Sara Flounders, International Action Center, 1995 

The recurring media image of Yugoslavia in the United States and Europe is of desperate people fleeing local war and ethnic hatred or living a precarious existence dependent on United Nations convoys for their next meal. 

According to the United Nations High Commission on Refugees, this is the largest refugee population in the world. By 1994 figures, there are over 3.7 million war refugees in the former Yugoslavia. The war has taken its toll on all participants in the struggle. Of the refugees, 44% are Muslim, 36% are Serbs and 20% are Croatian. The enormous human suffering represented in these cold statistics cannot be calculated.  

The very names Bosnia and Serbia are now associated with "ethnic cleansing," mass rape, atrocities and age-old national hatreds. 

U.S. involvement, UN troops and NATO forces are depicted as peacekeepers or neutral forces that are carrying out humanitarian or diplomatic missions. When UN officials, NATO generals, and U.S., British, French or German diplomats meet it’s to discuss the newest peace plan. Every measure is always described as being based on deep concern over how to end the fighting. 

Is the civil war raging in Yugoslavia a case of spontaneous combustion caused by "ancient ethnic hatreds" burning out of control? Is the U.S. government an innocent bystander? Is the real problem presidential indecision about how to defend a small, oppressed Bosnian Moslem government targeted by the new fascists of the 1990s—the Serbs? 

Age-old ethnic hatred among small nationalities didn’t just explode into modern-day barbarism. Rather, war exists in the region as a result of the intervention of outside powers. In this process the U.S. has been neither an innocent bystander nor a neutral party. 

A closer examination of the root causes of the incredibly destructive civil war raging in the region yields a completely different picture. 

The reality is that the U.S. government lit the fire in the Balkans. At every stage Washington has acted as an arsonist pouring gasoline on the flames.  

The greatest responsibility for the dismemberment of Yugoslavia and the resulting civil war lies with the U.S. government. It was not an accident or an oversight. It was a policy decision.  

Each step the U.S. has taken has widened the war and increased divisions in the region.  

TABLE OF CONTENTS  

• Origins of the breakup—a U.S. law 
• Control of the purse strings  
• European Intervention 
• Rewriting history 
• Casting the Serbs as fascists 
• The rape charge 
• Control through division in Bosnia 
• The CIA role in Bosnia 
• UN leaks information on U.S. role 
• Use of war propaganda 
• U.S. support for Croatian invasion of Krajina 
• "Safe areas" launching pads for U.S. war 
• The pretext for NATO bombs 
• "End the arms embargo" means widen the war 
• War is called peace 
• Inter-imperialist rivalry 
• Sanctions: Economic domination of the region 
• The Pentagon plan 
• Operation Balkan Storm 
• The only solution—U.S. out  

                          A year before the breakup of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, 
                          on Nov. 5, 1990, the U.S. Congress passed the 1991 Foreign Operations 
                          Appropriations Law 101-513. This bill was a signed death warrant. One 
                          provision in particular was so lethal that even a CIA report described three 
                          weeks later in the Nov. 27, 1990, New York Times predicted it would lead to 
                          a bloody civil war. 

                          A section of Law 101-513 suddenly and without previous warning cut off 
                          all aid, trade, credits and loans from the U.S. to Yugoslavia within six 
                          months. It also ordered separate elections in each of the six republics that 
                          make up Yugoslavia, requiring State Department approval of election 
                          procedures and results before aid to the separate republics would be 
                          resumed. The legislation further required U.S. personnel in all international 
                          financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International 
                          Monetary Fund to enforce this cut-off policy for all credits and loans. 

                          There was one final provision. Only forces that the U.S. State Department 
                          defined as "democratic forces" would receive funding. This meant an influx 
                          of funds to small right-wing nationalist parties in a financially strangled 
                          region suddenly thrown into crisis by the overall funding cut-off. 

                          The impact was, as expected, devastating. 

                          This law threw the Yugoslav federal government into crisis. It was unable 
                          to pay the enormous interest on its foreign debt or even to arrange the 
                          purchase of raw materials for industry. Credit collapsed and recriminations 
                          broke out on all sides. 

                          At the time there was no civil war. No republic had seceded. The U.S. was 
                          not engaged in a public dispute with Yugoslavia. The region was not even 
                          in the news. World attention was focused on the international coalition the 
                          Bush administration was assembling to destroy Iraq—a war that reshaped 
                          the Middle East at a cost of half a million Iraqi lives. 

                          What was behind the sweeping legislation directed at Yugoslavia, 
                          especially when U.S. policy makers themselves predicted that the sudden 
                          unraveling of the region would lead to civil war? 

                          With the collapse of the Soviet Union, U.S. big business was embarking on 
                          an aggressive march to reshape all of Europe. Nonaligned Yugoslavia was 
                          no longer needed as a buffer state between NATOand the Warsaw Pact. A 
                          strong, united Europe was hardly desirable. Washington policy makers 
                          considered both to be relics of the Cold War. 

                          This one piece of legislation—Law 101-513—demonstrates the U.S. 
                          government’s enormous power. It was one part of annual legislation that 
                          defines in detail policies to be pursued in every region of the globe. The 
                          Foreign Operations Act implements U.S. corporate control through major 
                          funding to international financial institutions such as the Inter-American 
                          Development Bank, Asian Development Fund, the African Development 
                          Fund, and through direct assistance to individual countries. 

                          The deadly restrictions on Yugoslavia took a mere 23 lines. Compare this 
                          to the more than nine pages that detail sanctions to be imposed on Iraq. 
                          As of January 1995, the U.S.-UN sanctions on Iraq had killed more than 
                          half a million children. This projection is from Thomas Ekfal, the United 
                          Nations Children’s Fund representative in Baghdad. (New York Newsday, 
                          Dec. 19, 1994) 

                          The 1990 foreign appropriations law also prescribed various forms of 
                          economic strangulation for several other countries deemed enemies, 
                          including Angola, Cambodia, Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Korea (DPRK) 
                          and Vietnam. On the other hand countries moving hastily toward a 
                          capitalist market economy in 1990, such as Poland, were to receive special 
                          funding. 

                          In all the expressions of concern and sympathy for refugees and displaced 
                          people in countries all over the globe, but especially in the former 
                          Yugoslavia, no U.S. official ever mentions the terrible suffering caused by 
                          U.S. economic strangulation. 

                          Of course, financial strings were hardly new to Yugoslavia in 1990. 
                          Yugoslavia had become utterly dependent on loans from Western banks. 
                          The increasingly onerous conditions had dislocated the economy. A year 
                          earlier, the price of continued U.S. loans and credits was a brutal austerity 
                          program that devalued the currency, froze wages, cut subsidies, closed 
                          many state industries deemed unprofitable for capitalist investors and 
                          increased unemployment to 20 percent. The result was strikes, walkouts, a 
                          sharp increase in political and economic tension, and, above all, an 
                          upsurge in national antagonisms on all sides. 

                          Once the U.S. acted so decisively toward Yugoslavia in 1990, the European 
                          powers were hardly willing to be bystanders to the enforced break-up of a 
                          country in their own backyard. The U.S. Foreign Appropriations Bill sent a 
                          clear message to the European powers that Yugoslavia and the whole 
                          Balkan region of Europe were again up for grabs. On their own they might 
                          never have dared to act. Now they dared not be out of the action. 

                          By February 1991 the Council of Europe followed the U.S. measure with its 
                          own political demands and explicit economic intervention in the internal 
                          affairs of the Yugoslav Federation. Their demand was similar: that 
                          Yugoslavia hold multi-party elections or face economic blockade. 

                          Right-wing and fascist organizations not seen in 45 years—since the 
                          defeat of the Nazi occupation by the anti-fascist partisan movement—were 
                          suddenly revived and began receiving covert support. These fascist 
                          organizations had been maintained in exile in the U.S., Canada, Germany 
                          and Austria. Now they became the main conduit for funds and arms. 

                          By March 1991, Croatian fascists were organizing attacks and 
                          demonstrations calling for the overturn of the socialist federation and the 
                          expulsion of all Serbs from Croatia. 

                          On May 5, 1991, the date of the six-month deadline imposed by U.S. 
                          Foreign Operations Law 101-513, Croatian separatists staged violent 
                          demonstrations and besieged a military base in Gospic. The Yugoslav 
                          Federal Government, under attack, ordered the army to intervene. The civil 
                          war had begun. Slovenia and Croatia declared independence on June 25, 
                          1991. 

                          In Croatia the right-wing party, the Ustashi, came to power using fascist 
                          symbols and slogans from the era of Nazi occupation. Its program 
                          guaranteed a return to capitalist property relations and denied citizenship, 
                          jobs, pensions, passports or land ownership to all other nationalities, but 
                          especially targeted the large Serbian minority. In the face of armed 
                          expropriations and mass expulsions, the Serbs in Croatia began to arm 
                          themselves. The experience of World War II—when almost a million 
                          people, primarily Serbs, but also Jews, Romani and tens of thousands of 
                          others died in Ustashi death camps—fueled the mobilization. 

                          As the largest nationality and the one that opposed the breakup of the 
                          Yugoslav Federation, the Serbs became the target and the excuse for 
                          Western intervention. History was turned on its head as the media 
                          portrayed the Serbs as fascists. In 1991, right-wing nationalist parties 
                          swept the elections in Slovenia and Croatia. However, in Serbia and in 
                          Montenegro the mass mood was overwhelmingly for the federation and 
                          also against further privatization or other capitalist inroads. This was an 
                          unexpected resistance to the political collapse sweeping Eastern Europe at 
                          the time. 

                          The tactic of targeting the Serbs with UN resolutions, imposing brutal 
                          sanctions, and freezing all credit and trade also serves as a veiled threat 
                          against Russia. The breakup and dismemberment of the Soviet Union has 
                          been encouraged by the same forces that encouraged the breakup of 
                          Yugoslavia. 

                          Reunited Germany moved aggressively into the region to consolidate its 
                          position. It was the first to openly grant diplomatic recognition to the 
                          break-away republics. 

                          The U.S. State Department’s position after Croatia and Slovenia seceded 
                          was official support for a continued federation. But this flew in the face of 
                          the demands and the process set in motion by the U.S. Foreign Operations 
                          Law passed in 1990 before the Yugoslav civil war began. 
 

                          The rationale behind Western intervention in Yugoslavia is based on
                          rewriting history.

                          Every debate about drawing and redrawing the map of Bosnia assumes the
                          right of the Western powers as outside "neutral" forces to carve up and
                          decide the fate of the region in the interests of "peace." The implied
                          justification is that the small, barbaric nations of the Balkans are so torn by
                          ethnic hatred that they are incapable of deciding anything themselves.

                          There is a bloody history in the Balkans—but it’s not the one that’s being
                          connected to the present-day struggle. It’s much more to the point. That’s
                          the history of the major imperialist powers battling for control and
                          domination of this strategic crossroads of Europe and the Middle East. 

                          The history of modern Europe sometimes seems to revolve around carving
                          and recarving the Balkans. It is a history of continually redrawing borders
                          and defining regions of influence, of arming mercenary bands and holding
                          international conferences in Paris, in Berlin, in London and at the Hague to
                          confer about which power would be in control of what region. All this was
                          always without any consultation with the many small nationalities whose
                          fate hung in the balance.

                          The Austro-Hungarian Empire, Ottoman Turkey, Czarist Russia, Britain,
                          France, Germany and Italy have all considered the Balkans their rightful
                          "sphere of influence." World War I began in Sarajevo. Although the
                          competition and rivalry for markets extended globally—far beyond the
                          Balkans—this small region has always been a tinderbox for the big powers.

                          In World War II the resistance movement to Nazi German occupation led
                          by Marshal Tito and the League of Yugoslav Communists united the small
                          nations of the Balkans into an explosive political force. From scattered
                          bands of guerrillas it grew into the largest partisan movement in Europe,
                          more than a million strong. Forty-three German divisions could not destroy
                          the movement. This experience shaped Yugoslavia’s history and laid the
                          basis for the socialist federation. It remains a powerful heritage today.

                          Today, while the capitalist media speak endlessly of "ancient ethnic
                          hatreds," this revolutionary partisan movement and the long tradition of
                          struggles to unite the South Slav peoples against outside domination is
                          never mentioned.

                          For 45 years the Yugoslav Federation—six republics and two autonomous
                          regions—was able to hold the Western powers at bay. It was able to
                          develop industry in an impoverished, underdeveloped area and raise the
                          standard of living. The fact that the IMF and U.S. banks were able to again
                          strangle and dismember it does not negate its historical accomplishment.

                          How did the Serbs come to be viewed as fascists in this developing
                          conflict? This characterization has now become an accepted fact, an issue
                          beyond debate. It makes U.S. motives seem unimpeachable and on the side
                          of good against evil.

                          An April 1993 interview by Jacques Merlino, associate director of French
                          TV 2, with James Harff, director of Ruder Finn Global Public Affairs, a
                          Washington, D.C.-based public relations firm, explains the role of the
                          corporate media in shaping a political issue. 

                          Harff bragged of his services to his clients, the Republic of Croatia, the
                          Republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina and the parliamentary opposition in
                          Kosovo, an autonomous region of Serbia. Merlino described how Harff
                          uses a file of several hundred journalists, politicians, representatives of
                          humanitarian associations, and academics to create public opinion. Harff
                          explained: "Speed is vital ... it is the first assertion that really counts. All
                          denials are entirely ineffective."

                          In the interview, Merlino asked Harff what his proudest public relations
                          endeavor was. Harff responded:

                          "To have managed to put Jewish opinion on our side. This was a sensitive
                          matter, as the dossier was dangerous looked at from this angle. President
                          Tudjman was very careless in his book, ‘Wastelands of Historical Reality.’
                          Reading his writings one could accuse him of anti-Semitism. [Tudjman
                          claimed the Holocaust never happened—S.F.] In Bosnia the situation was
                          no better: President Izetbegovic strongly supported the creation of a
                          fundamentalist Islamic state in his book, ‘The Islamic Declaration.’

                          "Besides, the Croatian and Bosnian past was marked by real and cruel
                          anti-Semitism. Tens of thousands of Jews perished in Croatian camps, so
                          there was every reason for intellectuals and Jewish organizations to be
                          hostile toward the Croats and the Bosnians. Our challenge was to reverse
                          this attitude and we succeeded masterfully.

                          "At the beginning of July 1992, New York Newsday came out with the
                          article on Serb camps. We jumped at the opportunity immediately. We
                          outwitted three big Jewish organizations—the B’nai B’rith
                          Anti-Defamation League, The American Jewish Committee and the
                          American Jewish Congress. In August, we suggested that they publish an
                          advertisement in the New York Times and organize demonstrations outside
                          the United Nations.

                          "That was a tremendous coup. When the Jewish organizations entered the
                          game on the side of the [Muslim] Bosnians we could promptly equate the
                          Serbs with the Nazis in the public mind. Nobody understood what was
                          happening in Yugoslavia. The great majority of Americans were probably
                          asking themselves in which African country Bosnia was situated. 

                          "By a single move, we were able to present a simple story of good guys
                          and bad guys which would hereafter play itself. We won by targeting the
                          Jewish audience. Almost immediately there was a clear change of language
                          in the press, with use of words with high emotional content such as ethnic
                          cleansing, concentration camps, etc., which evoke images of Nazi Germany
                          and the gas chambers of Auschwitz. No one could go against it without
                          being accused of revisionism. We really batted a thousand in full."

                          Merlino: "But between 2 and 5 Aug. 1992 when you did this you had no
                          proof that what you said was true. All you had were two Newsday
                          articles."

                          Harff: "Our work is not to verify information. We are not equipped for that.
                          Our work is to accelerate the circulation of information favorable to us, to
                          aim at judiciously chosen targets. We did not confirm the existence of
                          death camps in Bosnia, we just made it widely known that Newsday
                          affirmed it. ... We are professionals. We had a job to do and we did it. We
                          are not paid to moralize."

                         One charge against the Serbs has aroused the anger and shaped the view
                         of millions of people who previously had little interest or involvement in
                         the Balkans. The charge is rape—rape as a systematic weapon of war, a
                         planned deliberate strategy. The media asserts that rapes were a conscious
                         policy and the responsibility of the Bos nian Serb leadership.

                         Between the fall of 1992 and spring of 1993 sensational news reports
                         claimed that at least 20,000 and up to 100,000 Muslim women were raped by
                         units of the Bosnian Serb Army. This crystallized the view that the Serbs
                         were the aggressors and the Muslims the victims.

                         Women are the first victims in every war. Rape and the degrading abuse of
                         women are all too often carried out as a stamp of conquest by invading
                         armies imbued with patriarchal possessive attitudes. But the charge of rape
                         has many times been consciously used as an essential prop of war
                         propaganda. The purported defense of women is used to mobilize armies
                         and galvanize blind hatred.

                         The sensational charges of rape were used to a cynical extent by the major
                         corporate media, especially in the U.S., with no attempt to examine the
                         sources. The foreign minister of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Haris Silajdzic, first
                         raised the charge at peace talks in Geneva that 30,000 women and girls had
                         been raped. Ms. magazine ran a cover story that accused Bosnian Serb
                         forces of raping for the purpose of producing pornographic films. No such
                         films were ever found and the charges were not supported by the findings
                         of Helsinki Watch or Human Rights Watch.

                         In January 1993 the Warburton Report, authorized by the European
                         Community, estimated 20,000 Muslim women had been raped as part of a
                         Serb strategy of conquest. This report was widely cited as an independent,
                         authoritative source. No coverage was given to a dissenting member of the
                         investigative team, Simone Veil, a former French minister and president of
                         the European Parliament. She revealed that the estimate of 20,000 victims
                         was based on actual interviews with only four victims—two women and
                         two men.

                         According to the New York Times of Oct. 19, 1993, the Croatian Ministry of
                         Health in Zagreb was the main single source upon which the Warburton
                         Report based its figure of 20,000.

                         The Jan. 4, 1993, issue of Newsweek reported that up to 50,000 Muslim
                         women had been raped in Bosnia. Tom Post, a contributor to the article,
                         explained that the estimate of 50,000 rapes was based on interviews with 28
                         women.

                         This estimate was the result of an extrapolation—multiplying each charge
                         of rape by a certain factor because historically rape has been and
                         continues to be an under-reported crime.

                         French television reporter Jerome Bony explained the problem. "When I
                         was 50 kilometers from Tuxla, I was told: `Go to the Tuxla high school
                         grounds. There are 4,000 raped women.’ At 20 kilometers this figure
                         dropped to 400. At 10 kilometers only 40 were left. Once at the site, I found
                         only four women willing to testify."

                         The Jan. 15, 1993, New York Times, carried a photo story with the caption:
                         "A two-month-old baby girl born to a teen-age Muslim woman after she
                         was raped in a Serbian detention camp." USA Today of Jan. 13, 1993, told
                         the story of a five-month-old baby, presumably the product of systematic
                         Serbian rape. At that time, the war was not yet nine months old.

                         Women’s organizations understandably outraged by these lurid reports
                         demanded that the U.S. and the European powers take action. However,
                         many of these same women ought to be aware that U.S. troops do not
                         protect women. In every U.S. military operation an entire sex industry is
                         created and tens of thousands of women are forced into sexual slavery and
                         prostitution. Consider the experience of Vietnam, Thailand, Korea and the
                         Philippines. Even U.S. women in the military experience rape and sexual
                         abuse, then cover-ups and denial, as the Tailhook scandal so graphically
                         demonstrated.

                         The divisive U.S. role in Bosnia, the most multi-ethnic of the regions, raises
                         other questions. Does the U.S. seek, through the breakup of Yugoslavia,
                         not only to position itself in the region but to advance a more complex,
                         hidden agenda? Certainly U.S. conduct has involved many maneuvers that
                         have prolonged the war and increased the rivalry among Britain, France
                         and Germany. Turkey, Greece and Italy have also historically been
                         involved in the region and are again maneuvering. 

                         On March 18, 1992, a negotiated agreement for a unified state brokered by
                         the European Community was reached in Lisbon among the Bosnian
                         Muslim, Croatian and Serb forces. This agreement of all three parties would
                         have prevented the disastrous civil war that began that same year. It would
                         have saved the hundreds of thousands of refugees whose lives have been
                         destroyed by war. 

                         Washington sabotaged this original agreement by telling the Bos nian
                         regime of Alija Izetbegovic that it could get much more—possibly
                         domination of the whole region—with U.S. backing. The U.S. role in
                         destroying this carefully crafted agreement is acknowledged by all sides.
                         Even the June 17, 1993, New York Times described Washington’s role. The
                         U.S. government officially encouraged Izetbegovic, the head of the
                         right-wing Party for Democratic Action, to unilaterally declare a sovereign
                         state under his presidency. 

                         Muslim groups in two separate areas of Bosnia have challenged the
                         government led by Alija Izetbegovic. They dispute Izetbegovic’s claim that
                         he represents the interests of the Muslim community. They want a policy
                         of cooperation and trade with the other nationalities of the region. Both
                         groups have condemned Izetbegovic for right-wing nationalist policies and
                         reliance on U.S. military aid.

                         The elected Bosnian Muslim government in the city of Tuzla, one of the
                         wealthiest industrial centers of old Yugoslavia, claims that the
                         U.S.-supervised rewrite of the Bosnian constitution gave power only to the
                         most extreme right-wing nationalist forces of Izetbegovic’s Party for
                         Democratic Action and neo-fascist Franjo Tudjman’s Croatian Democratic
                         Union. Other political forces even among Muslims were excluded. 

                         A Bosnian Muslim group in the northwest Bihac area led by Fikret Adbic
                         declared its autonomy from the U.S.-backed government based in Sarajevo.
                         In retaliation, the Izetbegovic government launched a military attack
                         against these Muslim forces that wanted peace with their Serbian and
                         Croatian neighbors. This attack on an elected Moslem Bosnian
                         government was organized by the U.S. As was reported in November 1994
                         in Britain in such newspapers as the Guardian, the Observer and the
                         Independent as well as newspapers in France and Germany, six U.S.
                         generals took part in planning the offensive in June 1994. The attack
                         violated the cease-fire and a UN-declared safe area. 

                         The Izetbegovic government’s U.S.-backed offensive was at first
                         successful in the Bihac region. But the Bosnian Serbs, in alliance with
                         Serbs in Croatia and Bosnian Moslem forces led by Fikret Adbic,
                         reorganized and began a strong push back. U.S. bombers under NATO
                         command came to Izetbegovic’s defense.

                         In the U.S. media, neither the U.S. role in planning the offensive nor the
                         fact that the U.S.-backed forces were the ones to violate the cease-fire was
                         examined. The Bosnian Muslim forces opposing the Izetbegovic
                         government based in Sarajevo have received only scant mention as
                         "renegade forces."

                         Retired U.S. Air Force Gen. Charles G. Boyd, the deputy commander in
                         chief of the U.S. European Command from 1992 to 1995, wrote in the
                         September/October 1995 issue of Foreign Affairs magazine that Adbic’s
                         government in Bihac was "one of the few examples of successful
                         multi-ethnic cooperation in the Balkans." Further, Boyd writes, "Abdic, a
                         powerful local businessman, was a member of the Bosnian collective
                         presidency. He outpolled Izetbegovic in national elections and had been
                         expelled from the government when Sarajevo [Izetbegovic’s headquarters]
                         rejected an internationally brokered peace agreement."

                         U.S. backing of Izetbegovic’s attack on other Bosnian Muslim forces
                         exposes just how cynically the Pentagon is using right-wing Muslim forces
                         in order to prolong and widen the war. Those who call on the Pentagon to
                         come to the defense of Muslim people should recall the U.S. role in the
                         Middle East. The U.S. government has demonized Muslim people and
                         made war on the people of Palestine, Libya, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran and
                         Somalia. Muslim people in Bosnia will be the greatest losers in this
                         war-torn region as a result of the alliance of the narrow, right-wing
                         Izetbegovic grouping and the Pentagon.

                          Another view of U.S. aims and U.S. involvement develops from reading the
                          European press. 

                          Here are some headlines from the British press:

                          "CIA agents training Bosnian army," The Guardian (Nov. 17, 1994) 

                          "America’s secret Bosnia agenda," The Observer (Nov. 20, 1994)

                          "How the CIA helps Bosnia fight back," The European (Nov. 25, 1994)

                          "Allies facing split over Bosnia," The Independent (Nov. 12, 1994)

                          "Europe braces for more rows with U.S.," The Guardian (Nov.12, 1994)

                          These few headlines expose both the CIA role in Bosnia and the depth of
                          the growing dispute in NATO. The media in France, Germany and Italy
                          have carried similar exposés of large-scale CIA involvement in the
                          widening war in Bosnia.

                          Coverage has included information on tactical operations, sharing satellite
                          information and controlling local air traffic. Units of both the Croatian and
                          Bosnian armies have reportedly been trained within the region and in the
                          U.S. U.S.-based forces have provided assistance in building airstrips and
                          organizing large weapons shipments through Croatia to the Bosnian
                          forces.

                          Also reported was the meeting of six U.S. generals with the leaders of the
                          Bosnian army to plan the military offensive that broke the nine-month
                          cease-fire in Bosnia and opened the fighting in the UN-declared "safe
                          zone" of Bihac. All of this immediately raises the question, how long has
                          the CIA been involved? What is its purpose? The budget of the CIA is
                          today three times the budget of the U.S. State Department.

                          The debate in the European press—complete with Pentagon denials and
                          "clarification"—has received scant coverage in the U.S. media. This
                          avoidance of an issue receiving wide coverage in Britain and France raises
                          further questions of why the major U.S. media are aiding and abetting this
                          operation and why the European media are exposing this information.

                          The exposés follow months of increasingly sharp criticisms and veiled
                          charges by UN officials that the U.S. has sabotaged each agreement, peace
                          plan and even the cease-fires.

                          It is clear that the civil war in Yugoslavia has broken the growing unity of
                          the European powers. They are at each other’s throats over how to
                          proceed. The struggle between the use of UN peacekeepers versus NATO
                          bombing reflects these divisions. 

                          Occasionally the debate makes it into the back pages of U.S. newspapers.
                          On April 30, 1994, the Washington Post cited two senior UN officials—a
                          general and a civilian—who blame the U.S. "for the continuation of the war
                          in Bosnia because it has given the Muslim-led Bosnian government the
                          false impression that Washington’s military support was on the way."

                          The article explained that the officials interviewed were two of the highest
                          ranking UN representatives in Bosnia. Yet they feared using their names
                          lest they be expelled from Bosnia. However, both claimed that U.S. moral
                          and financial support of the Izetbegovic regime was prolonging the war.

                          The officials accused the U.S. of leading on Izetbegovic’s forces by
                          promising full-scale NATO intervention on his side. U.S. Gen. John
                          Shalikashvili, chair of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, had gone to Sarajevo to
                          meet with Bosnian military leaders. It was a powerful incentive to keep
                          fighting.

                          That was reinforced when, in an impassioned speech at the opening of the
                          new U.S. Embassy in Sarajevo, U.S. Ambassador to the UN Madeleine
                          Albright said, "Your future and America’s future are inseparable."

                          On June 24, 1994, the New York Times described the new supplies,
                          including heavy weapons, flooding into Bosnia since the U.S. organized
                          the Croatian-Bosnian alliance. 

                          Each "peace proposal" or map defining the areas of Moslem or Serb
                          control divides the area into dependent, unsustainable enclaves needing
                          constant resupply, which would require a military presence for many years.
                          Industrial centers and the major roads in this mountainous region are
                          partitioned so the Bosnian government based in Sarajevo controls them.
                          The Bosnian Serbs have been allocated the poorest rural and mountainous
                          regions with no connecting roads or corridors between them. The Bosnian
                          Serbs cannot survive under these plans. Their situation is untenable. They
                          are driven to resist. 

                          The siege of Gorazde in the spring of 1994 is one of the clearest examples
                          of the U.S. propaganda barrage to justify and demand measures that would
                          widen the war and give the U.S. military a blank check. Nightly news
                          broadcasts about Gorazde focused on the Serbian bombing of a hospital
                          and claimed casualties in the thousands. Then, after days of gory stories in
                          the media and heavy U.S. pressure, U.S. planes flying under NATO
                          auspices bombed Serb positions. A heated UN Security Council debate
                          and vote, however, blocked the full-scale NATO air strikes that the U.S.
                          was demanding.

                          After the siege was lifted, the commander of UN troops in Bosnia, British
                          Army Lt. Gen. Michael Rose, told visiting U.S. Rep. John P. Murtha, chair
                          of the House Appropriations Committee subcommittee on defense, that
                          reports of damage and casualties were greatly exaggerated. The Bosnian
                          casualties around Gorazde "were closer to 200 than 2,000." The media had
                          wildly exaggerated casualties in order to promote a war climate and justify
                          NATO intervention.

                          The UN officials found that the hospital in Gorazde, which had been
                          repeatedly described as all but destroyed by the Serbs, basically needed a
                          broom to clear up the rubbish. It was still functioning. The hospital had
                          been damaged because the Izetbegovic government forces had established
                          their military headquarters next to the hospital.

                          After the siege ended, a report in the April 24, 1994, New York Times
                          referred to a giant munitions factory in Gorazde under Bosnian Muslim
                          control. The Pabjeda Munitions Factory includes "a honeycomb of
                          underground tunnels and storage bunkers." There were "enough
                          explosives in the factory to flatten a city." Throughout the siege the public
                          has been bombarded with countless stories on the plight of unarmed
                          Bosnian Muslim forces versus a well-armed Bosnian Serb army. 

                          World sympathy for the government of Izetbegovic has been built mainly
                          through horror stories of brutal Serbian attacks on unarmed civilians in
                          Sarajevo. One of the most gruesome was an attack on an open-air market
                          that left 68 people dead on Feb. 5, 1994. As the rift between the U.S. forces
                          and the British and French forces under UN flag grows more heated, these
                          widely publicized "Serb atrocities" are being disputed. A UN analysis of
                          the crater showed that the Izetbegovic regime’s forces were responsible for
                          the explosion at the market. (Reuters, Feb. 18, 1994)Later, the UN publicly
                          released a crater analysis of another shell that exploded, wounding a child,
                          as proof that Izetbegovic’s Bosnian army had fired on its own civilians to
                          gain sympathy. (New York Times Nov. 10, 1994)

                          Just a few weeks earlier U.S. war propaganda had reached new depths with
                          gory descriptions of carnage, mass rapes, disembowelment, even
                          massacres of children when the Bosnian government pulled out of
                          Srebrenica. However, a UN investigative team reported on July 24, 1995,
                          that they could not find a single eyewitness to any atrocity. 

                          Hubert Wieland, personal representative of the UN high commission for
                          human rights, traveled with a team of investigators to Srebrenica and to
                          Tuzla, the Bosnian city to which almost all the refugees were taken.
                          Although his team spoke with scores of Muslims at the main refugee camp
                          and at other collection centers, no eyewitness could be found.

                          In contrast to the storm of outrage in the media when the Serbs moved into
                          the town of Srebrenica, there was no such coverage two weeks later when
                          on Aug. 3, 1995, in a blitzkrieg attack, Croatian forces with U.S. backing
                          launched the biggest and the bloodiest offensive in four years of civil war.

                          Within a week 200,000 new refugees were fleeing the Croatian army.
                          However, there was no coverage of these old people being driven from
                          their homes or the chaos of thousands fleeing the bombing of their
                          villages. There was no sympathy and there was no talk of sanctions on
                          Croatia. Secretary of State Warren Christopher declared that the crushing
                          military offensive was "to our advantage." 

                          Pentagon support amounted to far more than just a nod of approval.
                          According to the London Independent of Aug. 6, 1995, "The re-arming and
                          training of Croatian Forces in preparation for the present offensive are part
                          of a classic CIA operation: probably the most ambitious operation of its
                          kind since the end of the Vietnam war."

                          The London Times of Aug. 5 reported that "the rearming of Croatia
                          remains one of the biggest untold stories of the Yugoslav war. American
                          officials strenuously deny any involvement in this operation but the region
                          is teeming with former generals who unconventionally chose the Balkans,
                          rather than Florida, for their well-earned retirement."

                          On a daily basis news coverage in the U.S. refers to Serb violations of
                          UN-declared "safe areas," six towns held by the Bosnian government and
                          surrounded by Serb-held territory. This term reinforces the popular
                          misconception that the "safe areas" are neutral, demilitarized, civilian
                          havens removed from the civil war. U.S. military support has made this term
                          a cynical fraud. 

                          The excuse for every NATO bombing of the Bosnian Serb forces has been
                          an alleged Serb attack on a "safe area." But it is U.S. military intervention
                          that has made these "safe areas" unsafe. The "safe areas" are really
                          staging areas for U.S.-backed Bosnian army offensives against the
                          Bosnian Serb forces. 

                          UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali confirmed this in a report to
                          the UN Security Council on May 30, 1995 (UN Document S/1995/444):

                          "In recent months [the U.S.-backed Bosnian] government forces have
                          considerably increased their military activity in and around most safe
                          areas, and many of them, including Sarajevo, Tuzla and Bihac, have been
                          incorporated into the broader military campaign of the [Bosnian]
                          government’s side. 

                          "The headquarters and the logistics installations of the Fifth Corps of the
                          [Bosnian] government army are located in the town of Bihac and those of
                          the Second Corps in the town of Tuzla.

                          "The government also maintains a substantial number of troops in
                          Srebrenica (in this case a violation of a demilitarization agreement), Gorazde
                          and Zepa, while Sarajevo is the location of the General Command of the
                          government army and other military installations. There is also an
                          ammunition factory in Gorazde.

                          "The Bosnian Serb forces’ reaction to offensives launched by the
                          [U.S.-backed Bosnian] government army from safe areas have generally
                          been to respond against military targets within those areas."

                          Still another explosion on Aug. 28, 1995, at a small enclosed marketplace in
                          Sarajevo killed 37 people. It became the U.S. pretext for the most massive
                          military action in Europe since World War II. More than 4,000 U.S.-NATO
                          military air sorties were carried out. 

                          New York Times Washington correspondent David Binder reported in the
                          Oct. 2, 1995, issue of The Nation magazine that the explosion came the day
                          after Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke promised more active
                          NATO air strikes. Only an excuse was needed. Binder quotes four different
                          military sources disputing the immediate UN report that blamed the
                          Bosnian Serbs for the explosion.

                          Russian artillery officer Col. Andrei Demurenko went on television in
                          Sarajevo to denounce the UN report on the explosion as a falsification. He
                          announced that the probability of hitting a street less than 30 feet wide
                          from Serb artillery positions one to two miles away was "one in one
                          million."

                          A Canadian specialist with extensive service in Bosnia told Binder that the
                          fuse of the mortar shell recovered from the marketplace crater "had not
                          come from a mortar tube at all."

                          Two unidentified U.S. administration officials in Sarajevo explained to
                          Binder that based on the trajectory, the shallowness of the crater, and the
                          absence of any high-pitched distinct whistle, the shell was either fired from
                          a very close range or dropped from a nearby roof into the crowd.

                          Although Binder is a regular correspondent for the New York Times, he
                          had to go to The Nation with this story.

                          The U.S. media’s outrage over the marketplace explosion in Sarajevo
                          stands in sharp contrast to the great approval for the U.S. launch of 13
                          Tomahawk cruise missiles targeting the city of Banja Luka. Banja Luka is a
                          city behind the Bosnian Serb lines. It is the second largest city in
                          Bosnia—and the city with the most refugees of all of the former
                          Yugoslavia. In the U.S.-NATO attack many civilians were killed and one
                          hospital was bombed.

                          The demand to "end the arms embargo" is raised as a simple slogan of the
                          Bosnian government’s right to defend itself. Like the term "safe areas" the
                          reality is far different.

                          "End the arms embargo" means to legitimize tens of thousands of U.S.
                          troops technically training the Bosnian army in advanced military
                          equipment, securing airports and roads for landing and moving heavy
                          equipment. It further involves U.S. surveillance flights and ground cover in
                          a mountainous region where a dependent, isolated minority government
                          currently controls small enclaves. This would greatly expand Pentagon
                          involvement beyond the CIA training and supply level of today and the
                          NATO air cover of more than 40,000 sorties in the past three years. 

                          There’s a struggle within the summits of U.S. power between those who
                          want to rely on U.S./NATO bombing missions to destroy the Bosnian Serb
                          forces and those who feel the only way to decisively control and reshape
                          the region is through U.S. ground troops and an end to the arms embargo.
                          Both sides of the debate seek to expand and widen the war. Both sides of
                          the debate assert the right of U.S. finance capital to impose its solution.

                          The newly formed Action Council for Peace in the Balkans best reflects the
                          cynical double-speak where peace means war. It is composed of the
                          bipartisan forces of U.S. militarism that are framing the debate. Members of
                          the Executive Council include Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security
                          advisor under Carter; Frank Carlucci, a national security advisor and
                          secretary of defense under Reagan; Hodding Carter, a state department
                          spokesperson under Carter; Max Kampelman, who headed Reagan’s
                          nuclear arms team; and Jeanne Kirkpatrick, Reagan’s United Nations
                          ambassador.

                          On July 12, 1995, this Council for Peace in the Balkans issued a call for "an
                          end to the arms embargo against Bosnia, the withdrawal of the UN forces
                          from Bosnia and an effective NATO air campaign." This "peaceful" group
                          asserts that the "air campaign" should be "strategic and sustained," not
                          "pinprick strikes." The statement concludes, "A failure to act will be
                          disastrous for the people of Bosnia, for the U.S., and for our vital interests
                          in Europe." 

                          CIA and Pentagon involvement in the civil war in the Balkans has
                          positioned the U.S. militarily in a strategic region. At the same time it has
                          frayed the developing unity among its European imperialist rivals. These
                          U.S. rivals bear the increasing burden of hundreds of thousands of
                          destitute refugees, thousands of ground troops in position and the bitter
                          acrimony of competing interests.

                          What appears to be a bureaucratic dispute between NATO and UN
                          officials is in reality a struggle between the imperialist ruling class of the
                          U.S. and its European rivals, who fear being drawn into a protracted war.
                          Each defends its right to carve up this strategic region in accordance with
                          its own interests. But the Europeans have troops on the ground. If their
                          forces take casualties while the U.S. calls the shots, opposition at home
                          will rise. 

                          There seems to be a great deal of information on close German-U.S.
                          collaboration at the expense of British and French interests. But even this
                          may change. The fact that the U.S. arms and trains the Croatian troops may
                          be a sign that Washington is asserting itself in Croatia also.

                          The debate on U.S.-controlled NATO forces helping to evacuate UN
                          "peacekeepers" reflects an expanding effort to make the U.S. the only
                          power deciding the fate of the Balkans. Both France’s and Britain’s
                          determination to be bigger powers in Europe now that the Cold War is over
                          is reflected in their large commitment of troops under the UN flag
                          throughout Bosnia. 

                          But the Pentagon has been able to totally frustrate the British and French
                          troop placements by encouraging the Bosnian government, which is
                          totally dependent on the U.S., to sabotage any agreements.

                          Washington’s November 1994 decision to unilaterally end support for the
                          UN Security Council arms embargo was the most open statement to date
                          that it would pursue its own agenda in Bosnia at the expense of the
                          Europeans. This decision is also at the expense of the hundreds of
                          thousands of uprooted and displaced people caught in the crossfire.

                          The UN Security Council voted to impose a sanctions blockade on the
                          remains of the Yugoslav Federation (Serbia and Montenegro) on May 30,
                          1992.

                          The UN Security Council vote was rushed through to pre-empt a UN report
                          published two days later saying that the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
                          was in full compliance with the UN demands that all Yugoslav Federal
                          Army troops be withdrawn from Bosnia.

                          These sanctions strangling all economic life were imposed only on the
                          Serbs, in spite of the fact that the World Court in the Hague ruled that the
                          Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) was not the
                          aggressor in the conflict in Bosnia.

                          UN sanctions have not been imposed on Washington’s client states in the
                          region, the Croatian and Bosnian governments. The UN Security Council
                          did not even discuss imposing sanctions on the Croatian government in
                          response to its August 1995 massive attack on the Krajina section of
                          Croatia and its expulsion or "ethnic cleansing" of over 200,000 Serbs there.

                          Although the stated aim of sanctions is to end arms shipments from Serbia
                          to the Serbs in Bosnia, U.S. and Western powers used the opportunity of
                          enforcing the sanctions to gain control of all the roads, waterways and
                          communications in this strategic part of Europe. All approaches to
                          seaports and airports are sealed off. 

                          The Pentagon now controls all navigation on the mighty Danube
                          River—major thoroughfare of the Balkans and Eastern Europe. All
                          shipping is restricted. The Danube is more important for Europe than the
                          Mississippi River is for commerce in the U.S. All countries of the Danube
                          Basin—not only Serbia but Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary and
                          Slovakia—thus effectively come under the blockade. 

                          The Western capitalist powers are the only ones that stand to benefit from
                          the resulting economic dislocation in a number of formerly socialist
                          countries that are now forcibly going through privatization of their major
                          industries and resources. Entire industrial complexes, no longer able to be
                          competitive in the world market or even to receive raw material for
                          production or ship their goods, can literally be bought for a song by
                          multinational corporations.

                          Although medical and humanitarian goods are supposedly exempted, the
                          sanctions disrupt the entire supply system—its markets, foreign trade,
                          communications and transport. Funds, bank accounts and credit are
                          frozen. Yugoslavia is a country with limited resources that is forced to
                          cope with a flood of almost 2 million refugees displaced from Croatia and
                          Bosnia. More than 40% of the refugees are under 18 years old. Basic
                          medicines, food, fuel for cooking, heating and running industries and
                          sanitation are at crisis levels.

                          All the imperialist powers, but particularly the U.S., recognize that
                          Yugoslavia sets precedents for intervention in the former republics of the
                          Soviet Union. In early December 1994, the summit of the Organization for
                          Security and Cooperation in Europe met. Its first military action was to
                          authorize a "peacekeeping mission" to Nagorno-Karabakh, the enclave
                          disputed by Armenia and Azerbaijan. The stated purpose of the forces
                          going into Nagorno-Karabakh is to prevent a Bosnia-like situation. Their
                          track record is not encouraging.

                          Ownership and control of the newly privatized industries and natural
                          resources is at stake. In a war-torn region, all of this can be bought for a
                          song. Who will control the markets, the rich resources, the rebuilding and
                          the new investments? Military control of the situation will be decisive.
                          Diplomacy is only a cover for the military struggle. 

                          The U.S. is determined to be the dominant power in the Balkans. This
                          thinking is best reflected in an extraordinary 46-page Pentagon document
                          excerpted by the New York Times on March 8, 1992. The document, leaked
                          by Pentagon officials, asserts the need for complete U.S. world domination
                          in both political and military terms and threatens other countries that even
                          aspire to a greater role. The public threats seem to be aimed at the
                          European powers and Japan. Why else would the document be released
                          with no disavowal by the Pentagon?

                          This Pentagon policy document states: "Our first objective is to prevent
                          the re-emergence of a new rival. ... First, the U.S. must show the leadership
                          necessary to establish and protect a new order that holds the promise of
                          convincing potential competitors that they need not aspire to a greater role
                          or pursue a more aggressive posture to protect their legitimate interests. 

                          "We must account sufficiently for the interests of the advanced industrial
                          nations to discourage them from seeking to overturn the established
                          political and economic order. Finally, we must maintain the mechanism for
                          deterring potential competitors from even aspiring to a larger regional or
                          global role."

                          The document goes on to specifically address Europe. "It is of
                          fundamental importance to preserve NATO as the primary instrument of
                          Western defense and security.... We must seek to prevent the emergence
                          of European-only security arrangements which would undermine NATO."

                          No senior U.S. official has ever denounced or renounced this document.
                          When President George Bush was asked directly about the document, he
                          said that while he hadn’t read the report, "We are the leaders and we must
                          continue to lead."

                          Just how little U.S. involvement has to do with "aiding poor Bosnia" is
                          best seen in an opinion piece in the Nov. 29, 1992, New York Times by
                          retired Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael J. Dugan entitled "Operation
                          Balkan Storm: Here’s a Plan." 

                          Dugan is best remembered for an unusually candid interview before the
                          Gulf War where he laid out very precise plans for the destruction of Iraq.
                          He was relieved of his command for being too frank in describing the
                          Pentagon’s war plans at a time when the U.S. was claiming to the UN that it
                          wanted to impose sanctions on Iraq to pursue a diplomatic solution.
                          However, four months later the war unfolded almost exactly as Dugan had
                          described.

                          "A win in the Balkans would establish U.S. leadership in the post-Cold
                          War world in a way that Operation Desert Storm never could," Dugan
                          crowed. He laid out a scenario of coalition building, if possible, with
                          Britain, France and Italy on an ad-hoc basis since the UN Security Council
                          is deadlocked on the use of force by NATO. He described arming the
                          pro-U.S. Bosnian forces such as those around Izetbegovic and use of
                          "unconventional" operations in Bosnia to suspend UN humanitarian
                          operations. Then, he said, massive air power should be used against Serbs
                          in Bosnia and Serbia. This Air Force general likes to brag about U.S. death
                          technology. Dugan suggested using aircraft carriers, U.S. F-15s, F-16s,
                          F-18s and F-111s, Jstars and Tomahawk missiles to destroy Serbia’s
                          electricity grid, refineries, storage facilities and communications. "But the
                          U.S. costs in blood and treasure would be modest compared with that of
                          Bosnian trauma."

                          Whether it was the original U.S. legislation of November 1990, or the
                          recognition of an independent Bosnia under a right-wing U.S.-backed
                          government rather than the compromise government acceptable to all sides
                          in March 1992, or the U.S.-brokered Croatian-Muslim Federation of March
                          1994—U.S. intervention at each stage in the growing conflict in the
                          Balkans has fanned the flames of war.

                          Whether it is the early 1993 Vance-Owen plan to cantonize Bosnia into tiny
                          enclaves or the Vance-Stoltenberg Plan of late 1993 for a three-way
                          partition of Bosnia—each proposal is an assertion of U.S. determination to
                          dominate the region and keep its imperialist rivals off guard.

                          Despite the many grim warnings of difficult terrain and low cloud cover,
                          the Clinton administration has offered to send 25,000 troops as a
                          "peacekeeping" force if a U.S. plan presented in late August 1995 is
                          imposed on the people of the region. Massive use of air power began in
                          September 1995. Once committed, more and more troops will be required in
                          a war that can quickly escalate. There is a heated debate today in ruling
                          military, corporate and government circles. But it is not about how to
                          negotiate peace. It is about how to insure U.S. domination of a strategic
                          region.

                          The analogy to U.S. CIA advisers in Vietnam followed by 25,000 troops to
                          prop up the U.S. puppet Ngo Dinh Diem comes to mind all too quickly. 

                          The war that is unfolding will not be fought in a Hollywood fantasy in
                          front of computer screens, as the rank-and-file soldiers of other U.S. wars
                          know so well. The trauma for millions of refugees from Southeast Asia
                          continues to this day. It will cost much more in "blood and treasure" than
                          General Dugan so callously estimates. A further exposé of U.S. war plans
                          and involvement in the Balkans is desperately needed in order to open a
                          debate and build a powerful opposition to the latest espisode in the
                          Pentagon’s plans for world domination.

                          Concerned people of every political persuasion when confronted with the
                          gruesome images of the war ask, "Doesn’t the U.S. government have a
                          responsibility to do something to stop the bloodshed?" Or the question is
                          posed, "How can the U.S. bring peace?"

                          The U.S. economy today is completely dependent on and intertwined with
                          militarism. U.S. military spending is larger than the military budgets of all
                          the routher countries of the world combined. U.S. corporations are totally
                          dependent on the profits of war and militarism. It literally keeps this system
                          that is based on profits afloat. More than $250 billion a year is spent on
                          militarism. This is the only area of the federal budget not facing drastic
                          cuts.

                          The implications of greater and greater military involvement are not
                          discussed with working and poor people here in the U.S. Yet the decisions
                          will impact on the lives of every one in this country, in the form of further
                          cutbacks in desperately needed social services.

                          All the many nationalities of the former Yugoslavia have shown from past
                          experience that they are capable of resolving their differences. They lived
                          together in peace and harmony for 45 years under a socialist federation.
                          Although more than 1 million people died and millions were uprooted
                          during World War II, driving out the imperialist invaders became a
                          unifying force that galvanized all the many divided nationalities. 

                          U.S. involvement in the Balkans is not about helping any of the people in
                          the region—Muslims, Croats, Serbs or Albanians. The only interest of the
                          Pentagon is in creating weak, dependent puppet regimes in order to
                          dominate the entire region economically and politically. Only the giant
                          multinational corporations will benefit.

                          The only demand for those genuinely concerned with peace is, "U.S. out,
                          NATO out."

                          The involvement of the Pentagon can only bring wider war, more death
                          and destruction, shattered lives and hundreds of thousands of additional
                          refugees. 

                          The same demand needs to be raised by the anti-war movements in each of
                          the West European countries—Germany, France, Britain and Italy. They
                          and the U.S are imperialist powers, meaning that the highest profits of the
                          corporations of these capitalist countries come from their investments and
                          economic control of other less developed countries.

                          It is not an easy task to build an anti-war movement. It must combat all the
                          lies of the corporate media. But it has been done before. As the war widens
                          and the cutbacks in education, healthcare and housing continue here in
                          the U.S., this idea will take root.

                          The only way to end the Vietnam war was for the U.S. to get out. The years
                          and years of negotiations were only an excuse to widen the war, continue
                          the bombing and further the intervention. By the end of the war, all of
                          South East Asia lay in ruins, the landscape pockmarked with bomb craters
                          and poisoned with Agent Orange.

                          Getting the U.S. and the other imperialists out of the Balkans is the only
                          way to keep this war from escalating into an even wider struggle that
                          would engulf the whole region.