November 1980.
Other groups of people were beginning to form armed underground cells in in Western Europe, principally in Brussels and in Stuttgart.
The Guerrilla Brothers were assassinated in Stuttgart in 1982, who were the most coherent possible future leaders of an insurgency.
And the decision was taken by a lempicka exterior to establish a new centre of organisation.
But not in Germany because of the security problems. But in Switzerland.
In Zurich. And. In my view, the exterior in Zurich was the midwife for the KLA.
That will be very much more research to be done on this.
And we know that some leading participants have written memoirs which at the moment they are not willing to publish.
But this was where things things happened.
They were also able in Zurich to get some assistance from Albanian sources because Albania has foreign trade.
Even in the period of most or targeted isolation was conducted and financed, was done through Switzerland as a neutral country.
And so the Marxist-Leninist in Lempicka were able to open dialogue with the jurists in Tirana about the nature of what an insurgency might involve.
We don't know a great deal about how just reactions to these things.
The reason for this is I hope people do not think much of her indolence as a researcher and a historian,
but certainly because in Toronto most of the relevant archives are still shut and there may be archives elsewhere that would cast light on things.
But we still don't have access to the moment.
But by the end of the 1980s, there was already a build up of small arms and other munitions developing in some places in Kosovo.
And this is what the core of my story has been, is about really how this was done and how certain things were successful,
how other things were failures, and how what became was a tiny group of people.
I mean, the core group of people in Syria in 1987, 88 was a maximum of 25 people.
And some people would argue not as many as that grew to be able to put a military force in the field ten years
later and ultimately a force of 18,000 strong that was involved as an ally of NATO's in NATO's air campaign.
The ramifications of any of these things are very complex and I haven't got time to go into them now.
But what I think I would argue is that much of the work that built the KLA was done independently of the political leadership.
People realised in Kosovo, the political leadership in Switzerland was necessary,
but it wasn't something which operated in a very coherently authoritarian way.
To take one example and most of the armies in the Balkans, which depend on the partisan warfare tradition.
You had political commissars who were certainly in the Second World period,
communists who were primarily political functionaries rather than military military, and whose duty was to say nobody stepped out of line.
The value of these people was not doubted by people of his generation.
Shaye, who in some of his surviving writings,
has written about the political chaos as he saw it in the Spanish Civil War and the splits on the Republican side that affected military operations.
And he and others like him, or for that matter, Tito, had had the same experience in Spain.
They they didn't want the same things repeated in their own insurgency and to access movements in the Second World War,
the KLA, I think, was more intelligent.
They were certainly Marxist-Leninist in the leadership, but there were also many people who are not and who were independent nationalists,
and they were able to work together in a way which I think surprised a lot of us who are studying the movement at the time.
I first, just as an anecdote, I first came into contact with armed people in Kosovo in 1992 who I was astonished to meet,
as often does with these things, met by accident.
I was immediately struck by the very low level of their munitions, and particularly the fact they had weapons, but virtually no ammunition.
And this was going to be the story of the KLA for many years afterwards.
This inheritance, of course, grew and as I've indicated in the middle of my book,
the KLA ended up fighting side by side with the British Special Forces and Koshyari in May and June 1999.
And at one level this could be seen as the fulfilment of a dream, really, that this extraordinary,
some people would say backward rural defence force was fighting side by side with the finest individual soldiers in the world,
but yet within six months they didn't exist.
It was demobilised under the military technical agreements that General Jackson and others signed with the Serbs.
And in Kosovo to this day, even though formally independent, still doesn't have an army.
No, I won't. I haven't got time to dwell too much on the intricacies of what's been going on in.
I spent the last few years, but I think all of you should be aware of the many difficulties in northern
Kosovo to still exist for the Serbian majority areas north of the Ivo River.
The very high levels of personal arms possession in both communities and the
recreation of what traditionally has been known by was always called by Tito.
The Albanian arsenal. In other words, heavy personal arms possession, the munitions possession in the house and in the farm.
Security in Kosovo is provided power by NATO, as it has been since July 1999,
but with a quite dramatically diminished number of soldiers and and special police.
And I think I'm right in saying that in about August, September 99, there's about three 33,000,
35,000 NATO soldiers, you know, with boots on the ground in Kosovo.
That's just not shrunk to much less than ten.
But if you subtract the people whose essential duties are in keeping bases open, the technical work, the logistics,
the number of people who could be mobilised in the event of difficulties in Kosovo is quite limited.
Since independence, it's been argued that Kosovo will at some point have an army and this would inherit the KLA tradition.
So one way of interpreting the title of what I had to say this morning is you could say that could be a subtitle will be Kosovo Army.
Well, the answer to that, I think, is very complex.
It's an open secret that the United States and the U.K. wanted there to be a Kosovo army as part of the HSR agreement on independence.
But it's also, I think,
an open secret and established that the Europeans involved in that process vetoed this because they felt the Serbs shouldn't have to accept this,
and also that it would mean that the Serbs wouldn't sign the Tsar deal.
Well, whatever the rights and wrongs with that, the question has not gone away.
Pessimists would say that the paramilitary tradition in Kosovo is still alive.
This is exemplified by the very high level of weapons possession and families themselves,
which I've mentioned, and that the grounds for conflict are still there.
If you have as often happens in bulk in conflicts, some random incident,
that's nothing to do with politics at one level suddenly starts something and then you have rioting and the rioting can't be controlled.
But all of that agenda is certainly still present. We saw serious riot rioting in Kosovo in spring 2003 and also less so in 2005.
The Ibar River in Metro North is still a flashpoint for tensions.
Would there be if there was inter-communal trouble again?
Or pessimists might say now we have inter-communal trouble again?
Or could be on the brink of it. What role would paramilitarism play?
I think that's very hard to judge. The old look Barca doesn't exist anymore.
After 1999, it became an open political party for a short time and doesn't have any.
It didn't have any future.
And many members have left the club eventually joined Mr. Ramos-Horta Dinos Party, a majority, I think, who are resident in Kosovo.
You have a very different Kosovo diaspora now because most people have gone back home who are in political exile.
You no longer have what I think was the key catalyst for the insurgency,
the imprisonment of so many militants in the 1980s where prison formed, as it often does, a good university for revolutionaries.
So the old KLA is undoubtedly finished.
But I think there are people who are looking to the future.
They're looking to the unsatisfactory status as they see it.
Of course, under the Qatari deal, they're looking at the security vacuum,
which I think many people agree exists with NATO's drawing down and the absence of
anything to replace NATO and also growing regional tensions in the last few years.
Membership of the European Union has been held up as the answer to many of the problems of the Balkans.
Some new countries have joined like Croatia recently or is in the process of joining.
But what a difference this is going to make to underlying ethnic issues is far from clear.
It's also far from clear what the real purchase of the European Union will be,
particularly, I think, in Washington and the Obama administration's orbit.
The European Union is seen virtually as a panacea to all problems of Eastern Europe.
Well, I think we only have to open the newspapers certainly this morning to see that is perhaps not a responsible viewpoint.
The Bush administration was highly activist in the Balkans, obviously,
particularly on the Albanian side and in the manner of a lot of U.S. administrations.
The incoming administration was to do that diametric opposite of what the previous one did.
And we saw this happen when the Bush people arrived, and I think you're seeing some of that now in Kosovo.
My own view is that the crossover protection call, which is made up of certainly many ex KLA people, needs further development.
General Czech who came to this country and made a speech a little late last autumn and he said this, but I don't know how much support he got.
I'm very interested to see we have one member of the audience who I think has
much to say on this if she has the opportunity to share in the discussion.
The fact remains Kosovo is not yet a normal functioning state.
It has many of the appendages of statehood. It has grown quite successfully some of the state functions from 1999 in quite a short period.
For instance, it has quite a coherent and well-trained diplomatic service, but it doesn't have an army.
And the question of an army is central really to discussing inheritance.
The KLA. If we try to see what the options are for this inheritance, there are really only two.
One is, I think, to go back to this.
Really? I mean, that is what many NATO nations would like have an orderly infantry force trained according to NATO's standards,
and which, particularly in U.S. eyes, could provide badly needed manpower for US led international coalitions.
That's also, I think, what many Kosovar Albanians would like, because they feel that in the army when it comes,
would be funded largely by NATO and by the US and we would have good jobs and foreign travel and it would be very nice.
But that tradition of that image of an army has not much to do with the careless inheritance.
The careless inheritance is primarily based on defence of territory, property, family and so on.
And it's informal, it's paramilitary and so on.
And reconciling the two is going to be difficult. I found in one of my notebooks recently a discussion I had with how she felt.
She back in October 2001, when we were talking, as we often did, about what should or shouldn't happen to the soldiers, the Allied,
because this was becoming quite a live issue by then in the international community and there were widespread allegations of organised,
organised crime, involvement and so on, racketeering, ex-soldiers and all the usual problems that passionate demobilised armies often have.
And she said to me, Well, of course, you've got to understand, James,
and I'm quoting verbatim here from the conversation, who said we were always really to armies.
And at the time, I think we never understood that well enough.
There was the local rural, informal tradition of that chapter in Balkan terms.
In other words, the unit led by a prominent local individual based on purely, usually personal charisma, not military rank.
And there was the formal tradition,
which was in many ways inherited from those in the KLA who had served in Tito's China and then successors and general Czech,
who, of course is very much from the second tradition.
And I think that accounts and I think this is not just my opinion,
but many observers feel this just accounts for his lack of political success in post-war Kosovo.
Why is Hashim Starchy and her DNA and so on belonged to the other tradition in kind?
And they they were rapidly able to form and lead political parties, which whatever the ups and downs of things,
particularly her denies case still really dominate the political landscape in Kosovo today.
There is also another ingredient to consider what the attitude towards security in
the military and the KLA inheritance would be of of an curtiz's Vietnam vengeance.
This is the there was originally a student movement which became quite a serious political player and has members on the cusp of Parliament.
And it is completely rejectionist to the society plan and would mean if they came to power,
I think the departure of most of the remaining Serbs from Kosovo and also the opening of in some
dimensions the opening of the border with Albania and the movement towards a more united state.
No Curtiz's own background is distinctly non-military.
He was a prominent student leader in the war. He didn't join the KLA and like virtually everyone in the leadership of hard data such as parties.
And he was then imprisoned in Serbia for a long time.
And I've said in my book that I think that while his nationalistic credentials are impeccable,
there will always be a question mark about his credibility and many popular eyes
on the Kosovo Albanians side because of his lack of involvement in the war.
Although, of course, he would be the first to say, Well, that wasn't my fault if I was locked up.
So there is that point. I think that point of view is, I think, ambiguous.
It's not clear what steps they would take. I think in their hearts, like probably in the majority of Kosovo Albanians, they would like a KLA back.
There's an enormous inherited consciousness in all modern Balkan societies of the informal.
Tradition in warfare. Grandpa, who heroically killed a German village.
Great grandpa who heroically killed an Italian in his or something.
Going back years and years. And of course, the greatest tradition of all.
If you have produced someone in your family who killed a Turkish soldier at the time of the Ottoman
Empire and the possession of personal weapons and so on is essential to all these traditions,
what the Serbs think? Well, I think the answer is not much.
But on the other hand, at the moment, I don't think they're in a very good position to resist the creation of an army,
because their own military build up on the borders of Kosovo has been considerable since 1999 2000.
The new, enormous, new military base being built north of Verona in south east Serbia.
It is the largest single military civil engineering project in the whole of Europe and Europe and Russia.
And they, I think, would not be standing on very strong ground in no time if they protested against a former army being formed.
I think on that note, I would stop because I know there's a great deal of expertise in the room, some of which is wonderful to see.
But I was very surprised to see here. And so I would welcome your questions.
Thank you.