From: "Dave Coull" <d.y.coull-AT-dundee.ac.uk>
Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 16:07:18 GMT
Subject: Re: NATO doesn't want diplomacy


Carp wrote about Milosevic

>So he is misunderstood?  

No, he is not misunderstood. 
He is definitely not a nice man. 
But that is beside the point. Although
he is evil, so are lots of other heads
of government. So is Sadam Hussein,
yet despite lots of Iraqis being killed 
by NATO Sadam is still boss there.

>You, at least until you breath american air, 
>are loyal to your land also. 

>I mean can you honestly say, "carp:  I'd appreciate your 
>efforts in trying to misdirect and deflect NATO into acting 
>against my enemy, but let +me+ run off these pom shits."

>Tell me it's as clear as that, dave.

Well of course I take the view that anybody who invades
Caledonia deserves to be hung, drawn and quartered. 
No, that's too quick.  Roasted over a slow fire.
But that is because I am inconsistent. However,
I must point out that I am completely consistent
in my inconsistency. I make no rationalisations
or excuses for it, I just acknowledge that it's there.
So , of course , I can completely understand 
the feelings of Kosovo Albanians. But
(and this is the crucial point) while we
may be able to understand their feelings,
precisely because we are  _not_  directly
involved, we can take a calmer view of things.
And, looking at it rationally, the fact is that
NATO bombing is bad for the people on this
planet in general, and is not helping the Kosovo
Albanians one little bit. Indeed, since NATO
has started bombing refugee columns, 
it is clearly harming them.

>So this reality we are confronted with is so absurd that 
>EVERYONE INVOLVED GETS IMMUNITY FOR CRIMES 
>AGAINST HUMYNITY?  

Nobody should have immunity for crimes against 
humanity. If somebody wants to assassinate 
Slobo Milosevic, be my guest. But that is not
the issue here. NATO has absolutely no intention
of assassinating Milosevic. Shortly before 
the Second World War, but at a time when 
Britain still had an embassy in Berlin, the military
attache at the British Embassy in Berlin came
up with what looked like a foolproof plan for assassinating
Adolf Hitler. He managed to convince his superiors
that it would be virtually impossible for the Germans
to trace the assassination of Hitler back to the British
Embassy. However, his plan was eventually turned down
by the British government on the grounds that   "ONCE
WE  START  ASSASSINATING  HEADS  OF  GOVERNMENT,
THERE  IS  NO  TELLING  WHERE  IT  WILL  END".
So, instead, we had the Second World War. NATO
will continue to reject all plans for assassination,
and on the same grounds.

NATO will not assassinate Milosevic. He will remain
head of the Yugoslav government. But NATO will drop
a lot of bombs which will kill a lot of innocent people.
Even if you consider that all Serbs are guilty, Yugoslavia
includes a large Hungarian community in Vojvodina province
(heavily bombed by NATO) and of course NATO is now
targeting Albanian refugees. It is indisputable that innocent
people are suffering, and that Milosevic is not. And for what?

>Now you say it's okay to send 750,000 bleeding people 
>back to Kosovo because Milosevic says he has Arkan 
>on a leash and the Russians guarantee it? 

The story about Jeffrey Dahmer was colourful but completely
beside the point. Milosevic knows he can't hold on to all
of Kosovo. The deal the Russians have got him to agree
to involves a partition with Yugoslavia keeping just the bits 
in the north which no Serb leader could ever give up and stay
alive. Now, of course, from an anarchist point of view partition
is not a good thing. But remember,  _every_  border is a 
partition. From Yugoslavia's point of view, different bits of
Yugoslavia becoming independent was a partition of Yugoslavia.
The KLA want partition. They would just draw the line in a different 
place, that's all. So the fact is, unless there is a world-wide 
anarchist revolution first, sooner or later there  _will_  be 
partition. Under the deal negotiated by the Russians, Yugoslav 
forces would retreat beyond the partition line. Under this deal, 
most of Kosovo would have an Albanian government , with
Serbia just hanging on to an area roughly comparable to 
the Serb percentage of the population. There might be some
exchange of population, but most of that has already happened.
It wouldn't be much compared to the really big partitions (the 
partition of India to create Pakistan involved tens of millions 
of people on the move). Yes, it's a bad thing that people of 
different religion or ethnicity cannot live together, but the fact 
is, neither the Albanians nor the Serbs want to live together,
so partition is going to happen whether we like it or not. The
Albanian Kosovo would have lots of NATO troops on the ground 
and NATO effectively running the place as a "protectorate".
_That_  is  the deal the Russians negotiated.  _That_
is what NATO has rejected. And that is why I say

>>This war is continuing because NATO wants it to.
>>The deal which the Russians got Milosevic to agree
>>to could be used as a way of ending the war by negotiation
>>now. The refugees could go home, the bombing could stop.
>>But NATO doesn't want that to happen. So far as they are concerned,
>>what is now at stake is the credibility of NATO. They have to be 
>>seen to inflict a defeat on Yugoslavia or they will lose face. So a
>>negotiated settlement won't do.  So,  they will continue with the
>>bombing, and then there will be a long ground war, and after many
>>years just maybe Milosevic will be replaced. Then there will be a
>>settlement which NATO will hail as a victory. But that settlement 
>>will be the very same one that they could have  _now_ . Although
>>Milosevic's replacement will be a different  _person_ , he will not
>>have a different  _policy_  so far as hanging on to certain bits of
>>northern Kosovo are concerned, and for the same reason. So the
>>settlement which NATO will hail as a victory will be the same one 
>>that they could negotiate now. Billions of dollars and countless 
>>lives will have been expended for no better reason than to save  
>>NATO's  face.


Dave