I can see that it would be a dilemma to some, but $ and Euros for ending a succession of wars that seem to have no end seems to be a pretty good trade to me, and I bet most NATO members. Anyway, there wasn't a country in the Balkans whose economy wasn't in shambles in the before NATO operations started, besides possibly Yugoslavia and their economy was based on the premise that they could continue to displace non-Serbs and absorb their property into a Serbs only economy. It was bound for a downturn as soon as there were no more ethnics to cleanse.
On a positive note, perhaps it will take a massive transfusion of money but if anyone can afford it, it's the wealthiest collection of countries in the world, NATO.
The truth is, in almost a millennium of wars and conflicts, the Balkans have never really been "rebuilt". They've just withdrawn into insular, fortified, enclaves to lick their wounds and live their lives while planning revenge on each other. Maybe it's time to break the cycle of alternating atrocities. Maybe the rebuilding process can finally bring the Balkans out of the Dark Ages, where they've been stuck like a broken record, if not physically, at least psychologically, for almost nine hundred years. |
