Kosovo

I've liked maps since I was a little kid, and the map-conscious part of me likes it when the political map changes. However, not all these changes are good. In particular, the creation of an "independent" Kosovo is not good news.

Not only is Kosovo the historic heartland of Serbia, but the country has no visible means of support, it is run by gangsters, and its Albanians have a nasty habit of burning historic churches and monasteries that even the Albanian Nazi legions left alone. Kosovo's independence is also another needless provocation of Russia.

Why are we messing in the affairs of people so inconsequential for our interests, so far from our shores, and whom we understand so little?

Some of it is post-Wilsonian nonsense about self-determination. Some of it is wanting to show we care about "genocide" directed at Muslims, as well as at Jews--even if there was no genocide in Kosovo. And some of it is a strange antipathy to Orthodox Christianity.

It's an adventure of which we should be ashamed, and one that will do us no good.

UPDATE: This is not to say that the Serbs are blameless in this affair or the other recent Balkan affrays. It is to say that granting independence to every ethic enclave whose denizens have been abused by the majority is a recipe for endless conflict. And who, pray tell, are we to decide these questions? And what good does it do us to mess with them?