Re: [Marxism] Greek revolutionaries criticize pseudo-independence, call for real independence for Kosova Albanian

["Fred Feldman" <ffeldman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Many excellent observations and a largely sound political approach, IMHO.
The demands could be more focused, however, reflecting the Trotskyist
tendency to dissolve the concrete demands of time and place iinto more
cosmic generalities. 

For instance, a central demand that arises out of this situation for the
Kosova Albanians is for eliminating all foreign direct and formal control
over the government. A qualitative factor that distinguishes Kosova from
other complicated instances such as Kurdistan and East Timor is that KOSOVA
DOES NOT HAVE SELF-GOVERNMENT. The ultimate decisions are not just
informally and indirectly but formally and directly are in the hands of
imperialist-organized international institutions."Self-determination" and
"independence" without self-government is a completely new one on me. 

Secondly, the demand for imperialist troops out of Kosova should not be
dissolved into a general call for such troops out of the region. To
accomplish self-determination, independence, and self-government, the Kos
ova people will have to fight to end the occupation and; get the imperialist
boot which has replaced the Serbian  on  their necks (and always stood
behind the whole system of national oppression worldwide). 

This fight is now primarily the fight of the Kosova Albanians, who should
have international progressive support in any efforts they make in this
direction.. 

Today the Serbians are one of the most brutally mistreated and
misrepresented peoples in the world. I find outrage at the seizure of their
internationally recognized territory not by the Kosova Albanians, who had
the moral and political right to do so,  ;but by the imperialist enemies of
both peoples. 

The imperialists use wild exaggerations and outright lies about the crimes
that really did happen -- which they falsely portray as yet another
holocaust --  in the Yugoslav wars to paint themselves as saints and saviors
of humanity.  I think the pro-Serb left has done a service in exposing these
exaggerations, despite their mistaken basic position.  That includes the
coverage in Monthly Review. 

But there is no way out for the Serbian people - only a deadly trap - along
the road of Serbian irredentism towards Kosova. 

The fact is that the Serbian rulers had completely lost the confidence and
even the tolerance of the most poor and oppressed people of Kosova -- the
Albanians..  That is why they had no effective defense against the attack.
(After all, could the imperialists have taken Belgrade with the same ease?
They obviously didn't think so.. Nor does it make any sense to try to sell
the national movement of the Albanians and Kosova as an artificial creation
of imperialism. 

There is no solution to this conflict except along the road of recognizing
that the Kosova Albanians have the right of self-determination, and that
;they have clearly and definitively chosen not to be part of Serbia. 

Defeating the continued imperialist political pressure and threats against
Serbia - typical of relations between imperialism and relatively strong
oppressed nations that feel able to be more assertive of their independence
- will rquire alliances across the lines that the imperialists have drawn
preciselty to serve as lines of blood keeping th0e peoples at each other's
throats. 

When the fight against occupation and for self-government opens in Kosova -
and it eventually will - the Serbian masses will have every interest in
standing on the side of the Albanians against the commoon enemy. 

Fred Feldman 

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