The Hidden Costs of the War in Kosovo

It is an erroneous belief that what doesn't affect you directly is cost-free

Opponents to NATO's hi-tech war against Yugoslavia usually point to one of the more disturbing aspects of this new type of warfare. As the guns of NATO soldiers are increasingly being replaced by laptops, war has become more and more like an arcade game. Consequently, these virtual soldiers have become somewhat desensitised to the horrors that are invariably associated with armed conflict - namely, the physical destruction and victims on the other side of the computer screen.

This lack of exposure to the moral dilemmas that exist under such circumstances enables the ruthless execution of political policy with little regard for the consequences. Mainstream mass media takes the process one step further, desensitising the general public at large by focusing on technical wizardry and exotic war game imagery. In this way, the mistakes of Vietnam are not likely to be repeated - that is, the public indignation side of it, at least.

The bombing that is taking place in Kosovo, meanwhile, in many ways defeats the purpose. Since the province is 90% Albanian, the Kosovo Albanians have become as much the victim of NATO bombing as the Serbs. Even if we accept NATO statistics as being fully accurate, in that 80% of their bombs find their targets, this still means that 20% don't. These strays most likely hit unintended civilian targets and, even more likely, Kosovo Albanian ones at that.

Not only this, but NATO air strikes have actually contributed to the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo. Prior to the war, the thought of ethnic cleansing an area that was 90% Albanian was unthinkable - even for the Serbs. But now, Kosovar Albanian civilians are fleeing from both Serb militia forces and NATO bombers. This has given the Yugoslav army a chance to deport ten of thousands to Albania, Macedonia, and Montenegro as refugees.

The mainstream mass media in western countries miss this crucial point. The initial conflict in Kosovo, unlike Bosnia, had little to do with ethnic cleansing, but autonomy and independence. Yet, in order to secure emotional support for their actions, ethnic cleansing has become the main reason for NATO air strikes. Ironically, with this option now open to them, the Yugoslav army is taking full advantage of the situation.

What the mainstream mass media in the west also fail to realise is that it's not only Kosovar Albanians who have become displaced as refugees. Many Serbs have fled north to Hungary as well. Naturally, the number of refugees going north is far less than those going south. Presently, only 300 have crossed over the border.

Nevertheless, the Hungarian authorities have warned that it can't reasonably handle more than double this number with the resources already allocated for refugee assistance. One reason for this is the enormous financial strain the country has been under combating the devastation left by the spring floods. Another, and more important reason, is that the government is wary of somehow getting dragged into the conflict.

Hungarian reports about the refugees that have entered the country thus far is a little misleading, to the point of being inaccurate. Many of those fleeing are not actually Serbs but ethnic Hungarians living in the Serbian province of Vojvodina. Like Kosovo, Vojvodina was an autonomous region within the Yugoslav federation before its status was revoked in 1989. About 400,000 ethnic Hungarians presently live in the region.

As in the Bosnian civil war, most of the ethnic Hungarians fleeing the conflict are draft dodgers who see no point in fighting for the Serbs in a place that is relatively far removed from them. The danger at this point for Hungary is, as a NATO member that directly borders Serbia, a crisis in Vojvodina might be seen as a provocation to expand the war northward.

At this stage, such a scenario is remote. Still, there is an underlying anxiety about Vojvodina that goes beyond the present conflict. The policy of successive Hungarian governments is to discourage migration to the home country. Economically, the diaspora would put a strain on the labour market and drive wages down, being a pool of cheap labour. Conversely, for Hungarians living outside the border, the money they would earn, which would otherwise be considered starvation wages, is worth far more in their own countries; moreover, they would have access to goods and services which are either non-existent or very hard to come by back home.

Keeping Hungarians where they are also has a lot to do with the national psyche, a way to cope with the burden history. Approximately 3 million Hungarians live outside the borders (600,000 in Slovakia, 2 million in Transylvania, 400,000 in Vojvodina), areas which had belonged to the Austro-Hungarian monarchy but which were ceded by the Treaty of Trianon to the respective countries after the First World War. Hungary has never accepted the Treaty of Trianon; thus, the policy of maintaining Hungarian communities in the neighbouring countries is the only way in which Hungary is still able to lay some sort of cultural claim to those areas.

The fear that Vojvodina could become an Achilles Heel for Hungary is, therefore, very real. As long as NATO restricts its attacks to a bombing campaign, the danger is minimised. If land forces are eventually used, however, leading Serbia to widen conscription which, in turn, would stimulate a refugee flow northward of draft dodgers, then there is a good chance the conflict within Yugoslavia will spread.

For the moment, however, what is more worrying for the Hungarian government is the economic cost so far incurred because of the war. In order to exert pressure on NATO, Russia has cut off or suspended trade with the alliance's new members in Central and Eastern Europe. In addition to this, foreign investors have put their operations on hold, as the region has once more become an "unstable environment" for them.

These economic pressures have hit Hungary hard. In general, the break-up of Yugoslavia has had a negative effect, for it was one of Hungary's biggest trading partners. To this extent, Budapest has always quietly called for a lifting of sanctions, although it has never been in a position to influence global economic policy.

The negative pressures of the war on the Hungarian economy can be clearly seen on the country's stock market index, the BUX. The BUX had traditionally followed the lead of the Dow Jones; in fact, prior to the Russian meltdown last summer, the point figure of the Dow and the HUF figure of the BUX were roughly the same.

Since then, of course, the BUX has taken a beating. Yet, just as it was beginning to slightly recover from last year's tumultuous ride, the Kosovo crisis has once again exerted downward pressure on the market. The BUX has been in negative territory since the start of the war, as opposed to the Dow Jones which is over the 10,000 mark. In fact, Hungary never regained its former glory of 8,000 HUF, as it still struggles within the 5,000 to 6,000 HUF range.

As the drama in Kosovo continues to unfold, we are learning more and more about our inter-dependent world. There is an erroneous belief that what doesn't affect you directly is cost-free. Sadly, this is not so.

As with everything else, technology has a cost - social, ethical, and moral. With new attitudes toward armed conflict brought about by the introduction of hi-tech warfare (which is seen as cost-free, at least for NATO), coupled with a global economic paradigm that is likewise technologically-driven, the victims of war now extend beyond to just the belligerents involved.

In the end, Mao Zedong's astute saying that war is politics using blood while politics is merely war without blood rings true now more than ever, and will most probably be carried by us well into the Third Millennium.