Charges against Milosevic reveal NATO's larger crimes
by Stephen Gowans
George Orwell once said that a lot of journalism is like prefabricated
hen
houses -- ready-made phrases and ideas slapped together without a lot of
thought. Orwell's ghost must have smiled knowingly, reading media
reports
of Milosevic's abduction and transfer to The Hague. Drawing from a
warehouse of ready made fallacies, one journalist noted there was an
estimated 10,000 deaths related to Milosevic's crackdown in Kosovo.
Passed
from journalist to journalist, this canard spreads like a virus. After
at
time, it becomes part of the zeitgeist, accepted by all, because it's
accepted by everyone else, even though it has no roots in reality, like
people believing the earth is flat in the face of plenty of
opportunities
to see it isn't. Alan Freeman, a correspondent for the Toronto Globe and
Mail, dragged out the 10,000 dead myth, even though his own newspaper
has
run articles on forensic pathologists failing to turn up the 10,000 dead
NATO warned darkly of. That is that NATO once warned darkly of. NATO
long
ago backed away from the 10,000 dead figure. But once a virus starts to
spread, it's difficult to stamp out.
So it is that media reports can be built around a myth, despite internal
inconsistencies in the report that surrounds it. Freeman, for example,
lays
out the charges against Milosevic: deportation, murder, persecution.
Nothing about genocide. Ten thousand deaths surely ranks as genocide.
But
Freeman doesn't ask why the genocide charge is absent, doesn't even seem
to
know that his prefabricated hen house is askew, its angles all wrong.
The charges against Milosevic involve the murder of 391 individuals, not
10,000, something Freeman might not even know. If he does, he's not
saying.
Nor does he know, or mention, that by the most conservative estimate --
that of Human Rights Watch -- NATO killed 500 civilians in its 78-day
aerial bombardment of Yugoslavia, a bombardment that, without the
backing
of the UN, was illegal. That's in excess of a hundred deaths more than
Milosevic is accused of. Other estimates put the civilian death toll
higher. Yet NATO said it had to bomb Yugoslavia to stop a genocide.
Of course, the NATO death toll was accidental, NATO-supporters, and
journalists, will object. NATO didn't mean to kill those civilians, so
killing them was excusable. They were unfortunate collateral damage,
the
phrase Timothy McVeigh, ex-US serviceman, invoked to explain away the
hundreds he murdered. He learned well.
Journalist haven't always had such an exculpatory attitude to aerial
bombardment and its inevitable toll of "accidental" civilian casualties.
Consider this, from the New York Times, May 10, 1940.
"(Three bombers) whipped down to the valley, whirled around and came
back
again...They knew what they were doing. They knew they were destroying
private houses in a helpless village...and people in those houses if
they
were not quick enough.
The story of air warfare of this sort has been told and retold...It is
not
an accidental atrocity'...It is an attested, studied, boasted method of
attack. These are the gangsters of the air."
It could have been a comment on NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia, or, in
particular, on the attack on the quiet Serb town of Varvaran, well away
from the fighting, where, one day, two years ago, a NATO jet fighter
swooped down on a bridge filled with civilians, fired a missile, and
then
came back for a second attack while rescuers were pulling the dead and
wounded from the rubble. But it wasn't. It was a comment on a Nazi air
raid
in Norway. The Nazis were the last to bomb Yugoslavia...that is, before
NATO decided to see what cluster bombs, depleted uranium, cruise
missiles
and high-altitude bombing could do to embassies, radio-television
buildings, trains, factories, refugee convoys, hospitals, bridges
and...people.
If you're going to be gangsters of the air for 78 days, in violation of
international law, killing hundreds, if not thousands of civilians,
destroying civilian and economic infrastructure in contravention of the
articles of war, then you'd better be able to show that you have a
compelling reason. The murder of 391 people, by most standards, is
hardly
compelling. Which is why it's handy that the media is willing to trot
out
the myth about 10,000 deaths in Kosovo. It makes the NATO assault seem
worth it, even necessary.
It's handy too that the media raises no embarrassing questions about the
timing of the bombing. All of the murders of which Milosevic is accused,
but one, happened after the NATO bombing commenced. And the one
pre-bombing
incident, the Racak massacre, is now believed to have been faked by the
KLA, an organization which has since been revealed to have been trained,
funded, and encouraged by Washington, to oust Milosevic. Before the
bombing
the State Department denounced the KLA as a terrorist organization. The
KLA
has since transmuted into the NLA, another terrorist organization, this
time bedevilling the Macedonian government.
And what of the deportation charges? The mass exodus from Kosovo, like
the
massacres Milosevic is accused of ordering, happened after the bombing.
In
other words, Milosevic is in The Hague to answer for crimes that could
not
have been the reason for NATO's bombing, unless, somehow the universe
has
become disordered and cause follows effect. So why did NATO trample
international law, don the cloak of humanitarianism, and reduce a
country
to rubble?
Stratfor, the strategic forecasting organization, warns that Americans
may
be hoisted on their petards. If you can send Milosevic to The Hague on
charges of deportation, persecution, and murder, you can send scores of
leaders, political and military, to The Hague, including Americans,
Stratfor warns. Imagine how many Israeli leaders could be sent to The
Hague. Imagine how many NATO leaders could stand in the docket on more
serious charges: crimes against peace, crimes against humanity, war
crimes.
The reality, however, as Stratfor is quick to point out, is that "No
court
in the world has the ability to coerce China, Russia or the United
States
to hand over a current or former leader." Or to hand over leaders of
strategic allies, like NATO partners.
Carla del Ponte, Chief UN Prosecutor, told a news conference that,
"Nobody
is above the law or beyond the reach of international justice." And yet
asked why the Tribunal isn't pursuing others who are alleged to have
committed war crimes, del Ponte replied, ""The primary focus of the
Office
of the Prosecutor must be on the investigation and prosecution of the
(leaders of Yugoslavia) and Serbia who have already been indicted." By
a
most curious logic, "nobody", in del Ponte's reasoning, is equivalent to
"all but the Serbs."
And so the second NATO campaign begins. The first was a campaign of
bombs,
missiles, and civilian deaths, explained away, Timothy McVeigh-like, as
unfortunate accidents. The second is a bombardment of lies.
Mr. Steve Gowans is a writer and political activist who lives in Ottawa,
Canada.
Source:
by courtesy & � 2001 Steve Gowans
by the same author:
http://www.mediamonitors.net/gowans16.html
Miroslav Antic,
http://www.antic.org/
TARGETS - Independent monthly paper on international affairs
Sloterkade 20
1058 HE Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Ph. ++ 31 20 615 1122
Fax: ++ 31 20 615 1120
---
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by Stephen Gowans
George Orwell once said that a lot of journalism is like prefabricated
hen
houses -- ready-made phrases and ideas slapped together without a lot of
thought. Orwell's ghost must have smiled knowingly, reading media
reports
of Milosevic's abduction and transfer to The Hague. Drawing from a
warehouse of ready made fallacies, one journalist noted there was an
estimated 10,000 deaths related to Milosevic's crackdown in Kosovo.
Passed
from journalist to journalist, this canard spreads like a virus. After
at
time, it becomes part of the zeitgeist, accepted by all, because it's
accepted by everyone else, even though it has no roots in reality, like
people believing the earth is flat in the face of plenty of
opportunities
to see it isn't. Alan Freeman, a correspondent for the Toronto Globe and
Mail, dragged out the 10,000 dead myth, even though his own newspaper
has
run articles on forensic pathologists failing to turn up the 10,000 dead
NATO warned darkly of. That is that NATO once warned darkly of. NATO
long
ago backed away from the 10,000 dead figure. But once a virus starts to
spread, it's difficult to stamp out.
So it is that media reports can be built around a myth, despite internal
inconsistencies in the report that surrounds it. Freeman, for example,
lays
out the charges against Milosevic: deportation, murder, persecution.
Nothing about genocide. Ten thousand deaths surely ranks as genocide.
But
Freeman doesn't ask why the genocide charge is absent, doesn't even seem
to
know that his prefabricated hen house is askew, its angles all wrong.
The charges against Milosevic involve the murder of 391 individuals, not
10,000, something Freeman might not even know. If he does, he's not
saying.
Nor does he know, or mention, that by the most conservative estimate --
that of Human Rights Watch -- NATO killed 500 civilians in its 78-day
aerial bombardment of Yugoslavia, a bombardment that, without the
backing
of the UN, was illegal. That's in excess of a hundred deaths more than
Milosevic is accused of. Other estimates put the civilian death toll
higher. Yet NATO said it had to bomb Yugoslavia to stop a genocide.
Of course, the NATO death toll was accidental, NATO-supporters, and
journalists, will object. NATO didn't mean to kill those civilians, so
killing them was excusable. They were unfortunate collateral damage,
the
phrase Timothy McVeigh, ex-US serviceman, invoked to explain away the
hundreds he murdered. He learned well.
Journalist haven't always had such an exculpatory attitude to aerial
bombardment and its inevitable toll of "accidental" civilian casualties.
Consider this, from the New York Times, May 10, 1940.
"(Three bombers) whipped down to the valley, whirled around and came
back
again...They knew what they were doing. They knew they were destroying
private houses in a helpless village...and people in those houses if
they
were not quick enough.
The story of air warfare of this sort has been told and retold...It is
not
an accidental atrocity'...It is an attested, studied, boasted method of
attack. These are the gangsters of the air."
It could have been a comment on NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia, or, in
particular, on the attack on the quiet Serb town of Varvaran, well away
from the fighting, where, one day, two years ago, a NATO jet fighter
swooped down on a bridge filled with civilians, fired a missile, and
then
came back for a second attack while rescuers were pulling the dead and
wounded from the rubble. But it wasn't. It was a comment on a Nazi air
raid
in Norway. The Nazis were the last to bomb Yugoslavia...that is, before
NATO decided to see what cluster bombs, depleted uranium, cruise
missiles
and high-altitude bombing could do to embassies, radio-television
buildings, trains, factories, refugee convoys, hospitals, bridges
and...people.
If you're going to be gangsters of the air for 78 days, in violation of
international law, killing hundreds, if not thousands of civilians,
destroying civilian and economic infrastructure in contravention of the
articles of war, then you'd better be able to show that you have a
compelling reason. The murder of 391 people, by most standards, is
hardly
compelling. Which is why it's handy that the media is willing to trot
out
the myth about 10,000 deaths in Kosovo. It makes the NATO assault seem
worth it, even necessary.
It's handy too that the media raises no embarrassing questions about the
timing of the bombing. All of the murders of which Milosevic is accused,
but one, happened after the NATO bombing commenced. And the one
pre-bombing
incident, the Racak massacre, is now believed to have been faked by the
KLA, an organization which has since been revealed to have been trained,
funded, and encouraged by Washington, to oust Milosevic. Before the
bombing
the State Department denounced the KLA as a terrorist organization. The
KLA
has since transmuted into the NLA, another terrorist organization, this
time bedevilling the Macedonian government.
And what of the deportation charges? The mass exodus from Kosovo, like
the
massacres Milosevic is accused of ordering, happened after the bombing.
In
other words, Milosevic is in The Hague to answer for crimes that could
not
have been the reason for NATO's bombing, unless, somehow the universe
has
become disordered and cause follows effect. So why did NATO trample
international law, don the cloak of humanitarianism, and reduce a
country
to rubble?
Stratfor, the strategic forecasting organization, warns that Americans
may
be hoisted on their petards. If you can send Milosevic to The Hague on
charges of deportation, persecution, and murder, you can send scores of
leaders, political and military, to The Hague, including Americans,
Stratfor warns. Imagine how many Israeli leaders could be sent to The
Hague. Imagine how many NATO leaders could stand in the docket on more
serious charges: crimes against peace, crimes against humanity, war
crimes.
The reality, however, as Stratfor is quick to point out, is that "No
court
in the world has the ability to coerce China, Russia or the United
States
to hand over a current or former leader." Or to hand over leaders of
strategic allies, like NATO partners.
Carla del Ponte, Chief UN Prosecutor, told a news conference that,
"Nobody
is above the law or beyond the reach of international justice." And yet
asked why the Tribunal isn't pursuing others who are alleged to have
committed war crimes, del Ponte replied, ""The primary focus of the
Office
of the Prosecutor must be on the investigation and prosecution of the
(leaders of Yugoslavia) and Serbia who have already been indicted." By
a
most curious logic, "nobody", in del Ponte's reasoning, is equivalent to
"all but the Serbs."
And so the second NATO campaign begins. The first was a campaign of
bombs,
missiles, and civilian deaths, explained away, Timothy McVeigh-like, as
unfortunate accidents. The second is a bombardment of lies.
Mr. Steve Gowans is a writer and political activist who lives in Ottawa,
Canada.
Source:
by courtesy & � 2001 Steve Gowans
by the same author:
http://www.mediamonitors.net/gowans16.html
Miroslav Antic,
http://www.antic.org/
TARGETS - Independent monthly paper on international affairs
Sloterkade 20
1058 HE Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Ph. ++ 31 20 615 1122
Fax: ++ 31 20 615 1120
---
Questa lista e' curata da componenti del
Coordinamento Nazionale per la Jugoslavia (CNJ).
I documenti distribuiti non rispecchiano necessariamente
le posizioni ufficiali o condivise da tutto il CNJ, ma
vengono fatti circolare per il loro contenuto informativo al
solo scopo di segnalazione e commento ("for fair use only").
Archivio:
> http://www.domeus.it/circles/jugoinfo oppure:
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/crj-mailinglist/messages
Per iscriversi al bollettino: <jugoinfo-subscribe@...>
Per cancellarsi: <jugoinfo-unsubscribe@...>
Per inviare materiali e commenti: <jugocoord@...>
---- Spot ------------------------------------------------------------
CELLULARI, PALMARI, TELECOMUNICAZIONI, TARIFFE TELEFONICHE!
Le migliori offerte direttamente
nella tua casella di posta elettronica!
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
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