Serbs Angered by Strike on Factory
By George Jahn
Associated Press Writer
Wednesday, March 31, 1999; 5:23 p.m. EST
CACAK, Yugoslavia (AP) -- The Yugoslav army took reporters
Wednesday to a bombed-out appliance factory where workers
described themselves as innocent victims of allied airstrikes.
NATO said the plant was targeted because it also made
munitions.
At the state-run Sloboda factory, 100 miles south of Belgrade in
the industrial center of Cacak, reporters saw workers gingerly
picking through the wreckage for salvageable items -- a bit of
pipe here, a vacuum cleaner part there -- and heard them bitterly
criticize NATO.
``What are we going to live from?'' asked Mihajlo Draskovic, who
said he had worked at the plant for 25 years.
The plant is known for its production of household appliances,
and local officials said it employed 5,000 people. Wrecked
vacuum cleaners, hair dryers, stove parts and other appliances
were scattered in one hall.
But spokesman Eric Povel at NATO headquarters in Brussels,
Belgium said, ``As far as we know, this so-called vacuum cleaner
factory was also used as a munitions factory, so it was a valid
target.''
Some factories in Yugoslavia, where the government still controls
most manufacturing, are known to produce both civilian products
and military components.
Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon said NATO struck ``a
major ammunition manufacturing plant'' in the town.
``I believe we struck it successfully,'' he said. ``I'm not aware that
there was a lot of collateral damage but I don't have a complete
picture on that.''
Hundreds of steel girders lie twisted and broken over acres of
the plant, where a smell of burning lingered in the air. Tin roofs
were bent and broken.
Shattered manufacturing machinery was everywhere, and a huge
crater, surrounded by mounds of earth, was collecting rain and
groundwater.
Two areas with relatively undamaged buildings are cordoned off
with tape that says ``Stop, police.'' Police pushed away reporters
who attempted to approach the tape. Plant officials said the
areas were off-limits because of fears that some of the ordnance
fired by NATO might still be there, unexploded.
NATO says the air attacks are to stop the brutal offensive on
Kosovo Albanians by Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic.
Workers here expressed outrage, and growing hatred of the
West.
Manager Radomir Ljuljic said he was reduced to tears when 10
missiles hit on Sunday and a second wave of strikes came on
Tuesday, destroying what he says was a $300 million factory.
``They will pay for this sooner or later,'' he said. ``And the bill will
be enormous.''
NATO has not specified its targets since the attacks began a
week ago, beyond saying that they are of military or strategic
value, and meant to ``degrade'' the Yugoslav military's ability to
wage war in Kosovo.
But authorities in Yugoslavia, and Serbia, the main Yugoslav
republic, maintain that dozens of civilian buildings, including
schools, monasteries and kindergartens, have been hit. And
Yugoslav Foreign Minister Zivadin Jovanovic says dozens of
civilians have died.
It is unclear how much of that is propaganda. But the Sloboda
destruction is undeniable.
``This factory is already 50 years old,'' Ljuljic bellows, venting his
rage at the enemy. ``NATO will only be 50 in July.''
Miloje Djordjevic says he worked 30 years here. A mechanic, he
used to man one of the tooling machines in one of the halls.
``We bought this from the West, and now the West destroyed it,''
he says, eyes strangely blank.
There's more incomprehension and fury in Kragujevac. In this
city, about 40 miles south of Belgrade, an air force barracks was
hit last Wednesday, the first day of NATO airstrikes. It's the same
kind of destruction as in Cacak, on a smaller scale.
On a nearby hillside, about 4,000 people gather to listen to
pathos and poems. Some carry Yugoslav flags, other signs
heaping scorn on NATO and President Clinton.
This is the annual commemoration of a horrible chapter in
Kragujevac history. The Nazis killed 7,000 civilians -- 10 for every
German soldier killed by the partisans -- including an entire class
of high school students.
The commemoration is usually in October but was moved up
because of the NATO attacks.
``Our people wont let any force occupy us,'' says Miroslav
Bogdanovic, 65. ``We said that to Hitler and now we're saying
that to Clinton.''
© Copyright 1999 The Associated Press
