Yugoslavia Info 22; 1/4 Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit The Global Reflexion Foundation will contribute, according to her ability, to inform on the situation in the Balkan and NATO that in the media does not recieve proper attention or is presented in a distorted way. We receive information from different sources, that does not necessary reflect our opinion. If you don't want to receive it, please send us an e-mail. ********************************************************************** Info. nr. 22 - April 22, 1999. 1. YUGOSLAVIA Endangering world peace? 2. CHINA: Stand on Yugoslavia Shows Shift in Foreign Policy 3. NATO at Odds with Itself 4. Greeks see 'hypocrisy' in NATO action 5. McNamara sees Vietnam-like consequences 6. Earth day and Rambouillet 7. Chomsky Replies to Some Queries 8. Nobel Peace Laureates Call for End to War 9. The draft dodger goes to war 10. Serbia Info: Civilian targets hit by NATO missiles 11. NATO's unjust war 12. Earth Day Statement by the Serbian Ministry of theEnvironment 13. Time to face the reality of Kosovo 14. A. Cockburn: To Serbia from Vietnam 15. Clinton Approval Rating Falls 16. Stop the Bombing: A Statement from the Bruderhof Communities 17. Greenpeace cites increased dioxin, PCB levels in northeast Greece 18. NATO general autorizes plans for possible ground troops in Kosovo 19. The United States, Kosovo, and the Price of Building Coalitions *************************************************************** YUGOSLAVIA Endangering world peace? * Since the alleged end of the cold war, global stability has never been so much at risk as it is now, with the current attacks on that Balkan country by the Western powers BY ANTONIO PANEQUE BRIZUELAS (Granma International staff writer) IS the cold war over? Have military tensions on the planet come to an end? Does the present unipolar system imply peace? Are we regressing to earlier times of nuclear risk among the world's major nuclear powers? The response to these and other questions can be found in Yugoslavia. Indeed, the current strikes on that European nation by the principal Western powers, employing state-of-the-art military technology, has turned Yugoslavia into the epicenter of an armed conflict, that is bringing into play not only the destiny of that nation, but also that of Europe and the rest of the world. The dispute, brought about by the interventionist plans of the United States and the other Western powers in the internal conflict in Kosovo, a territory of only 11,000 square kilometers and of little economic interest, and also a province of the Yugoslav republic of Serbia, has already assumed the dimensions of a problem whose origin is known but whose outcome is totally unclear. The news of the start of hostilities, a hot issue for close to a year, was announced after Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's rejected the latest proposals of the Contact Group (United States, France, Britain, Germany, Italy and Russia). These proposals were linked to initial plans to separate Kosovo from the Serb republic and the Yugoslav Federation, involving a foreign presence to "supervise" the dispute. As in similar interventions (Iraq, Haiti and Somalia), the pretext has the same "humanitarian" fa=E7ade, with the United States and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) arguing for an intervention directed at "solving" the inter-ethnic conflicts that arose in Kosovo in the 1980s, between the majority population of ethnic Albanians (90%) and the Serbs, due to the separatist aspirations of the first group, encouraged by their foreign partners. However, in the absence of any logic in terms of economic pretensions, with no whiff of oil, uranium or glittering diamonds and gold, the real intentions of the strikes point to geopolitical and strategic interests - in the classic style of Washington and its followers - to maintain and strengthen U.S. dominion, now unipolar, over the world. In regard to Yugoslavia, independently of its government's right to solve its internal affairs without foreign interference, the whole world is aware that the multinational federation has been breaking up in recent years, with the loss, in a similar manner and for similar motives, of the republics of Slovenia, Bosnia, Croatia and Macedonia. In addition to those premises, which could strengthen national resistance to defend the country's unity, the people of Yugoslavia have a long tradition of struggle. Yugoslavia is a former colony of Austria and Turkey, and in 1878 two of its subsequent republics, Serbia and Montenegro, achieved their independence after a long and bloody armed confrontation. The 1914 assassination in Sarajevo of the heir to the Austro- Hungarian throne served as a pretext to unleash an interventionist attack on Serbia and, with that, World War I. Then, during the second global conflagration, the Yugoslavs victoriously confronted fascist German troops. Through all of this, the Yugoslav people and its armed forces - once the weaklings of the planet - have demonstrated their strength in the face of invasions. The situation during these few weeks of war against Yugoslavia, in which the military alliance has not relented in its undertaking to continue the war, and the Yugoslav government has persisted in its efforts to defend itself at any price, is steadily increasing the threat to world peace and, moreover, to humanity's very existence, among other reasons because of the awesome possibility of the employment of nuclear arms. >From the very first debates on the issue and subsequently during the air strikes, the Russian government has been totally opposed to intervention in Yugoslavia: it has expelled NATO experts from its country, broken off all links with NATO leaders in Brussels and announced the emplacement of nuclear warheads on its borders with Belarus. In recent days Moscow's response has become even clearer. It has sent a fleet of seven warships to the Mediterranean and has announced that additional ships will positioned in the Adriatic, both seas being adjacent to Yugoslavia. While Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeiev announced that it was a fact-finding mission and Washington admitted that it was not a good sign, General Anatoli Kvashnin, chief of staff of the armed forces of the Russian Federation, publicly stated: "If there were a life-and-death decision to be made for Russia, we would utilize all arms at the disposal of the armed forces, including nuclear weapons." According to reports from Moscow, at the same meeting in the Duma (the lower chamber) during which Kvashnin made that announcement, the parliamentary defense commission proposed a strategy envisaging an initial preventive strike by Russia, "if the enemy's conventional forces were stronger" than the Russian ones. To date, the U.S.-NATO operation has been based on rapid and heavy air strikes, in the form of cruise missiles launched from warships in the Mediterranean and the Adriatic, fighter planes leaving from Italian bases and B-52 bombers from British territory. Nevertheless, nobody has dared to go into detail about the remaining phases and when and if land troops will be deployed within Yugoslav territory, technically inevitable in a war of occupation. Indeed, in spite of the huge difference in the two sides' military capacity, military sources - including U.S. ones - have admitted the effectiveness of the Yugoslav army's resistance, which has also destroyed various U.S. aircraft, among them one of that country's F- 117 Stealth bombers. Reactions have varied throughout the world. There have been demonstrations in front of U.S. embassies, which, in the case of Moscow, included automatic gunfire; statements from various governments condemning the strikes, among them Brazil, Cuba, China, the Vatican and even Greece, a NATO member, some of whose leaders fear that a war like those that took place in Viet Nam or Lebanon could develop, if a cease-fire is not achieved in time." JC =A9Copyright GRANMA INTERNATIONAL DIGITAL EDITION. La Havana. Cuba Total or partial reproduction of the articles in this Website is autorized, as long as the source of the copyright is included. ********************************************** CHINA: Stand on Yugoslavia Shows Shift in Foreign Policy Analysis - By Antoaneta Bezlova BEIJING, Apr 21 (IPS) - China's reaction to the crisis in Yugoslavia marks a sea change in its foreign policy, whose basics were once dictated by ideology but these days are shaped by its preoccupation with territorial integrity. In the 1950s, it was Albania that was a 'dear friend' when Chairman Mao Zedong and Albania's communist leader Enver Hoxha were brothers in arms fighting the imperialist West and revisionist Yugoslavia. But these days, Belgrade is the city for whom the Chinese state media is singing songs of praise. Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, largely demonised in other parts of the world, is being described as a folk hero. China's state-sanctioned media imposed a blackout on the issue of ethnic Albanian refugees and the 'ethnic cleansing' of Kosovar Albanians for a whole week after US-led attacks by the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation began nearly a month ago. Instead, Chinese media whipped up support for Milosevic's cause, presenting him as a leader determined resolutely to fight to protect his country's integrity. Many newspapers here compared Milosevic's behaviour to that of late Marshal Josip Tito, who led a guerrilla war against the Nazi occupation. By contrast, the 'Yangcheng Evening News' presented US President Bill Clinton with a short Hitler mustache against a backdrop of fire and destruction. In an outburst of political support for the Serbs, Beijing cinemas have been showing a series of movies called 'Yugoslavian heroes have come back'. Chinese Central Television is showing World War II movies such as 'Protect Sarajevo' and 'The Bridge', about the heroic partisans of Marshal Tito. ''Many young people say that if the war is not ended, they will stop listening to Madonna and stop going to McDonald's and Kentucky Fried Chicken,'' says professor Yang Dazhou, an expert on Yugoslavia with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and translator of two books by Mira Marcovic, communist ideologue and wife of President Milosevic. The sympathy for the Yugoslavian government of Milosevic stands in sharp contrast to the old ideological ties between China and Albania. Young Chinese of the 1990s do not remember that Albania was China's only loyal ally in the mid-1950s -- and that Albanian movies were the only foreign movies shown for more than a decade in the country under the rigid hand of Mao. In those days, the Chinese were singing different songs, like 'Long live Chairman Mao, long live Enver Hoxha, long live the Communist Party, long live Beijing-Tirana'. What united China and Albania in the 1950s was their communist leaders' unwavering adherence to the Stalinist line, their common fight against the imperialist West and resentment of revisionists like Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev and Yugoslav President Tito. The Sino-Albanian friendly relationship became even firmer after the Albanians sponsored a resolution at the United Nations to give China a seat there and its permanent membership in the Security Council. But these ties were to change dramatically after the late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping came to power and started a new, more pragmatic approach to politics. Ideology was buried in favour of a market-oriented economy and fostering new alliances with the West and the rest of the world. Relations with Yugoslavia picked up after Tito made his first and only state visit to China in 1977, marking the normalisation of ties between the two Communist parties. A new peak in bilateral ties was reached when Milosevic visited China in November 1997. He was warmly received by Chinese President Jiang Zemin, who told him that China ''respects the choices of the Yugoslav people, appreciates the nation's independent domestic and foreign policies and admires the indomitable spirit of its people''. The new, post-Mao generation grew up watching Yugoslav war movies, which now are being shown as part of mass political campaign to support the Serbs and condemn NATO. The reason behind Beijing's sympathies for the Serbs is its fear that NATO is assuming a role of the 'world's policeman' with a mandate to intervene anywhere in the world in defense of human rights and democracy, as the group views it. It is not difficult for China to envisage that one day a similar scenario of intervention could be repeated in Taiwan, which Beijing regards as a breakaway province, or in other provinces with brewing ethnic disputes like Xinjiang and Tibet. Already, China's foreign affairs experts describe NATO's attacks as a new form of 'gunboat diplomacy', which was used by the Western powers in the last century to force imperial China to open its markets and cede five treaty ports. Yang, the expert on the Balkans, lays the entire blame for the crisis on the United States and its aspiration to maintain its role of a 'world leader' in the 21st century. ''Those European countries joining the US in the NATO attacks have accepted the US role as world leader wholeheartedly,'' Yang says. Yet for all its vigorous anti-NATO rhetoric and strong public support for Yugoslavia, Beijing has been careful to do nothing to actually help the victims of the Kosovo crisis. China has not offered any humanitarian aid to the Serbs or to the fleeing Kosovar Albanians. This restraint is in flagrant contrast to Beijing's previous record of giving civilian aid to its ideological allies in the Mao Zedong's era. Between 1956 and 1982, China gave 27 billion dollars worth of aid to Albania, North Korea, North Vietnam and Romania. And whatever Beijing's criticism of NATO and the West, the business of ties in furtherance of economic interests continue. Unlike Russian Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov who canceled his visit to the United States just as his plane was about to enter American air space to show disagreement with the NATO bombing, Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji went ahead with his first visit to the United States last week. And while Kosovo had been expected to create further tension in already strained US-China ties, Zhu's visit was generally dominated by much more pragmatic issues like the country's difficult bid to join the World Trade Organisation. ****************************************** http://wwwstratfor.com NATO at Odds with Itself 21 Apr 99 - 0300 GMT Two massive cross-currents are at work within NATO. There is, on one hand, strong antipathy toward waging all-out war against Serbia. Consider that the European Union today was not able to pass a resolution barring the sale of oil to Serbia. The proposal was blocked by Greece and Italy, who justified their position by arguing that a blockade must be preceded by a UN resolution. Underlying the legal niceties was the fact that neither country wants an intensification of the war. Given that Greece and Italy are strategically essential to any ground war because of their port facilities, their unwillingness to simply endorse an oil embargo poses a serious challenge to any ground campaign. Equally negative were statements today by German Bundeswehr chief-of-staff General Hans-Peter von Kirchbach, who said today that NATO has "an option to intensify air operations," but that "there are no plans for other operations. We are convinced that it will not be necessary." On the other hand, the same Greek government that voted against an oil embargo did hint earlier today that its ports would be available for use in a ground war, a substantial softening of its position. The United States and Britain, at the other extreme, are trying to make it appear that a ground war is inevitable. Indeed, there are indications of a build-up of forces in Albania. The arrival of the 82nd Airborne Division=92s advanced guard is= more than a security force for the Apaches that have not yet arrived and the MLRS. They will be joined by other elements of their division, indicating that a build-up of forces for a ground war is already underway. Yet, at the very same time, NATO=92s request for an additional 300 U.S. combat aircraft has not yet been approved, with Pentagon planners saying they are considering the impact of such a large transfer of forces on other areas of the world. As we come into Friday=92s summit of NATO leaders in Washington, the cross-currents are dizzying. Just as pressure dramatically increases on Serbia due to the Greek shift on ports, the EU=92s decision on an oil= embargo undermines that pressure. The creation of a deliberate sense of mystery about the build-up of forces in Albania then encounters a public unwillingness by the United States to commit requested aircraft. Statements from Washington and London that NATO is prepared to do whatever is necessary to solve the crisis is met by German officials saying that a ground attack is not necessary. The problem here is not public relations, but a deep split not only within NATO, but within each individual country over the future course of the war. There is simply no consensus emerging over what is to be done. Without such a consensus, NATO cannot act. Each time a consensus appears to be emerging and pressure on Milosevic builds, the consensus cracks apart and the pressure bleeds off. The current stalemate is less in the war than in NATO itself and even within the U.S. military. Agreement on the next step simply isn=92t emerging. The problem is partly political within countries. But the key problem remains military. The difficulties inherent in the ground option are daunting. The strategic implications of a major air build-up are similarly worrisome. Therefore, each day the world is whipped by conflicting signals. The only constancy in the signal is what the Serbs have clearly heard: NATO has not yet locked in a plan. Therefore Serbia continues to have room for maneuver. ********************************************* http://www.ana.gr Greeks see 'hypocrisy' in NATO action Parliament President Apostolos Kaklamanis on Wednesday said that those who are not familiar with the great tragedy of Hellenism, namely the Turkish occupation of one-third of Cyprus' territory, cannot understand why the Greek people sees much hypocrisy in NATO's intervention in Yugoslavia. He made the statement during an official visit to office in parliament by Norway's Ambassador in Athens, Jan Hegg. Kaklamanis reiterated Greece's position that the rights of all minorities should be protected and in favour of the inviolability of borders. ****************************************** Global Reflexion - Foundation for International Cooperation P.O. Box 59262 - 1040 KG Amsterdam - The Netherlands At: Center for International Cooperation Sloterkade 20 - 1058 HE Amsterdam - The Netherlands Ph. ++ 31 20 615 1122 / Fax: ++ 31 20 615 1120 e-mail: office@globalreflexion.org ================================================================= NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org e-mail: nyt@blythe.org ================================================================= nyteeu-04.25.99-12:10:28-2421