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Articles : Human RightsRest Easy, Bill Clinton: Milosevic Can't Talk Anymore
Slobodan Milosevic is characterized in the obituaries as the “Butcher of the Balkans.” If that is the story you want to read about, please go to almost any other media outlet and read it again and again. Some are now suggesting that death is Milosevic’s final revenge, that he “ended up cheating history” by dying before judgment was passed. But the world has already passed judgment on Milosevic and what is being cheated by his death is history itself.
What the corporate media overwhelmingly ignores in Milosevic’s death is what they ignored in his life as well—his intimate knowledge of U.S. war crimes in Yugoslavia. While Milosevic was undoubtedly a war criminal who deserved to be tried for his crimes, he was also the only man in the unique position of being able to expose and detail the full extent of the U.S. role in the bloody disintegration of Yugoslavia in the 1990s. In fact, that is precisely what he was fighting to do at his war crimes trial when he died.
Because of the rule of victors’ justice in the ad hoc tribunal system (a poor and unfair substitute for a true international court), Milosevic’s case would have been the only international trial to potentially expose the details of the illegal, U.S.-led NATO bombing of Yugoslavia for 78 days in 1999. While the U.S.-backed court consistently tried to limit Milosevic’s right to speak, stripping him of his right to self-representation, Milosevic battled regularly to raise U.S. war crimes. Sadly, with Milosevic will likely die the last hope the victims of these crimes in Yugoslavia had of getting their day (if it could even be called that) in court—a tragic and unjust reality to begin with—that speaks volumes about the twisted state of international justice.
Milosevic’s cause, regardless of what one thinks of it, was a casualty of 9/11—an event that relegated him and his trial to the annals of history before it was even over. Most people in the world – with the exception of those in the Balkans where the proceedings were broadcast live, daily – probably didn’t even know Milosevic was still on trial in the Hague. It became an obscure sideshow to the blood and gore unfolding constantly on the international stage.
Milosevic’s death means that those who bombed Yugoslavia for 78 days beginning 7 years ago this month, killing thousands, will be, once and for all protected from any public scrutiny for their crimes. However opportunistic Milosevic may have been, he would have been one of the few people to appear at the Hague that could have—and would have—laid out these crimes in great detail. Now, there is almost certain to be no condemnation of the U.S. bombing of Radio Television Serbia, killing 16 media workers, the cluster bombing of the Nis marketplace, shredding human beings into meat, the use of depleted uranium munitions and the targeting of petrochemical plants causing toxic and chemical waste to pour into the Danube River. There will be no condemnation of the bombing of Albanian refugees by the U.S. or the deliberate targeting of a civilian passenger train or the bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. Milosevic also would have discussed how the U.S. supports a regime in Kosovo that has systematically expelled Serbs, Romas and other ethnic minorities from their homes and burnt down scores of churches. He would have discussed the role of the US in funding and arming the Kosovo Liberation Army, which operates like a death squad and how the new prime minister of Kosovo, Agim Ceku, is a US-trained war criminal who gained infamy in both the Bosnian war and the 1999 Kosovo conflict. And Milosevic would have talked of the U.S. interference in the Yugoslav elections in 2000 and the ultimate neoliberal takeover that was the aim of Clinton’s sanctions and 78 days of bombing. In reality, it would have fallen on deaf ears, but it would have been stated for the record.
It is ironic that Milosevic’s last legal battle was an attempt to compel his old friend turned nemesis Bill Clinton to testify at his trial. If successful, Milosevic would have grilled the man who was U.S. president through the entire Yugoslav war in what would have been a fiery direct examination. Clinton and Milosevic were once pals who talked collective strategy in the 1990s. Milosevic had many damning stories to tell and, without a doubt, uncomfortable questions to ask Clinton. The judges in Milosevic’s case clearly worked to keep those moments from ever happening and the U.S. government made clear its forceful opposition to such subpoenas of U.S. officials, even considering invading a country that would put a U.S. official on trial. With or without Clinton, Milosevic’s defense would have brought to light some serious documentation of U.S. war crimes and he died, muzzled, before he really got started.
Little attention, therefore, has been paid to Milosevic’s long-term efforts – which predated 9/11, the 1999 NATO bombing and his own trial – to expose the presence of al Qaeda in the Balkans—from Bosnia to Kosovo. With 9/11, Milosevic’s talk of al Qaeda was easily dismissed as laughable, pathetic opportunism. But those who followed Milosevic’s career and more importantly the events of the 1990s in Yugoslavia know it was none of those. Those allegations were based on true events the U.S. does not want discussed in an international court. Following the defeat of the Soviets in Afghanistan in the 1980s, many Mujahadeen eventually turned their sights on Yugoslavia where they went to fight alongside the Bosnian Muslims against the Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats. Once again, the U.S. and bin Laden were on the same team. To this day there are reports of training camps in Bosnia, which remains under occupation. It is also a likely training ground for future blowback.
In his opening statement, Milosevic alluded to some of the information he would introduce during his defense. “In 1998 when [Clinton envoy Richard] Holbrooke visited us in Belgrade, we told him the information we had at our disposal, that in Northern Albania the KLA is being aided by Osama bin Laden, that he was arming, training, and preparing the members of this terrorist organisation in Albania. However, they decided to cooperate with the KLA and indirectly, therefore, with bin Laden, although before that he had bombed the embassies in Kenya and Tanzania [and] had already declared war.” Milosevic concluded that “one day all this will have to come to light, these links.”
That, however, is unlikely and more so now that Milosevic is dead.
To be sure, there will never be indictments of these U.S. war criminals at the Hague: Bill Clinton, Madeline Albright, Jamie Rubin, William Cohen, Sandy Berger, Richard Holbrooke and Wesley Clark. For many of Serbia’s victims of U.S. war crimes, Milosevic’s trial was a “Hail Mary” pass, as awful of an historical irony as that is, aimed at someone recognizing their forgotten suffering.
It is a sad testimony to the state of international jurisprudence that after many attempts to find justice, the only hope for U.S. victims in the Yugoslavia wars was the trial defense of a man many of those same victims despised. If there was an independent international court that was recognized and respected by the US, those responsible for bombing Yugoslavia would have been alongside Slobodan Milosevic in the docks these past years instead of having their responsibility being buried with him.
Jeremy Scahill is an independent journalist who spent extensive time reporting from Yugoslavia, including covering the 1999 US-led NATO bombing from the ground. The night Milosevic was arrested in Belgrade, Scahill was beaten by the former president’s supporters outside Milosevic’s residence. He has also reported from Milosevic’s trial in the Hague. Scahill is currently a Puffin Writing Fellow at The Nation Institute. He can be reached at jeremy(at)democracynow.org
Posted by anthony
Anthony Lappé is GNN's Executive Editor. He's written for The New York Times, Details, New York, Paper, The Fader and Vice, among many others. He has worked as a producer for MTV and Fuse. He is the co-author of GNN's True Lies and the producer of their Iraq doc,...
Yeah I’m sure Clinton would have willingly subjected himself to a warcrimes tribunal..you can’t love justice and love America at the same time
“those responsible for bombing Yugoslavia would have been alongside Slobodan Milosevic in the docks these past years instead of having their responsibility being buried with him.”
if this guy is truly dumb enough to compare Clinton/Wesley Clark to someone like Milosevic, he’s truly a ‘tard.
PS the Serbs were previously warned that media outlets that were serving as propaganda could be targeted.
I’m 100 % sure that a credible investigation by credible people into the background of the Balkans wars would uncover butchery by people who weren’t Serbs, as well. Former Croatian President Franjo Tudjman was named as co-offender in the massacre of Krajina Serbs.
Why were the Serbians singled out? To my knowledge they did have the sole remaining Socialist government in Eastern Europe at the time – not a tolerable situation in Western circles!
if this guy is truly dumb enough to compare Clinton/Wesley Clark to someone like Milosevic, he’s truly a ‘tard.
Well here’s someone who knows little to nothing about Clinton/Wesley Clark then. Under Bill Clinton, Iraq suffered from a sanctions regime which was unilaterally upheld by the U.S. which had, as its consequence, the death of over 500 000 Iraqi children. This figure is supported from both Hans Van Sponeck and Dennis Halliday, each men assigned with the responsibility of running the program, both of which resigned in protest of its “genocidal impact” Clinton and Halliday fully supported the Turks in their ethnic cleansing campaign against their native Kurd populations, with over 1 000 000 people displaced and hundreds of thousands killed. Both of those events dwarfed the civil war which was taking place in Kosovo, in which approximately 10 000 people had died. Doesn’t excuse Milosevic for doing what he did, but the real monsters are the ones we produce at home. You’d be wise to look into it and not stay blind to the truth. US foreign policy has been the bloodiest, and most terrorizing of that of ANY state since WWII.
Ok, I’ll play devil’s advocate. If he was in a position to blow the cover off the truth, why didn’t he? Don’t get me wrong- Clinton did preside over many American war crimes. That’s not in question. But the assassination theory to keep him quiet doesn’t hold much logical water. If we wanted him dead so he couldn’t talk, wouldn’t we have capped him during capture, or arranged a headhunter strike? Or maybe killed him before his trial even started? Why keep him in jail for (what’s it now? something like 8 years?) all that time and then kill him? Why wouldn’t he have sung like a canary in jail?
Also, just a thought, since we’re going on the cui bono line of reasoning…it seems to me that Milosevich himself stands to benefit from his death. Instead of dying a broken, fucked old man, convicted of war crimes and his name dragged through the muck, he becomes the victim of a sinister conspiracy, and dies a hero of Serb nationalists. No conviction, no ignominous incarceration- just a sudden death and enough rumors to discredit his enemies and buoy his supporters.
I’m not saying any of this is right. I’m just saying that the situation is not nearly so cut and dried as any of us imagine. There are a lot of plausible stories that could be ginned up.
you can’t love justice and love America at the same time
I do… so nyahh. I don’t love where America has been the last couple decades – but I do love the concept behind it all; that constitution thing.
if this guy is truly dumb enough to compare Clinton/Wesley Clark to someone like Milosevic, he’s truly a ‘tard.
I don’t know: he’s been producing at Democracy Now! for years and getting published all over the place. What have you done lately? Do you have any facts to support your claim?
PS the Serbs were previously warned that media outlets that were serving as propaganda could be targeted.
So are you saying that you support the “friendly-fire” Al Jazeera bombings? Did this guy have it coming? Rummy kep calling them propaganda – so they had it coming?
“Under Bill Clinton, Iraq suffered from a sanctions regime which was unilaterally upheld by the U.S. which had, as its consequence, the death of over 500 000 Iraqi children. “
here’s someone who doesn’t know what they’re talking about. The figure you’re throwing out is notorious, with people claiming that the sanctions killed 500000 people, 500000 civilians, or 1000000 people w/ 5000000 children.
http://www.reason.com/0203/fe.mw.the.shtml
“I don’t know: he’s been producing at Democracy Now! for years and getting published all over the place. What have you done lately? Do you have any facts to support your claim?”
Wow, that’s really strong support. Bill O’Reilly gets published/shown all over the place.
“So are you saying that you support the “friendly-fire” Al Jazeera bombings? Did this guy have it coming? Rummy kep calling them propaganda – so they had it coming? “
How on earth did you infer that? I merely pointed out that according to the Hague’s investigation and trial, NATO warned media outlets that were serbian could be bombed if they were broadcasting propaganda. I didn’t say that I supported this. I merely said that the Serbians were warned. I like the fact that you suddenly infer that I support the US bombing Al Jazeera in another war based on me reporting a fact about the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. Idiot.
“Opponents of Miloševi© inside Serbia charged that the managers of the state TV station had been forewarned of the attack but ordered staff to remain inside the building despite an air raid alert.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosovo_War#endnote_Erlanger
“Why were the Serbians singled out? To my knowledge they did have the sole remaining Socialist government in Eastern Europe at the time – not a tolerable situation in Western circles!”
I’m sure the hundreds of thousands of Albanian refugees would be very glad that you think that they weren’t worth saving.
I’m interested in hearing what you commenters that keeping pointing out war crimes from the US and NATO think should have happened while Milosevic was carrying out his campaign.
Wow, that’s really strong support. Bill O’Reilly gets published/shown all over the place.
You’re avoiding my question: what have you done lately? Why do you think you are more qualified? Do you have any facts to support your claim? Aside from that, can you honestly compare the O’Reilly factor with Democracy Now?
How on earth did you infer that?
I’m just fucking with ya… I use the Al Jazeera bombing to demonstrate the weakness of your “PS: they were warned” comment. How is your “they were warned” comment applicable other than as a justification of the bombing?
One man’s news = another man’s propaganda, or something. Rummy has been saying that Propaganda outlets (LIKE AL-J specifically) should be considered legit targets. Lo and behold; Al-J got bombed. If I were to say, Al-J was warned, I would sound like a douchebag, no? Hence, the AL-J analogy.
Idiot
At least I know how to use textile
“But the assassination theory to keep him quiet doesn’t hold much logical water. If we wanted him dead so he couldn’t talk, wouldn’t we have capped him during capture, or arranged a headhunter strike? Or maybe killed him before his trial even started?”
It’s the last veneer and dying gasp of democratic principles Snark. It’s like a sideshow to the main event to demonstrate that “we” aren’t barbarians like “they” are. Saddam killed thousands of people in Iraq. The USUK axis killed thousands of people in Iraq. It’s the skin of the teeth line of separation to let us have the pretty fantasy that we live in any kind of benevolent civilisation to say “but we put Saddam / Milosovic [insert Goldstein character] on trial”. Saddam’s sons were killed outright in a firefight – with no prospect of them being put on trial anyway. If the USUK axis was at all consistent, standing orders would have been to execute Saddam on sight.
We’re talking about irrational psychopaths here Snark, (“our” and “their” fearless “leaders”), why should we expect anything they do or say to “hold logical water”?
The assumption that the people who’s motivations and actions we are exploring are rational has caused much pain for political scientists, activists and anyone else who gives the slightest shit. In investigating these, and related, topics I consistently encounter huge explanatory gaps that are like vacuums.
In these (very frequent) cases I have the choice of filling it with speculative conspiracy theory, or fundamentally disturbed psychological pathologies on the parts of some or all of the actors involved. When I have at least some credible evidence I might err on the side of a rationalised conspiracy theory (‘rationalised’ in that it explains actors decisions, motivations and actions within the framework of their being rational). Without that all I have is pathology as an explanation or extreme conspiracy theory with no evidence. In that case I err on the side of pathology.A classic example of what I’m talking about is the Valerie Plame case. That’s just one big vacuum of nonsensical facts without (and these are just two examples), supposing an international conspiracy of some sort (designed to purposefully undermine US intelligence efforts – to what end, well pick your target…..) or dangerous pathology on the part of involved actors (i.e. a simple revenge attack on Wilson for undermining the war propaganda). IMHO it’s a nasty mixture of both and it makes my head spin.
It’s always important to note the element of irrationality and pathological behaviour in these discussions – if we dismiss these elements, there will always be something lacking in our own analysis, especially if we disagree with eachother.
Assume for example, both you and I are rational actors trying to explain event X in rational terms. We each have a different perspective and apply different conceptual tools to our arguments. Nevertheless our discussion proceeds on rational terms, with the assumption of a rational conclusion (even if that rational conclusion is just to acknowledge valid elements of eachother’s position and reach a kind of synthesis of our views).
Doing this, we will – pointlessly – wear eachother out with argument, counter argument and so forth. There’s almost a math at work here: rational actor + rational actor seek rational explanation about X. The irrational factor(s) in X are not susceptible to our rational analysis and conclusion seeking, so therefore, our analysis misses out irrational element Y. Does this make sense? If you understand what I’m getting at you might be able to articulate it better….
The assumption that the people who’s motivations and actions we are exploring are rational has caused much pain for political scientists, activists and anyone else who gives the slightest shit.
Oh, word, totally. My point was more that there are any number of rational- and irrational- explanations for what happened in a mysterious event like this; if we’re gonna sling hypotheses around, I just wanted to turn over a few more rocks that might not have been otherwise. And I do appreciate the cynicism of assuming that they’re all just insane fuckheads anyway- in fact, that attitude seems eminently….rational. If bleak. But what the fuck.
Bombing is not a war crime, never was, and never will be. I understand why far leftists get confused, the US is their enemy, and while the US stopped the potential genocide against Kosovar Albanians by Milosovic led Yugoslavia, the left never misses an opportunity to try and spin an anti-American story when an opportunity arises, however, bombing is not a war crime.
Secondly, the US could not be held responsible for war crimes anyways, since the US is the leader of freedom’s army. Any civilians killed by US action is considered an accident by definition. Third world dictators and their henchmen are potential war crimes candidates, since they are not on a high moral plane like the Americans. They are usually facsists out to spread their ethnic groups domain by killing others. Hence Milosovic.
Interesting article, Anthony. Thanks.
Snark,
Milo wasn’t capped after he surrendered years ago because the Eurocrats truly believed he could be successfully prosecuted, by the book. The trial of Milo would serve as an example of high justice — that NATO was righteous and impartial, and Yugoslavia is better now that it’s globalized into Europe.
But problems seem to appear. The perfect trial suddenly didn’t look so perfect. Milosevic is a smart man, regardless of being bad or not. If this trial was going to somewhat fair, then he had every right to explain he was fighting terrorists in Kosovo (there is no solid proof of genocide). As it turned out, those terrorists were the KLA and Al Qaeda.
Both of these baddies are armed “drug proxies”, trained and coordinated by the USGov (DIA) and Britain (MI6). Drug proxies have a historical habit of working for DC and London, often in relation to conflicts involving oil and greater business/monetary issues leading to globalization.
The KLA Albanian gangs are now the biggest drugdealers in Europe, while the biggest US base in the world — Camp Bondsteel — straddles a huge oil pipeline that goes right through Kosovo. Constructed by Halliburton, of course. The oil moves from the Caspian Area, through the Black Sea, to the Balkans, bypassing Russia and the geostrategic chokehold of the Dardanelles near Turkey. Once the oil moves through Kosovo, it goes to an Adriatic port, to be marketed to Western Europe.
It’s a project not unlike the BTC pipeline, which moves Caspian oil through the Caucasus and Turkey to the port of Ceyhan in south-east Turkey.
Mass debators.
Get a f’n life. Stop pretending to know about sht that you really have no idea about.
Hey, piss off, noob.
“.... I understand why far leftists get confused, the US is their enemy,....”
pretty much, but add to that any oppressor (including the financial military whatever else elite around in any country) and you got my point of view.
NinedenLtD, why don’t you tell us all about it, proxy boy?
at least Hunter Thompson never turned over any rocks on ethnic groups killing each others’ leaders and everyone…
I’m sure the hundreds of thousands of Albanian refugees would be very glad that you think that they weren’t worth saving
Heh. This is why I get into trouble in my life offline. I don’t clarify my position enough…
Right-o sens, first off I never did claim that the Albanians ‘weren’t worth saving’. I can see where you’d draw my ‘sole remaining Socialist government in Eastern Europe’ line as inferring ‘infallible in their actions’, but that just isn’t the case.
I’ll stand by my ‘why single the Serbs out’, though. All you hear in the media are ‘Serbs are synonymous with evil’ and the like.
But in that particular war (like every other) evil was on all sides. No one position had a monopoly on evil. ‘Why single out the Serbs’ was my attempt at trying to explore agendas hidden below the surface – being bias against a particular position is done for a reason, and I pegged it on the ‘sole remaining Socialist government in Eastern Europe’ hook.
No disrespect to the displaced, the raped or the murdered of any nation was intended, and I’m sorry if you took what I wrote as inferring disrespect.
Thank you for the article, it is true we can hear little about what happened.
Here are some links to articles written by Noam Chomsky at the time; might be of some interest : The current bombings : behind the rhetoric Znet, March, 1999 Crisis in the Balkans Zmagazine, May, 1999 Kosovo Peace Accord Zmag, July, 1999 Another Way For Kosovo? Le monde diplomatique, March 14, 2000 A Review of NATO’s War over Kosovo Zmag, April-May, 2001 voila!“.... Secondly, the US could not be held responsible for war crimes anyways, since the US is the leader of freedom’s army. Any civilians killed by US action is considered an accident by definition. ....”
Yes, for example ~ 6,000,000 Jews accidently killed on the way to a New Order.
Yes, for example ~ 6,000,000 Jews accidently killed on the way to a New Order.
Yaaaaaaaawn. Old.
but the NATO bombing campaign was helpful in destroying a lot of the Serbian capabilities and their paramilitary allies to attack Albanian refugees. Yeah, the Albanians did revenge attacks afterwards, which the NATO should have tried to do more to prevent. But I think saying that there’s a hidden agenda of secretly getting rid of a socialist government is pretty stupid.
and faelnarr, I happen to be very good friends with a Serb who lost his legs and 9 of his fingers from a gernade in the civil war, so I’m pretty sure I’m not stupid and tricked by the media about thinking the Serbs are all bad.
I know that you far lestists are out of touch, but let me propose something here for you to think about. People don’t go around assasinating people for convenience. We leftists like to build a world view of good vs evil, where evil people spend their entire days hatching nefarious plots and it is our job as good little leftists to expose these plots.
But guys, this is a fantasy, it is not the real world. In the real world, leaders of western countries pretty much do what leaders of corner McDonald restuarants do; they manage their sphere of influence trying to do the best job that they can do. They want the esteem of people who watch them and they want to pass on the next watch as orderly a domain as they can.
Nobody is going to conspire to kill a man in custody worried about what he might say. It is a trial, he can say what he wants.
Furthermore, we gave our consent to the Kosova campaign, it is done. In war, people die, we knew that going in. We weighed the consequences of Serbia’s actions in Kosova against the cost of an air war. The calulations were made, the war is approved, it was done, it is over.
Now it is time for use far leftists to get over it.
Never said you were stupid, sens. I can admit I’ve been fooled by the media before, so just because you believed something that later turned out to be untrue dosen’t make you a dupe, or dumb, or an idiot…
EDIT: Well, it means you were duped, but not a ‘dupe’ as in the derrogatory sense.
Furthermore, we gave our consent to the Kosova campaign, it is done. In war, people die, we knew that going in. We weighed the consequences of Serbia’s actions in Kosova against the cost of an air war. The calulations were made, the war is approved, it was done, it is over.
Hey Izzy, wasn’t there absolute furor in the Republican camp over Clinton’s decision to go to war over Kosovo? Remember that?
“Clinton did preside over many American war crimes. “
How could he?, no American President has ever committed a war crime. Even the confused asshole Presidents like Carter and Clinton never committed a war crime. The only Americans ever involved in potential war crimes were roque soldiers. We prosecute our own as you know because we are a leader in human rights and set a very high standard for our troops.
When prosecuting our own we don’t call normally them war crimes, but in fact that is just semantics. We think of war crimes as things only people in bad armies do, and that great democracies are required to intevene and prosecute.
However a war crime is a war crime no matter who does it. That is why the US sets such a high standard on her troops.
“ Hey Izzy, wasn’t there absolute furor in the Republican camp over Clinton’s decision to go to war over Kosovo? Remember that?”
Correct! The reason at the time was that we should not be involved over there because it was not in our national interest. And because we are not in the national building business and our intervention would only serve to make things worse.
However Clinton did what he did. He was elected and so the US public would have to accept the consequences of his bad judgement.
Peace.‘The only Americans ever involved in potential war crimes were roque soldiers‘
Heh. Remember My Lai? It’s likey that the only rogue soldiers on that operation were the ones who tried to stop. the massacre.
Lt. William Calley , who led the mission, was the only one convicted over the massacre of at least 500 Vietnamese civilians – he was initially charged with the premeditated murders of 22 civilians and on March 31, 1971 he was sentenced to life in prison. Ultimately, after appeal Calley served only 3˝ years of house arrest in his quarters at Fort Benning.
Three and a half years of house arrest, for a leading role in the murder of five hundred civilians? But hey, things happen in war, don’t they?
‘...because we are not in the national building business and our intervention would only serve to make things worse.’
Ah jeez, where could I go with this thing?
Ah jeez, where could I go with this thing?
Must…...stop…...laughing…...gut…...can’t…..take…...anymore…...
Sorry, mate!
But guys, this is a fantasy, it is not the real world. In the real world, leaders of western countries pretty much do what leaders of corner McDonald restuarants do; they manage their sphere of influence trying to do the best job that they can do. They want the esteem of people who watch them and they want to pass on the next watch as orderly a domain as they can.
Oops,
Just wanted to say that while I somewhat agree with the thought in the first sentence. The second one sounds somewhat hollow. I don’t think people in power give any thought about esteem unless luck there of threatens their status.
“We prosecute our own as you know because we are a leader in human rights and set a very high standard for our troops.”
Izzy…is…hysterical…
http://www.hrw.org/english/docs/2004/06/07/usdom8778.htm
Its like this… you haven’t been there, right? You can’t really know what its about until you’re a Muslim in Sarajevo. Stop pretending to know. You know they laugh at us, right? The ones trying to act all intellectual and say well this and this and that about Milosevic and Clinton and NATO or whatever… They laugh because it is just a bunch of rhetoric and essentially meaningless. Realize that the war started in 1986 and the crimes against humanity began in 1986, long before anyone else became involved. Now the entire region is just a big colony. And the war isn’t over, despite what you may think. The article lacks… knowledge of the issue.
I’m not making a statement on anything but the article, so don’t get defensive.
But since you did… what’s wrong, can’t look in the fuckin’ mirror?
That is what I thought.
“Hell is others!”
Marx and Engels most important contribution was in agitating for a global identity for the masses above, beyond or without religion, nationalism, ethnicity or race — and with the violent elimination of the bourgeois ruling class. Lenin and Trotsky divided this into highlighting or neutralizing nationalism and a workers of the world identity-building strategy is all but dead today.
Eco-consciousness should be the basis for a common world identity of the masses, yet it’s still “the economy, stupid,” and the regional, ethic, national and racial divisions remain. So, a very likely doomed species is witness to these thousands of GNN-type fragmented, compartmented lists/menus of intellectualizations, rationalizations, particularizations, jousting, fencing, recriminations, discriminations, procrastinations, shiftshaping and so on as a break from the boredom of getting high, listening to music or working for the man.
Bloggers of America unite and demand America give us the truth about everything, all documents from all presidencies and a new Constitutional Convention that empowers the common American citizen. As America is falling, a vision of its possibilities to have and to lead a new revolution may give mankind a chance to survive. All horror stories clearly lead to the realization of One World: One Revolution
A New Millennium Revolution
Wasn’t Milo refused the right to represent himself? And what evidence was there that showed that he had knowledge of the 7,000 muslims that were killed? There is a lot of strange things regarding this one..
a lot of strange things regarding this one..
This one and that one— in Dante’s Inferno?! Unless you think you’re just a guest visitor, the way out is by understanding the big picture, gnostics. The time for new examples from history as the key to learning from it has passed. There is no time left for the emotionally and ethnically consoling voyeuristic scholarship that covers some of these masturbatory and circle jerk rituals. Big Picture hypotheses and action or suck groupies. Clinton and these mass murders, Bush and those, Nixon and Johnson and those others, Reagan brings America back….All reducible to mu, phi, sigma or evil in an equation that spells extinction for a fragmented species.
A New Millennium Revolution
Nineden, speaking of rhetoric… you just told us nothing
The article summarized some concrete things, especially some things hidden from popular Western media. For instance, the Serbs were fighting KLA drug proxies and Al Qaeda, their presence in the Balkans supported by America. It also touches on the number of people actually blown to pieces by American bombs. I’m not picking sides. I’m just saying, those two issues are valid.
Very deft continuity Continuity. My vision is a united Eurasia to recenter civilization in a global socialist program that manages capitalist activities and unites in fighting crime and human rights violations through negotiated agreements to form over the agonizingly destructive and even violent fall of America during a brutal global capitalist crashdown and wars, civil wars and revolution everywhere. I’m suggesting that a continuation of case studies of this or that local, national, regional or global conflagration is just as useless as a dead language in a world facing the extinction of homo sapien account its failure to organize a united response to natural conditions and itself. One more insight about one more particular contemporaneous tragic failure to have eliminated ethnic, racial, national or religious division is not adequately adaptive at this stage of the game of history, albeit inviting some transient social cohesion from some ethnic, political or epistemic community. It’s time for a transcendent, messianic play, something that can use genetic algorithms and charisma to just beat out Coca Cola as a globally integrating res verba. What can bring Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, Marxism and Anarchism together — I say the combination of the fall of America, the collapse of a world capitalist system, international organized crime and the certainty of ecological disaster can and it’s time to focus on the big picture.
I had a long reply written, but the I realized it wouldn’t matter to you. That you would insist on your valid points. Of course they are valid and of course the US committed awful crimes. I don’t deny it. I am questioning Mr. Scahill’s very conscious decision to ignore everything that happened from 1986 until 1999. He writes as a skilled propagandist, skewing the information for his own point of view.
Just remember that I never agreed with direct US-NATO involvement in the region. That I also believe Clinton to be a war criminal in Yugoslavia. And Albright, and Rubin, and Cohen, and Berger, and Holbrooke, and Clark. I believe the entire region to be nothing better than a US colony. My point is the authors ignorance of the entire issue and his alarming willingness to be ignorant of every year prior to 1999. His article is a pathetic disrespect for everyone who died prior to 1999. He treats them as if it didn’t happen. We are talking about 13 years of violence and war crimes and thousands and thousands massacred and he wants to talk about 16 “media workers” (many of whom were responsible for spreading anti-Muslim lies)?
Nothing is black and white.
Nine,
I agree with many of these new things you’ve said. Believe it or not, I haven’t picked sides, nd I see no black and white. I can only look at this entire tragedy via one sub-topic at a time. You must agree that it’s impossible to write a single article that summarizes the entire mess?
Short articles always focus on a few matters. In the case of Milosevic’s trial and recent “death”, I find some of the article’s information helpful in enlargening the picture. But it doesn’t give me any sympathy for Milo, or hatred for Muslims.
This war was dirty, cynically controlled, horrible for all sides, and even now still not fully undestood. Just like most other wars.
WWII from the Nazi/Fascist side was utter evil. The U.S. role in Vietnam was utterly evil and the U.S. ought to have been the recipient of the strongest sanctions and war crimes trials. The stakes are too high anymore to refuse to place a priority on standing up and saying BASTA! Enough! to the USA. I feel it is questionable to address possible new acts of a career criminal with such deference to the niceties of scholarly review.
“In the case of Milosevic’s trial and recent“death”, “
If you think or suspect he was murdered by some conspiracy, you’re an idiot.
Okay… I see that you all got something to say about the matter…
But from where I’m desperately standig (cannot travel, need visas and crap like that if I want to go anywhere; legacy of dear old dead president and his allies) things look very different.
At one point we managed to overthrow our dictator and (alleged) war criminal, arrest him and send him to the Hague Tribunal. We lost the best politician as a consequence…
I would like to see the likes of that in Washington. Why aren’t the British and Americans acting? All I’ve noticed, so far are discussions, reasonings, rationalisations and things like that. The Americans managed to deal with Nixon. The British managed to deal with Eden. To them Bush and monkey Blair seem like two small parts which combined create one puny turd.
and when I say the best politician i mean Zoran Djindjic, of course. Djindjic was assasinated on March 12 2003, by forces (among others) who supported Milosevic and did not want to go to the Hague. To put it simplistically.
And Milosevic wasn’t killed! He had a heart condition, smoked, mixed sedatives with alcohol… He was ill even while in power! We’ve all expected him to die during the protests. Really, to say something like that… irresponsible…