No I don't. As my post of 8th May shows I was quite prudent enough at the time, contrary to the way someone like the nameless moderator of a marxism list wishes to caricature my position.
I had wanted to come back on this very interesting news report anyway. But as for your other questions, I would comment that subscribers from the USA, who naturally dominate this list numerically, for good motives have difficulty in moving beyond a position that is purely oppositional to their own government. At its worst this can be merely cynical.
Unless a revolution is imminent, and we agree Doug, there is not, it is obligatory for progressive people to search for those reforms that are most beneficial, most possible, and most helpful to the larger movement now. That applies to foreign policy too.
So after Srebrenica it is unwise to be so prudent about intervention by the "West" (I mean imperialism headed by US imperialism) that one falls silent about what the Russians are doing in Chechnya. Which most people on this list have. On this issue Camdessus is progressive, and his threats to stop IMF loans to Russia should be supported by the entire "proletariat" of the world. Indeed he and Clinton should be criticised for not doing more, as Chomsky berated them when the Indonesian fascists were driving the population of East Timor out of their towns and villages.
No, Doug, western imperialists must be prudent too. It is a mistaken criticism to attack imperialism as if it was always and only violent. US imperialism, like other systems, is operating at the limits of its capacity. It could not have sent troops into East Timor, without straining its own strength including its links with other countries to the point of instability. It chose not to.
It cannot, it thinks, apply the same medicine to Yeltsin's Russia as it did to Habibie's Indonesia over East Timor, because it regards the alternative to Yeltsin as too unstable and perhaps too left wing. Also it has not got a star wars missile shield to protect itself against a rogue nationalist government in Russia (a roguer government) dusting off the missiles and turning them towards the USA.
In Kosovo now, it has not got the power to grasp the nettle that there is no alternative to Kosovan independence. But also it has not got the power to want to stir up Montenegro to opt for full independence, because NATO would be damaged by another Balkan war at this stage.
No, through imperialist prudence, the Kosovan war will never be repeated in that form.
But the news report on the Chinese Embassy. The really interesting question is who knew what when, and what does this say about US global policy?
It may be that the Chinese Embassy bombing was the secret message behind Wesley Clark's premature departure. No one will speak about this. The US will not admit liability to China, but Clinton will murmur vaguely at a confidential summit meeting, that of course there were controversies within NATO and Wesley Clark left early.
But the more interesting scenario is that Clinton knew beforehand, and being Clinton, had a framework for bluffing it out and finessing the situation. The story as reported alleges that Arkan was using the Chinese Embassy. That sounds like wishful thinking from a junior US official to me. They probably had no more definite proof than that the Chinese were helping the Yugoslav regime with logistical support to its forces in Kosovo.
The bluff that was being called here was the claim by the Chinese that international norms of non-interference in other countries should be observed. The Chinese had a very strong case. Technically they had the right to give military assistance to a sovereign country, which is no different from all sorts of similar assistance given by the US officially or undercover, to regimes in the past. Nevertheless if released publically, it would undermine China's claim to a disinterested morality over Kosovo. It would also escalate publically military conflict between two of the biggest powers in the world.
At some stage and perhaps when the attack was launched, the US must have calculated that China would know that they knew the full story, and that China would not wish to reveal it.
Well Clinton has been able to finesse it. This may be because he has a dialectical policy towards China - what he calls a "both" policy - that China is both a competitor and a potential ally. China is now in the WTO, and due to join the Group of 7 within a year of two.
The overall lesson is that in a crunch situation, the independence of countries is no longer regarded even hypocritically as the highest goal.
Which makes the current imperialist appeasement of Yeltsin in his aggression against the Chechens and the silence of leftists about it, even more debatable.
Doesn't Chomsky demand that the IMF withdraw funds? Why has not the nameless arbiter of Marxism forwarded an interview to this effect?
Chris Burford
London