Subject: Response to the Guardian by Bill Dorich
February 26, 2008 The Guardian Letter to the Editor Dear Editor: I write with contempt about, Is Kosovo Serbian? We Ask an Historian by Noel Malcolm. As the author of the 1992 book, Kosovo, the first book published in the U.S. on this region of the world by 7 Balkan historians exposes this article as nothing more than further demonization of millions of Serbs who cherish Kosovo as their Jerusalem. Malcolm cleverly ignores the more than 1,500 Serbian churches and monasteries built in this area since the 12th century. Immorally he ignores church ruins that date to the 10th century. Arrogantly he conceals the fact that the first Islamic mosque was not built in Kosovo until 150 years after the battle of Kosovo in 1389, because these facts betray his rabid Serbophobia. The ugliest form of racism is to demean an ethnic group's religion, history or culture. This has not stopped Malcolm from revealing his closeted bigotry. He manipulates his access to the media knowing full well that most readers and editors are ignorant of Balkan history. People of Malcolm's ilk have found it easy to paint Serbs with collective guilt by demeaning them in this alleged "historical" context. What we see at play here is the Goebbles concept of "Tell a lie a hundred times and it becomes the truth." Kosovo independence is not about history, it is about equal human rights, and the absurd violation of UN Resolution 1244, the amputation of sovereign territory and in the process the violation of the UN Charter, the Helsinki Final Act, and the Geneva Conventions. Malcolm admits to your readers that "...the Serbs ruled Kosovo for 250 years," but omits the fact that when The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was formed in 1918 the Albanians represented less than 5% of the population—a fact that is historically documented. Saying that the Serbs were "25%" is historical revisionism but taken at his word why has Malcolm looked the other way as Serbs have been reduced to less than 3% in Kosovo over the last decade? The real Serbian Genocide by Albanian Nazis in WWII that liquidated tens of thousands of Serbs or the Genocide that is taking place in Kosovo today is never included in Malcolm's lunatic version of history, not shared by most respected historians. Malcolm ignores the cleansing of 185,000 Serbs in 1690, the 170,000 forced to flee in 1739 or the 150,000 that were forced out of Kosovo after the Congress of Berlin in 1878, when Serbia was internationally recognized as a nation, or the more than 100,000 Serbs forced to flee after Tito granted "Autonomy" in 1974. Malcolm also ignores the more than 300,000 Serbs cleansed in the past 9 years. No reference is made to the fact that 40% of the Albanians in Kosovo are illegal aliens who cross the border into Serbia as easily as Mexicans cross our border each night in San Diego, California. Equally disgraceful, the Guardian grants little to no access to your pages to any Serbian historian or journalists to give opposing views. This is hardly freedom of the press, the press is being used in this case to bludgeon Serbia's cultural aspirations. William Dorich Los Angeles, CA The writer is the author of 5 books on Balkan history.
