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| KEEPING THE PEACE | |
 June 10, 1999 
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The U.N. Security Council approved a Kosovo peace plan that calls for the deployment of an international peacekeeping force to Kosovo. Two experts discuss what lies ahead for the peacekeepers.
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General Neal, let's take the first phase of this, the next ten, eleven days, Serbs out, NATO in. What are the dangers there? |
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| Occupational hazards. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
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GEN. RICHARD NEAL (Ret.), US Marine Corps: Well, of course, the first thing they're going to have to worry about is bringing the Marines ashore and getting them organized and then moving. It seems like that's already taking place, and that's well ahead of schedule. The last thing I saw was about five hours ahead of schedule. At the same time, they've got about 1,700 army forces that are moving up to Skopje, also. They'll get up there, they'll get organized, and then they'll start the movement in. This will be a time-phased operation. And that's where the sensitivity is, is to make sure that the Serbs have started to move out of region one or sector one and moved out and starting going through three and then out one of the four exit allies that they've created. We don't want the US forces to get -- NATO forces to get in there too quickly if, in fact, we don't have where the mine fields are supposed to be annotated on maps and shown to US and NATO forces. And, likewise, they're supposed to clear all of the lines of communications of mines and booby traps and obstacles before they leave. So I think Lieutenant General Jackson is going to have to -- it's going to be a symphony. He's going to have to orchestrate it. It's going to be difficult. Then you have to make sure that you do it in such manner that, in fact, you have the sustainment capability up there to keep the troops sustained during this evolution. MARGARET WARNER: How dangerous do you think it is, how tricky, General Cherrie, this early phase?
MARGARET WARNER: And staying with you for a minute, the Serbs are supposed to leave these detailed maps of where all the mine fields and booby traps are, but what does a commander like General Jackson do? Does he rely on those? How does he know if those are accurate or complete? BRIG. GEN. STANLEY CHERRIE: If I can draw an analogy to Bosnia, we also received the mine field layouts from the former warring factions. We actually had the former warring factions assist us in setting up the mine awareness and the mine location center, went out with joint patrols with the factions to do a sampling to make sure that they were accurate. We relied heavily on their input and on them assisting us in the initial stages. |
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| Dealing with desperation and revenge. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
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MARGARET WARNER: Okay, General Neal, now, when they're in, then, what are the big dangers? What are the biggest challenges you see?
BRIG. GEN. STANLEY CHERRIE: I do think it's controllable, and the way to control it is not just to appeal to the masses, but to go to the refugee leaders. And there will be refugee leaders, and lay out for them the fact that they will be better taken care of if they remain in their current location until it's actually safe to go back; explain what we're doing to assist them in getting back; assure them that they will get back. And I do think it's controllable. But you have to use their own internal chain of command. You can't just attempt to appeal to the masses. You have got to find the leaders, convince them, and let them convince the individuals. MARGARET WARNER: And then, staying with you for a minute, how much of a problem do you see in the matter that General Neal mentioned, that you're going to have this mixing of populations, unlike Bosnia where you had more demarcation lines, did you not? You're going to have this mixing of populations with a lot of revenge, a very poisonous atmosphere. How does NATO handle that? BRIG. GEN. STANLEY CHERRIE: Well, having just read the treaty, I think it's an outstanding treaty. It gives General Jackson exactly what he needs. It uses words like "compel," "force necessary to accomplish," and it makes General Jackson the only interpreting authority on the treaty. So he has the tools available to go ahead and do that. And I think you just have to not rule with an iron hand. But it has to be a little bit of carrot and a little bit of stick to get the people to show if they do play ball, do what they're told, good things will happen and the peace will be maintained. |
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| General Jackson's role. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
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MARGARET WARNER: So, that's true, isn't it, General Neal, General Jackson will really be very much like a pro consul, really, I mean, the military ruler, the ruler of Kosovo, at least in the short-term, I'm sorry, General Neal I was referring to.
MARGARET WARNER: All right, General Cherrie, now what does he do about the KLA? BRIG. GEN. STANLEY CHERRIE: I think we've made some pronouncements that will disarm the KLA or I saw that in part of the treaty. MARGARET WARNER: Demilitarize I think is the phrase. I'm not sure of the difference.
MARGARET WARNER: Do you anticipate problems there, General Neal? GEN. RICHARD NEAL: I do. I think the KLA are not party to this arrangement that's been put together, but they have agreed in principle with all of the precepts of the treaty or the agreement. It will be interesting to see. The way it's been couched and from talking to some folks, they're talking about maybe in two or three weeks after General Jackson gets his enabling force in place, doing its thing, then they're going to address the KLA problem. And as General Cherrie pointed out, I don't think they'll turn that over to a NATO problem. They'll probably have civil authority somehow or the U.N. get involved in that effort. They're only talking about disarming the heavy equipment, the heavy weapons. They'll be able to keep their small arms, their rifles and other things. And that's going to be very difficult to judge when, in fact, you've got all of this heavy equipment. Where do you draw the line on what's heavy and what's light? And then you can kill with a pistol, just as well as you can kill with a .50 caliber weapon. So it's going to be a balancing act. And this is just another piece of this whole puzzle that's going to be very difficult. |
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Peacekeepers at risk? |
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MARGARET WARNER: General Cherrie, briefly, how risky do you think this operation will be to U.S. and other NATO soldiers? BRIG. GEN. STANLEY CHERRIE: I think there's a great deal of risk, a great deal more than we faced in Bosnia because the forces there had -- for want of a better term -- reached their culminating point. Here they have not. They've been pretty much forced to surrender. We've been bombing their homeland. So there will probably going to be more antagonistic, even though they're moving out. The KLA is more of an insurgent force, not readily identifiable. There could be dissident Serbs, as General Neal said, take the uniform off and hide in the hills, and sniping at forces and then blaming it on the other side. So I think General Jackson's going to -- and I know he will have force protection while they're moving in and throughout this operation, as one of his uppermost concerns.
GEN. RICHARD NEAL: I believe so. If you read the agreement, I think it really stipulates that General Jackson can take any force necessary in order to make sure that he protects his force, and at the same time, is able to execute his mission in bringing peace and stability to that region. I think the rules of engagement will give him all a clear-cut mandate. He can go out and do what needs to be done in order to carry out his mission. It's going to be an interesting challenge for him. MARGARET WARNER: And, General Cherrie, a prediction, how long NATO forces will be in Kosovo? BRIG. GEN. STANLEY CHERRIE: Oh, that is a loaded question. I'm sure we're going to want to bring troops home. I heard them ask the Secretary that, and Secretary Albright that also. I don't think there's any way to predict. But the one thing that I am pleased at is the way the treaty is crafted, exactly what has to be done. There's a flow to it. I can't really predict when, but we ought to be able to have a much, much smaller stabilization force in Kosovo, much, much more readily than we had in Bosnia. MARGARET WARNER: General Neal, do you care to hazard a prediction?
MARGARET WARNER: All right. Well, thank you. General Neal and General Cherrie, thank you both very much. |
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MARGARET
WARNER: For more on the challenges the NATO-led force will face, we
get two views. General Richard Neal retired last year after spending
33 years in the Marine Corps. He was deputy for operations at command
headquarters in Saudi Arabia during the Gulf War and also served as
spokesman for General Schwarzkopf. His last assignment was assistant
commandant of the Marines. Brigadier General Stanley Cherrie also retired
last year, after spending 34 years in the Army. He was assistant commander
of the first armored division that went into Bosnia in 1995 to implement
the Dayton Peace Accords. Welcome, gentlemen. 
BRIG.
GEN. STANLEY CHERRIE, (Ret.), US Army: Well, up until I saw the peace
treaty about two hours ago, I think it's very well organized. But as
General Neal said, I think he said it very applicably, it's a symphony.
You've got troops moving out. You've got complications with the refugees
using the same lines of communication. The lines of communication are
the roads and rail networks are not that good. So this initial part
is probably going to be the most difficult, just getting in and getting
set to accomplish the mission. 
GEN.
RICHARD NEAL: Well, as I see it, the big thing is to start the -- starting
to set the conditions so that the follow-on forces can come in, the
army out of Germany. And some of those conditions are starting to bring
-- make sure that the folks that have remained behind, those that are
Serbs or Kosovars that have stayed behind and have stayed in the hills,
they're start flowing back into the cities and into the towns. They'll
be needing first aid. They'll be needing water, food, all of the infrastructure
has been, if not destroyed, at least it's been incapacitated. So this
is going to be an assessment period. It's going to be a very difficult
time because you're going to have the mixing and matching of different
people. There's going to be some probable attempts at revenge. There's
going to be some -- emotions are going to be high when folks come back
and see their houses have been destroyed, their businesses have been
destroyed. The infrastructure is lacking. So they're going to have to
think about law and order and establishing rules and procedures. They're
going to have to think about looking at public works -- how do we get
water, electricity, gas, fuel -- so that we can start the rebuilding
efforts. All of these are going to be preliminary from the enabling
force point of view, and also creating these lines where people can
wander around without fear of being booby trapped and caught in some
exchange of fire, because there's some suspicion that perhaps some of
the Serb forces will discard their uniforms and go into the hills and
play as distracters and antagonists to start the shooting again. So
"peacekeeper," that's a tough name to wear. It will be peacekeeper.
It may turn it to be peacemaker, as well.
MARGARET
WARNER: General Cherrie, you also heard General Shelton and Secretary
Cohen say they were going to try to at least warn the refugees or hope
that a lot of the refugees in Albania and Macedonia wouldn't rush in
too quickly. But what do you anticipate there? Do you think that's controllable,
and if it's not, then what? 
GEN.
RICHARD NEAL: Absolutely correct. I think General Cherrie said it best.
He's really -- it's a well-crafted arrangement. And I think that it
gives General Jackson all of the latitude that he needs in order to
execute his mission. But even with that latitude, it's going to be very
difficult for all of the reasons that you and General Cherrie have articulated.
There are going to be all kinds of hiccups, I guess, for lack of a better
term, that are going to disrupt, and they're going to take away from
his main activity of trying to pacify the area and set the conditions
for allowing the refugees in. Uppermost in mind I think we have to keep
is that those 850,000 refugees, many of them are going to want to come
back immediately. And trying to keep them off of those lines of communication
so, in fact, the engineers can move up, the military police can move
up, the assessments can be made, and, in fact, the infrastructure can
start to be repaired and put back in working order, that's going to
be a mammoth job. And at the same time, you've got hopefully the exodus
of the Serbs. Now, that's 11 days we're saying that all of the Serbs
are supposed to be out of the entire province. That is going to be tough
for General Jackson to gauge the success. Now, we have four exit points,
but I think he's going to have a real challenge. 
BRIG.
GEN. STANLEY CHERRIE: What has to happen here, if we make an analogy
to the way it was done in Bosnia, the demilitarization and demobilization,
they actually do it. You don't do much of anything, except monitor it
and let them know how well they're doing. So it's weapons collection
points, in frequent inspections of the weapons collections points, and
then briefing the leaders of both NATO and the KLA on how well they're
doing. 
MARGARET
WARNER: General Neal, are the rules of engagement such that NATO forces
can really protect themselves? 
GEN.
RICHARD NEAL: No, not really. I think the Air Force units, Army, Navy,
Marines, they'll be able to probably start downsizing them very quickly
after the 11-day -- assuming they've suspended right now the bombing
and they'll terminate at the end of 11 days. Assuming all goes well,
they'll probably downsize that very rapidly. For the ground forces,
the stabilization force, like General Cherrie, that's anybody's guess.
I would suspect that the Marines will be pulled out probably within
two months, replaced by the Army forces. Then they'll slowly probably
downsize those, all of the NATO forces as time goes on. 
