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Politics : Bill Clinton Scandal - SANITY CHECK -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: j_b who wrote (7645)	10/7/1998 11:41:00 AM
From: jbe	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 67261

j_b, I should probably let go of this bone, but can't resist worrying it a bit more... You faulted (rather mildly, granted) some typically pro-Clinton groups for "their complete silence regarding the President's apparent bombing of civilians in the Sudanese factory, and his lack of action to prevent the slaughter in Kosovo." Some comments: 1) With one exception, the groups you cited are typically single-issue domestic policy advocacy groups, and one would not expect them to concern themselves with foreign policy at all. As for the (Congressional) Black Caucus, it is a partisan political organization. 2) Again -- why should people be concerned about the "slaughter" in Kosovo, in particular? If you want to talk slaughter -- what could possibly have been worse than the slaughter in Rwanda? It seems to me some black civil rights groups at the time may indeed have asked why "ethnic cleansing" bothered us so much more when it was going on in Europe (Bosnia meant here) than when it was going on in Africa. Good question, whether they asked it or not. 3) Now, to the bombing of the Sudanese factory. You know, I followed public & press reaction to the "anti-terrorist" bombings of Sudan and Afghanistan very closely. To my amazement, for at least a week I could not find ANY criticism, in ANY quarter, of the government for undertaking these actions unilaterally. After all, this was the fundamental question raised by observers abroad: why does the United States arrogate to itself (and only to itself) the right to initiate military strikes against the territory of other countries, with which it is technically at peace? Unilateralism is nothing new in American foreign policy, however. So in this country, the focus was on other questions, such as, 1) the question of just how "cost-effective" massive air strikes can be in combatting terrorism; 2) the "wag the dog" question (was it a "diversion"?); and 3) the question of whether we hit the right targets or not. Apparently, we did not, at least in the case of the Sudanese factory. (Fortunately, however, only one person reportedly lost his life during the raid.) I guess my question is: just who was out there from the beginning, criticizing the fundamental rationale for the air strikes? jbe