Kosovo. When the NATO contingent arrived at the country’s only airport, it had already been in Russian hands since the previous evening. Thirty armored vehicles were deployed to defend the airport. Putin would later claim that, as Secretary of the Security Council, he had authorized the Russian operation. US General Wesley Clark ordered all access routes to the airport to prevent Russian troops from resupplying. Eventually, a compromise agreement was reached: Russian troops would assume a constant role in local support. But something fundamental had broken between the Russians and the Americans, and Clinton realized it during the subsequent phone call with Yeltsin. Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov would tell his American counterpart Madeleine Allbright: “Madeleine, you don’t understand: we have many Kosovos in Russia.”
