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Pastimes : Kosovo -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: George Papadopoulos who wrote (12471)	6/18/1999 6:22:00 PM
From: George Papadopoulos	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 17770

Did Stratfor Ignore War Crimes? 18 June, 2156 GMT As the Kosovo crisis has wound down, Stratfor has received a number of e-mails charging that the discovery by NATO troops of mass graves and other hard evidence of alleged atrocities in Kosovo, has proven that Stratfor's analysis of the Kosovo crisis was incorrect or, more precisely, biased toward the Serbs. There have been very few such letters, but the charges stung. Being accused of covering up atrocities is something we just can't take quietly, regardless of how few the accusers. Moreover, as people who have written to Stratfor know, we take criticisms very seriously and sometimes, depending on the charge and tone, very personally. We are not a giant corporation and we care very much about what is said about us. Thus, the charge that we have been indifferent to or ignored war crimes cannot be ignored. Our readers know that we admit mistakes when we think we've made them and defend ourselves vigorously when we haven't. So we are going to take the rare step of posting a defense on our web site. The defense is simple: the charge is untrue. First, we reported the charges of atrocities from the beginning and as extensively as we reported charges on all sides. Anyone can browse through our news stories and see that. But more important, our commentaries and special reports took those atrocities into account regularly. A glance at one of our first Special Reports posted on March 31, entitled "Yugoslavia's Strategy" stated that at the heart of that strategy was the following assertion: "The Serbs see demographics as the key to retaining Kosovo. Once outside forces became dedicated to Albanian autonomy, it was the Serbs' view that this meant Albanian secession and the creation of a greater Albania under the control of the United States and NATO. Therefore, in order to render the issue of Albanian autonomy moot, the Serbs began a policy of population transfer under the threat of terror." On April 2, we published the UNCHR report on refugee reports of atrocities, including supportive commentary. When Truth in Media issued a report purporting to prove that reports of mass graves issued by NATO and based on imagery were untrue, we attacked the TIM report, arguing that NATO's claims had not been refuted. We could go on, but anyone interested can peruse our archives and see our true views. Those views were actually summed up in a piece entitled "Morality and Geopolitics," , which we invite those interested to reread. The point we made there was that the problem of Serb atrocities and the problem of geopolitics collide in the Balkans. Each side has a thousand years of atrocities to point to and it is not clear whether the latest round of atrocities ought to take precedence over older rounds. Everyone can debate who is more or less moral, but the geopolitical problem of the region is that the policies being followed by NATO will lead inevitably toward an outcome that most inhabitants of the region don't want to see happen: a greater Albania or an independent Kosovo. Regardless of the crimes or lack of crimes of the Serbs, a solution that leads to a powerful KLA will only lead to more atrocities. It was in this spirit that we attacked the idea of indicting Milosevic for war crimes. In a region divided between victim and victimizer, with roles alternating perpetually and historically, the surgical precision needed to identify moral responsibility for war crimes is beyond the capacity of the law and indeed, the satisfaction of the legal imperative will increase the probability of further atrocities. Our view of this was summarized on May 27 in a piece entitled "The War Crimes Gambit". There are many other examples but our point is clear. We neither ignored Serb war crimes nor did we dispute them. We did argue that the war was poorly executed by NATO, that it caused massive strategic problems with Russia and China which will prove extremely costly in the long run, and that the victory of NATO is quite illusory. We also argued that ending Serb atrocities sets the stage for Albanian atrocities. These were our positions and remain our positions. That is a far cry from denying that there were Serb atrocities or being indifferent to them In the end, there were plenty of people involved in this war who were prepared to be cheerleaders for one side our another. It was our mission to be both dispassionate and disinterested. We achieved that, according to most of our readers and for that we are proud. We certainly made errors. But denying war crimes was not one of them. We have been criticized by both sides for not being on their side. We are proud of that. But the charge that we ignored or denied Serbian atrocities is simply and completely untrue.