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| A STEP AWAY | |
 October 12, 1998 
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Although negotiations to end the violence in Kosovo have shown some progress, NATO has begun preparations for possible air strikes against Serbian forces. Jim Lehrer discusses the impending attack with former U.S. ambassadors to NATO and Yugoslavia.
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JIM LEHRER: The Kosovo story, starting with some background from Kwame Holman. KWAME HOLMAN: A week ago, U.S. Envoy Richard Holbrooke arrived in Belgrade with an ultimatum for Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic: Take several steps to end the crisis in Kosovo or NATO air strikes against Yugoslavia were inevitable. The steps included reducing drastically the number of Serb security forces inside Kosovo, which is a province of Serbia, and allowing international monitors to verify the reduction. However after that first meeting, Holbrooke appeared dissatisfied with Milosevic’s response.
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"A clear and simple message."
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KWAME HOLMAN: On the same day last week, representatives of NATO nations were gathering at NATO headquarters in Brussels to try to reach consensus on launching air strikes. Several member countries have yet to commit to strikes -- including Italy and Germany, whose governments are in transition. During the balance of last week, Holbrooke shuttled among meetings with Milosevic in Belgrade, Kosovo Albanian leaders in Pristina -- the capital of Kosovo -- and NATO representatives in Brussels. There he also consulted with Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, whose comments about Milosevic grew stronger as the week wore on.
KWAME HOLMAN: In preparation for air strikes, NATO commanders continued assembling a force of more than 250 aircraft from the United States and other NATO nations. It includes -- B-52 bombers armed with cruise missiles, as well as British carriers and American F-16, F-18, and A-10 aircraft, most based in Italy. Also on hand in the Adriatic Sea are the aircraft carrier Eisenhower and a guided missile cruiser. Supreme Allied Commander Wesley Clark warned Milosevic on Friday.
KWAME HOLMAN: Today at NATO headquarters in Brussels, the expectation
was that all 16 NATO nations would agree to a so-called activation order
-- the last step necessary for the authorization of air strikes. But
as the NATO ambassadors prepared to act, special envoy Holbrooke finished
his ninth round of talks with President Milosevic. Holbrooke went –
without commenting – to brief the NATO Council in Brussels. The two-track
process – negotiations coupled with the military build-up and threat
of air strikes – followed adoption of a resolution by the |
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Two views of the Kosovo crisis. |
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JIM LEHRER: Two views of this crisis in Kosovo now: Robert Hunter was U.S. ambassador to NATO from 1993 to ’98. He’s now a senior adviser at the Rand Corporation, a Washington study group. John Scanlan was U.S. ambassador to Yugoslavia in the late 1980s. He’s now senior consultant at ICN Pharmaceuticals, a multinational corporation owned by former Yugoslav Prime Minister Milan Panic. Ambassador Hunter, the latest word here is that Holbrooke has briefed the NATO folks in Brussels and is now going back to Belgrade to talk once again to President Milosevic. Is it possible to read anything into any of that? |
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JIM LEHRER: So you smell a deal? ROBERT HUNTER: Well, it sounds like there’s a deal working out here, which would have the UN resolution abided by, plus some observers on the ground. But we don’t know who would provide them yet. JIM LEHRER: How does it sound and smell to you, Ambassador Scanlan? JOHN D. SCANLAN, Former U.S. Ambassador, Yugoslavia: Well, it looks to me like they’re beginning to work out the details of a possible deal. Unfortunately, one part of the deal would be to help Milosevic stay in power, which is his only real interest. He has no other interest. He’s willing to sacrifice his people in order to achieve remaining in power as long as possible. But it’s better to have him remain in power, even if that’s the quid pro quo, to avoid the bombing, fine, but I think we should have spent some time talking to the political opposition as well. JIM LEHRER: Now the reports today said that the final sticking point – one of the final sticking points – was a point you made, Ambassador Hunter, that had some international observers come in there, about 1200 or so. Why is that such a big deal to Milosevic? |
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A final sticking point.
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JIM LEHRER: So he didn’t want any international – he didn’t want any UN-chartered NATO troops in there at all. JOHN SCANLAN: Absolutely not, but he would accept now I think some sort of a limited international participation. JIM LEHRER: Should that been seen as a major concession? ROBERT HUNTER: Well, I think just a little bit Brer Rabbit in the briar patch, because for Milosevic he wants very much for the Kosovo region not to become independent, and having a monitor there also will inhibit the activities of those people in Kosovo who are trying to pull the province away. Milosevic, in effect, is going to win this no matter what happens, whether the bombs drop, or whether they don’t. With all the months now that we have delayed, the opposition has effectively been undermined -- JIM LEHRER: The Albanian ethnic opposition within Kosovo. ROBERT HUNTER: Well, the opposition within Kosovo, the people on the ground, the monitors, if we get them, they wouldn’t be able to act as well, which is fine. The international community would prefer that Kosovo does remain an autonomous province, get autonomy within Serbia. But what Milosevic has been able to do in this crisis is, in effect, cut the opposition off at the knees within his own country. So, he is going to survive. JIM LEHRER: He cut them off and then he says, okay, now, I’m ready to make a deal, is that what he did, he acted first and then now he’s dealing and he’s dealing from strength, he can’t lose? |
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Dealing with the opposition. |
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JOHN SCANLAN: Well, he’s in a position now to say we had – there was an uprising against authority in Albania – it was serious – or not Albania – in Kosovo it was serious – I went in there and did what I had to do. And it took longer. It was tougher. There were some unfortunate incidents, but I’ve now restarted law and order there, so I’d be very happy to cooperate with the international community in order to take care of the refugee problem. JIM LEHRER: And meanwhile – yes – JOHN SCANLAN: We have to understand his campaign had really come to an end. JIM LEHRER: He got what he wanted. ROBERT HUNTER: He got what he wanted. He wanted to get as much killing done before winter. And now the real question is are we going to require him before the NATO threat is taken away to negotiate truly seriously on autonomy or more for the region?
JOHN SCANLAN: That’s correct. Until 1989. JIM LEHRER: When he took it away. JOHN SCANLAN: Yes. He worked out a constitutional reform, which – and I was there at the time, which, in effect, reduced the autonomy of Kosovo from rather generous to virtually nothing. JIM LEHRER: And this deal doesn’t change anything. In other words, it doesn’t move it back to what it was before 1989. |
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Fear of the Serbs. |
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JOHN SCANLAN: No. The Albanians want – of course, they want independence and we have made it clear that we don’t support independence for the Albanians in Kosovo. They’re very – very paranoid about – not just about Milosevic but in general about Serbs. Well, when I was there with Mr. Panic, when he was prime minister, we worked very hard to try and gain their confidence, we had lots of meetings with Mr. Ruguva, trying to – JIM LEHRER: Who’s the head of the Kosovars – JOHN SCANLAN: The Kosovars. JIM LEHRER: One of them. JOHN SCANLAN: And tried to get them to support him in his election challenge to Milosevic. And they refused to do it, even though they appreciated what he was trying to do, they just said you can’t do business with the Serbs. That was their attitude. JIM LEHRER: So make sure I understand this now. The bombing – for instance, this – first of all, what is some activation order? There’s all these steps toward dropping bombs. Where does activation order fit in there? ROBERT HUNTER: Well, the objective is to get 16 countries to know exactly what it is they’re going to do, and frankly to tell Mr. Milosevic all the allies are together. This is what happened in Bosnia. He out-maneuvered the alliance for about three years until everybody finally got together, and when they did drop some bombs, they backed off. You first start with an activation warning. Tell me what troops might be available – activation request. Now provide the names of the troops the military commander would have – activation order. Now the general can go off and command them. Slow process – activation order is the one that really matters. JIM LEHRER: And do you believe, Ambassador Scanlan, that it’s the activation order, or the coming – the sureness of the coming of the activation order that has now caused Milosevic to say okay, come back, Holbrooke, we’ll make a deal? |
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Milosevic: a master of the media. |
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JOHN SCANLAN: Well, I think Milosevic knew that he had won already in Kosovo and he was playing this up till the last possible moment to squeeze everything he could out of it, largely for domestic consumption, you know. He controls the media there, and he has taken control in the past two days of those small pockets of the media that he didn’t control, like one radio station, B-92, the student radio station index, 30 radio stations were broadcasting – RFEVOA and BBC --- told them they could no longer do that and they would be prosecuted if they did. So it’s – his – he uses his propaganda machine very cleverly to maintain himself as an international statesman that the world has to deal with in order to have peace in Yugoslavia. And that’s a mistake on our part. We should have also been talking to the opposition leaders, and there is a new opposition group called the Alliance for Change. Ambassador Gelbard met with them in July in the Hague, and has agreed to meet with some of them this week here in Washington – Bishop Artemia, from Kosovo, who’s very outspokenly opposed to Milosevic –Mr. Panic –and Mr. Oramovic, who’s a former World Bank official, who is very popular in Yuglosavia. JIM LEHRER: We took the position, the official position that we didn’t want to deal with the opposition --we didn’t – this was – we didn’t want to— JOHN SCANLAN: I’m not sure it’s an official position. I think it was simply because the – Mr. Holbrooke, frankly, didn’t have time for it, but I think he should have tried to make time for it, it would have undercut Milosevic somewhat. JIM LEHRER: Look, you all are both professionals. You know this part of the world probably as well as any two Americans could possibly know it and know what’s going on here. For those who are not – the ordinary Americans then – is this kind of end result that appears likely now – is this something that we should feel good about? |
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Have we done the right thing? |
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ROBERT HUNTER: Well, it was very important to stop the killing. If that can happen, -- JIM LEHRER: That’s good. ROBERT HUNTER: --that is something good, absolutely. The real question is – JIM LEHRER: And before the winter and – ROBERT HUNTER: Absolutely. JIM LEHRER: --before people started freezing to death and starving to death. ROBERT HUNTER: But there are two other questions: One, are we going to be able to do with a refugee situation and frankly, I think – JIM LEHRER: There’s 200,000 people, right? ROBERT HUNTER: Yugoslavia – they ought to have to pay a major part in reconstitution here, but the most important thing down the road –
ROBERT HUNTER: Letting them come back. Rebuilding. JIM LEHRER: Rebuilding their homes. ROBERT HUNTER: Absolutely. JIM LEHRER: Okay. ROBERT HUNTER: But most important, watching what Milosevic has done. We have to make sure that we don’t – in such a hurry to get out of the crisis that we let him next spring start over again, during the winter, not negotiate seriously, because if we do, we’ll feel good about him for now and we’ll be right back in the same spot next spring. JIM LEHRER: How do you feel about it? JOHN SCANLAN: I agree, and I think it’s very important that we don’t give him any special benefits for doing what he should have done in the first place. He’s going to push very hard for a lifting of all sanctions now. I think he should hold back on that until we make sure that he is in full compliance and is helping with the refugee problem. JIM LEHRER: In other words, a long way before we should feel good about this? |
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Has Milosevic outbluffed NATO? |
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JOHN SCANLAN: Well, I agree with Bob. I think it’s good to – it’s always good to avoid a war to stop a war, and stop the killing of innocent people but it’s a very sad, sad story, and in a sense I – as an American I feel for the last seven months or so we’ve been speaking loudly and carrying a small stick and have contributed in some ways to this problem getting as large as it is. ROBERT HUNTER: Let’s understand. Everybody out there will read accurately if NATO has been outbluffed on this and Milosevic continues his nasty business. He’ll get it exactly right. NATO can still lose this. JIM LEHRER: Okay. Gentlemen, thank you both very much. |
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RICHARD
HOLBROOKE: If he thinks NATO is bluffing, if he wants to take that risk,
all I can do is convey to him the views of our government, of the president
and the secretary of state on the seriousness of the situation. 
MADELEINE
ALBRIGHT: I have asked Ambassador Holbrooke to return to Belgrade to
convey a very clear and simple message to President Milosevic. He must
comply in a manner that is both durable and verifiable with the long-standing
political, humanitarian and military demands of the international community
or face the gravest consequences. 
COMMANDER
WESLEY CLARK: President Milosevic is going to have to calculate very
carefully what the risks will be as he moves ahead. That's the message
that I would give as a military leader who's very well familiar with
what the consequences of military action can be. 
UN
Security Council last month. That resolution followed the discovery
of the latest alleged Serb atrocity in Kosovo, a massacre of ethnic
Albanian civilians including children and elderly people, which prompted
heavy international protest. The UN resolution, number 1199, calls for:
the withdrawal from Kosovo of Serb security forces "used for civilian
repression;" an end to attacks on ethnic Albanian civilians; the start
of political dialogue with Kosovo's Albanian political leadership; the
right of more than 250,000 Kosovo refugees to return to their home villages;
and unfettered access to those refugees by international humanitarian
organizations. As the possibility of NATO attacks grew imminent, European
governments began closing their embassies in Belgrade and evacuating
personnel and evacuating personnel. And the Yugoslav Army reportedly
continued to fortify its already substantial air defense system.
ROBERT
HUNTER, Former U.S. Ambassador, NATO: Well, it’s always difficult at
a great distance to reach conclusions, but I suspect what is happening
is that Milosevic and Holbrooke are working out an arrangement of where
we will get what has been asked for in the UN resolution on the NATO
side, and Milosevic will get on his side continued control in his country
and, in effect, the political benefits that he needs. Diplomacy, if
it succeeds, always has both sides winners, and this looks the direction
that it’s going in now. 
JOHN
SCANLAN: Milosevic, if you’ll recall, had a referendum, an obviously
controlled referendum, just before this whole thing blew up back in
March against any kind of international involvement. This is his argument
for sovereignty here, and it’s a way of stimulating more nationalist
feelings and xenophobia within Yugoslavia. 
JIM
LEHRER: We always have to explain that Kosovo is a province of Yugoslavia;
it is 90 percent Albanian, and it used to have a form of self-government
– 
JIM
LEHRER: Letting those people come back into their homes.