>> >An opinion by Bogdan Denitch and Ian Williams
>> >-------------------------------
>> >The Nation, April 26, 1999
>> >
>> > The Case Against Inaction
>> >
>> > Sadly, some on the left are angrier about NATO's bombing
>> > than they are about the Serbian forces' atrocities, even though
>> > Milosevic's men have killed more in one Kosovan village than
>> > have all the airstrikes.
>>
>> Nato airstrikes have killed over 100 civilians in the past
>> two weeks. That's 2500 per year. A higher rate than the
>> estimated combined death rate caused by the Serbian military
>> and the KLA over the previous year.
>And yet they continue, even though they know their killing results in
>bombing that kills their own people.
And if I point a gun at your head and demand your wallet, my shooting
of you when you refuse to hand it over is your fault because you
*knew* the likely result of a refusal, right?
Those who commit atrocities *always* manage to find justification in
the actions of others, usually the victims, and always insist that
*other* people must take action before they will stop.
>> They have also provided cover for accelerating the very
>> ethnic cleansing they claim to be preventing.
>What do you mean by "providing cover"? They are accused of ethnic
>cleansing. People believe they are doing it, so the bombing isn't
>covering it.
Firstly the international observers who may be able to confirm or
deny the stories allegedly reported to NATO have fled the bombing
or been expelled.
Secondly, independent Yugoslav media and political opposition who may
have been able to get accurate info to those in Serbia have now been
suppressed as the country is on a war footing.
"People believe they are doing it", sure, but what about the facts and
details. There seems little doubt that the Serbian paramilitaries were
and continue to engage in 'ethnic cleansing', but there is also little
doubt that the NATO controlled press (e.g. CNN) is complicit in
propagating NATO disinformation and independent reports are few &
far between.
>> > Those who want an immediate NATO
>> > cease-fire owe the world an explanation of how they propose
>> > to stop and reverse the massive ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, in
>> > light of Milosevic's history as a serial ethnic cleanser and
>> > promise-breaker.
>>
>> Seems to me that it's up to those who favour the bombing to show
>> that it helps the situation, not those who oppose it to come up
>> with an alternative.
>NATO does't have to show anything, because there isn't any higher
>authority that can stop it.
Oh well, so much for the 'democracy' NATO was formed to protect.
>NATO just has to decide to do it and then
>do it. Without a higher authority, the only way to stop NATO before
>it finishes is to organize a massive protest that literally threatens
>the stability of the world economy.
Good idea.
When do we start?
I believe the Greeks & Italians are already well underway.
>That requires an enormous number
>of people to actually act against their own economic self-interest.
>If there were enough Buddhists in the west, it could be done. But if
>there were enough Buddhists in the west, we wouldn't be in this
>situation in the first place.
IMHO you don't have to be a Buddhist to reject short term
individual greed in favour of morality and 'social capital',
but it probably helps.
>> However, the irrational argument above is exactly the one
>> promoted by CNN, the State Department and NATO spokestooges.
>But it isn't an irrational argument. When should an organization like
>the Serb army led by someone like Milosevic be stopped by force?
>Never? If not never, then how close were we to the limit? If we had
>waited longer, would he have destabilized the entire region?
A good parroting of the irrational CNN line.
How does Milosevic 'destabilise the entire region' to the degree
that the exodus that started with the bombings does?
And what sort of argument is "When should an organization like
the Serb army led by someone like Milosevic be stopped by force?"?
Stop them from what?
How about "Never" if a way of stopping him without force is possible.
>> As the NATO bombings have sped up the ethnic cleansing,
>The NATO bombings have not sped up the ethnic cleansing. The Serbs
>have sped up the ethnic cleansing. The NATO bombing has destroyed
>much of the military and civilian infrastructure and has killed a lot
>of people.
A typical US style argument attempting to place all responsibility
on the faction you don't like by simplistically attributing any
result to a *single* unique cause. Like "Guns don't kill, people do".
The Kosovars are suffering from a situation which is the result of an
interaction of many forces & motivations. Before NATO intervention,
there were far fewer casualties and displacements than after.
To try to paint NATO as free of responsibility without showing
that the situation would be just as bad without their contribution
is dishonest.
>> allowed the suppression of Serbian opposition,
>The NATO bombings have not allowed the suppression of the Serbian
>opposition. The Serbs have suppressed the Serbian opposition.
Some Serbs *ARE* the Serbian opposition.
Funny that the pro-government Serbs weren't able to so completely
defeat the opposition until the bombings started isn't it?
>> rallied the waverers behind Milosevic and prevented
>> humanitarian aid from reaching the victims
>True.
>> there is already a strong case for stopping them.
>There is no authority to stop them. Organizing a grass roots movement
>will take so long that the bombing will end before it gathers enough
>momentum. Such a movement should have been organized long before the
>bombing.
Very good point.
Maybe when Clinton was bombing Iraq to protect his (blow) job.
If we organise them now, we might be able to stop the NEXT atrocity.
>It should have been organized to stop Milosevic and the
>Serbs.
It was, in Serbia and without Western support.
It's gone now though, thanks to NATO.
But as citizens of allegedly democratic countries, we should be
organising to stop *our_own* governments from participating in
these sorts of crimes.
"When they came to bomb the Libyans, I said nothing because I'm not
a Libyan. When they came to bomb the Iraqis ...."
God help you if they decide that Norway has a 'rogue government' Martin.
Maybe for the 'inhumane slaughter of minke whales' ;-).
>The people who are protesting the bombing now were not
>protesting the worsening situation in Jugoslavia.
Bullshit.
Check http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/Senate/3707/zap-english.htm
or at least find some sort of alternative media source before you
start parroting CNN lies.
>This list was dead until the bombing started. Protests organize to stop
>bombing, but they don't organize to stop dictators. They don't organize
>to prevent and defuse situations that NATO eventually decides to fix.
Could it be, Martin, that you just don't see anything in the mainstream
media until it becomes a CNN/NATO/US/UN issue, whereupon they pretend
that noone was doing anything until they stepped in.
Before NATO drove the international observers and relief agencies out,
the death rate due to military action was around 50 a week. It's
impossible to say now but it's doubtless much higher. Maybe people
*were* doing something, but it just didn't make good enough television
to draw your attention.
I have been involved in community protests about Indonesian govt actions
in East Timor and Australian government support of it since the mid 80s,
but I'll bet that up until the US based media started paying attention
about four years ago, noone was 'organising to prevent and defuse
situations that NATO eventually decides to fix' regarding Timor in
your eyes.
>There were
>no massive demonstrations when the IMF imposed stresses on the
>Jugoslavian economy.
Mores the pity.
There *will* be protests about exactly this sort of thing all over
Europe in June, culminating in the G7 (G8 now?) meeting on June 18.
Gonna be there Martin?
>There were no massive demonstrations when the
>fighting started that resulted in the breakup of Jugoslavia. There
>were no massive demonstrations when the Dayton accords neglected to
>resolve the Kosovo problem. Now NATO is bombing, and there are
>massive demonstrations.
Because now the government who claim to represent us have jumped
in armed with ignorance, high explosives and lies about their
motivations.
It's one thing to do nothing about a bad situation, another to
add to the problem.
> Before the bombing, if those who are
>protesting the bombing now cared, they didn't care enough to protest,
>not on this list anyway.
The list is mainly about media spin, which didn't exist until
the media started paying attention.
>> > Arguments that the NATO action diminishes
>> > the stature of the United Nations are, to say the least, highly
>> > questionable. What could diminish the UN's stature more than
>> > Milosevic's successful defiance of more than fifty Security
>> > Council resolutions?
>>
>> Umm, the much large number of resolutions defied by countries like
>> Israel and the US?
>True. But that isn't going to change unless the structure of the
>system changes. That should be obvious by now.
Absolutely.
How is adding to the chorus of crap being put out by the military
industrial propaganda machine contributing to a change in the structure?
Actually, while we wait for the revolution, we might even be able to
mitigate some of these abuses by adopting a more sceptical line towards
the attempts to manipulate public morality.
>> The defiance of UN resolutions against aggressive warfare by
>> NATO?
>True. But NATO is not hampered by a veto power, and, at the moment,
>there is no credible force to resist it, unless Russia threatens
>nuclear retaliation.
Scary.
Sounds like the threat to world democracy by Milosevic is nothing
compared to the threat posed by NATO.
Do you advocate bombing NATO countries now, or are you in favour
of appeasement?
But seriously Martin, are you suggesting that we should agree
with NATO because they're too tough to argue with?
>> > Ideally, there should have been a UN Security Council vote
>> > endorsing military action, but China and Russia had made it
>> > plain that no matter what barbarities Milosevic committed
>> > they would veto any such resolution.
>>
>> And we can't go having a vote if the result might go against us,
>> now can we?
>
>If the UN were a democracy, they probably would have put it to a
>vote. China and Russia could not have stopped it by themselves. But
>since there is the veto power, the UN won't work in these situations.
How sure are you that the UN would have voted in favour?
A lot of member nations value sovereignity rather highly you know,
even if they aren't fans of Milosevic.
>> Do these writers have a history of condemning UN resolutions
>> overwhelmingly
>> carried on the numbers which are then vetoed by the US?
>It doesn't matter.
But it matters whether CHOMSKY list members protested the situation
in Kosovo before the bombings started?
?Huh?
>That's how the structure works. If there is a
>veto power, it will be used. If it is used often, it effectively
>destroys the power of the instituation. The UN is good at helping
>refugees and providing other services on which everybody agrees. But
>in situations where there is major disagreement among the big players,
>it will function like the Red Cross.
So what's the problem there?
Beats having it function like NATO, as it is in Iraq, creating
a huminitarian tragedy that dwarfs anything happening in the Balkans.
The Red Cross does good work, and unlike CARE Australia, goes to great
lengths to make sure that it's effectiveness isn't compromised due to
partisan manipulation.
>>
>> > In short, the court of international public opinion has
>> > implicitly, resoundingly, endorsed military action.
>>
>> The UN represents international public opinion?
>>
>> I don't remember voting for them?
>
>That's one of the structural problems. You don't get to vote.
So where do these people get off claiming that the UN can
'resoundingly' reflect international public opinion then?
More bogus claims of a mandate if you ask me.
Are you aware of the 'badwagon effect' in push polling whereby
people are told that 'everyone agrees' on something before being
asked their own opinion?
>> >Milosevic
>> > is clearly counting on past experience that the international
>> > community will compromise, accept the results of ethnic
>> > cleansing and leave him in power. We hope that this time he
>> > has miscalculated. Three of the major European
>> > players--Britain, France and Germany--under like-minded
>> > left-of-center governments have united in their determination
>> > to stop him, and they have popular majorities for doing so.
>>
>> > Soon NATO will be faced with two alternatives: stop the
>> > bombing and "negotiate," or commit ground troops. The
>> > bombing should stop only when Belgrade agrees to pull out or
>> > is pushed out of Kosovo, if necessary by ground troops. For
>> > most of this decade Milosevic has used negotiations as a cover
>> > to consolidate the gains of ethnic cleansing.
>>
>> <snip, more CNN standard journalism, where 'evil Milosevic' is
>> given as the reason for bombing Serbs and Kosovars and the
>> fact that the bombings only aggravate the problem is compeletely
>> ignored>
>>
>> What is this propaganda in aid of? Is it meant to fool US 'liberals'
>> or something?
>
>I think people are in favor of the NATO action because it is a
>decisive action to stop a wrong. Despite the fact that the NATO
>action is also a wrong, I think they will continue to be in favor of
>it as long as it stays focused on its military goal and until the
>Russians negotiate a deal acceptable to NATO.
Gullible, manipulable people favour NATO action because no effort
or expense has been spared in organising the media to make people
think that aggravating the situation in aid of US strategic interests
is actually 'decisive action to stop a wrong'.
They will continue to be in favour for as long as the media snow job
can outshout reports of the actual *effect* of the campaign.
Tell me Martin, what *is* the NATO military goal, as they repeatedly
avoid any commitment to putting in ground troops? If you are just going
to repeat the 'degrading Milosevic's military capacity' line,
please explain what this means in terms of a viable exit strategy.
- michael
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