Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 18:58:48 -0500 (EST)
From: danceswithcarp <dcombs-AT-bloomington.in.us>
Subject: Kosovo - column (fwd)



This was sent to me from Grrmoney.  It's fairly succinct as far as
the overall confusion goes.



To: dcombs-AT-bloomington.in.us
Subject: Kosovo - column



Hi carpo,

I found the following column on the war in Kosovo in one of our local  
papers today. The paper, BTW, is pretty bourgeois, with leanings towards  
Social Democrat points of view (it used to be owned by the Social Democrat  
Party up to the early 80ies when it was sold due to financial problems).  
Any grammatical etc blunders are due to my translation.

You may have my permission to forward this to the list if you think it may  
be of interest to others, too:

************************************************************************

Morgenpost, April 19, 1999

Humaneness ravaged

Is it possible that the countries of the military alliance NATO (most of  
them with a Social Democrat or liberal government) have got stuck in the  
mud of an abhorrent logic and automatisms of war that Europe is heading  
into a catastrophe helplessly and without resistance? It rather looks like  
that.

Up to now, they *all* agree to continue or even increase bombardments,  
although the aims of this war have not been met in such a dramatical way  
as almost never before. So our bombs and missiles go down on the ground of  
Rest-Yugoslavia certainly in highly *humanitarian* intents. They just have  
an effect opposite to the one envisaged, as was quite obvious even after  
four days of bombings.

Yugoslav/Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic, immediately after NATO's air  
raids started, has increased his efforts to drive ethnic Albanians out of  
Kosovo. From then on, his bands of soldiers, his paramilitary bounces have  
been bawling: "You wanted NATO, so now you'll see what they do for you" -  
and drove the refugees out of their houses, out of their villages. Don't  
NATO bombers have something to do with this? One set out to prevent  
"humanitarian catastrophes". The scenes to be seen at the borders to  
neighbouring states are abhorrent and cannot aptly be described with the  
construction of words above.

Not mentioning that these neighbouring states, poor as they are, will be  
destabilized despite all aid - we've got to ask: how can the pack of  
murderers be stopped, how can it be ascertained that, *after* NATO's  
"humanitarian action", the result will be a devastated, in wide parts  
hungry Balkan, a Balkan predestined to even more ferocious fights? The  
allied armies have (with the consent of politicians, of ours to?)  
destroyed more and more factories producing civil goods, vital bridges,  
and their target is the economic infrastructure of Yugoslavia. Well, who  
took part in World War 2 knows that, even after all refineries were laid  
flat by bombs, there was still enough fuel to give the US army some severe  
problems in the Ardennes in 1944, at least for some time.

The German parliament on October 16, 1998 agreed to *limited* "air  
operations" carried out in phases - did it also legalize that Rest- 
Yugoslavia already now is a sad economic ruin, while the last but one  
victim is driven out of Kosovo? Not at all, just ask the politicians.

What's certain: time for reconstruction will come. Just guess who's going  
to pay for it. The share values in question have already started to go up  
in a promising way.
W.H.
**************************************************************************





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