If this was 1991 and Kosovo was Kuwait, we would be 10 days away from a land war, and two weeks from final triumph. The Gulf made war too painless, too easy to contemplate, particularly when war is aimed at erasing a manifest injustice - whether or not that injustice has a bearing on the national interest. Indeed, absence of crude national interest only increases the warrior politician's sense of righteousness. So to another incongruity, of a war not followed by a peace settlement, but to enforce a peace settlement. And again we forget.
Wars mostly last a long time.
The Middle Ages had one which lasted 100 years. A nationalist war of independence, which Kosovo ultimately is, usually is an even more protracted affair. The Algerian war lasted eight years, the present civil war in Sudan is into its 16th year, while Vietnam's continued for a quarter of a century. In its murder, rape and pillage, Kosovo perhaps most resembles the 17th century religious war in Europe better known as the Thirty Years War. It wasn't meant to be like that.