**OT** NATO vs. Serbia
Yogi,
as a european and a keen observer of world politics, i see nato's bombardment of serbia in a slightly different light. let me start with what's worrying me: a dangerous precedent has been set by declaring humanitarian reasons as the legal basis for the war. the fact is that this is unheard of in modern history and has become a hotly debated subject among legal scholars, as it implies that no sovereign nation may from now on safely murder,torture,expel or otherwise oppress parts of it's own citizenry, which has been generally accepted as not being worthy of intervention in the past. no wonder russia and china are not happy about this. of course i assume that they are aware of the real reason behind the war, which is basically an attempt to impose the wests will on one of the major cultural fault-lines in europe in an effort to avoid further destabilization of the region, which would have to be fought at much greater cost later if not nipped in the bud right away. my major gripe though is with nato's halfheartedness in getting the job done. having stumbled into this war, not enough determination is shown with regards to actually winning it. i realize that the use of ground troops scores low on the political feasibility scale, but every half-serious military expert was probably aghast when nato told milosevic from the outset it won't use them. one can only hope that either milosevic unexpectedly caves in, or nato gets it's act together and does whatever is necessary to win the war decisively. i notice that you make no mention in your post of the suffering endured by the kosovars, while complaining about the civilian casualties inflicted by nato's mistakes. how come? i'm also asking myself what 'strong measures' you would like russia and china to take in order to end the bombing. clearly 'strong measures' of whatever sort by these nations would not exactly contribute to the world's stability you profess to desire. let me tell you what russia and/or china should do: they should talk milosevic into accepting political asylum and hightailing it out of serbia as quickly as possible. then they should lean on whatever new government emerges in serbia to accept nato's peace plan for kosovo and if it makes them feel better,let them contribute troops to the contingent overseeing it's implementation.now that would be extremely constructive. if russia and china have no positive diplomatic contributions to make, it would be best if they stayed out of the conflict altogether. on current evidence though i would say that russia *is* trying to play a constructive role and i would not begrudge them to walk away with the credit if they manage to achieve a settlement. whether they can deliver though is still open to question. milosevic is after all your typical dictator, ruthless and imo slightly crazy to boot, a thoroughly unpredictable character. he and his cronies have lived like maggots in bacon, amassing fortunes as well as power, while serbia has been in a precipitous economic decline ever since milosevic took over. the true extent of the crimes committed in kosovo will only become clear once a protectorate is established there, but it takes no genius to guess what has happened to all those young men that have been marched off by serb soldiers. whatever the western troops will find once they enter kosovo, it promises to be very grim. there are your 'innocent people'. btw, in a western democracy, you don't 'put your life in danger' by voicing your opinion. in serbia and china, you do.
regards,
hb |
