Kosovo: A Short History

This book (especialy the introduction and last few chapters) is an extremely helpful introduction to the Kosovo problem. Malcolm does an almost perfect job of prooving how tenuous the Serb claims to Kosovo are (which obviously is why it has been looked upon with such disdain by Serbs), but seldom seems to be attacking them as a people. But, obviously the truth hurts (as seen by all of the negative reviews below) and many have written this book of as anti-Serb propaganda. He is not biased, it is just extremely hard not to paint the Serbs as the bad guys in either recent war...

As a student of history, I have found most of the recent works on Kosovo to be far too one-sided (almost ALL demonize the Serbs and glorify the Albanians). This work attempts to walk the middle ground and, does so very well. Making few judgement calls, the reader is left to make their own decisions on right and wrong, good and bad. While I abhor the recent actions of some Serbians, I equally abhor the actions being taken by the Kosovar Albanians. A reading of this book puts into perspective however what is now occuring and, gives a glimpse of what to expect in the future. I only wish our government officials had been required to read this book before putting one foot into that icky mess we have now labeled KFOR. At least they would have had a better idea of what to expect once the NATO bombing had stopped.

A nice attempt at didactic-I hope that it will be followed with few "Histories" of Kurdistan,Northern Ireland,Basqia,Krajina and few other places that people would normally never hear for.Once For All Times:Kosovo is Serbian Land,Just As Athens is Greek,even if Martians are to settle there.But what kind of objectivity in historical matters are to be expected from those who prefer under the slogan:History is not "Black and White",and should be presented with 50:50 proportion" to produce such writings that are apealing to certain kind of public and therefore it is possible to sell them?Maybe claim that Serbians are people with no land since they have other named provinces with certain ethnicaly non-Serbian populations that could took such provinces names and then split off?What is realy lacking now is not so much history of the region but comparative etnography:Albanians have extremely interesting and peculiar culture,one that is mixture of Islamic mainstream together with seclusive patriarchal conservatism and sociological insight into their society would be most contributing towards better understanding of curent affairs.

An overview of centuries of ethnic and dynastic controversy. No Balkan history can be a page-turner but this one is quite readable. It is, however, a work of history, not of politics or political science or current events. Those wanting to learn a lot of history about an obscure part of the world will be satisfied; those wanting simply a background to understand current events will be mystified.

This is indeed a masterpeace in the art called satanisation of the serbs.The historical facts in brief are as follows:During the byzantine era albanians ocupied only central northern part of what is today Republic of Albania.In 1389 serbs clashed with ottomans in one of the most grandious medieval battles,and although they suffered defeat,it is their sacrifice that saved whole of Europe from falling into ottomani rullership.After establishing Islamic Empire in the parts of Balkans turks have offered islamisation to all of their subjects,and from all peoples of the Balkans,only albanians(with the exception of few slavs-today's Bosnian muslims)excepted thorough islamisation,and because they achivied status of allies in eyes of turks,they were granted right to almost non-limited terorising of christian population-incliding slow,but certain collonisation of serbian land of Kosovo and Metohija as well as neighbouring teritories(south Montenegro and north-western Macedonia).This is nothing controversial because original documentary sources make possible the tracing of albanian collonisation virtualy on the daily basis.There is not a single geographical name of whatever kind in -including Kosovo-that is not of serbian origin.There are over 1800 serbian churches and monastiries there,as well as other monuments of culture and archaeological sites.Naturally,because serbs are indigenious population in whole of Kosovo-and this fact cannot be overemphasized enough.Serbian state liberated Kosovo after Balkan wars(1913). Albanians made only small portion of population then.After creation of SFR Yugoslavia in 1945,under it's liberal socialism Albanians were granted teritorial autonomy,although during the world war II they were amoung most furious allies of the nazis(Bali Kombetare party and Scanderbeg SS punitive unit).At the same times terror for albanians in Albania started under Enver Hoxha's ultrastalinist policy,which turned this pottentialy very rich country in the most backward and isolated place in europe,while albanians in Yugoslavia were much more educated,industrialised,urbanised and in process of state-sponsored elimination of abject poverty and other vestiges of feudal past.Many albanians become prominent scientists,politicians,high-ranking police and army officers,they had radio,TV,numerious papers,better socioeconomic stantards then citizens of Albania as well as right to free traveling,within and outside of country.If serbians wanted to be revanschistic against them,wasn't that the best time?However,Albanians had enormous birth rate in commparison with their slavic neighbours,indeed one of highest in the world,and through gradual expulsion of local non-albanians(a process seen today in it's speeded dynamics)they incouraged and started massive uprising,and from 1981 to 1990 commited innumerous actions of diversant and terrorist types,which latter culminated in creation of paramilitary groups.There is not,never has been,and there will be no organised state that could tollerate armed separatistic movement on it's on soil.The rest is now a history,and probably the worst action of "International Community"(read N.A.T.O).After extensive media-demonisation of serbs,it's naive that serbs will be anything but guilty for everything from Plague onwards in the eyes of western public,but i hope that those individuals who are immune to brainwashing will be able to recognise acts of quasihistorical agitprop as it is the case with this pamphlet from scholarly works.As a counterbalance most strongly is recomended Noam Chomsky's latest book on Kosovo-a brilliant insight into Western manipulation with history and propaganda about situations that preceeded 1999 events-and their subsequent consequences. P.S five star rating is for a good example of one-sided pseudohistory book.