Paul,
Well, for starters I certainly don't support
teaching people that "Serbs are monsters,"
although I might not oppose teaching that
about S.M., who is, as far as I am concerned.
One difference between what happened
in the US and what is happening in Kosmet
is that in the former we are talking about a
small minority of the population being cleansed
(no, I don't support it), and they were not expelled
from the country; although being sent to concentration
camps is very far from benign treatment.
In Kosmet we have a small minority (around
10%, right?) that is expelling the vast majority,
not just internally displacing them (that too).
Also, one can dismiss it as imperialist propaganda,
but the reports that S.M. did indeed have a plan for
what is going is far from incredible, even if it is also
far from being definitely proven. The very rapidity and
apparently systematic nature of how it has been
carried out suggests that there was prior planning of
this. However, I also have no doubt that even if there
was such a plan, it would not have been initiated with
the rapidity and violence that it has been if there had
been no bombing. NATO is certainly partially culpable
in this, but far from totally culpable.
Barkley Rosser
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Monday, May 17, 1999 9:41 PM
Subject: [PEN-L:6935] Re: Re: Rosser on Kurds/Kosovars
What is wrong with the logic of of the proposition that:
a: there was no ethnic cleansing;
b: NATO declares that unless Yugoslavia allows itself to be
occupied and Kosovo be declared independent, it will be bombed
regardless of how it treats its minority; and
c: Yugoslavia decides that the only way it can protect its territory
from foreign invasion is to 'clear the region of possible enemy
troups and collaborators' (like the US and Canada did in the
second world war by clearing the west coast (i.e. ethnic cleansing)
of Japanese).
I disagreed with the expulsion of the Japanese as much as I
dislike the expulsion of the Albanians. But from a military
standpoint I understand it and, in the case of Yugoslavia, the
military argument is much stronger than the one for the internment
of the Japanese by the US and Canada in WW2.
Brad seems to be in denial -- it is NATO that initiated the ethnic
cleansing, not the Serbs!!!! There would be no -- repeat no -- ethnic
cleansing if NATO had not tried to cleanse Kosovo of the Serbs
through its bombing campaign.
And now we, in Canada, are beginning to get the backlash of the
Serb/Milosevic demonization campaign -- Serb kids in Canadian
schools being taught by their teachers that the Serbs are evil
ethnic oppressors -- reminiscent of the 1930s in Germany. Don't
talk to me about the attempt to make every Muslim responsible for
the terrorist acts of the KLA when you are attempting to make
every Serb and Yugoslav responsible for the terrorist acts of NATO
and the military response to those terrorist acts.
> >It is we, members of NATO, that have caused the ethnic cleansing by
> >our bombing
> >
> >Paul Phillips
>
>
> Why this strange and pathetic attempt to deny the agency of those who are
> undertaking the ethnic cleansing? And why this attempt to make every
Muslim
> in the region bar responsbility for the terrorist deeds of the KLA?
>
>
> Brad DeLong
>
>
