Petrovec, Macedonia, March 28, 1998: A Finnish officer shouts instructions as Americans test fire Finnish rifles during a live-fire exercise near Skopje airport. Americans, most of them from Schweinfurt, Germany, made up 350 of the 750 United Nations peacekeepers patrolling Macedonia. Their patrols bordered the volatile Kosovo regioin of Serbia, but the U.S. troops said their mission was to monitor the border, not get involved in potential combat.

Read Stars and Stripes’ article on the 1998 Macedonian mission here.

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