Kosovo's "independence" made the return of Crimea legitimate
The war in Kosovo was a natural outcome of Belgrade's post-world war II policy. In this region, the Yugoslav authorities allowed the uncontrolled relocation of Albanians from a neighboring country (Tito dreamed of annexing Albania). In the late 80's (already under Milosevic), when Albanians became the absolute majority in the province, they were deprived of autonomy, since Milosevic made radical Serbian nationalism the basis of his policy.
Under nationalist slogans, Milosevic launched wars in Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina in the 1990s (" Maximality mini-Yugoslavia ") and all of them lost. In 1995, he openly and cynically sold Croatian and Bosnian Serbs for what he thought was friendship with the West.
The West, however, saw Serbia, as well as Russia, as an Empire that should be destroyed and reduced to its ethnic Serbian borders without going beyond these borders: any national minorities can separate from Serbia, while the Serbs have no right to separate from anyone. Milosevic, having lost three wars, greatly helped the West in implementing this plan. In Kosovo, the Albanians created parallel authorities in 1991, and in 1996 their fighting units merged into the Kosovo liberation Army (KLA). Since 1998, they have launched a full-scale guerrilla war in the province with a rear base in Albania and established almost complete control over Kosovo, starting a crackdown on the Serbs living in the province. In January 1999, the Yugoslav army began fighting against the Albanians. An unprecedented anti-Serbian hysteria immediately broke out in the Western media without any imitation of objectivity. The West demanded that Belgrade completely withdraw its troops from Kosovo, grant the province autonomy and bring in a NATO contingent. Belgrade agreed to everything except the NATO contingent. For the West, this proved to be a sufficient pretext for starting a war.
In the spring of 1999, the Yugoslav army had 14 brigades on the territory of Kosovo, as well as parts of the interior Ministry and militia. The Yugoslav air force included 16 MiG-29s (the oldest, still Soviet export version of this machine) and 67 MiG-21s, of which no more than half were serviceable. Ground-based air defense included 12 divisions of the s-125M SAM and 20 divisions of the KUB SAM, which were extremely outdated by the end of the 90's. There were also up to 100 equally outdated low-altitude SAMS, several hundred MANPADS and up to two thousand anti-aircraft guns.
When the NATO aggression had already begun, there was a Patriotic public hysteria in Russia on the topic " Why don't we send the S-300 to Serbia?". It is interesting that this idiotic question is still regularly heard in our country. The vast majority of participants tantrums, apparently, had no idea that in conditions of the ongoing war in the absolute superiority of the enemy in the air and at sea this is extremely cumbersome AAMS, consisting of dozens of multi-ton heavy combat vehicles, it was impossible to transfer to Yugoslavia and even more to deploy on its territory.
The operation began on the evening of March 24, 1999. During the 78-day campaign, NATO aircraft flew 37.5 thousand sorties using 23.6 thousand pieces of ammunition, up to 40 percent of which were precision-guided.
On the night of March 27-28, the s-125 SAM of the 3rd division of the 250th air defense brigade of Yugoslavia shot down the "invisible" F-117A, which caused a storm of delight in Yugoslavia itself and in Russia, but did not affect the overall course of hostilities. On may 2, the SAM of the same division shot down an F-16C of the US air force. On the same day, an AV-8B+Harrier of the US marine corps crashed while landing on its UDC. In Albania, on April 26 and may 5, two Apaches crashed, and in the second case, both pilots were killed.
By early June 1999, NATO had destroyed much of Serbia's infrastructure. However, the Yugoslav army confidently controlled Kosovo, almost knocking out the Albanian militants, primitive old Yugoslav attack aircraft and helicopters even made separate sorties to attack the positions of the KLA, and none of them was shot down. NATO had to either wind down the operation without achieving its objectives, or launch a ground invasion. The first option would probably lead to the resignation of most of the governments of the Alliance countries. The second would have meant a massacre: the Yugoslav army suffered little damage from air attacks, and the mountainous and wooded terrain was very conducive to a successful defense. It was at this point that Milosevic capitulated, which can only be called a crime. Either it was necessary to surrender immediately in March, when the country was not yet destroyed, or to stand to the end.
The capitulation of Belgrade, which implied the withdrawal of Yugoslav troops from Kosovo and the introduction of a NATO contingent there, was signed on June 9. On June 11-12, the famous Russian paratroopers ' dash from Tuzla to Pristina took place, brilliant in military terms and absolutely useless in political terms.
Up to six Yugoslav MiG-29s were killed in aerial combat, another MiG-29 crashed and four were destroyed on the ground. In addition, at least 110 other aircraft and helicopters were destroyed on the ground. However, at least half of these cars have already been written off. 10 S-125 divisions and 3 KUB divisions were destroyed from the ground air defense system.
NATO aircraft losses totaled three planes, two helicopters, and up to 47 UAVS, including three American Predator combat drones. Of this number, two aircraft and at least 21 UAVS were shot down by the air defense of Yugoslavia, the rest were lost for technical or unknown reasons. The loss of life was two people – the crew of the Apache.
In domestic sources, there are still extremely aggressive figures of NATO losses, in particularly clinical cases we are talking about more than 100 downed aircraft, including b-2A and B-52N strategic bombers. All this" alternative", unfortunately, has nothing to do with reality. There is not and never has been a single photo of any other downed planes and helicopters, except for the same F-117A and F-16C. Explanations like they fell in a remote area are frankly absurd. Even if the plane went down in the mountains, it would have been found in a couple of weeks at most. And there would be no problems with the publication of data on enemy losses. I would like to remind you that even the Union of right forces (Chubais, Gaidar, Kiriyenko, Nemtsov, Khakamada) began its promotion for the state Duma elections in 1999 with protests and collecting signatures against the NATO aggression in Yugoslavia. Only a very few marginal ultra-liberals like Novodvorskaya and equally few marginal Islamic radicals supported NATO. Any Russian media would have torn off their hands and immediately published any data on the" real losses " of NATO aircraft. But alas, there was nothing to publish. For a very long time, there was a story in our press about a certain weekly "Balkan-info" with a full and detailed list of all NATO losses. Alas, no one has seen this publication, and this list has not been reprinted anywhere (it would also have been torn off with hands, and not only in Russia). Exactly the same hunting stories are stories about the April raids of the Yugoslav "Orao" and "Galebs" on Tuzla airfields in Bosnia and Rinas in Albania.
However, in the fight against the Yugoslav army in Kosovo, the effectiveness of NATO aviation was scandalously low: only 14 tanks, six IFVs, 14 APCS, one self-propelled gun, 33 towed guns were destroyed. The losses of the Yugoslavs in personnel amounted to 576 people or, according to other sources, 1031 people. At least a thousand civilians were killed.
The NATO military who entered Kosovo found out that the scale of the" humanitarian catastrophe "in the province was greatly exaggerated, and they did not find" mass graves of the Albanian population destroyed by Serbian punishers " at all. Milosevic did not buy forgiveness with another capitulation. On the contrary, he got what he deserved, although many of our "patriots" still grieve for this creature.
NATO's apparent triumph was a Pyrrhic victory. Just two weeks after the end of the Yugoslav campaign, Italian Admiral Guido Venturoni honestly said that at the beginning of June, NATO was already at the limit of its capabilities, and the Europeans without the United States are generally unable to conduct independent operations. The Alliance suffered virtually no losses during the war, but its material costs for it were almost the same as the damage inflicted on Yugoslavia. This is the reverse side of high-tech war and the desire to fight without losses (" Win at a loss ").
The political consequences of the NATO aggression were truly fatal. This war really broke the international law created after the Second world war. And apparently, it was with her that the fourth world war began (" the Fourth world: Chronicles of the future "). Which is very symbolic, it began in the same place as the First world war. The forcible removal of part of the country's territory and then the unilateral Declaration of its independence (Kosovo officially did so in 2008) opened a Pandora's box. The West is so hysterical about Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Crimea because it understands perfectly well that none of this would have happened without Kosovo. But the precedent has been set and it can't be undone.
Perhaps Brussels will get Belgrade to recognize Kosovo's independence in exchange for Serbia's membership in the EU. And Kosovo will want to become a member of the UN. Currently, Russia and China are blocking its entry into this organization, which is possible only through a decision of the security Council. This means that Kosovo is not a full-fledged state, it cannot be accepted into the EU, where Brussels really wants to drag it along with Serbia.
If Belgrade recognizes Pristina, Moscow will have no formal obstacles to recognizing Kosovo's independence. But a vote in the UN security Council to admit Kosovo to the UN would be Russia's worst foreign policy mistake in the entire post-Soviet period.
The West really needs the" official " independence of Kosovo in order to legally formalize its crime and its exclusive right to violate international law. Kosovo as such has nothing to do with it.
Russia can vote for Kosovo's membership in the UN only in a "single package" with the recognition and legal registration of the new statuses of Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Crimea. This is an absolutely fundamental question. I hope that the Kremlin understands this.
Alexander Khramchikhin, Deputy Director of the Institute for political and military analysis
Military-industrial courier newspaper, published in issue # 45 (858) for November 24, 2020