Countdown to 75: US Army in Kosovo

By U.S. Army Center for Military HistoryMarch 8, 2017

Balkans
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Checkpoint
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Serbia
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Although the U.S. Army has traditionally focused on conventional warfare, it also has a long history of conducting irregular operations of almost every nature and size.

In Bosnia, the Army worked with its European allies to enforce a negotiated settlement among rival ethnic groups following a long and violent civil war. But no sooner had relative peace come to the area in the late 1990s that another conflict arose to the immediate south when ethnic violence spilled over into the nearby Serbian province of Kosovo.

By early 1999, more than eight-hundred thousand ethnic Albanians had been driven out of Kosovo by Serbian forces under Slobodan Milosevic, while as many as twelve thousand may have been murdered in a wave of ethnic cleansing that horrified the world.

Working again in concert with European allies, U.S. forces entered Kosovo in June 1999 with the primary objective of bringing peace to that troubled land. The task, code named Operation Joint Guardian, proved exceedingly difficult.

Entrenched ethnic hatred between Albanians and Serbians continued to fuel the conflict, and the general devastation continued for many weeks. Organized as the Kosovo Forces (KFOR), the allies were finally able to enforce a tentative peace by October of that year.

But as of 2007, the current peacekeeping mission has no end in sight, while the path leading to a larger political solution regarding Kosovo's future has been equally elusive.

The Army's mission in Kosovo was significantly different from the warfighting customarily associated with military service, but it was no less important and no less dangerous.

We'll be highlighting U.S. Army Europe's history over the next 13 weeks as we countdown to our 75th birthday. Follow along with #75Strong!

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