The Yugoslav Sociological Association Published me in Their First Post 1999 Kosovo Journal....
United States :
http://www.komunikacija.org.yu/komunikacija/casopisi/sociologija/XLI_3/d05/show_html?stdlang=gb
The Yugoslav Sociological Association Published me in Their First Post 1999 Kosovo Journal....
The Yugoslav Sociological Association
Documentation
SELECTED CORRESPONDENCE concearning the NATO Agression on the FR Yugoslavia
1. To YSA May 07, 1999
Thank you for your e-mail of 29 April. You have all my sympathy for what is happening in Belgrade and elsewhere in Yugoslavia. But how can you say these things and not even refer to what is going on in Kosovo? We all want to bring the war to an end, but the Serbian leadership, which is responsible for these atrocities, must play a full part in doing so.
Anthony Giddens
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2. To Prof. Anthony Giddens May 11, 1999
Dear Prof. Giddens,
Thank you for your reply and for your sympathy. We accept your objection – partly though; the article to which you refer is On Belgrade. So far we have sent various letters; in some of them we have offered our view of solving the Kosovo crisis. Finally, we don’t have influence on the Serbian leadership at all.
We hope we’ll stay in touch.
You can expect some further information from us.
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Karel Turza, Mladen Lazić and Sreten Vujović
P.S. We are sending you again copy of the statement of YSA [of April 19], because we are not sure that you have already received it.
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3. To YSA May 13, 1999
Dear Professor Molnar and Colleagues,
Thank you for your email of 11 May. No, I hadn’t seen the YSA statement previously. I would completely agree with the six points you make, plus the succeeding set of points. We must do all we can to bring this conflict to an end with these points of view. With best wishes to all of you.
Yours,
Anthony Giddens
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4. To YSA May 19, 1999
Dear Colleagues:
I am most grateful for the set of documents I received from you today and hope you will continue to keep me and other sociologists in the USA informed on the Yugoslavian point of view. I was especially impressed by the five points in your proposal for ending this unfortunate conflict. It seems to me that they go beyond the demands of NATO with the exception of allowing for an international armed force which is necessary to enforce the conditions you suggest. The documents you sent are a strange assortment of new information (for me), misunderstandings, half-truths, untruths, and exaggerations. These are sometimes stated in a propagandistic sort of vocabulary which does not help the reader to understand your perspective. I am trying very hard to do that and there is nothing I (and I think most Americans and Europeans) would like more than to see this conflict ended as soon as possible.
If anyone wished, I could be more specific and could engage in a debate on particular points with which I differ, but I am not sure how useful that would be. Let me just say for now that I wish you well and I wish all of this would stop. I have a personal inquiry to make regarding a Yugoslav sociologist. Back in 1969 or 1970 (or thereabouts) I had the good fortune to be invited to Belgrade to present a lecture at the university. It was a most memorable and satisfactory experience for me but I have lost contact with the sociologist who was responsible for the invitation. [...]
Thank you,
Irwin Deutscher
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5. To YSA May 19, 1999
Thank you very much for keeping me informed, though I wish your news were totally different. It’s so painful to hear what happens to you there and not only there.
People are irrational all around. Otherwise they would have already stopped this ordeal by now. I don’t like at all the official position of Romania which wants by all means to get into NATO. The majority of people don’t agree with the NATO aggression and with the parliament decision to allow the NATO planes to fly over our territory. The anti-USA feelings are quite strong here, too. People think that there must have been other means to punish Milošević.
I wish I could be optimistic hoping that it will end soon, but I fear that it might be just the opposite.
[…]
Irina Balta, National School of Political and Administrative Sciences,
Bucharest, Romania
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6. To YSA May 19, 1999
Dear Colleagues:
I appreciate receiving your news and commentary, and share with heartfelt sadness your feelings about being caught up in a brutal and ugly war. I wish you the best in pressing your pursuit of peace. I also suggest that these positive efforts be separated from your criticism of NATO and the US. This is not to say that you are wrong in your views and analyses, only that such negativism is likely to be self-defeating.
Only peace brings peace. NATO and the US may indeed be misguided, or perhaps something more sinister is in the works. Nevertheless, you must love your enemy while forgiving his stupidity.
With best wishes,
Jay Weinstein, Professor of Sociology
Eastern Michigan University, USA
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7. To YSA May 19, 1999
[…]
Right now, Yugoslavia is the issue which occupies most of my time. As a human being, as a Romanian and as a student (I am taking my Ph.D. in British foreign policy in East-Central Europe) I can not be but concerned about what happens in Yugoslavia. I considered from the very beginning NATO’s action as a tragic mistake which will result in the death of many hundreds of people and a humiliation for the alliance. What happens in Yugoslavia will remain in history as a turning point in the evolution of the international relations. By this aggression against a sovereign state, NATO, that is the main political actors in the world, have thrown to the dust bin the whole legal system created after 1945 (with the founding of the United Nations) and reconfirmed by the Helsinki Agreements three decades later. Some say that the system of »national sovereignty« was typical for the period of the Cold War which presented with a balance of power between USA an USSR. After the fall of USSR and the break of this equilibrium, some say we need a new system of international law. They forget that the principle they apply now to Yugoslavia, and called »the limited sovereignty« was invoked by the Soviet president Breznev in 1968 in order to excuse his repression of the »Spring Revolution« in Czechoslovakia. A reconfirmation of this principle is extremely dangerous and leads to arbitrary (as in the case of Yugoslavia). Who decides what is democratic and what is not? Who decides how should the borders of a country be drawn? The US? NATO? Those who are friends of the US or NATO members can get along with any kind of abuse (see Turkey massacring Kurds) or can deliver weapons to criminal regimes (British help for Burma’s regime), while in Yugoslavia, a »moral« question forces them to intervene. If the Americans can be excused, because they have always been ignorant regarding Balkan history and politics, I am bitterly disappointed with the position of France, and especially Britain. They had a duty to explain to their allies how things are going there. The whole settlement in Yugoslavia was created with the help and the blessing of the United Kingdom in 1945, and now they try to destroy exactly that settlement. I think it was a just settlement and its change would put the whole Balkan region on fire. What happens now is the beginning of the end for NATO. More and more NATO countries will refuse to stay in an alliance which, far from being a defensive one, has been transformed in an aggressor, in a world policeman. There are many things I would like to say about this. I will do it in the next messages. However I think that NATO will fail and the solution will be a diplomatic one in which both parties will have to accept a compromise which will leave Kosovo in its right place, that is, as part of Serbia. I can hardly imagine how horrible must be to live under the terror of endless bombings but at least I am with all my thoughts near you and all those who are going daily through that awful tragedy. The thought of what happens to people in Yugoslavia annoys me in the extreme and I had already several quarrels with my supervisor who has worked for NATO for 16 years and is now advisor of the Foreign Office for Central and Eastern Europe. But about this issue, about British attitude towards this conflict and about my opinion regarding Milošević, I will write next time. Don’t forget, whatever the tragedy, that there, outside the country, you and the Serbian people in general, have friends, many friends, friends who care and whose feelings will not be altered by bombs or by a mad propaganda. And even among your enemies, the resolve to continue the aggression is decreasing every day in spite of well orchestrated lies on radio and TV.
Sincerely yours,
Marius Floca, Ph.D. student in British foreign policy in East-Central Europe,
University of Oxford, UK
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8. Za YSA Maj 20, 1999
Zdravo svima,
ja sam sociolog iz Beograda, a i ovde sam završila M.A. program iz društvenih nauka. Ovaj apel [New Appeal, May 14] je jako dobro napisan i ja to prosleđujem svima koje znam, a koji se bave bilo kojom društvenom naukom ili se prosto smatraju intelektualcima. Inače, neki od nas govore slično već duže vremena. Ja sam se stavila na raspolaganje International Action Centru (Ramsey Clark je u centru a ovde u San Francisku imaju ogranak) i trudimo se. Mislim da je krajnje vreme da sociolozi u Jugoslaviji malo ozbiljnije promisle kako se »stara« Jugoslavija raspala, šta se sada zbiva i šta se zbivalo u Bosni i Hrvatskoj. Takođe mislim da su saznanja što bliža istini daleko važnija nego da se naši sociolozi dokazuju »Zapadu« kao sposobni i »demokratski orijentisani«. Kako stvari stoje već duže vremena, mi ćemo biti potcenjivani ma koliko se trudili i to je nama ovde jasno. Neki naši ljudi koji su ovde završili fakultete i počeli duboko da veruju u ovdašnji obrazovni sistem i ovo što se ovde zove demokratija, doduše, bolje prolaze i možda će vam preneti drugačije utiske. Ipak, ja mislim da naš posao nije da u nešto verujemo već da istražujemo. I pored njihovih ličnih boljih iskustava oni bi valjda mogli da se zapitaju zašto oni koji dolaze sa B.A. izvan US imaju mnogo više poteškoća čak i da uđu na bilo koji Ph.D. program; o poslu i da ne govorimo. Možda njima nije significant kad ovdašnji predsednik u svome govoru kaže »I do not believe that the Serbs are any worse than we are, or that the Serbian newborn baby has any genocidal gene, do you?«, ali ja to nalazim veoma važnom i opasnom izjavom. Život i rad nekih od nas je ovde ispunjen stalnom borbom jer smo (ako nemamo B.A. odavde) na veoma suptilne načine, i pre ovog rata, bili omalovažavani i s vremena na vreme je jasno sugerisano da dolazimo iz zemlje u kojoj je demagogija dominirala obrazovanjem. Šta onda reći za United States gde deca završavaju srednju školu bez i jednog jedinog časa svetske istorije i gomilu koledža bez da mnogo pominju išta izvan ove zemlje? Ja sam ubeđena da se to radi namerno jer da su prosečni ljudi ovde bolje obrazovani o tome šta se zbiva u svetu bilo bi svakako više onih koji bi se pobunili protiv nebrojenih »humanitarnih« intervencija ove zemlje. Posle svih tih »humanitarnih« ratova, koji nisu ratovi nego uvek borba »good guys against bad guys« gde vrhovni sudija mora da interveniše, ova zemlja se održava kao jedina super-sila a decenijama posle njenih »humanitarnih misija« stanovništvo koje je bilo štićeno pati od misterioznih bolesti i neverovatnih defekata (pogledati i dan danas vijetnamske bolnice, iračku decu itd). Čak oko 90.000 američkih bivših vojnika je bolesno najviše zbog upotrebe osiromašenog uranijuma. Ni o njima niko ne haje, svi se prave ludi, a u mnogim situacijama im se ne daje ni zdravstveno osiguranje. Najbolje bi bilo da nestanu sa lica zemlje, misle oni koji su odgovorni, jer ti ljudi su ovde, na licu mesta, dokaz. Da ne dužim više o tome; drago mi je da smo u vezi pored sveg zla koje se nakupilo tamo i svuda oko nas. Čuvajte se koliko god je to moguće. Puno toplih pozdrava,
Milina Jovanović, sociolog
San Francisko, USA
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9. To YSA May 20, 1999
Dear Yugoslavian Sociologists:
I received your statement regarding the bombing of your country. I am also a sociologist and I sympathise with your cause. To help you in your cause I have disseminated your e-mail to my friends and I personally printed it and had it photocopied so I can distribute it to my colleagues here at the Department of Sociology, University of the Philippines, Diliman.
As a sociologist I know that we should stand up for political freedom and rights. So please continue your fight. Here in our country the American government is pressuring us to sign the Visiting Forces Agreement that will enable US Military forces to stay in our strategic places. But your condition is far worse. The media in our country ignore or even misrepresent what is really happening in your country. Your statement is a bit frightening, maddening, and I feel guilty for not condemning such inhuman actions.
Again, regards to all of you and may we all find peaceful solution to this madness!
Gerry Lanuza, Assistant Professor
Sociology Department, University of the Philippines
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10. To YSA May 20, 1999
Hi,
Thanks for your information. I am interested in any further documents and information. I’d like to tell you I stand firmly with you and the Chinese Government.
Regards,
Yu Hai
[Professor at Sociology Department, at Fudan University, Shanghai, China, and
Visiting professor at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada]
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11. To YSA May 20, 1999
Who is to be blamed for the Kosovo tragedy?
Sociology is the science that studies and explains the behaviour of people. Every sociologist should have foreseen what is now happening in Kosovo. After the tragedy occurred, they should have explained it. Since the sociologists are silent, I have undertaken to do the dirty work. The sociologists’ silence is not surprising. Presently there are thousands of sociologists throughout the world who have studied and are familiar with Robert Michels’ »iron law of oligarchy«. I know of not a single case where sociologists use their knowledge to turn against this oligarchy. When I addressed the sociologists’ discussion group and asked »who should lead society, illiterate politicians or educated sociologists?«, the educated sociologists kept silent. Illiterate politicians are ignorant while the problem with the educated sociologists is that they are not familiar with the concept of entropy. Let me explain: the growth of entropy is the growth of anarchy. The fall in entropy corresponds to mass repression and restoration of order. In a closed (thermodynamic) cycle, anarchy is necessarily followed by repression.
In my opinion, illiterate politicians are the first to be blamed for the Kosovo tragedy, and primarily Bill Clinton, President of the US. All he wants is to lead – as Michels said »the main thing is to lead!«. Whether it is good or bad leadership, does not matter.
In my work on social dynamics »Civil war, terrorism and gangs« (http: //www.israel.net/raikhlin) I indicated the cause of terrorism. It is simple: man is a herd animal and he needs the herd as much as he needs air to breathe. When the herd breaks down and the cohesion between people decreases (entropy grows), there will always be someone who instinctively feels it coming. This individual becomes aggressive because he hates everybody including himself. In a herd of dogs, a similar situation would lead to a fight as a result of which the strongest dog would seize power and re-establish order (decrease in entropy). Usually these are the specimens from the lowest level of social hierarchy, which gives rise to bandits and outcasts. They are followed by the more »intelligent« layer who are capable of formulating their own thoughts. What are the thoughts of these »intelligent« specimens? Not knowing the true source of their anger and aggressiveness, they accuse the surrounding society and its leaders for all thinkable and unthinkable sins. Their main request is freedom and independence. Give them freedom and independence and they will create their own oligarchy. This is how the request for autonomy of the Kosovo Albanians was born. Autonomy can later be turned into independence. The Albanians enforced their requests with armed fighting, neglecting to think about the consequences.
In the situation described here a conflict of interests arose between two oligarchies: the former oligarchy led by the Yugoslav President Milošević and the new Albanian one. Which side is right?
My characterisation of President Milošević is that he is »impotent«. Starting with the very beginning he did not exhibit a firm attitude and allowed the country to break down (growth of entropy). Now he represses the newly born dreams of the Albanians about autonomy (further growth of entropy).
It should be noted that there will always appear a third party to organise and support the terrorist movement in the country of the adversary, regardless of the slogans employed. Terrorism cannot last long without material and political support. Israel supported the Kurdish movement headed by Mustafa Barazani in Iraq. Later the US took this position. Syria supported the anti-Turkish actions of the Kurdish. The latter were a card in the hands of several countries. The Kurdish were beaten, poisoned with gas, but their leaders did not object to the fact that they were tricked. The Arab terrorism in Israel was supported by all Arab countries. Now NATO hurried to assist the Albanians. But what were the real motives of the NATO countries when they made of the case of the Albanians just another card game?
Since a long time the Serbs were under the protection of Russia. Unlike other Slavic brothers, their religion was the Orthodox religion and their writing Cyrillic, bringing them close to Russia. The latter always supported the Serbs in their fight for independence. To strike the Serbs meant striking Russia. Germany understood this well when she launched on World War I. The Austrian heir to the throne was killed in Sarajevo, but the war was declared to Russia. Yugoslavia’s independence under Tito and its separation from the Soviet bloc found sympathy in the NATO countries. Under Tito, Serbia was loved. The crash of the USSR and of its power changed the love for the Serbs into hate. The NATO paid back Russia for past threats through the Serbs . By attacking them, NATO proved that Russia had lost its power. The first instance in which NATO tested Russia was in the Bosnian war. Russian did not interfere leaving Bosnia to be consumed by NATO. As appetite grows during eating, the NATO countries started speaking about the freedom and the rights of the Albanians. Fuel was added to the Kosovo fire. The leaders of the Kosovo Albanians were inflamed and started fighting the government more actively than before. This is how the conflict developed.
Man is endowed with fear in order to make him prudent and prevent him from crossing the border of the permissible. Formerly western politicians were afraid of Russia. Everybody remembers that the Soviet army occupied the countries of the »socialist union« and what its functions were there. Hopefully Berlin, Budapest and Prague remember the Soviet tanks on their streets. These tanks could have easily crossed the borders and move westward. With the disappearance of Russia disappeared also the fear and prudence. The NATO countries led by the US took upon themselves the role of policemen of the world. What could be better than becoming a world oligarch! The main thing is to rule the world, whether well or badly, matters much less.
The weak ones are beaten, just like in animal nature, where there is order in biting and pecking. The crash of the USSR led to a new international pyramid and oligarchy on the top. The top of the pyramid is occupied by the US and the NATO countries. Those who can be beaten must be down below, but the question is »for how long?« Any agreement must be mutual in order to be observed. The NATO politicians believe that a »compromise« can be achieved by twisting the arms of both sides.
The Serbs and the Kosovo Albanians were made to sit around the table. The menu was prepared in the kitchen of NATO. It is hard to understand what were the ingredients and the recipe. However, it became clear that the Albanians participated in the discussions, which was in their favour. The losers were the Serbs, but this did not satisfy the cooks. NATO requested that their troops be allowed on the territory of Yugoslavia in order too »guarantee the agreement«. So the Soviet occupants in Europe were replaced by NATO occupants. The München agreement together with its guarantors led to the Second World War. No threat worked on President Milošević.
If one wants to climb a tree, one should think how to get off it. The characteristic feature of the large majority of illiterate politicians is that they did not take into account this simple fact. They are not capable of estimating the consequences. Having started with arm twisting, the leaders of NATO had no choice but to start breaking bones.
Both the UN and NATO were created out of fear from the Soviet power. The West talked constantly about peace and defence from aggression, about the rights of each country. Now there is no Soviet monster anymore and all the nice words are forgotten. All pacts and agreements have been trampled. Those who insisted on protecting peace launched the attack. This confirms the fact that all international agreements are useless pieces of paper as long as there is no mutual understanding between the parties. With no official declaration of war and against all its commitments, the NATO countries sent bombs and rockets into the skies of Yugoslavia. A war in the name of peace? A war in the name of humanity?
What happened was unexpected by NATO, as it often happens in wars. Three American soldiers were captured by the Serbs. They are threatened to be brought before a war tribunal and to be sentenced to death. But as war was not declared, the soldiers are not war prisoners, but sooner spies and saboteurs. The US had to be reminded of those international agreements that they had trampled. Astonishing psychological make up of the US president! Had he declared war to Yugoslavia, the soldiers’ lives could have been saved as war prisoners. But Bill Clinton does not wish to save the lives of his soldiers; instead he prefers to threaten Yugoslavia. Had he become familiar with my work, Clinton would know that the leader is responsible for all. The blood of those soldiers is on the hands of the Supreme Commander.
The unexpected happened. Three journalists from the NATO countries were captured on the territory of Yugoslavia while these same countries were attacking it.
When Italian dictator Benito Mussolini decided to occupy Albania, a simple and quiet way was suggested to him: poison the king and the new leader will join Italy of his own accord. But Mussolini was not satisfied; he wanted a war, victory and triumphal march on a white horse into the conquered country. Triumphal laurels are also what US President Bill Clinton dreamt about. He wanted revenge after being battered because of Monica Lewinsky. He saw his chance in using the obstination of the Serbs.
But about the NATO unionists? Are they not capable of thinking reasonably? So it seems. »Collective thinking« is when the female meets a purely bred male and stops thinking; she offers herself to him without thinking of the consequences. This type of thinking is characteristic for the »intellectual layer, the illiterate politicians included.« I should like to address Mr. Tony Blair, the Prime Minister of Britain. I wonder if he realises that by shattering the traditions of his country he demoralises his people and destroys his country. But this did not satisfy him, he had to go onto Yugoslavia.
I am addressing the Foreign Minister of Germany, Joschka Fischer. He is portrayed in my work Civil war, terrorism and gangs where I indicated that all »green« and pacifist people are golems. Their slogans are no more than cover ups for their hate towards their country and their people. He, a pacifist, is one of those who started this war which could become a world-wide conflict. Now you want to fill the Germany with Albanian refugees. That will only lead to more anarchy in Germany and to demoralisation.
Wars are intended to annihilate the adversary, not just defeat him. Moral rules disappear during wars. What sustains the combating parties is the fear from a stronger adversary. This is a truth that politicians should remember.
What does the government do when during war the population behind the lines is hostile? It represses that population (entropy falls). Examples are the concentration camps for the Japanese established by the US during the Second World War, the millions of Germans expelled from their places of birth during and after World War II from Poland, Czechoslovakia and even from the German town Königsberg. This is what the Yugoslav government did to the Kosovo Albanians; long rows of refugees crossed the borders to the neighbouring countries. The Kosovo Albanians paid a heavy price for the games of the politicians, both their own and those of NATO. The Israeli television broadcasted an interview with a Serb and an Albanian. The Serb told about how following the war against the Turks, the latter populated Kosovo with Albanians. The Albanian (a poet) spoke about the necessity of ruthless fighting against the Serbs, fighting for freedom regardless of the price to be paid! The interviewer repeated the question »regardless of the price?« and the Albanian said »Yes!«.
The question is what results did the NATO leaders expect when they started the »humanitarian« military actions. It is astonishing that they did not consider the consequences. Do they want to wipe Yugoslavia off the face of the Earth? The echoes of these consequences will reverberate through the world for a long time to come, only confirming my thesis that the world is led by illiterate politicians.
How did Russia react to the NATO aggression? Wasn’t she the reason for fighting the Serbs? Russia declared firmly through the voice of her Prime Minister: » We shall not be driven into the war«. Translating the diplomatic language into plain language, this means »you may beat the Serbs, that’s not our business«. Russia has been humiliated but the rich aggressors paid her 4.8 billion dollars!
Kosovo is the general rehearsal of what could happen in Israel tomorrow. As I said in the beginning, in a closed cycle, anarchy is always followed by repression. This is an iron law of nature that cannot be changed. The party that starts repression and restores order is the one that gains.
The impotence of Israeli leaders has created in our country a situation close to anarchy, similar to Yugoslavia or even worse. The Arabs’ talks about autonomy ended in their preparations for the declaration of the Palestinian State. They are in a continuous process of arming themselves and tomorrow they will turn for military help to the »Arab brother states«. It is generally known that all peace talks end in wars. Will the Israeli government act like the Yugoslav government and expel the Arabs from Israel? Or perhaps is our government waiting to see Jews streaming out of their country? Will the peace fighters and humanists bomb Israel? None of our illiterate politicians is capable of answering that question.
I ask our politicians why do we have to pay for the narrow-mindedness of the NATO leaders? Why do we have to assist the Albanians? Let that problem be solved by those who created it.
The leader of the Israeli Labour party expressed his solidarity with the US President Bill Clinton. (I would like to point out that wars are usually fought by socialists or national-socialists). This is additional evidence that Israeli leaders act according to »collective thinking«; they do not reason on their own.
Raddai Raikhlin Ph.D.
9, Hassidei Umot HaOlam St.,
Haifa, Israel, 32985
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12. To YSA May 21, 1999
Dear members of the Yugoslavian Sociological Association
I am a member of the Greek sociological association and got your e-newsletter about the terrible atrocities committed by NATO to Serbia. Universities and schools are the only buildings not yet hit by these barbarian criminals who will soon pay for their crimes.
In Greece we admire Serbian people you have to believe that and small kids here make Serbs their heroes. [...]
Thank you in advance and we all here pray for peace in Serbia.
Yours sincerely
Nikos Gousgounis, Sociologist Ph.D.
13. To YSA May 20, 1999
Gone are the dreams of the maniacs a sociologist’s notes
I have been waiting for some hint in the media or in the writings of sociologists and psychologists concerning the outstanding event in the history of mankind that we are now witnessing. I couldn’t find any such hint. Contrarily, I have observed a trend to diminish the importance of what is happening. Perhaps this is the reason for the silence. I am assuming the role of herald. I hope to find support between in the media that so boast with their openness.
We have been witnesses to a remarkable event – the 50th anniversary of the NATO block. For the first time in the long history of mankind, a »World Oligarchy« was created.
This was formally announced in the Washington ceremony. The world has returned to the imperialist politics of gun-boats with the only difference that today there is a single and sole world policeman represented by NATO.
I shall not dwell here on the military and other aspects of this event (its consequences are there to stay for a very long time). What I would like to do is attract the attention of sociologists to the fact that the outcome could be foreseen. In my work on social dynamics I attempted to sketch a pyramid of world hierarchy but did not complete it because it exceeded the frame of my topic »Civil War, Terrorism and Gangs«.
The same old »Iron law of oligarchy« of Robert Michels lies at the basis of world oligarchy. An international oligarchy was formed after the fall of the USSR. I shall draw a few historical analogies in order to throw light on the pattern and inevitability of event and its consequences.
Compare the words about peace and democracy uttered at the NATO ceremony in Washington with the slogans of the Jacobins or the Bolsheviks when they seized power. As if nothing has changed in 100-200 years! Tyranny and terror lurk behind demagogic speeches about freedom and peace. The war against Yugoslavia is a clear example of materialisation of NATO demagogy.
Let us return to the »Iron law of oligarchy«. It follows from the law that oligarchy uses the organisation that it rules for its personal objectives. The question arises: »what are the criteria that guide the international policeman in its punitive actions?« It seems to me that a more accurate name for this organisation today is Mafia.
The whole concept of world policeman is based on NATO’s significant superiority in the field of armament. This concept failed in Vietnam as it did in Afghanistan. For more than a month NATO has been subjecting Yugoslavia to massive bombing with unexpected and negative results for NATO. As a result, the Serbs chased the Albanians from Kosovo. These Albanians will never return to miserable Kosovo out of their own free will. They don’t need it any more. So how can the NATO strategists explain what has happened? Are they capable of giving up their policy? No and no. They will not admit their stupidity. They accuse only Yugoslav President Milošević for all their sins. I join Mr. Slobodan Milošević and offer myself for accepting part of the blame. In my work »Civil War, Terrorism and Gangs« I explained the roots of conflicts. It is important that the policemen understand them.
Some of my opponents consider that my writing is »too political«. I do not collect signatures for or against General Pinochet, but I cannot see Sociology without political involvement especially when it concerns the role and behaviour of the ruler.
The following is a classification of rulers.
Ruler
Nature of leadership
Society
Charismatic
Consolidates society by means of religion and reprisals.
Stalinist dictatorship
Optimal
Optimal leadership
Optimal society
Anarchist
Tramples morality and laws thereby destroying society.
Anarchy
Impotent
Thirsty of power but incapable of ruling.
Before constructing this table I looked up the word »impotent« in the dictionary. The word »impotent« gives an accurate description of the stereotype. The impotent is thirsty for power but cannot rule. Anarchists, as defined in Sociology textbooks, are those who are not capable of restraining themselves, lack discipline and do not think about the consequences of their actions. When such people become leaders, the consequences can be disastrous.
Should anyone disagree with my assessment of leaders, Israeli courts offer the possibility to disprove my viewpoint. For example, US President Bill Clinton whom I consider anarchist and amoral, could use the rights accorded by Israeli law. He will not do it. Just like Israeli President Ezer Weizmann did not do it.
I noted several times before that as a rule, politicians are not capable of thinking properly nor of working. How many of them are familiar with the work of Robert Michels? Do they know anything about social dynamics?
Can they foresee the results of their actions? No, no and no. Guided solely by their ambitions, they do not image the awful consequences their acts can have for society. Do NATO leaders think that they will keep ruling the world? They have already stimulated the arms race and a re-evaluation of strategies in all countries processing nuclear power.
All this is intended to stop the NATO hegemony. NATO’s brainless politicians lead us to war and confrontation between military blocks. Russia has announced that it has a right to strike with a preventive atomic blow. China and India have not yet made the announcement but this only means that they tacitly agreed with Russia. Georgia is preparing the end of its conflict with Abkazia using NATO methods. Hence its desire to get nearer to NATO.
The Serbs could live in peace with the Albanians just like Israelis and Arabs could live in peace. Partnership is much more worthwhile than enmity. However, the Albanians have become the card played by the policeman for proving his right to rule the world.
R. Raikhlin Ph.D.
9, Hassidei Umot HaOlam St.,
Haifa, Israel, 32985
14. To YSA May 21, 1999
Dear Colleague,
Since you sent out this mailing, you must have wanted a response. I find it strange that in all your comments there is no reflection on your and your compatriots’ responsibility for this mess. Milošević is clearly the despot Canetti had in mind when he described his essence as someone who wants to outlast everyone. You make no mention of the way Yugoslav forces created over half a million refugees in a matter of weeks, literally cleaning out Kosovo, nor of the way Milošević has ruined Yugoslavia, former and current. What rains down on you now is what you caused to rain down on so many other old bridges, towns, civilisations, lives, in the FRY. This situation is a colossal nightmare no one inside and outside the FRY with a brain or a heart could wish. But it seems to me the best way to stop it would be for forces within Serbia to do something about it, and you might start with getting rid of your present criminal government. No amount of arguments will persuade anyone that it is anything but criminal. And those who treat it as anything but criminal are complicit in the crime. Milošević refused a negotiated settlement more than once and has shown since that any diplomatic resolution will only be seized to consolidate his hold and continue his policies. It is hard to go against the grain of nationalist sentiment in crisis conditions, but there are other bonds than national ones and memories of a common human history that ought to outweigh them. It is not only Belgrade that is the world. Sarajevo too once was. And even the little towns of Kosovo.
Stephen Schecter
Professeur, Département de sociologie
Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada
* * *
15. To YSA May 21, 1999
Dear friends from YSA,
Thanks indeed for your letter and the really useful information in it. We are really interested to receive further statements from your Association and develop mutual communication. We are fully aware that NATO response to inadequate inter-ethnic (if that is the case) policies of the regime in Belgrade is thoroughly inadequate. We do need objective data and profound analyses on the lasting Yugoslav crises which deeply concerns us, the Balkan people.
With best regards,
Free Information and Civic Participation Societies,
Sofia, Bulgaria
16. To YSA May 22, 1999
Dear Colleague:
I already distributed your statements to other faculty members of my Department here at the Department of Sociology, University of the Philippines, Diliman. Our Chairman, Prof. Luzviminda Valencia wanted to organise a meeting on the issue. Can you send your statements to socfclty@Mindgate.net? This is the e-mail of the Department of Sociology. I would also like to ask for further information on the issue!
Again, I express my solidarity for your cause.
Gerry Lanuza, Assistant Professor, Sociology Department,
University of the Philippines, Diliman Quezon City, Philippines
* * *
17. To YSA May 22, 1999
Dear friends,
I’m a History student from the University of Costa Rica and a silent member of the Tarkovsky list (although not silent otherwise). I’m really interested in getting continuous and extensive information on what’s going on in Yugoslavia.
Latin America has many times seen the consequences of the US megalomania and authoritarianism, and this proves to be another case of exchanging human rights for the legitimacy of power and economic interests.
I had the pleasure to meet both a Croatian girl and a Serbian guy from Belgrade (immigrants from Sarajevo where he lost his parents) and feel very close to the situation in your country although I’m miles away in many ways.
Also I do a radio show called »Voices from the Third World«, where we talk toward these types of topics (because as you can imagine press around here is totally one-sided), and we usually don’t talk much about entirely European affairs (as we do talk about European and US affairs in other places), but this time it’s a necessity.
So I would appreciate if you could send me material or direct me to any particular mailing list or web page or any resource for facts and opinions about the current crisis.
Thanks in advance,
Antonio Jara
* * *
18. To YSA May 22, 1999
[…]
Unfortunately the news I got are not very good. According to my professor, whose official position I mentioned in my last message, NATO will continue the bombardments by extending the targets to all those facilities without which the economic life of Yugoslavia would be gravely disrupted (communications centers, power stations, archives, bridges, and official buildings). He told me that this was an option taken into consideration from the beginning of the war.
[...] The anti-Serbian propaganda becomes here more fierce every hour. It is the only way whereby they can keep public opinion in a supportive mood towards these savage bombardments.
I am, in general, a very peaceful person. But in this case, were I a Yugoslav leader, I would have no mercy. The three American thugs you took prisoners cannot be considered POWs because, according to US, NATO is not at war with Yugoslavia. That is why they did not break, at the beginning of the conflict, their diplomatic relations with Yugoslavia. If there is no war, there can’t be any POWs. Therefore the Convention of Geneva does not apply. As regards their position as UN peace keepers, it isn’t even worth discussing it. That UN mission ceased months ago. Therefore these soldiers should have been placed on the two bridges of Novi Sad. I doubt the Americans would have destroyed them. If they have no mercy towards the Serbian civilians, why should the Serbs have mercy for US soldiers? The missiles which destroyed the two government buildings might have missed their target with a few meters. It would have been even a greater tragedy. I can only hope that the Serbian people will not surrender, and, in spite of this permanent terror, they will win this war, which is primarily a war of nerves. The number of those opposing the bombardments is increasing every day in spite of the fact that western televisions refuse to show the dreadful effects of these attacks on the life of people in Yugoslavia. Meanwhile they »bombard« us with news from Kosovo. They believe everything the Albanians refugees say, and doubt any news coming from Belgrade. Though Britain is one of the most important aggressors, I think (as a student in international relations) that your main enemies (in this war and in general) are the US and Germany. It is not a secret that the KLA is funded not only by the Albanian emigrants from Germany but also by the German authorities. For US things are more simple: Yugoslavia is the place were they can drop their stocks of missiles while using the conflict in order to reassert their influence on their increasingly reluctant European partners within NATO. I want to thank you for keeping me informed with the events in Belgrade and with the tragedy through which you pass every day. I do believe that this war will result in a humiliation for the aggressors and Yugoslavia will remain intact with an autonomous Kosovo. Nevertheless this conflict is shaking the bases of the world system. As one Romanian journalist put it: »After Yugoslavia nothing will be like before«. In Bucharest and Timisoara there have been almost daily demonstrations of support for the Serbian people. The authorities are very cautious because of their objective of seeing Romania in NATO.
But they can not hide the feeling of the Romanians. And the quasi-unanimity of the Romanians are besides their Serbian friends. As one Romanian statesman said: »Throughout our entire history we had only two good and faithful neighbors: Yugoslavia and the Black Sea«.
[...]
Marius Floca, PhD student in British foreign policy in East-Central Europe,
University of Oxford, UK
19. To Prof. Stephen Schecter May 25, 1999
Dear Colleague,
The Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association wants to thank you for your quick response.
We appreciate the efforts you made to give us your opinion on the statements of the Yugoslav Sociological Association. We would like to inform/remind you that Yugoslav sociologists have been among the sharpest critics of the current regime in the past ten years. Many of them participated in and organised civil and student protests in 1991, 1992, 1996/97, 1998. […] You can find further information on these activities in our periodical Sociologija (Sociology) No. 1/1997 and No. 4/1998. If you are interested in the topic we would be glad to supply you with a couple of articles via E mail.
We assure you that we strongly condemn all repression and actions taken by paramilitary organisation against people in Kosovo. We are prepared to do anything within our power to establish, promote, and build civil society, ethnic tolerance and cultural diversity. Our statements are not intended to give a full scientific explanation of the current events in Yugoslavia. We are doing this as our contribution to stopping the NATO bombing.
With best wishes to you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
P.S. Sorry for being late. We have a lot of problems with electricity, which makes it quite difficult for us to keep you updated on the latest developments here. The continuing attacks on Yugoslavia have taken an extremely dangerous direction. Over the past days, instead of just disabling electrical power plants NATO missiles have begun to destroy them completely. Thus the repeated blackouts of Yugoslavia are increasingly likely to become permanent.
* * *
20. To. YSA May 25, 1999
Dear Colleagues!
Thank you very much for your information. And we are interested to receive further statements from your Association. A friend of mine is editor of a sociological newspaper in St. Petersburg. If you agree we can publish your paper. Please send us the history of your Association. We surely can help you, if you need information from us (our Sociological Association).
My very best regards to you [...]
Professor S. A. Kugel
SPB School of Sociology Science and Technique, St Petersburg, Russia
21. To YSA May 25, 1999
Your statements and your beliefs about imperialist NATO convinces me that there are no innocent civilian population just as in Nazi Germany they believed Jews and all other inferiors were responsible for all their problems. Shame on all you so called intellectuals! As a veteran of the 8th Air Force from late 1942 to early 1945, it makes me long for the good old days of saturation bombing.
Paul Laven
* * *
22. To Prof. Jay Weinstein May 25, 1999
Dear Prof. Weinstein,
Thank you for your message. We are glad to be in communication with you.
[...]
We share your opinion that the decision to bomb FRY was wrong. We are convinced that a lasting and just solution of the conflict is now much farther away than before the bombing started. At the same time we strongly condemn all repression and actions taken by paramilitary organisation against people in Kosovo. We are prepared to do anything within our power to establish, promote, and build civil society, ethnic tolerance and cultural diversity. Our statements are not intended to give a full scientific explanation of the current events in Yugoslavia. We are doing this as our contribution to stopping the NATO bombing.
[...] We must do all we can to bring Kosovo conflict to an end.
With best wishes to you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
23. Pour prof. Pierre Bourdieu Mai 26, 1999
Monsieur le professeur Pierre Bourdieu
Tres respecte Monsieur,
Ce n’est que maintenent, apres une recherche prolongee, que nous avons enfin reussi de nous procurer de votre e-mail adresse. En esperant bien que vous allez nous pardonner ce retard qui n’est du qu’aux circonstances exceptionelles ou nous vivons ces derniers mois, nous voudrions simplement vous prevenir que la lettre signee par vous et vos collegues et publiee dans le »Monde« du 31 mars nous a encourage de persister dans nos effort de presenter a la communaute internationale des sociologues quelques faits relatifs a l’absurdite du bombardement de notre pays.
Notre ambition, bien sur, n’est pas d’elaborer d’ores et deja une analyse profonde sur les causes – externes aussi bien qu’internes – de cette guerre dont on n’entrevoit ni le sens ni la fin. Le but de nos communications que vous trouverez ci-joints n’est que de mettre a la disposition de nos confreres dans le monde entier le fait tres simple qu’au lieu de prevenir la catastrophe humanitaire cette campagne destructrice ne produit que les souffrances inouies des millions d’hommes, femmes et enfants, sans egard aux leur origine etnique et attitudes politique. Nous, en sociologues, nous savons tres bien mesurer les »inputs« et les »outputs« des actions humaines, surtout quand il s’agit de la violence pur et simple de tous les cotes...
En admirant une fois encore votre lucidite et en vous remerciant de nouveau de votre solidarite, veillez agreer, cher Collegue, les expressions de notre amitie.
Presidence de l’Association yougoslave des sociologues
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović et Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
24. To YSA May 27, 1999
Dear Mr./Ms. President,
I am currently taking my MA in Sociology at the University of the Philippines. I got hold of your recent statements about the NATO attacks on Yugoslavia and I would say that I sympathise with the YSA’s sentiments.
Thus, I would like to request copies of the statements so I could send them to my colleagues. It is a pity that I could not do anything as an individual, but collectively, I hope that we could influence the future decisions about your country’s plight.
Best of luck in your current endeavours.
God Bless,
Shella Quezada-Zagada
MA Student in Sociology at the University of the
Philippines, Diliman Quezon City, Philippines
* * *
25. To YSA May 28, 1999
Dear Colleagues:
Thank you for your response. I am glad to know that my message to you was received under what must be nearly impossible circumstances.
Have you heard or done anything about establishing some kind of international forum of concerned sociologists to consider what we might do about the situation in your country and region? I would certainly be willing to join in, and could contact some close friends in Albania who are also sociologists (and others as well).
I realise that this may be very impractical, but a meeting at the 34th World Congress of Sociology, being held in July in Tel Aviv, would be an appropriate site.
I await your feedback on this matter.
Jay Weinstein, Professor of Sociology
Eastern Michigan University, USA
* * *
26. To YSA May 29, 1999
This a terrible state of affairs which you report. It must surely be brought to an end. Why do Serbs tolerate a government which has practised ethnic cleansing on Croatians, Bosnians, and now Kosovars? Rid yourselves of this indicted war criminal who runs your country and let the rest of the world heave a sigh of relief as a civilised society returns to Yugoslavia.
Irwin Deutscher
* * *
27. To YSA May 29, 1999
My sister sent me a number of your pronouncements about the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia and I am in solidarity with your position. Would you allow me to read those materials to my classes in Social Sciences and probably when we train our public safety officers on peace and human rights.
I will be sending these updates to my friends in Human Rights Education in Asia-Pacific Region.
I would also want to receive updates from you.
Sincerely,
Zenaida Quezada-Reyes
Graduate College,
Department of Social Science Teaching and Teaching History,
Philippine Normal University, Taft Ave., Manila, Philippines 1001
28. To YSA May 30, 1999
I believe you have the support of a great number of people in my country (the UK). I am a student at Cambridge University and there is a strong movement here opposed to NATO’s war. Last week around 500 people demonstrated against NATO in Cambridge – one of the largest demonstrations in the city in a decade, despite it coming in the middle of our students’ examination period.
Of course, you will not have heard of all the opposition to NATO within NATO countries, because the western media do not report it. This is an obstacle to the anti-NATO movement here too. Many people have told me they were afraid to speak out against NATO because they felt they were alone in their opposition. That is the impression one might get from reading English newspapers. Dissent is not easily voiced here at the moment.
Nevertheless, many in the UK support you in your opposition to NATO’s war, and we will continue to call on our leaders to halt their campaign.
Yours in solidarity,
Edward Genochio
Cambridge, England
* * *
29. To YSA May 31, 1999
Dear Friends,
I am both as morally outraged, as I am completely frustrated about NATO’s criminal bombing campaign against Serbia’s civil society! Unfortunately, the Western American everyday mind has few connections to Serbia and in this sense, most people just do not care! I am an Int’l Sociological Honors Student, Russian, and I am personally doing all that I can to stop NATO! If you have any suggestions, please advise me of such. I will be volunteering some time to assist the International Action Center, in NYC to stop NATO this forthcoming week. The man that I love and hope to marry one day resides in Kraljevo. His relative just gave birth in the hospital in Kraljevo (I believe that was one of NATO’s criminal targets)! His sister-in-law is apparently not doing well. I myself lived like a refugee in America because of the criminally corrupt legal system here! So, in this sense I can empathise with you. I, like my friend in Serbia, almost starved right here in New Jersey – USA. I was beaten up by NJ/NY cops! And I used to have to bathe in rivers. I want this war to end as much as my friends. I feel we are at a pivotal moment in this war. In my assessment as a political analyst, 1) Either the war will worsen, or, 2) if all interest blocs and also NATO employ wise diplomacy, there can be a quick end in about one week to this madness!
I pray to God (+) that the latter is the case.
Respectfully Yours,
Jill Louise Starr, New School, NY, USA
P.S. There are millions of persons around the world of all nationalities that are demonstrating against NATO! Also, many of us are taking collections of both food and medicines to be sent to Serbia. Do you have any problems receiving these supplies since the bridges are down? I have a friend who would like to give many donations of clothes and women’s apparel to Serbian refugees and others. Do you need women’s clothing and purses and stuff or no? I donated my pain medicines also to the Serbian Orthodox Church. I will do what I can so just please e-mail me and tell me.
* * *
30. To Miss Jill Louise Starr May 31, 1999
Dear Miss Starr,
Thank you for your touching letter and your concern for all of us here in Yugoslavia. We admire your courage and determination to participate in global efforts to stop the war in Yugoslavia.
Since we have no opportunity to distribute clothes you generously offered, we were suggested by some orthodox church young team representatives to tell you to make a contact with Milivoj Ranđić (E mail: mrandjic@EUnet.yu) from St. Sava Youth Community who can direct you to the people, organisations, etc. dealing with distributing humanitarian aid.
With best wishes to you.
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
31. To YSA May 31, 1999
Thousands of us here in the US will march in Washington, DC on June 5th to protest the insanity of the bombing of the good people of Yugoslavia. I will be among them.
The American people are divided about 50-50 on support for or against the bombing. Those who are for it have been influenced by the one-sided news we are fed, and the exaggerations of the ethnic cleansing that our government broadcasts. The history of ethnic Albanian abuse is absent from reporting.
Unfortunately, we Americans are lazy. Yugoslavia is a strange, far-away country; and we can watch our television, go to a doctor, drive anywhere on vacation, and never hear a bomb or have to detour around a bombed out road. We do not hear the screams of a child being treated for burns or missing limbs.
Fortunately, there are those among us who share at least the thought of your pain. We work to stop the insanity. We monitor the Internet for news that is not filtered through our government and its famous reporters. We vigil three times a week, carrying signs to awaken those of us who are asleep with indifference.
We stopped the madness in Vietnam, and we will stop this.
Jack Lander, Inventor’s Bookstore, USA
* * *
32. To YSA May 31, 1999
In the conclusion of the YSA statement circulated last May 19, it is said that »...we in Europe live among madmen«. For the sake of precision, and out of great discomfort, I must add »...and madwomen«.
Apparently no more good will and wisdom appear from women politicians than from their fellow colleagues in this foolish war (sorry, »crisis«!).
What else can I add? All has been said already, to no avail.
If you can, and I know it is not easy, do not make the same mistake as the »civilised« NATO countries, failing to distinguish among different kinds of people and destroying them all (though pretending they are not).
Bruna De Marchi, female sociologist with a specific interest in the environment, besides human beings.
Istituto di Sociologia Internazionale di Gorizia
P.S. Is it only when we in »civilised Europe« start to see our own dead (soon maybe) that we will understand?
* * *
33. To YSA May 31, 1999
I am writing to express my solidarity and sympathy to all the innocent, sick and disadvantaged people in Yugoslavia who are suffering as a result of NATO’s actions.
At present, we are organising bigger protests here in the city of Bristol, a pattern which is being similarly repeated in many places throughout Britain. I am a 19-year old Biology student – and maybe this has made me more aware of the health and ecological damage due to the war.
I have always strongly condemned the appalling »ethnic cleansing«, but there is a feeling of helplessness when you think that your tax money is going into NATO’s destructive policies.
I hope that enough »ordinary« people working together can stop this war, as happened with Vietnam.
Please write back if you can – it is of great importance to know how people’s lives are directly being affected.
Yours faithfully,
Tom Sagar-Fenton,
Bristol, United Kingdom
* * *
34. To Mr. Tom Sagar-Fenton May 31, 1999
Dear Mr. Sagar-Fenton,
Thank you very much for your detailed message and your concern for all of us here in Yugoslavia.
Unfortunately, we don’t have good news from here. We are using short intervals between two reductions of electricity to send you this e-mail.
NATO keeps striking at electrical power plants throughout Yugoslavia, steadily undermining the minimum supply of electricity. Serbian Electric power company said that its capacities, destroyed by NATO attacks, would not be able to supply energy for a longer period of time. NATO missiles damaged and completely destroyed some of the most important power grids used for supplying Belgrade and most of the Yugoslavia with electric power. Electricity cuts continue, and get more and more frequent.
It happens to us that we are cut of fresh water so we can compare what is worse: being cut of electricity supplier or liquid. Both are necessary. The air is hot but there is enough free air for all of us till now. We try four combinations: be connected to both; out of electricity but having water; getting electricity missing water; being without both for some period. Our impression is that the wining combination if you are to choose between the two is to save electricity, it is easier to handle the reduction of water resources. For making private supplies of technical water we use periods when there is water pouring it into bottles, disinfected it, boiling it, buy mineral water for drinking. Without electricity we turn to our own natural energy sources, batteries, gas and sun. It makes a lot of changes in our way of life – we go to sleep and wake up early – in a few months we will live like the Amish expecting somebody to reinvent electricity.
NATO authorised the two months spectacle of full decomposition of Yugoslav urban and rural landscapes. In some sense Belgrade becomes the most »trendy« city in Europe, since deconstructionism is still the most recent and fashionable style in architecture. For the temporary application of deconstructionist style NATO has activated enormous power of decomposition of human hearts, minds, senses, memories, etc. Cynical political artists are reinvented basic for cruel war styles.
At the same time there are a lot of cultural events in Belgrade. In the National theatre they turn on the generator in the case of electricity reduction. All the children are out in the parks in the street, they gather on street corners playing and shouting, enjoying their freedom because they don’t go to school and will get certificates. Everybody is doing their best to couch what is worth in life circulating around at public and private gatherings. Unexpected and very pleasant experience in this catastrophe.
We will do our best to keep you updated with all our forthcoming statements
With our best regards,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
35. To Prof. Jay Weinstein May 31, 1999
Dear Prof. Weinstein,
Thank you very much for you constructive suggestion. Unfortunately, we are not able to establish an international forum of concerned sociologists about the war in Yugoslavia. We are here faced with existential problems and therefore are not capable of organising such activities (we are using short intervals between two reductions of electricity to send you this e-mail).
Your initiative to bring in connection Albanian and Yugoslav sociologists seems very significant to us. It is of utmost importance to get an opportunity to exchange rational arguments between people holding various views on the current situation. That is the only way to bring a lasting and just solution somewhat closer. Therefore we are ready and looking forward to establish communication with open-minded and concerned Albanian and American colleagues. As a first step, we suggest drafting a common statement to be finished, if possible, by the beginning of the 34th World Congress of Sociology. As of this moment, it is highly unlikely that any of the Yugoslav sociologists will be able to attend the Congress in person, but the communication may be sustained through e-mail and otherwise. We would greatly appreciate if you could mediate our further activities.
It will be a great pleasure for us to keep in touch and cooperate with you.
With our best regards,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
36. To Mr. Paul Laven May 31, 1999
Dear Mr. Laven,
Thank you for your brief, emotional and confused commentary. We do not doubt there are people who enjoy in throwing bombs on other countries. Neither do we doubt that you are one of them, and that you feel nostalgia for your youthful years when you were able to do it. Since we belong to the sort of people Sigmund Freud called »Pazifisten (...) aus organischen Gründen« (»pacifists [...] on the organic basis«) we find it extremely difficult to understand how it is possible to take delight in war destruction and killing, no matter which side is doing it.
We wish you to live long and in good health.
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar and Lazar Nikolic
* * *
37. To Prof. Giorgio Cadoni May 31, 1999
Dear Mr. Cadoni
Thank you very much for your constructive action! If you find it useful, we would appreciate to have our previous statements on one of the web sites you already sent us. We checked them and were pleased to see plenty of important information from different sources.
NATO keeps striking at electrical power plants throughout Yugoslavia, steadily undermining the minimum supply of electricity. Electricity cuts continue, and get more and more frequent, which makes it very difficult for us to sustain communication via the Internet.
We wish you success in your further activities.
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
38. To YSA June 01, 1999
Dear Sirs,
Thank you for appreciating my work: it is what I can do for you. I am glad to inform you that I have sent your attached file with all your statements (May 31, 1999) to sites listed on
http://web.tiscalinet.it/Controcorrente/rete.html
and
http://web.tiscalinet.it/Controcorrente/YSA.html.
Sorry for my bad English.
Peace now!
Yours faithfully
Giorgio Cadoni,
Prof. of Political Philosophy, Rome University
* * *
39. To YSA June 01, 1999
Dear colleagues from the Yugoslavian Sociological Association,
I have received a copy of your message about the situation of the Yugoslavian health care system in relation with the NATO aggression, and I have distributed it to other e-mail addresses in Spain.
Please put me on your mailing list for further information on the war which you may wish to distribute. If you can send them in Spanish, it would be much better, otherwise I can translate them.
Peace,
Félix Díaz, Departamento de Sociología IV,
Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Spain
* * *
40. To YSA June 01, 1999
Thank you all so much for writing back to me in the time that you could. It is useful to read people’s accounts of the reality of life in Yugoslavia during NATO’s aggression. The water and electricity cuts are particularly disturbing in the effect that they have upon people’s lives. At least there is still a good range of cultural events in Belgrade.
In the early 1960s, my aunt and other relatives travelled to Macedonia to help people after the disastrous earthquake at Skopje, and so I feel a kind of attachment for all the peoples of Yugoslavia’s republics.
Hopefully in the future I might be able to contribute somehow to helping with voluntary reconstruction work in Yugoslavia, through a non-governmental group (like Oxfam), but I think that our main priority outside Yugoslavia will be to financially support the reconstruction work through donations.
Reconstruction will happen: think of what the Koreans and Vietnamese have been able to do since their countries were ruined by war.
We have several anti-war demonstrations coming up over here, and I think that the anti-war momentum is growing in Britain (not to mention in Greece and Italy). I will write back again: for now, best wishes, and remember that even in NATO’s heartland the opposition to the war is rising.
Yours sincerely
Tom Sagar-Fenton.
* * *
41. To YSA June 02, 1999
Thank you very much for your kind note. It means a lot to me. I live alone. I do not communicate with anyone here in America very much, except for Church. The man that I love, he is in Kraljevo and is Serbian. I was recently thrown out of my university in New York City due to my Anti-NATO viewpoints. My University tried to cover up why they really through me out of the school. They still bar my registration. I am fighting the University on this.
I am both a national and international sociological honour student. For those of you who do not know, both Albright and Rubin, these liars learned their trade and graduated from Columbia University which is affiliated with, the New School, where I was studying in New York City. Mrs. Hillary Clinton is in NYC running for a »Senate Seat« now also. She has so much political corrupt baggage that a NATO jet could not take off! She is a sad joke! She comes to NYC often to visit the highly repulsive, World Policy Institute, which is located on the 4th Floor of my University at 5th/14th Ave’s in New York. This is probably wherefore I was tossed out of my school for my Anti-NATO views.
Notwithstanding, it is my absolute pleasure to obey God (+) and to help His Holy Body of Christ world-wide. I cannot bare to witness any human suffering, wherever it may be in the world (regardless of race, religion, or creed). However, NATO’s air-strikes against Serbia stab me personally, right in the heart. I have church family and friends in Serbia. [...]
Respectfully,
Miss Jill L Starr
* * *
42. To YSA and Mr. Milivoje Ranđić June 02, 1999
I am writing to discover where I can have either food or women’s clothing and other items (sewing machine) »picked up« to be sent to Serbia. This would be in the North New Jersey area 1) Maplewood and 2) Mahwah. A former professor is selling his house and has many items that he desires to donate. His phone number is (973) 762-1146 Mr. Stark. Also, I have a friend doctor that perhaps can assist you in obtaining a donation of tranquillisers, or other medicines Ms. Piuck (201) 337-8226.
[...] I am sorry that I seem helpless to do more at this present time to assist stop the criminal NATO war criminals! The International Action Center in New York City were I volunteered yesterday to prepare for our march against the Pentagon this forthcoming Saturday has been somewhat impeded by the criminal Arlington Virginia cop-shop!
They want to not allow us to legally protest upon a stretch of 1/4 mile to the Pentagon. They rather we take a »bike path« that would take us 2 days to get to the darn Pentagon. We are going anyway!
Respectfully,
Jill Starr
* * *
43. To YSA June 02, 1999
Hi,
I read your report Health For All.... it came via our Student Christian Movement network. I am a part time worker, student, etc. Some years ago I was fortunate to have visited your country and travelled south through to Greece and Turkey. It was at the International airport that I first saw and touched snow in my life. I have a deep love of your capital city. As an ammeter historian esp. of the Byzantine world I have an appreciation for the significance your people and part of the world has and does play. Yugoslavia was the beacon of inter racial and inter faith tolerance exp. between East and West. It is distressing to see that god work undone by short sighted nationalists.
However, 2 wrongs do not make a right and the Americans continue to be the world # 1 threat to peace and stability through out the world. We need remember that the USA has been the only nation to use an A bomb and they deliberately dropped it upon civilians yet no war crime trial for the USA????
I will write to the local Prime minister here in Australia expressing my anger at Australia’s lack of action regarding ending the war. I continue to work as a volunteer with many of the Bosnia refuges who have moved to Adelaide. The horror inflicted upon peoples lives in the name of nationalism remains a daily indictment to us all.
Yours in international solidarity
Denis Voight, Student Rights Officer
University of South Australia Students Association
* * *
44. To YSA June 03, 1999
Dear friends,
Hello, I hope that things are easing a bit for you now in Belgrade, though I think that this is very unlikely.
Yesterday, we held an anti-war vigil here in Bristol, in the rain, and today we held an anti-war demonstration outside the BBC building, which attracted quite a lot of public support. It was about the way in which the British media is selectively distorting, exaggerating and ignoring the truth in the news reports, effectively helping NATO’s »war machine«.
This weekend there are major anti-war demonstrations planned for London and Glasgow.
I am also strongly supporting all people inside Yugoslavia who are opposed to the war, and, people in all countries who are opposed to the policies of death and destruction must unite: we here are not ‘pro-Milošević’, and they are not ‘pro-NATO’. As Dr. Martin Luther King said,
»Those of us who love peace must organise as effectively as the war hawks. As they spread their propaganda of war, we must spread the propaganda of peace«.
I still have a lot to read and learn before I have a more substantial understanding of Yugoslavian history, but I know that different people’s willingness to live and work together after World War II, and build peace and prosperity, was a beacon for those in other countries. Such spirit is as crucial today as it ever has been.
I hope that all the war criminals, NATO and Serbian, will be held accountable for their atrocities in the future: it is our responsibility collectively to ensure that they are NOT let off, free.
Please carry on writing back here, it is important that we know what is really happening and the effect upon innocent people’s lives.
Yours in friendship,
Tom Sagar-Fenton.
»mipne darkei shalom«, for the sake of peace.
* * *
45. To Prof. Irwin Deutscher June 04, 1999
Dear Professor Deutscher,
Thank you for your e-mail. [...]
We appreciate very much your consideration of our problems. Your objections are precious to us since we truly believe that only critical thought can bring about an objective view of the events we have been facing over the past seventy days. Yet, there are certain disagreements between you and us (it’s quite normal, isn’t it?). First, referring to your words: »The documents you sent are a strange assortment of new information (for me), misunderstandings, half-truths, untruths and exaggerations«, we would be most grateful if you were more specific; that is to say, if you tell us which particular sentences in our messages you consider half-truths, untruths or exaggerations?
Second, be so kind as to tell us what’s wrong with our »propagandistic sort of vocabulary«? Don’t you agree that it would be quite strange (and inappropriate) if we tried to inform our colleagues, quite a lot of them all over the world, about the Kosovo crisis by disseminating (by e-mail!) sociological essays, theoretical studies and/or books? We do not deny at all that our action is a sort of propaganda. For, propaganda as such does not misinform necessarily.
Third, you suggest (in your second e-mail, 29 May) we should do something about the actual regime. To get rid of it, namely, to change it. Like a pair of dirty socks, pants or whatever? Is it that easy? (In fact, you should clarify this suggestion since it refers to Serbs only; among the Yugoslav sociologists, however, there are those who are not Serbs.) Many Yugoslav sociologists were active in organised civil and student protests in 1991, 1992, 1996/97, 1998. Some of them were even beaten and arrested. Further information on these activities you can find in our (of the Yugoslav Sociological Association) periodical Sociologija (Sociology): No. 1/1997 and No. 4/1998. If you are interested in the topic we can supply you with a couple of articles via e-mail.
Finally, we would really like to know: what have the American sociologists done about the US military interventions all over the world over the past 100 years? Have they ever managed to get rid of the US leadership? There have been a lot of reasons for such actions, many times. (Of course, we are well acquainted with the works and public engagements of people such as Lewis Mumford, C. W. Mills, or H. Marcuse...; yet, practically, what did they do? Did they change the US leadership?) Just to remind you and thus help you to formulate an answer, we enclose a list (made by Zoltan Grossman) that is impressive, isn’t it (please, see the attachment)?
[...] With best wishes to you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
**************************************************************************
Attachment: A Century of US Military interventions: From Wounded Knee to Yugoslavia (Compiled by Zoltan Grossman), revised 3/25/99
The following is a partial list of US military interventions from 1890 to 1999. This guide does not include demonstration duty by military police, mobilisations of the National Guard, offshore shows of naval strength, reinforcements of embassy personnel, the use of non-Defence Department personnel (such as the Drug Enforcement Agency), military exercises, non-combat mobilisations (such as replacing postal strikers), the permanent stationing of armed forces, covert actions where the US did not play a command and control role, the use of small hostage rescue units, most uses of proxy troops, US piloting of foreign warplanes, foreign disaster assistance, military training and advisory programs not involving direct combat, civic action programs, and many other military activities.
Among sources used, besides news reports, are the Congressional Record (23 June 1969), 180 Landings by the US Marine Corps History Division, Ege & Makhijani in Counterspy (July-Aug. 1982), and Daniel Ellsberg in Protest & Survive. »Instances of Use of United States Forces Abroad, 1798-1993« by Ellen C. Collier of the Library of Congress Congressional Research Service.
SOUTH DAKOTA, 1890 (-?)
Troops
300 Lakota Indians massacred at Wounded Knee.
ARGENTINA, 1890
Troops
Buenos Aires interests protected.
CHILE, 1891
Troops
Marines clash with nationalist rebels.
HAITI, 1891
Troops
Black workers revolt on US-claimed Navassa Island defeated.
IDAHO, 1892
Troops
Army suppresses silver miners’ strike.
HAWAII, 1893 (-?)
Naval, troops
Independent kingdom overthrown, annexed.
CHICAGO, 1894
Troops
Breaking of rail strike, 34 killed.
NICARAGUA, 1894
Troops
Month-long occupation of Bluefields.
CHINA, 1894-95
Naval, troops
Marines land in Sino-Japanese War.
KOREA, 1894-96
Troops
Marines kept in Seoul during war.
PANAMA, 1895
Troops, naval
Marines land in Colombian province.
NICARAGUA, 1896
Troops
Marines land in port of Corinto.
CHINA, 1898-1900
Troops
Boxer Rebellion fought by foreign armies.
PHILIPPINES, 1898-1910(-?)
Naval, troops
Seized from Spain, killed
600,000 Filipinos.
CUBA, 1898-1902(-?)
Naval, troops
Seized from Spain, still hold Navy
base.
PUERTO RICO, 1898(-?)
Naval, troops
Seized from Spain, occupation continues.
GUAM, 1898(-?)
Naval, troops
Seized from Spain, still use as base.
MINNESOTA, 1898(-?)
Troops
Army battles Chippewa at Leech Lake.
NICARAGUA, 1898
Troops
Marines land at port of San Juan del Sur.
SAMOA, 1899(-?)
Troops
Battle over succession to throne.
NICARAGUA, 1899
Troops
Marines land at port of Bluefields.
IDAHO, 1899-1901
Troops
Army occupies Coeur d’Alene mining region.
OKLAHOMA, 1901
Troops
Army battles Creek Indian revolt.
PANAMA, 1901-14
Naval, troops
Broke off from Colombia 1903, annexed Canal Zone 1914-99.
HONDURAS, 1903
Troops
Marines intervene in revolution.
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, 1903-04
Troops
U.S. interests protected in Revolution.
KOREA, 1904-05
Troops
Marines land in Russo-Japanese War.
CUBA, 1906-09
Troops
Marines land in democratic election.
NICARAGUA, 1907
Troops
»Dollar Diplomacy« protectorate set up.
HONDURAS, 1907
Troops
Marines land during war with Nicaragua.
PANAMA, 1908
Troops
Marines intervene in election contest.
NICARAGUA, 1910
Troops
Marines land in Bluefields and Corinto.
HONDURAS, 1911
Troops
U.S. interests protected in civil war.
CHINA, 1911-41
Naval, troops
Continuous occupation with flare-ups.
CUBA, 1912
Troops
U.S. interests protected in Havana.
PANAMA, 19l2
Troops
Marines land during heated election.
HONDURAS, 19l2
Troops
Marines protect US economic interests.
NICARAGUA, 1912-33
Troops, bombing
20-year occupation, fought guerrillas.
MEXICO, 19l3
Naval
Americans evacuated during revolution.
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, 1914
Naval
Fight with rebels over Santo Domingo.
COLORADO, 1914
Troops
Breaking of miners’ strike by Army.
MEXICO, 1914-18
Naval, troops
Series of interventions against nationalists.
HAITI, 1914-34
Troops, bombing
19-year occupation after revolts.
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, 1916-24
Troops
8-year Marine occupation.
CUBA, 1917-33
Troops
Military occupation, economic protectorate.
WORLD WAR I, 19l7-18
Naval, troops
Ships sunk, fought Germany
RUSSIA, 1918-22
Naval, troops
Five landings to fight Bolsheviks.
PANAMA, 1918-20
Troops
«Police duty« during unrest after elections.
YUGOSLAVIA, 1919
Troops
Marines intervene for Italy against Serbs in Dalmatia.
HONDURAS, 1919
Troops
Marines land during election campaign.
GUATEMALA, 1920
Troops
2-week intervention against unionists.
WEST VIRGINIA, 1920-21
Troops, bombing
Army intervenes against mineworkers.
TURKEY, 1922
Troops
Fought nationalists in Smyrna (Izmir).
CHINA, 1922-27
Naval, troops
Deployment during nationalist revolt.
HONDURAS, 1924-25
Troops
Landed twice during election strife.
PANAMA, 1925
Troops
Marines suppress general strike.
CHINA, 1927-34
Troops
Marines stationed throughout the country.
EL SALVADOR, 1932
Naval
Warships sent during Faribundo Marti revolt.
WASHINGTON DC, 1932
Troops
Army stops WWI vet bonus protest.
WORLD WAR II, 1941-45
Naval,troops, bombing, nuclear
Fought Axis for 3
years; 1st nuclear war.
DETROIT, 1943
Troops
Army puts down Black rebellion.
IRAN, 1946
Nuclear threat
Soviet troops told to leave north (Iranian Azerbaijan).
YUGOSLAVIA, 1946
Naval
Response to shooting-down of US plane.
URUGUAY, 1947
Nuclear threat
Bombers deployed as show of strength.
GREECE, 1947-49
Command operation
U.S. directs extreme-right in civil war.
CHINA, 1948-49
Troops
Marines evacuate Americans before Communist victory.
GERMANY, 1948
Nuclear threat
Atomic-capable bombers guard Berlin Airlift.
PHILIPPINES, 1948-54
Command operation
CIA directs war against Huk Rebellion.
PUERTO RICO, 1950
Command operation
Independence rebellion crushed in
Ponce.
KOREA, 1951-53(-?)
Troops, naval, bombing, nuclear threats US& South Korea fight China & North Korea to stalemate; A-bomb threat in 1950, & vs. China in 1953. Still have bases.
IRAN, 1953
Command operation
CIA overthrows democracy, installs Shah.
VIETNAM, 1954
Nuclear threat
Bombs offered to French to use against siege.
GUATEMALA, 1954
Command operation, bombing, nuclear threat CIA directs exile invasion after new gov’t nationalizes US company lands; bombers based in Nicaragua.
EGYPT, 1956
Nuclear threat, troops
Soviets told to keep out of Suez crisis; Marines evacuate foreigners
LEBANON, 1958
Troops, naval
Marine occupation against rebels.
IRAQ, 1958
Nuclear threat
Iraq warned against invading Kuwait.
CHINA, 1958
Nuclear threat
China told not to move on Taiwan isles.
PANAMA, 1958
Troops
Flag protests erupt into confrontation.
VIETNAM, 1960-75
Troops, naval, bombing, nuclear threats Fought South Vietnam revolt & North Vietnam; 1-2 million killed in longest US war; atomic bomb threats in 1968 and 1969.
CUBA, 1961
Command operation CIA-directed exile invasion fails.
GERMANY, 1961
Nuclear threat Alert during Berlin Wall crisis.
CUBA, 1962
Nuclear threat
Naval Blockade during missile crisis; near-war with USSR.
LAOS, 1962
Command operation
Military buildup during guerrilla war.
PANAMA, 1964
Troops
Panamanians shot for urging canal’s return.
INDONESIA, 1965
Command operation Million killed in CIA-assisted army coup.
DOMINICAN REPUBLIC, 1965-66
Troops, bombing Marines land during election campaign.
GUATEMALA, 1966-67
Command operation Green Berets intervene against rebels.
DETROIT, 1967
Troops
Army battles Blacks, 43 killed.
UNITED STATES, 1968
Troops
After King is shot; over 21,000 soldiers in cities.
CAMBODIA, 1969-75
Bombing, troops, naval Up to 2 million killed in decade of bombing, starvation, and political chaos.
OMAN, 1970
Command operation US directs Iranian marine invasion.
LAOS, 1971-73
Command operation, bombing US directs South Vietnamese invasion; »carpet-bombs« countryside.
SOUTH DAKOTA, 1973
Command operation Army directs Wounded Knee siege of Lakotas.
MIDEAST, 1973
Nuclear threat World-wide alert during Mideast War.
CHILE, 1973
Command operation CIA-backed coup ousts elected marxist president.
CAMBODIA, 1975
Troops, bombing Gas captured ship, 28 die in copter crash.
ANGOLA, 1976-92
Command operation CIA assists South African-backed rebels.
IRAN, 1980
Troops, nuclear threat, aborted bombing Raid to rescue Embassy hostages; 8 troops die in copter-plane crash. Soviets warned not to get involved in revolution.
LIBYA, 1981
Naval jets Two Libyan jets shot down in maneuvers.
EL SALVADOR, 1981-92
Command operation, troops Advisors, overflights aid anti-rebel war, soldiers briefly involved in hostage clash.
NICARAGUA, 1981-90
Command operation, naval CIA directs exile (Contra) invasions, plants harbor mines against revolution.
LEBANON, 1982-84
Naval, bombing, troops Marines expel PLO and back Phalangists, Navy bombs and shells Muslim and Syrian positions.
HONDURAS, 1983-89
Troops
Maneuvers help build bases near borders.
GRENADA, 1983-84
Troops, bombing Invasion four years after revolution.
IRAN, 1984
Jets
Two Iranian jets shot down over Persian Gulf.
LIBYA, 1986
Bombing, naval Air strikes to topple nationalist gov’t.
BOLIVIA, 1986
Troops Army assists raids on cocaine region.
IRAN, 1987-88
Naval, bombing US intervenes on side of Iraq in war.
LIBYA, 1989
Naval jets Two Libyan jets shot down.
VIRGIN ISLANDS, 1989
Troops
St. Croix Black unrest after storm.
PHILIPPINES, 1989
Jets
Air cover provided for government against coup.
PANAMA, 1989-90
Troops, bombing
Nationalist government ousted by 27,000 soldiers, leaders arrested, 2000+ killed.
LIBERIA, 1990
Troops
Foreigners evacuated during civil war.
SAUDI ARABIA, 1990-91
Troops, jets Iraq countered after invading Kuwait; 540,000 troops also stationed in Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, UAE, Israel.
IRAQ, 1990-?
Bombing, troops, naval Blockade of Iraqi and Jordanian ports, air strikes; 200,000+ killed in invasion of Iraq and Kuwait; no-fly zone over Kurdish north, Shiite south, large-scale destruction of Iraqi military.
KUWAIT, 1991
Naval, bombing, troops Kuwait royal family returned to throne.
LOS ANGELES, 1992
Troops
Army, Marines deployed against anti-police uprising.
SOMALIA, 1992-94
Troops, naval, bombing US-led United Nations occupation during civil war; raids against one Mogadishu faction.
YUGOSLAVIA, 1992-94
Naval
NATO blockade of Serbia and Montenegro.
BOSNIA, 1993-95
Jets, bombing No-fly zone patrolled in civil war; downed jets, bombed Serbs.
HAITI, 1994-96
Troops, naval
Blockade against military government; troops restore President Aristide to office three years after coup.
CROATIA, 1995
Bombing
Krajina Serb airfields attacked before Croatian offensive.
ZAIRE (CONGO), 1996-97
Troops
Marines at Rwandan Hutu refuge camps, in area where Congo revolution begins.
LIBERIA, 1997
Troops
Soldiers under fire during evacuation of foreigners.
ALBANIA, 1997
Troops
Soldiers under fire during evacuation of foreigners.
SUDAN, 1998
Missiles
Attack on pharmaceutical plant alleged to be »terrorist« nerve gas plant.
AFGHANISTAN, 1998
Missiles
Attack on former CIA training camps used by Islamic fundamentalist groups alleged to have attacked embassies.
IRAQ, 1998-?
Bombing, Missiles
Four days of intensive air strikes after weapons inspectors allege Iraqi obstructions.
YUGOSLAVIA, 1999-?
Bombing, Missiles
Heavy NATO air strikes after Serbia declines to withdraw from Kosovo.
Instances of the US dropping bombs since WWII – By William Blum:
China 1945-46
Korea 1950-53
China 1950-53
Guatemala 1954
Indonesia 1958
Cuba 1959-60
Guatemala 1960
Congo 1964
Peru 1965
Laos 1964-73
Vietnam 1961-73
Cambodia 1969-70
Guatemala 1967-69
Grenada 1983
Lebanon 1984
Libya 1986
El Salvador 1980s
Nicaragua 1980s
Panama 1989
Iraq 1991-99
Sudan 1998
Afghanistan 1998
Yugoslavia 1999
* * *
46. To YSA June 04, 1999
The Yugoslav Sociological Association is 100% correct! If I were going to school in Belgrad, I doubt that I would be thrown out from my University like I am now. I perhaps would have had received an (A) grade! Perhaps you would be as kind as to forward to me an application for studying at your University in Belgrad. I would very much like to study one or more semesters in Serbia. I do not know how to speak or write Serbian (this is a major problem for me) – I am learning. I can obtain a study grant for foreign language study abroad perhaps. The American Sociological Imagination will consume anything that it hears on the CNN (Comedy News Network). American media have been completely biased in reporting about this tragic war! Much of this is due to complete ignorance! For example there are many international research organisations affiliated with my school (The New School), Columbia University, and also NYU. These Pro-Clinton (Democratic think tanks) have interesting names for themselves BUT, they are just a guise for promoting Pro-Clinton, NATO, and very backwards Democratic Foreign Policy objectives (another words they want to overthrow every government in the world that is not a USA clone!) I want you to become familiar with a few of these evil institutions such as: The Eastern European Study Association and the very repulsive, World Policy Institute (Hillary Clinton goes to this one on her NYC trips and drinks liquor)! These are located on the 4th floor of the Graduate Faculty Dept. of Political Science at the New School for Social Research at 5th and 14th streets in NYC. […] Professor A. Zolberg (see my web site to New School which is http:// www.newschool.edu) is one of those professors who covertly tried to promote to his students, that NATO’s bombing of Yugoslavia is a »good idea«! […] Another reason for which I am thrown out of school is because I made this Albanian Lecture known throughout the world! The man Fatmos came and preached to New School students that he deserved a greater Albania as far back as Fall 1997! In fact, I had one Albanian classmate last semester. In the middle of a class with (Robert Latham – a world renown scholar and now a war hawk!)... this Albanian classmate stated that he would like to commit »Ethnic Genocide«, against me as a Russian/Orthodox Christian. So what happens. He can stay at my school and I get tossed out!
Welcome to backwards, America!
Miss Jill Louise Starr, Graduate Student
The New School for Social Research, Political Science Graduate Faculty
* * *
47. To YSA June 04, 1999
Dear Yugoslavian Sociology Colleagues,
In response to your »On Media« memo:
U.S. progressives have long been aware of the misinformation spread in our country by the major news media, all of them intimately linked to the weapons producers and purveyors. For those who care to look beyond that misleading, self-serving superficial »news«, other information and interpretation is available (e.g. The Nation, Mother Jones, Z [magazines]; Pacifica Radio; etc.), in recent times supplemented by internet and e-mail sources that make it far easier to gain alternative perspectives on important events. – But you know this already.
I want you to know how profoundly ashamed I and millions of other progressive US Americans are of the brutal, cynical, pernicious bombing campaign with which our political and military »leaders« have been tormenting you and yours over the past 70+ days. No, I can’t know the terror and immiseration to which you are being subjected; I can only imagine it, and my images make me sick at heart.
I pray that yesterday’s diplomatic »breakthrough« will lead to a quick end to NATO’s criminal bombing of your country. Be that as it may: In the times ahead we have our work cut out for us: peacemaking, healing, rebuilding. We obviously cannot rely on our elected and corporate »leaders« to do this work in a humane way. Instead, we shall need to use all the progressive links at our disposal to side-step the high-profile, corporate-compromised players and take care of each other ourselves.
Obviously, money will be a crucial tool in this effort; and official money (dollars, dinars) will be in short supply, as it always is for constructive, humanitarian projects. I have some experience in the theory and design of local currencies, and connections with many people far more experienced and qualified than myself. Please contact me if you would like to pursue the idea of communities creating their own money – money which cannot leave home, and which is owned not by banks, but by the people who create it, for them to use again and again, at zero interest. I expect your countryfolk will be needing it.
I send you my most heartfelt hopes for surviving the insanity which my government and others have unleashed upon you, and for emerging from this nightmare with a renewed, clear vision of a healthy future for us and all our children.
Philip H. Beard, Ph.D.
Chairman, Department of Languages and Literatures
Sonoma State University
Rohnert Park, California 94928, USA
* * *
48. To YSA June 05, 1999
Dear colleagues! We thank you for the letter. The scientific public of Omsk state university (Russia) supports you. We consider that military intervention of any country in the affairs of another is not acceptable and is unreasonable. We support you and we act to stop the bombardment of territory of your country.
Anastasiya G. Bykova
Omsk State University, Russia
* * *
49. To YSA June 06, 1999
Dear friends:
I am a psychologist from Spain. I agree with you in all of your statements about the war. But what about Milošević? What about the children, women and men from Kosovo?
On the other hand, there is no »them« and »us«, the war is bad for everybody: people from Yugoslavia and from Kosovo. I want to stop the war.
»LET’S STOP THE WAR«
»NATO NO«
»MILOŠEVIĆ NO«
In solidarity, Fco. Javier Llamazares Granda,
Apdo. correos núm. 8146, ES-33210 Gijón, Spain
* * *
50. To YSA June 06, 1999
Yes, the refugee flow increased with the NATO bombing, but not because the Kosovar Albanians were fleeing NATO bombs. Rather, Milošević and the Yugoslav army and police went in and cleaned out Kosovar in line with a predetermined plan. And all this to wind up with the same agreement proposed at Rambouillet which Yugoslavia refused to sign. Among other things, that is what we get in the Western press. Hardly propaganda. We even have a press that questioned the wisdom of the NATO bombing. But always with revulsion at the refugees created by Milošević and his forces. They did not have to persuade us of the humanitarian catastrophe. It was there for everyone to see, except perhaps in Yugoslavia. By the way, how come we had nothing from the YSA before the bombing started to take its toll? Now that all seems provisionally over and we are back to square one with even more damage done, it all seems quite useless, doesn’t it? Maybe you ought to see the film Before the Rain, done by a Macedonian filmmaker some years ago. It is good for meditating upon after such a human disaster.
Best wishes.
Stephen Schecter
Professeur, Département de sociologie
Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada
* * *
51. To YSA June 06, 1999
Dear friends,
Over here we are keeping up the anti-war effort ... and we will continue to do so even when NATO finally does decide to stop its bombing.
Yesterday, around 5,000 people, I believe, demonstrated in the area near the Houses of Parliament in London – not that our parliament ever gave approval to NATO’s campaign in the first place, characteristic of NATO’s 50 year-old anti-democratic, right-wing structure. This demonstration, surprisingly, was reported well by the BBC. People pledged to continue the protest movement until the damage to Yugoslavia’s economy had been repaired. I think that about 500 people protested in Glasgow yesterday, too.
There has also been a protest recently at the Royal Air Force / US Air Force air base at Fairfield, with the group called Women In Black interfering with the movement of bombs: they also had messages of solidarity sent from the Women In Black group in Belgrade.
As you might imagine, we are following news reports closely, as the political events unfold. I really feel, as I believe one speaker at yesterday’s demonstration in London put it »the shame of being British«, when public money is indirectly being spent on destroying a country’s infra-structure and population. And yet we have no say in it when it comes to the iron will of Jamie Shea, Wesley Clark, Tony Blair, and others.
Your analysis of the Western media’s portrayal of events was very revealing, and that helps explain the difficulty people in the anti-war campaign movements have had: when atrocities either are, or are presented as being, committed by Serbian forces in Kosovo, people tend to think that the war is »just«. On the other hand, Tuđman’s past actions, and his vile anti-Serb and anti-Semitic racism, are virtually never discussed in the mainstream media over here.
At a meeting on Friday, we had a discussion about the Balkans – one person involved, Jelena, is Serbian, and a Greek man came as well. People like myself who do not come from the Balkans really need to be given the opportunity to understand the region better.
The only things that I can really do now are to continue the campaign against the war, and to pledge my help for the future in somehow helping people in Yugoslavia of all ethnic groups in the recovery from NATO’s humanitarian atrocities: ecological, economic, social. Your suffering is my suffering, too.
It seems to me particularly appalling that NATO has carried out the destruction of oil installations and ammonia plants, etc, causing such severe pollution and damage to the air, land and waterways, as well as using depleted uranium in Kosovo, while Blair and Clinton and others deceive us into thinking that they are trying to safeguard the environment.
Such abuses of health, environmental, psychological and other human rights cannot and will not be overlooked, even if they are committed by the strongest powers in the world. Nor can the hundreds of lives lost, or millions of lives ruined.
Thank you for writing to me – please continue writing as things carry on, and let us know what’s happening.
Yours sincerely,
Tom Sagar-Fenton
* * *
52. To YSA June 07, 1999
On Wednesday I debate in full view of my colleagues the con/against side of the proposition: »The NATO air campaign against Yugoslavia was justified.«
I have read your June 3, 1999 statement, »On Media«. Do you have any other statements or official policy statements I might consult? I pray that this reaches you and that the bombing will be ended.
Michael A. Dover
Ph.D. Candidate, Social Work and Sociology
University of Michigan
1080 S. University Ave. USA
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53. To YSA June 09, 1999
[…]
I do hope that this »peace« agreement progresses, at least to the point of stopping the bombs on you.
As for other consequences, unfortunately, you and we will pay them for the next 50 years at least (if the world lasts that long). Few people (and no politicians!) yet realise how devastating they will be.
Best wishes, (sorry if it sounds inappropriate, but don’t know what else to say).
Bruna De Marchi
* * *
54. To YSA June 09, 1999
I am very shocked by your following sentences :
A simple but principle question that follows is: why »misfortune of about one million men, women and children (no matter who they are) is very much important and, on the other hand, sufferings of nearly ten million civilians deserve quite a modest attention? As a matter of fact, there were some reports that were underlined by an objective approach«.
How many children, women and men the Serbian army and police have deliberately and voluntary organised to murder, to rape and to destroy?
What the Serbian people did against Milošević?
War is horrible, but at no time was there a deliberate intention to kill civilian people by NATO. Don’t you think this is a huge difference?
Please answer to these questions.
Emmanuel Bigand
LEAD CNRS
Faculte des Sciences
Bld Gabriel
21000 Dijon, France
55. To YSA June 11, 1999
Hello,
I am very pleased to hear that NATO has now stopped its bombing campaign, and I really hope that this means it is nearly the end of the war.
I have seen pictures on the news of people celebrating in Belgrade, and the Kosovars in Albania also seem relieved and filled with hope by this. However, I know that there are years of work to be done, and the impact of the bombing will only be known in the coming few years. Your reports have been very moving to read.
I hope that the first thing to happen now in Yugoslavia is that people can become used to living without the noise and the fear of the bombs, and that more comfortable daytime patterns will resume. The psychological impact will, I am sure, take months or years to fully recover.
The ecological, economic and social damage will be immense burdens, and ones which I want to contribute to alleviating. If you have any more details about the ecological impacts of the bombing, please let me know, as I am trying to do some research on the theme of »War, Health and the Environment«, that addresses and raises people’s awareness of such issues. Any details of the suffering caused by the bombing among the more vulnerable people in society (the children, elderly, disabled, and so on) will also be useful to know.
I have heard that the charity »Save the Children« is still active inside Yugoslavia – if there are any other international non-governmental groups like that group that you know of inside Yugoslavia, please let me know, as I am looking at next year’s Summer or the Summer of 2001 to help with relief effort work.
I truly hope that people all over Yugoslavia will now have the chance to rebuild their lives and undo the damage that has been done.
Sociological work is of the utmost importance in monitoring the impacts of the war, and the reconstruction events following on afterwards.
My sympathy is with you all at this time of pain – and I wish you all the best of luck in the process of recovery from the bombing. Please write back to me again, if you have time, on:
I shall probably write by post to you soon, having your address sent in your messages.
Yours in friendship,
Tom Sagar-Fenton.
* * *
56. To YSA June 10, 1999
Dear colleagues,
Thank you for your letter.
I distributed your previous letter among Israeli physicians. It has met with understanding and sympathy. Unfortunately, Israeli State policy lacks logic and is subject to American directives.
I am not sure that you understand correctly my work but its main points are the following:
1. There is no fight for freedom and independence among Albanians. There is division of Yugoslavia planned by the US and NATO and a provoked civil war.
2. There is infringement of international standards and morals by the US and NATO and the establishment of World sovereignty. In Chapter 7 of my work I dealt with a similar issue and indicated the impotence of the British Government in solving the Ulster problems. […]
I am willing to collaborate with a Yugoslav advocate who would like to write an article about principles of international law, their infringement and the brainless the Hague Court.
Your government is free to act since all standards of morality have been ruined anyway, it should serve solely the interests of the Yugoslav people. The expulsion of the Albanians from Kosovo was a correct decision. A la guere comme a la guere.
My main interest presently is to apply to sociology the principles of thermodynamics of open systems. My letters and articles about your country were written out of deep anger and irritation. It is terrible when Golems and Maniacs rule a country but it is even worse when they attempt to rule the world.
I shall be glad to cooperate with a Yugoslav sociologist or physicist in the above project.
Raddai Raikhlin
* * *
57. To YSA June 10, 1999
Despite being of Croat descent, I’ll like to receive your reviews.
I think all Balkan peoples should unite and think about their past in common.
Želim mir za sve! Hvala,
Paulo Jurza, Brasil
* * *
58. To YSA June 10, 1999
NATO’s Propaganda war was a great success. It was able to demonise the Serbs and portray them as the new Nazis that were capable of anything. Each time NATO blew up a hospital, school, embassy or killed innocent civilians, NATO ‘s tactic would be to demonise the Serbs instantly for the alleged discovery of another mass grave or some other gross atrocity. Invariably the major media would report this without question.
As opposed to NATO’s Propaganda stories, the major media suppressed the human tragedy of the Serbian people. No mention of the 1,000,000 Serb refugees from western Slavonia, Krajina and Bosnia, or that thousands of Serb civilians had been slaughtered and that this was done by the Croat irregulars, Croatia’s regular army, Bosnian Croats and Muslims alike.
The major media in the US and Britain pushed the NATO line without question. Why? The media’s duplicity in the coverage of NATO’s war against Serbia will be revealed as it was in Vietnam.
To my knowledge only the LA Times had a journalist working in Kosovo during the war. The reports filed by LA Times journalist Paul Watson gave an entirely different view to that reported by the major media groups.
As for the media all I can say is that when you behave like a whore you will be eventually treated like one. It also highlights the need for a independent media, one that does not have to worry about its vested interests and reports without fear or favour.
Gregory Dower,
49 Hawkhurst Street,
Spotswood Vic 3015, Australia
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59. To Jill Starr June 11, 1999
Dear Miss Starr,
We are very honoured by the wish you expressed to study at a Serbian university. But on the other hand, we do not think it is a very good idea, and for a number of reasons. First, scholarship is literally impossible to get here – there are no programs of giving grants to foreign students for studying in Yugoslavia. Second, a bit self-critically, we must say that the whole organisation and administration system of the Serbian universities is quite rigid and old fashioned. For instance, you could not apply from abroad, you would have to be here and hand in the application in person. This is also reflected in the complicated procedure for confirming academic degrees obtained abroad, which a foreign student is obliged to undergo. Having in mind the wide incongruity between the curricula, you would probably find it quite difficult to adjust to the environment of (post)graduate studies here.
But what is perhaps possible, and what we suggest to you, is to seek a research grant from some of the funding agencies in the US. For example, the Open Society Fund in New York, with its wide network all over Eastern Europe, including Yugoslavia, has some special programs in social sciences promoting East-West relations. There are certainly many more such institutions. If you come as an independent researcher, you have much more freedom, while at the same time you can easily establish many professional contacts and take part in scholarly life, including the university.
We feel deep compassion at your bad luck with the New School, and wish you success in the future.
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
60. To Mr. Emmanuel Bigand June 11, 1999
Dear Mr. Bigand,
Thank you for your message. We wish to stress that we condemn and oppose inflicting pain and suffering on anyone. We have noticed that in the Western media, concentrated on Kosovar Albanians, almost no attention has been paid to the suffering of other people in Yugoslavia, including Albanians outside Kosovo. In this regard the Western and Serbian media are quite similar – they both ignore the suffering of the other side. The propaganda of the war in the West consisted, among other things, in the effort to present targeting civilian objects in Yugoslavia as a side effect, or »collateral damage« of the supposedly main thrust of the whole operation, which was, allegedly, to shoot at military targets. But in the aftermath of the bombing, the number of civilian targets, and the scope of their destruction, by far exceeds the same at the side of the military. As many preconditions for normal life of the civilian population have been removed, the question arises whether this was really just a side effect.
»How many children, women and men the Serbian army and police have deliberately and voluntary organised to murder, to rape and to destroy? What the Serbian people did against Milošević?«
The problem is not so simple as you see it. And we have a question for you: what has the West done with Milošević, always choosing to talk to him and nobody else, and promoting him as the »guarantor« of peace in the region (e.g. at Dayton) thereby giving him disproportionate significance? As Dr. Jan Oberg (Director, head of the TFF Conflict-Mitigation team to the Balkans and Georgia; Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research, Sweden, http://www.transnational.org), who is neither »NATO« nor »Serbian«, has said: »The lack of empathy and solidarity with the 11 million citizens of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia whose society is being destroyed is as amazing as it is deplorable... Remember when people of culture, science, politics, media and humanism flocked to Sarajevo when it was under siege? Where are they now?... Where are those who believe Yugoslavia is a dictatorship? Supporting fellow human beings suffering under dictatorship is a noble reason to go but those around the world who hold this view stay away. Where are the human rights activists when numerous human rights are being violated by NATO? Where is the sympathy with innocent citizens who endure the systematic destruction of a European society and capital in the name of Western civilisation?....In spite of the war, it is perfectly possible to go there and freely meet anyone you like. I did that,« says Dr. Oberg. »It is mind-boggling that even intellectuals seem to be able to hold only two categories in their head at a time: if you are anti-NATO’s bombings, you must automatically be pro-Milošević or pro-Serb. Or, if you go there, you support the regime and are disloyal to the West. I am afraid that those who hide behind such banal dichotomies are responsible for a gross civilisational injustice done to every and all citizens in today’s Yugoslavia.... The international so-called ‘community’ indicts President Milošević and a handful of leaders. It’s doubtful that they will ever end up in the Hague. But those who are suffering under this leadership are being killed, punished, isolated and humiliated by NATO. Any taxi driver in Belgrade will tell you with sardonic humour: ‘We only have two problems: 12 years with Milošević and now NATO’s bombs, otherwise everything is fine here!’ Yugoslavia’s opposition, independent intellectuals and peace movements will tell you exactly the same: ‘You, the West, are making everything so much more difficult for us now – and a generation’s time ahead. What are your real interests? We are the ones who want to be part of the modern world, who struggle for a democratic Yugoslavia and desire integration with the West. Don’t you understand how counterproductive these bombs are to us?’ ... Oberg continues, »I watch the heavy bombs and cruise missiles fall at night – ‘successfully’ according to NATO’s spokesmen a few hours later. I hear the roaring thunder of the explosions. I feel the shaking of the building and ground. I note sirens at any time of the day and the night, NATO permits no one to sleep for long. I feel the rage inside, the utter meaninglessness, my own powerlessness and humiliation in the face of mighty high-tech destruction and I think, ‘this is my culture, it is my political leaders who do or support this.’ I know now how true it is that one has to be there to sense it and I experience how much stop working when we are without electricity – water pumps, cookers, street lights, computers, phones. There is only one word for what I feel: I am ashamed of the culture that does this.«... »I walk around Belgrade and Novi Sad to see the surreal landscapes of destroyed buildings, bridges, ministries, police stations, hotels, radio- and TV stations, apartment houses, schools and embassies. The oil refinery in Novi Sad is still burning, three weeks after the hit. What was once big trees are now black, charred stumps. I know it is different, but it reminds me of images of Hiroshima«... (Press Info # 68, Belgrade under the bombs, Report from a visit, June 1, 1999).
Throughout the nineties the Yugoslav sociologists have been very active in organised civil (and student) protests, e.g., in 1991, 1992, 1996/1997, 1998. Some of us were beaten and even arrested. Most sociologists are acutely aware of the necessity for the respect of human rights, in our country and elsewhere. Some of them proved their commitment by getting directly involved in projects of human rights monitoring. Obviously, you know nothing about these events. You can find further information on these activities in our periodical Sociologija (Sociology) 1/1997 and 4/1998 (issues published in English). If you are interested in the topic we would be glad to supply you with a couple of articles via E mail.
With best wishes to you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
61. To Professor Stephen Schecter June 11, 1999
Dear Professor Schecter,
Thanks for your e-mail. We appreciate your taking interest in our problems. Your views are quite similar to those that the main Western electronic media have been offering ever since the NATO aggression started. Thus, almost all answers to the questions you ask in your message had been already given in our article (»On media«) – to which you referred. Nevertheless, we’ll give comments upon some of your sentences – for the sake of dialogue (the rest we concern a matter of the »could be« speculations, since both you and we are quite insufficiently informed on the issues – e.g., on ethnic cleansing).
Well, about the facts:
a) The refugee flow increased because the Kosovar Albanians were fleeing NATO bombs, too! (Even some reports broadcast by the Western electronic media confirmed that);
b) You say the Yugoslav army and police »went in« Kosovo; but you seem to be forgetting the fact that Kosovo/Metohija is a part of Yugoslavia, therefore the presence of state armed forces there was completely legitimate. (Do you question the deployment of the British army and police in Northern Ireland?) What one could dispute is the quantity, and strategy, of these forces; but that is another question. (Just a few words on ethnic cleansing, though: even in the USA some eminent authors have questioned its character and scope; see, e.g., one of Noam Chomsky’s most recent articles: »Kosovo Peace Accord« – available on the Internet;
c) »On media« deals with the Western electronic media only, not with the press (the Western newspapers have not been available in Yugoslavia ever since the NATO bombing started);
d) How could you have been acquainted with a humanitarian catastrophe without the media reports? You said you needed no media to persuade you, for »the humanitarian catastrophe was there for everyone to see«!? OK, but how? By what means? By divining?;
e) You asked: »How come that we had nothing from the YSA before the bombing started to take its toll?« Throughout the nineties the Yugoslav sociologists have been very active in organised civil (and student) protests, e.g., in 1991, 1992, 1996, 1997, 1998. Some of us were beaten and even arrested. Obviously, you know nothing about these events. Professor Schecter, let’s not pretend naïveté; the Yugoslav drama became an attractive topic only when the NATO authorities and their political masters (in the first place) decided so! By bringing about a real tragedy!
Finally, there is, so to say, a natural hierarchy of threats, fears, and reactions. Professor Schecter, have you ever heard a sound of jets and missiles over your head, and terrifying explosions quite close your place? We doubt. No one has ever heard such a horrible »music« on the territories of the USA and Canada, remember? That’s why you could meditate, in your quiet and peaceful surroundings, on our tragedy – after »Before the Rain« – in such an abstract manner. Yes, Professor Schecter, we saw the film (»Before the Rain« was in our cinemas as well as on the Yugoslav state TV). There are, however, some other films (most of them made in Yugoslavia, though) that deal with quite similar problems; you should see them. Most of them are far more dramatic, and far more explicit than »Before the Rain« and, thus, very inspiring for both meditating and – learning! As we said, we appreciate your concern. Now that the NATO bombing is about to end, we would be grateful if you gave a professional contribution to our further engagement: making a project of civil society in Yugoslavia.
We shall send you an outline very soon.
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
62. To Prof. Philip H. Beard June 11, 1999
Dear Mr. Beard,
Thank you very much for your letter and your concern for all of us here in Yugoslavia.
[…]
We are sending you the statements of the Yugoslav Sociological Association we prepared in the last two months (see the attachment, please). We will do our best to keep you updated with all our forthcoming statements.
»Obviously, money will be a crucial tool in this effort; and official money (dollars, dinars) will be in short supply, as it always is for constructive, humanitarian projects. I have some experience in the theory and design of local currencies, and connections with many people far more experienced and qualified than myself. Please contact me if you would like to pursue the idea of communities creating their own money – money which cannot leave home, and which is owned not by banks, but by the people who create it, for them to use again and again, at zero interest. I expect your countryfolk will be needing it.«
Thank you very much for this useful suggestion. Unfortunately, none of us has been involved in any practical endeavour concerning economic matters. There is, however, a group of independent economic experts, called »Group 17«, who have been developing a comprehensive project of economic reform in Serbia. As soon as we get in touch with them, we will send you the addresses of some of the members with whom you may discuss the issue.
We wish you success in your further activities,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
63. To Mr. Tom Sagar-Fenton June 11, 1999
Dear Mr. Sagar-Fenton,
Thank you very much for your extremely kind and concerned letters. Your support has helped us endure the hard days that, hopefully, are now behind us. At the moment, the citizens of Yugoslavia are recovering from the shocks of the two-and-a-half month NATO aggression, sincerely hoping that the war is really and permanently finished. The consequences of the bombing, of course, are still acutely felt, but nevertheless, living without bombs is a wonderful thing. When peace is definitively established, we will face the difficult tasks of building our country – in the double sense of rebuilding what was destroyed by NATO missiles, and of (re)building democracy, civil society, and constitutionality within our political scene.
We think your idea to cooperate with some NGO in Yugoslavia is very good. We suggest you contact the Center for the Development of the Non-Profit Sector, which is the co-ordination and information center for the Yugoslav NGO scene, where you can get relevant information and get in touch with NGOs themselves. Unfortunately, the e-mail address of the Center has been out of order, but we’ll find out how they may be contacted and then let you know.
We’ll prepare for you some articles on the suffering caused by the bombing (as well as the ecological impact of the bombing) and we’ll send you them very soon.
With best regards to you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
64. To YSA June 12, 1999
I find it quite incredible that you ascribe to NATO responsibility for bringing out a real tragedy. Frankly, to read your letters it would seem you believe that Serbia was the victim rather than the aggressor. The fact is that Milošević planned his ethnic cleansing campaign in Kosovo and set about it just as he did in other parts of the FRY. Why else did he dither and eventually refuse the Rambouillet accords? No one wants bombs to fall.
I don’t and certainly not on me and my compatriots. Nor on you. But I must point out that when the bombing stops, you in Belgrade resume your life while a million refugees from Kosovo find their homes, land, cities in ruins. Serbian police and army went in and destroyed records, razed houses, raped and killed. That is not part of war, nor policing, not even part of quelling a rebellion. National sovereignty, like making the world free of communism, is no excuse for slaughter, and no one has a monopoly on virtue. But spare me Chomsky and a bunch of other reports I have read that do not impress me with their overall judgement. Chomsky was not too astute about Cambodia, and moral posturing is not always the best way to resolve disputes. You may have been active in civil protest, but your letters did start to come not over the forcible ejection of Kosovars but over NATO bombing, with a veneer of leftist propaganda dressed up as sociological analysis. Bad propaganda and bad analysis. I am sorry I did not see some of the other films, but I am glad I saw Before the Rain. I found it very instructive and profound, not only about your corner of the world but about the way human passions anywhere can unleash large-scale war. You might think about that instead of serving up your classic Marxist or neo-Marxist line which mixes analysis with moral intimidation. NATO is not a lily-white organisation. The US certainly has blood on its hands from escapades elsewhere. But in this case, the world outside the FRY was both outraged and incredulous that Milošević seemed to be allowed to get away with his premeditated and organised murder. Hence the support for NATO. It springs from a development we should all welcome – that somehow the idea of universal human rights has made its way into global consciousness and takes precedence over other considerations. We all know that this principle does not always win out for all kinds of sordid reasons. You might feel that it is hypocritical for it to be applied in your case. NATO, after all, is not about to go to war with China over its record of human rights. But we might also be thankful that at least one ruthless dictator was stopped. Too bad it happened to be yours. We could obviously talk for hours, but I will not bother to answer every one of your statements. It is the overall tone that bothers me, and I wonder how you will rebuild your society unless you change the tone. We are all in this world together, you know, and every one of us can either keep the murder going or stop and start to reverse its course. Perhaps when we have the time we can start thinking about that. In the meantime, good luck with your rebuilding. If you only want to browbeat me or score political points, you needn’t bother responding. And I won’t either. Still, if we were to do some political sociology, we might try and figure out how the federal republic after Tito’s death drifted into such a mess. Will we ever understand, and enough to learn something useful?
Stephen Schecter
* * *
65. To YSA June 13, 1999
Dear friends,
Thank you for your message back to me recently!
It is good to read it and to realise that, despite the years of difficulty lying ahead of us in reconstruction in all its forms, at least the worst days are past.
I particularly appreciate your information about NGO help in Yugoslavia, and I can follow this up now that my summer term here in Bristol is coming to an end.
It is good to keep in contact with you as a Sociological Association, as your observations and analyses are detailed and non-governmental, giving perhaps the best account of conditions that we, in other countries, are likely to get.
In other countries, and in particular in NATO countries such as Britain, we need to keep up the pressure, keep aware of the situation (political, social, economic, ecological, etc), and work out the best ways that we can lend our help. I think that many people would be suspicious of any attempts by NATO country governments to let big corporations profit from reconstructing the infrastructure that NATO itself destroyed.
On the other hand, Russia has seemed more genuinely reliable and willing to help with humanitarian aid during this conflict, without too many strings being attached, and I expect this will continue.
Concern for human rights is at the centre of my involvement here, and I am determined to see that such abuses of basic rights – whoever by, and whoever is affected – are stopped, and reversed. This is behind my particular interest in the health and ecological impact, from the use of depleted uranium in Kosovo, to the happy-go-lucky explosions of oil refineries and ammonia plants.
All of this is of equal importance to the situation of the Kosovars themselves, of course, and as I have said before I have always condemned the use of repression, violence, and ethnic cleansing during recent years, by whatever side. I have also, as long as I have known about it, always condemned the original 1989 removal of Kosovo’s autonomous province status. People in my family, and many friends, have generously supported the charities helping the Kosovar refugees, with both money and material donation – my sister, who is 14 years old and plays the violin, is playing in a concert to raise funds for the Kosovar refugees later on this month.
I will keep you updated of things that are going on in Britain, and if a spokesperson from the YSA or a comparable organisation in Yugoslavia is planning to come to speak in Britain, I would be very interested to hear about it (though I assume that this is quite unlikely in the immediate future).
I wish you my very best wishes, and my solidarity with all the people throughout the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia who have suffered and who are devoting their efforts towards peace, reconstruction and a democratic society, and I look forward to corresponding again soon!
Yours sincerely,
Tom Sagar-Fenton.
* * *
66. To YSA June 12, 1999
Dear Friends,
I cannot express to you all in words how relieved I am that NATO’s bombing has finally stopped. I feel assured that the worst is over in Serbia insofar as NATO’s illegal bombing is concerned. Unfortunately, »sorry is not enough« for the persons of Yugoslavia. I say, economic restructuring plans can never bring back the lives that have been lost due to NATO’s war crimes. NATO can not bring back the homes and lives NATO has destroyed for no good reason! I of course will continue to support the persons of Yugoslavia, I am Russian in decent. Thank you very much for your empathy about my experiences with the New School for Social Research, it is a creep show! I do have support from former professors/scholars, I will write for research grants. I think that it is of great importance for Western minded scholars and politicians to understand the history, culture, religion, of both Serbia and Russia.
The past links us to the present, and then onto our future (whatever that may be). And future prospects for peace as we enter into the 21st century for many states such as Iraq, Cuba, and Latin America, look very grim at present as long as NATO leaders continue on their unilateral mission to destroy all societies and cultures that are not USA clones. This is a great evil in my eyes. I will be visiting Serbia one day in the near future, perhaps to visit my friend in Kraljevo. I can stay with my friend’s family in Belgrad (after all it is the persons of Serbia that make the country so beautiful to me)!
I aalso want to assess NATO’s damage, speak to persons about their experiences and needs in Serbia now, and also I would like to visit the Holy Monasteries (+). If my friend decides to visit me here for a while, this is fine also. When I do visit Serbia however, I would love to visit the University of Belgrad and to introduce myself (say hello in person). I perhaps will work with the CATO Institute. If I can be of any further assistance, please advise...I stand ready to assist you in any manner that I can.
Your Friend
Jill
PS: What are your basic human necessities at present? If I do not visit immediately to Belgrad, my friend is planning to, she has family there. Perhaps she can bring with her some necessities to you? JLS
* * *
67. To YSA June 12, 1999
Dear Members of the Presidency,
»On the Media«: »Us« and »Them«
I have read your letter (which appears below) and commented within your text. Please understand that there are others who sympathise with and grieve for the current destruction raining down on your country.
»Over the past seventy two days, ever since the NATO bombings started in the intermezzos between detonations (and while there has been electricity) – we, the Yugoslav sociologists, have been trying to form a complete view of what has been going on, on the grounds of various domestic sources, our own experiences, of course, and information we have collected by watching CNN, Sky News, BBC, RAI etc. (via satellite).«
As a private citizen with no training in any field related to international affairs I have been trying to do the same thing: »to form a complete view of what has been going on.«
This has proven to be a daunting task! Media Experts indicate that there are formidable obstacles in such paths as ours.
»’Cherishing methodical suspicion’ we usually consider the main principle in reaching significant and valid sociological data and insights. Yet, we confess, there was a certain prejudice (Vorurteil), quite widespread among us, that the Western media – due to the fact that a relatively long democratic tradition underlay their modus operandi – were offering an objective view of the Yugoslav drama.«
My assumption, from the beginning, was the opposite. I assumed that I would not obtain an objective accounting from the Western corporate media (a/k/a the traditional media, or the elite press). (I arrived at this conclusion while following the media reports during the OIC investigations and impeachment of the President of the USA.)
»Alas! It was an entirely naive assumption.«
Though naive, it is understandable. Most people did the same, but stopped short of further consideration. Giving up this and other cherished beliefs and attitudes has been a difficult and painful task for me.
»For it is plain now: the main Western electronic media, particularly British and American, so far have been mostly (if not entirely) engaged in justifying the NATO aggression;«
My limited observation supports this. Why the media (print as well as electronic) does this is a question worth considering.
I am also intrigued by the question: How is the consistency of reportage achieved? What is the co-ordinating mechanism? There is little variance between US sources and almost no opposing views are presented.
One must resort to the on-line alternate press to find serious debate and consideration of »non-standard« interpretations and explanations of the War and the many issues related to it.
»and in persuading their public that there is a humanitarian catastrophe of the Albanian refugees and, on the other hand, a military action that should prevent its escalation.«
As far as I can tell from personal observation, the media has succeeded is rendering the viewing public disinterested in political events, insensitive to human suffering, and unable or unwilling to think critically about the information presented.
»No one can deny that a horrible exodus of the ethnic Albanians has been under way, and that it is still going on. It is true as well that:
a) the refugee flow drastically increased with the NATO bombings (as, by the way, Commanding General Wesley Clark had predicted!?!), and«
A few of us know that. But, that knowledge is diluted by the vast numbers of people who do not.
»b) due to the NATO bombings some quite appalling events have happened in Yugoslavia. Regarding the latter, just few facts may clearly illustrate what has happened up to now:
1. about 1500 civilians have been killed (in two recent days only – 30, 31 May – 60) and over 6000 injured (these events, as is already widely known, have usually been ‘softened’ by the NATO authorities’ cynical hocus-pocus neologism: ‘collateral damage’);«
Reports of NATO caused deaths and injuries do not seem to appear in the corporate media nor is there any citing of these numbers.
My knowledge of this has been gleaned from pursuing internet publications. Of course, »collateral damage« and similar phrases have been utilised by the NATO spokespersons and the media, thereby deflecting attention from the horrendous human toll NATO’s attacks have exacted. Mostly, the media has acted to keep the public ignorant of all information other than official NATO viewpoints.
Not everyone has been taken in by their propaganda.
»2. the latest estimates suggest that over two million men, women and children within Yugoslavia have no material means to survive any more (each day of bombing dramatically increases the number);«
The local print media’s coverage consists primarily of selected items from the NYT and AP. These, however, are further slanted by locally written headlines which sometimes give a completely distorted and opposite interpretation of the article itself.
»3. in some parts of Serbia ecological damage is so severe that the word »catastrophe« might soon become a mere euphemism;«
I have been writing to the President and Vice President about this. But have not seen it in the American Press. (I must add, however, that I have not done any systematic search for such information). There is absolutely no doubt in my mind, that this War have resulted in an ecological catastrophe. As I write this in mid July, 1999, official statements appear in the press that early damage estimates (in Kosovo) were much greater than actual. Reference to Balkan ecological damage is absent.
»4. terrifying sounds of the air-raid alarms, NATO jets and bomb detonations over the past 72 days have turned almost every night (and day) into a nightmare, causing serious distresses, particularly among children;«
Of this, there can be no doubt. Yet, of the people I know here, no one talks about the War, let alone, discusses its effects on civilians.
»5. by destroying the electricity network and water supply systems, the NATO bombings have caused acute suffering of the entire population, particularly of its most vulnerable part (patients, babies, pregnant women...). Etc.«
This, it is to be hoped, will be investigated and properly dealt with by legitimate international bodies which must be encouraged to fulfil their obligations in this regard. The War Crimes Tribunal’s legitimacy and impartiality is in serious doubt. Mounting campaigns to encourage the investigation and prosecution of ALL War Criminals would be a significant contribution. Otherwise, this will be ignored and remain unknown by the world’s peoples.
»What do the Western electronic media usually do when they inform about the Yugoslav tragedy? Our general impression – based though on a systematic watching of their reports – is: their main concern are the Albanian refugees (these reports always include stirring pictures from the Albanian and Macedonian refugee camps and interviews with the afflicted Albanian men, women and children).«
The media continues unrelentingly, this extraordinarily lopsided presentation.
»That would be quite correct, we admit, if the NATO actions caused no serious sufferings of the rest of civilian population in Yugoslavia. But, it is not so. Why, then, we wonder, BBC, CNN, Sky News, etc., have obstinately practised an obvious (quantitative and qualitative) disproportion in informing about sufferings of the Albanian refugees and of the rest of the Yugoslav population.«
The media appears to serve corporate interests and, to be primarily concerned with net profit. Its function of providing the citizenry with information, knowledge and insight to help them arrive at rational decisions in a democracy appears to have been disregarded. There are a number of organisations (at least some of which publish on the web) that are devoted to correcting this inequity. However, I fear they have a small readership, are inadequately funded and therefore, have limited influence.
In my opinion, we are faced with a very serious problem of information reliability and access. The implications, I believe, have far reaching potential consequences.
»A simple but principle question that follows is: why misfortune of about one million men, women and children (no matter who they are) is very much important and, on the other hand, sufferings of nearly ten million civilians deserve quite a modest attention? As a matter of fact, there were some reports that were underlined by an objective approach (e.g., Tim Marshal’s report – Sky News – on sufferings of the citizens of Novi Sad, on 26 May, at 10 PM); these were the exceptions though. All right, let’s say: c’est la guerre! That is to say, there are »us« and ‘them’; ‘we’ are good guys, and ‘they’ are bad guys (the enemy); so, ‘our’ (i.e. Western) media should then show that ‘we’ are right, noble, moral..., and that ‘they’ are wrong, primitive, immoral and so on. On principle, this logic (of war propaganda) would be appropriate, and understandable and acceptable – but in an eventual WW III, for instance. In this very case, however, such reasoning faces some serious, both formal and substantial obstacles:
a) the NATO aggression is an obvious and drastic violation of international law, UN Charter, the NATO founding act, etc. – (nota bene!) at the end of the twentieth century!;«
This is not discussed in the US press, as far as I know.
»b) the war against Yugoslavia has never been proclaimed!;«
You may perhaps know of Representative Tom Campbell’s attempts to bring this and related matters before the Congress. The ambiguous outcome speaks volumes about the US Congress and the functional health of US Democracy. A federal court has recently refused to consider the suit against government officials on the basis that Congress, though it has not formally authorised a war, has voted funds to support it. (As far as I can understand this, it is seen to be »consent by implication«.) It is one of the ambiguities of the system; Congress approves informally what it does not approve formally – by its actions and omissions.
»c) the so-called collateral damages have become so frequent that one could reasonably ask what is supposed to be appropriate or, so to say, legitimate damage (?); besides, they have brought about numerous civilian victims on both sides, so that the question: whom they (the NATO authorities and their political masters) are protecting anyway, is simply unavoidable;
d) the life of almost ten million civilians in Yugoslavia has been reduced to desperate attempts, often unsuccessful though, to escape from »la danse macabre« of the NATO missiles, so another crucial question is: how can an action, of which the aim is preventing a humanitarian catastrophe, be acceptable when it causes sufferings of almost ten times larger (civilian) population? Etc.
As far as we know, such questions have never been posed by journalists of the Western electronic media. This implies that they are indifferent to the very basis (both formal and substantial) of their views and reports, or – and that would certainly be far worse – that they are consciously avoiding it.«
There may be additional possible interpretations for this seeming indifference. Dependent, as they are, on NATO spokespersons, Western journalists may not have any information to the contrary. But my readings, indicate that journalists have accepted uncritically the information NATO provides, failing to challenge even obviously doubtful statements. In recent years the print media has reduced their staffs of investigative reporters. The print media now relies heavily on news services such as NYT, WP, AP et al. Profit margins are controlling considerations.
During impeachment proceedings I learned that some reporters were complaining that they could get NO AIR TIME for news that was not related to impeachment. It seems to me that the OIC investigations and Impeachment had the effect of rendering the public disinterested, dis-trustful of the media and, uninformed about international affairs in general and, in particular, the brewing storm that finally erupted in the NATO War Against Yugoslavia.
This implies that they are indifferent. The US media is essentially in the control of ten corporations, many of whom have interlocking directorships. One may ask: in whose service are these corporations? What are their fundamental objectives? Obviously, they are interested in their own profits. But are they also serving the interests of major US and multi-national capitalist interests? The financial resources of the latter lead me to doubt that they are not exercising their immense powers to further their own profit oriented goals by influencing, if not directly controlling, the media.
It should be further noted, that these ten corporations have, for some time, been in the process of acquiring controlling financial interests in foreign media. One may wish to know if this is motivated by business interests alone or if it is propelled by desire to influence, shape and ultimately control public opinion, thought, attitudes and, ultimately, actions.
In any case, however, it is plain: dubious and/or wrong fundaments can hardly provide right information.
»Our intention (of the members of the Yugoslav Sociological Association) over the past two months has been to call your attention to another side of the Yugoslav tragedy; the one that has been insufficiently exposed by the Western electronic media. The materials (appeals, information, analyses, statements...) that we have made and disseminated all over the world, have no other function than to enable you, our colleagues, to gain an objective insight into the real nature of the NATO aggression.
Although these massages might seem a mere propaganda,«
Having read very widely on the subject of NATO’s Intervention I have no problem with your claim to providing the best information available nor with your motives for so doing.
»our views have never contained deliberate exaggerations. It is also worth mentioning, we think that we have never been influenced by any agency of the actual regime; by our very personal experiences – and sufferings – we confess, our words have been influenced very much, though (yet, always under the motto: ‘sine ira et studio’). If, however, in your opinion, the latter lessens our objectivity – there is nothing we can do about it. For we have no immunity; missiles (no matter how ‘clever’ they are) hit sociologists (and their families) too! Just to remind you: between 350 and over 750 jets fly above our heads every day and night; about 500 missiles fall«
We hear about these numbers. We don’t hear about the hospitals, schools, pollution, radiation, etc.
»on our cities, villages, houses, hospitals, schools, roads, bridges, factories, fields, rivers, lakes... and, of course, on men, women and children every day and night. These are quite significant ‘soci(ologic)al facts’, aren’t they? We’ve been facing them continually (72 days!) and – thoroughly. Can you assimilate them, really? Well, with a certain hermeneutical effort – that, among other things, implies acceptance of reports broadcast by your (or »your«) media with even a modest »methodical suspicion« – we believe, you can; you will realise then, from our point of view they are horribly (to us even deadly) coercive.
New rules of sociological method? No! An impertinent short lecture? No! Just an appeal to join us in our efforts to provide a complete view of what is going on in our country. For the sake of both the Albanian refugees and innocent civilians in Yugoslavia.«
As much as I grieve for the losses of Yugoslavia, I perceive the problem to be one with vast implications extending far beyond the scene of current hostilities.
TODAY IT IS YUGOSLAVIA TOMORROW IT CAN BE ANYWHERE (if we allow it).
In closing, I look forward to the possibility of communicating further with you and your colleagues.
Sincerely yours,
Roland Dion, San Diego, CA
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68. To soc.all.fac@umich.edu [all Sociology faculties June 13, 1999
of University of Michigan, USA], Leslie Kish, YSA etc.
I am also in possession of a 56k Word YSA document which I can forward to any interested parties via an attachment. Note that the YSA call for the prosecution of war criminals on all sides is a courageous stance given the current indictment of Milošević and several others. The longer document also contains the original French and an English translation of a statement by Bourdieu and others denying the legitimacy of false dilemmas such as either supporting NATO bombing or supporting the Serbian government. Thus, while Habermas supported the bombing, Bourdieu did not. Note that I have provided the e-mail addresses that I have for the YSA in case any other sociologists wish to be in touch.
Michael A. Dover
Ph.D. Candidate, Social Work and Sociology, University of Michigan
1080 S. University Ave. Ann Arbor MI 48109-1106
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69. To YSA June 14, 1999
Thank you for your analysis of the emerging situation in Yugoslavia, and Kosovo in particular, now that peace in within our reach.
I agree with and support all of those principles held by the Yugoslav Sociological Association, and I think that these provide a good model to be worked on.
I shall be keeping in contact with you, whilst at the same time I need to be reading and learning so that I can think and have opinions in a qualified way, whether it is Kosovo or any other part of Yugoslavia.
My best wishes to you all.
Yours sincerely,
Tom Sagar-Fenton
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70. To YSA June 13, 1999
Dear friends,
We are happy that the NATO aggression against Yugoslavia has ended. But many of us are unhappy with the conditions that have been imposed. First, we suspect that the real criminals in this war, Clinton, Albright, Blair, Clark, and so on, will not be indicted. Second, Clinton has tied aid to the ousting of President Milošević. If Milošević retains power for the indefinite future, Yugoslavia’s recovery will take years. This is terribly unfair, and many of us will continue to work against this condition. I have already written to my Congressional Representative, and a letter to my newspaper.
President Clinton was on television boasting about NATO’s victory. The very word, victory, is shameful. In our civil war, a little more than a century and a half ago, General Lee, the rebel, surrendered to General Grant, the leader of the United States’ armies. Grant ordered his men to feed the hungry rebels, and respect them. Celebration was not allowed. He permitted Lee to keep his sword which had been offered as the traditional token of surrender. And he permitted those who had horses to retain them in order to help them with the spring plowing and planting. The word »victory« would have been inappropriate and humiliating. Our president lacks the maturity to understand such values.
Old news: On June 5th about 10,000 of us met at the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, DC, and marched to the Pentagon to demonstrate against the bombing. Many ethnic Yugoslavians were in this crowd.
Except for CNN’s brief live coverage, our news media was conspicuously absent. Censorship by default. Very disturbing.
I carried a sign that read: »CLUSTER BOMBS AND ‘DEPLETED’ URANIUM ARE CRIMINAL. INDICT THE CRIMINALS.« It attracted considerable attention. Two people even asked me for more information, as though I were some kind of expert, which I am not. I have no credentials other than being a humanist with strong suspicions about our industrial-military complex.
I hope that the people of Yugoslavia do not hate all Americans. I think that the majority of Americans see through the hypocrisy and deceit that we have been fed, and feel a sense of deep regret about what has been done.
We wish you well, and we will continue to work for your recovery.
Jack Lander, concerned citizen of the world
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71. To YSA June 14, 1999
Thank you to have partly replied to my e-mail.
»How many children, women and men the Serbian army and police have deliberately and voluntary organised to murder, to rape and to destroy? What the Serbian people did against Milošević?«
The depth of my question was really to understand what Serbian people knows about these collective murders? What did they know about the massacres of Bosnia?
A response to this question is also a reply to the one you ask me below: No doubt that Western politicians have their own responsibilities in what has happened last months in Yugoslavia despite the real effort to find a diplomatic solution (at least by the French congress). The question is that Western countries have no right to put away a dictator from his own country. This kind of decision is the responsibility of the Serbian people. Obviously, this question is not solved since Milošević is still president of your country. One thing has changed however since he (and his collaborators) are under the arrest. It is now up to you, Serbian people, to decide something about your destiny.
»Any taxi driver in Belgrade will tell you with sardonic humor: »We only have two problems: 12 years with Milošević and now NATO’s bombs, otherwise everything is fine here!« Yugoslavia’s opposition, independent intellectuals and peace movements will tell you exactly the same: ‘You, the West, is making everything so much more difficult for us now«
I am not sure. This is now the best opportunity to send Milošević to jail and NATO bombs are finished.
»Throughout the nineties the Yugoslav sociologists have been very active in organized civil (and student) protests, e.g., in 1991, 1992, 1996/1997, and 1998. Some of us were beaten and even arrested. Most sociologists are acutely aware of the necessity for the respect of human rights, in our country and elsewhere. Some of them proved their commitment by getting directly involved in projects of human rights monitoring.«
I have deep respect for these actions, and I have no doubt that they were numerous and needed a lot of courage. We have enough history in France to understand your combat. All the people here will support any action sending Milošević to jail (and Chirac is very clear on this issue) and helping your country to find the right way and to be reconstructed.
With best wishes to you,
Emmanuel Bigand
LEAD CNRS
Faculte des Sciences, Bld Gabriel, 21000 Dijon, France
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72. To YSA June 13, 1999
Dear Friends,
I have grave concerns about the current approach the United States and its Western NATO allies are now taking in guiding their current human rights policy in New York at the UN to guide the world into the 21st century. Currently, the United States are more aggressive than ever in »Universalizing« human rights. New aggressive attempts made by culturally »ignorant« politicians such as Bill Clinton and Congressional lawyers who, although they know absolutely nothing about Kosovo Polje history or ethnic migrations between Serbs and Albanians as far back as Serbian State formation itself, now believe that they know whereby Serbia’s Kosovo province can be healed (or so they say so, and wrongly of course!!)
Using their genocidal NATO bombs to impose by murderous force, the USA Western Ethnocentric World Model of living upon the unwilling persons of Non-western Traditional states is now an increasing cause for serious world alarm! This is a primary reason for which the 1999 Kosovo crisis manifested. There are other contributory factors also which instigated the 1999 Kosovo Crisis also such as: (US Media Lies, imposing free trade and capitalism in Nonwestern States in order to gain election votes which are more important to Western Politicians than obedience to int’l laws, etc., etc., etc.)... and of course NYC Universities such as the New School for Social Research which are more concerned about obtaining Federal Funding and less concerned about giving Fall 1997 lecture series that promote Albanian KLA Nationalism (which I have proven and give you my word is true!). I believe in the future that we will be witnessing an increasing number of direct confrontations between Eastern and Western states. Such contentions intersect at direct bipolar points of political and cultural contention due to the following reasons:
1) The West is attempting to universalize human rights and then to spread them by force over the entire world like human rights can be applied to the world, like jelly can be just spread with a knife upon two pieces of bread when one makes a peanut butter & jelly sandwich (it is not this simple of course we realize). In the Balkans, NATO has clearly neglected Serbian desires and has simply demanded that Serbia accepts the American modernization model! Of course the US Model of Capitalism and Democracy necessities to become more flexible in my opinion. One model (such as the USA model of democratic governance will not easily accommodate and fit into the diverse social spaces and geo-political locales of every nonwestern state such as we have witnessed in Kosovo now.
2) The West should not be imposing by NATO bombs their way of life upon the rest of the nonwestern world! This is an oxymoron and immoral human rights policy! It is illegal. It is not Serbia’s fault that the USA has almost none of its own natural resources left and now is desperate to dominate gold and silver mines in Kosovo and the natural resources of Russia! US State Dept. clearly should not be promoting insurgency movements such as the KLA to do their dirty work for them! New progressive models for both peace and democracy, such as the personificist approach put forth by both Martin and Unger, can be used to put construct models for both peace and democratic governance that will accommodate the rulers of many Non-Western States if they desire that form of government at all.
There must be a healthy dialectic relationship between those who govern and those whom are ruled or surely we will see incidences such as the Russian and French Revolutions again. History sadly repeats itself since humankind never seems to learn. US should spend more time on enhancing diplomacy between itself and the rest of the world instead of alienating the rest of the world to itself – the United States.
I suggest for starters: a) That Western diplomats should not lack an understanding the traditional Balkan culture (Turk, Greek, Serbian, Russian, Slavic in general history on Kosovo other than from Tito to the present), and, I also claim that both (UN & USA) diplomats neglect to become either educated or familiar with for instance, Serbian cultural tradition, religion, law, diplomacy, and also Serbia’s national heritage (which can assist modern Western diplomats in understanding Serbian past which links us to present nationalism regarding Kosovo in 1999. By the Western diplomats and politicians spending more time studying law, and less time (if any) studying either Balkan religion or culture, Western ambassadors now fall completely short of understanding whereby to resolve, the 1999 Kosovo crisis. I further claim that this lack of understanding on the part of the West, has directly caused a few new political developments, such as: b) David Apter’s »Radicalization Theory« in which many Serbs are alienated both from the West, and its modern democratic/nihilistic and capitalistic fervour. c) Such neglect on the part of the West neither to understand both Orthodox Christian Church law such as (Dušan’s Law), and also Serbian oral and written poetic traditions, has resulted in much of Russian and Serbian Diaspora who now reside in the West, feeling very much as if they are in an extreme state of »anomie«. This is a reason that Prof. Pollis often states in her writings is a primary cause for which Greek identity has been fragmented and loyalties confused abroad such as in NYC.
What I speak of now causes much of this fragmenting of Greek identity when the West shoves Greek, Russian, and also Serbian heritage, religion, and its traditional culture aside to try to modernize the Balkans. This then also causes riots and other new political developments which are manifested in the form of civil disobedience (we can see this today in Greeks protesting against NATO). This also causes ethnic tensions to increase say between Turkey and Greece in a scenario such as is occurring now with Turkey supporting NATO while 99.5% of all Greeks are against even allowing NATO to launch air strikes from Greek soil.
Please write often, I love to exchange ideas. My cousin works in the UN in NYC (we do not exactly see eye to eye). I have plane fair and I would like to visit [you] for a while perhaps. Again, I stand ready to assist you in any manner that I can. I have some antibiotics perhaps I can send from my doctor (SUPREX) which is very strong. I know that those are much needed in Serbia now. Keep in Touch as I must leave for Church (+)
Jilly
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73. To YSA June 15, 1999
Dear Sir,
I am really happy to have seen peace in Yugoslavia though it came so late. For the past three months I lived in Canada and took great interest in the development of your country. Up to now I haven’t believed what the Western media said about Yugoslavia. I have been asked about the Tibet issue by Canadian people. They are all nice and reasonable, but they all have their own prejudices. They are badly influenced by the Western media. I don’t believe the KLA because of too much support from NATO. But I am not sure what is the exact reality in Kosovo. Would you please give me any information or objective explanation.
My best [regards],
Yu Hai
Professor at Sociology Department at Fudan University, Shanghai, P. R. of China
Visiting professor at Carleton University at Ottawa.
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74. To YSA June 16, 1999
Thanks for your e-mail of 13 June. We are all greatly relieved that the war has come to an end – hopefully. I don’t see why you don’t mention NATO or the EU in your letter. I very much agree with the other points you make. But who is going to pay »compensation« to all those who suffered in Kosovo? Many hundreds of thousands of people were simply evicted by force from their homes.
Yours sincerely,
Anthony Giddens
75. To Tom Sagar-Fenton June 21, 1999
Dear Mr. Sagar-Fenton,
Thank you very much for your letter. We have three information for you. Firstly, you can contact Mr. Žarko Paunović, who is the director of the Center for Development of Non-Profit Sector (crnps@eunet.yu). His organisation acts as a co-ordinator for the entire NGO network in Serbia and will be glad to supply you with all the necessary information regarding the existing NGOs, their profile and activities, and help you establish contact if you decide to work with some of them.
Secondly, the texts describing the conditions in Yugoslavia during and after NATO bombing are still lacking. However, some projects are developing. For example, you could contact Mrs. Slavica Musić (misvss@bits.net), who is secretary of the project »Ecological Consequences of the War in FRY« under the auspices of the Eco Center in Belgrade. The members of the Research team are Prof. Dr. Vukašin Pavlović (co-ordinator), Prof. Dr. Zorka Vukmirović, Prof. Dr. Vojislav Vasić, Prof. Dr. Fedor Zdanski, Prof. Dr. Ivan Stanković, Prof. Dr. Ranka Popović, Dr. Rada Matić, Prof. Gordana Đurić, Dr. Jasmina Krpo Ćetković, Sonja Prodanović, Dr. Vaskrsije Janjić, Dr. Ilija Perić, Suzana Stamatović and Petar Despotović.
Thirdly, we can inform you that the European Movement in Serbia posted on their Web Site (www.emins.org) – the following materials (Today, we have had a problem to open this Web Site, but we send you their material »On Civilian Casualties And Destruction in The Territory Of the Federal Republic Of Yugoslavia from 24 March to 08 June 1999« we got earlier via E mail).
With best wishes to you,
On behalf of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
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76. To all the correspondents June 20, 1999
Dear Colleagues,
In past two months the Yugoslav Sociological Association has developed various activities directed towards a single objective – to contribute to stopping the NATO bombing of FR Yugoslavia. Now the time has come to put some other questions on the agenda: the democratization of our country, implementation of economic reforms, and other measures. In the near future Yugoslav sociologists will be particularly interested in questions of building and consolidation of civil society throughout FRY and particularly in Kosovo.
Our correspondence regarding YSA statements is finishing. There will be no further statements of YSA concerning NATO aggression on FR Yugoslavia. We hope we shall never again have such an unfortunate occasion for communicating with our colleagues sociologists and other intellectuals all over the world. We would like to continue communication in the future on some other, more attractive topic.
Statements and replies you have been receiving from YSA have been signed by several sociologists from Belgrade and Novi Sad, mostly members of the Presidency of the Association. The YSA membership, to which your letters were addressed, has not been acquainted with the correspondence. Wishing to inform them as soon as possible about the opinions of foreign sociologists and other intellectuals, we have decided to devote the next issue of our periodical to this communication. The complete correspondence will be published, including your contribution. If you feel like adding a final comment of yours, along with your personal judgment on the consequences of the entire NATO intervention, we would be very glad to publish it within the same issue. Original scientific papers are also welcome.
Hoping to meet you in person some day on a conference or meeting, somewhere in the world (maybe in Yugoslavia), we wish you success in your professional and private life and send you our warmest regards.
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
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77. To YSA June 20, 1999
Dear Friends,
You are indeed correct. The article you sent me below is very intelligently written. The Western NATO member states and their UN affiliates since WWI have been contriving new illegally coercive manners in which to expand their own Liberal Democratic Capitalistic World Order and impose it by NATO force or economic sanction, upon the other 3/4’s of the non-western governed world. The West has long been on a unilateral greed ridden expansive Democratic Religious Crusade. This crusade is one in which US Presidents from Woodrow Wilson (Paris Peace Conference 1918) to Bill Clinton (Rambouillet 1999) conceptualise America’s foreign policy initiatives relative to those of the rest of the non-western governed world as one in which America is believed to possess some prophetic manifest destiny in which America and NATO views itself as possessing sole proprietary rights to decide who lives and who dies each day in the non-western world. Increasingly, NATO does what Thucidydes once warned of during the Melian debates during the Peloponesian Wars where: »The strong [NATO] do as they will, and the weak do as they must.« NATO’s new 21st century initiative must be capitulated now! Furthermore, the UN should not become some impotent chatterbox which stands idly by and watches NATO violate every international law in book such as, but not limited to the: UN Charter, Geneva Convention, and Vienna Conference.
I avidly agree with TFF’s, Dr. Jan Oberg. Old obsolete peace theories such as the Democratic and Economic Peace Theory must be tossed aside. Now is the time for us to construct and develop new progressive peace theories which notably will fit into the geo-political locales and diversified social spaces of our evolving world, but which are also congruent with our world’s current historical time period. It is not traditional religious societal culture which should be strangled to make way for the Western NATO modernises and their economic development greed ridden donor agenda in Kosovo, it is the opposite! Had US Sec. of State Albright heeded the words of Father (+) Sava and the Dečani delegation when they met with her in Washington DC this past February, perhaps those residing in both Kosovo/Serbia would not be suffering to the extent they are now. Wherefore you ask? My own case makes this quite clear. Our world’s Western renown conventional scholars who study Russia, Serbia, and international relations and who have graduated and emanated from Columbia University in NYC (Political Science Dept.) such as: Albright, Rubin, and Mark Von Hagen (In the Fall of 1997 I met Von Hagen at another New School Lecture directly prior to the NS lecture in which they promoted Pro-Albanian Nationalism)...and surprise, I Jill Starr even had problems then when I complained about that Pro-Albanian lecture! I was told that I had no right to inquire about the following quotes written by pro-genocide USA supported Franjo Tuđman! I was studying on »thin ice« at the New School even then when I asked some professors why the US government would demonise my Serbian friends and give money and guns to genocide promoters such as Croatian president F. Tuđman.
During World War II, the newly formed Croatia, with Hitler’s help, opened several concentration camps, in which more than 700,000 Serbs were put to death. During the July and August of 1941, 1,564 men, women and children were slain by the Croats in the church of Glina. Croatia’s present leader, Franjo Tuđman, writes in his book Wastelands of Historical Reality that »Genocide is a natural phenomena [...] Genocide is not only permitted, it is recommended, even commanded by the word of the Almighty, whenever it is useful for the survival or restoration of the kingdom of the chosen nation, or for the preservation and spreading of its one and only correct faith.« (Source: The Orthodox Word, in Nos. 193-94 on Martyred Serbia).
The problem as I assess it is that we need more scholars such as myself who know less about American Law and 101 lies like Hilary Clinton, and who know more about specialised areas such as Russian and Serbian religion and culture. After all we do not go to a foot doctor to heal a sore throat? Similarly, it is absolutely absurd for NATO to listen to some secular cold hearted bitch named M. Albright. A woman who flies from state to state in our world on US tax dollars dictating who will live and who will die by her illegal NATO bombs! She has no right to dictate any foreign and domestic policy to Russia and Serbia! Albright knows nothing about the civil society of Kosovo/Serbia. She knows absolutely null-zero about Serbia’s political development, Serbia’s Religion, or culture in Kosovo!
Therefore, you are 100% correct, it is absurd to think that NATO and its some brainless woman named M. Albright can bring peace to Kosovo civil society! A culture she does not understand. On a side note, I found it even more sadly ironic that Albanian’s in Kukes would not even eat the NATO/USAID food! They would get sick from US food because it was not »vegetarian«! This shows how little Albright and her Criminal NATO Wilsonian warmongering counterparts really know about Kosovo civil society. In fact one US Aid worker had made the vulgar comment to the effect that, »if the food is good enough for the US Army, it is good enough for them«! This shows you how very little Clinton and his illegal war criminal NATO allies know about the very people they »claim« to be saving (which is a laugh in and of itself!!
PS: Keep on touch. I always love to share ideas. I would promote the work of Jan Oberg. He is on the money with his intermediary mediation council. I have often promoted such ideas.
Respectfully,
Jill L Starr (NJ – USA) hoping to come to Serbia to meet you one day soon (+)
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78. To YSA June 20, 1999
Dear Friends,
Perhaps you can sell to US Scholars and Universities your own, YSA Social Science Journal. I think now there is quite an extensive market for such a journal here in the US. I have persons asking me all kinds of questions lately about Kosovo and Serbia. I agree that it is time to move on to more positive issues. I hope also that there is never ever another sad occasion in which we will meet on-line again as just past.
The question now I agree, is whereby we can construct a community bond which will lessen the cycle of ethnic hate between many Albanians and Serbians in Kosovo. I believe Serbian Government necessitates to keep a close watch on NATO and its various NGO’ affiliates as sometime these as you well know cannot be trusted. During the Bosnian War my friends went to Serbia to visit their family and US NGO’s smuggled weaponry to Serbia’s enemies on trucks which were supposed to carry milk and butter! This is often the case as was in both Africa and South America. Many USA-NGO human rights organisations are only US state border infiltrators to promote Albright’s NATO agenda. She does not give up easy and I am sure the US Dept. of State will continue attempting to sponsor covertly the KLA with both weaponry and moneys in order to help the KLA take over Kosovo. I can read the daily State Dept. Briefings here and I believe that Rubin’s agenda has not changed (I hope it has though, or will!)
Another problem is immediately disarming the KLA as soon as possible! Cohen’s new NATO-KLA agreement does NOT call for »DISARMING« the KLA at all! This is a problem and it moreover places the Serbian persons lives in immediate and eminent danger in Kosovo! Obtaining: food, medicines and immediate money for sheltering those who have lost their homes or have had to flee Kosovo for fear of their lives is a priority.
We need to find millions of dollars fast so that the people in Serbia can rebuild power facilities before the cold winter, or more human suffering will follow! Rebuilding will help also because it will bring jobs to those so desperately in need. We must contrive a manner in which to pressure the West/NATO and their IMF/World Bank counterparts to hand over those milllions $ that they owe Serbia in Reparations for the damages that they have imposed upon those in Serbia! I think that Ramsey Clark’s moving forward internationally with prosecuting NATO for war Crimes in NYC on July 3 1999 will assist in applying international pressures and much needed embarrassment on NATO and this embarrassment will, I hope, assist us in pressuring the Western European Powers in handing over to the Serbian Government that much needed money – regardless who is President!
It has been my experience that nothing brings persons together faster than a life/death emergency. For instance we had an emergency snow storm here a few years back and for weeks there was no water, no power, no gas, food, etc. (a state of emergency). And all of a sudden people who never cared prior if their neighbours lived or died, bonded together as a community in order to help each other. I think that equal seating in Kosovo’s new government for both ethnic groups is an important beginning. As long as persons generally have their basic human needs, food, car, medical care, work, and shelter, this usually lessens tensions and it will in Kosovo
I have many ideas which are congruent in many ways to those of TFF. Also Will Kymlicka has many ideas on self-autonomous rule which he has spoken of in his successful attempts to grant the Quebecois in Canada self-rule.
Perhaps we can look into some of his policy’s? I have a few articles I can forward to you if you want. Please keep in touch and I would enjoy greatly the opportunity to work with you in constructing a peaceful and prosperable environment for all those residing in Serbia/ Kosovo as we move forward towards hopefully a better future for us all (+)
Jill Starr
NJ – US
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79. To Prof. Stephen Schecter June 21, 1999
Dear Professor Schecter,
It was a great pleasure reading your last letter. As the sharpest critics of our statements you are doing a favour to us, presenting a point of view which differs from our actual focus. Polemic tension in our correspondence proved to be provocative, inspiring and very stimulating for us. Exchanging different opinions and experiences was and still is a value we highly appreciate.
You are right; »we could obviously talk for hours«. Yes, we admit, dialogue could be quite difficult, for various reasons. For example, when one side keeps telling the other side the same old story, the response does not matter. Yet, regardless of problems at the outset, we believe, dialogue can provide a path to understanding. There are some rules that even the most temperamental disputants usually attempt to respect – unless, of course, their intention is to turn a discussion into a mere quarrel. E.g., in an urbane discussion – according to the habits established long time ago – one should avoid the »argumentum ad hominem«. It might be legitimate, though far more often than not it implies inadmissible simplification.
Concerning our previous polemic, we would like to stress some of your arguments, which do not fit this model of urbane discussion. You say that our letters have »a veneer of leftist propaganda dressed up as sociological analysis«; furthermore, you say, we are »serving up your [i.e., our] classic Marxist or neo-Marxist line which mixes analysis with moral intimidation«.
Firstly, we would be very grateful if you told us what do you assume by the vague stigma of »leftist propaganda«. For there are leftists and some other »ists« among us, and we don’t differ on the topics of our statements. Secondly, what’s wrong with being leftist, and (particularly) Marxist? Are they (some of us), because of that, always a priori wrong? What about Joschka Fischer, Gerhard Schroeder, Tony Blair, and in some aspects, even Bill Clinton? Aren’t they leftists also? Does it mean that they are a priori wrong too? We were truly convinced that such a way of (intrinsically ideological) characterisation/proscription had been rejected and buried together with McCarthyism and, later on, Bolshevism – especially among social scientists.
Reasoning that somebody is a priori wrong just because he/she is a leftist (or Marxist, or functionalist, or structuralist, or positivist, or nominalist, or capitalist, or le petit bourgeois, or proletarian, or butcher, or hairdresser and so on and so forth) belongs to a market-place conversation. Talking about the »argumentum ad hominem«, Hegel jovially presented us an dispute between customer and greengrocer: »These eggs are not fresh at all!«; greengrocer to customer: »Oh, yeah?!? You dare judge my eggs. You’d better watch your daughter who walks with soldiers.« The end. Of logic! – due to the »argumentum ad hominem«, concluded Hegel.
In your letter, you said »If you only want to browbeat me or score political points, you needn’t bother responding«. Browbeating (you or anybody else) and scoring political points have nothing to do with us, the Yugoslav sociologists. For we’ve got no other interest but that of our professional ethos! Exactly due to that, namely, because we have no (either internal or external) ideological and/or political, or financial etc. masters and sponsors, we do have a privilege of using a tone that obviously annoyed you. Our one and only objective was to give a contribution to stop the bombing. For, we are strong supporters of the concept of civil society, which begins where war ends. And, as you already know, there are plenty of (both rightist and leftist) theoretical approaches to civil society.
[...]
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
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80. To YSA June 21, 1999
Little brother is watching
English author George Orwell wrote about »Big Brother« in his novel, 1984. Big Brother referred to governments spying on their citizens using sophisticated methods and equipment.
Orwell had the right concept, but he was 180 degrees off course. It is »Little Brother« who is spying; it is we individuals who, through the Internet, are informing ourselves of the truth of events in the recent NATO/US bombing of Yugoslavia, and of the lies of our government.
A large fraction of the people of the United States are appalled by what our government has done to the people of Yugoslavia. We are ashamed of our leaders. We will continue to work for the rebuilding of your country. Our hearts are with you.
Jack Lander
37 Seneca Road, Danbury, CT 06811, USA
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81. To YSA June 21, 1999
Thank you for your informative reports; I found them helpful as I did my writing and speaking against NATO bombardment. I also hope that this is the last time when your country experiences such horrors. Wishing you all the best,
Paul Mojzes, Academic dean and professor of Religious Studies at
Rosemont College, PA, USA
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82. To YSA June 21, 1999
Dear Colleagues,
I read most of your messages with interest. I would like to know your position about a potential Serbian collective responsibility.
Each hour, NATO discovers another atrocity deliberately perpetuated by the Serbian army and police. Milošević alone could not have murdered all these men, women and children. These massacres have been committed by human beings from Yugoslavia. Every one in Yugoslavia knows, more or less directly, someone in the Serbian army and police that deliberately decided to destroy civilian people in Kosovo. There is now a collective responsibility for the Serbian community to proclaim what has happened in Kosovo and to demand that Serbian people responsible for these deliberate murders be tried. Doing nothing is simply accepting to be a party to the crimes that have been done.
There is also a collective responsibility of the people of other countries to force our respective governments to demand justice in memory of all civilian victims killed by hate in Kosovo.
Emmanuel Bigand
LEAD CNRS,
Faculte des Sciences,
Bld Gabriel, 21000 Dijon, France
83. To YSA June 21, 1999
Dear Colleagues,
I’ve been following the events in former Yugoslavia since Seven declared its independence – I even wrote a piece during the war in Bosnia (herewith attached). I read your statements and although I agree that the first imperative is to rebuild civil society I find it hard to support you totally – not because I’ve been manipulated by the Western media but because I can hardly find some sympathy from your side for the Albanian citizens.
Best wishes,
Frederic Vandenberghe
Department of Human Sciences, Ux-bridge, Middx. UB 8 3 PH,
United Kingdom (Member of RCHS)
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84. To YSA June 21, 1999
Hi,
Thanks for your previous e-mails. I attach a copy of an e-mail I sent to a man in the UK. He is another one who talks about bombing and killing people for the »right« reason, moral causes and human rights. He sounds like »pop« Blair. I wonder if you could sent me some information about the background of Milošević over the past 20 years and any info on Tito.
I am writing an extensive paper on Yugoslavia and want to write the right facts. Hope to hear from you soon
Kind regards
Gregory Dower
49 Hawkhurst Street, Spotswood, Vic 3015, Australia
**************************************************************************
I am sorry that you are bored with my anti NATO stance and I am sorry that I have not replied to your question about.... Do you agree that they should have taken Milošević out at the start?
Well are you suggesting that he should have been assassinated? I can not agree with that after all, as much as you may not like it, he is the elected head of a Government. Just for the record I do not support Milošević.
Am I anti NATO? The answer is no, however I am anti Blair, Clinton and Albright and Cook.
If you believe you should fight a war over human rights you must be talking about selective human rights. You support the theory that the »bad guys« citizens have no human rights and you can exterminate them at will.
Just a few other points on human rights. What about the human rights of the Irish? NATO should bomb the UK for what the British have done to the Irish, and there are the people in Africa that engage in ghastly abuses of human rights, not to mention the Russians and the Israel’s.
But worst of all that you do not mention are the human rights of the 500,000 Serbs that were ethnically cleansed from Croatia in the Bosnian war. I presume that does not matter because they are Serbs.
Another thing what about the human rights of the 400,000 of the Serbian and Montenegrin population from Kosovo who forced to leave their land, houses and other property because the Albanian separatists used various violent methods of blackmail, arson, harassment, or the 50 Police Officers killed in Kosovo over the past 12 months.
Now we have some 50,000 Serb refugees from Kosovo, I also presume that this does not matter because they are Serbs.
Just to conclude you must remember that there [were] no refugees until NATO started bombing. I also absolutely condemn atrocities, but my compassion for refugees and condemnation of atrocities is not selective.
As far as the UN question is concerned going by your views we should let NATO run things instead of the UN.
Currently I am writing a paper about what has happened in Yugoslavia over the past 60 years. It will detail the extermination of over 1,000,000 Serbs. I will send you a copy when I am finished. Hope to hear from you soon.
Kind regards
Gregory Dower
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85. To YSA June 22, 1999
On March 25th President Clinton told the about-to-be victims of mass slaughter: »I cannot emphasise too strongly that the United States and our European allies have no quarrel with the Serbian people«. At about the same time UK Prime Minister Tony Blair told the world »we have a moral obligation to bomb Serbia and that NATO must win the war against Serbia at any price«.
His statements that NATO is at war with Serbia for humanitarian reasons must be the most hypocritical statements that I have ever heard from a world leader.
But what did Mr Clinton and Tony Blair and their NATO friends do to the people with whom they had »no quarrel«. It designed its bombing campaign to hit civilian targets and to destroy the factories and infrastructure in Kosovo and Serbia. In the process they created the greatest human catastrophe in Europe since the end of World War II.
Mr Clinton and Tony Blair have now told the people of Serbia that they will not rebuild their destroyed country because Milošević is still in power. And in Kosovo NATO troops stand by and watch as people burn and loot Serbian homes.
Tony Blair has told the world that he is a man who has a strong belief in moral and humanitarian issues. Mr Blair forgot to add that this does not extend to Serbian people.
Gregory Dower
49 Hawkhurst Street
Spotswood, Vic 3015, Australia
* * *
86. To YSA June 22, 1999
Dear Yugoslavian Colleagues:
Greetings! I am very glad that the NATO bombing of your country had stopped. I wish that there would be no more bombings in the future. I think that sociologists should work things out on how to prevent such unfortunate barbarism in the coming millennium. As sociologists, I think, it is our contribution to study sociologically the social effects of such heinous atrocities and their causes. We should, I think, harness our sociological imagination in preventing such acts. Politically, we should condemn the hegemonic powers that push states, nations, and peoples to fight against each other and to unmask the ideological perversions and myopia that shroud the issues.
I hope I can contribute to that through my involvement in the academy.
Again, thank you for your letters and enlightening statements. I hope we can communicate on some other things. If you will do sociological studies on the human and social costs of the conflict, please tell me about the results of your studies.
Gerry Lanuza
Department of Sociology, University of the Philippines
Diliman, Quezon City
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87. To YSA June 23, 1999
I am happy to give you permission to publish my comments in your newsletter. I feel that I have been repetitious regarding the ownership of major print media in the US For that reason, I hope you will feel free to edit my comments as you may deem appropriate.
There are also one or two minor corrections I might make if you can accommodate changes.
Most importantly, my statement regarding the outcome of the case »Campbell et al. v. William Jefferson Clinton« must be verified. I will endeavour to do so.
Please advise as to what procedure you wish me to follow so that these changes may be sent to you in a timely fashion.
With appreciation for your response and looking forward to further communication with you, I remain,
Very truly yours,
Roland J. Dion, San Diego CA
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88. To YSA June 24, 1999
With the current revenge that some Ethnic Albanian’s are taking out on Serbs we are seeing human nature in its worst form. Some will say that the Serbs deserve it, however the revenge we are seeing by separatist rebels is an effort to clear Serbian real estate to make way for ethnic Albanian’s. This is part of their goal to create an ethnically pure »Republic of Kosovo«. The Commander of international peacekeeping forces in Kosovo (KFOR), British General Michael Jackson, has asked ethnic Albanians not to execute their revenge on Serbs. General Jackson said that threats and revenge of ethnic Albanians present a »shameful behaviour«. The town of Kosovska Mitrovica is an example of the plight of Serbs in their own country. This is a city under effective partition. Hundred of Serbs are trapped and need protection. The Serbs are civilians and not Army or Police, accordingly I see such by action by some Ethnic Albanian’s as a cowardly and reprehensible and far worst then what the Serbs did. Unfortunately some Ethnic Albanian’s would not understand the meaning of the following words »Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good«. They now believe Kosovo is theirs and they have a licence to expel or kill all remaining Serbs. The extreme Serbs will soon be the equivalent of the IRA.
Gregory Dower
* * *
89. To YSA June 24, 1999
Dear Everyone,
Thanks for your e-mail of June 20. I very much agree with the questions you are planning to put on the agenda. Democratisation is really crucial, for reasons that don’t have to be spelled out.
Good luck with your future work.
Sincerely,
Tony Giddens
90. To YSA June 25, 1999
The suggestion by Prime Minister John Howard that a number of Kosovo refugees currently in Australia may want to stay is not surprising and should be supported. Australia’ commitment to providing placement for refugees for humanitarian reasons has always been non-discriminatory. Australia cannot afford to be caught up in the type of ethnic discrimination that has been the source of so many conflicts. Many Australians, because of the political situation in Yugoslavia, may be under aware of the extremely serious situation in Serbia. The Red Cross, according to the organisations Australian Secretary General Jim Carlton, believes the situation in Serbia is extremely serious with many cities without water, electricity and food shortage. The humanitarian situation in Serbia is far worst then that of Kosovo but it gets less attention.
Serbia already had approximately 500,000 refugees that were ethnically cleansed from the Krajina and other parts of the former Yugoslavia prior to the Kosovo war. Now with the current ethnic cleansing from Kosovo this number is increasing daily.
I believe that the Australian Government must immediately provide the same assistance to Serbian refugees as it did to the ethnic Albanians. I believe this would give far greater leverage for the release of aid workers Pratt and Wallace then sending Mr Downer to Belgrade and it would further enhance this country’s reputation in providing humanitarian aid on a non-discriminatory basis.
Gregory Dower
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91. To Mr. Frederic Vandenberghe June 26, 1999
Dear Mr. Vandenberghe,
Thank you for your message and the attachment you sent us. We are glad to be in communication with you. We want to thank you for your quick response. We read with great interest your interesting article on »Legality, legitimacy and the politics of ethnic purification«.
»I find it hard to support you totally – not because I’ve been manipulated by the Western media but because I can hardly find some sympathy from your side for the Albanian citizens.«
We would like to ask you which side is »ours« and why do you think that we have such a minor sympathy toward Albanian citizens?
With appreciation for your response and looking forward to further communication with you,
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
92. To Mr. Emmanuel Bigand June 26, 1999
Dear Mr. Bigand,
We fully agree with you that it is important to raise the issue of responsibility of all people, both in Yugoslavia and in Western countries, who have endangered lives of civilians.
At the same time, we would like to ask you some questions:
1. Are Serbs the only ones who are guilty, excluding other citizens of Serbia (e.g. Gypsies, who in Serbia support Milošević to a great extent, perhaps more strongly than Serbs themselves);
2. Are those Serbs also guilty who have left Serbia (and now live, say, in the West),
3. Are those Serbs also guilty who lived outside Serbia but moved here after ethnic cleansing (e.g. from Kraina in 1995),
4. Who is Serbian – those who feel that way, who have »Serbian blood«, or something else;
5. Are half-Serbs just half-guilty (and half-innocent!);
6. Is the sufficient proof for collective guilt what the Western media say;
7. Can the one who judges on collective guilt of another people avoid the nationalist trap – i.e. isn’t it just rationalisation of one’s own hatred against another people and sublimation into ethical judgements;
We hope that all individual perpetuators will be brought to trial, where their individual guilt will be ascertained!
With appreciation for your response and looking forward to further communication with you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
93. To Mr. Gregory Dower June 26, 1999
Dear Mr. Dower,
Thank you very much for all your messages.
We are sending you two attachments. The first one is on »Slobodan Milošević’s Rule: An Attempt of Typological Definition«, written by Slobodan Antonić from the Institute for Political Studies, Belgrade.
There are 4 chapters in the article: The Basic Characteristics of Slobodan Milošević’s Rule, The Type of Milošević’s Rule, Louis Napoleon – Slobodan Milošević: a Comparison, Instead of a Conclusion: the Future of Milošević’s Rule. There is no complete background of Milošević over the past 20 years in that paper, but we are sure that it could be of some help. The second attachment is on Tito’s Historical Achievement written by Todor Kuljić from the Sociological Department (Faculty of Philosophy). Both articles are published in the journal Serbian Political Thought, English edition 1-2/1996, the first – pp. 35-48, the second pp. 101-112.
Please, also find enclosed the summary of the newly published book Economic Consequences of NATO Bombing: Estimates of Damage and Finances Required for Economic Reconstruction of Yugoslavia by a group of independent economic experts, called »Group 17«, who have been developing a comprehensive project of economic reform in Serbia.
We wish you success in your work on the paper on Yugoslavia.
Looking forward to further communication with you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
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94. To Mr. Tom Sagar-Fenton June 26, 1999
Dear Mr. Sagar-Fenton,
We would like to share with you some new information on the sources which present ecological consequences of the NATO intervention.
Firstly, we are forwarding you the compilation of a complete set of 64 references on the Ecological catastrophe & health hazards of the NATO Bombings: an annotated URL referenced list of internet articles, news, Press releases [Compiled by Dr. Janet M. Eaton, June 13, 1999 ]
Secondly, find enclosed the summary of the newly published book Economic Consequences of NATO Bombing: Estimates of Damage and Finances Required for Economic Reconstruction of Yugoslavia« by a group of independent economic experts, called »Group 17«, who have been developing a comprehensive project of economic reform in Serbia.
Thirdly, you can visit the Web Site of the United Nations Environment Program (www.unep.org) with the special link »Balkan Conflict« (Balkan task force with general information, situation reports, press release, other documents).
With best wishes to you and looking forward to further communication with you,
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
95. To YSA June 28, 1999
The way you have formulated all of your questions reflects a very strange way to face the collective responsibilities problem. Lets raise the problem differently and much more directly.
Do you or do you not feel (even indirectly) for all the murders deliberately committed by your compatriots in Kosovo ?
Emmanuel Bigand
LEAD CNRS,
Faculte des Sciences,
Bld Gabriel, 21000 Dijon, France
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96. To YSA June 28, 1999
Dear Colleagues,
Thank you for your swift response. If I was a bit critical in my former E-mail it is because I was not always sure what your position exactly is. Your country has really gone off the track since the last 10 years.
I was in touch with some members of the Belgrade women’s movement but I wonder why I didn’t hear anything from the Yugoslav Sociological Association during their war in Bosnia? Are there any members of the association who have played a role as a handmaid of Serbia’s irredentism?
Anyway, the first priority seems to be to rebuild the civil society of Serbia. I hope your association will play a constructive role in that.
Yours sincerely,
Frederic Vandenberghe
* * *
97. To YSA June 29, 1999
Dear Friends,
Thank you for your information on Tito and Milošević. Both papers are most interesting. The paper on Milošević was obviously written prior to the Kosovo war. Do you agree with the last paragraph [of the article »Slobodan Milošević’s Rule: An Attempt of Typological Definition« by Slobodan Antonić] which states: »His rule is well based and well conducted, so it would be a miracle if he gave up any part of it in the near future. Serbia is in strong and dependable hands, the kind of hands it always liked, and it is in these hands that it is sure to meet the end of this century, and probably the end of the first decade of the next century as well«.
I believe there must be a political change in Serbia. I do not have a personal dislike of Milošević but believe it would be in the best interest of the country if there was a change.
The Serbian people have been used for far too long and enough Serb blood has been spilt and if there is not a major political change in Serbia it will once again be the innocent civilians that will suffer. I believe that Mr. Milošević has reached his used by date regardless of the incitement hanging over his head.
The process to introduce major political change in Serbia will not be easy and resistance can be expected from Mr. Milošević and many of the hard liners.
In order to introduce major political change in Serbia there are two essential things that must be done. The alternative leader must gain the confidence and the support of the military. Failure to do either at time will ensure failure. Then he/she must gain the support and confidence of the people. I would not align myself with politicians like Vuk Drašković. I firmly believe that the Serbian people want change but not a western take over. I also believe that the military will accept change because I believe that they feel that Milošević has humiliated them.
The Serbian people need a leader that will show the way and is prepared to stand up to Milošević in public. I also believe that Milošević is in danger of a Romanian exit.
I would be interested in your views and the political options in Serbia.
Look forward to hearing from you soon.
Kind regards
Gregory Dower
* * *
98. To YSA June 28, 1999
Clearly the paper written by the Group 17 with respect to Serbia’s much needed monetary restructuring plan is brilliant. When examining the Annals of Western Foreign Policy and human rights decisions whether monetary aid was given to ‘developing states’ whose leader’s the West labelled as either anti-democratic or gross human rights violators, we find the following scenarios. In most cases up unto the late 1990’s and the present 1999 Kosovo Crisis it did not matter to the extent it does today to Western States and the Int’l Investment Bankers thereof whether a state leader was considered a human rights violator when decisions were made for that state to receive monetary humanitarian aid from the World Bank, ODA, or the IMF. Human rights were not yet directly linked to trade, politics, or development aid to the extent it is today. Subsequent to China’s Tiananmen Square incident, Canada decided it would continue its trade relations with China regardless as to what the USA did.
Moreover, the US continued trading with Stalin in Russia. This is most ironic when we examine the manner in which Bill Clinton’s oxymoron administration sells out America’s own security secrets to China legally (see Cox Report). And now the Clinton Administration tries selling the spin to the American public on CNN (Comedy News Network) that China’s Embassy in Belgrad was bombed because there were two Chinese spies in that Embassy (something like this I heard today on the US News reports which to me is utterly absurd.)
Nevertheless, the US in particular neither guides its developmental aid policies nor its economic aid policies to states such as China, Turkey, Russia, and Serbia by how many human rights a leader of a state violates. If it did, Bill Clinton would surely be indicted at the ICC tomorrow. Human rights, contrary to what NATO tells the world, has never been a genuinely linked to US trade interests, nor has it been linked to whether a particular country obtains economic aid moneys and favour from the World Bank, US, or NATO. Clinton is only using economic sanctions and is moreover withholding the vital economic aid that Serbia needs for its civil society in an illegal and criminal bribery attempt to have the Yugoslavian people subvert its own government which is clearly illegal according to Int’l Law! Bill Clinton has stated this illegality many times over on the Int’l news himself. It is rather sickening to hear US President Bill Clinton speak about allowing the Serbian people suffer and starve to death this forthcoming winter unless they overthrow their own government! I assure you that Bill Clinton does not give a dam* about human rights! Look at the man’s track record. As proof, look at China who won the USA’s ‘Most favoured trading nation’. This is axiomatic by viewing whereby the US while it whines like a baby about China’s violations of human rights, the US and other NATO states feel just fine to turn their heads at Tibet, and also whereby Turkey has committed gravely sickening ethnic genocide against the Kurds. Never mind the US turning over the captured Kurdish Leader to his own enemy! Some human right policy Clinton promotes, it is a sickening to say the very least! What can we expect from US NATO Capitalist greed? I mean to elucidate that point that if China is committing human right violations and NATO nations can cover their eyes to that, why is Bill Clinton so mentally bent on demonising the Serbs and making the civil society of Serbia suffer this winter and starve? Obviously, Clinton himself is a most gross violator of human rights and he had no darn business intervening in the privy affairs of Serbia as far as I am concerned...but he did... and now he must not deny the Serbian people their Basic Human Rights. NATO leaders owe this 30 billion dollars to the Serbian people and more than that in my own assessment! I believe that the people of Serbia have the right such as the Japanese women did that were raped by US serviceman during W. W. I and also during the Vietnam War, to sue the hell out of the US NATO states for destroying their lives!
Let s examine what was stated in the Group 17 paper. If I understood it correctly, the paper correctly states the damages done by NATO to Serbia and its people and gives the amounts of money which is about $30 billion US dollars which is needed to rebuild and modernise Serbia in addition to allowing Serbia integrate itself again into the rest of the EU Community (albeit with some political reforms.) I agree with this paper. Clearly Bill Clinton knows not the first thing about human rights and foreign policy and either does his Half-wit (US Secretary of State). Actually, a colleague I know who graduated from Columbia University told me that Albright did not even got good grades. When we actually analyse those countries that received monetary assistance from Canada and the USA such as Haiti, South Africa, Chile, and the Philippines, we find that when the Official Development Agency (ODA) withdrew all monetary and development aid based on the gross human rights violations that allegedly the leaders of such non-western governed states were committing, civil wars, genocide, and also chances of military coups either fully manifested themselves and/or the human right crisis in that geo-political region worsened.
However, in the case of Haiti, the regime became even more oppressive after the West withdrew its monetary aid to the state. Canada did not go along with many other western states in this decision regarding withdrawing economic aid to the Haitian people. Ironically, Canada is denying the same economic aid to the Serbian people today since its inception into the »rouge« NATO Club. Anyway, Canada at that time had decided that it was wrong to allow the people of a state such as Haiti to suffer for their leaders alleged human right crimes. In the case of Haiti, Canada continued to offer monetary humanitarian and economic monetary assistance to Haiti and this later proved to the West to be beneficial in promoting, Democratic Governance.
When we examine the states that are in the same situation that Serbia is presently, I mean states which were got cut off from receiving Western or other such economic developmental aid from, say, the World Bank or UNICEF, we find some alarming statistics which probably would surprise Bill Clinton! Again in examining Haiti, the regime as the West calls it, when it withdrew its economic and developmental monetary aid, the Haitian Government was even more ruthless and oppressive to its people and began to desperately over tax the Haitian people.
Like in Kosovo today, there was also at that time in Haiti much competition for basic living necessities such as food and shelter which led the people and the government into a bloody stand-off (assisted by the West of course). Kosovo today could easily slip into another Vietnam War if Serbian troops were to re-enter Kosovo to protect the Serbian population being oppressed by the KLA. If such occurred, Bill Clinton would no longer have to worry about violating that War Powers Act since he would have already have placed US Troops in harms way. It is utterly ironic and poor policy making for Bill Clinton to say that he is committed to assisting the Kosovo Albanian Refugees when as previously stated in another note, the US does not even recognise that any refugees even have the human right to habitat, or »housing« ! Why would Bill Clinton send hundreds of thousands of refugees back into Kosovo when there is hardly any Basic Human living necessities such as : Food, or Shelter? He is a dunce! In brief, the idea that NATO and Bill Clinton is committed to saving the Albanian refugees is absurd! He is only committed to New Imperialism over Kosovo gold and silver mines! Even in 1973 when the ODA Aid suspended economic aid to Chile, soon after this there was a military coup in Chile. In contrast however when ODA monetary aid into Chile was resumed, Chile in 1980s was seen to be moving towards western democracy. So I ask, what is Bill Clinton’s and NATO’s obsessive National Interest with Kosovo?
Jill Starr (Freely pass this on if you like).
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99. To YSA June 29, 1999
Dear friends,
Thank you so much for your messages sent to me in recent weeks – I’m sorry that I haven’t written back as yet, there have just been a few things to do with the end of term and going home, etc. The internet addresses you have provided will be very helpful for my research.
There have been so many events going on in Kosovo and Yugoslavia as a whole in the last two or three weeks. The UN force in Kosovo now has formidable problems in the disarmament of the Kosovo Liberation Army, assisting the return of refugees, and the general economic, social and political reconstruction. The presence of Russian troops is essential for the international balance of influence within the force, and I’m sure that an integrated force will assure both Albanians and Serbs of their security. However, there is the will for revenge attacks, and I have personally been shocked by the terrible attacks on the Roma gypsy community by certain extreme elements among the Kosovars, as well as the continuing attacks upon both Serbs and Albanians.
The general well-being of the Roma gypsies is low throughout much of Central and Eastern Europe (e.g. in the Czech and Slovak Republics and Romania), and I think that a stronger voice for gypsies is needed within both the United Nations and the European Parliament, which is an issue that I intend to campaign for. Israel may be an ally for that – I doubt that the UK and US governments will be very helpful.
I hope that life is returning to some semblance of normality in Belgrade and the rest of Serbia, now, too. What is the situation with water and electricity supplies, now? I read about the violinist Nigel Kennedy’s visit to Belgrade to play with the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra in a ‘concert for peace’ at the Sava concert hall. I was very heartened to think about that, and Nigel Kennedy had also taken part in a UNICEF charity event in aid of the Kosovar refugees last week.
There must surely be a lot to do within Yugoslavia outside of Kosovo now, particularly in Montenegro and in Vojvodina, and I hope that if politics takes a more democratic direction now, then separatist urges in those regions will be subdued. I am relieved that NATO has not ended up occupying the entire Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, as was envisaged in the Rambouillet accord – change must be brought about from within, not from the outside in a top-down fashion – whether by NATO, the EU, the USA or the IMF. More colonialism is not needed in the Balkans.
I have done more reading recently to improve my understanding of the history of Yugoslavia, Albania, and the Balkans more generally, so that I can feel more qualified to make comments on these subjects. Whatever different political views people have, the campaigns of the Yugoslav and Albanian Partisans, under Tito and Hoxha respectively, during World War II, were essential to the defeat of Italian fascism and German nazism, and therefore the saving of millions of peoples’ lives. I am encouraged by the determined effort of the peoples of Macedonia to build a multi-ethnic and democratic society, which I hope can eventually happen throughout the Balkans. However, it will take the efforts of many ordinary people to remove the nationalist extremism of the likes of Tuđman in Croatia, the KLA in Kosovo, and Arkan & Šešelj in Serbia.
I wish your Association, and all the decent people in Yugoslavia, the best of luck in all forms of reconstruction and reconciliation – including in the former Yugoslav Republics of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and Slovenia.
I look forward to writing to you again.
Yours sincerely,
Tom Sagar-Fenton
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100. To Mr. Emmanuel Bigand July 06, 1999
Dear Mr. Bigand,
We are surprised that you completely ignore all the problems immanent to the concept of collective responsibility indicated in our questions. We do notice, however, that this time you have rephrased your question and that you are interested in our individual feeling of responsibility.
Yes, Mr. Bigand, we do feel individual responsibility for: our insufficient involvement in the democratisation of the country; organisation of insufficiently successful protests and acts of civil disobedience; insufficient influence on the public opinion; unsuccessful struggle against nationalism (both Serbian and Albanian); not preventing the breakdown of former Yugoslavia; and probably many other things.
Also, we do feel responsible for our unsuccessful resistance to the NATO aggression against Yugoslavia, whereby the preconditions were created for »murders deliberately committed by our compatriots in Kosovo«. But as we pledge for the ascertaining of individual responsibility for all committed crimes against peace, crimes against humanity and war crimes, in a regular judicial procedure, regardless of the side perpetuating them (Serbs, Albanians, NATO), we can not feel guilty for them. Once the responsibility is individualised and the perpetrators punished, justice will prevail.
At the same time, we would like to ask you just two questions:
1. You are certainly acquainted with Regis Debray’s article published in Le Monde where the parallel has been made between the war in Kosovo at the end of the 90s with the war in Algeria in the 60s. Do you think the French are collectively responsible for all »murders deliberately committed by their compatriots in Algeria«? Do you feel responsible?
2. You are certainly acquainted that in air strikes against purely civilian targets in Yugoslavia more civilians (women, children, old and ill, etc.) than soldiers were killed? Do you think the French are collectively responsible for all »murders deliberately committed by their compatriots in Belgrade, Novi Sad, Niš, Kuršumlija, etc«? Do you also feel responsible?
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
101. To Mr. Gregory Dower July 06, 1999
Dear Mr. Dower,
The paper on Milošević was indeed written prior to the Kosovo war – in 1996, to be precise. The Kosovo war has changed dramatically the political situation in Yugoslavia. The mentioned paper had been written before the KLA appeared and the Kosovo crisis got out of hand. You are absolutely right that there must be a political change in Serbia in the near future. Some of us, the signers of this letter, have authored various articles analysing the mechanisms of the Milošević government and predicting when, and how, it might break down. See, for example, Aljoša Mimica »Tocqueville et le despotisme democratique: le cas de la Serbie«, The Tocqueville Review / La Revue Tocqueville, vol. XVIII, No. 1, 1997, pp. 107-119 (from the symposium in Bucharest, Romania, 1992).
In the attachment you can find selected bibliography of the books and articles concerning the war and collapse of former Yugoslavia (1989-1996). Please, find also enclosed the appropriate font (YU Times).
The summer vacation is about to begin. We wish you lots of sun and a nice holiday.
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
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102. To Mr Frederic Vandenberghe July 06, 1999
Dear Mr. Vandenberghe,
Thank you for your e-mail. There are a few reasons why you didn’t hear anything from the Yugoslav Sociological Association during the war in Bosnia. Firstly, the collapse of Yugoslavia entailed the disintegration of almost all Yugoslav associations, including the Yugoslav Sociological Association. It took us a lot of time to re-establish the Association and to develop its professional as well as political activities. Secondly, in that period many sociologists were engaged individually in political parties, non-government organisations and student and civil protests. Thirdly, electronic devices (such as e-mail) were not available to us.
We don’t know any colleague of us who has ever promoted the idea of »Serbia’s irredentism«. On the contrary, most of us were devoted to the idea of democratisation of the former Yugoslavia.
We are looking forward to co-operate with you in the process of rebuilding the civil society of Serbia.
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
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103. To YSA July 06, 1999
Please let me first say that I perfectly acknowledge the difficulty of your actual position and I have a deep respect for your association. Regardless of the probable clumsiness of my last message, I simply intended to say that Milošević is not the only one responsible for the murders in Kosovo. Serbian army and the police are directly involved in these murders.
I did not want to say that Serbian civilians (as you) are guilty. I simply hope that a legal process would not only involve Milošević but also all human beings in the Serbian army and the police that committed the crimes.
I meant that this is the responsibility of the Serbian people to demand judgement for their own army and police.
Now I turn to your question.
»1. You are certainly acquainted with Regis Debray’s article published in Le Monde where the parallel has been made between the war in Kosovo at the end of the ‘90s with the war in Algeria in the ‘60s. Do you think the French are collectively responsible for all ‘murders’ deliberately committed by their compatriots in Algeria’?«
There are huge differences between both situations. But anyway, I agree that there is some collective responsibility of the French not to have demanded justice for some crimes.
»Do you feel responsible?«
I was born in 1960, but I feel responsible for the injustice that has been done (and still is) to the Algerian people.
»2. You are certainly acquainted that in air strikes against purely civilian targets in Yugoslavia more civilians (women, children, old and ill, etc.) than soldiers were killed? Do you think the French are collectively responsible for all ‘murders deliberately committed by their compatriots in Belgrade, Novi Sad, Niš, Kuršumlija, etc’?«
Civilians have been killed, but not Deliberately. At no time there was a decision to deliberately destroy civilians by Nato. The destruction of civilians by the Serbian army and the police was deliberately planned many months ago. Do you contest this?
I found the military strategy followed by Nato inadmissible, and I really hope that those responsible for this strategy will be demanded an explanation by the International Tribunal. But no comparison is possible with what has been committed by the Serbs.
Sincerely yours,
Emmanuel Bigand
LEAD CNRS, Faculte des Sciences
Bld Gabriel, 21000 Dijon, France
104. To YSA Jul 06, 1999
The real crime of Kosovo
I believe it is time that the media started to reveal the facts about the real crime of Kosovo, a crime that has continued for 50 years and is continuing today while NATO troops look on and in most cases do nothing to stop it. The real crime in Kosovo is the wholesaler ethnic cleansing and killing of the – Serbs, Gypsies, Montenegrins and other minority groups.
The fact that 400,000 Serbs, Gypsies, Montenegrins had been ethnically cleansed from Kosovo since World War II is not appreciated by the moral leaders of the west.
In order to justify NATO ‘s bombing and destruction of Serbia the media and a number of world leaders have attempted to portray the Serbs as a Nazi regime. I believe it is extremely offensive and demeaning to the memory of those six million innocent Jews who died at the hands of the Nazis and Nazi sympathisers to use their deaths to justify NATO’s bombing and incite further hatred against the Serbs.
The forced expulsion, harassment, burning of houses and killing of ethnic Albanians by paramilitary forces during the NATO bombing should be condemned and those responsible should be trailed under International law, however now what we are seeing is human nature in its worst form. Some will say that the Serbs deserve it, however the revenge we are seeing has other motives. The KLA is using the opportunity for the continuation of their effort to clear Serbian real estate and Serbs, Gypsies, Montenegrins to make way for ethnic Albanian’s and for the realisation of their goal to create an ethnically pure »Republic of Kosovo«.
The western world should be condemned for it supporting such evil and saying nothing.
Gregory Dower
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105. To YSA July 06, 1999
Dear friends and colleagues.
We got your message at the end of May. Forgive our long silence. From the first days of bombing Yugoslavia and up to now, all of us have been sharing the immeasurable loss and suffering of the people of Yugoslavia. We are sure that our words of sympathy, compassion and support cannot be too late. The war which was cynically called »peace-making« did not prevent a humanitarian catastrophe, but, on the contrary, generated events much more catastrophic than they had been before the war. The country is ruined, and the ethnic conflict in Kosovo is being escalated. It is very important, especially now, to make the »world community« understand who is really responsible for the sufferings of the thousands of Yugoslavs, and what is the real price for the »peace-making« operation, as they called it.
To join a public discussion on the crisis in Kosovo, we should have had some more or less objective information on what really happens not only in Kosovo, but in our country and in the world as well. It turned to be a difficult task, because of »information war« spread by both the Russian and the international mass media. Some Russian journalists and democratic public leaders still share the illusion that NATO, together with the democratic community, stands for true democracy all over the world.
This position is evidently false. Irrespective of anyone’s political views and sympathies, irrespective of any negative attitude to the policy of the Yugoslavian government, the extremely brutal and inhuman means of counteraction of NATO to the inhuman ethnic policy of Milošević, cannot and must not be approved or excused. One cannot save one nation by destroying the other nation. Any aims, however generous they may seem, are a poor excuse for hundreds of victims among the peaceful population and for the ruining of the whole country.
As the history of the crisis in Kosovo is concerned, we are far from making only the Yugoslavian President responsible for this crisis.
Ethnic imbalance emerged in this region after World War II. Still the open ethnic conflict could have been prevented, had the leaders of Yugoslavia and the politicians of adjacent countries (including the so-called »democratic community«) paid more attention to the evident danger of ethnic war. In the 1990s, all nations of Kosovo suffered the consequences of this imbalance, which at that time overstepped the limits of an ethnic opposition and grew into the armed conflict. We, being the citizens of a multiethnic country, condemn the massive repression of the Kosovo Albanians conveyed by the Yugoslavian federal and local authorities. The grave experience of the recent war in Chechnya, which has become the Kosovo of Russia, only confirms the common knowledge, that ethnic conflicts cannot be solved by repressive measures.
At the same time, the territorial safety of a country should be acknowledged a primordial value of international democracy, of international law and order, like the human (individual) rights. Ignoring this simple rule opens the way to violation of both individual and collective rights, and allows the political leaders of other countries to manipulate both the interests of an oppressed ethnic group and public opinion, in order to gain their own geopolitical profits.
That is why separatism, terrorism and violence practised by the KLA, should also be condemned and defined as criminal and breaking down international law and order. The KLA should be stopped as soon as possible, instead of being supported by NATO.
But the position of the NATO alliance in this conflict seems the most faulty and vicious. If NATO had really wanted to stop the ethnic conflict in Kosovo, they should have never used force, since violence can only generate more violence, in return. This is what we observe in the North Caucasus, as well as in Kosovo nowadays. We see that the Albanians have lost much more than they acquired, the Serbs of Kosovo become the victims of murder and marauding, and the KFOR have no control on the KLA troops. The total humanitarian catastrophe, which exceeds the bounds of one region, is the result of the irresponsible policy of the European countries’ leaders, and of the alliance.
And, finally, one of the gravest losses of the world community is the loss of true democracy. Nowadays we hear much of »the new world order, emerging at the end of the millennium«. This new order, determined by the national interests of the USA, is going to be unicentric. We, the former citizens of the USSR, gained the understanding of the fact that unicentric power is vicious, since it tends to avoid responsibility for its decisions and actions, to break its own laws and to violate human rights. It seems that the international democratic community is loosing its own achievements. If the idea of a »new world order« comes into life, the very notions of democracy, human rights, law and order will be deprived of their humanitarian value, and become a plain instrument of political and ideological pressure.
This is exactly what we observe nowadays. Double standards in policy, force methods instead of international law, one-way determining of rights and crimes by the most powerful states of the present day, together with the overall conformism of the »world community« – this is what is a real humanitarian catastrophe.
We claim that the core notions of democracy and international law and order urgently need revising, lest they turned into their antithesis and start to be used as an excuse for illegality and aggression.
Dear colleagues, we wish you courage and endurance to undergo many trials which you are facing now. We join all those whose will and actions contribute to the revival of Yugoslavia – free and independent, democratic and multiethnic country, as it should be.
Vida Mikhalchenko, Tatyana Kryutchkova, Natalya Kolesnik, Olga Kazakevitch, Olga Parfenova, Yulia Trushkova and others.
Research Center of Ethnic and Language Relations,
Institute of Linguistics, Moscow.
Here find enclosed two statements made by the Board of Memorial International Society (April – May 1999), the position of which we, in a general way, share.
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Recent news from the Balkans leave no doubt: after NATO air strikes on Yugoslavia, ethnic purges practised by the Serbian army and police during their fight against Albanian separatists have turned into large-scale crimes against humanity, something Europe has not known since World War II.
The current Belgrade regime’s guilt in committing these crimes is evident and recognised by the whole world, with the exception of a group of Russian politicians and media. Yet, how could Western leaders’ actions be qualified, when they have publicly announced their goal was to prevent a humanitarian disaster in the Balkans but actually triggered off this disaster?
If some NATO politicians believed in earnest before bombardments began that air raids on Yugoslavia might save the Kosovo Albanians from being destructed by Serb units, this means gross professional incompetence.
If the idea was »to punish Milošević for being a hard-liner«, this is gross irresponsibility. It is the hundreds of thousands of Kosovo Albanians who came the first to be »punished«. Milošević’ positions in the country seemed to have been strengthened.
Another side effect of the NATO military operation is increased probability of a communist revanche in several countries including Russia. The impact of anti-Western fundamentalist forces on Russia’s foreign and home policy is quite significant even at this point of time; given the current situation, it is threatening to turn into a decisive one. If it does, events might begin evolving in an unpredictable and very dangerous direction.
Of course, it is not NATO leaders but Russian citizens who are responsible for the fate of Russian democracy. Of course, no general political considerations may outbalance massive killings. Yet, so far NATO politics have simply endangered the prospects of bringing East and West – »the third world« and the developed democracies – closer together, while the Kosovo Albanians’ position is not relieved.
The Alliance fell into the same trap where the Russian leaders found themselves four years before when they tried to use strength to liquidate the Dudaev regime in Chechnya. The disgraceful Chechen war discredited nobody but the emerging Russian democracy. A new war in the Balkans threatens to undermine the prestige of democracy as such.
The international community’s impotence to apply peaceful means for making the Yugoslav government observe the norms of humanitarian right in Kosovo came as a proof of the fact that the current system of international relations is highly deficient. Yet, the military operation destroying this system proved to be equally impotent.
We thought a few years ago that the fall of communism would lead to a new world order based on law. This did not happen.
The twentieth century is coming to an end in the same way as it began, i.e., with Balkan wars. Does the mankind remember one of these wars evolved into a world-wide one?
Today, the only reasonable and moral policy is to use any chance, whatever tiny, if it allows to suspend hostilities, stop violence against civilians, and go back to negotiations, no matter how hard or even humiliating this step might look to one or another conflict participant. Yet, it seems that none of the parties (including Russia) involved in the conflict directly or indirectly has enough will, courage, common sense or simple humanity to pursue this policy.
April 8, 1999
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Memorial Society expresses its concern about the demonstrative use by NATO countries (particularly the USA) of double standards as regards two crises that aggravated in the winter of 1999, i.e., the Kurd and Kosovo ones.
The background of events in these two hot spots is similar in many respects. The authorities both in Turkey and Yugoslavia have for decades grossly violated the rights of ethnic minorities – the Kurds in the first case, and the Albanians in the second case, by directly discriminating them by ethnic origin. Fundamental human rights were violated – the minorities’ right to preserve their cultures and use their native languages, the right to freedom of associations, free expression of their opinion, freedom of thought and conscience. In their turn, national movements of both Turkish Kurds and Kosovo Albanians have gradually acquired features of aggressive separatism. In both cases separatists’ armed units have launched large-scale guerrilla wars. Numerous crimes were committed by the government and anti-government forces during hostilities that affected primarily civilians.
Yet, while Turkish authorities’ actions towards the Kurd movement cause but a phlegmatic censure from Western countries, Yugoslavia authorities’ attempts to suppress the movement for Kosovo’s independence activate the whole arsenal of international pressures including bombardments. NATO countries are using force to make Yugoslavia government sit down at the negotiations table with the Albanian insurgents (terrorists or fighters for national liberation, whatever one prefers to call them), while actions of Turkey (a NATO member!), whose troops destroy insurgent units outside the country’s borders, produce no visible reaction.
It is not for the first time during these past years that we are facing a situation when the »double standard«, as applied to separatist movements, is, in fact, a norm in international relations. The relation between two norms of international law – the principle of state sovereignty and the people’s right to self-determination – is each time interpreted in a different way, depending on the needs of the day.
Regretfully, the new Russia’s policy did not become an exception. Self-proclaimed entities in South Ossetia, Trans-Dniester and Abkhasia have for a long time tapped on understanding, if not direct support, of Russian politicians. Separatist armed units often had Russian citizens, even the Russian Army officers, among their members. The state did not express any clear and principled position on this issue, and double standards were regarded as a policy instrument.
At the same time, during the Chechen war Russia rejected the slightest opportunity of the international community’s interference in its »internal affairs.« It should be pointed out that this position met leading Western powers’ understanding: massive violations of human rights and federal authorities’ war crimes committed in Chechnya in winter and spring of 1995 were not given the same clear judgement as similar events in the Balkans.
The current tragic developments in Yugoslavia are a result of intransigence demonstrated by one or another party in the conflict; in fact, it is also a result of instigations made by the great powers backing the conflict participants. It is of minor importance who bears a heavier guilt for the inter-ethnic conflict evolving into a full-fledged war – Russia which indirectly indulges one party, or the Alliance which openly patronises the other.
Such an open use of double standards is fraught with a sad fall-out for the future of mankind. Instead of attempts to build a new world order based on LAW common to all, we can see attempts to build an order based on FORCE and ARBITRARY RULE demonstrated by a group of countries that have appropriated the right to censure things at their wisdom, on the basis of their own interests. A heavier blow on the idea of human rights as the underlying principle of building a intra- and inter-state relations could not be imagined.
Yelena Zhemkova Dima Shabelnikov
Executive Director Consultant
Memorial International Society Ford Foundation, Moscow
106. To Prof. Alberto Martinelli and Prof. Jennifer Platt July 06, 1999
Dear Professor Martinelli/Platt,
Over the past 3-4 months, as I believe you know, a team of the Yugoslav Sociological Association has been engaged in exposing another side of the NATO aggression on Yugoslavia; the side that has not been – or has been insufficiently – presented by the Western (electronic) media. Up to now, the team has sent (via e-mail) messages to some 800 addresses, and has had an intensive correspondence on the issue with almost 200 men and women, sociologists mostly, from all over the world.
The International Sociological Association was one of our addressees. However, so far, we (in the YSA) have not received a word from organisation to which the YSA belongs. We would appreciate very much if you informed us on the attitude of the ISA – if there is any, of course – towards both the NATO military action and, particularly, our action.
For, unfortunately, both actions happened, didn’t they?
Yours sincerely,
Karel Turza, Vice-President of the YSA
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107. To Mr. Karel Turza, Vice-President of the YSA July 14, 1999
Dear Karel,
I am quite surprised at this message, as I thought that Alberto Martinelli at least sent you a reply to your request a while ago that the ISA circulate a document that the YSA had produced – though it may not have been a reply that you found satisfactory. Did you not receive it? If not, perhaps you could contact him directly to ask him to repeat it.
As far as I know the ISA has not reacted in any other way, and indeed I would not have expected it to do so unless there was a specific request directed to it as an association. It does not in general make comments on political or ethical issues, unless they very directly involve sociologists as a targeted group; indeed, it does not normally comment on ones of sociological substance, either. In addition, the mechanism for commenting, or even making a serious reply which responded to the content of your communications, would be very difficult, since the Executive only meets about once a year and our next meeting is not until next Easter; it is not easy to conduct a discussion among people all over the world, with e-mail of very varying efficiency, except at a meeting, and little business which requires interchange among the members is normally carried out outside the meetings. I think that the only response it is realistic to expect, from what my experience tells me of ISA’s workings, is what you may receive from individual members.
Did you get the information that I sent to you about our seminar series here on Kosovo? If not, let me know, and I will repeat it.
Best wishes to you (and your colleagues)
Jennifer Platt, Professor of Sociology
Arts E, University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9QN, Sussex, England.
108. To Mr. Emmanuel Bigand July 19, 1999
Dear Mr. Bigand,
We are glad that our points of view become more convergent. However, we are strongly devoted to the concept of individual responsibility for every crime and judicial guarantee of fair trial for every indicted. It seems to us that this is some kind of civilisational achievement. The approval of this thesis can be found in an interesting book by René Girard Violence and Sacred (original book published in Paris, by Grasset, 1972 [La violence et le sacré]), describing the process of establishing the criminal law and elimination of spiral multiplication of collective crimes and revenges.
When you say that you »agree that there are some collective responsibilities for French not to have demand justice for some crimes«, we can only confirm this. We hope that citizens of FR Yugoslavia would find enough strength to demand justice for all people responsible for crimes done during the escalation of Kosovo crisis.
There is a topic in your letter which seems disputable to us. You say:
»Civilians have been killed, but not Deliberately. At no time there was a decision to deliberately destroy civilians by Nato. The destruction of civilians by the Serbian army and the police was deliberately planned many months ago. Do you contest this?«
»Destroy civilians« means not only killing civilians by weapons, but also using more sophisticated methods of destruction. Bombing of power plants, water supplies, and other facilities necessary for every-day life, is directly violating all international law concerning protection of civilians in combat regions.
With best wishes to you. Looking forward to develop mutual communication and professional co-operation with you in future,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
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109. To YSA July 22, 1999
Dear Members of the Presidency,
The media has little to say about the disaster in Yugoslavia and even less to say about its reconstruction. The following article is among the very few that I have seen that discusses the humanitarian disaster.
Humanitarian disaster in Yugoslavia
By Mike Head and Michael Conachy, 22 July 1999
From: http://www.socialequality.com/articles/1999/jul1999/yugo-j22.shtml
In contrast to Michael Conachy’s article, The AP has written: Balkans reconstruction may hinder aid projects elsewhere. Nations launch effort to raise Kosovo funds from:
http://www.uniontrib.com/news/utarchives/cgi/idoc.cgi?483387+unix+rjdion+www.uniontrib.com..80+Union-Tribune+Union-Tribune+Library+Library++%28Balkans
This piece is garbled, but includes several interesting statements including »Kosovo’s real standard of living is higher than the statistics would indicate« and »the damage caused by NATO bombing and Serbian oppression was »less than anticipated«.
Once again, we see the repetition of the media focus on Kosovo and the appalling neglect of the humanitarian needs within Yugoslavia. Ready enough to participate in destruction, now that it is time to pay the bill, the NATO nations are quick to minimise the damage and display great reluctance to contribute the resources for reconstruction. Early damage estimates of US$ 100 billion, have been quickly pared down to US$ 25 billion for the entire Balkan region!
Sincerely yours,
Roland Dion, San Diego, CA
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110. To YSA July 24, 1999
Dear colleagues,
I hope that now in Serbia, as well as in Kosovo under the United Nations mandate, there are starting to be social, economic and political improvements.
Certainly, I am following the issues in the media over here, and the coverage has generally been quite good during the weeks since the end of NATO’s bombing campaign.
In Kosovo itself, we are told, markets are starting again, and people are returning to their homes. However, a lot more needs to be done to stop the ethnic domineering mentality that is costing the lives of all the people’s of that province through ‘revenge’ attacks.
I hope that genuine economic improvements can be made in Serbia too, and I tend to look towards the Montenegrin government in Podgorica as a kind of a progressive model. Any continuation of the present state will surely favour the popularity of Šešelj and other ultra-nationalists. I am interested in such political figures as Vuk Obradović and Vesna Pešić (of the Civic Alliance in the 1996-1997 demonstrations), and I think that moral support must be given to such figures who oppose nationalism.
What is the situation like now concerning water and electricity in Belgrade? Are hospitals being repaired? I shall follow the environmental issues, and have been interested in the arrival of the UN environmental inspection team during the last week.
Do let me know how life is recovering in Belgrade and the FR of Yugoslavia. I would look forward to hearing from you again.
With best wishes to you,
Tom Sagar-Fenton.
111. To Mr. Karel Turza, Vice-President of the YSA July 26, 1999
Dear Mr. Turza,
Here is the text of the letter I sent long ago to Prof. [Slobodan] Vuković, President of the Serbian Sociological Association, who asked me to diffuse a message of his association:
»Dear Colleague,
I deeply regret the consequences of the war for all the people affected. I am personally sympathetic with the colleagues of the Serbian Sociological Association. However, the ISA will not diffuse your message since it may appear in support of the Milošević government, which is responsible of violations of human rights of the people of Kosovo. I can assure you that I will continue my efforts to contribute to a solution of durable and equitable peace.
Alberto Martinelli, President of the International Sociological Association«
I did not receive any letter from the Yugoslav Sociological Association. If I had, I would have answered in the same way. I also want to tell you and the other Yugoslav colleagues that ISA will be glad to cooperate in the process of reconstruction.
Looking forward to hearing from you, I send my best wishes,
Alberto Martinelli, President of the International Sociological Association
* * *
112. To YSA July 30, 1999
[…] I still think Milošević’ is an anomic individual that deserves to be excluded from the Balkans, since he IS NOT the voice of all. He’s playing God and it’s not permissible in a world like ours. We have to live all in harmony, without interfere in others beliefs or creeds. We are the tomorrow mankind – And we have to deserve the right of habitat the Earth. […]
[Paulo] Jurza
PS: I will still take some time to read the whole message that you’ve sent to me, but I like the sound of it – I grew up listening to this language. But I’m alone studying and it’s a bit difficult, since I have nobody to talk to or to clear my doubts. Till today I can’t understand fully the declinations and I do not know how to form the past time... But I’ll get there, and who knows, I’ll be at the Balkans watching people living in peace...
* * *
113. To Aleksandar Molnar, Editor in chief of Sociologija July 31, 1999
Dear Aleksandar,
You may not be aware that one of our members of the US Congress is proposing that Yugoslavia (Serbia?) be declared a Terrorist State. (Exactly who Yugoslavia may threaten is beyond me). If that show be approved communications between Yugoslavia and the US will be severely restricted. I shall be happy to research this and send you specifics if you wish.
It occurs to me that whatever can be done to prevent this should be done as soon as possible. Additionally, communications that might further the well being of the people of Yugoslavia (Serbia ?), should not be delayed.
Sincerely,
Roland Dion
San Diego CA
* * *
114. To Aleksandar Molnar, Editor in chief of Sociologija July 31, 1999
Dear Aleksandar,
The Western Media has quickly moved away from commentary on the War Against Yugoslavia. This is altogether typical. Sensationalism and Crisis Response are their modus operandi. Their purpose, in my opinion, is to form and control public opinion in order to further the objectives of the great capitalists interests.
Like innumerable other events, the War Against Yugoslavia will be quickly relegated to media archives and forgotten by most people.
Serious analysis of its causes and effects will be left for the historians and probably will not appear in print for many years.
It is my belief that this War has very far reaching implications for the world order, international law, and democracy. The implications, in my view, extend far beyond the territories of FRY. One needs only to study the text of NATO’s new mission statement to gain some insight into what is in store.
I urge you and your colleagues to continue studying and publishing your thoughts regarding these and related matters. I can think of few things of greater importance.
Sincerely yours,
Roland Dion
San Diego CA
* * *
115. To Mr. Roland Dion August 02, 1999
Dear Mr. Dion,
Thank you very much for giving me very useful information and interesting ideas. To my opinion Professor Michael Mandel’s letter [to the Honorable Madam Justice Louise Arbour, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, from July 26] is balanced and convincing. However, we know that all legal arguments in favour of a democratic and law governed »New World Order« are at stake when »Realpolitik« is in charge.
»I hope that members of your Faculty of Law are studying this matter. If they have published anything pertinent I should appreciate your referring it to me.«
Unfortunately, I must inform you that a new and very repressive Serbian University Act has been enacted last year. As a consequence of that, the best and the most courageous professors at the Faculty of Law in Belgrade were dismissed (in the attachment you can find the article on this topic, written by Prof. Jovica Trkulja and published in issue 4/1998 of Sociologija). The leading persons of the Faculty (as well as in the Serbian foreign policy) are pure mediocres and blind executors of the personal rule of Slobodan Milošević. It is hard to believe that they are capable of doing their part in establishing a democratic and law governed »New World Order«.
However, the dismissed Professors have established the Center for Advancing the Legal Studies (Centar za unapredjenje pravnih studija), where they also deal with the most important issues in domestic and foreign politics. If I find any document on the ICTY in English produced by the members of the Center I shall let you know about it as soon as possible.
As you can see, independent intellectuals in Yugoslavia are having a hard time. After period of ten years of fighting for democracy and human rights, instead of successes, we face only more and more problems. Not long ago, it seemed that democratic despotism of Slobodan Milošević, awful dilettantism of the leaders of opposition and political apathy of the population were the sole obstacles to democratisation of the country. Illegal NATO aggression and war crimes committed in spring 1999 added one more obstacle.
If you have some more interesting information or ideas for us as well as scientific articles – please feel free to send them. We’ll be happy to get acquainted with them.
Sincerely yours,
Aleksandar Molnar, Editor in chief of Sociologija
* * *
116. To Prof. Alberto Martinelli August 08, 1999
Dear Professor Martinelli,
The Yugoslav Sociological Association – in fact, a group of sociologists on behalf of the YSA – was very active during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. Information, articles, analyses, statements, appeals etc. written by the group were disseminated all over the world (to some 800 addressees – sociologists mostly) in order to expose another side of the NATO military action; the side that was insufficiently (or not at all) presented by the Western electronic media. All these materials were sent to you too, though via Madrid (Mrs. I. Barlinska) – since we did not have your e-mail address. By the way, we were surprised very much when we learnt that you had not received them!?! Anyway, we are sending them now, convinced that you should be informed about the YSA activities in general, and particularly on such an extraordinary enterprise. These materials (plus selected correspondence initiated by them) – we believe you should be informed about that as well – will be published in the next issue of Sociologija (publication of the YSA) in English; the issue will appear in September/October and will be sent to sociologists all over the world. Regarding your letter to Dr. Slobodan Vuković – which we received only few days ago – the fact is that we do not know to what did it refer at all. I mean, we have no idea what did Dr. Vuković write. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter. The ISA’s attitude towards the NATO military action is plain – individual sympathies, but institutional reserve, or even indifference. As a matter of fact, as far as I know, the only, say, institutional reaction was that of Prof. Dirk Kaesler (see his »Letter from the President« in: ISA – RCHS Newsletter, May 1999). His words imply that sociologists cannot simply deny the fact that there was a war in Europe. This implies then, I think, that the ISA should find an institutional way/form of facing the fact. For, it’s a sociological fact, isn’t it?
Yours sincerely,
Karel Turza, Vice-President of the YSA
* * *
117. To YSA August 09, 1999
»...There is a topic in your letter which seems disputable to us. You say: ‘Civilians have been killed, but not Deliberately. At no time there was a decision to deliberately destroy civilians by Nato. The destruction of civilians by the Serbian army and the police was deliberately planned many months ago. Do you contest this?’
‘Destroy civilians’ means not only killing civilians by weapons, but also using more sophisticated methods of destruction. Bombing of power plants, water supplies, and other facilities necessary for every-day life, is directly violating all international law concerning protection of civilians in combat regions...«
Bombing of power plants, water supplies and so on, is clearly illegal, but this is in no way comparable to deliberate murder of thousands and thousands of women, children, old people, men, because of their ethnic group.
How many people did actually directly die from Nato’s bombing of facilities necessary for every-day life? Compare this number to the number of civilians in Kosovo directly murdered by your army and the police?
What is your point?
Best regards. I am afraid it will take a long time for your country to become free from a Serbian nationalistic way of thinking.
Sincerely,
Emmanuel Bigand
LEAD CNRS, Faculte des Sciences
Bld Gabriel, 21000 Dijon, France
118. To YSA August 10, 1999
Dear Member of the YSA,
Nice to hear from you and to be able to imply that there is still some ability among your countrymen to function.
I appreciate your putting me in touch with TFF! I’m in the process of reviewing their Press Releases.
Here, on this side of the Atlantic, there are constantly new developments restricting and controlling our ‘Free Press’. Shall I send them on to you? I suspect that, except for the constraints of time, you have full access to the same sources that I have.
I hope I have not been sending too much material that you’ve already seen and that I have not been sending you duplicates of the same material too often. (My memory sometimes fails me in this regard.)
I am corresponding with a former Russian Journalist living in Moscow. He often makes insightful and penetrating observations on political matters relating to FRY, Russia, Eastern Europe and NATO/US objectives.
Are you interested in seeing these?
Finally, I am mounting a month long Solo Exhibition of Abstract Photography at the San Diego Art Institute. I will be relating these 12 or 14 works (via titles) to the War Against Yugoslavia. Although I do not have electronic imaging facilities, I would be glad to send you my Artist’s Statement and related materials.
Exhibition: San Diego Art Institute, August 19, to September 19, 1999, Reception: 6:30 to 8:30 P.M. August 27, 1999
Roland Dion
San Diego, California
* * *
119. To YSA August 19, 1999
Yes, please keep me informed. I am quite interested, being a multiculturalist and a strong believer that multinational states are the only way for a peaceful future.
Kind regards,
Daphne L. Romy-Masliah, Ph.D.
86, route de Frontenex
1208 Geneva, Switzerland
Sociolinguist at CER/FDP (Centre d’Etudes et de recherches: Fondements du Droit Public) Universite de Cergy-Pontoise, France
120. To Mr. Emmanuel Bigand August 23, 1999
Dear Mr. Bigand,
As we have repeated many times, our position is strictly legalistic: we want all persons who committed crimes against peace, crimes against humanity and war crimes to be trailed in a regular judicial procedure, regardless of the side perpetuating them (Serbs, Albanians, NATO).
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
121. To Mr. Roland Dion August 23, 1999
Dear Mr. Dion,
Thank you for all information you are sending to us. We were wondering what profession belongs to the person of such wide interest. We’ll be glad to hear your impressions from the opening ceremony of your Solo Exhibition of Abstract Photography at the San Diego Art Institute as well as to receive your Artist’s Statement.
Now, we are facing the aftermath – not normality, but not the extremes we were living with for so many weeks. It will be very hard to have a sense of how life is/can/should be, in this context of »what happened/what next« conditions. We have no problems with water, but electric system seems to be badly damaged. From time to time we experience electricity reduction, but the real problem will arise very soon, with autumn and winter. As you may have seen – the report of the UN Environmental inspection showed that the environmental situation in Novi Sad, Pančevo, Kragujevac and Bor is extremely serious, almost catastrophic. For the information on our actual political situation (especially on protest held in Belgrade on August 19, 1999) please, visit the web site www.freeserbia.org
There are no more intruding objects of pathological attention or obvious destructive social happenings like bombing was. Many people are still away from Belgrade on summer vacations or summer schools so that YSA meetings have been quite infrequent. The new school year begins on October 1, 1999.
Sincerely yours,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
122. To Mrs. Daphne L. Romy-Masliah August 23, 1999
Dear Colleague,
In April, May and June the Yugoslav Sociological Association has developed various activities directed towards a single objective – to contribute to stopping the NATO bombing of FR Yugoslavia. […]
In our letter to you from the second part of May we sent you the first 10 statements of the Yugoslav Sociological Association. Since there was no any feed back from you, we did not want to annoying you. In this letter we would like to share with you the statements we prepared during May and June which you did not receive (please, see the second part of this e-mail). […]
Hoping to meet you in person some day on a conference or meeting, somewhere in the world (maybe in Yugoslavia), we wish you success in your professional and private life and send you our warmest regards.
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
123. To YSA August 25, 1999
Dear Colleagues,
I am sorry that my silence has been misinterpreted. Usually, when I do not wish to be included in a mailing list, I simply reply and ask for its removal. Nevertheless, the period you underwent consisted for me as well in a very busy period. I was out of the country more often than not, so I am sorry to let you know that I found only lately the opportunity to open my all too numerous mail which, like a tree prevents from seeing the forest, has kept your message hidden and prompted you with a negative feedback. Thank you for forwarding me your messages which meet my heartfelt sympathy and, as a scholar focusing on multiculturalism, it is my turn to wish you all the best in your endeavours and to hope too, that your next messages will bring us hope in a brighter future. Meanwhile, please accept friendly regards,
Daphne L. Romy-Masliah, Ph.D.
* * *
124. To YSA August 30, 1999
Dear Members of the YSA Presidency,
I have noted in my readings an absence of internet petitions regarding the US/NATO War Against Yugoslavia.
This stands in startling contrast to the drive for impeachment when dozens of petitions circulated on the web, were signed by great numbers of people and possibly affected the outcome of the Congressional Hearings.
I came across this interesting site this morning and the thought occurred to me that it could serve as a starting point for petition drives for various matters related to FRY.
I have found myself unable to adequately express myself regarding this monstrously hideous assault. Petitions could be helpful to me and perhaps others, in expressing what we cannot ourselves articulate and bringing some influence to bear on decision makers.
I hope you may find some way to utilize this.
I shall be trying to do the same.
Sincerely yours,
Roland Dion
San Diego CA
* * *
125. To Mr. Karel Turza September 01, 1999
Dear Professor Turza,
it is unfortunate that the writings of the YSA group did not reach me. And it is unfortunate and surprising that you were not aware of what Dr.Vukovic wrote. Anyway, what matters now is that the issue of Sociologija is discussed by the international sociiological community. I will read it with great interest. As far as the ISA position is concerned, let me make it clear once again that ISA will not take an official stand on the war in Europe, according to the opinion of the vast majority of its Executive Committee members. This does not mean, of course, that ISA overlooks the tragic relevance of this war in Europe, nor that it does not welcome serious sociological analyses on its official journals.
Yours sincerely,
Alberto Martinelli
* * *
126. To YSA September 04, 1999
Dear YSA Friends,
You wrote:
»We’ll be glad to hear your impressions from the opening ceremony of your Solo Exhibition of Abstract Photography at the San Diego Art Institute as well as to receive your Artist’s Statement.«
I was inspired by the reactions to my exhibition to expand this collection, make more explicit the relationship between the images and NATO’s War Against Yugoslavia and exhibiting the images in additional venues. I hope to provide titles in both English and Serbian and include wall labels bearing extended information. I might also include reprints of short, pertinent articles and provide attributions for quotes used in my Titles and in my Artist’s Statement. I will, probably retitle the exhibition to something more descriptive of the recent events in FRY.
I composed two Artists Statements. Although they contain a certain amount of redundancy, both are included below.
ARTIST’S STATEMENT (Posted in the Gallery)
CHANGE And THE NATURE OF THINGS is a continuation of my series: Man’s Work/Nature’s Work in which the effects of nature on man-made objects are recorded. The photographic subjects themselves, are anonymous and ubiquitous, ordinarily neglected as a source of visual interest or pleasure. They remain outside ordinary conscious perception – unseen and unknown though readily seeable and knowable.
On seeing these photographs, viewers are sometimes impelled to ask »What is it?« The question seems to have a number of possible motives among which are:
Verification that somewhere in the physical world there exists »something« that has been recorded by the truth telling photograph, but which, for all the seeing one does, has not been seen.
Another appears to be an attempt to satisfy one’s curiosity – »This looks like something I have seen (or have never seen). How could I have missed it. If I knew what it was I might be able to experience these objects myself, directly«.
A third, and there are undoubtedly more, may be an attempt to reduce or eliminate the uncertainty aroused by seeing photographic images that purport to represent features of the physical world that cannot be readily identified with confidence. We are, after all, accustomed to the idea that a landscape was photographed in Yosemite, or a portrait was made in Kosovo.
A photograph, must, of course, have been made of something, somewhere. But what and/or where? Questions that probably would not arise if the medium were oils, watercolors or pastels are influenced by the accepted concept of photographic verity (now changing due to the capabilities of digital imaging and its manipulative possibilities and always subject to the manipulative techniques of traditional photography). But, it is not the subject, per se, that interests me. It is the changing nature of the universe and all that is in it. It is the idea that Change is in the Nature of Things that informs my images.
TECHNIQUE: My photographs are composed through the camera view finder, in ambient light, using neither special film, filters or equipment using a standard 35 mm Single Lens Reflex Camera. They are rendered full frame and without technical enhancement.
Roland Dion
081999
The second version formed part of the exhibit catalog which included Titles of the Works. This version, together with the accompanying TITLES, spoke indirectly to the subject of NATO’s War Against Yugoslavia. Frustrated by my inability to adequately articulate my thoughts and feelings about the War, I allowed the images to speak for themselves. My sense is that they do so more forcefully than anything I might have verbalized. Some people understood at once that something extraordinary had occurred in Yugoslavia. Others were inspired to learn more about NATO’s Military Intervention. Most, however, were as oblivious as they had been throughout the period of actual bombardment.
ARTIST’S STATEMENT (From the Catalog)
CHANGE AND THE NATURE OF THINGS continues my series: Man’s Work/Nature’s Work documenting the effects of nature on man-made objects. The fifteen images in this collection can, in a metaphorical sense, also be understood as illustrating Man’s power to »systematically and progressively attack, disrupt, degrade, and devastate and ultimately... destroy« the very objects he creates, the natural environment and himself. In a departure from previous exhibits, this possibility is proposed through image titles. The actual photographic subjects are anonymous and ubiquitous, ordinarily neglected as a source of visual interest or pleasure. They most frequently remain outside conscious perception – unseen and unknown though readily Seabee and knowable.
A photograph must, of course, have been made of something, somewhere. But what and/or where? Questions that probably would not arise if the medium were oils, watercolors or pastels are influenced by the accepted concept of photographic verity. Adhering to this concept, I compose my images through my camera view finder, in ambient light without special film or equipment and without manipulating my subjects. But, it is not the subject, per se, but its state of being at a particular moment in time and its potential to evoke a wide range of viewer responses that interests me. It is the changing nature of the universe and all that is in it. It is the idea that Change is in the Nature of Things and that their endless permutations provide infinite possibilities for sensory and intellectual experience in every place, at every time, for every one to see something of what there is to be seen.
© Roland Dion, Photographer
619-462-4489
rjdion@home.com
www.geocities.com/paris/louvre/3816
As I do not have electronic imaging capabilities and cannot transmit them to you in that fashion, I am including titles, brief descriptions and comments about what these images say to me. This represents a departure from my usual approach. Ordinarily, I leave all interpretation to the viewer. Titles generally give no clue as to possible meaning of subject matter. In my previous Solo Show Titles were simply »I«, »II«, »III«....
TITLES AND DESCRIPTIONS
(Dimensions – in inches – include frames)
PARTITIONING KOSOVO (38 X 84)
Orange/gold and blue triptych. Nothing literal here. Highly abstract. Amorphous shapes of many shades and tints. The left panel is divided by heavy, dark lines separating the image into segments that seem to prohibit unification. Other panels seem to await some kind of division, but are, in any case, divided within themselves by large color masses and from the others by their mats and frames and the spaces between them. The triptych is designed to be viewed as a single unit.
The colors evoke something mystical, ethereal, spiritual.
I cannot look at this set of images without thinking of Kosovo’s rich mineral assets and the eagerness with which the victors will attempt to seize this prize.
DANUBE CROSSING (28×38)
A high contrast, complex organic form with strong major shapes and subtle variations vaguely suggestive of a male/female human figure and dark watery depths.
Viewing it, one may wonder: Who are they, Where arethey now? What happened here? Why does everything looklike this? Will their descent cease and will they again rise? – among my most compelling and exciting images. It is scary and provocative.
I think this MUST hang in my living room.
RAMBOUILLET – APPENDIX B (28×38)
Soft red monochrome dominated by a dark, threatening shape suspended midway between the upper region (from which it may have descended) just above a pale gray rectilinear shape that stands uncertainly in defiance of the dominant force that threatens to render it asunder. Nearby, o its side, separated and almost rather neglected, is a similarly shaped and colored form, which is larger, more assertive but only partially visible – this, I see as the infamous Appendix B.
NOT A RED CENT – NEW WORLD ORDER (38×28)
This could be, but is not, a space shot of the planet Mars. A small white, bright circular form is one of the primary focal points. To its side, a large pink void into, or from, which it may move. Supported on a background Vibrant Scarlet Red, Pink, Gray and Brown irregular masses course about the central subject which shows much evidence of physicalabrasion and reworking.
Its a new world order I see herein. But it is an order that comes about with violence and bloodshed, turmoil and distress. Everything within the image takes place in two dimensions. There is little, if any, sense of depth. Order imposed upon a flat surface without consideration for the natural terrain, its people, their culture, history, experience, needs and values.
DEPLETED URANIUM BUNKER BUSTER (20×27)
A curious blending of surrealistic suggestions with a disturbingly literal image of two strands of rope pulled taunt through a pierced hole in something that could have been steel armor. The area around the opening appears to have melted andsplattered under intense heat. Colors: Silver graycircular form surrounded by a marvelously ephemeral, unnatural green background – all undefined mist. All supported on a strong, rust colored horizontal.
MARIJA’S FORGOTTEN DREAM (18×20)
The smallest image (7×11). A lovely thing – an impressionists version of warm summer light falling on an orchard of flowering plum trees. Evening. Vibrant Rose on the left shifts tosomber central purples and finally blend into teal greens on the right edge. Landscape suggested by a horizontal band covering lower sixth of image. Dreamy.
STEALTH (27×20)
How Could It Have Been Invisible? (Something here got Busted – Badly Busted) Mostly gray and white. Hard edged. Behind this violation is a poorly defined something. It is an orange something, something uncertain, indistinguishable, separate and apart from the principle object – an unknown quantity occupying a minor portion of the image. Is it important? It is something of a contradiction somehow glowing with a fiery intensity beyond the wreck.
NATIONAL FINALE (35×27)
Red, minor areas of black, yellow and gray. This could be, but is not, the Albanian Flag (distorted). It conveys for me a sense of disorganization, contortion, chaos. It seems to reach out in several directions, either expanding or contracting. Fortunately, it is safely contained within the mat and frame of this photograph. However, one cannot be sure that it will remain within its boundaries – within the frame and mat but expanding into additional areas of the image.
AIR WATER EARTH AND PETROCHEMICALS (27×37)
Fluid forms (such as oil slicks on the surface of a water). Also suggestive or a raging storm’s aftermath. For the moment it is suspended animation. Its beauty belying its potential morbidity. (Marine Blues, Soft Grayed Reds)
CIVILIAN INFRASTRUCTURE (27×37)
Gray, white & beige collage type composition suggestive of fragmented materia rent by sudden force. There is form and the probability of some formerfunction now rendered non-functional. Different thanany of the other images. This is (or was) the productof man; not nature. Sharp edges, clearly defined boundaries, nothing organic here, no blurring of colors or shapes – each exists distinct from theothers but related spatially and chromatically.
UNDER THE BLACK RAIN (27×37)
A series of dark blue/black splotches (clouds?) gathers from the upper right and travels across the image toward a smallish struggling rose something (could it be the sun? the moon?). Below, there is the remnant of something that might be, or might have been, a field, now scorched and scoured by furrows. Farmers did not do this!
24 MARTA, 1999 (37×27)
This piece evokes for me a sense of impending and immediate violence, a veritable Avenging Angel, A War Hawk in full flight, talons bared, tearing through space into and against the entirety. Its effects clearly visible in all directions where havoc has already been wrought. Its energy is uncurbed. Its violence unparalleled (Pale Blues and Rust on White ground).
HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION (27×20)
Across a pink field is a color swath of diluted Red. These scars will not heal.
NIGHTS IN BELGRADE (27×20)
A vaguely suggested landscape across the lower eighth of this vertical image lies beneath a surrealistic sky of wine Red punctured by bursts of white forms each of which are encircled by irregular black masses. Does this have anything to do with bursting bombs?
DISSIDENT VIEW (27×20)
(Could this be a sailboat on a stormy sea?) Its a wreck of an image in rust and turquoise. Its nothing, but it is a powerful nothing. An enigma – at once peaceful and turbulent, serene but threatening. It is all motion, yet it stands, for the moment quite still.
Dear Friends,
I will appreciate hearing of your reactions and receiving any suggestions you may have for future exhibits.
Kindest Good Wishes,
Roland Dion
San Diego CA
* * *
127. To YSA September 06, 1999
I corresponded with your association as part of my anti-war activism during the bombing. Since that time I have become involved with an effort to publish a special issue of Reflections, a peer-reviewed social work journal which will be seeking narratives according to the call I will send in a following message.
Do you have a mechanism which could possibly forward the call (which I will forward under separate cover) to your members? I am hoping that some of them will themselves be interested in contributing or know social workers or relief or human rights or peace workers who would be interested in contributing.
Michael A. Dover
Ph.D. Candidate, Social Work and Sociology
University of Michigan, 1080 S. University Ave.
Ann Arbor MI 48109-1106
(734)623-9484, mdover@umich.edu
* * *
128. To YSA September 08, 1999
Dear Friends at the YSA,
Apparently, it takes someone from outside the US sphere of influence to clarify what has been quite obscure for me.
I was particularly struck with Amin’s commentary [Samir Amin: »Democracy Against Hegemony«, Al-Ahram Weekly, 22-28 April 1999, Issue No. 426] about Friedman’s NYT article and his role as Albright’s advisor. Amin’s statement about the manipulation of the media addresses the problem that has vexed us for some time: the uniformity and one-sidedness of the US media. Amin’s syntax makes for some problematic reading, as does his implicit assumptions. I found I had to read and reread this very carefully to uncover all he says.
With Kindest Regards to You and Your Colleagues,
Roland Dion
San Diego CA
* * *
129. To Mr. Michael A. Dover September 12, 1999
Dear Mr. Dover,
Thank you very much for your call to take a contribution in a special issue of Reflections. We electronically forwarded your message to our colleagues from Department of Sociology (Faculty of Philosophy). Some of them will contact you during the next week. Also, we printed your call and sent in to our colleagues from Department of Social Work at the Faculty of Political Sciences.
[...]
Looking forward to improve our professional cooperation,
With best wishes,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
130. To YSA September 17, 1999
Dear Friends,
The attachment refers to a letter writing campaign of great importance. I hope you will join this effort to pressure the ICTY to prosecute all War Crimes – not just those chosen by the Great Powers.
Sincerely Yours,
Roland Dion
San Diego CA
**************************************************************************
ACTION ALERT!
Write to New Prosecutor of International Criminal Tribunal
»The Truth About Yugoslavia is Getting Out«
On Sept 15, 1999 a new federal prosecutor will head the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). It is important for her to understand from day one that the truth about Yugoslavia is getting out and the Hague Tribunal will not be able to continue it’s persecution (not prosecution) of Serbs. I am spearheading a letter writing campaign to incoming head Judge Carla Del Ponte. I would appreciate it if you would post on your web site the address and my request for the well informed throughout the world write a letter this week to Justice Del Ponte. Let her know that there are people who have found the truth and that we will be watching her. It would be a major statement if we could inundate her with mail upon her arrival.
Justice Carla Del Ponte
Churchillplein 1
2517 JW The Hague
PO Box 13888
2501 EW The Hague, Netherlands
The Yugoslav Sociological Association
Documentation
SELECTED CORRESPONDENCE concearning the NATO Agression on the FR Yugoslavia
1. To YSA May 07, 1999
Thank you for your e-mail of 29 April. You have all my sympathy for what is happening in Belgrade and elsewhere in Yugoslavia. But how can you say these things and not even refer to what is going on in Kosovo? We all want to bring the war to an end, but the Serbian leadership, which is responsible for these atrocities, must play a full part in doing so.
Anthony Giddens
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2. To Prof. Anthony Giddens May 11, 1999
Dear Prof. Giddens,
Thank you for your reply and for your sympathy. We accept your objection – partly though; the article to which you refer is On Belgrade. So far we have sent various letters; in some of them we have offered our view of solving the Kosovo crisis. Finally, we don’t have influence on the Serbian leadership at all.
We hope we’ll stay in touch.
You can expect some further information from us.
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Karel Turza, Mladen Lazić and Sreten Vujović
P.S. We are sending you again copy of the statement of YSA [of April 19], because we are not sure that you have already received it.
* * *
3. To YSA May 13, 1999
Dear Professor Molnar and Colleagues,
Thank you for your email of 11 May. No, I hadn’t seen the YSA statement previously. I would completely agree with the six points you make, plus the succeeding set of points. We must do all we can to bring this conflict to an end with these points of view. With best wishes to all of you.
Yours,
Anthony Giddens
* * *
4. To YSA May 19, 1999
Dear Colleagues:
I am most grateful for the set of documents I received from you today and hope you will continue to keep me and other sociologists in the USA informed on the Yugoslavian point of view. I was especially impressed by the five points in your proposal for ending this unfortunate conflict. It seems to me that they go beyond the demands of NATO with the exception of allowing for an international armed force which is necessary to enforce the conditions you suggest. The documents you sent are a strange assortment of new information (for me), misunderstandings, half-truths, untruths, and exaggerations. These are sometimes stated in a propagandistic sort of vocabulary which does not help the reader to understand your perspective. I am trying very hard to do that and there is nothing I (and I think most Americans and Europeans) would like more than to see this conflict ended as soon as possible.
If anyone wished, I could be more specific and could engage in a debate on particular points with which I differ, but I am not sure how useful that would be. Let me just say for now that I wish you well and I wish all of this would stop. I have a personal inquiry to make regarding a Yugoslav sociologist. Back in 1969 or 1970 (or thereabouts) I had the good fortune to be invited to Belgrade to present a lecture at the university. It was a most memorable and satisfactory experience for me but I have lost contact with the sociologist who was responsible for the invitation. [...]
Thank you,
Irwin Deutscher
* * *
5. To YSA May 19, 1999
Thank you very much for keeping me informed, though I wish your news were totally different. It’s so painful to hear what happens to you there and not only there.
People are irrational all around. Otherwise they would have already stopped this ordeal by now. I don’t like at all the official position of Romania which wants by all means to get into NATO. The majority of people don’t agree with the NATO aggression and with the parliament decision to allow the NATO planes to fly over our territory. The anti-USA feelings are quite strong here, too. People think that there must have been other means to punish Milošević.
I wish I could be optimistic hoping that it will end soon, but I fear that it might be just the opposite.
[…]
Irina Balta, National School of Political and Administrative Sciences,
Bucharest, Romania
* * *
6. To YSA May 19, 1999
Dear Colleagues:
I appreciate receiving your news and commentary, and share with heartfelt sadness your feelings about being caught up in a brutal and ugly war. I wish you the best in pressing your pursuit of peace. I also suggest that these positive efforts be separated from your criticism of NATO and the US. This is not to say that you are wrong in your views and analyses, only that such negativism is likely to be self-defeating.
Only peace brings peace. NATO and the US may indeed be misguided, or perhaps something more sinister is in the works. Nevertheless, you must love your enemy while forgiving his stupidity.
With best wishes,
Jay Weinstein, Professor of Sociology
Eastern Michigan University, USA
* * *
7. To YSA May 19, 1999
[…]
Right now, Yugoslavia is the issue which occupies most of my time. As a human being, as a Romanian and as a student (I am taking my Ph.D. in British foreign policy in East-Central Europe) I can not be but concerned about what happens in Yugoslavia. I considered from the very beginning NATO’s action as a tragic mistake which will result in the death of many hundreds of people and a humiliation for the alliance. What happens in Yugoslavia will remain in history as a turning point in the evolution of the international relations. By this aggression against a sovereign state, NATO, that is the main political actors in the world, have thrown to the dust bin the whole legal system created after 1945 (with the founding of the United Nations) and reconfirmed by the Helsinki Agreements three decades later. Some say that the system of »national sovereignty« was typical for the period of the Cold War which presented with a balance of power between USA an USSR. After the fall of USSR and the break of this equilibrium, some say we need a new system of international law. They forget that the principle they apply now to Yugoslavia, and called »the limited sovereignty« was invoked by the Soviet president Breznev in 1968 in order to excuse his repression of the »Spring Revolution« in Czechoslovakia. A reconfirmation of this principle is extremely dangerous and leads to arbitrary (as in the case of Yugoslavia). Who decides what is democratic and what is not? Who decides how should the borders of a country be drawn? The US? NATO? Those who are friends of the US or NATO members can get along with any kind of abuse (see Turkey massacring Kurds) or can deliver weapons to criminal regimes (British help for Burma’s regime), while in Yugoslavia, a »moral« question forces them to intervene. If the Americans can be excused, because they have always been ignorant regarding Balkan history and politics, I am bitterly disappointed with the position of France, and especially Britain. They had a duty to explain to their allies how things are going there. The whole settlement in Yugoslavia was created with the help and the blessing of the United Kingdom in 1945, and now they try to destroy exactly that settlement. I think it was a just settlement and its change would put the whole Balkan region on fire. What happens now is the beginning of the end for NATO. More and more NATO countries will refuse to stay in an alliance which, far from being a defensive one, has been transformed in an aggressor, in a world policeman. There are many things I would like to say about this. I will do it in the next messages. However I think that NATO will fail and the solution will be a diplomatic one in which both parties will have to accept a compromise which will leave Kosovo in its right place, that is, as part of Serbia. I can hardly imagine how horrible must be to live under the terror of endless bombings but at least I am with all my thoughts near you and all those who are going daily through that awful tragedy. The thought of what happens to people in Yugoslavia annoys me in the extreme and I had already several quarrels with my supervisor who has worked for NATO for 16 years and is now advisor of the Foreign Office for Central and Eastern Europe. But about this issue, about British attitude towards this conflict and about my opinion regarding Milošević, I will write next time. Don’t forget, whatever the tragedy, that there, outside the country, you and the Serbian people in general, have friends, many friends, friends who care and whose feelings will not be altered by bombs or by a mad propaganda. And even among your enemies, the resolve to continue the aggression is decreasing every day in spite of well orchestrated lies on radio and TV.
Sincerely yours,
Marius Floca, Ph.D. student in British foreign policy in East-Central Europe,
University of Oxford, UK
* * *
8. Za YSA Maj 20, 1999
Zdravo svima,
ja sam sociolog iz Beograda, a i ovde sam završila M.A. program iz društvenih nauka. Ovaj apel [New Appeal, May 14] je jako dobro napisan i ja to prosleđujem svima koje znam, a koji se bave bilo kojom društvenom naukom ili se prosto smatraju intelektualcima. Inače, neki od nas govore slično već duže vremena. Ja sam se stavila na raspolaganje International Action Centru (Ramsey Clark je u centru a ovde u San Francisku imaju ogranak) i trudimo se. Mislim da je krajnje vreme da sociolozi u Jugoslaviji malo ozbiljnije promisle kako se »stara« Jugoslavija raspala, šta se sada zbiva i šta se zbivalo u Bosni i Hrvatskoj. Takođe mislim da su saznanja što bliža istini daleko važnija nego da se naši sociolozi dokazuju »Zapadu« kao sposobni i »demokratski orijentisani«. Kako stvari stoje već duže vremena, mi ćemo biti potcenjivani ma koliko se trudili i to je nama ovde jasno. Neki naši ljudi koji su ovde završili fakultete i počeli duboko da veruju u ovdašnji obrazovni sistem i ovo što se ovde zove demokratija, doduše, bolje prolaze i možda će vam preneti drugačije utiske. Ipak, ja mislim da naš posao nije da u nešto verujemo već da istražujemo. I pored njihovih ličnih boljih iskustava oni bi valjda mogli da se zapitaju zašto oni koji dolaze sa B.A. izvan US imaju mnogo više poteškoća čak i da uđu na bilo koji Ph.D. program; o poslu i da ne govorimo. Možda njima nije significant kad ovdašnji predsednik u svome govoru kaže »I do not believe that the Serbs are any worse than we are, or that the Serbian newborn baby has any genocidal gene, do you?«, ali ja to nalazim veoma važnom i opasnom izjavom. Život i rad nekih od nas je ovde ispunjen stalnom borbom jer smo (ako nemamo B.A. odavde) na veoma suptilne načine, i pre ovog rata, bili omalovažavani i s vremena na vreme je jasno sugerisano da dolazimo iz zemlje u kojoj je demagogija dominirala obrazovanjem. Šta onda reći za United States gde deca završavaju srednju školu bez i jednog jedinog časa svetske istorije i gomilu koledža bez da mnogo pominju išta izvan ove zemlje? Ja sam ubeđena da se to radi namerno jer da su prosečni ljudi ovde bolje obrazovani o tome šta se zbiva u svetu bilo bi svakako više onih koji bi se pobunili protiv nebrojenih »humanitarnih« intervencija ove zemlje. Posle svih tih »humanitarnih« ratova, koji nisu ratovi nego uvek borba »good guys against bad guys« gde vrhovni sudija mora da interveniše, ova zemlja se održava kao jedina super-sila a decenijama posle njenih »humanitarnih misija« stanovništvo koje je bilo štićeno pati od misterioznih bolesti i neverovatnih defekata (pogledati i dan danas vijetnamske bolnice, iračku decu itd). Čak oko 90.000 američkih bivših vojnika je bolesno najviše zbog upotrebe osiromašenog uranijuma. Ni o njima niko ne haje, svi se prave ludi, a u mnogim situacijama im se ne daje ni zdravstveno osiguranje. Najbolje bi bilo da nestanu sa lica zemlje, misle oni koji su odgovorni, jer ti ljudi su ovde, na licu mesta, dokaz. Da ne dužim više o tome; drago mi je da smo u vezi pored sveg zla koje se nakupilo tamo i svuda oko nas. Čuvajte se koliko god je to moguće. Puno toplih pozdrava,
Milina Jovanović, sociolog
San Francisko, USA
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9. To YSA May 20, 1999
Dear Yugoslavian Sociologists:
I received your statement regarding the bombing of your country. I am also a sociologist and I sympathise with your cause. To help you in your cause I have disseminated your e-mail to my friends and I personally printed it and had it photocopied so I can distribute it to my colleagues here at the Department of Sociology, University of the Philippines, Diliman.
As a sociologist I know that we should stand up for political freedom and rights. So please continue your fight. Here in our country the American government is pressuring us to sign the Visiting Forces Agreement that will enable US Military forces to stay in our strategic places. But your condition is far worse. The media in our country ignore or even misrepresent what is really happening in your country. Your statement is a bit frightening, maddening, and I feel guilty for not condemning such inhuman actions.
Again, regards to all of you and may we all find peaceful solution to this madness!
Gerry Lanuza, Assistant Professor
Sociology Department, University of the Philippines
* * *
10. To YSA May 20, 1999
Hi,
Thanks for your information. I am interested in any further documents and information. I’d like to tell you I stand firmly with you and the Chinese Government.
Regards,
Yu Hai
[Professor at Sociology Department, at Fudan University, Shanghai, China, and
Visiting professor at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada]
* * *
11. To YSA May 20, 1999
Who is to be blamed for the Kosovo tragedy?
Sociology is the science that studies and explains the behaviour of people. Every sociologist should have foreseen what is now happening in Kosovo. After the tragedy occurred, they should have explained it. Since the sociologists are silent, I have undertaken to do the dirty work. The sociologists’ silence is not surprising. Presently there are thousands of sociologists throughout the world who have studied and are familiar with Robert Michels’ »iron law of oligarchy«. I know of not a single case where sociologists use their knowledge to turn against this oligarchy. When I addressed the sociologists’ discussion group and asked »who should lead society, illiterate politicians or educated sociologists?«, the educated sociologists kept silent. Illiterate politicians are ignorant while the problem with the educated sociologists is that they are not familiar with the concept of entropy. Let me explain: the growth of entropy is the growth of anarchy. The fall in entropy corresponds to mass repression and restoration of order. In a closed (thermodynamic) cycle, anarchy is necessarily followed by repression.
In my opinion, illiterate politicians are the first to be blamed for the Kosovo tragedy, and primarily Bill Clinton, President of the US. All he wants is to lead – as Michels said »the main thing is to lead!«. Whether it is good or bad leadership, does not matter.
In my work on social dynamics »Civil war, terrorism and gangs« (http: //www.israel.net/raikhlin) I indicated the cause of terrorism. It is simple: man is a herd animal and he needs the herd as much as he needs air to breathe. When the herd breaks down and the cohesion between people decreases (entropy grows), there will always be someone who instinctively feels it coming. This individual becomes aggressive because he hates everybody including himself. In a herd of dogs, a similar situation would lead to a fight as a result of which the strongest dog would seize power and re-establish order (decrease in entropy). Usually these are the specimens from the lowest level of social hierarchy, which gives rise to bandits and outcasts. They are followed by the more »intelligent« layer who are capable of formulating their own thoughts. What are the thoughts of these »intelligent« specimens? Not knowing the true source of their anger and aggressiveness, they accuse the surrounding society and its leaders for all thinkable and unthinkable sins. Their main request is freedom and independence. Give them freedom and independence and they will create their own oligarchy. This is how the request for autonomy of the Kosovo Albanians was born. Autonomy can later be turned into independence. The Albanians enforced their requests with armed fighting, neglecting to think about the consequences.
In the situation described here a conflict of interests arose between two oligarchies: the former oligarchy led by the Yugoslav President Milošević and the new Albanian one. Which side is right?
My characterisation of President Milošević is that he is »impotent«. Starting with the very beginning he did not exhibit a firm attitude and allowed the country to break down (growth of entropy). Now he represses the newly born dreams of the Albanians about autonomy (further growth of entropy).
It should be noted that there will always appear a third party to organise and support the terrorist movement in the country of the adversary, regardless of the slogans employed. Terrorism cannot last long without material and political support. Israel supported the Kurdish movement headed by Mustafa Barazani in Iraq. Later the US took this position. Syria supported the anti-Turkish actions of the Kurdish. The latter were a card in the hands of several countries. The Kurdish were beaten, poisoned with gas, but their leaders did not object to the fact that they were tricked. The Arab terrorism in Israel was supported by all Arab countries. Now NATO hurried to assist the Albanians. But what were the real motives of the NATO countries when they made of the case of the Albanians just another card game?
Since a long time the Serbs were under the protection of Russia. Unlike other Slavic brothers, their religion was the Orthodox religion and their writing Cyrillic, bringing them close to Russia. The latter always supported the Serbs in their fight for independence. To strike the Serbs meant striking Russia. Germany understood this well when she launched on World War I. The Austrian heir to the throne was killed in Sarajevo, but the war was declared to Russia. Yugoslavia’s independence under Tito and its separation from the Soviet bloc found sympathy in the NATO countries. Under Tito, Serbia was loved. The crash of the USSR and of its power changed the love for the Serbs into hate. The NATO paid back Russia for past threats through the Serbs . By attacking them, NATO proved that Russia had lost its power. The first instance in which NATO tested Russia was in the Bosnian war. Russian did not interfere leaving Bosnia to be consumed by NATO. As appetite grows during eating, the NATO countries started speaking about the freedom and the rights of the Albanians. Fuel was added to the Kosovo fire. The leaders of the Kosovo Albanians were inflamed and started fighting the government more actively than before. This is how the conflict developed.
Man is endowed with fear in order to make him prudent and prevent him from crossing the border of the permissible. Formerly western politicians were afraid of Russia. Everybody remembers that the Soviet army occupied the countries of the »socialist union« and what its functions were there. Hopefully Berlin, Budapest and Prague remember the Soviet tanks on their streets. These tanks could have easily crossed the borders and move westward. With the disappearance of Russia disappeared also the fear and prudence. The NATO countries led by the US took upon themselves the role of policemen of the world. What could be better than becoming a world oligarch! The main thing is to rule the world, whether well or badly, matters much less.
The weak ones are beaten, just like in animal nature, where there is order in biting and pecking. The crash of the USSR led to a new international pyramid and oligarchy on the top. The top of the pyramid is occupied by the US and the NATO countries. Those who can be beaten must be down below, but the question is »for how long?« Any agreement must be mutual in order to be observed. The NATO politicians believe that a »compromise« can be achieved by twisting the arms of both sides.
The Serbs and the Kosovo Albanians were made to sit around the table. The menu was prepared in the kitchen of NATO. It is hard to understand what were the ingredients and the recipe. However, it became clear that the Albanians participated in the discussions, which was in their favour. The losers were the Serbs, but this did not satisfy the cooks. NATO requested that their troops be allowed on the territory of Yugoslavia in order too »guarantee the agreement«. So the Soviet occupants in Europe were replaced by NATO occupants. The München agreement together with its guarantors led to the Second World War. No threat worked on President Milošević.
If one wants to climb a tree, one should think how to get off it. The characteristic feature of the large majority of illiterate politicians is that they did not take into account this simple fact. They are not capable of estimating the consequences. Having started with arm twisting, the leaders of NATO had no choice but to start breaking bones.
Both the UN and NATO were created out of fear from the Soviet power. The West talked constantly about peace and defence from aggression, about the rights of each country. Now there is no Soviet monster anymore and all the nice words are forgotten. All pacts and agreements have been trampled. Those who insisted on protecting peace launched the attack. This confirms the fact that all international agreements are useless pieces of paper as long as there is no mutual understanding between the parties. With no official declaration of war and against all its commitments, the NATO countries sent bombs and rockets into the skies of Yugoslavia. A war in the name of peace? A war in the name of humanity?
What happened was unexpected by NATO, as it often happens in wars. Three American soldiers were captured by the Serbs. They are threatened to be brought before a war tribunal and to be sentenced to death. But as war was not declared, the soldiers are not war prisoners, but sooner spies and saboteurs. The US had to be reminded of those international agreements that they had trampled. Astonishing psychological make up of the US president! Had he declared war to Yugoslavia, the soldiers’ lives could have been saved as war prisoners. But Bill Clinton does not wish to save the lives of his soldiers; instead he prefers to threaten Yugoslavia. Had he become familiar with my work, Clinton would know that the leader is responsible for all. The blood of those soldiers is on the hands of the Supreme Commander.
The unexpected happened. Three journalists from the NATO countries were captured on the territory of Yugoslavia while these same countries were attacking it.
When Italian dictator Benito Mussolini decided to occupy Albania, a simple and quiet way was suggested to him: poison the king and the new leader will join Italy of his own accord. But Mussolini was not satisfied; he wanted a war, victory and triumphal march on a white horse into the conquered country. Triumphal laurels are also what US President Bill Clinton dreamt about. He wanted revenge after being battered because of Monica Lewinsky. He saw his chance in using the obstination of the Serbs.
But about the NATO unionists? Are they not capable of thinking reasonably? So it seems. »Collective thinking« is when the female meets a purely bred male and stops thinking; she offers herself to him without thinking of the consequences. This type of thinking is characteristic for the »intellectual layer, the illiterate politicians included.« I should like to address Mr. Tony Blair, the Prime Minister of Britain. I wonder if he realises that by shattering the traditions of his country he demoralises his people and destroys his country. But this did not satisfy him, he had to go onto Yugoslavia.
I am addressing the Foreign Minister of Germany, Joschka Fischer. He is portrayed in my work Civil war, terrorism and gangs where I indicated that all »green« and pacifist people are golems. Their slogans are no more than cover ups for their hate towards their country and their people. He, a pacifist, is one of those who started this war which could become a world-wide conflict. Now you want to fill the Germany with Albanian refugees. That will only lead to more anarchy in Germany and to demoralisation.
Wars are intended to annihilate the adversary, not just defeat him. Moral rules disappear during wars. What sustains the combating parties is the fear from a stronger adversary. This is a truth that politicians should remember.
What does the government do when during war the population behind the lines is hostile? It represses that population (entropy falls). Examples are the concentration camps for the Japanese established by the US during the Second World War, the millions of Germans expelled from their places of birth during and after World War II from Poland, Czechoslovakia and even from the German town Königsberg. This is what the Yugoslav government did to the Kosovo Albanians; long rows of refugees crossed the borders to the neighbouring countries. The Kosovo Albanians paid a heavy price for the games of the politicians, both their own and those of NATO. The Israeli television broadcasted an interview with a Serb and an Albanian. The Serb told about how following the war against the Turks, the latter populated Kosovo with Albanians. The Albanian (a poet) spoke about the necessity of ruthless fighting against the Serbs, fighting for freedom regardless of the price to be paid! The interviewer repeated the question »regardless of the price?« and the Albanian said »Yes!«.
The question is what results did the NATO leaders expect when they started the »humanitarian« military actions. It is astonishing that they did not consider the consequences. Do they want to wipe Yugoslavia off the face of the Earth? The echoes of these consequences will reverberate through the world for a long time to come, only confirming my thesis that the world is led by illiterate politicians.
How did Russia react to the NATO aggression? Wasn’t she the reason for fighting the Serbs? Russia declared firmly through the voice of her Prime Minister: » We shall not be driven into the war«. Translating the diplomatic language into plain language, this means »you may beat the Serbs, that’s not our business«. Russia has been humiliated but the rich aggressors paid her 4.8 billion dollars!
Kosovo is the general rehearsal of what could happen in Israel tomorrow. As I said in the beginning, in a closed cycle, anarchy is always followed by repression. This is an iron law of nature that cannot be changed. The party that starts repression and restores order is the one that gains.
The impotence of Israeli leaders has created in our country a situation close to anarchy, similar to Yugoslavia or even worse. The Arabs’ talks about autonomy ended in their preparations for the declaration of the Palestinian State. They are in a continuous process of arming themselves and tomorrow they will turn for military help to the »Arab brother states«. It is generally known that all peace talks end in wars. Will the Israeli government act like the Yugoslav government and expel the Arabs from Israel? Or perhaps is our government waiting to see Jews streaming out of their country? Will the peace fighters and humanists bomb Israel? None of our illiterate politicians is capable of answering that question.
I ask our politicians why do we have to pay for the narrow-mindedness of the NATO leaders? Why do we have to assist the Albanians? Let that problem be solved by those who created it.
The leader of the Israeli Labour party expressed his solidarity with the US President Bill Clinton. (I would like to point out that wars are usually fought by socialists or national-socialists). This is additional evidence that Israeli leaders act according to »collective thinking«; they do not reason on their own.
Raddai Raikhlin Ph.D.
9, Hassidei Umot HaOlam St.,
Haifa, Israel, 32985
* * *
12. To YSA May 21, 1999
Dear members of the Yugoslavian Sociological Association
I am a member of the Greek sociological association and got your e-newsletter about the terrible atrocities committed by NATO to Serbia. Universities and schools are the only buildings not yet hit by these barbarian criminals who will soon pay for their crimes.
In Greece we admire Serbian people you have to believe that and small kids here make Serbs their heroes. [...]
Thank you in advance and we all here pray for peace in Serbia.
Yours sincerely
Nikos Gousgounis, Sociologist Ph.D.
13. To YSA May 20, 1999
Gone are the dreams of the maniacs a sociologist’s notes
I have been waiting for some hint in the media or in the writings of sociologists and psychologists concerning the outstanding event in the history of mankind that we are now witnessing. I couldn’t find any such hint. Contrarily, I have observed a trend to diminish the importance of what is happening. Perhaps this is the reason for the silence. I am assuming the role of herald. I hope to find support between in the media that so boast with their openness.
We have been witnesses to a remarkable event – the 50th anniversary of the NATO block. For the first time in the long history of mankind, a »World Oligarchy« was created.
This was formally announced in the Washington ceremony. The world has returned to the imperialist politics of gun-boats with the only difference that today there is a single and sole world policeman represented by NATO.
I shall not dwell here on the military and other aspects of this event (its consequences are there to stay for a very long time). What I would like to do is attract the attention of sociologists to the fact that the outcome could be foreseen. In my work on social dynamics I attempted to sketch a pyramid of world hierarchy but did not complete it because it exceeded the frame of my topic »Civil War, Terrorism and Gangs«.
The same old »Iron law of oligarchy« of Robert Michels lies at the basis of world oligarchy. An international oligarchy was formed after the fall of the USSR. I shall draw a few historical analogies in order to throw light on the pattern and inevitability of event and its consequences.
Compare the words about peace and democracy uttered at the NATO ceremony in Washington with the slogans of the Jacobins or the Bolsheviks when they seized power. As if nothing has changed in 100-200 years! Tyranny and terror lurk behind demagogic speeches about freedom and peace. The war against Yugoslavia is a clear example of materialisation of NATO demagogy.
Let us return to the »Iron law of oligarchy«. It follows from the law that oligarchy uses the organisation that it rules for its personal objectives. The question arises: »what are the criteria that guide the international policeman in its punitive actions?« It seems to me that a more accurate name for this organisation today is Mafia.
The whole concept of world policeman is based on NATO’s significant superiority in the field of armament. This concept failed in Vietnam as it did in Afghanistan. For more than a month NATO has been subjecting Yugoslavia to massive bombing with unexpected and negative results for NATO. As a result, the Serbs chased the Albanians from Kosovo. These Albanians will never return to miserable Kosovo out of their own free will. They don’t need it any more. So how can the NATO strategists explain what has happened? Are they capable of giving up their policy? No and no. They will not admit their stupidity. They accuse only Yugoslav President Milošević for all their sins. I join Mr. Slobodan Milošević and offer myself for accepting part of the blame. In my work »Civil War, Terrorism and Gangs« I explained the roots of conflicts. It is important that the policemen understand them.
Some of my opponents consider that my writing is »too political«. I do not collect signatures for or against General Pinochet, but I cannot see Sociology without political involvement especially when it concerns the role and behaviour of the ruler.
The following is a classification of rulers.
Ruler
Nature of leadership
Society
Charismatic
Consolidates society by means of religion and reprisals.
Stalinist dictatorship
Optimal
Optimal leadership
Optimal society
Anarchist
Tramples morality and laws thereby destroying society.
Anarchy
Impotent
Thirsty of power but incapable of ruling.
Before constructing this table I looked up the word »impotent« in the dictionary. The word »impotent« gives an accurate description of the stereotype. The impotent is thirsty for power but cannot rule. Anarchists, as defined in Sociology textbooks, are those who are not capable of restraining themselves, lack discipline and do not think about the consequences of their actions. When such people become leaders, the consequences can be disastrous.
Should anyone disagree with my assessment of leaders, Israeli courts offer the possibility to disprove my viewpoint. For example, US President Bill Clinton whom I consider anarchist and amoral, could use the rights accorded by Israeli law. He will not do it. Just like Israeli President Ezer Weizmann did not do it.
I noted several times before that as a rule, politicians are not capable of thinking properly nor of working. How many of them are familiar with the work of Robert Michels? Do they know anything about social dynamics?
Can they foresee the results of their actions? No, no and no. Guided solely by their ambitions, they do not image the awful consequences their acts can have for society. Do NATO leaders think that they will keep ruling the world? They have already stimulated the arms race and a re-evaluation of strategies in all countries processing nuclear power.
All this is intended to stop the NATO hegemony. NATO’s brainless politicians lead us to war and confrontation between military blocks. Russia has announced that it has a right to strike with a preventive atomic blow. China and India have not yet made the announcement but this only means that they tacitly agreed with Russia. Georgia is preparing the end of its conflict with Abkazia using NATO methods. Hence its desire to get nearer to NATO.
The Serbs could live in peace with the Albanians just like Israelis and Arabs could live in peace. Partnership is much more worthwhile than enmity. However, the Albanians have become the card played by the policeman for proving his right to rule the world.
R. Raikhlin Ph.D.
9, Hassidei Umot HaOlam St.,
Haifa, Israel, 32985
14. To YSA May 21, 1999
Dear Colleague,
Since you sent out this mailing, you must have wanted a response. I find it strange that in all your comments there is no reflection on your and your compatriots’ responsibility for this mess. Milošević is clearly the despot Canetti had in mind when he described his essence as someone who wants to outlast everyone. You make no mention of the way Yugoslav forces created over half a million refugees in a matter of weeks, literally cleaning out Kosovo, nor of the way Milošević has ruined Yugoslavia, former and current. What rains down on you now is what you caused to rain down on so many other old bridges, towns, civilisations, lives, in the FRY. This situation is a colossal nightmare no one inside and outside the FRY with a brain or a heart could wish. But it seems to me the best way to stop it would be for forces within Serbia to do something about it, and you might start with getting rid of your present criminal government. No amount of arguments will persuade anyone that it is anything but criminal. And those who treat it as anything but criminal are complicit in the crime. Milošević refused a negotiated settlement more than once and has shown since that any diplomatic resolution will only be seized to consolidate his hold and continue his policies. It is hard to go against the grain of nationalist sentiment in crisis conditions, but there are other bonds than national ones and memories of a common human history that ought to outweigh them. It is not only Belgrade that is the world. Sarajevo too once was. And even the little towns of Kosovo.
Stephen Schecter
Professeur, Département de sociologie
Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada
* * *
15. To YSA May 21, 1999
Dear friends from YSA,
Thanks indeed for your letter and the really useful information in it. We are really interested to receive further statements from your Association and develop mutual communication. We are fully aware that NATO response to inadequate inter-ethnic (if that is the case) policies of the regime in Belgrade is thoroughly inadequate. We do need objective data and profound analyses on the lasting Yugoslav crises which deeply concerns us, the Balkan people.
With best regards,
Free Information and Civic Participation Societies,
Sofia, Bulgaria
16. To YSA May 22, 1999
Dear Colleague:
I already distributed your statements to other faculty members of my Department here at the Department of Sociology, University of the Philippines, Diliman. Our Chairman, Prof. Luzviminda Valencia wanted to organise a meeting on the issue. Can you send your statements to socfclty@Mindgate.net? This is the e-mail of the Department of Sociology. I would also like to ask for further information on the issue!
Again, I express my solidarity for your cause.
Gerry Lanuza, Assistant Professor, Sociology Department,
University of the Philippines, Diliman Quezon City, Philippines
* * *
17. To YSA May 22, 1999
Dear friends,
I’m a History student from the University of Costa Rica and a silent member of the Tarkovsky list (although not silent otherwise). I’m really interested in getting continuous and extensive information on what’s going on in Yugoslavia.
Latin America has many times seen the consequences of the US megalomania and authoritarianism, and this proves to be another case of exchanging human rights for the legitimacy of power and economic interests.
I had the pleasure to meet both a Croatian girl and a Serbian guy from Belgrade (immigrants from Sarajevo where he lost his parents) and feel very close to the situation in your country although I’m miles away in many ways.
Also I do a radio show called »Voices from the Third World«, where we talk toward these types of topics (because as you can imagine press around here is totally one-sided), and we usually don’t talk much about entirely European affairs (as we do talk about European and US affairs in other places), but this time it’s a necessity.
So I would appreciate if you could send me material or direct me to any particular mailing list or web page or any resource for facts and opinions about the current crisis.
Thanks in advance,
Antonio Jara
* * *
18. To YSA May 22, 1999
[…]
Unfortunately the news I got are not very good. According to my professor, whose official position I mentioned in my last message, NATO will continue the bombardments by extending the targets to all those facilities without which the economic life of Yugoslavia would be gravely disrupted (communications centers, power stations, archives, bridges, and official buildings). He told me that this was an option taken into consideration from the beginning of the war.
[...] The anti-Serbian propaganda becomes here more fierce every hour. It is the only way whereby they can keep public opinion in a supportive mood towards these savage bombardments.
I am, in general, a very peaceful person. But in this case, were I a Yugoslav leader, I would have no mercy. The three American thugs you took prisoners cannot be considered POWs because, according to US, NATO is not at war with Yugoslavia. That is why they did not break, at the beginning of the conflict, their diplomatic relations with Yugoslavia. If there is no war, there can’t be any POWs. Therefore the Convention of Geneva does not apply. As regards their position as UN peace keepers, it isn’t even worth discussing it. That UN mission ceased months ago. Therefore these soldiers should have been placed on the two bridges of Novi Sad. I doubt the Americans would have destroyed them. If they have no mercy towards the Serbian civilians, why should the Serbs have mercy for US soldiers? The missiles which destroyed the two government buildings might have missed their target with a few meters. It would have been even a greater tragedy. I can only hope that the Serbian people will not surrender, and, in spite of this permanent terror, they will win this war, which is primarily a war of nerves. The number of those opposing the bombardments is increasing every day in spite of the fact that western televisions refuse to show the dreadful effects of these attacks on the life of people in Yugoslavia. Meanwhile they »bombard« us with news from Kosovo. They believe everything the Albanians refugees say, and doubt any news coming from Belgrade. Though Britain is one of the most important aggressors, I think (as a student in international relations) that your main enemies (in this war and in general) are the US and Germany. It is not a secret that the KLA is funded not only by the Albanian emigrants from Germany but also by the German authorities. For US things are more simple: Yugoslavia is the place were they can drop their stocks of missiles while using the conflict in order to reassert their influence on their increasingly reluctant European partners within NATO. I want to thank you for keeping me informed with the events in Belgrade and with the tragedy through which you pass every day. I do believe that this war will result in a humiliation for the aggressors and Yugoslavia will remain intact with an autonomous Kosovo. Nevertheless this conflict is shaking the bases of the world system. As one Romanian journalist put it: »After Yugoslavia nothing will be like before«. In Bucharest and Timisoara there have been almost daily demonstrations of support for the Serbian people. The authorities are very cautious because of their objective of seeing Romania in NATO.
But they can not hide the feeling of the Romanians. And the quasi-unanimity of the Romanians are besides their Serbian friends. As one Romanian statesman said: »Throughout our entire history we had only two good and faithful neighbors: Yugoslavia and the Black Sea«.
[...]
Marius Floca, PhD student in British foreign policy in East-Central Europe,
University of Oxford, UK
19. To Prof. Stephen Schecter May 25, 1999
Dear Colleague,
The Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association wants to thank you for your quick response.
We appreciate the efforts you made to give us your opinion on the statements of the Yugoslav Sociological Association. We would like to inform/remind you that Yugoslav sociologists have been among the sharpest critics of the current regime in the past ten years. Many of them participated in and organised civil and student protests in 1991, 1992, 1996/97, 1998. […] You can find further information on these activities in our periodical Sociologija (Sociology) No. 1/1997 and No. 4/1998. If you are interested in the topic we would be glad to supply you with a couple of articles via E mail.
We assure you that we strongly condemn all repression and actions taken by paramilitary organisation against people in Kosovo. We are prepared to do anything within our power to establish, promote, and build civil society, ethnic tolerance and cultural diversity. Our statements are not intended to give a full scientific explanation of the current events in Yugoslavia. We are doing this as our contribution to stopping the NATO bombing.
With best wishes to you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
P.S. Sorry for being late. We have a lot of problems with electricity, which makes it quite difficult for us to keep you updated on the latest developments here. The continuing attacks on Yugoslavia have taken an extremely dangerous direction. Over the past days, instead of just disabling electrical power plants NATO missiles have begun to destroy them completely. Thus the repeated blackouts of Yugoslavia are increasingly likely to become permanent.
* * *
20. To. YSA May 25, 1999
Dear Colleagues!
Thank you very much for your information. And we are interested to receive further statements from your Association. A friend of mine is editor of a sociological newspaper in St. Petersburg. If you agree we can publish your paper. Please send us the history of your Association. We surely can help you, if you need information from us (our Sociological Association).
My very best regards to you [...]
Professor S. A. Kugel
SPB School of Sociology Science and Technique, St Petersburg, Russia
21. To YSA May 25, 1999
Your statements and your beliefs about imperialist NATO convinces me that there are no innocent civilian population just as in Nazi Germany they believed Jews and all other inferiors were responsible for all their problems. Shame on all you so called intellectuals! As a veteran of the 8th Air Force from late 1942 to early 1945, it makes me long for the good old days of saturation bombing.
Paul Laven
* * *
22. To Prof. Jay Weinstein May 25, 1999
Dear Prof. Weinstein,
Thank you for your message. We are glad to be in communication with you.
[...]
We share your opinion that the decision to bomb FRY was wrong. We are convinced that a lasting and just solution of the conflict is now much farther away than before the bombing started. At the same time we strongly condemn all repression and actions taken by paramilitary organisation against people in Kosovo. We are prepared to do anything within our power to establish, promote, and build civil society, ethnic tolerance and cultural diversity. Our statements are not intended to give a full scientific explanation of the current events in Yugoslavia. We are doing this as our contribution to stopping the NATO bombing.
[...] We must do all we can to bring Kosovo conflict to an end.
With best wishes to you,
On behalf of the Presidency of the Yugoslav Sociological Association
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović and Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
23. Pour prof. Pierre Bourdieu Mai 26, 1999
Monsieur le professeur Pierre Bourdieu
Tres respecte Monsieur,
Ce n’est que maintenent, apres une recherche prolongee, que nous avons enfin reussi de nous procurer de votre e-mail adresse. En esperant bien que vous allez nous pardonner ce retard qui n’est du qu’aux circonstances exceptionelles ou nous vivons ces derniers mois, nous voudrions simplement vous prevenir que la lettre signee par vous et vos collegues et publiee dans le »Monde« du 31 mars nous a encourage de persister dans nos effort de presenter a la communaute internationale des sociologues quelques faits relatifs a l’absurdite du bombardement de notre pays.
Notre ambition, bien sur, n’est pas d’elaborer d’ores et deja une analyse profonde sur les causes – externes aussi bien qu’internes – de cette guerre dont on n’entrevoit ni le sens ni la fin. Le but de nos communications que vous trouverez ci-joints n’est que de mettre a la disposition de nos confreres dans le monde entier le fait tres simple qu’au lieu de prevenir la catastrophe humanitaire cette campagne destructrice ne produit que les souffrances inouies des millions d’hommes, femmes et enfants, sans egard aux leur origine etnique et attitudes politique. Nous, en sociologues, nous savons tres bien mesurer les »inputs« et les »outputs« des actions humaines, surtout quand il s’agit de la violence pur et simple de tous les cotes...
En admirant une fois encore votre lucidite et en vous remerciant de nouveau de votre solidarite, veillez agreer, cher Collegue, les expressions de notre amitie.
Presidence de l’Association yougoslave des sociologues
Aleksandar Molnar, Aljoša Mimica, Anđelka Milić, Karel Turza, Ljubinko Pušić, Marija Bogdanović, Mladen Lazić, Sreten Vujović et Vladimir Vuletić
* * *
24. To YSA May 27, 1999
Dear Mr./Ms. President,
I am currently taking my MA in Sociology at the University of the Philippines. I got hold of your recent statements about the NATO attacks on Yugoslavia and I would say that I sympathise with the YSA’s sentiments.
Thus, I would like to request copies of the statements so I could send them to my colleagues. It is a pity that I could not do anything as an individual, but collectively, I hope that we could influence the future decisions about your country’s plight.
Best of luck in your current endeavours.
God Bless,
Shella Quezada-Zagada
MA Student in Sociology at the University of the
Philippines, Diliman Quezon City, Philippines
* * *
25. To YSA May 28, 1999
Dear Colleagues:
Thank you for your response. I am glad to know that my message to you was received under what must be nearly impossible circumstances.
Have you heard or done anything about establishing some kind of international forum of concerned sociologists to consider what we might do about the situation in your country and region? I would certainly be willing to join in, and could contact some close friends in Albania who are also sociologists (and others as well).
I realise that this may be very impractical, but a meeting at the 34th World Congress of Sociology, being held in July in Tel Aviv, would be an appropriate site.
I await your feedback on this matter.
Jay Weinstein, Professor of Sociology
Eastern Michigan University, USA
* * *
26. To YSA May 29, 1999
This a terrible state of affairs which you report. It must surely be brought to an end. Why do Serbs tolerate a government which has practised ethnic cleansing on Croatians, Bosnians, and now Kosovars? Rid yourselves of this indicted war criminal who runs your country and let the rest of the world heave a sigh of relief as a civilised society returns to Yugoslavia.
Irwin Deutscher
* * *
The fax # listed for the ICTY is +31(70)416-5355.
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