[From the CATO Institute]

*presented w/out the permission of the copyright owner for "fair-use"under the United States Copyright Laws

Bill Clinton, Aggressor

by Ted Galen Carpenter

There are some occasions when one should not mince words, and the
spectacle of U.S.-led air strikes on Serbia is one. Put bluntly, President
Clinton's assault on Serbia is a flagrant, shameful act of aggression. U.S.
forces are attacking a country that has not attacked the United States, a
U.S. ally, or even a neighboring state. That is the very definition of an
aggressor.

Belgrade is guilty of nothing except attempting to put down a secessionist
rebellion in one of its own provinces. Nearly a dozen other countries have
done the same thing in this decade alone -- often with far greater
bloodshed. Russia's war in Chechnya, Sri Lanka's conflict with Tamil
rebels and Turkey's suppression of the Kurds are merely a few examples.

The Clinton administration's spin meisters insist that Serbia is the
aggressor in the current confrontation, but that argument twists language
in a manner reminiscent of characters out of George Orwell's novels 1984
and Animal Farm. "Aggression" is a long-standing concept in international
relations, and it has a very specific meaning: unprovoked cross-border
warfare -- an unwarranted attack by one state on another. A country
cannot commit aggression in its own territory any more than a person can
commit self-robbery.

The argument that Serbia has committed aggression in Kosovo, thereby
justifying military intervention by NATO, is not only an Orwellian
distortion, it sets an extremely dangerous precedent. The traditional
standard that developments within a country, however sad and tragic, do
not justify military intervention by outside powers is one that should not be
cast aside lightly. Without that limitation, weak and imperfect as it may be,
the floodgates are open to intervention by an assortment of countries for
any number of reasons -- or pretexts.

Before the proponents of NATO intervention in Kosovo cheer too loudly,
they ought to consider the potential ramifications. For example, might
Russia and its ally Belarus someday cite the Kosovo precedent for
attacking Ukraine because of the latter's alleged mistreatment of
Russian-speaking inhabitants in the Crimea? Could China and Pakistan
argue that India's suppression of secessionists in Kashmir is a
humanitarian tragedy and a threat to the peace of the region, justifying
joint military action against that "aggressor"?

Of course, the Clinton administration contends that the events in Kosovo
are not really an internal Serbian affair, because the conflict might spread
southward in the Balkans. According to that scenario, the fighting
threatens to draw in Albania and Macedonia and, eventually, NATO
members Greece and Turkey. That argument is a refurbished version of
the old domino theory, and it is dubious on two levels.

First, it is curious (if not nauseating) to see Clinton, Deputy Secretary of
State Strobe Talbott and other alumni of the anti-VietnamWar movement
make that argument. They ridiculed the domino theory when Lyndon
Johnson and Richard Nixon invoked it during the conflict in Southeast
Asia. They were even more scornful when Ronald Reagan invoked it with
regard to the communist insurgencies in Central America and the
Caribbean during the 1980s. Now, suddenly, they believe the theory has
indisputable validity in the Balkans in the 1990s. At the very least, they
owe the American people an explanation of their dramatic change of
perspective.

Second, even if one accepts the dubious domino theory, the
administration's policy is making the spread of the Balkan conflict more
rather than less likely. The Serbs are not the party with expansionist
ambitions in the southern Balkans; the Albanians are. Kosovo Liberation
Army commanders have stated that their ultimate goal is, not merely an
independent Kosovo, but the creation of a Greater Albania. Nationalist
groups in Albania openly circulate maps of Greater Albania -- an entity
that includes not merely Albania and Kosovo but an additional slice of
Serbia, all of western Macedonia and a large chunk of northern Greece.

By facilitating Kosovo's secession -- and the NATO-imposed peace
settlement is nothing more than Kosovo's independence on the installment
plan -- the United States and its allies would be strengthening the very
faction that is the most likely to stir up additional trouble in the southern
Balkans. Thus, the administration's policy lacks even internal coherence.

War against Serbia is unwarranted on strategic, legal and moral grounds.
Serbia is the fourth country Bill Clinton has bombed in the past seven
months. That record is one of a trigger-happy administration that is
creating an image of America as the planetary bully. Decent Americans
need to make a stand when it has reached the point of a full-scale war of
aggression against a country that has done us no harm.
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Ted Galen Carpenter is vice president for defense and foreign policy
studies at the Cato Institute in Washington, DC, and the author or
editor of 10 books on international affairs.