n August 2018, a surprising proposal was sprung on an unassuming public in the Republic of Kosovo and in Albania — a territorial swap between Kosovo and Serbia, to solve once and for all the issues between the two countries. The Presidents of Kosovo and Serbia, Hashim Thaci and Aleksandar Vučić, and the Prime Minister of Albania, Edi Rama, were all on the same page on the proposal.

The rumor that the Trump administration was behind this spread immediately, mostly by his critics in the region. It did not help that the National Security Advisor to President Donald Trump, John Bolton, showed his support. Nevertheless, various members of the Trump administration denied the claims that the proposal had come from them, and even Bolton, years later, said that it had been the local leaders who had presented the plan to the U.S. government. Local media pointed to the Open Society Foundation as the brains behind this idea. (READ MORE from Nikola Kedhi: Conservatives Should Restore and Improve Reagan’s Fusionism)

If implemented, it would have proven a Pandora’s box in a delicate region with a fragile status quo, creating a precedent for Bosnia, other parts of the Balkans, and even in Europe, bringing back sensitive topics put to rest long ago. The potential for ethnic conflict was there, and by undertaking this dangerous experiment, the chain reaction that would have started would have been consequential for the whole continent.

There was only one leader that stood up against this prospect, alone. Former Prime Minister of Albania, and current opposition leader, Sali Berisha, a conservative statesman with experience in politics going back many years and an unparalleled knowledge in geopolitics, spoke up loudly and harshly against the border corrections in the region, and specifically between the Republic of Kosovo and the Republic of Serbia.

As soon as the idea started to circulate, Berisha, in line with the positions that later Germany and France would take, became the first to emphasize that the “exchange of the territories, was a Serb idea which they had always sought with pathological insistence, even before the declaration of independence of the Republic of Kosovo. The truth is that in this case Serbia wants to trade, to use the Albanian territories as a market product, as it is concerned by the ever-greater awakening of national consciousness among the Albanians. Any agreement and any solution should be an agreement between two independent countries that recognize each other’s territorial integrity.”

A few months later, the U.S. ambassador in Kosovo, Philip Kosnett, stated that Washington had never encouraged any idea of changing borders. “If you want a peace agreement, you have to sit down and talk with your opponent,” the American ambassador added at the time.

Thanks to strong opposition by leaders such as Berisha in Albania, various political actors in Kosovo, Germany, and subsequently a vocal rejection by the United States, the idea of the territorial swap was abandoned.

After this episode the idea of the “Minishengen,” or Open Balkans, was presented as an alternative to the Berlin Process, an intergovernmental cooperation initiative linked to the future enlargement of the European Union. While the latter had the oversight and necessary guarantees provided by Germany and other European countries, the first included solely Albania, Serbia, and Macedonia, with the reluctant on and off participation of Montenegro, and would have surely led to Serbian dominance in the region. The United States — or at the very least the Department of State — appeared once again to back this new idea, with many mixed signals coming from beyond the Atlantic. Pressure increased on Kosovo to join, even though Serbia refused to recognize its independence and tried to impose its will on the region.

Nonetheless, out of nowhere, in August 2023, as the war in Ukraine was well into its second year, the Open Balkan initiative was declared dead by the Albanian prime minister and other factors in the region, returning once again to the German-led Berlin Process. Analysts and local political actors, when explaining the incoherence in American foreign policy raise the issue of the many currents within the American government, often at odds with one another, with different aims and methods. These are only two examples where lack of American leadership, and careless experimentation of certain segments of the American bureaucracy, could have set back hard-earned progress in the region.

Once again, Sali Berisha, representing the Albanian right, was the leading voice in the Balkans urging against a process, which had the blessing of Russia and that would have destabilized the Balkans, increasing Russian influence. It was the latest in a series of statesmen-like positions that Berisha had held during his long career, including his tireless work of getting Albania in NATO and starting the process for EU accession. It also includes his consistant pro-American and pro-Western policies, his foresight on decreasing energy reliance on Russia by lobbying for and building the TAP and many other initiatives, for which he does not get the appropriate credit.

Berisha, conservative voices from his party, and the Kosovo government were left alone for many years in opposition to a dangerous plan that would have seen Russia slowly usurp the leadership role of the United States in the Balkans. Ultimately, they were proven right. The pro-Western Albanian right has a legacy of being on the right side of history throughout the past decades. Even in the face of inexplicable abandonment from its allies, it has always persevered with dignity and held its head high. It has done so even when after decades of persecuting the right, communists found refuge in the West, after the fall of the Berlin wall.

The region lacks leaders of the stature of Berisha, who can bring long-term stability and who have the capacity to take a stand in delicate moments. “Lab” created leaders can never replace the real ones, whose importance, experience, and decision-making skills become paramount, especially in fragile regions. One of the mistakes the West makes frequently is backing the wrong individuals or groups, and that has consequences that all stakeholders subsequently come to regret. Helping and supporting communists in Albania during and after communism, instead of those persecuted by the bloody regime and who hoped in American salvation, has been one such mistake.

The West, especially during the Obama years, supported the so-called stabilocracy — meaning the creation of semi-authoritarian regimes in the Western Balkans that would keep the status quo and prevent these countries from escalating conflicts with each other, at the expense of democracy. On the other side, Russian influence in countries such as Serbia is significant, and Albania and Kosovo have pinned their hopes to the United States being a fair and honest mediator and influence in the region.

However, the West has to know that sacrificing democracy for stability will ultimately lead to instability and conflict. History shows no other alternative. Many people in the region feel that Western bureaucracy interferes in domestic issues, imposing solutions that they believe are the right ones, alienating in the process the local people — especially the most pro-European and pro-American ones. Attacking democratically elected leaders, particularly the ones that have proven themselves to be great allies, and asking for their removal through undemocratic processes, can backfire. Trust in American leadership is decreasing even among the most pro-American people, and that is something only the United States can fix.

The Europeans, meanwhile, for all their talk of democracy and rule of law, are happy to stay on the sideline and see a whole region fall into authoritarianism. Fortunately, Albanian center-right conservatives can rise to the challenges of our time and prove to be a positive force in the region, if given the chance, building on the legacy of previous generations of the right and drawing from the experience of leaders such as Berisha.

The region would be worse off under Russian and Chinese influences — there can be no doubt about that. However, it is also clear that American actions are the ones that are leading to a waning of American influence. It seems nonsensical, but unfortunately true. It is a continuation of a chaotic foreign policy that abandons allies and encourages enemies. It would appear that the main threat to the Pax Americana is the American bureaucracy itself. (READ MORE: NATO’s Bleak Future)

Foreign policy flip flops, the lack of a cohesive long-term strategy and abandonment of allies should come to an end first and foremost in the interest of the United States, and certainly also to the benefit of pro-American countries such as Albania and Kosovo, that continue to suffer, quite unjustly.

Strong political leadership is needed in the United States in order to prevent the unaccountable bureaucratic hand from setting policy and enforcing their will. Only a cohesive, realist foreign policy, coupled with common sense, Reaganite fusionist policies domestically, can restore American leadership on the world stage, and prevent a Chinese century.

Nikola Kedhi is an economic expert and geopolitical commentator, co-author of the Constitution of the Center-Right Values in Albania, and contributor to several media outlets in the U.S., the U.K., and Europe. Kedhi’s articles reflect solely his own opinions.