Henry Kissinger’s remarks on the Macedonian issue

in Articles, FYROM news / by Admin / on September 14, 2008 at 2:02 am /

For the 3d time in history, Henry Kissinger makes it clear how he feels about Macedonia:

‘Greece has historical rights to the name ‘Macedonia’ ‘ was his answer to Skopje’s Parliamentary President of Foreign Affairs and Defense during a meeting on September 4, 2008. Can we say that the current Greek Foreign Ministry feels the same?

From the Greek-Canadian Newspapers “Βήμα” on 13th September of 2008.

However as already pointed out, this was not the first time the experienced diplomat and former US minister, Henry Kissinger had commented about the issue. In 1992 we had:

The 1992 Top Management Forum Competing in Global Markets

Henry Kissinger

An Analysis of the Global Geopolitical Environment

Management Centre Europe

18-19 June 1992, Paris
2/10/92

This is an abstract of the minutes kept during the annual meeting of Management Centre Europe held in Paris on June. During the question time at the end of Henry Kissinger’s presentation one of the questions was:

“What is your opinion for the problem which Greece have to accept the name Macedonia which the Skopje Government is trying to implement?”

Mr. Kissinger asked the man who asked the question:

“Are you Greek?”

Reply “Yes”

“Look, I believe that Greece is right to object and I agree with Athens. The reason is that I know History, which is not the case with most of the others including most of the Government and Administration in Washington.

The strength of the Greek case is that of the History which I must say that Athens have not used so far with success.”

Other questions followed.

The following are also statements made by the infamous Henry Kissinger and were published from our blog in a previous article on 5th of April 1999 on CNBC show “Hardball”. Read carefully what H. Kissinger says:

“When the US engages itself in war, there is no substitute for victory, and we have to do what is necessary to prevail. I frequently expressed doubts before we went in there about whether the US should make the Balkans a central point of its foreign policy. But now that we are in, I believe that we have to do what is necessary, and if that requires ground troops, we have to send ground troops”.

When asked what would winning look like in this context. Dr. Kissinger said:

“In this context, it means the removal of Serbian combat forces from Kosovo, the return of refugees and the establishment of some international status for Kosovo that is under some sort of international supervision. Nothing else can now work.”, and added “Serbia is a country of less than 10 million population with poor resources and not very effective army except against unarmed civilians.”

“After the ethnic cleansing and after the aerial bombardment, you cannot ask the refugees to return to Serbian sovereignty. We all talk about self-government for Kosovo. But the Balkans is a whole mixture of ethnic groups that have been thrown together there by a succession of wars. Once the objective in Kosovo has been reached, that will open the chapter of Macedonia, because in Macedonia, there are 800,000 Albanians and it’s going to be a problem to deny them what has just been granted to the Albanians in Kosovo“.

” And when that happens, the Slavs in Macedonia who are almost exclusively Bulgarians, will raise their demands. And so we may face the disintigration of another country. And therefore , the administration absolutly requires some strategy for political settlement of all of the Balkan issues before we are being dragged step by step into becoming the successor of the empires that used to govern there and who had atleast one thing in common, that they were hated by the populations over whom they ruled.”

“Once we have achieved self-government for the people of Kosovo, which I now support, this is not the end of the story. Then we have to consider what happens , to the many ethnic clans that exist in the Balkans to avoid being triggered into crisis after crisis by this sort of issue and especially by the issues that will emerge in Macedonia and maybe even in northern Greece.“, concluded Dr. Kissinger.

By Christos