[PEN-L:4658] Re: Moral Blindness of Serb "liberals"

[Wojtek Sokolowski <sokol@xxxxxxx>]

At 11:41 PM 3/29/99 +0100, Chris Burford wrote:
>
>Similar argument to that of the racist white South Africans, who would
>visit Britain. When you protested the treatment of the black majority, they
>would say, have you ever been to South Africa?
>
>Wojtek's question is similarly disingenuous. He knows that civil society
>has been crushed in Yugoslavia. He knows B92 independent radio station has
>gone off the air.

--snip ---

Goebbels is credited with saying that a thousand words is more effective
than a thousand guns.  Although he got it mixed up, he should have said
that a thousand words is more effective when backed by a thousand guns, he
correctly saw propaganda as in important instrument of war.

It is truly amazing to see how otherwise intelligent and critical people
shed their crtical thinking and jump on the bandwagon as soon as shots are
being fired and bombs are being dropped -- even though the official casus
belli behind the Yugoslav adventure raises more doubts that brings assurances.

We are told of attrocities committed by the military and paramilitary
forces as the reason of the NATO invasion.  Cognizant of the attrocities
committed in South Africa, Chile, El Salvador, Indonesia, etc.  the
bleeding hearts start pounding and say "yeah, bomb them" while failing to
listen to reason.

A moment of critical reflection reveals that there is a fundamental
difference between South Africas and El Salvadors on the one hand and
Yugoslavia on the other.  The stories of attrocities in the foremer were
told by independent international human rights organizations that had no
stakes in the ongoing conflicts, while the latter are blasted by the
propaganda machine of governments and armies that _are the combatants_.

Wars are nasty business, and I have no doubts that innocent people are
being killed in Kosovo.  That is truly reprehensible and no sane person
will condone it.  But before we blame anyone for these death, determining
the circumstances under which those deaths occurred can make quite a big
difference.  And there is plenty of reasonable doubt that raise serious
questions about the official casus belli of the Kosovo invasion.  Here are
some of them.

1. We do not know what share of the civilian loss of life is "collateral
damage" of the guerilla war (by NATO military's own admission, a
"legitmate" form of killing civilians), what share is a provocation staged
to outrage foreign public opinion, and what share results from deliberate
pacification campaigns.

2. There have been reports in the European press that some of the massacres
(cf. Racak) were in fact, deaths directly resulting from a combat between
guerillas and the government forces (i.e. the combatants themselves being
killed) or collateral damage resulting from that combat.  Such reports are
not a proof, but they at least raise a reasonable doubt about the official
story.

3. There have been reports of the combatants in the Yugoslav conflict
staging spectatcular attacks against their own population (especially the
Muslims) to outrage the international public opinion and draw foreign
powers to the war on their side.

Such provocations are nothing unusual in the history of modern war - the
Nazis first torched the Reichstag and blamed that on Communists to justify
their assault on democratic institutions of Weimar Germany, and later
staged attacks against German population in Poland as well as an assault on
a radio station in Gleiwitz to fabricate their causus belli againts Poland
and start 2nd World War.  American staged an attack on their own navy
vessel in the Tonkin Gulf to justfy their escalation of Vietnam war, etc.
etc.

Again, these are not proofs that all the civilian death toll in Yugoslavia
is all but fabrication, but they raise reasonable suspcion that at least
some of them might be.

3.  Even if some of the civilian casualties are the victims of deliberate
killings, it is important to know the precise circumstances under those
deaths occurred.

No one in his right mind called for the bombing of Washington, DC for the
My Lai massacre even though it was known from beginning that it was
committed by the US military forces.  In Yugoslavia, we do not even know
who the killers are and what is their motivation.  Are they regular units
executing orders?  If so, whose orders?  Or are they armed mobs or
"militias" acting on their own?  And if so, for what ends?  political
gains? Revenge? Robbery?

That raises enough reasonable doubt to refrain from blaming the Yugoslav
government for the supposed "ethnic cleansing" - at least until some
convincing evidence is produced.

4. Furthermore, the NATO propaganda machine claims that military action is
necessary because negotiations failed, since the Belgrade regime broke its
promises.  Yet a moment of critical reflection reveals the absurdity of
this claim.

No state in the world will ever negotiate its own dissolution or
dismemberment.  The independence of Ulster, the Palestinian state within
Israel, the separation of the Basque region from Spain, or the separation
of the Native Americans from the US (which under the US law are considered
separate nations) are NOT negotiable issues. Period.

So the fact that the Yugoslav government agreed to even negotiate the
Kosovo issue shows that it is much more flexible on the issue of sepratism
taht the governments of the UK, Israel, Spain, or the US.  (the same, BTW,
can be said of x-USSR).  But the NATO propaganda machine twists that around
and blames them for not being flexible enough. That is absurd.

5. Finally, how is the campaign of terror bombing supposed to achieve its
stated objective of stopping the violence.  There is not single shred of
evidence that aerial bombardment has even achieved that, but plenty of
evidence that armed conflicts lead to an increase in civilian violence.

Again, these are reasonable doubts that that any critically thinking person
should have regarding this conflict.  Doubts are not exonerations - they
simply tell that the government is yet to make its case against the
Yugoslav government as weall as the case for its proposed solution of the
problem.  The propaganda blitz waged by the NATO with the help of the
mainstream media has provided neither.  In fact, NATO is acting as the
prosecutor, the judge, and the executioner on issues that are to the
international tribunals to decide.

regards,

Wojtek