WSWS : News & Analysis : Europe : The Balkan
Crisis
NATO escalates attack on Yugoslav
sovereignty
By Barry Grey
8 June 1999
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NATO intensified its bombing of Yugoslavia one day after talks
between NATO and Serbian military officials in Macedonia broke off
without an agreement on terms for the withdrawal of Yugoslav forces
from Kosovo.
“You'll see an intensification of the campaign today, tomorrow and in the
future,” said Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon. He said NATO
planes carried out 93 missions Sunday and plans called for doubling or
tripling that number over the next several days.
“We're going back to a full range of targets,” another senior Pentagon
official said, implying new attacks on Belgrade and other major cities
were in the offing.
Most of the strikes over the weekend were concentrated in southwestern
Kosovo near the border with Albania, where NATO is coordinating its
air assault with Kosovo Liberation Army forces fighting Serb troops on
the ground. American B-52s dropped anti-personnel cluster bombs and
missiles aimed at Serb tanks and artillery.
NATO continued to bomb civilian targets, hitting a number of villages in
Kosovo and the district of Gornji Milanovac. One civilian was killed and
another seriously injured in the attacks, according to the Serb news agency.
NATO planes also hit Serb radio and television transmitters.
As has been the case throughout the 11-week war, US and NATO
officials insisted they were not negotiating with the Serbs, but rather
presenting “non-negotiable instructions.” The price for Serb recalcitrance
was more death and destruction.
Later on Monday Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic gave new
assurances to NATO foreign ministers meeting in Bonn that he intended
to comply with the agreement he approved last week, providing for the
withdrawal of all Serb troops and police from Kosovo and the
occupation of the province by a NATO-led military force.
NATO leaders and the Western media are depicting the breakdown in
the talks in Macedonia as a product of Milosevic's penchant for stalling and
deception. In fact the issues raised by the Yugoslav generals are entirely
legitimate, from the standpoint both of protecting their forces during a
retreat from Kosovo, and maintaining what remains of Yugoslav sovereignty.
According to various press reports on the talks, the Yugoslav side
wanted firm guarantees for the safety of its forces. This is reasonable,
under conditions in which NATO has been arming the KLA and the separatist
guerrillas are champing at the bit to occupy the vacuum left by retreating
Serb forces. It is doubly so given NATO's insistence that it has a right to
use force in the event of any Serb violation of an eventual agreement. NATO
would be judge, jury and executioner in overseeing the entire process.
The Yugoslavs also argued they would need more than the seven days
allotted by NATO to remove some 40,000 troops, tanks and artillery
from the province. They cited the difficulties created by the destructive
impact of the NATO air assault on roads, bridges and rail lines, as well as
a shortage of oil caused by NATO attacks on Serb oil facilities. They
proposed a 15-day pullback period.
Another point of contention was the provision, mentioned in the
agreement accepted by Milosevic but not elaborated on, requiring
Yugoslav forces to pull back beyond a buffer zone within Serbia and
Montenegro that would separate the Yugoslav military from Kosovo.
The size of this buffer zone was not spelled out, nor was any limit
indicated for its duration.
This provision is, on its face, a violation of Yugoslav sovereignty and
opens up the possibility for NATO to impose a “no-go” area within
Yugoslavia similar to the “no-fly” zones the allies have imposed on Iraq.
The Serb generals, however, did not reject the provision. They merely argued
for a buffer zone of three miles, instead of the fifteen miles demanded by
NATO.
A further indication of NATO's attitude toward Yugoslav sovereignty,
which is formally acknowledged in the agreement accepted last week by
Belgrade, came when Lieut. Gen. Sir Michael Jackson, representing the
NATO military leadership, instructed his Yugoslav counterparts that they
were to withdraw all of their troops to Serbia, and would not be
permitted to transfer any portion to Montenegro, the other constituent
republic of Yugoslavia.
The Yugoslavs apparently balked at attempts to force them to accept the NATO
military's outline for the US-European occupation of Kosovo that is to
follow the Serb withdrawal. They insisted, citing the text of last week's
agreement, that such provisions fell within the purview of the United
Nations Security Council, which is nominally to have overall authority over
Kosovo.
Both Belgrade and Moscow want to delay the withdrawal of Serb forces
until after the passage of a UN Security Council resolution on Kosovo,
thereby underscoring the legal authority of the UN, as opposed to
NATO. The US and Britain, on the other hand, want to begin moving
NATO forces into Kosovo with or without—and preferably in advance
of—a UN resolution, thereby underscoring the de facto supremacy of
NATO in the Kosovan protectorate that is to be established.
According to some reports, the Yugoslav military leaders also objected
to the demand for the total withdrawal of their forces from Kosovo,
suggesting they be allowed to retain some 15,000 troops. This apparently
took NATO by surprise and suggested differences between Milosevic and his
military commanders. On Monday White House press secretary Joe Lockhart,
responding to a reporter's question, denied there were any indications
Milosevic was not in control of the generals representing Yugoslavia at the
pullout talks.
Meanwhile on Monday, the foreign ministers of the G-7 countries and
Russia, meeting in Bonn, were unable to agree on a resolution to bring
before the UN Security Council because of differences raised by Russian
Foreign Minister Ivanov. However Russian President Yeltsin assured Bill
Clinton that Moscow would not block a UN resolution to provide a legal cover
for the US-NATO occupation of Kosovo.
See Also:
UN relief agencies warn of humanitarian disaster
in Yugoslavia
[5 June 1999]
Why is NATO at war with Yugoslavia? World power,
oil and gold
Statement of the Editorial Board of the World
Socialist Web Site
[24 May 1999]
The Milosevic indictment: a mass of contradictions
[4 June 1999]
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