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| WINNING THE PEACE | |
 June 22, 1999 
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NewsHour correspondent Charles Krause examines the challenges facing one U.S. Army unit as they work to restore order and security to a war-ravaged Kosovo.
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| Building order out of chaos. | ||||||||||||||||||||
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CHARLES KRAUSE: 82nd Airborne Task Force Commander Lieutenant Colonel Joseph Anderson whose men took control of Strpce yesterday says the peacekeeping mission in Kosovo is clear. LT. COL. JOSEPH ANDERSON: To come in and establish law and order, protection and secure key facilities and networks that are critical to the infrastructure of this country.
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| Fearful Serbs. | ||||||||||||||||||||
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SGT. KEVIN NEIL: They're going to have to do what they feel is right for them and their family. I can't give you that kind of guidance. INTERPRETER: "The right security for the whole city." SGT. KEVIN NEIL: We can't post a guard at every single apartment. SGT. DANNY GREEN: We'll notify UNHCR of the plight of these people up here. There is nothing we can do.
SGT. DANNY GREEN: But CARE and UNHCR and other agencies have a responsibility for this city. CHARLES KRAUSE: U.S. Army Civil Affairs Sergeants Kevin Neil and Danny Green are specially trained for conflict resolution and confidence building. But during those critical days last week, even their best efforts were not usually good enough to reassure the Serbs. INTERPRETER: She wants to stay but she's scared. SGT. KEVIN NEIL: I understand. We need to know what she's going to do. Does she want to go become into the apartment or not? SGT. DANNY GREEN: We can talk to the commander and go back there to reoccupy.
SGT. KEVIN NEIL: We cannot have a soldier at every apartment in every house. Basically all we need her to know right now because we don't have time to continue, we have many other problems. Does she want back in the apartment to stay or leave? SGT. DANNY GREEN: We're getting ready to walk away. You can walk away with us and we'll go back to the house or walk away and - CHARLES KRAUSE: The family decided not to go with Neil and Green. The next morning, they left for Serbia. |
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| Leaving Kosovo behind. | ||||||||||||||||||||
 CHARLES
KRAUSE: There are still people waiting at the train station to leave this
place, Serbs. Are there going to be any Serbs left in the city by the
time this is over?
SGT. KEVIN NEIL: There are always going to be some people staying. Some people are going to tough it out. SGT. DANNY GREEN: We think we've got -- out of an estimated population of 4,700 -- I think we've got less 500 left. CHARLES KRAUSE: Serbs? SGT. DANNY GREEN: Everyone that I've seen - SGT. KEVIN NEIL: A very rough guess.
CHARLES KRAUSE: The other side of the story, the atrocities committed by the Serbs and the Albanians continued suffering was also evident in Urosevac last week at the hospital. But when Neil and Green first visited, their concern was security.
SGT. KEVIN NEIL: That's what we were going to suggest. DOCTOR (speaking through an interpreter): "From which moment you can start to work here?" SGT. DANNY GREEN: Immediately. But first of all, before we allow our soldiers to come in, when they come here, they need to search the entire hospital to look for any arms or bombs or booby traps.
SGT. KEVIN NEIL: Sergeant Green will be with them the whole time to make sure they are not de-sanitizing anything or destroying any medical equipment or anything like that. |
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| Restoring water and electricity. | ||||||||||||||||||||
| CHARLES KRAUSE: Restoring public services like water, electricity
and health care, is a priority for the peacekeepers second only to security.
What Neil and Green found at the hospital was probably not very different
from the other hospitals which remain in much of Kosovo.
CHARLES KRAUSE: Still Urosevac has become something of a model. It's viewed as an early success story by the U.S. military. Over the past several days, Urosevac has clearly begun to come alive, shaking off years of violence and hostility and three months of NATO bombing and outright war. But despite the beginnings of recovery here and elsewhere in Kosovo, the situation is still tense, and the biggest perceived threat to security has now shifted from the retreating Serbs to the ascendant KLA. U.S. SOLDIER: Give up your weapon.
U.S. SOLDIER: We need to look at your vehicle. INTERPRETER: He says they have no weapons. KLA SOLDIER: No, no, no. U.S. SOLDIER: Tell him that all his weapons and all his ammunition are coming with me. INTERPRETER: He said, "I don't have weapons." U.S. SOLDIER: Tell him I'm taking that, too. KLA SOLDIER (speaking through an interpreter): "My brother just died at war gave me this -- has gave all this. He died in war and this is -" U.S. SOLDIER: Tell him I'm going to check his vest. Tell everybody to get out of the vehicle. CHARLES KRAUSE: After searching the KLA soldiers and their car, the KFOR American troops found guns, ammunition, and hand grenades.
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CHARLES
KRAUSE: Yesterday afternoon, U.S. forces entered Strpce, a tiny farming
village far from Kosovo's principal cities deep in the American sector.
Responding to reports of reprisals and revenge, GI's belonging to one
of the Army's elite rapid reaction battalions were rushed in to secure
the area. And 11 days after U.S. KFOR forces first entered Kosovo, yet
another U.S. peacekeeping mission was underway. 
LT.
COL. JOSEPH ANDERSON, U.S. Army: There's been everything from larceny
to arson to threats of use of force to use of force, shots fired to
include people being killed. 
CHARLES
KRAUSE: From the very beginning, KFOR troops have tried to remain evenhanded.
They've taken weapons from both Serbs and Kosovars. They've patrolled
both Serb and Albanian streets and neighborhoods in Kosovo's cities
and they've now begun to establish at least a presence in the vast rural
areas where thousands of Kosovars were killed and whole villages were
destroyed. For KFOR, the first priority was and remains security, making
Kosovo safe for both the hundreds of thousands of Albanians who fled
and for those Serbs who, so far have chosen to remain. U.S. troops now
control the principal border crossing between Macedonia and Kosovo where
every car is searched for weapons. For the most part, there's little
resistance; indeed, most of those crossing the border are Albanian Kosovar
refugees who seem to welcome the increased security. 
STAFF
SGT. MICHAEL FITZPATRICK, U.S. Army: There's all kinds of reactions.
I mean there's people who come in -- I've had people walk up crying
and they've been crying as they're walking up. I've had people cross
over - you know -- past the booths there, and they get down, and they're
kissing the ground. And, basically it's just - you know -- people are
really joyous about it, they're going home. And that means the sooner
they go home, the sooner I go home. 
CHARLES
KRAUSE: But it's in the cities where hostilities between Serbs and Albanians
are most apparent. And it's here in cities like this Urosevac where
the peacekeepers must rebuild trust and confidence if Kosovo is ever
to escape its history of ethnic hatred and religious violence. Urosevac
is Kosovo's fourth largest city, a farming and light manufacturing center
located in the American sector. When U.S. Troops first entered 
Urosevac
last week, there were still remnants of the retreating Serb army, as
well as Serb paramilitary units responsible for most of the worst civilian
atrocities. But the balance of power was shifting quickly. As both U.S.
KFOR forces and armed KLA commandos entered Urosevac, it was the city's
four to five thousand Serbs who were suddenly fearful. Hundreds waited
at the city's train station, desperate and determined to leave. Others
sought help from the Americans, begging for food and water and asking
for protection. 
SERBIAN
WOMAN (speaking through an interpreter): Why are they doing this? If
this is supposed to be peace and now they are chasing them out of their
homes. Should they leave or should they stay? 
SGT.
KEVIN NEIL: The relief agency is moving so slow. 
INTERPRETER:
She says will you go and secure us that we'll be okay if we go home?
SGT.
DANNY GREEN: Everyone that I've seen is 60, 70 years old and older and
-- old men and old women, they've lived here all their lives and they
realize that they may die here, but this is their home. It's unfortunate
that we've seen some of them get roughed up. And there's also a population
of Romans or gypsies that are left here. I don't have an estimate on
their population, but you can see at the train station that some of
them are trying to leave. And since most of them were pro-Serbian, the
Albanians are glad to see them go.
INTERPRETER:
They would like you to protect the hospital. 
DOCTOR
(speaking through an interpreter): "Yes, you're free to do -- yes."
SGT.
DANNY GREEN: They have a lot of gunshot, a lot of mine victims, amputations.
There was one girl in there who had an amputation of her leg and she
is probably going to lose a hand. But the worst thing is she lost a
brother. Her brother was killed in the mine because they were running
and playing. She's 13. Another girl beside her had her foot amputated
and lost an eye. I'd expected things like women dying of childbirth
and children getting sick with 
pneumonia
and things like that. But the number one cause of death while they were
fighting was starvation. And that really took me by surprise. We saw
some cases in this hospital where it almost looked like something out
of Auschwitz or Dachau as far as people emaciated.
CHARLES
KRAUSE: In the American sector, U.S. Troops have been stopping, searching
and disarming KLA guerrillas for most of the past week. Hours before
the KLA formally agreed to disarm in stages over the next three months,
there was a tense confrontation not far from the American garrison in
Vetina that could be read as an ominous sign of things to come.
President
Clinton's promises today that the United States will ensure Kosovo's
safety and help the Kosovars rebuild their lives will in many ways depend
on the U.S. Army and the other KFOR peacekeeping forces now in Kosovo.
What seems likely is that this war-torn and still violent land will
require an international military presence for years if not decades
into the future.