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Bombing the Baby with the Bathwater
by Veran Matic
Belgrade, Yugoslavia

The air strikes against Yugoslavia were
supposed to stop the Milosevic war
machine.  The ultimate goal is ostensibly
to support the people of Kosovo, as well
as those of Serbia, who are equally victims
of the Milosevic regime.  In fact the bombing
has jeopardised the lives of 10.5 million
people and unleashed an attack on the
fledgling forces of democracy in Kosovo
and Serbia.  It has undermined the work
of reformists in Montenegro and the Serbian
entity of Bosnia-Herzegovina and their
efforts to promote peace.  The bombing of
Yugoslavia demonstrates the political
impotence of US President Bill Clinton and
the Western alliance in averting a human
catastrophe in Kosovo.  The protection of a
population under threat is a noble duty, but it
requires a clear strategy and a coherent end
game.  As the situation unfolds on the ground
and in the air day by day, it is becoming more
apparent that there is no such strategy.

Instead, NATO is fulfilling the prophecy of its
own doomsaying:  each missile that hits the
ground exacerbates the humanitarian disaster
that NATO is supposed to be preventing.  It's
not easy to stop the war machine once its
power has been unleashed.  But I urge the
members of NATO to pause for a moment
and consider the consequences of what they
are doing.  Analysts are already asking whether
the air strikes are still really about saving
Kosovo Albanians.  Just how far are NATO
members prepared to go?  What comes next
after the "military" targets?  What happens if the
war spreads?  All of these terrifying questions
must be answered, although I suspect that few
will want to live with the historical burden of
having answered them.  The same questions
crowded my mind as I sat in a Belgrade prison
on the first day of the NATO attack on my
country.  Whiling away the hours in the cell I
shared with a murder suspect, I asked myself
what the West's aim was for "the morning after".

The image of NATO taking its finger off the
trigger kept coming to mind.  I've seen no
indication so far that there is a clear plan to
follow up the Western military resolve.  My
friends in the West keep asking me why
there is no rebellion.  Where are the people
who poured onto the streets every day for
three months in 1996 to demand democracy
and human rights?  Zoran Zivkovic, the
opposition mayor of the city of Nis answered
that last week:  "Twenty minutes ago my city
was bombed.  The people who live here are
the same people who voted for democracy
in 1996, the same people who protested for
a hundred days after the authorities tried to
deny them their victory in the elections.  They
voted for the same democracy that exists in
Europe and the US.  Today my city was
bombed by the democratic states of the
USA, Britain, France, Germany and Canada!
Is there any sense in this?"  These people
are now compelled to take up arms and join
their sons who are already serving in the
army. With the bombs falling all around them
nobody can persuade them - though some
have tried - that this is only an attack on
their government and not their country.  It
may seem cynical that I am writing this
from the security of my office in Belgrade -
secure, that is, compared to Pristina,
Djakovica, Podujevo and other places in
Kosovo.  But I can't help asking one question:
How can F16s stop people in the street killing
one another?  The free media in Serbia has
for years opposed nationalism, hatred and
war.

As a representative of those media, and as
a man who has more than once faced the
consequences of my political beliefs, I call
on President Bill Clinton to put a stop to
NATO's attack on my country.  I call on him
to begin negotiations which aim at securing
the right to a peaceful life and democracy
for all the people in Yugoslavia, regardless
of their ethnicbackground.

(excerpts)
Veran Matic, Editor in Chief
Radio B92, Belgrade, Yugoslavia
From:   "Radio B92" <www at b92.net>