FREE ESSAY ON KOSOVO CONFLICT

KOSOVO CONFLICT

Kosovo
Background of Kosovo:
-The Balkans have been a very unstable region for hundreds of years. The reason for
contention is because of ethnic origin and disputes of which race owns which land.. That
is the reason for the dispute over Kosovo is because of the same thing. This is a very
complicated situation, that I don't really know everything about. I just kind of know the
basics. Back in the 1500 hundreds, the Serbs conquered the Kosovo area, slowly and
gradually over the years the Ethnic Albanians started occupying the territory, until
before the bombing began, Kosovo consisted of 90% Ethnic Albanians. Well, the Serbs
didn't like this, especially Milosevic who is the ruler over Serbia. Since Kosovo has
many historical ties to the Serbs, and the Serbs conquered that territory back in the
1500 hundreds, Milosevic wanted to reclaim their rightful territory. And his method to do
this was through ethnic cleansing Kosovo. 
Stats:
-Milosevic has been doing this subtlety for years, and as of last fall has increased his
killing of ethnic Albainians. To date, there are now 200,00 people dead as a result of
Milosevic's ethnic cleansing. That is probably a very low figure. 100,000 Kosovar men are
now missing, which might be the reason for the mass graves that have been pictured.
Nearly one half a million people have been expelled from their homes, many forced out at
gunpoint, while the Serbian troops destroyed their identity papers, making them unable to
return to their homes. This flood of refugees have overwhelmed neighboring countries, who
are economically weak, and are unable to take in all the refugees. 600,000 Kosovars are
surviving off the land in mountains nearby.
Controversy:
-You might wonder what business the U.S. has in a country on the other side of the world,
where it seems to be no political interest whatsoever. That is a big controversery of
whether or not NATO should be involved. At first I was against NATO involvement for just
those reasons, why should NATO get involved where there would be no benefit to us,
because this was more of a humanitarian issue. But as I researched this and read more
about it, I am in favor of NATO involvement. I believe that we should do everything
possible to help stop Tyrants from killing innocent people. Which is what was and is
occuring in Kosovo.
-But I am against NATO in who, why and how NATO is handling this conflict. 
Who:
-NATO is very hypocritical by saying they got involved in this situation purely because
of humanitarian reasons. There have been many occasions where the U.S. looked the other
way on bigger humanitarian disasters. In West Africa, there was a similar ethnic
cleansing situation where the U.S. did not get involved. 
Why:
-In the begging, where NATO was on the verge of bombing Kosovo, Clinton spoke in a public
meeting about why we were getting involved. He said, trying to get public approval, that
the reason the U.S. is getting involved is largely an economical reason. He said that
this war would help the U.S. financially. By getting involved, we would become partners
with Europe, thus increasing a trade relationship. That is what I am against. I am
against the U.S./Clinton thinking more about how much money we can get, rather than
saving innocent lives from being brutally murdered. 
-After the bombing had dragged on for longer than expected, which was only about a week
in some people's opinion, the objectives were stated as follows: To stop ethnic
cleansing, stop flood of refugees into nieghboring countries, stop NATO from splitting,
prevent Milosevic from strengthening his grip on the Balkan region. And, after over 2
months of involvement, NATO has not been able to meet those objectives. 
-Bob Bennet said that the current bombing has been no help to the Albanians and
Macedonians, who have seen hundreds of thousands of refugees flood across the borders
into their ill-equipped countries. It has been of no help to NATO, an alliance that has
seen its military stocks drawn down to dangerously low levels, with no effects on the
atrocities going on in the killing fields. 
-One speculated reason to get involved was because of the military stategic point in the
Balkans. After NATO wins, the U.S. would put troops in the area to secure it. That was
one reason why Russia is against U.S. involvement.
How:
This is my biggest controversy to NATO's actions. NATO's strategy to stop Milosevic from
killing innocent people, was to bomb him into submission. Military officials predicted
this war would last less than two weeks. NATO underestimated milosevics tolerance.
(VIETNAM CARTOON) Many people compare this war to vietnam. The U.S. underestimated what
Vietnamise were willing to take. Also, both sides did not fully explore the possiblity of
a peaceful negotiation. After the Vietnam war, there was a study on the conflict where a
group of researchers tried to find out if there was a better way of handling the
conflict. They talked with both U.S. government and the vietnamese government, they found
that both sides were much more open to negotiations than previously thought. The U.S.
just assumed that there was no peaceful solution, and thought bombing would solve all
problems. Which in the end, made things much worse. That is the question being raised in
this conflict, could there have been a peaceful negotiation? 
-quote from New York Times-This century has been the bloodiest in history. Over 160
million human beings have been killed in various conflicts, and that number rises each
day. It is a dark history, but unless we look at it and seek to learn from it, it will
only get darker. It was once famously said that the United States did not have 10 years
of experience n Vietnam, but one year of experience 10 times over. Will we say the same
about the Balkans?
-This is a quote from a military spokesman, NATO strikes continue to cause serious damage
to the Serb military and will further degrade their capability to commit atrocities
against the Kosovo Albanian population We are also seeing increased evidence of ethnic
cleansing-Same spokesman, same briefing, same day, one minute later. This is also a
characteristic of Vietnam, where there was very questionable news being sent back to the
public. There is very vague reports of what NATO bombed, and how bad the damage was. It
doesn't seem as though we are getting all the information. There has been much use of
double speak in the news. The death of innocent men, women and children from bombs and
missiles launched by over a thousand warplanes are labeled as Unintentional collateral
damage. Bakeries and water pumping stations blown to pieces by NATO's barrage are
dual-use facilities because soldiers, like civilians, eat and drink. And, of course,
deliberate terror bombing is a humanitarian war.
-Another big controversy of this war is whether or not to bring in ground troops. The
U.S. did not even consider ground troops before the war began; they didn't even have the
threat of using them. This gave Milosivic the advantage. Without even the threat of
ground troops coming in, Milosevic had all the freedom he wanted to ethnically cleanse
Kosovo. Milosevic was allready killing ethnic albanians before the bombing began, but not
to the degree he was after bombing started. NATO bombing gave the serbs a good reason to
start kicking all the Ethnic Albanians out. So, you could argue that NATO involvement has
only worstened the situation in Kosovo. 
- The reason why NATO picked air raids as there strategy to win was because they did not
want to lose allied lives. As in Somalia, the U.S. was involved as long as no U.S.
soldiers lives were not lost. Then in one day, when 15 soldiers died, the U.S. backed out
of Somalia. The single most remarkable fact about this war is this: Not one allied
soldier engaged in combat has even been seriously injured in 2 months of the campaign.
Has there ever been such a war anywhere? 
-It seems as though NATO's biggest objective in this war is to make sure that no allied
lives are lost, not to save the thousands of Kosovars that are dying and millions that
are going homeless. This is by far my biggest objection to this war. If the U.S. is going
to get involved in a war, then I believe that we should do whatever is necessary to
accomplish the objectives. In this case, to save the ethnic albanians. 
-A recent pole showed that 63% of the American people think that NATO is right in getting
involved. When asked about sending in ground troops this dropped to only 41% thinking
that ground troops should be used. This means that the majority of people are allright
with being involve in a conflict, just as long as no allied soldier's lives are lost. And
this is exactly how Clinton is going about this war. Clinton, I believe, is too concern
with public opinion. In general, the average american citizen is not going to have an
in-depth knowledge of the Kosovo situation, and what strategy would be the best to use to
save the most amount of lives. 
-NATO is not even willing to air drop desperately needed food and medicine to the tens of
thousands of Albanians still trapped inside Kosovo. The reason for this is because the
planes would have to fly low and they might be shot down. I guess this didn't apply to
the f-117 stealth fighter pilot who was shot down over enemy territory. NATO actually got
together an entire rescue team, flew over enemy territory in a helicopter, much more
vulnerable than a plane, and rescue the single pilot taking an incredible risk of being
shot down. Is this supposed to mean that a single allied life is worth more than
thousands of albanian lives?
My view:
-I think that the U.S. should use the Powell strategy used in Desert Storm. To use as
much force as possible to overwhelm the opposition. I believe that a human life is worth
the same no matter where that person is from. I believe that if the President is not
willing to sacrifice allied lives to achieve military objectives, then we have no
business