AMERICA AT WAR IN MACEDONIA
>
> by Michel Chossudovsky
> Professor of Economics, University of Ottawa [14 June 2001]
>
> [See map at
http://www.bsrec.bg/taskforce/SYNERGY/oilprojects2.html ]
>
> Washington's covert war in Macedonia aims to consolidate America's
> sphere of influence in southeastern Europe. At stake is the strategic
> Bulgaria-Macedonia-Albania transport, communications and oil
> pipeline "corridor" which links the Black Sea to the Adriatic coast.
> Macedonia stands at the strategic crossroads of the oil pipeline
> corridor.
>
> To protect these pipeline routes, Washington's goal is to install
> a "patchwork of protectorates" along strategic corridors in the
> Balkans. The promise of "Greater Albania" used by Washington to
> foment Albanian nationalism is part of the military-intelligence
> ploy. Amply documented, the latter consists in financing and
> equipping the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) and its National
> Liberation Army (NLA) proxy to wage the terrorist assaults in
> Macedonia.
>
> The development of America's sphere of influence in Southeastern
> Europe --in complicity with Britain-- supports the interests of the
> oil giants including BP-Amoco-ARCO, Chevron and Texaco. Securing
> control and "protecting" the pipeline routes is paramount to the
> success of these multi-billion dollar ventures:
>
> A successful international oil regime is a combination of economic,
> political, and military arrangements to support oil production and
> transportation to markets.1
>
> The Anglo-American consortium which controls the AMBO Trans-Balkan
> pipeline project linking the Bulgarian port of Burgas to Vlore on the
> Albanian Adriatic coastline largely excludes the participation of
> Europe's competing oil giant Total-Fina-Elf. 2 In other words, US
> strategic control over the pipeline corridor is intent upon weakening
> the role of the European Union and keeping competing European
> business interests at arms' length.
>
> WHO IS BEHIND THE TRANS-BALKAN PIPELINE?
>
> The US based AMBO pipeline consortium is directly linked to the seat
> of political and military power in the United States and Vice
> President Dick Cheney's firm Halliburton Energy.3
>
> The feasibility study for AMBO's Trans-Balkan Oil Pipeline, conducted
> by the international engineering company of Brown & Root Ltd.
> [Halliburton's British subsidiary] has determined that this
> pipeline...will become a part of the region's critical East-West
> corridor infrastructure which includes highway, railway, gas and
> fiber optic telecommunications lines.4
>
> And upon completion of the feasibility study by Halliburton, a senior
> executive of Halliburton was appointed CEO of AMBO. Halliburton was
> also granted a contract to service US troops in the Balkans and
> build "Bondsteel" in Kosovo, which now constitutes "the largest
> American foreign military base constructed since Vietnam".5
> Coincidentally, White and Case LLT, the New York law firm that
> President William J. Clinton joined when he left the White House also
> has a stake in the AMBO pipeline deal.
>
> MILITARISATION OF THE PIPELINE CORRIDORS
>
> The AMBO Trans-Balkans pipeline project would link up with the
> pipeline corridors between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea basin,
> which lies at the hub of the World's largest unexplored oil reserves
> (See map of
http://www.bsrec.bg/taskforce/SYNERGY/oilprojects2.html).
> The militarisation of these various corridors is an integral part of
> Washington's design.
>
> The US policy of "protecting the pipeline routes" out of the Caspian
> Sea basin (and across the Balkans) was spelled out by Clinton's
> Energy Secretary Bill Richardson barely a few months prior to the
> 1999 bombing of Yugoslavia:
>
> "This is about America's energy security... It's also about
> preventing strategic inroads by those who don't share our values.
> We're trying to move these newly independent countries toward the
> west... We would like to see them reliant on western commercial and
> political interests rather than going another way. We've made a
> substantial political investment in the Caspian, and it's very
> important to us that both the pipeline map and the politics come out
> right."6
>
> The Anglo-American oil giants, including BP-Amoco-Arco, Texaco and
> Chevron --supported by US military might-- are competing with
> Europe's oil giant Total-Fina-Elf (associated with Italy's ENI) which
> is a big player in Kazakhstan's wealthy North East Caspian Kashagan
> oil fields. The stakes are high: Kashagan is reported "so large as to
> even surpass the size of the North Sea oil reserves."7 The competing
> EU based consortium, however, lacks a significant stake and leverage
> in the main pipeline routes out of the Caspian Sea basin and back
> (via the Black Sea and through the Balkans) to Western Europe. The
> key pipeline corridor projects --including the AMBO project and the
> Baku-Cehyan project through Turkey to the Mediterranean-- are largely
> in the hands of their Anglo-American rivals, which rely heavily on US
> political and military presence in both the Caspian basin and the
> Balkans.
>
> Washington's design is to eventually distance all three AMBO
> countries, namely Bulgaria, Macedonia and Albania from German-EU
> influence through the installation of full-fledged US protectorates.
> In other words, US militarisation and geopolitical control over the
> projected pipeline linking Burgas in Bulgaria to the Adriatic port of
> Vlore in Albania is intent upon undermining EU influence as well as
> weakening competing Franco-Belgian-Italian oil interests.
>
> Negotiations concerning the AMBO pipeline have been supported by US
> government officials through the Trade and Development Agency's (TDA)
> South Balkan Development Initiative (SBDI) "designed to help Albania,
> Bulgaria and FYR Macedonia further develop and integrate their
> transportation infrastructure along the east-west corridor that
> connects them."8
>
> The TDA points to the need for the three countries to "use regional
> synergies to leverage new public and private capital [from US
> companies]" while underscoring the responsibility of the US
> government "for implementing the initiative." With regard to the AMBO
> pipeline, it would appear that the EU has largely been excluded from
> the planning and negotiations. "Memoranda of understanding" (MOU)
> have already been signed with the governments of Albania, Bulgaria
> and Macedonia which strip the countries' national sovereignty over
> both the pipeline and the transport corridors by providing "exclusive
> rights" to the Anglo-American consortium:
>
> " ...[The] MOU states that AMBO will be the only party allowed to
> build the planned Burgas-Vlore oil pipeline. More specifically, it
> gives AMBO the exclusive right to negotiate with investors in and
> creditors of the project. It also obligates ... [the governments of
> Bulgaria, Macedonia and Albania] not to disclose certain confidential
> information on the pipeline project.9
>
> "EAST-WEST CORRIDOR 8"
>
> The AMBO pipeline project is linked up with another strategic project
> entitled "Corridor 8", initially proposed by the Clinton
> Administration in the context of the "Balkans Stability Pact". Of
> strategic importance to both the US and the European Union, "Corridor
> 8" includes highway, railway, electricity and telecommunications
> infrastructure. In turn, the existing infrastructure in these sectors
> is slated for deregulation and privatisation (at rock bottom prices)
> under IMF-World Bank supervision.
>
> Although rubber-stamped by EU transport ministers as part of the
> process of European economic integration, "Corridor 8" feasibility
> studies were conducted by US companies financed directly by the TDA.
> In other words, Washington seems to have set the stage for the
> takeover of the countries' transport and communications
> infrastructure. American corporations including Bechtel, Enron and
> General Electric (with financial backing from the US government) are
> competing with companies from the European Union.
>
> Washington's design is to open up the entire corridor to US
> multinationals in a region situated in the European Union's "economic
> backyard", where the power of the Deutschmark tends to dominate over
> that of the US dollar.
>
> "EU ENLARGEMENT"
>
> In early 2000, the European Commission began negotiations on EU
> associate membership status with Macedonia, Bulgaria and Albania. And
> in April 2001, at the height of the terrorist assaults, Macedonia
> became the first country in the Balkans to sign a so-
> called "stabilisation and association agreement" (SAA) constituting
> an important step towards full EU membership. The agreement provides
> the basis for "trade liberalisation, political co-operation, economic
> and institutional reform and transplantation of EU legislation."
> Under the SAA, Macedonia would (de facto) be integrated into the
> European monetary system, with full access to the EU market.10
>
> The terrorist assaults coincided chronologically with the process
> of "EU enlargement", gaining momentum barely a few weeks before the
> signing of the historic "association agreement" with Macedonia. Amply
> documented, the US has military advisers working with the terrorists.
> Was this a mere coincidence?
>
> Also, Robert Frowick, "a former US diplomat", was appointed to head
> the OSCE mission in Macedonia in mid-March, again barely a few weeks
> before the signing of the "association agreement." In close liaison
> with Washington and the US embassy in Skopje, Frowick initiated
> a "dialogue" with NLA rebel leader Ali Ahmeti. He was also
> instrumental in brokering an agreement between Ahmeti and the leaders
> of the Albanian parties, which form part of the government coalition.
>
> This agreement negotiated by Frowick has largely contributed to
> destabilising political institutions, while at the same time
> jeopardising the process of EU enlargement.11 Moreover, the
> deteriorating security situation in Macedonia has provided a pretext
> for increased US political, "humanitarian" and military interference,
> while contributing to weakening Skopje's economic and political ties
> to Germany and the EU. In this regard, one of the "binding
> conditions" of the "association agreement" is that Macedonia conform
> to "EU standards on democracy".12 Needless to say, without
> a "functioning government" in Macedonia, the EU association process
> with Brussels cannot proceed.
>
> The puppet governments installed in Tirana, Skopje and Sofia, while
> largely responding to US diktats, are currently being swayed in the
> direction of the European Union. Washington's intent is ultimately to
> curb Germany's "Lebensraum" into Southeastern Europe. While paying
> lip service to "EU enlargement", the US has consistently
> favoured "NATO enlargement" as a means to pursuing its strategic
> interests in Eastern Europe and the Balkans, while Germany and France
> have opposed it.
>
> While the tone of international diplomacy remains mannerly and
> polite, US foreign policy under the Bush administration has become
> distinctly "anti-European". According to one observer:
>
> "At the heart of the Bush team, Colin Powell is [considered] the
> friend of the Europeans, while the other ministers and advisers are
> considered arrogant, hard and indisposed to listen or to give the
> Europeans a place."13
>
> GERMANY AND AMERICA
>
> Amply documented, the CIA is behind the KLA and the NLA rebels, who
> are waging the terrorist assaults against the Macedonian security
> forces. While the CIA's German counterpart the Bundes Nachrichten
> Dienst (BND) collaborated with the CIA in overseeing and financing
> the KLA prior to the 1999 war, recent developments suggest that the
> BND is not involved in Washington's military-intelligence ploy in
> Macedonia.14
>
> Barely a few weeks before the signing of the "association agreement"
> with the European Union, German troops stationed in Macedonia in the
> Tetovo region were (mid March 2001) "accidentally" targeted by the
> NLA. While the Western media --echoing in chorus the official
> statements-- maintains that German troops were "caught in the cross-
> fire", reports from Tetovo suggest that the NLA shelling "was
> deliberate." In any event, the incident would not have occurred had
> Germany's BND been working with the rebel army:
>
> "Up to 600 German troops were forced to leave Tetovo overnight after
> their barracks... were caught in crossfire... [They] were too lightly
> armed to defend themselves against the Albanians. The Germans will
> replace the departing troops with a Leopard tank squadron [belonging
> to the Panzer-Artillerie-Batterie division stationed in Nordrein-
> Westphalen]. ...[T]he new [German] firepower may be used to knock out
> Albanian positions now established around Tetovo,..." 15
>
> In a bitter irony, two of the commanders responsible for the
> terrorist assaults in the Tetovo region had been trained by British
> Special Forces:
>
> "Embarrassingly for KFOR, it emerged that two of the Kosovo-based
> commanders leading the Albanian push [into the Tetovo region] were
> trained by former British SAS and Parachute Regiment officers in the
> days when NATO was more comfortable with the fledgling Kosovo
> Liberation Army (KLA). A former member of a European special forces
> unit who accompanied the KLA during the Kosovo conflict said that a
> commander with the nom de guerre of Bilal was organising the flow of
> arms and men into Macedonia, and that the veteran KLA commander Adem
> Bajrami was helping to co-ordinate the assault on Tetovo. Both were
> taught by British soldiers in the secretive training camps that
> operated above Bajram Curri in northern Albania during 1998 and
> 1999."16
>
> These same British trained rebel commanders view Germany as
> the "enemy" because Bundeswehr troops stationed in Macedonia and
> Kosovo --rather than providing "protection" to NLA "freedom fighters"
> in the same way as their British and American KFOR counterparts--
> frequently detain "suspected terrorists" at the border:
>
> "A spokesman for the Albanians' National Liberation Army (NLA) in
> Pristina warned the Bundeswehr its involvement would constitute 'a
> declaration of war by the Federal Republic of Germany'". 17
>
> In response to NLA threats, the Bundeswehr sent in its own Special
> Forces, the Fallschirmjäger (Parachutists) to work with its Panzer-
> Artillerie-Batterie squadron.18 German Defence Minister Rudolf
> Scharping confirmed that "he was ready to send more tanks and troops
> to bolster Bundeswehr forces".19 Yet in recent developments, Berlin
> has chosen to withdraw most of its troops from the Tetovo region and
> not in any way challenge the US military-intelligence ploy in support
> of the NLA rebels. Some of these German troops are now stationed on
> the Kosovo side of the border.
>
> While the NLA received a shipment of brand new advanced
> weaponry "made in America", Germany donated (mid-June) to the
> Macedonian Security forces all terrain vehicles as well as
> weapons "for sophisticated infrared tracing in the battlefield."
> According to a report from Macedonia, the small contingent of German
> troops which still remains in the Tetovo region "was under heavy
> attack from the terrorists who attacked them with mortar from the
> mountains above Tetovo. That is probably the response of yesterday's
> [14 June 2001] donation to our army made by the German government".20
>
> While divisions between "NATO allies" are never made public,
> Germany's Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer --in a strongly worded
> statement to the Bundestag directed against "the Albanian extremists
> in Macedonia"-- has called for "a long-term arrangement, aimed to
> make the whole region closer to Europe." (i.e. free of US
> encroachment). The German position is in marked contrast to that put
> forth by the US, which requires the Skopje government to grant
> amnesty to the terrorists, modify the country's constitution and
> incorporate the NLA rebels in civilian politics:
>
> "The pact reportedly called for the rebels to stop their fight in
> exchange for amnesty guarantees. The rebels would also have the right
> to veto future political decisions regarding ethnic Albanian rights.
> The accord was reportedly mediated by Robert Frowick, a former U.S.
> envoy who currently served as a Balkan representative for the
> Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe." 21
>
> THE ANGLO-AMERICAN AXIS
>
> The clash between Germany and America in the Balkans is part of a
> much broader process which affects the heart of the Western military-
> industrial complex and defence establishment.
>
> From the early 1990s, the US and Germany have acted jointly as NATO
> partners in the Balkans, coordinating their respective military,
> intelligence and foreign policy initiatives. While maintaining in
> their public statements a semblance of political unity, serious
> divisions started to emerge in the wake of the Dayton Accords (1995),
> as German banks scrambled to impose the Deutschmark and take over the
> monetary system of Yugoslavia's successor states.
>
> Moreover, in the wake of the 1999 war in Yugoslavia, the US has
> reinforced its strategic, military and intelligence ties with
> Britain, while Britain has severed many of its ties (particularly in
> the area of defence and aerospace production) with Germany and
> France.
>
> Launched in early 2000, U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen and his
> British counterpart, Geoff Hoon, signed a "Declaration of Principles
> for Defense Equipment and Industrial Cooperation''. 22 Washington's
> objective was to encourage the formation of a "transatlantic bridge
> across which the DoD [US Department of Defense] can take its
> globalization policy to Europe."23
>
> The US defence industry --which now includes British Aerospace
> Systems (BaeS)-- is clashing with the Franco-German defence
> consortium EADS --a conglomerate composed of France's Aerospatiale
> Matra, Deutsche Aerospace, which is part of the powerful Daimler
> group, and Spain's CASA. In other words, a major split in the Western
> military-industrial complex has occurred with the US and Britain on
> one side and Germany and France on the other.
>
> Oil, guns and the Western military alliance are intimately related
> processes. Washington's design is to eventually ensure the dominance
> of the US military-industrial complex in alliance with the Anglo-
> American oil giants and Britain's major defense contractors. These
> developments evidently also have a bearing on the control over
> strategic pipelines, transport and communications corridors in the
> Balkans, Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.
>
> In turn, this Anglo-American axis is also matched by increased
> cooperation between the CIA and Britain's MI5 in the sphere of
> intelligence and covert operations as evidenced by the role played by
> British SAS Special Forces in training KLA rebels.
>
> WAR, "DOLLARISATION" AND THE NEW WORLD ORDER
>
> "Protection" of the pipelines, covert activities and the recycling of
> drug money in support of armed insurgencies, militarisation of
> strategic corridors, defence procurement to "Partnership for Peace"
> (PfP) countries are all an integral part of the Anglo-American axis
> and its quest to dominate oil and gas routes and transport corridors
> out of the Caspian sea basin and from the Black sea across the
> Balkans.
>
> More generally, what is happening in the broader region linking
> Eastern Europe and the Balkans to the former Soviet republics is a
> relentless scramble for control over national economies by competing
> business conglomerates. And behind this process is the quest by Wall
> Street's financial establishment --in alliance with the defence and
> oil giants-- to destabilise and discredit the Deutschmark (and the
> Euro) with a view to imposing the US dollar as the sole currency for
> the region.
>
> Control over "money creation" --imposing the rule of the US Federal
> Reserve system throughout the World-- has become a central feature of
> US expansionism. In this regard, Washington's military-intelligence
> ploy not only consists in undermining "EU enlargement", it is also
> intent upon weakening and displacing the dominion of Germany's
> largest banking institutions (e.g. Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank and
> WestDeutsche Landesbank) throughout the Balkans.
>
> In other words, the New World Order is marked by the clash between
> Europe and America for "colonial control" over national currencies.
> And this conflict between "competing capitalist blocks" will become
> increasingly acute when several hundred million people from Eastern
> Europe and the Balkans to Central Asia start using the Euro as
> their "de facto" national currency on January 1st 2002.
>
> See map at
http://www.bsrec.bg/taskforce/SYNERGY/oilprojects2.html).
>
> NOTES
>
> 1 Robert V. Baryiski, The Caspian Oil Regime: Military Dimensions,
> Caspian Crossroads Magazine ,Volume 1, Issue No. 2, Spring 1995.
>
> 2. Reference to the European Union in this article should be
> interpreted as the "European Union minus Britain".
>
> 3 See Albanian Telegraph Agency, Tirana 28 July 1998 and Milsnews,
> Skopje, 23 January, 1997 available at
>
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a379fb721329c.htm.
>
> 4. Milsnews, op cit.
>
> 5. See Karen Talbot's incisive analysis: "Former Yugoslavia: The Name
> of the Game is Oil, People's Weekly World, May 2001 at
>
http://www.ecadre.net/pages/news/stories/990197752.shtml, see also
> Marjorie Cohn, "Pacification for a pipeline: explaining the US
> Military presence in the Balkans, The Jurist, Legal Education
> Network, June 2001,
http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forumnew22.htm.
>
> 6. George Monbiot, A Discreet Deal in the Pipeline, The Guardian, 15
> February 2001.
>
> 7. Richard Giragosian, "Massive Kashagan Oil Strike Renews
> Geopolitical Offensive In Caspian", The Analyst, Central Asia-
> Caucasus Institute, Johns Hopkins University-Paul H. Nitze School of
> Advanced International Studies, 7 June, 2000,
>
http://www.soros.org/caucasus/0059.html.
>
> 8. See the Trade and Development (TDA) by Region at
>
http://www.tda.gov/region/sbdi.html.
>
> 9. Alexander Gas and Oil Connections,
>
http://www.gasandoil.com/goc/news/nte04224.htm, October 2000.
>
> 10. Under so-called "asymmetric trade preferences" with the EU.
>
> 11. For further details on the role of Robert Frowick, see Michel
> Chossudovsky, "Macedonia: Washington's Military-Intelligence Ploy".
> June 2001
>
> 12. See AFP, 10 April 2001.
>
> 13. According to Pascal Boniface, director of the Paris Institute of
> International and Strategic Relations, UPI, 11 April 2001.
>
> 14. For details on CIA-BND support to the KLA see Michel
> Chossudovsky, "Kosovo Freedom Fighters Financed by Organised Crime",
> Covert Action Quarterly, Fall 1999 also available at
>
http://www.heise.de/tp/english/inhalt/co/2743/1.html),
>
> 15 Tom Walker, NATO Troops caught in a Balkan Ulster, Sunday Times,
> London, 18 March 2001,
>
> 16. Ibid.
>
> 17. Ibid.
>
> 18. See Deutsche Fallschirmjäger nach Tetovo, Spiegel Online, 24
> March 2001, see also, Bundeswehr verlegt Soldaten ins Kosovo, Spiegel
> Online, 23 March 2001.
>
> 19. Deutsche Press Agentur, 19 March 2001,
>
> 20. Information transmitted to the author from Skopje, June 2001.
>
> 21. Facts on File, World News Digest, 30 May 2001.
>
> 22. Reuters, 5 February 2000.
>
> 23. The agreement was signed (according to a Pentagon official quoted
> in Muradian) shortly after the creation of British Aerospace Systems
> resulting from the merger of BAe with GEC Marconi. British Aerospace
> (Bae) was already firmly allied to America's largest defense
> contractors Lockheed Martin and Boeing. For further details see Vago
> Muradian, Pentagon Sees Bridge to Europe, Defense Daily, Vol. 204,
> No. 40 Dec. 01, 1999.
