yugoslavias implosion

e a sustained attack and it’s not something that’s going to go on for
an overly long time.” 423 “Do not forget,” recalled Jamie Shea, nato’s
spokesman, “that many believed that he [Milošević] would surrender
after 24–48 hours.” 424
The Serbian intention to expel the Albanians on a massive scale
was substantiated two years later by Ratomir Tanić, a member of all
the state delegations that had gone through the motions of negotiating
with the Albanians over the years. In an interview with Radio
Free Europe on March 11, 2001, he said:
There was a plan for ethnic cleansing. There was above all a plan to
reduce the number of Albanians to under a million, and after that
it could be claimed that there are less than 50 per cent of them and
because of that they do not have the right to autonomy … Our security
organizations were not all engaged in settling scores with the terrorists,
but were settling scores with the population. That is how, among
other things, the Serb-Albanian conflict started in early March 1998.
Instead of arresting the Jashari brothers and some others, as the rules
of combat state, you attack the houses where they live, kill their wives,
children, relatives...all that provoked the Albanian people. Milošević
knew that with such measures he would provoke the Albanians into an
uprising, and then he could say, we have a rebellion. And, as for incidents,
I can give you some statistics of our mup (Interior Ministry).
Let’s say, in 1991 there were eleven terrorist acts, in 1992 twelve, in 1993
eight, 1994 six, 1995 five, but in 1998, when Milošević started the provocation
of the ethnic conflict, there were 1,885 terrorist acts. Then it’s
clear that the rise of terrorism is a consequence of ethnic cleansing, not
its cause. 425
423 Madeleine Albright, “Madame Secretary, a Memoir”,Macmillan, New York, 2003, p .408 .
424 Tim Judah, Kosovo: War and Revenge, Samizdat FeeB92, Beograd, 2002, p . 249 .
425 Radio Free Europe on March 11, 2001 . Ratomir Tanić, RFE/RL’s South Slavic Service, interview
“There was a plan for Ethnic Cleansing before the NATO Bombing,” . Later Tanić, as a witness
in Milošević’s trial, claimed that the Yugoslav Army prepared “Operation Horseshoe,” which
involved the deportation of eight hundred thousand Kosovo Albanians and the killing of many
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