JUN-10-99 THU 09:01

GOLDHAMMER

FAX NO. 5617450358

P. U4

its new organizations with appropriate resources. But it also

requires a new thoughtfulness on both sides of the Atlantic if it
vital American interest of close ties - climate
Europe and America are not to drift apart.

in preparation to move

As we contemplate a situation in which better than a

For the foreseeable future American land a
division and a half of American troops have wound up on near
frontiers
permanent sentry duty at the fringes of the Balkans, we must

therefore
(temper) triumphalism with some reflection on the need to
establish geopolitical priorities. Before we treat Kosovo as the
model for a new era of humanitarian diplomacy, we should examine
where else either the diplomacy or the strategy might apply.

There are some twenty-two million refugees around the world and
scores of ethnic conflicts. To which of them would a comparable
mix of force and diplomacy be relevant? Where else could we bomb
for ten weeks without casualties, a prohibitive risk of

escalation or creating precedents for other countries' pressures?
The demonstration of what democracies can accomplish when aroused

015

CWH HORIZON CLUB

11/06. 99 02:30 FAX 86 10 65053170

[X]

2093 WORDS

KISSINGER NEWSWEEK ARTICLE 6/10/99

Those of us who questioned the wisdom of the diplomacy preceding the war over Kosovo owe it to the Clinton Administration to express our respect for the fortitude with which, despite initial stumbling, it persevered, and the skill with which it preserved Allied unity and achieved Russian acquiescence. But victory has not stifled the uneasiness over its legacy, which risks leaving us permanently mired in a corner of the Balkans as successors of the vanished Ottoman and Austrian empires.

From the first day of the war, I urged an uncompromising strategy including the use of ground forces if necessary.

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2

Stalemate or defeat would have threatened the cohesion of the Atlantic Alliance, shaken confidence in America's stabilizing role and encouraged rogue states everywhere.

But the avoidance of disaster is not, in itself, victory.

[NATO, comprising all the major Western industrial nations and a population of six hundred million, was bound to defeat a developing nation of ten million unless it fell prey to moral collapse or domestic pressures. Rather, I was troubled - and remain so - by the long-term implications of the decision by which the Atlantic Alliance, a defensive grouping, initiated hostilities on the basis of the rejection of a diplomatic proposal - a claim we would strenuously resist were it put forward by any other country or coalition. Ethnic cleansing is reprehensible. But the ultimatum of Rambouillet - which peremptorily demanded the entry of thirty thousand NATO troops into the territory of a state with which we were not at war - was

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at best premature and seemed more designed to provide a pretext
for the initiation of bombing than for a diplomatic settlement.
Massive ethnic cleansing followed rather than preceded the Allied
bombing - though NATO spinmasters have skillfully created the
opposite impression. I am disturbed by the self-righteousness
that celebrates a strategy, that left almost the entire
population of Kosovo either as refugees or homeless in their own
country, and devastated Kosovo and crippled Serbia in the name of
a new humanitarian foreign policy. I remain convinced that a
different mix of diplomacy and force would have saved more lives
and caused less suffering. But these are issues for future
debate, partly overtaken by events.]¹

What must concern us in the immediate future is to prevent
the emergent settlement from becoming another open-ended
commitment to ever deeper embroilment, turning us into the

¹Bracketed section may be deleted.

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gendarme of a region where we have few strategic interests. The
obvious relief of the foreign ministers of the G-8 when they
agreed on June 8 on the United Nations Security Council
resolution authorizing the international presence on Kosovo,
reflected how close-run the operation had been in terms of
domestic support and Allied cohesion. But did they examine the
legacy with which they may have saddled themselves?

Many commentators emphasize the differences between the plan
put forward by the Finnish president and ratified by the Yugoslav
parliament and the Rambouillet proposals in the name of which the
bombing was initiated. And these are nuances of some consequence.
The NATO forces are entering Kosovo on the basis of a UN mandate
rather than of an agreement between Belgrade and the Atlantic
Alliance; Kosovo is explicitly described (Article 5) as a part of
Yugoslavia (albeit an autonomous one); the territorial integrity
and sovereignty of Yugoslavia are affirmed (Article 8); the

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provision for a referendum at the end of three years has been
abandoned.

But the core of the problem is the arrangements in the peace
plan that parallel the Rambouillet accords. For these threaten
near permanent American involvement in an endless set of
predictable conflicts.

The turgid language of the peace plan was designed to be
impenetrable so that each party could interpret the inevitable
ambiguities in a way favorable to it. This diplomatic device is
not without precedent, but it is a special problem when it
involves parties that have refined their volatile passions for
centuries in the crucible of mutual slaughter. It provides for
four stages of political evolution: (1) an interim administration
for Kosovo by a designated administrator; (2) an international
civil presence; (3) substantial autonomy for the people of Kosovo
within Yugoslavia, under the aegis of the UN Security Council;

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(4) the development of provisional democratic self-governing institutions.

Every aspect of this scheme is a land mine. According to Article 8, the political framework is supposed to take full account of the Rambouillet accords and the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. How can those objectives possibly be reconciled? Rambouillet provided for the occupation of Kosovo by NATO and a referendum at the end of three years. The peace plan stops at autonomy. But the KLA (the military arm of the Kosovo Albanian population) fought and suffered for independence, not autonomy. After what its members have endured during the ethnic cleansing campaign, remaining within Serbia will be inconceivable to them. The additional provision of Article 8, for the "demilitarization of the KLA" by NATO, is even more remote from reality. The KLA is not likely to give up its arms.

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If any of these provisions are to be realized, they must be imposed by American and other Allied military forces. We will be in the ironical position that, having fought on the side of the Albanians for their autonomy, we may find ourselves resisting them (or perhaps even fighting against them) on the issue of their independence. And having defended the Albanian population against Serbian ethnic cleansing, we may now be obliged to protect the Serbian population against the rage of their Albanian neighbors. When the smoke clears, ethnic cleansing of the Serbian population is the likely outcome unless we stay in permanent occupation.

The confusion is magnified by another provision of Article 8 that envisions "negotiations between the parties." But who are these parties? Presumably they are the Serbs and the Albanians, guaranteeing a deadlock. This seems to be implied by an additional provision that insists that "deadlock should not delay

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or disrupt the establishment of self-governing institutions." The agreement is silent as to on whose shoulders the task of imposing such self-governing institutions would fall - presumably ours. Imperceptibly, we are on the road to replacing the Ottoman and Austrian empires in the Balkans and, in time, facing the same hostility from the subject populations.

The projected command arrangements compound the ambiguity. The military forces, in the words of the UN resolution, will be substantially Nato's. Additional troops from Russia will be assigned with ambiguous command arrangements. However, to prevent the partition of Kosovo, Russian troops will not be given a contiguous area. But the role of these forces is vague and their rules of engagement are defined in the first instance by the Security Council.

Analogies to Bosnia are misleading. There, the three armies of the ethnic contenders ended up on homogeneous territories

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9

specifically assigned to them by the Dayton accords. In Kosovo, there is no such equivalent. Nor are there armies to separate since Serb forces will presumably have left. The NATO forces' task will be to disarm the KLA and protect Kosovo's borders - a task likely to bring them into conflict with Albanians seeking to influence events in Kosovo or Macedonia.

The enormous tasks of reconstruction and rebuilding civil society will fall to the civil administrator appointed by the UN Secretary General "in consultation with the Security Council" and operating under a charter established by a UN resolution.

Whatever the charter, the administrator will need to organize a police force and oversee the restoration of essential services in a totally devastated country. As Kosovar indigenous institutions come to life, they are likely to challenge the civil administrator's authority in the name of Kosovar independence.

What if the KLA emerges as the police force of the autonomous

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10

authority? And, as Serbia recovers, it may challenge - backed by
Russia - the civil administrator in the name of Yugoslav
sovereignty.

The situation in Kosovo differs from Bosnia in yet another
important respect. Bosnia was, in a way, sui generis. Kosovo is
bound to have a profound impact on its neighbors. The relations
of the Albanians in Macedonia - comprising about a third of the
population - with the dominant Slav majority are analogous to
those of the Kosovars vis-a-vis the Serbs. The Macedonian
Albanians are likely to demand, at a minimum, a status for
themselves analogous to that of the Kosovars. And the
disintegration of Macedonia has the potential of igniting another
Balkan explosion. Comparable pressures can be expected from the
somewhat smaller Albanian minority in Montenegro. And there
exists as well a drive toward a greater Albania, encouraged both
from Tirane and by emigre Albanians supplying much of the

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11

financial muscle.

Awareness of these tendencies - and as a sop to Russian and Yugoslav self-respect - has caused the West to concede Yugoslav sovereignty over Kosovo. Intended to keep the Kosovars from emerging as an independent international presence, it cannot possibly work smoothly. Russia and Yugoslavia will have every incentive to affirm Yugoslav sovereignty and America and NATO cannot indefinitely stand in the way of self-determination.

If we try to operate the system defined by the compromise in the UN resolution literally, we will emerge as the permanent arbiter of arcane Balkan quarrels. It would be far wiser to cut the Gordian knot and concede Kosovar independence as part of an overall Balkan arrangement in which the borders of Kosovo's neighbors are guaranteed and Kosovo renounces any attempt at expansion. The international forces would then patrol, as in Bosnia, both sides of these borders for at least a substantial

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12

interim period.

Moving the Kosovo issue to some definite solution is all the
more important because not only the local but the international
environment is less hospitable to the Kosovo outcome than to that
in Bosnia. Most nations were either acquiescent or supportive of
the Dayton accords. This is not the case in Kosovo. Russia may
have thrown in the towel on seeking to shape the immediate
outcome significantly. But it feels deeply humiliated; Kosovo has
become a public symbol of Russia's loss of influence and public
degradation by the West. It has no incentive to facilitate the
arrangement once it is in place. Rather, it is likely to seek
occasions to obstruct it or to reduce elsewhere what it perceives
as America's hegemonic tendencies.

The same is true, if to a lesser extent, of China, which
rejects the unilateral manner of NATO's military intervention in
what it treats as the internal matters of Yugoslavia. Indeed,

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13

most of the nations of the world will have an incentive to create
obstacles to the application of Rambouillet-like principles to
themselves. For some, an incentive may have been created to
acquire weapons of mass destruction as the surest deterrent to
Western intervention. A major assessment of how to relate the new
foreign policy to an international consensus is imperative.

Even the Atlantic Alliance will never be the same after
Kosovo. The Clinton Administration skillfully held the Alliance
together through more than ten weeks of bombing, But the decision
of the European Union's heads of state at Cologne to accelerate a
unified European defense and foreign policy reflects deep
uneasiness about Europe's relative impotence in face of the
imperious American tactics that led to the failure at Rambouillet
and then the conduct of the bombing campaign.

A serious European effort to build autonomous centers of
decision would be far from undesirable provided Europe backs up

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14
its new organizations with appropriate resources. But it also
requires a new thoughtfulness on both sides of the Atlantic if
Europe and America are not to drift apart.

As we contemplate a situation in which better than a
division and a half of American troops have wound up on near
permanent sentry duty at the fringes of the Balkans, we must
tempter triumphalism with some reflection on the need to
establish geopolitical priorities. Before we treat Kosovo as the
model for a new era of humanitarian diplomacy, we should examine
where else either the diplomacy or the strategy might apply.

06-10-1999 16:26 FROM:

TO:5617450358

centuries in the crucible of mutual slaughter. It provides for four stages of political evolution: (1) an interim administration for Kosovo by a designated administrator; (2) an international civil presence; (3) substantial autonomy for the people of Kosovo within Yugoslavia, under the aegis of the UN Security Council; (4) the development of provisional democratic self-governing institutions.

06-10-1999 16:27 FROM:

TO:5617450358

[Y]

After what its members have endured during the ethnic cleansing campaign, remaining within Serbia will be inconceivable to them. The additional provision of Article 8, for the "demilitarization of the KLA," is even more remote from reality.

If any of these provisions are to be realized, they must be imposed by American and other Allied military forces. We will be in the ironical position that, having fought on the side of the Albanians for their autonomy, we may find ourselves resisting them (or perhaps even fighting against them) on the issue of their independence. And having defended the Albanian population against Serbian ethnic cleansing, we may now be obliged to protect the Serbian population against the rage of their Albanian neighbors. Ethnic cleansing of the Serbian population is the likely outcome, unless we stay in permanent compatriot

06-10-1999 16:27 FROM:

TO:5617450358

PAGE:9

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7

these parties? Presumably they are the Serbs and the Albanians,
guaranteeing a deadlock. This seems to be implied by an
additional provision that insists that "deadlock should not delay
or disrupt the establishment of self-governing institutions." The
agreement is silent as to on whose shoulders the task of imposing
a solution ~~would fall - presumably ours. Imperceptibly, we are on~~
the road to replacing the Ottoman and Austrian empires in the
Balkans and, in time, facing the same hostility from the subject
populations.

The projected command arrangements compound the confusion.

The military forces ~~will be authorized by a United Nations resolution~~

in the words of the resolution ~~substantially~~
Security Council resolution but will in practice be predominantly

Nato's Additional troops from Russia will be assigned with
ambiguous command arrangements. However, to prevent the partition
of Kosovo, Russian troops will not be given a contiguous area.

What is less clear is the role of these forces, Analogies to

06-10-1999 16:28 FROM:

TO:5617450358

Bosnia are misleading. There, the three armies of the ethnic
contenders were located on territories specifically assigned to
them by the Dayton accords. In Kosovo, there is no such
equivalent. Nor are there armies to separate since Serb forces
will presumably have left. The NATO forces' task will be to
disarm the KLA and protect Kosovo's borders - a task likely to
bring them into conflict with Albanians seeking to influence
events in Kosovo or Macedonia.

The enormous tasks of reconstruction and rebuilding civil
society will fall to the civil administrator. The organization
appointed by the UN Secretary General in consultation with
appointing him has not yet been decided, it may be the UN, the
UN Security Council, or some other body. Under the UN
European Union by the European Security Conference in any event,
he will have a charter established by a UN resolution. It can be
expected that China and Russia, concerned about sweeping
precedents, are likely to fight hard to restrict his authority.
Whatever the charter, the administrator will have to organize a

06-10-1999 16:28 FROM:

TO:5617450358

administration's authority in the name of Kosovar independence.

And if Serbia recovers, it may do so in the name of Yugoslav
sovereignty.

The situation in Kosovo differs from Bosnia in yet another
important respect. Bosnia was, in a way, sui generis. Kosovo is
bound to have a profound impact on its neighbors. The relations
of the Albanians in Macedonia - comprising about a third of the
population - with the dominant Slav majority are analogous to
those of the Kosovars vis-a-vis the Serbs. The Macedonian
Albanians are likely to demand, at a minimum, a status for
themselves analogous to that of the Kosovars. And the potential
disintegration of Macedonia has the potential of igniting another
Balkan explosion. Comparable pressures can be expected from the

06-10-1999 16:30 FROM:

TO:5617450358

PAGE:13

11

patrol, as in Bosnia, both sides of these borders for at least a substantial interim period. It would not be a tritium-free zone, but better than the failures and frustrations guaranteed by some definitive solution is the arrangements now being envisaged. We must be clear that not only the local but the international environment is less hospitable to the Kosovo outcome than to that of Bosnia. Most nations were either acquiescing or supportive of the Dayton accords. In the case of Kosovo, this is not the case. Russia may have thrown in the towel on seeking to shape the immediate outcome significantly. But it feels deeply humiliated; Kosovo has become a public symbol of Russia's loss of influence and public degradation by the West. It has no incentive to facilitate the arrangement once it is in place. Rather, it is likely to seek occasions to obstruct it or to reduce elsewhere what it perceives as America's hegemonies, tendencies.

1983 WORDS

KISSINGER NEWSWEEK ARTICLE 6/8/99

Those of us who questioned the wisdom of the diplomacy preceding the war over Kosovo owe it to the Clinton Administration to express our respect for the fortitude with which, despite initial stumbling, it persevered, and the skill with which it preserved Allied unity. But victory has not removed the uneasiness of the legacy with which we are now saddled.

From the first day of the war, I argued that, despite my doubts, stalemate or defeat would threaten the cohesion of the Atlantic Alliance, shake confidence in America's stabilizing role and encourage rogue states everywhere.

[Y]

2

NATO, comprising all the major industrial nations and a
population of six hundred million, was bound to defeat a
developing nation of ten million unless it fell prey to moral
collapse or domestic pressures. Rather, my concerns were the
long-term implications of transforming the Atlantic Alliance from
a defensive grouping into an organization prepared to initiate
hostilities on the basis of the rejection of a diplomatic
proposal; and launching a war whose successful outcome would
leave us as a Gendarme of a corner of Europe in which we had no
strategic interests in any traditional sense, and for an
indefinite period of time.

Events have, for the moment, overtaken the growing doubts as
to whether our well-justified concern over ethnic cleansing was
appropriately dealt with by the ultimatum of Rambouillet - which
demanded the entry of thirty thousand NATO troops into the
territory of a state with which we were not at war. Was there in

[Y]

3

fact no alternative to a policy that vastly accelerated ethnic cleansing, indeed left almost the entire population of Kosovo either as refugees or homeless in their own country and devastated Kosovo and crippled Serbia in the name of a new humanitarian foreign policy? It is hard to believe that a different mix of diplomacy and force would not have saved more lives and caused less suffering.

The obvious relief of the foreign ministers of the G-8 when they agreed on the Security Council resolution authorizing the international presence on Kosovo, reflected how close run the operation had been in terms of domestic support and Allied cohesion. But did they examine the legacy with which they had saddled themselves? On the face of it, the plan put forward by the Finnish president and ratified by the Yugoslav parliament represents a step back from the Rambouillet proposals in the name of which the bombing was initiated. The NATO forces are entering

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4

Kosovo more as the result of a UN mandate rather than on the
basis of an agreement between Belgrade and the Atlantic Alliance;
Kosovo is explicitly described (Article 5) as a part of
Yugoslavia (albeit an autonomous one); the territorial integrity
and sovereignty of Yugoslavia are affirmed (Article 8); the
provision for a referendum at the end of three years has been
abandoned. Though Milosevic will claim these changes as
significant successes, they do not reach the core of the problem.
It is that the arrangements envisioned in the Allied peace plan
guarantee a near permanent American involvement in a set of
predictable conflicts.

[Y]

5

centuries in the crucible of mutual slaughter. It provides for four stages of political evolution: (1) an interim administration for Kosovo by a designated administrator; (2) an international civil presence; (3) substantial autonomy for the people of Kosovo *within* Yugoslavia, under the aegis of the UN Security Council; (4) the development of provisional democratic self-governing institutions.

[Y]

6

If any of these provisions are to be realized, they must be imposed by American and other Allied military forces. We will be in the ironical position that, having fought on the side of the Albanians for their autonomy, we may find ourselves resisting them (or perhaps even fighting against them) on the issue of their independence. And having defended the Albanian population against Serbian ethnic cleansing, we may now be obliged to protect the Serbian population against the rage of their Albanian neighbors. Ethnic cleansing of the Serbian population is the likely outcome.

[Y]

7

these parties? Presumably they are the Serbs and the Albanians,
guaranteeing a deadlock. This seems to be implied by an
additional provision that insists that "deadlock should not delay
or disrupt the establishment of self-governing institutions." The
agreement is silent as to on whose shoulders the task of imposing
a solution would fall - presumably ours. Imperceptibly, we are on
the road to replacing the Ottoman and Austrian empires in the
Balkans and, in time, facing the same hostility from the subject
populations.

The military forces will be authorized by a United Nations

What is less clear is the role of these forces. Analogies to

[Y]

8

The enormous tasks of reconstruction and rebuilding civil society will fall to the civil administrator. The organization appointing him has not yet been decided; it may be the UN, the European Union or the European Security Conference. In any event, he will have a charter established by a UN resolution. It can be expected that China and Russia, concerned about sweeping precedents, are likely to fight hard to restrict his authority. Whatever the charter, the administrator will have to organize a

CYJ

9

police force and oversee the restoration of essential services in a totally devastated country. As Kosovar indigenous institutions come to life, they are likely to challenge the civil administration's authority in the name of Kosovar independence. And if Serbia recovers, it may do so in the name of Yugoslav sovereignty.

[Y]

10

somewhat smaller Albanian minority in Montenegro. And there
exists as well a drive toward a greater Albania, encouraged both
from Tirane and by emigre Albanians supplying much of the
financial muscle.

Awareness of these tendencies - and as a sop to Russian and
Yugoslav self-respect - has caused the West to concede Yugoslav
sovereignty over Kosovo. Intended to keep the Kosovars from
emerging as an independent international presence, it cannot
possibly work out that way. Russia and Yugoslavia will have every
incentive to subvert Kosovar autonomy, and the Kosovars will have
every incentive to seek independence. The inevitable disputes are
likely to sow divisions within the Atlantic Alliance.

After all that has happened, it would be far wiser to move
rapidly toward independence for Kosovo as part of a Balkan pact
in which the borders of Kosovo's neighbors are guaranteed and
Kosovo renounces any attempt at expansion. NATO forces would then

[Y]

11
patrol, as in Bosnia, both sides of these borders for at least a
substantial interim period. It would not be a brilliant outcome
but better than the failures and frustrations guaranteed as part
of the arrangements now being envisaged.

We must be clear that not only the local but the
international environment is less hospitable to the Kosovo
outcome than to that of Bosnia. Most nations were either
acquiescing or supportive of the Dayton accords. In the case of
Kosovo, this is not the case. Russia may have thrown in the towel
on seeking to shape the immediate outcome significantly. But it
feels deeply humiliated; Kosovo has become a public symbol of
Russia's loss of influence and public degradation by the West. It
has no incentive to facilitate the arrangement once it is in
place. Rather, it is likely to seek occasions to obstruct it or
to reduce elsewhere what it perceives as America's hegemonical
tendencies.

[Y]

12

The same is true, if to a lesser extent, of China, which
rejects the unilateral manner of NATO's military intervention in
Kosovo. Indeed, most of the nations of the world will have an
incentive to create obstacles to the operation of the Rambouillet
principles [vis-a-vis] themselves. An incentive may have been
created to acquire weapons of mass destruction as a deterrent. A
major assessment of how to relate the new foreign policy to an
international consensus is imperative.

Even the NATO Alliance will never be the same after Kosovo.
The Clinton Administration skillfully held the Alliance together
through more than ten weeks of bombing, But the decision of the
European Union's heads of state to create a unified European
security and foreign policy reflects deep uneasiness about
Europe's relative impotence in face of the imperious tactics that
led to the failure at Rambouillet and then the conduct of the
bombing campaign. A serious European effort to build autonomous

[Y]

13

centers of decision would be far from undesirable provided Europe
backs up its new organizations with appropriate resources. But it
imposes a requirement for new thoughtfulness on both sides of the
Atlantic if a new era of cooperation is to result.

As we contemplate a situation in which better than a
division and a half have wound up on near permanent sentry duty
at the fringes of the Balkans, we must tempter triumphalism with
some reflection on the need to establish geopolitical priorities.
Before we treat Kosovo as the model for a new era of humanitarian
diplomacy, we should examine where else either the diplomacy or
the strategy might apply. There are some twenty-two million
refugees around the world and scores of ethnic conflicts. To
which of them would a comparable mix of force and diplomacy be
relevant? Where else would we bomb for ten weeks without
casualties, a prohibitive risk of escalation or creating
precedents for other countries' pressures? The demonstration of

JUN-07/99 MON 1/7/91

GULDHAMMER

FAX NO. 5617450358

P. 02

1942 WORDS

KISSINGER NEWSWEEK ARTICLE 6/7/99

Those of us who questioned the wisdom of the war preexisting over Kosovo were initiated-owe it to the Clinton Administration to express our respect for the fortitude with which, despite initial stumbling, it persevered, and the skill with which it preserved

But victory has not removed the uneasiness of Allied unity. And Americans can take pride in the professionalism of NATO's commanders and airmen. Despite my doubts

From the first day of the war, I argued that the only exit from it was victory. Stalemate or defeat would have been a disaster threatening the survival of the Atlantic Alliance and encouraging rogue states in many parts of the world as confidence in America's stabilizing role collapsed. This is why I argued that the air campaign be stopped with the threat of ground forces

throughout the Atlantic Alliance and everywhere. While encouraging, rogue states in many parts of the world as confidence in America's stabilizing role collapsed. This is why I argued that the air campaign be stopped with the threat of ground forces

JUN-07-99 MON 17:51

GOLDHAMMER

FAX NO. 5817460358

[Y]

2
- as key Alliance leaders, led by Prime Minister Tony Blair, increasingly recognized when they were rescued from the doubts of their colleagues by Yugoslavia's collapse.

But the avoidance of disaster is not victory in itself. My doubts about the strategy that led to the military operation did not concern their likely success. NATO, comprising all the major industrial nations and a population of six hundred million, was bound to defeat a developing nation of ten million unless it fell into a domesticorz presure.

Full preys to moral collapse. My concern was the political consequences of launching into a war whose successful outcome

would leave us with a permanent role as a gendarme of a corner of Europe in which we had no strategic interests in any traditional for an indefinite period of time.

sense. And these doubts have been reinforced by the situation in which we now find ourselves. For the moment, lives have taken over the facing doubts.

At some point, the country should debate whether our well-
justified concern over ethnic cleansing was being dealt with by

JUN-07-99 MON 17:53

GOLDHAMMER

FAX NO. 5617450358

P. 07

[Y]

KLA (the military arm of the Kosovo Albanian population) did not fight and suffer for autonomy but for independence. After what its members have endured during the ethnic cleansing campaign, remaining within Serbia will be inconceivable to them. The additional provision of Article 8, for the "demilitarization of the KLA," is even more remote from reality.

If any of these provisions are to be realized, they must be imposed, that is to say with the active participation of American military forces. We will be in the ironical position that, having fought on the side of the Albanians for their autonomy, we may find ourselves resisting them (or perhaps even fighting against them) on the issue of their independence.

The confusion is magnified because another provision of Article 8 envisions "negotiations between the parties." But who are these parties? Presumably it means the Serbs and the Albanians, guaranteeing a deadlock. This seems to be implied by

JUN-07-99 MON 17:53

GOLDHAMMER

FAX NO. 5617450358

P. 09

The major task of reconstruction and establishment of civil society will fall on the civil administrator. The organization appointing him has not yet been decided; it may be the UN, the European Union or the European Security Conference. In any event, he will have a charter established by a UN resolution. It can be expected that China and Russia, concerned about establishing sweeping precedents, are likely to fight hard to restrict his authority. Whatever the charter, the administrator will have to organize a police force and see to the restoration of essential services in a totally devastated country. As Kosovar institutions

develop, it is likely to bring the civil head into increasing conflict with the Kosovars' drive for independence.

OUM 01.00 NOV 17.04 GOLDMANPINEK

FAX NO. 5817450358

[Y]

 important respect. Bosnia is a relatively self-contained entity; its ethnic groups had no ambitions outside the territory except possibly to join their brothers in Serbia and Croatia. But Kosovo is bound to have a profound impact on its neighbors. The relations of the Albanians in Macedonia - comprising about a third of the population - with the dominant Slav majority are analogous to those of the Kosovars vis-a-vis the Serbs. The Macedonian Albanians are likely to demand, at a minimum, a status for themselves analogous to the Kosovars. And this has the potential of igniting another Balkan explosion. Comparable pressures can be expected from the somewhat smaller Albanian minority in Montenegro. And there exists as well a drive toward a greater Albania, encouraged by emigre Albanians who are supplying arms to the Bosnian Serbs.

many of the financial resources.

It is indeed to contain these tensions - and to give a stop to Russian and Yugoslav self-respect - that the West has been working.

JUN-07-99 MON 17:55

GOLDHAMMER

FAX NO. 5617450358

[Y]

 priorities. Before we treat Kosovo as a precedent for a new era of diplomacy, we should examine just where else either the strategy applies. It is estimated that there are twenty-two million refugees around the world and scores of ethnic conflicts. To which of them would a comparable mix of force and

diplomacy be relevant? Where else would we bomb for ten weeks without casualties or a prohibitive risk of escalation? The demonstration of what democracies can accomplish when aroused was a great achievement that will stand them in good stead in the years ahead. It now remains to elevate our purposes to the level of our power.

1942 WORDS

Those of us who questioned the wisdom of the way the war
over Kosovo was initiated owe it to the Clinton Administration to
express our respect for the fortitude with which, despite initial
stumbling, it persevered, and the skill with which it preserved
Allied unity. And Americans can take pride in the professionalism
of NATO's commanders and airmen.

From the first day of the war, I argued that the only exit
from it was victory. Stalemate or defeat would have been a
disaster threatening the survival of the Atlantic Alliance and
encouraging rogue states in many parts of the world as confidence
in America's stabilizing role collapsed. This is why I argued
that the air campaign be coupled with the threat of ground forces

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But the avoidance of disaster is not victory in itself. My doubts about the strategy that led to the military operation did not concern their likely success. NATO, comprising all the major industrial nations and a population of six hundred million, was bound to defeat a developing nation of ten million if it did not fall prey to a moral collapse. My concern was the political consequences of launching into a war whose successful outcome would leave us with a permanent role as a gendarme of a corner of Europe in which we had no strategic interests in any traditional sense. And these doubts have been reinforced by the situation in which we now find ourselves.

At some point, the country should debate whether our well-justified concern over ethnic cleansing was best dealt with by

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the ultimatum of Rambouillet - which demanded the entry of thirty thousand NATO troops into the territory of a state with which we were not at war - the price that will have to be paid for transforming the Atlantic Alliance from a defensive grouping into an organization prepared to initiate hostilities on the basis of the rejection of a diplomatic proposal, and about the way the existing alternatives were perceived. Granting the importance of dealing with ethnic cleansing, was there no alternative to a policy that did not prevent and vastly accelerate ethnic cleansing, left almost the entire population of Kosovo either as refugees or homeless in their own country, devastated Kosovo and crippled Serbia at the cost of tens of thousands of casualties of the local population; and destabilized surrounding countries - all in the name of a new humanitarian diplomacy? It is hard to believe that a different mix of diplomacy and force would not have been preferable.

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Now that the objectives of returning the refugees and establishing an international presence in Kosovo have been realized, it is important to consider the legacy of that achievement. The international framework for it revives all the concerns generated by the Rambouillet proposal. In some respects, they are more favorable to the Yugoslavs than were the original proposals. The NATO forces are entering more as the result of a UN mandate than on the basis of an agreement between Belgrade and the Atlantic Alliance; Kosovo is explicitly described (Article 5) as a part of Yugoslavia (albeit an autonomous one); the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Yugoslavia are affirmed (Article 8). Though Milosevic will claim these changes as significant successes, they do not reach the core of the problem. It is that the arrangements envisioned in the Allied peace plan as approved by the Serbian Parliament open a new set of conflicts in all of which the United States will be inextricably involved.

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For one thing, setting up the political arrangements will
take years and the operation of them will oblige us and our
allies to stay indefinitely. The turgid language of the peace
plan was designed to be impenetrable so that each party could
interpret the inevitable ambiguities in a way favorable to it - a
diplomatic device not without precedent. It seems to provide for
four stages of political ____: (1) an interim administration for
Kosovo; (2) an international civil presence; (3) substantial
autonomy for the people of Kosovo *within* Yugoslavia, under the
aegis of the UN Security Council; (4) the development of
provisional democratic self-governing institutions.

Every aspect of this scheme is a land mine. According to
Article 8, the political framework is supposed to take full
account of the Rambouillet accords and the principles of
sovereignty and territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia. How can those objectives possibly be reconciled? The

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an additional provision that insists that "deadlock should not
delay or disrupt the establishment of self-governing
institutions." If a stalemate is not to be permitted to do this,
a solution must obviously be imposed. The agreement is silent as
to on whose shoulder this task would fall - presumably our. So
imperceptible is the road to empire.

The military forces will have NATO as its core, perhaps with some
additional troops from Russia. However, to prevent the partition
of Kosovo, Russian troops will not be given a contiguous area.

What is less clear is the role of these forces. The analogy to
Bosnia is misleading. There, the three armies were ethnic
contenders and were located on territories specifically defined
by the Dayton accords. In Kosovo, there is no such equivalent.

Nor are these armies to separate since Serb forces will
presumably have left. The NATO forces' task will be to disarm the

[Y]

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The major task of reconstruction and establishing a civil
society will fall on the civil administrator. The organization
appointing him has not yet been decided; it may be the UN, the
European Union or the European Security Conference. In any event,
he will have a charter established by a UN resolution. It can be
expected that China and Russia, concerned about establishing
sweeping precedents, are likely to fight hard to restrict his
authority. Whatever the charter, the administrator will have to
organize a police force and see to the restoration of essential
services in a totally devastated country. As Kosovar institutions
develop, this is likely to bring the civil head into increasing
conflict with the Kosovars' drive for independence.

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important respect. Bosnia is a relatively self-contained entity; its ethnic groups had no ambitions outside the territory except possibly to join their brethren in Serbia and Croatia. But Kosovo is bound to have a profound impact on its neighbors. The relations of the Albanians in Macedonia - comprising about a third of the population - with the dominant Slav majority are analogous to those of the Kosovars vis-a-vis the Serbs. The Macedonian Albanians are likely to demand, at a minimum, a status for themselves analogous to the Kosovars. And this has the potential of igniting another Balkan explosion. Comparable pressures can be exploited from the somewhat smaller Albanian minority in Montenegro. And there exists as well a drive toward a greater Albania, encouraged by emigre Albanians who are supplying many of the financial resources.

It is indeed to contain these trends - and to give a sop to Russian and Yugoslav self-respect - that the West has been

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willing to concede the fig leaf of Yugoslav sovereignty. Though
intended to keep the Kosovars from emerging as an independent
international presence, it will not work out that way. Russia and
Yugoslavia will soon understand the hollowness of the
arrangement, if they ever took it seriously. But they will have
every incentive to subvert it and to use the inevitable disputes?
to weaken NATO.

For all these reasons, I believe it would be far wiser to
move matters rapidly toward independence for Kosovo as part of a
Balkan pact in which the borders of Kosovo's neighbors are
guaranteed against aggression and Kosovo renounces any attempt at
expansion. NATO forces would then patrol both sides of these
borders for at least a substantial interim period. It would not
be a brilliant outcome but better than the fractious? and ______
frustration _______ ed by the arrangements now being envisaged.

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international environment is less hospitable to the Kosovo
outcome than to that of Bosnia. In Bosnia, most nations were
either acquiescing or supportive. In Kosovo, this is not the
case. Russia may have thrown in the towel on seeking to shape the
immediate outcome significantly. But it feels deeply humiliated;
Kosovo has become a public symbol of Russia's loss of influence
and public degradation by the West. It will do nothing to
facilitate our task and seek occasions to obstruct it or to
reduce elsewhere what it perceives as our hegemonical
aspirations.

The same is true, if to a lesser extent, of China, which
rejects the unilateral manner of NATO's military intervention in
Kosovo. With respect to both of these countries, a major
assessment of how to restore a constructive relationship is
imperative.

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The Clinton Administration skillfully held the Alliance together
- with strong assistance from Tony Blair - through over ten weeks
of bombing, But the decision of the European Union's heads of
state to create a unified European security and foreign policy
reflects uneasiness about the relative impotence displayed by
Europe in the face of imperious tactics that led to the failure
at Rambouillet and the conduct of the bombing campaign. A serious
independent European effort challenging us to a new era of
cooperation would be far from undesirable provided Europe back up
its new organizations with appropriate resources. But it imposes
a requirement for new thoughtfulness on both sides of the
Atlantic.

As we contemplate a situation in which better than a
division and a half have wound up on near permanent sentry duty
at the fringes of the Balkans, we should tempter any im____ent
triumphalism with some reflection on the need to establish

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priorities. Before we treat Kosovo as a precedent for a new era
of diplomacy, we should examine to just where else either the
diplomacy or the strategy applies. It is estimated that there are
twenty-two million refugees around the world and scores of ethnic
conflicts. To which of them would a comparable mix of force and
diplomacy be relevant? Where else would we bomb for ten weeks
without casualties or a prohibitive risk of escalation? The
demonstration of what democracies can accomplish when aroused was
a great achievement that will stand them in good stead in the
years ahead. It now remains to elevate our purposes to the level
of our power.