The winner "We are winning, he is losing and....he knows it", "hell bent on using the clearly unprepared Apaches and sacrificing their pilots" "mad bomber of civilians" "protector of drug running prostitution ring Mafia KLA thugs" Clarke got "promoted"<g>....I wanna know when Hitler/Allbright gets her walking papers and check into a nursing home where she belongs...
0300 GMT, 990730 - Washington Begins the Post-Kosovo Purge
The first of the heads responsible for the Kosovo crisis rolled on July 27, when Supreme Allied Commander
Europe (SACEUR) General Wesley Clark was sacked. Clark was ordered to resign his post in April, three
months before the end of his current term, to be replaced by Air Force General Joseph Ralston, Vice Chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). Officially, Clark's term was shortened because otherwise Ralston, whose
term as JCS vice chairman expires in February, would have been forced to retire. Instead, it is Clark who is
being pensioned off, though Defense Secretary William Cohen reportedly recommended Clark be offered an
ambassadorship.
Pentagon and White House officials were quick to assert that Clark's removal did not reflect any dissatisfaction
with the general, insisting that it was merely part of a broader normal rotation of commanders. "No one is being
pushed out. No one is being forced out," said White House spokesman Joe Lockhart. "Clark did a great job,"
said an anonymous White House official, quoted by the New York Times. "He won the war, for God's sake!" An
anonymous Pentagon official assured the Times, "If this was in any way dissatisfaction with Clark, he'd be
moved out long before."
The White House could not say, "Clark helped push the president into an ill advised military quagmire, from
which escape was achieved only through some particularly duplicitous diplomacy and buying off the Russians."
After all, it has already claimed a triumphant military victory in Operation Allied Force. The White House could
not say, "Throughout the war, Clark critically damaged U.S. relations with its European NATO allies, and his
continued criticism of those allies makes reconciliation extremely difficult." After all, Operation Allied Force was
a triumph of cooperation among NATO members faced with a bold new mission. The White House cannot say,
"Clark's binary view of Belgrade and the Kosovar Albanians makes control of the situation in Kosovo and a
quick and safe exit from the Serbian province nearly impossible." After all, Milosevic remains an indicted war
criminal, and the Serbs are responsible for untold atrocities. And the White House can not mention the fact that
Clark and Secretary of Defense William Cohen –a man Clinton does trust – are so estranged that Cohen must
relay his commands to the general, including the order to step down, through JCS Chief Hugh Shelton. And so,
officially, Clark is simply at the mercy of an unfortunate scheduling problem.
General Clark was one of four top Clinton advisors most responsible for pushing the U.S. and NATO into a
military confrontation over Kosovo. According to a number of reports that emerged during and after the war,
Secretary of State Madeline Albright in January 1999 presented the plan under which NATO should threaten air
strikes. She was backed up by Clark and by envoys Richard Holbrooke and Robert Gelbard, who argued that
Milosevic would buckle under a day or two of bombing, if not merely the threat of air strikes. They, in turn, were
backed by a sea of anonymous analysts in the U.S. intelligence agencies who, until the bombing began,
repeatedly argued that Milosevic would quickly submit under air attacks. Skeptics included Cohen, Shelton,
presidential advisor Sandy Berger, and presumably Ralston.
Now NATO has won in Kosovo, or at least it has declared victory, though being stuck between the KLA and the
growing threat of hostile Serb paramilitaries is a questionable triumph. The White House must now set about
repairing relations with Russia, China, and its NATO allies, and seeking a way out of Kosovo. Enough time has
passed for the "victory" to be accepted as common knowledge and the "heroes" of that victory to be pensioned
off, hopefully making way for a team that can clean up the mess.
Technically, Clark is not the first head to roll. His is just the most public. Gelbard is being dispatched as
ambassador to Indonesia, where it is questionable whether he can make the situation any worse than it already
is. Holbrooke's bid for the post of U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations has been blocked twice by
Republicans, which is understandable considering they are fond neither of him, nor of the UN. However, the
Clinton administration has noticeably failed to lift a finger in his defense. Holbrooke will probably end up with
his UN seat, though again, it will be more of a reflection of the Republicans' contempt for the international body
than a tribute to Holbrooke's diplomatic skills, and both he and the organization will be equally ignored. And
now Clark is being shuffled off to retirement ahead of schedule. That leaves Albright.
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