Amer Kurtović, a researcher and the deputy director of the Social Sciences Research Center at International Burch University, presented research entitled “Bosnia” in Kosovo: The Use of Discourse by US Foreign Policymakers in Arguing for Intervention in Kosovo, at the conference 25th Anniversary of NATO Intervention in Kosovo, organized by the University of Arkansas’ Clinton School of Public Service in cooperation with the University of Prishtina, held in Prishtina, Kosovo from March 26 to March 28.
The two-day conference featured 50 scholars and practitioners from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Germany, North Macedonia, Switzerland, and the United States over a dozen panels presenting papers on various perspectives on the 1999 intervention and discussing experiences, lessons learned, and ways forward for Kosovo.
After the failed Rambouillet Conference in early 1999 and as a result of widespread Serb atrocities committed against the local Albanian Kosovar population, NATO forces led by the United States conducted almost three months of bombing of Yugoslavia to coerce the Milošević regime to halt its campaign of ethnic cleansing.
Kurtović studied how different foreign policymakers, ranging from the White House and the State Department to Congress as well as thought leaders such as political commentators, made the case for war to the American public using analogies and metaphors, specifically those of previous humanitarian atrocities such as the Holocaust and the Rwanda Genocide.
Preliminary results indicate that the dominant narratives involved largely left the example of Bosnia and Herzegovina unused. For the presentation abstract, please see here. This paper, along with others, will be published at a later date as a special edition of a peer reviewed journal.
This research fills a gap in the literature, which has thus far focused on the use of the Holocaust and the Rwanda Genocide in making the case for war and, therefore, failed to materially assess the role the intervention in the Bosnian War had in the contemporary discourse.
During the visit to Kosovo, Kurtović also met with colleagues from the University of Prishtina and other partner organizations to discuss existing collaboration and opportunities for future cooperation.