Requiem For Milosevic

http://www.coastalpost.com/06/04/24.html

 

Coastal Post Online

 

April, 2006

 

Requiem For Milosevic
By Edward W. Miller

 

"I'll be the judge and I'll be the jury," said cunning old Fury. "I'll try the whole case and condemn you to death." (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland) Lewis Carroll, 1865

"Serbia has never had only Serbs living in it... I am truly convinced that... Socialism ... being a progressive and just democratic society, should not allow people to be divided in the national and religious respect." (Milosovic speech made in Kosovo in 1989)

On March 13th, 2006 ( NY Times) Slobovan Milosevic was found dead in his prison cell in the Hague. After suffering during his four years in prison from high blood pressure, Milosevic had recently asked the Court's permission to seek medical treatment in Moscow where his son and wife were living.. She had been facing possible indictment by the Serbian government. The Hague Court's Chief Justice declined Milosevic's request. An autopsy performed in the Netherlands determined his death to be from coronary disease though some had accused the authorities of murdering him.
Milosevic's body was flown from the Netherlands to Belgrade, where, as Daniel Williams noted : (Washington Post 16 Mar) "The trip into the city of his flag-draped coffin provided signs that Milosevic still inspires some measure of adulation. Several hundred mourners lined part of the road and tossed carnations at the hearse. When the vehicle reached the St. Sava Hospital morgue, supporters waved the red flags of his political party, some clutching photos of the former leader." His coffin was placed inside Belgrade's Museum of the Revolution for two days of public viewing, where on March 18 well over 50,000 Serbs massed on the central square here ...in the public wake, representing, in this nation's deep divide, either his final victory or one last embarrassment for Serbia at his hands. (New York Times, Mar 19) The following day he was buried at his own residential compound in Pozarevac, his home town 50 miles east of Belgrade. The government rejected burial in a section of Belgrade's central cemetery called the Lane of the Greats.

Just as Gaius Julius Caesar, Rome's general during her Gallic wars, paraded the captured Versingetorix, brave leader of the revolting Gauls, in chains before the Roman populace before executing him in 45 BC, just so, Clinton and our Western media paraded Milosevic, as the Serb's criminal, before a misinformed public before he was murdered in the Hague prison. A routine coronary bypass, easily available in Moscow might have added years to the life of this man who died at age 62. To many of his countrymen, Milosevic was a hero, a tough politician who fought a defensive battle against those Western countries which had been tearing apart his beloved Yugoslav Federation for their colonial economic gain.

Twice elected president of the Serbian Republics, and once President of Yugoslavia, Milosevic during his last years in office was increasingly demonized by Western media while he resisted the dismemberment of his Yugoslavia, the only country in Europe which would not dismantle its welfare state and public sector economy. A campaign of disinformation and villification provided the media cover under which NATO politically and militarily destroyed the Federal Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia and then decimated the Kosovo, a Yugoslav economy, leaving millions homeless, cities in ruins, factories and refineries smoking environmental hazards and highways and rivers (the Danube) obstructed and useless. The 78 days of intense NATO bombing, in 1999 destroyed Serbia's economic infrastructure, laying bare its remaining government-owned and private businesses to the predatory jackals of international commerce to seize at rock-bottom prices. The Western-controlled election which followed the military devastation left Milosevic only marginally defeated but a run-off election, demanded by Yugoslavia's Constitutional Court never took place. It was canceled by NATO.

Much of the intrigue associated with the breakup of the Yugoslav Federation was hidden from the public, however, Jared Israel and other investigative political writers from the USA, Canada and the Netherlands (see http://emperors-clothes.com) had earlier reported that Senator Biden, with Clinton's special envoy to the Balkans, Robert Gebard, confirmed during the July 1999 Senate hearings on Yugoslavia, that: "The US pays and controls the so-called 'independent democratic' opposition."... "In the two years leading up to the Kosovo crisis, we spent $16.5 million in support of Serbian democratization... Gebhard's millions had "funded or even created political parties, radio stations, even trade unions." The Senate had previously voted $105 million to the Yugoslav opposition. Jared, et al, noted: "If any hostile foreign power did that in the USA, their local agents would be thrown in jail."

Clinton's top advisor also testified that the US distributed money in Yugoslavia via the National Endowment for Democracy, which calls itself "non-governmental" but is actually funded by Congress, and does openly what our CIA does under cover, recruiting peace and democracy activists, and "independent economists." During those Senate hearings, Senator Biden said: "... We are kicking the living hell out of Milosevic. There ain't no alternative left... My dream is to visit Milosevic in prison."

Jared's investigative group added: "These (Serbian) people were wined and dined and paid well. With fellowships, scholarships, and internships, they were made to feel they were tomorrow's leaders

in the American Empire."
Recruited reporters were overnight transformed into "independent journalists" who took over newspapers, radio, TV stations, and TV shows. Small underground print shops and distribution networks were set up. The international financier and crook, George Soros, using his Open Society Institute, had spent millions, both working with the CIA and funding "independent" media and other organizations in Yugoslavia. Almost a year before the Serbian election, leaders of OTPOR, a US-funded student resistance movement, attended a seminar on "Non-Violent Resistance" at the Hilton Hotel in Budapest, Hungary, some 12 miles across the border from Serbia where, American pollster Doug Schoen briefed the students on strategies for toppling Milosevic and in the months following, US-funded consultants "played a crucial role in virtually every facet of the anti-Milosevic drive, running tracking polls, and training thousands of opposition activists."

US taxpayers paid for 5000 cans of spray paint to scrawl anti-Milosevic slogans across Serbia, and 2.5 million paper stickers to paste on walls across the country, with the slogan: "GOTOV JE" (he's finished) and a clenched fist. Over three tons of these stickers were plastered across Serbia. As one, Serbian pollster noted: "The brand to sell was Kostunica. The brand to beat was Milosevic." Retired US Army colonel Robert Helvey briefed OTPOR students on non-violent civilian actions, organizing strikes, communication, undermining a regime's authority and overcoming personal fears. Eventually, OTPOR trained over 70,000 "activists."

Had Yugoslavia been a totalitarian state, the US strategy would not have worked, but Milosevic's free society gave western backers their all-important opening.

Before the NATO bombing, Yugoslavia had 101 radio and TV stations, most independent. Belgrade alone had 14 daily newspapers. Even rival Albanian groups sold opposition papers on Belgrade streets On voting day, polling places across Yugoslavia were monitored not only by foreign experts, but by student activists trained by OTPOR. The media declared Kostonika "winner" by a slender margin, and thousands of demonstrators surged through the streets of Belgrade.

However, when Belgrade's Constitutional Court ordered a run-off election, the Western powers, using OTPOR and trained activists brought to Belgrade by the DOS party, created riots, protesting any run-off. Police fired tear-gas as the crowd stormed the federal parliament, smashing windows and destroying files and computers, and setting fire to office equipment, even destroying that Serbian Television station RTS previously bombed by NATO.

NATO then declared Kostonika "winner" and canceled the runoff election." US-trained activists carried out a three-day reign of terror against Milosevic's Socialist (SPS) Party. Members were threatened and physically beaten, SPS offices broken into and destroyed across Serbia, and SPS-radio and TV stations were seized. Thus the US and Germany, supported by other NATO countries, first subjected democratic-socialist Yugoslavia, to 78 days of fierce NATO bombing, and then politically seized power in a carefully rigged election.

In the midst of this NATO savagery, on October 2nd, 2000 Milosevic via the media addressed his people in an effort to outline for them the West's subversive campaign to destroy his country. Exerpts are as follows:

"Honored citizens.. I'd like to explain my views on the political situation in our country... As you know, efforts have been underway for a whole decade to put the whole Balkan Peninsula under the control of certain Western powers. A part of the job was accomplished by establishing puppet governments in some countries... transforming them into countries with limited sovereignty or no sovereignty at all. Because we resisted, we have been subjected to all the pressures that can be applied to people in today's world... There has been a group amongst us which, under the guise of being pro-democratic, has in fact represented the interests of the governments attacking Yugoslavia. The group calls itself the "Democratic Opposition of Serbia" (DOS)... represents the armies and governments which recently waged war against Yugoslavia... With the establishment of an administration... installed by NATO, Yugoslavia would be quickly dismembered...

All governments controlled by foreign powers speedily become impoverished in a way that destroys all hope... a great division into a poor majority and a rich minority... national humiliation, state fragmentation and social misery... lead to forms of social pathology... crime would be the first. One of the obvious consequences of takeover is the loss of national identity... the greatest defeat a nation can know... The leaders of this (DOS) are trying to stop production, all work, all activity. Using money that is being shipped into the country, they are bribing some, blackmailing or harassing others, organizing strikes, unrest and violence. I consider it my duty to warn the citizens of our country about the consequences of the activities financed and supported by NATO."

While our media was hiding from Americans their government's pre-emptive campaign to destroy the Yugoslav Federation and criminalize its leaders, a few investigative journalists reported Washington's activity in detail.

Writer Michael Parenti (www.tenc.net 05/22/2000 ) wrote: "For the better part of a decade, the US public has been bombarded with a media campaign to demonize the Serbian people and their elected leaders. During that time, the US government has pursued a goal of breaking up Yugoslavia into a cluster of small, weak, dependent, free-market principalities. Yugoslavia was the only country in Europe that would not dismantle its welfare state and public sector economy... it still is charting a course not in keeping with the New World Order. "

From the Jordan Times (12/04/2000) Alexander Schlevogt reported: "The war over Yugoslavia was fought not only inside the country, but also on a global front, through the international public opinion... the strategy proved successful. During the whole string of events that lead to the toppling of the legitimate president, America used its flagship propaganda mouthpiece, CNN, to broadcast manipulated information to a global audience. In addition, television stations together with American coercion, most governments and people spoke with the same voice (and picture)... CNN manufactured and told a one-sided propaganda tale... conveying the impression that the whole people in Yugoslavia not only opposed the president, but deeply despised him." The whole intent behind Washington's ten-year Balkan adventurism had been to first disassemble that Federation of Yugoslavian States (structured by Tito toward the end of WWII ..), and then present these small once-socialist countries on the silver-platter of "democratization" to feed the rapacious appetites of international business, the IMF and the World Bank."

The process had its beginnings shortly after the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 when political groups in both Washington and Berlin visualized the Balkan States as potential targets for first, military, and then economic exploitation. At Berlin's Brandenberg Gate on October 12, 1994, President Clinton referred to Germany's then-Chancellor, Helmut Kohl as "my principal partner in Europe." To create military backing for this colonization of the Balkans,

Clinton peddled that straw tiger, NATO across Europe to the border of Russian, while the arms industry lobbied our Senate for NATO expansion. Giant Lockheed-Martin in 1996 offered a $2.3 million campaign fund contribution. Meanwhile, arms manufacturers, Saab/British Aerospace, Boeing/McDonnell

Douglas, and others, envisioning a central European arms market, spent millions on "voter education" in the projected NATO countries, thus violating local media laws regarding foreign contributions (The Nation, March 16, 1998). Early in 1998, the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee voted 16/2 to extend NATO membership to Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic, followed by Senate approval in April of that year.

With minimal media coverage in the US, the Balkan countries were violently separated from one another as the West employed nationalist Trudjman in Croatia and Izetbegovic in Bosnia-Hertzegovinia to assist in "ethnic cleansing" of their Serb populations. Over 350,000 Serbian farmers were killed or expelled from their farms in eastern Croatia alone. Our CIA offered arms and military assistance (air cover), and dismantled the Serbian military and police communications systems, while stirring up anti Serb feelings in both countries.

Protestant Germany, along with the Vatican, had secretly armed the Roman Catholic Croats, while working politically to separate, first Slovenia and then Croatia from the Yugoslav Federation. Our media constantly demonized Slobodan Milosevic, as he tried in vain both to protect his Serbs and hold his Yugoslav Federation together.

In Bosnia-Herzegovenia, our CIA even brought in thousands of its old Muslim mujahedin fighters from Afghanistan to help drive the Serbs out of their homes. Both the US and Germany using the UN and NATO, as well as compliant members of the EU to shield their activities, secretly supported ethnic cleansing of the Serbs from these states while both demonizing Milosevic and reporting Serb efforts to defend their lives and homes as "Serbian Terrorism."

CNN and other media reported Bosnia Serbs "raped anywhere from 25,000 to 100,000 Muslim women." Michael Parenti noted the Helsinki Watch could find no credible supporting evidence of these "atrocities."

As NATO bombs rained down on Yugoslavia and Kosovo, the anti-Milosevic and anti-Serb media campaign expanded exponentially. In the now infamous Racak incident, our ex-El Salvador ambassador William Walker, escorted foreign reporters to the "execution massacre of 45 Kosovo Albanians in a mass grave." However, foreign forensic experts brought in at Serb request discovered the bodies had been assembled at the "grave" from some distance, that rifle shell casings were missing and only one body had been shot in the head. European news reported these victims as killed in the crossfire actually filmed earlier by an Associated Press TV crew. So much for CNN.

The anti-Milosevic campaign continued up to his death. The US with NATO assistance had set up a pseudo "International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia" to indict Serbs accused of crimes genocide. Milosevic was the NATO target.

As Black and writer Edward S. Herman pointed out: " On May 27, 1993 in the midst of the 78-day bombing of Yugoslavia, the US "International Criminal Tribunal's chief prosecutor, Louise Arbour, announced the indictment of Serb president Slobovan Milosevic and four associates for war crimes, as a "public relations coup to justify the NATO policies and help permit the bombing to continue." This pseudo International Tribunal was set up by the UN Security Council in the early 1990s "to serve the Balkan policy ends of its dominant members, especially the United States." ("Z" Magazine Feb. 2000) Toronto lawyer Christopher Black, specialist in International Law, stated this court in the Hague was illegal, and was instigated and funded by private US corporations and NATO. Black said that though the UN Security Council tried to legitimize it, the Council lacked the credentials to do so, since International Tribunals, could, under the UN Charter, only be established by the UN General Assembly, not the Security Council. The Hague, court's chief prosecutor, Carla D el Ponte, in an interview on 12 March 2006, in the Italian newspaper La Republica said: "Perhaps he did commit suicide. He could have done it as a last act of defiance towards us."

Manufacturing a crime to justify military intervention has become the custom in Washington. Noam Chomsky called it "the principle of retrospective justification," while political writer Diana Johnstone prefers "making the crime fit the punishment," saying, "In any case, the object is to present our military adventurism in such a way as to hide both intent and process, thus achieving tacit support from an uninformed public while avoiding such politically-embarrassing backlash as Washington suffered during the Viet Nam war. This smoke-and-mirrors approach to our little wars requires extensive planning." Johnstone* pointed out: "NATO's land is a gated community whose armed forces are being prepared to intervene worldwide, at the bidding of Washington, to defend members' interests..." adding: "Clinton has voiced a "new principle of international relations: the destruction or displacement of peoples within states can justify international intervention." Thus Washington excused NATO's brutal destruction of Yugoslavia and Kosovo as "humanitarian intervention."

Americans had hoped that destroying a people to save them from some politician or political system, the so-called My-lai syndrome had been buried with the Viet Nam war. Not so." (* see her book on the Balkan wars: FOOL'S CRUSADE)

In many ways, the Clinton -Kohl war against the Yugoslav Federation was a rehearsal for the Bush Jr. assaults on both Afghanistan and Iraq. Slobovan Milosevic was the Clinton-Kohl sacrificial victim, Saddam is Bush's.

Slobovan Milosevic, a talented businessman, lawyer and politician, during four years in the Hague Court defended himself and his socialist regime skillfully, frustrating both his prosecutors and the judge. He gave his life in defense of his people and their choice of the socialist form of democracy. He deserves our admiration. As for Americans, will we ever learn to recognize these fascist wars, designed by our military-industrial complex, and stop them in their tracks?