INCREASING APPREHENSIONS TRIGGERED BY US AMBASSADOR FARISH CALL FOR TRANSFORMING BALKANS IN NATO DOMINATED "BUFFER ZONE." 

In an interview to the London Sunday Times the US ambassador in Britain, the "close friend of President George W Bush," William Farish stated that, announced a drastic change in the officially stated US policy in the Balkans.

 Not only NATO should not decrease his presence, in Macedonia and the Balkans, NATO, as The Sunday Times paraphrased him "has to strengthen its presence in the region, turning the Balkans into a prominent theatre of operations and training. 

Perhaps reflecting US fears of a rise in Islamic fundamentalism in Turkey, a Nato ally, Farish sees the Balkans as a possible buffer zone in future against unstable regimes to the east.

" During a visit at the Bondsteel US base in Kosovo, George W. Bush said that the "burden" of the peacekeeping operation should be taken over by European armies. "but after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, Farish told The Sunday Times that foreign policy was being radically rethought."

 Farish himself with take an "unusually" key role for US policy in the Balkans from London And, the ambassador says, Bush is being advised in his change of strategy by "key advisers' such as Dick Cheney and others. 

"These 'advisers' are evaluating how best to safeguard American and European interests in the region, including planned pipelines to the vast oil and gas reserves of central Asia".

 "A SON OF ONE OF THE FIVE GREAT OIL FAMILIES OF HOUSTON, TEXAS, FARISH IS FASCINATED BY THE 'BLACK GOLD' THAT LIES IN THE CASPIAN SEA AREA,"... 

writes the Times, referring to Ambassador Farish. "Farish believes the stability of Macedonia, which lies on a projected pipeline route between the Black Sea and the Adriatic, is vital to the region's economic development."

 Balkan officials have expressed extreme concern for these statements. "Nobody that I know asked him to assume the role of Lord protector of Macedonia," said one. 

The projected pipeline, Farish was talking about is the so-called "Corridor 8" that would link the Black Sea in Varna or Burgas, Bulgaria to the Adriatic coast of Albania. 

The Corridor that would be in competition with all the other North South natural "corridors" through the Balkans, is being sponsored by the Halliburton company, whose CEO was until last January, Dick Cheney.

 However, as an other official put it "the only pipeline existing there is the drug pipeline coming from Afghanistan." Halliburton and his subsidiaries have been busy building US and NATO military facilities. 

According to sources what is being planned is the relocation of large part of the troops now stationed in Germany, and whose presence there cannot be justified anymore.

            And additional concern, according to these Balkan sources, is that NATO, in Farish scheme, is supposed to defend the North against the "Eastern instability" in a new bipolar world that would coincide with a Clash of Civilization scenario. 

Strangely enough NATO would control both sides, Turkey and Macedonia. Additional concern comes from many reports showing that the KLA logistic network coincide with the main centers of Halliburton in the area.

GERMANY IS TO LEAD SMALL MILITARY FORCE IN MACEDONIA TOGETHER WITH ITALY AND FRANCE. 

According to Balkan sources one of the reasons for the unexpected statements by Ambassador Farish, is the determined opposition by Anglo-American circles to a continental European semi-independent military intervention. 

Though both London and Washington have given lip service to the idea that "Europe should shoulder the military burden, when push come to shove, this possibility is absolutely indigestible."  

Reportedly there has been an increasing backstabbing in high-level NATO discussions. Recently the so-called "small mission" of Germany, Italy and France in Macedonia was formally accepted. Britain was excluded. 

The "small mission" consists in the deployment of 600 military to protect the OSCE observers in Macedonia at the end of NATO Essential Harvest Operation on Sept 26. 

"But the British did not really mean that the Germans should make an independent military deployment, and a frantic tug of war began," said a source.