SERBS DESERVES JUSTICE AND BRITONS NEED TO FACE SOME FACTS – Dr Colin Meade, 2004
In 2003, millions marched through the streets of London to oppose the Bush administration’s drive for war against Iraq. Four years earlier, in 1999, mere handfuls had protested against the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia over Kosovo.
People from a left-wing and “anti-imperialist” background fiercely desire to see the two events as part of a smoothly unfolding sequence, with the arch enemy of humanity, the US, leading coalitions of the reluctant in military assaults on “rogue nations”, in both cases without the legitimacy of a UN Security Council resolution.
However, it is clear that the overwhelming bulk of opponents of the Iraq war see no such sequence. Quite the opposite; key players in the attack on Yugoslavia were adamantly opposed to “Bush’s unilateralism” over Iraq and are now fully accepted as part of the “antiwar” camp.
Think of Robin Cook, British Foreign Secretary in 1999 and a militant supporter of the Kosovo war, who resigned from the Cabinet over Iraq. Or Bill Clinton, US President at the time of the Kosovo war, who received a standing ovation at the 2003 Labour Party Conference. Or General Wesley Clarke, the leader of the military assault on Yugoslavia, who won the endorsement of American “antiwar” activist Michael Moore for his bid for the Democratic nomination for the 2004 Presidentials. Newspapers like as the Guardian, Independent and Mirror which questioned the Iraq war, were all 110% behind the bombing of Yugoslavia.
There are two attitudes one can take to the discrepancy: either the millions who opposed Bush over Iraq are, through lack of political education, incapable of spotting the hidden anti-imperialist connection; or, the two wars were, in fact, not part of a single imperialist plan at all, but involved different constellations of political forces pursuing different goals.
I would submit that the second proposition is correct, however unpalatable this may be to those of us long accustomed to viewing politics in “anti-imperialist” terms. The fact is that major political forces took entirely different political attitudes to the two wars.
Thus, radical Islamism and Old Europe, both bitterly hostile to Yugoslavia, and fervent backers of the 1999 war, were both opposed to Bush over Iraq. Unless we believe that these powerful forces have no minds of their own, and are merely passive agents of some hidden hand (presumably located in Washington), then it follows that it must have been perfectly consistent of them to support the one war and oppose the other.
And consistencies are not in fact hard to find. In the eyes of radical Islamists, who played a central role in the antiwar movement in Britain, Bosnia, Kosovo, Palestine and now Iraq are all key fronts in the battle to restore the Islamic Caliphate and defeat the anti-Islamic crusade of the US/Israel (the Great and Little Satans) and those in their thrall.
For Old Europe – led by Germany – the attack on Yugoslavia and the Serbs advanced their plans for a European superstate, while the assertion of unilateral US power in the Middle East, on the other hand, is a direct threat to that project.
In the US, Clinton was prepared to put US power at the disposal of radical Islam and Old Europe, in order to maintain US military and political credibility. Bush, on the other hand, especially after 9/11, considers that these forces have reached a point of development where they are directly challenging the American position in the world; for him, radical Islamism and Old Europe are now beyond appeasement. They have to be thwarted.
The realisation that the two wars are different is both good and bad news for those who want to see justice done for the Serbs.
Here is the bad news: it cannot be assumed that the vast crowds who turned out against Bush can easily be won to support for the Serb cause. Quite the contrary, the mobilisation against Bush was driven by political forces which are by and large also anti-Serb.
But there is good news too. Firstly, there is no need or point in dissolving the specific, concrete issues raised by the struggle for justice for the Serbs into a general anti-imperialist movement for which they are not a priority. Indeed, the anti-Serb campaign has had a unique feature, which should be a matter of concern for all democrats, and that is the systematic use of atrocity propaganda to inflame hatred of Serbs and their leaders.
While Blair may have over-egged the pudding on Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, there is no doubt that Saddam aspired to possess such weapons. The lies about the Serbs are of a quite different quality. Genocidal intentions and actions have been attributed to Serb leaders and Serbian culture vilified as essentially barbaric. Fabrications and slanders of all kinds, derived undiluted from the propaganda arsenals of Balkan Serb haters, are disseminated and reiterated in the media and by leading academics. A whole industry has grown up devoted to rubbishing an entire people and its history.
Dissent or questioning of the anti-Serb consensus is strictly policed, most virulently by liberal public opinion formers – as often as not critics of the Iraq war. The standard account of events in the Balkans rests on an edifice of lies which it is perilous to challenge. This is a catastrophe for both the Serbian and British peoples. Justice for the Serbs means first and foremost demolishing this edifice, thereby removing a source of intellectual pollution from British public life.
A tall order maybe. But the second piece of good news is that there is a lot more political wiggle room in today’s world than is apparent through “anti-imperialist” spectacles. Following the recent upsurge of separatist Albanian violence in Kosovo, there is a new openness to rediscussing the Balkans in the media and the political classes. Seeking to open new doors should not mean compromising on the essential steps needed to restore Serbs to their rightful place in the community of nations; on the contrary those basic demands should be put forward with renewed confidence that progress can be made.
A Justice and Truth campaign would, I suggest, tenaciously demand,
1. An apology from Tony Blair and Robin Cook to the Serb people for the Kosovo war and to the British people for misleading them on the facts.
2. An end to the repetition in the media of blatant lies, baseless allegations and propaganda presented as fact (“an estimated 10,000 Kosovo Albanians were killed in a Serb crackdown in 1999”, etc.).
3. The removal of outright falsehoods and misleading statements about Serb and Serbia from future editions of legal and political textbooks used in schools, colleges and universities.
4. A review by competent legal experts of the procedures and decisions of the Hague Tribunal, based on traditional British standards of justice.
5. An end to all political support for Balkan factions which engage in anti-Serb propaganda and activities.
We need a team of prominent public figures prepared to put themselves at the forefront of the campaign and the organisation of initiatives which can gain wide publicity for these demands.
It seems to me that the call for Justice and Truth could provide the basis for a long-term and broad coalition of Serb and non-Serbs.
Colin Meade, 6 April 2004
Dr. Colin Meade works as a translator and lecturer at the London Metropolitan University in international relations, international law, and modern European studies.