The Kosovo Debacle Is the Logical Result of an Interventionist
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
Roots of Allied Farce n the morning of macy should be judged by March 29, 1999, what it prevents, not only by the sixth day of what it initiates and cre- NATO’s bombing ates.. .Much of it is a holding campaign against action designed to avoid the Serbs, Ameri- explosion until the unifying can diplomats forces of history take human- throughout the Office of the ity into their embrace.” High0 Representative (OHR) Hutson is a Balkan expert. in Bosnia-Herzegovina Fluent in Russian and Serb@ received an unusual message Croatian, over the course of from their colleague in Tuzla. a three-decade long foreign It was Foreign Service officer service career Hutson spe- Thomas R. Hutson’s last offi- cialized in the Soviet Union ’ cial e-mail to his associates. and its Slavic satellite. His Hutson’s message was a first Balkan posting was to bombshell. He was openly Belgrade in the heyday of attacking Clinton’s Kosovo Marshall Tito’s Yugoslavia. policy. Over time, he has lived a total “My personal reasons for of eight years in the region. retiring now have only been Hutson was in the Balka- strengthened by the ill-con- ns when Bosnia and Croa- ceived decision of NATO to The Kosovo debacle is the logical tia, with dominant ethnic bomb the Serbs,” Hutson U mi nor i ty populations , wrote. “Tliis decision has uni- exploded into a savage war fied the Serbs as no other result of an interventionist doctrine of secession from predomi- event I have witnessed in my nantly-Serbian Yugoslavia. observation of the area for He returned to the Balka- nearly three decades.” that rose alongside Bill Clinton. ns after the Dayton peace U “As for its impact on accords were signed by the Bosnia and Herzegovina,”v he Western powers and lead- warned, “I fear that it has driven a stake into the heart of the ers of former Yugoslavia in December 199;. Dayton accords.” Hutson’s first digs in Tuzla were dismal; he and his staff of His e-mail closed with a quote from Abba Eban: “Diplo- three were housed in an old salt factory. Yet under his ener- .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. .. getic leadership the OHR mission grew to almost thirty peo- JOHN B. ROBERTS11 is a writer and television producer. ple. They moved into a building renovated by a local soccer The American Spectator . June I 9 99 LICENSED TO UNZ.ORG 35 ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED star who had prospered in Turkey (according to rumor, as a leading advocates of a new and radical use of military interven- gun-running war profiteer). tion around the globe. In the early nineties, when Clinton was From his office, Hutson could see a nearby square, the site of still governor of Arkansas, they formed part of a small foreign a May 1995 artillery attack that killed 71 people. It was a reminder policy elite convened by the Carnegie Endowment for Interna- of the stakes of war in the Balkans. So were the difficulties he tional Peace to change U.S. foreign policy after the Cold War. encountered in trying to resettle people displaced by the war. Reports signed by all three recommended a dramatic escalation Although protected by military forces from countries, includ- of the use of military force to settle other countries’ domestic ing the Russians and the U.S. 1st Cavalry Division, villagers were conflicts. Ironically, an institution dedicated to “International extremely hesitant to go home. Serbs, victims of savage ethnic Peace” set the stage for Clinton’s interventionist policies in Soma- cleansing in Krajina, feared their Bosnian Muslim and Croat lia, Haiti, Bosnia, and KOSOVO,triggering the most widespread neighbors, who in turn feared one another and the Serbs. deployment of U.S. troops since the Second World War. Hutson foretold the current conflict in the fall of 1997, when I Ambassador Milton Abramowitz, former assistant secretary of asked him to identify unresolved Balkan hot spots. “Although it is state for intelligence and research, was president of the Carnegie not yet in the center of the screen,” he wrote me in reply from Sara- Endowment between 1991 and 1997. During his tenure he estab jevo, “the dilemma over Kosovo (the U.S. commitment to its being lished blue-ribbon commissions of policy experts to create a new part of Serbia vs. aspirations of the 90 percent Kosovar Albanian U.S. foreign policy framework. majority for independence or union with Albania). It could also spill In February 1992 I was asked to design a publicity campaign over into Macedonia, with inevitable consequences for Serbia to gain public support for the commission’s recommendations. and the rest of the Balkans.” I was invited to attend closeddoor com- Hutson tried first to shape policy mission meetings, and later I met with from the inside. During a briefing on Abramowitz, who made clear he want- resettlement of Bosnian war refugees, ed the commission’s views to play a Hutson alerted NATO Supreme Com- part in the upcoming presidential elec- mander Wesley Clark to the difficul- tions. Some commissioners had been ties of dealing with the Serbs. Using a appointed to brief Democratic presi- Turkish word, inat, to describe the Serb dential candidates. The release of the temperament, Hutson told Clark the final report was to coincide with the Serbs could not be bombed into sub Democratic National Convention. mission. hat,Hutson says, means irra- I didn’t know it at the time, but these tional. The Serbs’ attachment to Koso- meetings were my introduction to vo as a symbol of national inde- Clinton’s Cabinet-in-waiting. During pendence is like a Texan’s view of the the spring and summer of 1992, Alamo. NATO would not easily force Madeleine Albright, Henry Cisneros, the Serbs to allow Kosovo to secede John Deutch, Richard Holbrooke, from Yugoslavia and join with Albania, Alice Rivlin, David Gergen, Admiral the goal of the Kosovar liberation William Crowe, and numerous lesser movement since the early nineties. luminaries who would nonetheless get sub-cabinet appoint- At his initiative, Hutson met separately with White House ments debated defense and foreign policy for hours. Richard aide Leon Fuerth, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, and pres- Perle and James Schlesinger were the token conservatives. I lis- idential envoy Richard Holbrooke to urge U.S. support for rein- tened intently, offering opinions only when asked. stating exiled Crown Prince Alexander Karadjordjevic as a creative Shortly before I began attending the commission’s meetings, solution to the search for a successor to Milosevic. (There was a Bosnians voted in a referendum for independence from precedent for U.S. meddling in Yugoslavia’s royal affairs. In 1941, Yugoslavia. All-out war erupted in Sarajevo one week later. So the U.S. military attach6 Louis J. Fortier plotted with General Simovic, Balkans were a hot topic of commission discussions. Richard head of Yugoslavia’s air force, to depose a pro-Axis King and Holbrooke, who three years later became Clinton’s architect of replace him with his pro-U.S. brother. This palace coup set the the Dayton peace accords, argued passionately for American stage for the Yugoslavs’ fierce resistance to German troops. ) military intervention there. Hutson’s advice, drawn from years of field experience, was Bosnia was then the most critical trouble spot in the region, brushed aside. So at 10:28 in the morning of March 29, 1999, but hardly the only one. On April 28,1992, Albanian president Sali Hutson dispatched his e-mail dissent with a simple “send” com- Berisha welcomed visiting Kosovar leader Bujar Bukoshi to mand. He didn’t wait around to read the replies. Tirana with fateful words. “We must demand,” he said, “the right for self-determination of the Albanians in ex-Yugoslavia.” hen he met with Albright, Holbrooke, and Fuerth in Albania knew the.Kosovars’ ultimate goals. In a series of New 1995 Hutson may have thought they were simply unin- York Times interviews in 1992, Kosovar political leaders said they Wterested in his political solution to preserve the Yugoslav planned autonomy or independence as intemiediate steps. Some Federation and prevent war. He didn’t realize the three were of the Kosovars said there was no point negotiating with Serbs. 36 LICENSED TO UNZ.ORG June I 999 . The American Spectator ELECTRONIC REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED Due to higher birthrates, they said they were now Kosovo’s eth- States, but to impose highly subjective political settlements on nic majority. They alone would control Kosovo’s future. They other countries. It discarded national sovereignty in favor of inter- planned to secede from Yugoslavia and join Albania. national intervention. I began to regret my efforts to build pub- licity for the report. y mid-summer, the Camegie Endowment’s final report was The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace was gird- ready. “Changing Our Ways: America’s Role in the New ing for war. All it needed was a president eager to do battle. BWorld” was a dramatic departure from the bipartisan for- Shortly after the report’s release, presidential candidate Bill eign policy consensus of the Cold War period. Richard Perle Clinton took up the Carnegie Endowment’s cudgel. In a July 25, and James Schlesinger resigned rather than endorse the report’s 1992 speech he said Milosevic needed to be brought to justice for conclusions. his “crimes against humanity” and criticized George Bush’s lack The report urged “a new principle of international relations: the of “real leadership.” By August io, Clinton advocated the use of destruction or displacement ofgroups of people within states can military force against the Serbs.