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

To: nuke44 who wrote (2640)	4/8/1999 12:04:00 PM
From: The Philosopher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 17770

Article 4 of the NATO treaty states, "The Parties will consult together whenever, in the opinion of any of them, the territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the Parties are threatened." So I again ask the question which D. Long has repeatedly failed to answer: Which NATO country's territorial integrity, political independence, or security were threatened by the civil war in Yugoslavia? (Note that even Clinton hasn't claimed any of that -- he's only claimed a generalized moral right to stop ethnic clensing.) Not Hungary, which is the only NATO country bordering on Yugoslavia--they have not even hinted that they held any fear for their territorial integrity, political independence, or security. Not Greece -- they supported Serbia's war against the rebel KLA. Not Italy; they went along with the bombing only reluctantly, and we don't know what behind-the-scenes pressure the US used to gain approval to use Italian bases for this action. As far as I know, NO Nato country has stepped forward to claim that the Serbian-KLA war threatened its territorial integrity, political independence, or security. The charter does NOT say that Nato may intervene in an offensive (not defensive) way when there is a generalized threat to the security of an area within NATO's claimed sphere of influence. Macedonia may ask for NATO protection, but they have no more right to it under the NATO charter than Rwanda would. This same article was used to provide NATO military defense for West Germany before it became a member of NATO in 1954 The key word here is "defense." Nato would have gotten involved only if Germany had been attacked. My recollection is that this had mostly to do with West Berlin, which at that time was surrounded and seriously threatened by East Germany -- remember the Berlin airlift? East Germany believed that Berlin should be reunited (under East German control, of course). NATO said that if W. Berlin were attacked, NATO would help defend it. Not the same situation as here AT ALL. Will a document signed and agreed upon by NATO members cause you to reverse your opinion on NATO's intervention in the Balkans? A document which shows a clear and credible legal basis for NATO's action, preferably backed up by an opinion by the World Court, and specifically addressing NATO's commitment to the UN Charter and addressing how a NATO attack would also satisfy the provisions of the UN charter, would satisfy me. (Believe me, if NATO could produce such an opinion, they would. They know they are acting illegally. It's the dirty secret--or, rather, not so secret, but not said out loud.) But just because NATO signed a document saying it was okay to invade Yugoslavia (or China or Pakistan or Zanzibar -- after all, in a global economy and with access to intercontinental ballistic missiles on the black market, the argument can be made that a conflict anywhere in the world threatens the security of every other country in the world) that would do no more for me than a statement by the L.A. police that the beating of Rodney King was in accordance with police protocols. A protocol cannot CREATE legal validity; its only legal validity stems from the source document from which it is drawn. That's why we have laws.