T his week, NATO conducted air exercises over Albania as a warning to Belgrade that its crackdown in Kosovo must end now. Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic must call off his offensive by June 16, allow monitors unimpeded access to the rebellious province, let the refugees return home, and resume talks with the Kosovan resistance. France contends that NATO needs a new U.N. Security Council resolution before it can attack, but the United States say earlier resolutions will do.
Air strikes are an act of war.
When Biafra broke from Nigeria, the United States sided with Lagos as it crushed the rebellion at the cost of a million lives. When Chechnya tried to break from Russia, we sided with Russia. Kosovo is 90 percent ethnic Albanian, and Milosevic's treatment of its majority has indeed been repressive and cruel. Yet Kosovo is also the cradle of the Serb nation. Serbs are no more willing to let it go than Israelis would be willing to let Jerusalem go.