I'm not saying it's funny, but... no, I'm saying it's funny.

          In addition to being a week of outrage in US politics, it’s also been a week for separatists in post-Ottoman nations. Evidently the International Court of Justice has ruled that Kosovo’s secession in 2008, along with its de facto independence since 1999, was within the bounds of international law. The first impulse is to make a snide comment about how much international law usually means, all things considered, and it even seems to be justified. After all, Serbia still claims Kosovo as its sovereign territory, Kosovo is still pretty much an independent entity, and nobody recognizes their independence who didn’t before. This is probably a bit unfair, as the question of separatist groups is no small one for many countries. More interesting, though, is the potential impact on the future of the interventionalist policies adopted by NATO and Russia in Central and Eastern Europe and the Balkans.
          Like many of the eventual Ottoman territories, Kosovo has something of a confused history. Conquered by Rome in the 160s BC, the region experienced a period of autonomy after the fall of the Roman Empire until its conquest in the middle of the 9th century by the Bulgarian Empire. Unsurprisingly, therefor, this brought it into the center of the attentions of Basil II of Cosntantinople (also called Basil the Bulgar Slayer). As an area central to Slavic opposition to the Byzantine Empire, the area changed hands fairly frequently until the Serbs finally managed to assert sole control at the end of that century. During the 13th and 14th centuries these principalities increased in power, culminating in the 1346 formation of the Serbian Empire, which was promptly conquered by the Ottoman Turks four decades later.
          Considering their history of resistance to Byzantine rule, it’s no great shock that the Serbs struggled vigorously against Ottoman occupation. The severity of this fighting produced the most notable impact of this period on the region, a non-trivial demographic shift. The constant warfare, and its attendant devastation, led to a constant stream of Serbs living in Kosovo leaving for other parts of Europe. The temporary conquest of the region by Austria during the Habsburg-Ottoman War led to as many as 40,000 Serbs leaving Kosovo for Austria in 1690, which in turn triggered further mass-migrations of Christians throughout the next century.
          In the meantime, the initially ferocious Albanian resistance to Ottoman rule had come to an end. The conversion of the Albanian chiefs to Islam led to a general improvement in the status of Albanians throughout the Ottoman Empire. In addition to the accession of many Albanians to prominent government positions, the Albanian tribes expanded into the now-depopulated Kosovo. With first stirrings of nationalism in the late 19th century, the Albanian population of Kosovo briefly pushed for Albanian autonomy and cultural rights, but ultimately supported the continued existence of the Ottoman Empire. This new ethnic nationalism did, however, begin to entrench tensions between Muslim Albanians and Christian Serbs, setting the stage for the events of the 20th century.
          The 1912 ouster of Sultan Abdul Hamid II by the Young Turks triggered violence in the Albanian portions of the Ottoman Empire. A crushing defeat at the hands of the Albanians was exacerbated by a wave of desertions among Albanian troops in the Ottoman army; not long after the Ottomans were driven from the majority of their European possessions by an alliance of Balkan forces, leaving Kosovo in the hands of the Serbs. During the First World War, Kosovo was occupied by Austria-Hungary and her allies. After the Central Powers were ejected in 1918, the newly formed Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenians considered Albanian Kosovars a minority, and began a campaign of land reform and colonization to drive the Albanian populace from Kosovo, at the same time as restricting Albanian-language education.
          With the outbreak of World War Two, Kosovo was invaded by the Axis powers along with the rest of Yugoslavia, and made a part of Italian Albania. According to some sources the wartime Albanian government, a fascist satellite regime of Italy, engaged in a massive campaign of deportation against the Serbs of Kosovo, while other sources report as many as 10,000 deaths. Despite calls by leadership for Kosovo to become part of Albania after the war, it was eventually made a part of the Democratic Republic of Yugoslavia.
          The Yugoslav government faced significant opposition from Albanian Kosovars, largely as a consequence of pursuing a policy of marginalization. With the fall of communist regime in 1966, this trend began to reverse until the 1980s, when significant backlash against continued protests saw the Albanian population in Kosovo suppressed by Yugoslav authorites. The failure of the Yugoslav government to grant Kosovo equal status triggered ongoing sporadic violence, culminating in Kosovo declaring itself independent in 1990. By 1996 the Kosovo Liberation Army had begun to offer genuine military resistance to the government of Slobodan Milosevic, which responded with increasing violence, leading to the Racak Massacre. In 1999, after the rejection by Yugoslavia of a draft of peace accords, NATO intervened, ultimately forcing their capitulation.
          For most of the last decade Kosovo was administered to by a UN mission as an autonomous part of first the Republic of Yugoslavia, and thereafter by its successor state, the Republic of Serbia. In 2008, the Assembly of Kosovo passed a measure declaring Kosovo to be independent. Since that time 69 states have recognized the independence of Kosovo, including the United States and many European nations. In addition to the obvious distaste of the Serbian government, notably absent from the list of nations supporting the independence of Kosovo has been Russia, Spain, and China.
          It’s hardly any wonder that countries with their own separatist problems, such as Spain and China, are uncomfortable with the independence of Kosovo, but I suspect that the ruling on the part of the International Court of Justice will likely have little bearing on the situation of many nations facing secessionist elements. The major difference between most of these nations and the Republic of Serbia is that they actually control their separatist regions; Spain is in administrative control of, and provides government services to, the Basque region, for instance. In situations where they emphatically don’t, like China with Taiwan, the International Court’s ruling couldn’t matter less. Maybe the more nebulous situations around the globe are less clear, but Turkey should stop worrying at least. I bet you any amount of money that the PKK has violated international law. The ICJ’s ruling fundamentally only really represents an acknowledgement of the existing situation.
          More interesting, however, is the reaction of Russia, which still considers the secession of Kosovo to be illegal. Not so long ago, after all, Russia staged an invasion of Georgia with the stated intent of supporting ethnic minorities who had adopted Russian citizenship in the Ossetian and Abkhaz Autonomous Regions. Russia’s dispute with Ukraine over gas prices not long after suggested that Russia’s motivations were less than altruistic. Russia’s refusal to provide military aid in Kyrgyzstan in response to the ethnic violence there, despite an explicit request from the Kyrgyz government, carried undertones rich with crocodile tears over the international response to both of Russia’s recent confrontations in Eastern Europe. The material benefit to Russia in these cases was consolidated influence over strategically important pipelines in both countries. Little wonder then, that Russia should show no interest in either aid to Kyrgyzstan, nor in recognizing Kosovo as independent. This, however, does not represent the totality of the situation.
          The notion that Russia’s invasion of Georgia, coming during Georgia’s bid for admission to NATO, was designed to remind NATO of who wears the pants in Eastern Europe isn’t too difficult to accept, especially in light of their publicly announced foreign policy principles. And they really do provide a concise context for the Ukraine gas crisis. As I suggested earlier, the refusal to commit troops to Kyrgyzstan fits into this story as the chastised reaction to international outcry at their previous adventures, and most to the point, had nothing to do with the fact that the airbase that they maintain there is a second or third-tier strategic asset. The continued reticence regarding the independence of Kosovo seems to be a disinclination to legitimize NATO intervention in what Russia regards as their sphere of influence. Which is ironic, really, since the NATO campaign in Kosovo was unsanctioned by the UN, who actually went to the trouble to call NATO out on it, and arguably set the modern precedent for interventionalism in the middle regions of Europe.

          I promise not to say anything about separatists or post-Ottoman states for a while after this.