I have just left my T.V. set after seeing the firing of one of the capital cities of Europe, Belgrade. My God, what have we done? Nazis in WWII did not allow such devestation of capital cities. Have we become mad to allow this to happen in the name of a punk president who puts all behind his own sucess? Shame, Shame on all of us to allow this. I wish I knew how to protest other than writing stupid letters. Shame. Bill in South Carolina

-- Bill Solorzano (notaclue@webtv.net), April 02, 1999

Answers

Grow up. Shit happens. War is nothing new. Stop blaming Clinton when so many others are involved in calling the shots. Stop assuming you know the full picture. Milosevic is a madman. Both of his parents committed suicide. His army is systematically exterminating humans. We asked him to stop. He refused. We told him to stop. He refused. We said "stop, or we'll rain bombs on you". He still refused. What are we supposed to do then? Apologize for even bothering him?

Remember Hitler? Should we sit idly by as Neville Chamberland did? If it were up to you armchair quarterbacks, Iraq would have nuclear warheads capable of reaching US cities by now. What is it about these painful realities that you fail to comprehend?

I have read dozens of opinions of this latest "war". Almost all are against the action. All I'm saying is that this situation is not as simple as it looks. Of course there are hidden agendas. There always are. The bigger question is can we make lemonade from this military lemon?

-- y2k con (a@b.c), April 02, 1999.

I am no fan of our involvment in that mess over there.

But... what have we done? (and I mean WE, not NATO which is a worthless construct anymore). We struck one (1) building in Belgrade. That's what the news shows show. We have, by hitting one and only one building, shown that twit over there that HE is not safe personally. Perhaps our three give away pawns will not suffer too harshly now.

-- art welling (artw@lancnews.infi.net), April 02, 1999.

It seems that Bill Clinton and the rest of the NATO (U.N.) forces have made more refugees out of more people than any of the other Slovak leaders have ever done. Way to go Bill! Of course he is sitting in his big little ol' white house, well fed, watered and with his own passport and ID papers still intact. These refugess can't even prove where they used to live.

-- Laurane (familyties@rttinc.com), April 02, 1999.

I still think if the leaders of the world had to be the first to go into the conflicts, there would be a lot less war.

-- Linda A. (adahi@muhlon.com), April 02, 1999.

Here, here! I second the motion. Equip them all with a rifle, a few grenades, and a helmet, and ship their happy governmental butts over there pronto. Shall they beat their swords into plowshares then, ya think?

-- Donna Barthuley (moment@pacbell.net), April 02, 1999.

We've actually hit a lot of roads, monasteries, hospitals, residential areas. We've killed at least 8 REFUGEES by bombing, and countless Serbian civilians. Countless because there's a "news blackout." "Only one building" is utter b.s.. 2000 people there died before the bombing, on both sides. Are more people going to get killed as a result of our invasion, or less? Are they caving in, or, as their history suggests, will they fight -down and dirty- to the last man? We want to get "stuck" there, with ground troops, to secure the new NATO countries to the North, to secure new oil fields and pipelines, to check any Russian resurgence in the future. We're destroying their power system with EMP weapons. We're there to stay, and in addition to slaughtering a lot of Serbs, a river of American blood will be spilled. You squawk "Milosevic is a demon!" Well, he's a pretty popular demon now. Before our bombs started raining down on them, the Serbians were getting pretty sick of him. Now he's a hero. This is bullshit, and you're falling for it. Well, Y2k will put an end to your bread and circuses. Let's see if you have the stomach for empire then.

Prepared

-- Prepared (sickened@masshysteria.now), April 02, 1999.

To Y2Kcon, Art W and you other short-sighted, two-legged animals --- May you some day feel the pleasure of the 500# bombs from B52s, not die right off, feel the pleasure of American democracy in act.

-- RememberingBitterly (VietNam@1967-68.net), April 02, 1999.

Whatever is now done, is.

What NEEDS to be done is helping those refugees. What you think, pro or con, of NATO and Clinton, isn't remotely important.

People are.

Milosevic made his choices, Clinton made his.

The Kosovars didn't choose this, and frankly, it's our responsibility, and NATO's now. Like it or not.

You can e-mail your thoughts to President Clinton at president@whitehouse.gov -- I just did.

Diane

-- Diane J. Squire (sacredspaces@yahoo.com), April 02, 1999.

I posted this yesterday, but here it is again.

http://www.polyconomics.com/searchbase/03-31-99.html

If you will go and read this piece, you will get an understanding of what has been going on for twenty years, and where your ire should be really directed. And in this case it ain't necessarily clinton.

-- dave (wootendave@hotmail.com), April 02, 1999.

Diane:

Care to share your message to Clinton with us?

Remembering and Prepared:

You think wars are perfect? Are humans infallible? Are there always easy answers to life's strifes? You don't need to convince me that War is hell. What you need to show me is how we could have survived as a world power had we not taken matters into our own hands in the Middle East war (Iraq) and now Europe (which is a few months away from y2k induced economic collapse, which could result in the greatest power vacuum ever seen). Don't overlook the obvious. The PTB may be one step ahead of you on this one.

Answer the questions I posed in this and my previous post.

-- y2k con (a@b.c), April 02, 1999.

dave: Excerpted from your link:

"But what happened to Yugoslavia -- and now continues in its weak successor states -- should resonate beyond the Balkans. Yugoslavia is a mirror for similar economic restructuring programs in not only the developing world but also in the US, Canada and Western Europe. The Yugoslav reforms are the cruel reflection of a destructive economic model pushed to the extreme."

Exactly. This is the downside of the "largest peacetime expansion in history" coming home to roost. The IMF (international bankers practicing "fractional banking", which is really nothing but voodoo and chicken bones) is now lowering the boom as History's latest period of Wine and Roses finally comes to an end. Hence my statement, "Stop blaming Clinton when so many others are involved in calling the shots."

But here's the kicker. We, as Americans, have benefited from this period of prosperity. We didn't think it important enough at the time to figure all this nasty stuff out; we were too busy picking out SUV's and watching Sally Jessie Rafeal, and obsessing over the President's mistress. So, bitching about what is going down now is just so much whining and gnashing of teeth of what were previously eager participants (yes you - YOU wanted a higher salary...YOU wanted your 401K to skyrocket...YOU wanted a higher standard of living than your parents, and a higher one still for your children..)

This is nothing. Save your angst for what will transpire later this year, and the next. And pray to God that we do not go over the brink.

-- y2k con (a@b.c), April 02, 1999.

Bill,

the interesting part of all this to me is how the current imbroglio in Yugoslavia documents the clinton administration's total ignorance of history...the last person who tried to occupy Yugoslavia militarily was Hitler and it cost him three combat divisions just to keep the roads open and the cities relatively stable for the little time he owned the place. Stalin was somewhat smarter and was willing to play ball with the Tito...

Predictions:

1. there is now a better than even chance that those three GI's will end up lynched - a 'mob' will break into the jail, 'overpower the guards' and sieze and so on.

2. The Russians have already 'test fired' a sub-launched ballistic missile (see: http://38.201.154.103/articles/?a=1999/4/1/71257), their next move may well be to deploy their major fleet units within strike range...but only as an exercise, of course...this will drive the NATO commanders wild, but billy jeff and his friends wont have a clue what to do next.

I really hate it when amateurs attempt to make war, especially pseudo liberals like the clintons, 'cause they're just so very bad at it.

Arlin

-- Arlin H. Adams (ahadams@ix.netcom.com), April 03, 1999.

Bill, you wrote:

"My God, what have we done? Nazis in WWII did not allow such devestation of capital cities."

You forgot London, Paris, Amsterdam, Brussels, Warsaw, Moscow, and many others. Then there was the city I grew up in, Sheffield, where filled-in bullet holes are still visible on the columns supporting what was left of City Hall, where all around us were enormous bomb craters and burned out shells or piles of rubble of houses, shops, department stores, factories, hotels, hospitals, schools, libraries, playgrounds, parks, an art gallery--and many stayed that way until the mid-sixties. The only difference is the Nazis weren't able to pinpoint quite as well as Cruise/Tomahawk missiles and engaged in saturation bombing of British cities.

Many lesser Britsh cities and their people suffered widespread destruction, death and maiming, among them Plymouth, Portsmouth, Leeds, Birmingham, Manchester, Southampton, Bradford, Norwich, Peterborough, Cardiff--and, of course, poor old Coventry. Our World War II went from 1939 to 1945, a tiny country the size of Oregon virtually alone against Hitler. Much of the bombing happened in the early years of the war. Had it not been for Pearl Harbor at the end of 1942, who knows when America would have entered into the fray? I'm not fond of Bill Clinton but I don't see how anyone can stand idly by and watch the butcher Slob. Milosevitch massacre people by the hundreds, perhaps thousands now. If only Hitler had been stopped earlier, we wouldn't have lost a total of 9 million Europeans in the camps. I have to support this action, my conscience and memories won't let me do otherwise. "Never again."

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), April 03, 1999.

All of the above has its good points, however, one can almost read the age of the writer by what is written. Us old timers, like Ol' Git and me, remember WWII. And while Vietnam was no picnic for those involved or with sons and daughters over there, it didn't much affect the people like WWII did. You have to have lived with rationing, black outs, taking turns at air plane spotting, or watching the waters from the cliffs of California, etc. Its all relative to where you have been and I agree 100% with Ol' Git.

Got stamps for gas? Sugar?

-- Taz (Tassie@aol.com), April 03, 1999.

WW I was manipulated into fruition.

WWII likewise.

Today - Yugoslavia - likewise.

Why?

Do a little reading.

Check out this link and do a little research - the recent March 29th interview on the Jeff Rense show is a good place to start.

http://www.davidicke.com/icke/index.html

-- Andy (2000EOD@prodigy.net), April 03, 1999.

Arlin,

Well said. It is ironic that the young man who protested Viet Nam is now the leader that gets un involved in a mess just as sticky. There doesn't appear to be any good solution at this point.

-- Nabi Davidson (nabi7@yahoo.com), April 03, 1999.

For Old Git and Taz:

From a newspaper interview in 1933:

"I am insulted by the persistent assertion that I want war. Am I a fool? War! It would settle nothing!"

From an address on the same day of that same year:

"I am not so senseless as to want war. We want peace and understanding, nothing else. We want to give our hand to our former enemies. . . When has the German people ever broken its word?"

From a speech on September 30, 1942:

"The occupation of Stalingrad, which will now be concluded, will become a gigantic success. . . No human being ever shall push us away from that spot."

And finally, from a statement two months later:

"I wanted to take it. (Stalingrad). And--you know we are modest--we actually have it."

All of the above words are attributed to Adolf Hitler, so I can certainly relate to Old Git's and Taz's opinions. My father also fought in World War II (refused a purple heart because he said those should be given to soldiers whose injuries were worse than shrapnel in one's lungs and legs).

I also understand the differing opinions on this issue because my dad had a really difficult time understanding the mindset of our country during the Vietnam War. Burning flags and draft cards horrified him, because he was brought up to "serve his country" no matter what. He died in 1973, and I wonder what he would think of this situation were he still alive.

I have a question pertaining to an earlier comment: If the seeds of this current war were indeed sown by the deliberate impoverishment of Yugoslavia by the International Monetary Fund, would someone please enlighten me as to who (names and countries please) controls that?

-- FM (vidprof@aol.com), April 03, 1999.

I'd like to make a point that is a bit off the subject, but is food for thought I think.

The current troubles in Yugoslavia have been going on for some time....at least a year. As I understand it, the Albanians in Kosova are the people who are targeted. Surely they have had warning that this situation was getting worse, not better, but still, we see thousands of refugees literally running for their lives....with only the possessions they could grab and carry with them. Why didn't many of them recognize what was comming and relocate to Albania while there was still time?

I'm sure there were all sorts of reasons...financial ....health.... family, and most likely, denial, but today, none of those reasons have protected them from the plight they are in now.

I can't help but relate this to ourselves and Y2K. We hear about the problem, we are able to imagine the possible consequences, and we have the added advantage of knowing the time frame, and yet we have "reasons" for not preparing to the hilt and perhaps even relocating.

I think we should take a good look at the pictures of the refugee camps and perhaps re-think a few things.

-- Sheila (sross@bconnex.net), April 03, 1999.