Europe's unresolved disputes--Kosovo's bid for independence, the breakaway regions of Georgia, the long-festering Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the Greek-Turkish divide in Cyprus--present the United States and other global and regional powers with a policy dilemma: how to balance a people's call for autonomy with a desire to maintain the territorial integrity of existing states and preserve regional stability. None of these cases exists in a vacuum. A U.S. decision to support autonomy in one area, such as Kosovo, could embolden demands for independence by other groups. In turn, the manner in which Europe's frozen conflicts are resolved could have a broader impact, setting precedents that might be cited for Taiwan, West Papua or southern Sudan, for example.
U.S. policymakers have a choice: They can either apply guiding principles in brokering or mediating those disputes, or consider each case independently in light of U.S. geopolitical interests. International law falls, for the most part, on the side of territorial integrity. Washington is similarly wary of lending momentum to a potential Balkanization of the entire world. The question is whether "consistency for consistency's sake" is the best approach. To escape the quandary that the current stalemates in Kosovo, Cyprus and the Caucasus present, it may be time to utilize some creative thinking that breaks us out of the "independence versus integrity" dilemma.
Countdown for Kosovo
