Not my war Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
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The aftermath of the war on Yugoslavia is not following the
typical pattern. Usually, the
commander in chief basks in the glow of victory. Medals are handed
out, parades organized,
speeches given to the masses. Veterans are heralded as preservers
of freedom. The
national soul swells in patriotic fervor. The merchants of death
gain a new lease on life.
Not this time. This is no victory glow, no parades, no flag
waving. Outside the mainstream
media, there is a curious lack of any bragging at all. There are
no yellow ribbons adorning
trees. Indeed, veterans of this war are more pitied than praised.
Veterans of past wars are
rushing to repudiate the whole mess.
As regards the "national soul," it is pretty much what it was
before and during the war:
skeptical of any pronouncement from D.C. Meanwhile, Congress has
moved on to the usual
civic pieties: promising to reform a smattering of failed
programs, dreaming up new ways to
regulate our lives, and celebrating Rosa Parks. Even Clinton seems
to be backing away from
the topic of the war.
What gives?
This war never enjoyed wide or deep public support, and for good
reason. It was an attack
on a far-away sovereign country that never did anything to any
American. No interests of
this country were threatened, or even affected, by the 600-year-
long struggle between
Christians and Muslims over Kosovo. The U.S. bombing was simply an
aggression of the sort
the Russians used to accuse us of.
Even now, it is difficult to know the real reason for
intervention, since no one believes that
the Clinton administration cares about human-rights violations.
You can't take anti-brutality
sermons seriously when the preacher is simultaneously bombing
hospitals, schools, and
water systems, and killing innocents as a war tactic. Far from
giving rise to nationalist pride,
U.S. behavior forms a pit in your stomach.
Clinton tried to draw on antique war myths and accuse his
opponents of appeasement in
the face of evil. But it didn't fly. His poll ratings actually
declined during the war, an
astounding fact in light of the tendency of war to unite a country
behind the ruling regime.
And these numbers are from phone polls that dramatically under-
assess the level of
dissatisfaction with existing government policy. The war was
supported with intensity by
very few, mostly those who had something to gain from it.
Even according to NATO's own stated aims, the war was not a
success. The final treaty
steps away from the absurd demands made in the Rambouilett talks.
And from a humane
point of view, the war was catastrophic, with thousands dead and
an entire society in ruins.
The lack of public celebration of victory reflects a widespread
acknowledgment of this.
The truth about this war was not being spread by mainstream organs
of opinion, of course.
But thanks to the Internet, this was the first war in which a
sizeable number of Americans
had access to alternative media. News from anti-war sites was just
as accessible as that
from pro-war sites (again, the mainstream media). So there was no
need to rely on the
warfare state's spokesmen, and those who parrot their opinions.
The contrast between truth and propaganda was so dramatic that we
all received an
education in how war disinformation works. Even NATO was sometimes
forced to admit it
had lied about its own iniquities. It was either confess, or lose
all credibility.
One of the few reporters to deal somewhat frankly with NATO
atrocities was Steven
Erlanger of The New York Times, though he waited until the NATO
occupation to unburden
himself fully. Writing in the New York Times Magazine (June 13,
1999), he points out that no
one, Serbian or Albanian, believed "that this was anything but
Washington's war." All the
prattle about allies was just a fig leaf.
He further confirms that the U.S. was, "perhaps out of
frustration," deliberately targeting
civilians. One "month into the war, no Serb believed that the
bombs were not aimed at them
or that NATO hit anything -- even hospitals or the Chinese Embassy
-- by error."
He tells a horrifying story about the massacre at Aleksinac.
Reporters were invited to view
the death inflicted on civilians by NATO. As they walked, "Western
reporters joked to inure
themselves to the bloody human remains on which they were
unavoidably stepping." But
Serbians standing nearby said, "listen to the bastards, speaking
English and laughing."
Serbians wept, says Erlanger, not only at the loss of life and
property, but also "for the
death of their own misconceptions of America."
And now, we hear of individual Serbs being run out of Kosovo,
80,000 at last count,
frightened of terrorism directed against them that NATO is either
powerless to stop or de
facto encouraging. When a handful of Serbs refuses to collaborate,
and dares to resist the
foreign occupiers with guns, can anyone really say they are wrong?
As Erlanger notes, even
Serbs "have a right to their patriotism, and to their own national
myths, and to their grief."
There's a scene in Godfather when Michael Corleone tells his new
girlfriend how his father
once offered a contract to a man at gunpoint. His father said,
"either your brains or your
signature are going to be on that paper." His girlfriend freezes
in horror, but Michael quickly
assures her, "that's my family, Kate, it's not me."
It is difficult for Americans to consider the immense human
suffering inflicted on Yugoslavia
with weapons built by our tax dollars. Far from celebrating, there
is a widespread tendency
to avoid even thinking about it. But for those who do think, this
war makes them want to
cry out to the world: that was the government's war, not mine.
Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. is president of the Ludwig von Mises
Institute in Auburn, Alabama.
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