True, the form of intervention, with high level bombing rather than a ground intervention with mobile helicopter troops seizing key points to paralyse Serb freedom of manoeuvre, maximised the chance of retaliation against the civilian population. The KLA should have known the untrustworthiness of the saviours on whom they were relying.
HOWEVER 1/4 million people displaced already in 1998 is a substantial total, and the politics of Serb war against the independence fighters was quite clear. If necessary the entire population would be made refugees.
>and second, NATO did nothing to stop the Albanian ethnic cleansing that
>followed the bombing campaign.
yes NATO should have placed the responsibility on the KLA to police the peace. However the balance of suffering still looks good to outside observers.
>So on those two counts, NATO's action was a failure -- unless
>pro-interventionists simply enjoyed the spectacle of Serbians getting "theirs."
>
>But perhaps most importantly, how could anyone take seriously the claim
>that NATO was out to stop ethnic cleansing when far worse ethnic
>cleansing took place within NATO? Turkey's murderous policy against the
>Kurds was much, much worse than what Milosevic did to the Kosovars: some
>30,000 villages destroyed, tens of thousands killed, 3 million refugees.
>Where was the left interventionist call to stop this? Indeed, NATO
>wouldn't have to drop a single bomb to curb this violence, assuming the US
>was serious about curbing it. Didn't anyone here find the sight of Turkish
>pilots, fresh from dropping napalm and cluster bombs on Kurdish villages,
>engaged in the NATO bombing of Serbia to be repugnant?
>
>DP
Because a left wing policy that called for respect for the democratic rights of subject populations was exactly the stance that should have best followed through to defense of the Kurds. If the left had not totally opposed NATO intervention but criticised it, then it could have linked the criticism to the need likewise to defend the Kurds.
Chris Burford
London
-------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <../attachments/20010125/730e5a89/attachment.htm>