I sent this yesterday, but by then I had used up my quota of five
messages per day, so here it is today.

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Date: Sun, 4 Apr 1999 20:59:56 +0200 (MET DST)
From: Martin William Smith <[log in to unmask]>
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CC: [log in to unmask]
In-reply-to: <[log in to unmask]>
        ([log in to unmask])
Subject: Re: [CHOMSKY] If you were Milosevic

> > F. Leon Wilson writes:
> > > If you were Milosevic what would you do?
> > >
> > > How would you respond to NATO/US?
>
> > Martin wrote:
> > If you mean that I would have done all the things he has done up to
> > the and including his refusal to sign the deal, and if you mean my
> > goal would be to hang on to power, then I would have done just what he
> > has done.
>
> But why?
>
> There is lots of discussion about "Kosovo," but what is the ultimate goal
> of Milosevic?

I saw a documentary on Milosevic tonight.  It was not a Norwegian
documentary.  It was made by the BBC.  It presented Milosevic as a
very rational and intelligent man but one possibly without empathy for
the suffering of others.  His father and mother both committed
suicide, but not until he was a young adult.

> Is the goal to rid the country of Albanians?
>
> We'd better look at this situation again.

The documentary made the point that Milosevic has built his career on
Kosovo, and that Kosovo represents the foundation of the Serb
identity, because the Battle of Kosovo was fought there (600 years
ago?) between the Serbs and... sorry, I forgot, but the Serbs lost.
Kosovo began his rise to power there in 1987 when he went there as a
communist to quell a situation in which the albanians were abusing the
few Serbs who lived there.  He promised them they would never be
mistreated again by anyone, and he has risen to power on that
promise.  The documentary indicated that NATO may have made a very bad
error in thinking they can get him to give it up, because of his
promise, his apparent lack of empathy, and the identity Serbs derive
from Kosovo's distant past.

So I don't think the Albanians are important to him.  I don't think he
cares whether they stay or go, live or die.  I don't think he is evil
in the Hitlerian sense, but he might be without scruples, as the
documentary tried to demonstrate through interviews with pople who had
negotiated with him at Dayton and earlier.  By the way, the
documentary reminded me that NATO did use air attacks for 15 days in
the Bosnian war when the Serbs, under direction from Milosevic,
surrounded Srebernica, which was a UN safe haven at the time, shelled
it, and then went in and ethnically cleansed it.  The NATO air strikes
lead Milosevic to join the Dayton negotions, where he refused to
include Kosovo in the negotiated deal, although it was supposed to be
part of what he was to give up at that point.

> > Martin wrote:
> > When the weather clears and I start losing my heavy weapons
> > I will be looking to cut a deal.
>
> What is more important?
>
> 1) Heavy weapons
> 2) Ridding the counrty of Albanians?
>
> > Martin wrote:
> > I will be willing to negotiate only with the Russians, and I will
> > ultimately give up Kosovo, saying the Albanians are pigs anyway.

I'm wrong here, I think.  He won't give up Kosovo.  He won't want to
lose his heavy weapons.  He won't carry about the Albanians.


Can't write more now.  I must go home to watch the last episode of
Adam Dalgleish "A Certain Justice".  I'm a Roy Marsden fan.

martin

Martin Smith                    Email: [log in to unmask]
P.O. Box 1034 Bekkajordet       Tel. : +47 330 35700
N-3194 HORTEN, Norway           Fax. : +47 330 35701
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