>Reports are starting to come out in the western media of Yugoslavs trying
>to avoid the call up
Get away! I would never have believed that the Western media would say such terrible things about Yugoslavia's military...
>Yesterday a report came out through Montenegro of demonstrations against
>the war in Serbia
Given that there have been umpteen, demonstrations against Nato's war in Montenegro, Macedonia, Greece, I'm not sure that this counts as a scoop.
>I am writing however because I was disappointed that people have not taken
>up my question to James Heartfield (under the Foreign Affairs and KLA
>thread title) of why the anti-war movement in the west is weak.
Because oppositional movements in general are weak in the West. It is ironic that Blair and Clinton continue to describe this as a war between democracy and dictatorship, since their own 'democracies' are effectively dead through lack of interest. Politics is an elite game that alienates the vast mass of ordinary people in Britain and America.
Characteristically the critics of Yugoslavia complain of the public's excessive influence upon the political process there, objecting that the 'ethnic hatred' of the mob is given too much influence. As can be readily demonstrated by the example of Bosnia under UN tutelage, the Western ideal of democratisation in practice means the exclusion of ordinary people from influence upon the state. That is why Nato in Belgrade and the UN in Bosnia have gone out of their way to close down television and radio stations. A free press is a challenge to Nato's elite rule.
>
>But fundamentally I would suggest the anti-war movement has failed because
>its line was incorrect. It started out assuming that any action by the
>imperialist powers against genocide in Kosovo was to be opposed. This has
>divorced serious militant democrats and marxists from what is correct in
>the main thrust of popular response to what the western governments have
>done.
I would say that the left has failed for the very opposite reason. It failed to distance itself from the ideological characterisation of the Serbs as Nazis and the civil war as a one-sided genocide. Consequently it could only react against the consequences of that politicisation of Western imperialism, but not distance itself from the underlying thrust of it.
But Chris should be honest and say, too, why Nato's war has failed. It is not enough to make all shortcomings external or mere contingencies. The slaughter of innocent Serbs, Kosovars, the murder of TV journalists, the destruction of buildings, bridges, hospitals and homes are all a necessary element of the war. Will he embrace these as the real fruits of his politics, or try to pretend that they are mere incidentals?
And what of democracy? Will he say that it is right that the Bosnians should be denied control over their own state? Or will he simply pretend that 'at some future date' the UN will be have tutored them in civilised behaviour?
>
>It has left the agenda in the hands of the imperialist governments instead
>of challenging it. This is the worst failing.
Yes, support for Nato has left the left in the hands of the imperialist governments of Britain and the United States.
>
>A correct line would have started out clearly against national oppression
>of a subject people and then emphasised the need to oppose the
>implementation of this in disproportionate and imperialist ways.
Yes support for the right of the people of Yugoslavia to determine their future free from Nato attack would have been the correct line. -- Jim heartfield