Troopers from U. S. Army units in Europe are sharpening their
bayonets;
U.S. Navy ships, on station in the Adriatic Sea, are prepping their
Tomahawk missiles; and U.S. jet-jockeys in Europe are doing their
pre-strike
drills.
Will Serbia’s Kosovo province be Bill Clinton’s next military
quagmire?
Will this primitive land which has nothing to do with America’s
national
security be our next Vietnam?
Bosnia — just one of Clinton’s current tar pits — was supposed to
be an in-and-out-and-over one-year commitment. Instead, we’re going on
four. The Bosnian swamp’s already cost over 12 billion bucks and almost
ruined three of our best heavy Army divisions, and there’s no end in
sight.
On the human side, there have been more than 100 U.S. casualties, from
arms
ripped off to broken bones and more than a dozen body bags filled.
Kosovo promises to be an even hotter and more dangerous mission than
Bosnia. The Serbs may defend their sacred homeland ferociously, and if
we
intervene in our misguided global RoboCop manner, American blood could
really flow.
Kosovo is to the Serbs as Jerusalem is to the Jews and Mecca is to
the
Muslims. Kosovo’s a full on-going civil war that’s been on the boil for
decades.
Perhaps the major lesson of the Vietnam War was not to take sides in an
insurrection.
Kosovo belongs to Serbia. Albanian terrorists armed and supplied from
an
across-the-border sanctuary want to change the present management. They
don’t think Serbian-born Albanians should be governed by Serbian-born
Serbs,
just as in the early 1960s, the North Vietnamese didn’t think South
Vietnamese should be ruled by the Saigon government.
Back then, the Vietnamese northerners operating from cross-border
sanctuaries armed and trained the southerners, kicked up the ante by
infiltrating in regulars, and eventually we, without any deep reflection
on
the consequences, eagerly galloped to the rescue. The result: disaster.
The major lesson learned: Don’t get mixed up in somebody else’s family
squabble.
The question is: What right does Clinton have to attack an
independent
nation — Serbia — whose troops and police are fighting insurgents
in their own land?
In 2020, Southern California will be predominately Hispanic. Imagine
if
California-born Hispanic leaders following the Kosovar rebel scenario
convinced their followers that the home of the Rose Bowl Parade was
theirs. They could argue, “This land belonged to our forefathers long
before the English settled Jamestown. They came with guns and took it
from
us. We’re taking it back and: A) Rejoining Mexico; B) Creating a new
republic called Aztlan; C) Forming a Commonwealth similar to Puerto
Rico.”
Hollywood, Disneyland and the mighty aircraft arm of the Military-
industrial-congressional Complex, along with a whole bunch of
non-Hispanic
born-in-Southern California folks wouldn’t be too happy with this idea.
Of course, they’d scream to Washington. “Save us!”
And five will get me ten that the U.S. president would react exactly
as
Serbia’s Slobodan Milosevic is acting now. “It’s our land and we will
defend it.” Imagine if Aztlan next invited Mexico to help it fight for
self-government?
While we’re imagining, what if the USA sticks its military nose into
Kosovo and the Serbs ask their first cousins, the missile-rich Russians,
to
help them out? During a War Game at the U.S. Army’s War College, the
Ruskies and Yanks locked horns over the Balkans. The men from Moscow
blew
away our satellites and “the war” ended in a draw. History is replete
with
war games becoming wars.
As with our Iraqi tar pit, I doubt we’d get too much help from our
European pals. Sure, Clinton’s foreign policy twin, Britain’s Tony
Blair,
would pony up a few toys and boys, but the French, still mindful of
their
defeats in their counterinsurgency campaigns in Indochina and Algeria,
would be reluctant players. And the Germans, who well remember the five
years of costly defeats and the loss of 700,000 men suffered by their
elite
World War II army at the hands of the Serb partisans, wouldn’t be too
eager for a
rematch.
The military solution won’t work in Kosovo. Let’s pray that Clinton’s
military advisers do what their predecessors failed to do regarding the
Vietnam War: Stand tall and speak out so that Kosovo won’t be another
veterans
wall waiting to be memorialized.
