[moki]

Another war, another set of statements that turned out to be inaccurate, with civilians killed... Ah well, as long as the UN was involved, it's okay, right?

from: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/517168.stm

.....

Q & A: Counting Kosovo's dead

How many were killed in this year's bitter conflict in Kosovo? The recent figures announced by the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague, Carla del Ponte, are the most accurate given so far, though only partial.

She said United Nations investigators had so far exhumed over 2,100 bodies, though the actual number of ethnic Albanian victims of the conflict may be much higher.

The figures follow controversy in the western media, with some reports claiming the number of victims was much less than Nato sources claimed during the war.

The BBC's South-east Europe analyst, Gabriel Partos, tries to separate fact from fiction over the killings in Kosovo:

How many bodies have been found?

In her 10 November report to the UN Security Council, chief prosecutor Carla del Ponte said 2,108 bodies had been found so far. That figure relates to about one third of the 529 grave sites notified to the ICTY. The remaining two-thirds, along with possible fresh sites, will be investigated in the spring when conditions on the ground make resumption of the work possible.

How much higher is the final death toll likely to be?

It is not possible to make any accurate estimates on the basis of what has been found so far because some of the mass graves yet to be opened up may contain many more - or many fewer - bodies than those exhumed so far. Besides, the ICTY says the investigators have found evidence of tampering with the graves, including the burning or apparent removal of the victims' remains.

What are the estimates?

More than 11,000 deaths have been reported to the ICTY - but only a fifth of these have been confirmed. Other reports are of around 5,000 Kosovar Albanians still missing, now presumed dead. So it may be conjectured that the total numbers - or whatever figure can be established - may be somewhere between 5,000 and 12,000.

What was Nato saying during the conflict?

Nato officials during the conflict were doing their best to drum up public support for the campaign of air strikes against Yugoslavia which was meant to halt and reverse the ethnic cleansing of Kosovar Albanians. They made tough attacks on Belgrade's policies in the region - often using Kosovar Albanian reports which could not be independently verified. But Nato never claimed to have accurate figures for the number of victims.

What about the hundreds of thousands of victims mentioned at Nato briefings?

These figures related to those believed to be missing - some of whom were assumed to be dead. Nato estimates of those missing ranged from 100,000 to more than 400,000 Kosovar Albanians. Many of them were indeed "missing", hiding in forests. But it appears it was closer to a few thousand who were actually killed.

Why does the number of victims matter?

For Nato member states it is important to justify the bombing campaign against Yugoslavia on humanitarian grounds - especially since Nato's own air raids killed civilians, both Kosovar Albanians and Serbs, mostly as a result of pilot error or rockets and bombs going astray. According to Belgrade, hundreds were killed in the Nato strikes. By contrast, opponents of Nato's action want to downplay the level of Serbian atrocities in an attempt to show that the campaign was unnecessary.

[theolein]

??? And what is the point in this one?

[Developer]

Originally posted by theolein:
??? And what is the point in this one?

The point is that this was done without UN approval for humanitarian reasons, just like the invasion of Iraq. I guess this is supposed to be an example of the European "double standard" moki complained about.

[Spliffdaddy]

A prime example, at that.

Hey, maybe that got some bad intelligence.

Who's the dolt that ordered the bombing?

Off with his head - he's a moron.

Wonder what the REAL purpose was? Power? Control? Oil? World Domination?

[theolein]

Originally posted by Developer:
The point is that this was done without UN approval for humanitarian reasons, just like the invasion of Iraq. I guess this is supposed to be an example of the European "double standard" moki complained about.

But the bombing of Serbia was done explicitly for humanitarian reasons. It was announced as such and foughten as such, and no one in Europe (with the exception of the Russians who feel some kindred with the Serbs) objected to it. The Europeans, all of them, fought in that war alongside the Americans. The British, the French, the Italians, the Germans (for the first time outside their country since WWII).

And the invasion of Iraq was announced as being for WMD. The humanitarian aspect was not mentioned in a big way, if at all. All the big announcements by Tony Blair and george Bush were about WMD. The fact that no one believed them is why so many did not want to get involved in Iraq.

This is ridiculous. moki, what is wrong with you? You're starting to become very bitter.

[thunderous_funker]

First of all, the Security Council did NOT authorize the NATO bombing--a point often repeated by Clinton's critics from the Right and Left.

Secondly, just because the president calls something "humanitarian" in a speech, doesn't make it so. Interveneing in the war was arguably necessary, but I'd hardly call it humanitarian. Is it humanitarian when riot police thrash violent protestors into submission? We shouldn't mistake cruel necessity for humanitarianism.

The NATO bombing campaign was a cruel, ruthless and politically calculated effort designed to reduce the amount of NATO casualties after sitting on the sidelines and watching the horror for 6 years. In fact, the worst atrocities occured in retaliation for the NATO bombing.

What we did after the war was ended was humanitarian. The war itself was brutal, heartless and horrific as all wars are.

[moki]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
What we did after the war was ended was humanitarian. The war itself was brutal, heartless and horrific as all wars are.

That sounds remarkably familiar... hrm...

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by moki:
That sounds remarkably familiar... hrm...

Are you comparing peacekeeping operations in the Balkans with the occupation and privatization of Iraq?

Ideology aside, the most notable difference is the absence of peace in Iraq.

[moki]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
Are you comparing peacekeeping operations in the Balkans with the occupation and privatization of Iraq?

Ideology aside, the most notable difference is the absence of peace in Iraq.

There was quite an absence of peace in the Balkans for some time too, if you recall...

Regardless, the most interesting thing out of all of this is that the leaders who authorized the bombing in Kosovo were not screamed at as "liars" when their intelligence ended up being so utterly wrong, nor were they so demonized for their unilateral action (read: non-UN sanctioned)...

[Lerkfish]

Originally posted by moki:
There was quite an absence of peace in the Balkans for some time too, if you recall...

Regardless, the most interesting thing out of all of this is that the leaders who authorized the bombing in Kosovo were not screamed at as "liars" when their intelligence ended up being so utterly wrong, nor were they so demonized for their unilateral action (read: non-UN sanctioned)...

well.....if you cannot see the difference between acting on wrong intelligence and reshaping intelligence you know is wrong, but lying about it and saying its right in order to justify an unjustifiable war, then you have a long way to go before we can discuss these issues on equal footing.

[moki]

Originally posted by Lerkfish:
well.....if you cannot see the difference between acting on wrong intelligence and reshaping intelligence you know is wrong, but lying about it and saying its right in order to justify an unjustifiable war, then you have a long way to go before we can discuss these issues on equal footing.

According to the article, the folks in favor of bombing Kosovo reshaped intelligence... so yes, I don't see the difference?

Your other words are not really relevant. Whether the war is "justifiable" or not (in both Kosovo and Iraq) is entirely within the eye of the beholder.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by moki:
Regardless, the most interesting thing out of all of this is that the leaders who authorized the bombing in Kosovo were not screamed at as "liars" when their intelligence ended up being so utterly wrong, nor were they so demonized for their unilateral action (read: non-UN sanctioned)...

Exactly what "intelligence" are you talking about? Clinton claimed humanitiarian intervention grounds for trying to stop the war and most Americans agreed with it. Do you mean there really wasn't a war? Clinton made it up?

Clinton was criticized on the Right for sticking his nose in Europe's problems and risking our troops on hair-brained "nation building" exercises that would be a quagmire.

He was criticized on the Left for ignoring the horror for 6 years and then claiming that dropping millions of tons of ordinance all over the place was "humanitarian".

[moki]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
Exactly what "intelligence" are you talking about? Clinton claimed humanitiarian intervention grounds for trying to stop the war and most Americans agreed with it. Do you mean there really wasn't a war? Clinton made it up?

The claim was that hundreds of thousands of people were being slaughtered. They'd been able to confirm 2,100. That's a rather large difference, wouldn't you say?

Indeed, it was the base justification for the war... hrm, this sounds familiar again...

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by moki:
The claim was that hundreds of thousands of people were being slaughtered. They'd been able to confirm 2,100. That's a rather large difference, wouldn't you say?

Indeed, it was the base justification for the war... hrm, this sounds familiar again...

This is a very very very weak argument and I'm surprised you'd even attempt to use it.

The Balkan war has been raging for 6 years before NATO got involved. Hundreds of thousands of people had been displaced under regimes of organized "ethnic cleansing". These were not fabrications of the "liberal media". Some threw the word genocide around with some controversy, but you can't possibly claim that the severity of the situation was "sexed up" to justify American intervention.

Secondly, you seem to have completely been brainwashed by the PR machine coming from the White House concerning the reasons for the Iraq invasion. Do the words "wmd", "threat", "imminent", "clear and present danger", "mushroom cloud", etc ring a bell?

Regardless, Simey and I went over this endlessly and I don't really care to rehash it. Feel free to sort through the archives if you're interested.

The only reason I piped up at all was to put "humanitarian" in context in terms of the Kosovo operation. For that matter, it is also important to apply the same scrutiny for the use of the term "humanitarian" for the Iraq invasion.

Anyone who claims the US was being "humanitarian" towards Iraq seems to have completely forgotten all US-Iraq history preceeding 1998.

Don't confuse necessary with humanitarian.

[christ]

As a mathematician, I would say that 2,100 is a lot. It is also about 2% of 100,000.

Zero WMD is not a lot. It is none. It is 0% of anything.

'A lot' may be justification, '100s of 1000s' is an exaggeration, but 'WMD' is (appears to be) a lie.

Funnily enough, tho', I take your point. I agreed with Blair when he supported action over Kosovo, and revile him for his action in Iraq. I wonder why that is, as it doesn't appear to be party political. (Not only does he represent the same party, but he is the same person)

[moki]

Originally posted by christ:
Funnily enough, tho', I take your point. I agreed with Blair when he supported action over Kosovo, and revile him for his action in Iraq. I wonder why that is, as it doesn't appear to be party political. (Not only does he represent the same party, but he is the same person)

Maybe it's more fashionable to bash the US and the UK now than it was in 1999? hrm... nah, it was in fashion then too. I'm not sure why that'd be...

[moki]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
This is a very very very weak argument and I'm surprised you'd even attempt to use it.

The remarkable thing here, to me at least, is how vehemently you'll support one action (Kosovo) and how vehemently you'll condemn another (Iraq). From a high level view, they have quite a bit in common, certainly enough to make justifying such a bi-polar stance very unlikely.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by moki:
Maybe it's more fashionable to bash the US and the UK now than it was in 1999? hrm... nah, it was in fashion then too. I'm not sure why that'd be...

What you call "bashing", I call holding elected leaders accountable.

At any rate, perhaps you didn't see as much outrage over the Clinton's decision to bomb Serbia as I did. I was in college at the time and the debates were epic. In fact, it was more thoroughly and completely debated than the Iraq invasion because I don't recall anyone being called a traitor or Milosevic-lover for opposing the Kosovo war and thereby lowering the level of discourse so low as to make the topic as undebatable as Religion.

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by moki:
The remarkable thing here, to me at least, is how vehemently you'll support one action (Kosovo) and how vehemently you'll condemn another (Iraq). From a high level view, they have quite a bit in common, certainly enough to make justifying such a bi-polar stance very unlikely.

Who said I supported the NATO bombing? That would be your first mistake.

The second would be to continue to pretend that there is much of anything in common between the two wars other than the common thread of demonstrating how the Security Council can be hamstrung by the selfish interest of the major powers.

[christ]

Originally posted by moki:
Maybe it's more fashionable to bash the US and the UK now than it was in 1999? hrm... nah, it was in fashion then too. I'm not sure why that'd be...

I can't speak for the US, and I pointedly referred to the UK, and I don't see any evidence that UK bashing is more fashionable now than then.

I think that you are struggling to make this a party political point, but aren't quite honest enough to say that out loud. (And I think that you would be wrong if you did).

[moki]

Originally posted by christ:
I think that you are struggling to make this a party political point, but aren't quite honest enough to say that out loud. (And I think that you would be wrong if you did).

No, honestly, I could care less about who was President at the time. I'm more interested in the disparity of views on subjects that in the end have more in common than not.

[moki]

Originally posted by thunderous_funker:
Who said I supported the NATO bombing? That would be your first mistake.

given how the area is doing today vs. what was going on then, do you now think the action there was on the whole a good thing, or not?

[thunderous_funker]

Originally posted by moki:
given how the area is doing today vs. what was going on then, do you now think the action there was on the whole a good thing, or not?

What kind of absurd reductionism is that?

Europe turned out ok, so I guess the Inquistion wasn't a bad thing.



Perhaps you are confusing the NATO bombing campaign that further fueled ethnic killing, killed innocents, devastated infastructure and cemented Serbian popular support for Milosevic with the OTPOR student movement that bravely, stubbornly and methodically undermined the Milosevic regime, united the disparate and ineffectual opposition parties, forced a popular election and then took over the capital in a virtually bloodless popular uprising when Milosevic tried to nullify the election results over a year later?

You're in good company. Lots of people forget that the NATO campaign didn't remove Milosevic, occupy Belgrade, appoint a governing council, dictate massive market liberalization, change the currency, sell its infastructure for foreign investors, etc.......

A bloody and devastating bombing campaign that stopped a shooting war is not anything in common with the invasion/overthrow/occupation of Iraq.

NATO didn't overthrow the government of Serbia. The people of Serbia did.

[Lerkfish]

Originally posted by moki:
Maybe it's more fashionable to bash the US and the UK now than it was in 1999? hrm... nah, it was in fashion then too. I'm not sure why that'd be...

what's sad is that you categorize objection to war as "fashionable", instead of understanding the true nature of the objection.
Also, you are sounding a bit paranoid, characterizing anyone who disagrees with particular US policies as bashing the US. I can disagree with the invasion of Iraq without thinking less of the United States.

[Lerkfish]

Originally posted by moki:
The remarkable thing here, to me at least, is how vehemently you'll support one action (Kosovo) and how vehemently you'll condemn another (Iraq). From a high level view, they have quite a bit in common, certainly enough to make justifying such a bi-polar stance very unlikely.

for the record, as Simey knows, I am not in support of ANY military action, including Kosovo, Desert storm 1 and II.

I feel that military action signals the breakdown of diplomacy, in other words, a complete failure.

so....how do you malign me, then, if you can't make personal attacks of bipolar ethics?

perhaps you should stop this bitter, bitter campaign to basically tell people on this board to **** themselves? We can read between the lines, you know. We aren't as clueless as you'd prefer to think.

[theolein]

Originally posted by moki:
The remarkable thing here, to me at least, is how vehemently you'll support one action (Kosovo) and how vehemently you'll condemn another (Iraq). From a high level view, they have quite a bit in common, certainly enough to make justifying such a bi-polar stance very unlikely.

Well, I for one, your favourite nemesis, DON?T condem the invasion of Iraq, because I saw the chance of ridding Iraqis of Saddam, who was definitely a genocidal butcher.

There are major qualifying points about this though:

As you well know, and you know this, you can read as well as everyone else, the justification used for invading Iraq was the threat of supposed WMD. The humanitarian side was mentioned, but only as a side note. I am against what has happened in Iraq after the war. The attempts to blame the rest of the world and the UN on the mess that has become of Iraq is ludicrous.

It is also bitterly ironic that this new found interest in the humanitarian side of the Iraqi issue comes 12 years after the real genocidal actions took place. It was prior to and in the aftermath of Gulf War I that Saddam exterminated Kurds with nerve gas and massacred Shiites who believed that the UN was going to come and rescue them. Nothing happened for 12 years, although the major killings had already taken place.

Now if that isn't double standards, then I don't know what is.

[moki]

Originally posted by theolein:
Well, I for one, your favourite nemesis

that implies you haven't been beaten or overcome...

Originally posted by theolein:
Now if that isn't double standards, then I don't know what is.

And what kind of "standard" would *never* doing anything be?

I'd rather be glad the action happened than criticize the timing...

[moki]

Originally posted by Lerkfish:
for the record, as Simey knows, I am not in support of ANY military action, including Kosovo, Desert storm 1 and II.

hrm... let me guess... you're in academia?

[Lerkfish]

Originally posted by moki:
hrm... let me guess... you're in academia?

nope. try again.
I'm a graphic journalist in newspapers....which has nothing to do with my attitudes towards the proper use or misuse of diplomacy.

another attempt at condescension goes awry.
You're such a joke at it one might assume you piddle away making computer games.

[BlackGriffen]

The funny thing about Kosovo is that it's my understanding that the sanctions were far more effective at getting Serbia to bow down than the bombing campaign.

Now, let's try to make some things clear to you, moki. First, Kosovo was a crisis. Whether the number who had already been killed had reached hundreds of thousands yet or not is irrelevant because left unchecked it probably would have. Don't forget, refugees fleeing to Albania and ethnic tensions in Macedonia were bubbling to the surface, both promising to widen the conflict.

Put shortly, the situation was such that we had to either do something now, or we'd have to deal with it later when it got worse.

Iraq, on the other hand, was a comparatively stable situation. There wasn't a conflict threatening to widen until it engulfed the whole region. There was a brutal dictator, whaling impotently under our thumbs. Like it or not, the situation wasn't rapidly degrading. We had time that we could utilize to explore other solutions.

Now, remember this. Engrave these words on to the inside of your eyelids so that you are reminded of this fact every time you blink:

The chief justification offered for the invasion of Iraq was that Iraq posed an imminent threat to the United States because it possessed weapons of mass destruction.

The beginnings of programs is not enough. The materials to make WMDs is not enough. Only actual possession of completed weapons could have made Iraq an actual imminent threat.

That, to me, is the critical thing that was lied about. Iraq was not an imminent threat, the way Kosovo was a ticking time bomb about to go off. All Bush had to do was give the French and Germans a couple of lousy months. That small a compromise, offered before Chirac dug in his heels, would have made all of the difference, IMHO.

Now, if Bush wants to play the humanitarian, he should have sold this on humanitarian grounds from the beginning. Instead, what we have is the Emperor reaching for a towel because everyone else has realized that he really didn't have any clothes.

Theo is right. Iraq was a humanitarian crisis in 1992, not 2002. In 2002 it was a humanitarian wreck.

Do you want to know what the single best way to get rid of Saddam Hussein and any possible threat he may have posed? Lift the sanctions. What kept Saddam in power was his ability to blame the economic situation that he fostered to keep himself in power on the sanctions. Lift them, and back up. Without the US as a boogey man, Saddam would have either had to start treating his population better or face a coup (whether popular or internal). Then it would be possible to facilitate a gradual shift to a representative government.

How about this for a parallel argument: Saudi Arabia treats its people about as bad as Saddam Hussein did, and the links between that government and 9/11 are non-fiction (if not provably direct). Why didn't we invade them instead? The humanitarian case is at least equal, and the terrorist case is far greater. For the cynics, they even sit on more oil, and I wouldn't doubt a claim that SA has bio and/or chemical weapons (and certainly the ability to produce them rapidly in massive quantities, what with all of those petrochemical industries that are there). If anything, the case for invading Saudi Arabia is far stronger than the case for invading Iraq was.

Or do you think that it may be possible that it would be better to achieve things gradually? No dictator lives forever. Representative governments are immortal compared to the short life-span of a brutal dictator. So we have time on our side, why not take advantage of that?

Let's not forget that General Patton wanted to mix it up with the Soviet Union right after WWII. Was he right, or was it better to take a gradual, patient, approach?

BlackGriffen

[theolein]

Originally posted by moki:
that implies you haven't been beaten or overcome...



And what kind of "standard" would *never* doing anything be?

I'd rather be glad the action happened than criticize the timing...

I have been beaten, quite often. It happens and gives one an insight what it's like to "lose", your implied anathema, as if this were some kind of computer game (pun not intended), which I don't think it is. I would have though the idea of this board would have been to make one think, not win debating points, not with the topics that are discussed here.

I said it so many times, that I don't know how to make this point understood any better: I am not against the invasion of Iraq to get rid of Saddam.

Perhaps, just to be anal, I should say that again: I am not against the invasion of Iraq to get rid of Saddam.

However, and you know this, although you steadfastly fail to even acknowledge the point, the invasion of Iraq was not called for on humanitarian grounds by Bush and Blair. They called for the invasion on the grounds of WMD. Point. NO call was ever made to the UN prior to the war, or to the EU or Nato, for that matter, to intervene in Iraq on Humanitarian reasons. The same in Afghanistan, where everybody and their mothers helped the US, although that action was the first in the so called war on terror and had nothing to do with humanitarian issues in Afghanistan prior to the invasion.

The humanitarian issues were hardly mentioned.

It was only AFTER the invasion, that the issue of the humanitarian reaons was even mentioned to any large extent, and it is very easy to doubt the genuine origin of those claims as it came when it bacame apparent that enforcing the hastily thought out post war scenario was not going to be that simple. Then it suddenly became everybody's business and obligation to send money and soldiers to serve under American orders.

And that is yet another double standard if there ever was one.

I find it senseless to continually accuse others of double standards while not explaining the real reasons for the conflict.

[moki]

Originally posted by theolein:
However, and you know this, although you steadfastly fail to even acknowledge the point, the invasion of Iraq was not called for on humanitarian grounds by Bush and Blair. They called for the invasion on the grounds of WMD. Point. NO call was ever made to the UN prior to the war, or to the EU or Nato, for that matter, to intervene in Iraq on Humanitarian reasons. The same in Afghanistan, where everybody and their mothers helped the US, although that action was the first in the so called war on terror and had nothing to do with humanitarian issues in Afghanistan prior to the invasion.

Actually, I've acknowledge both. I've even stated that if the WMD issue isn't resolved/explained to my satisfaction, I will go well out of my way to vote against Mr Bush in about a year.

[theolein]

Originally posted by moki:
Actually, I've acknowledge both. I've even stated that if the WMD issue isn't resolved/explained to my satisfaction, I will go well out of my way to vote against Mr Bush in about a year.

In that case, my apologies. I didn't see it.