NATO bombing of Kosovo: Humanitarian intervention or crime against humanity?

International Journal for the Semiotics of Law

Volumn 15, Issue 1, 2002, Pages 79-106

  Cohn, Marjorie ^a  

^a Thomas Jefferson School of Law   (United States)

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 12944280524     PISSN: 09528059     EISSN: 15728722     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1023/A:1015043810758     Document Type: Article

References (178)

1. Judith Miller, Security Council Backs Peace Plan and a NATO-Led Force, N.Y. TIMES, Jun. 11, 1999, at A12.
2. New Figures on Civilian Deaths in Kosovo War, Human Rights Watch, World Report 2000, Feb. 7, 2000, http://www.hrw.org/hrw/press/2000/02/nato207.htm;
3. Yugoslavia A Year Later: Turning a Blind Eye to NATO War Crimes, May 22, 2000, www.counterpunch. com.
4. Transcript of March 25, 1999 Press Conference by Secretary General, Dr. Javier Solana and SACEUR, Gen. Wesley Clark, http://www.nato.int/kosovo/press/ p990325a.htm.
5. Robert H. Reid, NATO Bombs Yugoslavia for 2nd Night, AP ONLINE, Mar. 25, 1999.
6. Dana Priest, The Battle Inside Headquarters; Tension Grew With Divide Over Strategy, WASH. POST, Sep. 21, 1999, p. 1.
7. Stratfor.com, Kosovo: One Year Later, http://www.stratfor.com/CIS/ specialreports/ special26.htm.
8. A Wall Street Journal article described an American B-2 pilot who took off in the morning from a Missouri Air Force Base, dropped tons of bombs on Yugoslavia, and returned that evening to his home. After mowing the lawn, "we ordered out for Pizza Hut, because it was a special occasion." Thomas E. Ricks, For These B-2 Pilots, Bombs Away Means Really Far, Far Away, WALL. ST. J., Apr. 19, 1999, at Al.
9. NATO violations of the laws of war during Operation Allied Force must be investigated, Amnesty International, July 25, 2000, http://www.amnesty.org/news/ 2000/4/002500.htm.
10. Richard B. Bilder, Kosovo and the "New Interventionism": Promise or Peril? 9 J. TRANSNAT'LL. &POL'Y 153, 169 (1999).
11. William Dorich, Defending Democracy in the Balkans, WASH. TIMES, Jul. 19, 1998, at B5.
12. George Kenney, Rolling Thunder: the Rerun (Review), NATION, Jun. 14, 1999 at 48.
13. Noam Chomsky, The New Military Humanism 40-48 (1999);
14. Mary Mostert, Is Another Outbreak of War Looming in Kosovo? The Battle of Mitrovica is Not About Visiting Cousins - its About the Trepca Mines, Feb. 24, 2000, www.originalsources.com.
15. See also, Michael McAuliffe, The Road to Racak, CBC Radio News, May 22, 2000.
16. After Racak, the European Union hired a Finnish team of forensic pathologists to investigate the deaths. Its report, kept secret for two years, said that Finnish investigators could not establish the victims were civilians, only one body showed traces of an execution-style killing and there was no evidence the bodies had been mutilated. BERLINER ZEITUNG, Jan. 16, 2001.
17. The 45 Racak deaths are listed in the indictment against ex-Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic, pending in the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. See, http://www.un.org/icty/milosevic/
18. Barton Gellman, The Path to Crisis: How the United States and Its Allies Went to War; The Battle for Kosovo, A Defining Atrocity Set Wheels in Motion, WASH. POST, Apr. 18, 1999, at A1.
19. John J. Merriam, Kosovo and the Law of Humanitarian Intervention, 33 CASE W. RES. J. INT'L L. 111, nn. 127-129 and accompanying text.
20. U.S. Representative Saxton, a Republican Congressman from New Jersey, said: "I know when the ethnic cleansing started, I know when the refugees started to move ... It was when we started bombing." James Dao, Back From Belgrade, Congressman Says NATO Is Worsening Refugee Crisis, N.Y. TIMES, Apr. 23, 1999, at B5.
21. See also, Jared Israel, Why Albanians Fled During NATO Bombing: An Interview With Cedda Pralinchevich, Dec. 7, 2000, www.emperorsclothes.com.
22. Stephen Zunes, Bombing Serbia Not the Answer, PROGRESSIVE RESPONSE, Vol. 2, No. 10, Mar. 23, 1999
23. Jonathan I. Charney, Anticipatory Humanitarian Intervention in Kosovo, 32 VAND. J. TRANSNAT'L L. 1231, 1245-1246
24. The U.S. Department of State's press releases acknowledged that while the KVM was present, violence by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was limited, and focussed on suppressing the insurrectionist Kosovo Liberation Army. See, U.S. Department of State, Kosovo Update (Mar. 2, 1999), http://www.state.gov/ www/regions/eur/rpt_990302_kdom.html;
25. U.S. Department of State, Kosovo Update, Mar. 12, 1999, http://www.state.gov/www/ regions/eur/rpt_790312_kdom.html;
26. U.S. Department of State, Kosovo Humanitarian Situation Report, Mar. 31, 1999.
27. See, Charney, Kosovo Humanitarian Situation Report, id., at 1248, n. 44.
28. General Clark said it was "entirely predictable" that terror and violence by the Serbs would worsen after the bombing. Nato attacks, SUNDAY TIMES LONDON, Mar. 28, 1999, at 3.
29. Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke admitted that "our greatest fear by far, by far," was that NATO's air attack would push the Serbs to more vicious "ethnic cleansing." See, Blaine Harden, A Long Struggle That Led Serb Leader to Back Down, N.Y. TIMES, Jun. 6, 1999, at A16.
30. BBC Summary of World Broadcasts, Mar. 25, 1999, Thursday SECTION: Part 2 Central Europe, the Balkans; FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF YUGOSLAVIA; SERBIA; EE/D3492/A, citing the Tanjung (Yugoslav state) news agency.
31. In Focus: Bombs Away - A Call for the Unconditional Ending of the Bombing Campaign, FOREIGN POLICY IN FOCUS, Vol. 4, No. 13, May 1999, http://www. foreignpolicy-infocus.org/briefs/vol4/v4n13koso.html.
32. British House of Commons Select Committee on Foreign Affairs Report, prepared June 2, 2000, http://www.publicationsparliament.uk/pa/cm19990/cmselect/ cmfatt/28/ 2803.html.
33. Noam Chomsky reports that U.S. intelligence warned the bombing would lead to "a virtual explosion of refugees" and an ethnic cleansing campaign. Noam Chomsky, In Retrospect-A review of NATO's war over Kosovo, Part I, Z MAG., Apr. 2000, at 19, 23.
34. In fact, since the bombing, an astronomical number of Serbs have been cleansed from Kosovo. Jan Oberg, Director of the Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research in Sweden, reported in October, 1999, "[w]ith perhaps 90% of all non-Albanians now driven out, the Kosovo-Albanian leadership is responsible for the proportionately largest ethnic cleansing in the Balkans since the wars started in 1991." See, Jan Oberg, Misleading UN Report on Kosovo (Part A), Oct. 3, 1999, http://www.transnational.org.
35. General Sir Michael Rose, Nato's 'Failure' to Achieve its aims, TIMES LONDON, Jul. 14, 1999, at 1.
36. NATO is also eyeing Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania for NATO membership. See, NATO'S Uncertain Role, L.A. TIMES, Jul. 22, 2001, at M4.
37. After the Cold War ended, it was said in Washington, "NATO must either go out of area, or out of business." Diana Johnstone, Deception and Self-Deception: The Mixed Motives behind NATO's War against Yugoslavia, www.emperors-clothes.com/ articles/Johnstone/balk.htm.
38. The expansion of NATO also meant new markets for U.S. military contractors. For this reason, the U.S. Committee to Expand NATO, a powerful lobby run by Lockheed's chief executive, overcame U.S. Congressional reluctance to endorse NATO expansion. "NATO is the military arm of an unjust, undemocratic and destructive economic globalization." Id.
39. Patrick E. Tyler, U.S. Strategy Plan Calls For Insuring No Rivals Develop, N.Y. TIMES, Mar. 8, 1992, at 1.
40. Benjamin Schwarz and Christopher Layne, NATO: At 50, It's Time to Quit - US Leadership and Aid Are No Longer Needed in Europe. Why Are We Still There? NATION, May 10, 1999, at 15, 17.
41. Paul Stambin, The New Great Game, FOREIGN POLICY, Mar. 13, 1999.
42. Tyler, supra note 22.
43. Pentagon's New World View, WASH. POST, May 24, 1992, at A23.
44. The leaked Pentagon document led to "reverberations around the world among our allies," according to then Defense Secretary Richard Cheney. See, Barton Gellman, Pentagon Abandons Goal of Thwarting U.S. Rivals; 6-Year Plan Softens Earlier Tone on Allies, WASH. POST, May 24, 1992, at Al.
45. In response, the Bush I Administration sought to control the damage by backing down from the sole superpower goal, even though that goal had been mirrored in Cheney's public statements and testimony. See, Patrick E. Tyler, Senior U.S. Officials Assail Lone-Superpower Policy, N.Y. TIMES, Mar. 11, 1992, at A6.
46. Jacob Heilbrunn and Michael Lind, The Third American Empire, N.Y. TIMES, Jan. 2, 1996. Also key to this analysis is the role the United States has played in the Middle East. In order to keep any country from becoming too powerful on the western shore of the Persian Gulf, to ensure its access to Middle East oil, the U.S. played Iraq off against Iran. After the U.S.-friendly Shah was toppled by his people, the United States quietly encouraged Saddam Hussein to invade Iran. But the U.S. overlooked the fact that when Iraq won, Saddam would act to consolidate his victory. Thinking the United States was still his ally, Saddam informed the U.S. ambassador to Iraq he was about to invade Kuwait. He received no protest from the U.S. ambassador. But the United States, not wanting Iraq to dominate the western shore of Persian Gulf, reacted by re-invading Kuwait.
47. See Global Intelligence Update, STRATFOR.COM, Aug. 30, 1999, http://www.stratfor.com. The U.S. didn't really wish to destroy Iraq; it still wanted Iraq as a counterweight to Iran. But the United States underestimated Saddam's ability to maintain his position of control over the Kurds and the Shiites - both politically and through the use of terror. The survival of Saddam, like Milosevic, represents a severe limitation on United States political power. Having worked to convince Americans that Saddam is the reincarnation of Hitler, the U.S. cannot be seen negotiating with him. By mid-2000, the United States had dropped 88,000 tons of bombs over Iraq, killing many civilians, in clear violation of the Geneva Conventions. Napalm, cluster bombs and depleted uranium were used, in what the Los Angeles Times described as a "massacre" and a "massive slaughter."
48. See Robert Jensen, PERSPECTIVE ON WARFARE - The Gulf War Brought Out the Worst in Us - Foreign policy: Demonizing one general diverts us from assessing responsibility for the slaughter, L.A. TIMES, May 22, 2000, at B7. Yet U.S. rhetoric continually mischaracterizes its actions in Iraq as designed to eliminate Saddam Hussein's "weapons of mass destruction." Utilizing the same strategy it later used in Yugoslavia, the United States attacked the infrastructure of Iraq. It bombed electrical, water and sewage plants, as well as agricultural, food and medical production facilities. The destruction of electrical generators - many of which were used for water purification and sewage treatment - has led to hundreds of thousands of Iraqi deaths from disease caused by unclean water since 1991. Current estimates are between 4000 and 5000 children killed per month in Iraq as a result of U.S. bombing. When asked on national television in 1996 for her reaction to these deaths, former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said, "we think the price is worth it."
49. See Noam Chomsky, THE NEW MILITARY HUMANISM 67 (1999). The "price" is acceptable to Washington, as the end (U.S. hegemony) justifies the means (thousands of dead Iraqi children). After Operation Desert Storm in 1991, the United States and its allies created a "no-fly zone" in the airspace over Iraq's own territory, without Security Council authorization. During Operation Desert Fox in 1998, the U.S. bombed Iraq after Saddam refused to let UN inspectors into Iraq, on the grounds they were spying for the CIA. It turns out they were indeed CIA spies.
50. See Barton Gellman, Annan Suspicious of UNSCOM Role; U.N. Official Believes Evidence Shows Inspectors Helped U.S. Eavesdrop on Iraq, WASH. POST, Jan. 6, 1999, at A1. American and British aircraft continue "surgical strikes" against Iraq, to maintain moderate but steady pressure on that country, and in turn neutralize its power in the Persian Gulf. The Washington Post reported in June 2000 that about 300 Iraqis had been killed and more than 800 wounded in the preceding 18 months.
51. See Edward Cody, Under Iraqi Skies, a Canvas of Death; Tour of Villages Reveals Human Cost of U.S.-Led Sorties in 'No-Fly' Zones, WASH. POST, Jun. 16, 2000, at A1.
52. Mortimer B. Zuckerman, The big game gets bigger - Russia will gain wealth and influence if it controls Caspian Sea oil, 126 U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT 7576, May 10, 1999.
53. Marjorie Cohn, Cheney's Black Gold: Oil Interests May Drive U.S. Foreign Policy, CHICAGO TRIB., Aug. 10, 2000.
54. David B. Ottaway, Vast Caspian Oil Field Found; Discovery May Spur U.S.-Russia Pipeline Rivals, WASH. POST, May 16, 2000 at A1.
55. James Kitfield, Stars and Stripes on the Silk Route, FOREIGN POLICY, Mar. 13, 1999.
56. George Monbiot, A discreet deal in the pipeline: Nato mocked those who claimed there was a plan for Caspian oil - Special report: the petrol war, GUARDIAN, Feb. 15, 2001.
57. Stephen Kinzer, A New Big-Power Race Starts on a Sea of Crude, N.Y. TIMES, Jan. 24, 1999.
58. Nick Elliott, NATO bombings paralyze traffic up and down Danube, JOURNAL OF COMMERCE, Apr. 14, 1999, at 10A.
59. Kosovo itself is also sitting on rich oil deposits. "There is every reason to believe that in the near future Kosovo will become one of Europe's largest oil-bearing regions." Pyotr Iskenderov, Will Kosovo Become a "Balkan Kuwait?" VOICE OF RUSSIA, May 18, 2000.
60. The U.S. Amoco oil company has evidently verified a massive layer of lignite beneath Pristina, Dragosa and Araholos. "The experience of Kuwait and other Persian Gulf countries shows that oil and the American military presence always go hand in hand." Id.
61. Monbiot, supra note 32.
62. See also, Michel Chossudovsky, America at War in Macedonia, 14 Jun. 2001, http://www.transnational.org/forum/meet/2001/Chossudov_AMBOMacedonia.html;
63. Daniel McAdams, Anti-Western Feeling - No Surprise, Jun. 26, 2001, http://www.bhhrg.org,
64. and What is it all about? Komiti.Com, http://www.komiti.com/default.asp? page_id=4. On June 29, 2001, I received an e-mail from Gligor Tashkovich, Executive Vice President of the U.S.-British consortium AMBO which is sponsoring the Trans-Balkan Oil Pipeline project. Mr. Tashkovich denied that NATO's bombing was related to his project, and stated the Republic of Albania has supported the project since 1992. But an Executive Summary he sent me says, "An additional branch [of the pipeline] connecting Macedonia and the Panchevo [sic] Refinery near Belgrade is a future possibility." Pancevo and other sites in Belgrade were NATO bombing targets. The Executive Summary also states that the feasibility study for the pipeline was conducted by Brown & Root, a division of Halliburton that was headed by Richard Cheney before he was tapped for Vice-President.
65. David H. Hackworth, Wanted: Guns For Hire, SOUTH FLORIDA SUN-SENTINEL, Jul. 12, 2001, at 21A;
66. Michel Chossudovsky, Washington Finances Ethnic Warfare in the Balkans, Apr. 3, 2001, http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/choss/fin.htm;
67. Karen Talbot, Former Yugoslavia: The name of the game is OIL! PEOPLE'S WEEKLY WORLD, May 2001, http://www.ecadre.net/pages/news/stories/990917752. shtml;
68. Christian Jennings, Nato tanks move in as conflict spreads, SCOTLAND ON SUNDAY, Mar. 18, 2001, p. 19;
69. Marjorie Cohn, Pacification for a Pipeline: Explaining U.S. Military Presence in the Balkans, Apr. 27, 2001, JURIST: THE LEGAL EDUCATION NETWORK, http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forum/forumnew22.htm;
70. Rebecca Sumner, A New World Order, LONDON DAILY, Aug. 5, 2000.
71. Macedonia has lost faith in NATO and accused it of siding with the Albanian insurgents. Macedonia Accuses NATO of Siding With Militants, STRATFOR - THE GLOBAL INTELLIGENCE COMPANY, Jul. 30, 2001, http://www.stratfor.com.
72. "Either through intent or mismanagement, NATO has helped prepare the ground for civil war." Id.
73. Starobin, supra note 24.
74. Monbiot, supra note 32.
75. John M. Biers, Caspian Region is Filled With Give and Take - Presentation Spotlights Area, NEW ORLEANS TIMES-PICAYUNE, May 2, 1999, at F1.
76. Nora Boustany, Diplomatic Dispatches - The Room's Not Big Enough for the Two of Them, WASH. POST, Apr. 28, 1999, at A17.
77. For summaries of the interests of the major U.S. oil companies in the Caspian region, see, Patrick B. Pexton, The Hunt for Oil and Gas, FOREIGN POLICY, Mar. 13, 1999.
78. Jonathan Power, Russia, US playing new Great Game for Caspian oil, NEW STRAITS TIMES, Feb. 13, 1999, at 8. Vice President Richard Cheney, ex-CEO of Halliburton, the biggest oil-services company in the world, told a gaggle of oil industry executives in 1998, "I can't think of a time when we've had a region emerge as suddenly to become as strategically significant as the Caspian." In 1999, Halliburton's Brown & Root Division was awarded a $180 million-a-year contract to supply U.S. forces in the Balkans. Brown & Root built Camp Bondsteel in southern Kosovo, the largest American foreign military base constructed since Vietnam
79. (see, Cohn, Cheney's Black Gold, supra note 29), at a cost to the U.S. government of $36.6 million.
80. See, Pierre Briand, Americans build huge camp in Kosovo to house peacekeepers for winter, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESS, Oct. 12, 1999.
81. Zbigniew Brzezinski, Compromise Over Kosovo Means Defeat, WALL. ST. J., May 24, 1999, at A30.
82. Karen Talbot, Backing up Globalization with Military Might, Covert Action Quarterly, http://www.covertaction.org/full_text_68_03a.htm. In 1992, the U.S. pushed the UN Security Council to impose economic sanctions - a total blockade - on Yugoslavia.
83. See, S.C. Res. 713, U.N. SCOR, 46th Sess., 3009th mtg. at 42, U.N. Doc. S/INF/47 (1993). The sanctions aimed to facilitate the secession of Slovenia, Croatia and later Bosnia and Kosovo from Yugoslavia. The U.S. Navy and its NATO allies enforced the blockade by patrolling the Adriatic Sea and the Danube River and stopping all vessels possibly bound for Yugoslavia.
84. See, Marjorie Cohn, Milosevic Empowered by Punishment Politics, Jul 31, 2000, JURIST: THE LEGAL EDUCATION NETWORK, http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forum/ forumnew12.htm. In April 1992, after Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Slovenia were admitted as members of the UN, Serbia-Montenegro proclaimed the dissolution of the former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
85. See, Sean Murphy, Humanitarian Intervention: The United Nations in an Evolving World Order 201 (1996).
86. See also, Michel Chossudovsky and Jared Israel, The U.S., Moves to Impose a Puppet Regime in Yugoslavia, Oct. 5, 2000, www.tenc.net.
87. Alex N. Dajkovic, A "Model" for the Balkans, Z MAG., Jan. 2001, at 25, 28. Serbia, with 11 million people, should be "an attractive market," according to The New York Times. "The Danube, one of Europe's major rivers, runs through it. It is the overland bridge between Western Europe and Greece and Turkey."
88. See, Joseph Kahn, The Sanctions - Easing of Some Restrictions By West Could Happen Soon, N.Y. TIMES, Oct. 8, 2000, at Y13.
89. Chris Hedges, Kosovo War's Glittering Prize Rests Underground, N.Y. TIMES, Jul. 8, 1998.
90. South Balkans - Trepca: Making Sense of the Labyrinth, International Crisis Group, Nov. 26, 1999, http://www.crisisweb.org/projects/sbalkans/reports.
91. See also, Diana Johnstone, Taking over the Trepca mines: Plans and Propaganda, www.serbia-info.com/news, Mar. 3, 2000.
92. Sara Flounders, NATO Troops Seize Mining Complex, WORKERS WORLD, Aug. 24, 2000; www.iacenter.org.
93. Viktor Chernomyrdin, Impossible to Talk Peace With Bombs Falling, WASH. POST, May 27, 1999, at A39.
94. John Daniszewski, NATO Get-Together in Baltics Has Russia Miffed, Staying Away - Military: Venue for meeting of lawmakers raises hackles in Kremlin, which opposes plans for an expansion into ex-Soviet Union, L.A. TIMES, April 29, 2001, p. A4.
95. See also, Michael Wines, The Russians - Muscovites Savor a Caper After Being Down So Long, N.Y. TIMES, Jun. 16, 1999, p. A15.
96. John Daniszewski, Putin Urges Russian Role in New NATO - Security: In first big press conference, president calls for a complete overhaul of Europe's treaty system, with equal membership for Moscow, L.A. TIMES, Jul. 19, 2001, at A3.
97. See also, Timothy Garton Ash, Russia's Eventual Place in NATO, N.Y. TIMES, Jul. 22, 2001, at WK13. U.S. House of Representatives Minority Leader Richard A. Gephardt has outlined an eventual goal to "extend to Russia the prospect of NATO membership."
98. See, Thom Shanker, Gephardt Launches an Attack on Bush's Foreign Policy, N.Y. TIMES, Aug. 3, 2001, at A6.
99. Patrick E. Tyler, Russia and China Sign 'Friendship' Pact: Join to Oppose Missile Shield for the U.S., N.Y. TIMES, Jul. 17, 2001, at A1.
100. Russia President Vladimir V. Putin told an Italian newspaper, "[W]hen NATO enlarges, division doesn't disappear, it simply moves toward our borders." Id.
101. Gerald Segal, Europe Needs US Might to Beat the Serbs, EVENING STANDARD - LONDON, Jun. 2, 1999.
102. Roger Cohen, Page Crisis in the Balkans: The Continent - Europe's Aim: Parity, N.Y. TIMES, Jun. 15, 1999 at A1.
103. Steve Erlanger, Fresh Air, NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO, Nov. 13, 2000.
104. See also, Michael R. Gordon, Armies of Europe Failing to Meet Goals, Sapping NATO, N.Y. TIMES, Jun. 7, 2001, p. A6;
105. Henry Kissinger, The questionable future of NATO, SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIB., Jan. 28, 2001, p. G6.
106. Associated Press, Text of Kosovo Military Agreement, Jun. 9, 1999.
107. See also, www.un.org.
108. Roger Cohen, In Secret Belgrade Talks, London Financier Seems to Have Helped Milosevic Accept Accord, N.Y. TIMES, Jun. 15, 1999, at A15.
109. Rambouillet Agreement - Interim Agreement for Peace and Self-Government in Kosovo, http://www.state.gov/www/regions/eur/Ksvorambouillet text.html.
110. Steve Erlanger, Milosevic's New Version of Reality Will Be Harder for NATO to Dismiss, N.Y. TIMES, Apr. 8, 1999.
111. British House of Commons, supra note 18.
112. Noam Chomsky, In Retrospect: A review of NATO's war over Kosovo, Part II, Z MAG., May 2000, p. 23.
113. Tom Kirchofer, Associated Press, War Means Business for Arms Clients, Jun. 8, 1999. From 1994, until Jan. 5, 2001, Lynne V. Cheney, wife of Vice President Richard Cheney, sat on the board of directors of Lockheed Martin, the world's largest defense contractor. Manufacturers of the high-tech weapons used to bomb both Iraq and Yugoslavia received an "advertising dividend" as tiny video cameras enabled hundreds of millions of television viewers to "experience vicariously" the missile attacks.
114. See, Disarmament: UN Calls for New Partnership with Arms Industry, Inter Press Service, Jul. 9, 1999, quoting Jaynatha Dhanapala, UN Under-Secretary- General for Disarmament Affairs.
115. Blaine Harden, Serb Miscalculation: Persistence and Resources Can Compel Victory, N.Y. TIMES, Jun. 5, 1999, at A6.
116. Benjamin Schwarz and Christopher Layne, The Case Against Intervention in Kosovo, NATION, Apr. 19, 1999.
117. BBC, Apr. 19, 1999.
118. Charter of the United Nations, June 26, 1945, 59 Stat. 1031, T.S. No. 993, 3 Bevans 1153, entered into force Oct. 24, 1945.
119. Ann Fagan Ginger, What Should We Do About the Next Kosovo? 57 GUILD PRAC. 65 (2000).
120. "There is broad agreement that this prohibition of the unauthorized use of force is at the heart of the Charter and contemporary international law and is one of the most significant legal advances in human history." Bilder, supra note 8, at 156-157.
121. Apologists for the bombing campaign point to the Security Council's March 26, 1999, defeat of a Russian, Belarus and India-proposed resolution which would have condemned the NATO bombing attacks as a threat to international peace and a flagrant violation of the UN Charter. U.N. SCOR, 54th Sess., 3989th mtg. at 3, 5, U.N. Doc. S/PV3989. "But a vote after the fact, particularly after the stepped up ethnic cleansing that the bombing had set off, on a resolution that crassly included no condemnation of that accelerated ethnic cleansing, is not the same as prior Security Council authorization for the bombing." Stephen R. Shalom, Reflections on NATO and Kosovo, NEW POLITICS, Summer 1999; http://www.zmag.org/crisescurevts/shalomnp.htm.
122. The terms of the peace agreement between NATO and Serbia - which were very different from the Rambouillet Ultimatum - were embodied in Security Council Resolution 1244. S/RES/1244 (1999). The Rambouillet plan also violated Articles 51 and 52 of the 1980 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, which forbids coercion and force to compel any state to sign a treaty or agreement.
123. Murphy, supra note 44, at 206-207, 257.
124. The United States refused to participate in the humanitarian intervention or the UN peacekeeping operation in Rwanda, because no U.S. international interests were at stake, notwithstanding the undeniable genocide occurring in that country. Id. at 258.
125. An estimated 500,000-800,000 people were slaughtered in eight weeks as the U.S., Belgium, France and other NATO countries stood by and watched. See, Bilder, supra note 8, at 163.
126. Jane Perlez, Trickiest Divides Are Among Big Powers at Kosovo Talks, N.Y. TIMES, Feb. 11, 1999, at A3.
127. Haas quoted by Jonathan Landay, How a NATO strike on Serbs could set precedent, CHRISTIAN SCI. MON., Jan. 21, 1999.
128. Jonathan I. Charney, Anticipatory Humanitarian Intervention in Kosovo, 32 VAND. J. TRANSNAT'L L. 1231, 1234,
129. citing Corfu Channel, 1949 I.C.J. at 32-22. In the Corfu Channel case, the International Court of Justice did not accept Great Britain's claim that its intervention in Albanian territorial waters was justified to vindicate British rights. NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia violated the NATO treaty as well: Article 1: The parties, as set forth in the UN Charter, undertake to settle any international dispute by peaceful means ... and they are to refrain from the threat or use of force in any manner inconsistent with the UN. The NATO bombing was not a peaceful settlement and bypassed the UN. It therefore violated this provision of the NATO Treaty. Article 51: Protection of the civilian population - This article provides the civil population and individual civilians shall be protected against dangers from military operations. They shall not be object of attack; indiscriminate attacks are prohibited (those not directed at a specific military objective); and they must not be of a nature to strike military objectives and civilians without distinction. Several NATO bombs hit civil targets, including bombings of 50 bridges, 12 railroad lines, 5 civilian airports, 50 hospitals and clinics, 190 educational institutions, 16 medieval monasteries and shrines, and several factories, power plants, water mains, major roadways, media stations, libraries and homes. An estimated 500-1800 civilians were killed as a result of the bombing. Article 85 provides: Making the civilian population or individual civilians the object of attack or launching an indiscriminate attack affecting the civilian population is a grave breach of the NATO Protocol.
130. See, http://home.wanadoo.nl/tcc/nato/treaty.html.
131. U.N. DOC. A/1316, 2 Y.B.I.L.C. 374 (1950).
132. Walter J. Rockler, War Crimes Law Applies to U.S. Too, CHICAGO TRIB., May 23, 1999.
133. In addition, Article 54 of Protocol I of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 prohibits attacking, destroying, or rendering useless "objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population," including water supplies.
134. Christopher Black, An Impartial Tribunal? Really? Jun., 2000, www.emperors-clothes.com/analysis/Impartial.htm.
135. Statute of the International Criminal Tribunal For the Former Yugoslavia, adopted May 25, 1993, S.C. RES. 827, http://www.un.org/icty/basic/statut/ stat2000_con.htm.
136. See, http://www.un.org/icty/indictment/english/mil-ii990524e.htm
137. Pentagon Report Whitewashes Civilian Deaths in Yugoslavia, Human Rights Watch, Feb. 8, 2000, http://www.hrw.org/hrw/press/2000/02/nato208.htm. Spanish Captain Adolfo Luis Martin de la Hoz, who participated in the NATO bombing, reported that NATO consciously chose nonmilitary targets and "every single" mission was planned by high U.S. military authorities.
138. See, Jose Luis Morales, Spanish Fighter Pilots Admit NATO Purposely Attacks Civilian Targets, Z MAG., Jun. 14, 1999.
139. NATO also violated the 1949 Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in time of War, and the f977 Geneva Convention and the 1899 and 1907 Hague Conventions, which specify that military operations should not target and kill civilians.
140. Norman Kempster, Report Blames NATO for 500 Civilian Deaths, L.A. TIMES, Feb. 7, 2000, p. A6.
141. NATO violations of the laws of war during Operation Allied Force must be investigated, Jul. 6, 2000, http://www.web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/index/EUR70025200.
142. Steven Boggan, War In The Balkans: Nato warned on war crimes - Civilians, INDEPENDENT - LONDON, May 5, 1999, at 4.
143. Each cluster bomb contains up to 200 bomblets the size of a tennis ball canister. It opens at about 2,000 feet and unleashes a hail of bomblets that cover an area the size of four football pitches with lethal shrapnel. Each bomb can penetrate five inches of steel. See, Jonathan Steele, Death Lurks in the Fields, GUARDIAN LONDON, Mar. 14, 2000.
144. See also, Carlotta Gall, U.N. Aide in Kosovo Faults NATO on Unexploded Bombs, N.Y. TIMES, May 23, 2000, p. A3.
145. Paul Watson, Unexploded Weapons Pose Deadly Threat on the Ground," L.A. TIMES, Apr. 28, 1999, p. 5.
146. Carlotta Gall, NATO Blamed For Delay in Cluster Bomb Cleanup, N.Y. TIMES, May 23, 2000.
147. The use of cluster bombs violates the Ottawa Convention on the prohibition of the use of anti-personnel mines. But the United States, party to only a handful of international human rights treaties, has refused to sign the Ottawa Convention.
148. Tony Wesolowsky, Collateral Damage, IN THESE TIMES, Aug. 8, 1999, http://www.inthesetimes.com/wesolowski2317.html.
149. Torcuil Crichton and Felicity Arbuthnot, Global spread of DU reaches food chain, SUNDAY HERALD SCOTLAND, April 15, 2001.
150. Wesolowsky, supra note 90.
151. Dan Fahey, Depleted Uranium: America's Military 'Gift' That Keeps on Giving, L.A. TIMES, Feb. 18, 2001, p. M2. Depleted uranium, which remains radioactive for four-and-a-half billion years, has penetrated the food chain and has been found in the urine of all civilians tested in Kosovo and Bosnia.
152. Crichton & Arbuthnot, supra note 91.
153. Mark Fineman, Yugoslav City Battling Toxic Enemies - Balkans: NATO strikes on chemical sites have left environmental nightmare, L.A. TIMES, Jul. 6, 1000, at A1.
154. Wesolowsky, supra note 90.
155. Milenko Vasovic, Hiding under the black rain - Ecologists say the authorities in Serbia are concealing the extent of the ecological and health threats caused by NATO bombing, http://www.ddh.nl/fy/Kosova/opinions/i999/ black_rain3006.html.
156. Fineman, supra note 94.
157. Id.
158. Michel Chossudovsky, NATO Willfully Triggered An Environmental Catastrophe in Yugoslavia, June 2000, http://emperors-clothes.com/articles/ chuss/willful.htm.
159. The release of these toxic chemicals also violated several other provisions of international law, including the Nuremberg Principle VI; Hague Articles 22 and 23, Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous and Other Gases; Geneva i925 (Poisonous Substances Protocol); Geneva 1977, Protocol I Additional, Articles 48, 51, 56; Stockholm Declaration of the UN Conference on the Human Environment 1972; and Principles I, II of UN Conference on Human Environment.
160. Carlotta Gall & Marlise Simons, Croatia in Turmoil After Agreeing to Send 2 to Tribunal, N.Y. TIMES, Jul. 9, 2001, p. A3.
161. In July 2001, the Croatian government sent two of its leaders to The Hague to answer ICTY indictments for this incident. Id.
162. See also, Peter Beaumont & Ed Vulliamy, Guns secret set to haunt US - War crimes hunt turns heat on Croatia's ally, OBSERVER, Jul. 8, 2001.
163. Colum Lynch, Peril seen in supporting Kosovo independence, BOSTON GLOBE, Apr. 1, 1999, at A26.
164. Human Rights Watch, Weapons Transfers and Violations of the Laws of War in Turkey, Nov., 1995, http://www.hrw.org/reports/1995/Turkey.htm.
165. Turkey to double military aid to Albania, JANE'S DEFENCE WEEKLY, Mar. 8, 2000.
166. Chomsky, supra note 11, at 42.
167. Associated Press, U.S. Seeks to Keep Lid on Far East Purge Role, L.A. TIMES, Jul. 28, 2001, at A19, detailing U.S. financial and intelligence assistance which enabled the slaughter of between 100,000 and 1,000,000 Indonesian communists in the 1960s, and efforts to keep the U.S. role secret.
168. See, http://www.nsarchive.org.
169. Chomsky, supra note 11, at 69.
170. Bilder, supra note 8, at 163.
171. In 1998, 120 countries adopted the Statute of the International Criminal Court as a multilateral treaty. U.N. Doc. A/CONF.183/9 (17 July 1998). Established under the aegis of the United Nations, the ICC will be the first permanent international body to try suspected war criminals. Its jurisdiction extends to genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and the crime of aggression. Seven countries - including Libya, Iraq, China, India, Sudan, Israel and the United States - voted against the establishment of the ICC. The U.S. is seeking to ensure the legal processes of the ICC do not jeopardize its role as global superpower, insulating its soldiers and policy-makers from becoming defendants in war crimes prosecutions. The United States is fully aware that its actions in Yugoslavia could subject it to prosecution under the Rome Statute for intentionally directing attacks against civilians and non-military objects. One week before he left office, President Bill Clinton signed the ICC statute on December 31, 2000, the deadline for signing the treaty without being compelled to ratify it. A signature enables a country to have input into the development of the Court. Clinton urged incoming President George W. Bush to refrain from submitting the treaty to the Senate for ratification because it would make U.S. leaders vulnerable to indictment. Bush has indicated he has no intention of asking the Senate to ratify the treaty. See, Marjorie Cohn, The Crime of Aggression: What is It and Why Doesn't the U.S. Want the International Criminal Court to Punish It? Mar. 22, 2001, JURIST: THE LEGAL EDUCATION NETWORK, http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forum/forumnew18.htm;
172. Marjorie Cohn, No "Victor's Justice" in Yugoslavia: NATO Must be Held Accountable for Its War Crimes, 56 GUILD PRAC. 146 (1999)
173. and JURIST: THE LEGAL EDUCATION NETWORK, Mar. 27, 2000, http://jurist.law.pitt.edu/forum/forumnew4.htm;
174. and Abraham D. Sofaer, International Law and Kosovo, 36 STAN. J. INT'L L. 1, 21, n. 88 (2000).
175. Christian Jennings, Irish Times, Mar. 22, 2000, at 12.
176. Richard B. Bilder, Rethinking International Human Rights: Some Basic Questions, 1969 WISC. L. REV. 171, 202 (1969).
177. Doug Bandow, NATO's Disastrous Victory in Kosovo, Mar. 10, 2000, http://cato.org/ danys/03-10-00.html.
178. Interview with Doug Henwood, WBAI, Apr. 15, 1999. Edited version in Henwood's Left Business Observer #89, Apr. 27, 1999.