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54 comments from readers

Philobiblos
14 August 2008 at 11:13

Thank you John Pilger for telling the simple truth: no embellishments, subterfuges or outright lies, which have been used to justify a predatory US/NATO policy towards Yugoslavia, then Serbia.

And it can't get much dirtier: first the Anglo-American alliance with Muslim fanatics in Bosnia (only to have the "allies" express their gratitude with 9/11 and 7/11), then in bed with KLA, the gangsters Mr Pilger so aptly describes (and whom the Americans themselves had characterized as "terrorists.")

One hopes that the dictum of the ancient tragedian does not come to pass, viz. "those whom the gods want to destroy, they first make mad."

ikotubo
14 August 2008 at 14:24

Simply astonishing - and would have been quite unbelievable but for the unrivalled authority of John Pilger in these matters.

flamur
14 August 2008 at 14:45

As it look`s like, for Mr Pilger, Kosovo problem arises only with NATO bombing....a "journalist" of a such caliber should look behind, starting from 1987 to 1999, this for sure will give him a clear picture of the reasons for the NATO strikes against Serbia.

And Harold Pinter`s opinion...please come on!

mosgjig
14 August 2008 at 14:59

BS!

Learn the history, interview the key figures and multiple civilians from both sides, and then report on it. Your blind hatred of America is dulling your professional skills.

This piece casts a clout over your other works. Stop being lazy and do your homework.

Dim
14 August 2008 at 16:11

Bravo! This is no surprise to many of us, but more reporting on this would be great, to undo the brainwashing that the anti-serb propaganda instilled in a world that was hearing about Kosovo for the first time.

writeon
14 August 2008 at 16:32

The "problem" I have with Pilger's peice is that it's substantially accurate, horrifyingly true, if one takes the time to examine what actually happened in Yogoslavia. The "story" we've been told is close to the "story" we were presented with in relation to Iraq, that is, for the most part a fabrication designed to justify and obscure a blatantly imperial project.

If this is an accurate picture of the true nature of events then we have a "problem" because many of the fundamental assumptions we have about our democracy and way of life are, if not undermined, are then certainly questioned, and this is dangerous and subversive. None-the-less, after Iraq, we cannot ignore what we appear to be, can we really pretend any longer, who exactly do we think we are fooling? It can't be the countries we are destroying, because there the people are face to face with reality which trumps mythology every time, at least once the blood starts to flow. In reality we are only fooling ourselves and this serves a valuable purpose for our ruling elite, but it is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain our illusions, dangerous so.

Are Western values really what they seem? Are we the benign force for "good" in the world we like to think we are? Are we a beacon of hope and a model for civilized development, or are we under the surface something else, something far more sinister and destructive?

nvrioni
14 August 2008 at 16:50

Mr Pilger

sorry isn't personal but

I think you are mad, you really don't know what you are talking about. i'm not even going to try to argue with you as whole world know what happened what Milloshevic +serbs did as he didn't do it on his own!

regards nick vrioni

michaelpetek
14 August 2008 at 18:27

John Pilger returns to form as the David Irving of Balkan holocaust denial. He was saying exactly the same thing only days after freezer vans had been fished out of the river near Belgrade, stuffed to the brim with the Kosovan victims of the likes of Arkan's Tigers.

He's got it wrong about the timeline, too. Germany was, at first, reluctant to recognise Slovenia and Croatia as independent.

It was forced to do so by public opinion, as Germans were outraged at the atrocities and the destruction that the Yugoslavian National Army was visiting on places where they took their summer holidays, and on people they had often befriended both on holiday and in their workplaces in Germany.

lucy
14 August 2008 at 19:06

to those who found this article interesting and revealing, I cordially recommend reading the book'FOOL'S CRUSADE' written by Diana Johnstone. You will figure out every detail in this brilliant and curageous truthful analysis of the break-up of Yugoslavia.

ArtCarruthers
14 August 2008 at 23:14

John Pilger's piece is unfortunately all too true: governments lied (headed by punks like Clinton, Blair & Bush), they formed some of the most unsavory alliances. Philobiblos above mentions cooperation with al Qaeda (bin Laden was given a Bosnian passport!...), which had no problem launching mortar rounds into the Serajevo market place because that politically helped Clinton/Blair justify intervention.

The Kosovo Albanian criminals, drug smugglers and human traffickers (as an added touch Pilger mentions trade in human organs "harvested" from live human beings cited by Del Ponte), are now being blessed by the US/EU.

There are those who are morally oblivious, who while citing Milosevic's culpability ignore Nasr Oric (who got a slap in the wrist by ICTY for torturing and decapitating prisoners) or Ramush Haradinaj, whose prosecution witnesses (6 or 7 out of 9 or 10) were murdered and he was released for lack of a case!...

It is all too horrible, yet the most troubling is what it says about us, who voted the Clintons, Blairs and Bushes into power; we have collaborated in a deconstruction not only of democracy, but also of simple decency.

P.S. Diana Johnstone is a little too kind in ascribing mere foolishness to the Anglo-American interventionists. And as for Mr Vrioni above, no the world does not know what happened, as it doesn't know that nominally democratic governments aided and abetted the crimes by Muslim terrorists and Albanian gangsters. If Pilger is mad because he is telling the truth, what does this make the rest of us who swallowed all those lies because we did not want to accept that our leaders are the real war criminals.

Jon Campbell
15 August 2008 at 01:19

Excellent article, thank you for acknowledging the truth!

Dragan
15 August 2008 at 02:19

Thank you Mr. Pilger for helping uncover the truth. The goal of the kangaroo court in the Hague is to turn the victims into aggressors, and the aggrossors into victims, to rewrite history. The despicable lies from NATO about 'genocide' would have made Josef Goebels proud. The REAL genocide happened with the killing and expulsion of all Serbs from Krajina - 500 years of history wiped out in one weekend. This was US sponsored genocide, nothing less. The fact that Kosovo is almost empty of Serbs now is more US sponsored genocide. The people who should be tried for war crimes are not Serbs, as Serbs are the biggest victims, but Solana, Albright, Wesley Clark, Clinton, and the rest of the 'humanitarian bombers'. The evidence against them is overwhelming. Bombing hospitals, bridges, TV stations, power plants, markets...for 78 days illegally, is a blatant war crime. They are very afraid of the truth, so keep on writing it! Justice will prevail over force.

arianit
15 August 2008 at 02:28

Yes, there was no genocide. Would you rather prefer that there was one?

No massacres in Kosovo? Please provide the direct quote where Del Ponte says so. Since Del Ponte prosecuted 5 Serb state leaders on Kosovo crimes, either you sir are laying or Del Ponte is.

dazza
15 August 2008 at 06:40

Your blind hatred of America makes everything you write seem bitter and twisted.

I would draw reader's' attention to the following account of Mr Pilger's participation in a debate on this at Kingston University. In particular, look at his response to the 2788 figure which he quotes in this article.

http://greatersurbiton.wordpress.com/2007/12/14/

voice
15 August 2008 at 09:08

No frills, just the truth! Thanks Mr. Pilger. It has taken a long time for the truth to start coming out. Writeon, you are right. Not only did many of us have to live with the tragedy of the war but had to live with the lies the press and media were peddling! People believed it and many still do. It is a shocking thing to realise that the BBC could be so biased in its reporting. Still, it is a lesson for us all as we look at the reporting from Georgia. Same rules apply!

nawawimohamad
15 August 2008 at 11:03

Come on... Pilger is not making up the stories, he is just refering to the book "The Hunt: Me and War Criminals." by Carla Del Ponte.

FireBlade
15 August 2008 at 11:38

Too late.

Who will pay for 20 lost years? Who will pay for people dying of cancer in Serbia? Number of cases increased many times after the war in '99.

Who will be sentenced as a war criminal? And when?

redtakesy
15 August 2008 at 14:01

This article could do with a little balance. The acknowledgement that control over Kosovo was a key objective of chauvinist Serb nationalists, say, who had taken away Kosovo's autonomy and crushed peaceful calls for its restitution, say (recognised by Noam Chomsky, among others). In this I agree with flamur, this is dangerously uncontextualised - if nothing else, Del Ponte's book has some pretty pointed things to say about Serbs I believe...

This isn't to deny the lies and exaggerations, the use of cluster munitions and bombing of civilian infrastructure, but skepticism needs to cut both ways.

And I would be interested to see how the claims of "ethnic cleansing" in South Ossetia will play out - Russia might well have just found its Kosovo

marx
15 August 2008 at 14:38

This article can picture the biggest mistake that some so-called Left-wing members are doing today. The same mistake made by John PIlger.

I agree with u that USA and NATO and UN mission in Kosova is oppressor but because it is not recognizing the right of Albanian for self - determination and self - govern, but not because it crushed the Serbian regime from Kosova.

Please, do not post these kind of articles before u read history!!!

From 1912 Albanians of Kosova lived always oppressed by Serbia. There are about 10 million assimilated albanians in Turkey - that have been displaced by Serbia. About 12.000 albanians (about 10.000 of them civilian) were killed in 1999 (juring the war). 20.000 girls were raped by Serbian Army. 1 mil. albanians were displaced to Albania...etc.

I don't hate serbs. Of course, they are not guilty for their racist governments. But, the truth is that serbs were not forced to leave Kosova. They left with they army... not because albanians forced them.

And the last:

KLA was not a muslim army. It was albanians army to liberate Kosova. If u say that KLA was terrorist organization u are saying that NLA (National Liberation Army - of Algeria) was terrorism... KLA was similar to NLA (I hope u understand what I'm trying to say).

I am a left man, but abhorred with those mistakes of these kind of analysts. I liked so much John Pilger... I saw many movies made by him... but now I am disappointed on him.

For more about Kosova and it's history or even it's actual political and social situation u may visit www.vetevendosje.org (than click "ENGLISH DOCUMENTS).

James
15 August 2008 at 14:38

Certainly Serbian altra-nationalists in the 1990s were responisble for some very bad things indeed and it is only right that they are condemmed and if possible punnished. HOWEVER the context of NATO attacks on Serbia in 1999 must be understood. A figure of 2,900 odd or 10,000 odd deaths? Both are terrible but when we recall that the figure banded about in the mainstream press was around 200,000 kosovan dead the difference matters. Why? A figure of 200,000 has really different conotations- it gives an impression (and it is impressions that count NOT truths) of a Serbian military out to iradicate Kosovans. The systematic killing of 4000 to 10,000 civilians (like in Bosnia) is an example of a very very dirty war- but it is not a holocaust. It is not the same as trying to erase a people from existance. Genocide is genocide people say. No. Not when it is used to give an impression of an evil and malice that simply isn't there. Genocide is a term used far to much these days. In the Balkan case better to say "discriminate killing of civillians to spread terror in order to win a dirty war." That's not to say it's not terrible but is very misleading to draw comparison with the holocaust and other mass killing. We were misled not in nature of the crimes committed but in the scale and further misled into comparing such crimes with those of Nazi Germany. Why? That is a question worth asking. Why is there a need to mislead us?

voice
15 August 2008 at 15:57

marx - I just love it!!!! Now the US, NATO and UN mission is the oppressor! You poor Albanians you have always been oopressed!!! Yesterday it was the Serbs, today it's the above mentioned. Do you people ever stop!?!? You're happy getting the handouts. As soon as that stops, you're oppressed. HA HA HA!!!!

Philobiblos
15 August 2008 at 17:24

After returning to this column and seeing the reaction to the Pilger piece, I cannot resist some comments in response to the grouchy marx remarks: he makes statements as if they have the weight of authority that draws from fantasy, thus "12,000 Albanians were killed in 1999,... 20,000 girls were raped by Serbian Army (sic)". In fact approximately 2,500 dead (many of indeterminate ethnicity) were documented in Kosovo in toto;, and as for the rapes, the figure presumes that the Serbs did nothing else; but where is the documentation of these rapes? At least the figure of those displaced is close to accurate according to the sources (the Serbs were in fact heavy-handed...), even if such displacement lasted 3-4 weeks...

The truth is NOT "that serbs were not forced to leave Kosova (sic)", when in fact not only were tens of thousands terrorized into leaving (after being forced to sell their properties for pennies on the dollar), with hundreds of civilians being murdered in cold blood after NATO occupied the place (the western press dismissed these as understandable "revenge killings"), but also the pogrom organized in March 2004 in which KLA-organized mobs lynched people, defiled and destroyed dozens of Christian churches, many of which were hundreds of years old (somehow Bush's pharisaic religiosity ignored these acts).

These abominations took place under the nose of the US, British and German "peacekeepers", who justified not stopping these mobs because they "lacked rules of engagement"! (To their credit, Spanish, Italian and Greek troops actively intervened and blocked the mobs, so that the destruction in their sectors was limited).

Finally, the final farcical aspect, to paraphrase the original Marx, is the reference to the KLA (which the State Dept originally labeled terrorist); the abilities of their members lie in other spheres, such as drug smuggling, human trafficking, and trade in human organs. Chances are that the heroin sold in your town and the unfortunate women in the brothel near you, are controlled by Kosovar networks, consisting of individuals mostly with KLA experience -- this holds not only in the Balkans and Italy, but Britain as well.

As for the trade in human organs, Mrs. Del Ponte was quite specific as to the sources for these (hundreds of Serb prisoners, and the occasional unruly Albanian), while police organizations throughout Europe speak softly of hundreds of children that have disappeared, many ending up as "merchandise" moved by the Kosovo gangster networks.

It was ostensibly to defend these allies that western democracies appear to have ignored their foundational values... Though it is likely that not all people will be fooled all of the time, so that the recognition of the gangster state of "Kosova" by the majority of the world's nations is a long way off.

Douglas Chalmers
15 August 2008 at 23:11

John Pilger: "...not acceptable to the expanding European Community, especially newly united Germany, which had begun a drive east to dominate its "natural market" in the Yugoslav provinces of Croatia and Slovenia..."

The "natural market" of the Teutonic knights (really just smelly horse soldiers) of 1,000 years ago when Frankfurt-am-Main was becoming a trading centre and a focus of power. But other "unpalatable truths about the West's intervention..." included their fortress in the Carpathians, Bran Castle, latterly but erroneously famous as Dracula's home or the castle of Vlad Dracul (Prince Vlad Tepes).

Transylvania and the Caucasus (including Georgia) are ancient lands of civilisation. The Roman Empire conquered the territory and its wealth (gold, etc) was systematically exploited just as more recent expansionist states (now including the EU) have sought control. In the past, some regions were fought over by the Mongolians and the Turks. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5PoedKBq-Y

That is something that the Serbs never forgot as Kosovo was a historic bloody battleground just as Culodden was for the Scots. Having halted the expansionism of past Asian empires, they have found themselves forgotten in modern history as little is remembered by the Western Europeans since WW2. They and the Russians should have been embraced as brothers and sisters instead of being once again exploited.

The result is a major failed opportunity and it is happeneing again with Russia. Turning their backs on Russia and fawning over America, the Western Europeans have sought to contain an imaginary enemy instead of co-operating with a friend and ally. It is late to change now as the tide of history has also turned and Russia and Asia (China + India) are rising in their influence and power.

Peggy
16 August 2008 at 00:27

John Pilger is not the only person with this sort of a view on what happened in Yugoslavia. Noam Chomsky would agree with this as well. Gregory Clark has written a good piece regarding Kosovo and how the Serbs are owed an apology for that.

So all of you who are labeling John Pilger wrong here must also condemn the others for their opinions as well.

Thank you John for being brave to write the truth when doing so will bring attacks against you from many.

It is because of brave people like you that the truth finally comes out albeit too late.

One important fact to consider when deciding who to believe is that if Kosovo is 90% Albanian, then it was the Serbs who were ethnically cleansed from it. You can't have such a high percentage of one group of people there and claim that they are the ones who were ethnically cleansed.

What happened to the Serbian population of Kosovo. There was always more than 10% there.

One must use logic here instead of propaganda and John Pilger deals in facts and plenty of logic.

Gideon Polya
16 August 2008 at 01:22

Excellent article by John Pilger.

The tragedy of the Balkans was due to resurgent, US-inspired militarism in the EU that subsequently realized its fuller potential in the Occupied Iraqi and Afghan Territories (post-invasion excess deaths 2 million and 3-6 million, respectively; post-invasion under-5 infant deaths 0.6 million and 2.3 million, respectively; refugees totalling 4.5 million and 4 million, respectively; an Iraqi Genocide and an Afghan Genocide as defined by Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention and now variously involving many war criminal European countries including the new "democratic Nazi" Germany; see " Palestinian, Iraqi, Afghan, Biofuel and Climate Genocides – Silence Kills and Silence is Complicity": http://www.liberalati.com/?q=node/261 ).

Adding to the tragedy of the Balkans War ( 200,000 dead) was the utter avoidability as demonstrated by the example of the Slovenians who simply BOUGHT their way out of the carnage by assuming a huge amount of Yugoslavian debt.

Indeed the ideal of the EU was a rational translation in which borders were effectively subsumed in a Common Market. The Balkan War simply did not have to happen but did due to racist US militarism and "differentialist" primitavism that now extends to making Eastern Europe a world-threatening missile base for the racist Bush-ite Strangeloves.

Pencils
16 August 2008 at 02:28

Excellent piece by John Pilger. Others have sung its praises sufficiently, but let me add to the recommendations of Diana Johnstone's ' Fool's Crusade'; also Michael Parenti's 'To Kill a Nation', Kate Hudson's 'Breaking the South Slav Dream', ' the Srebrenica Report' online by Edward S. Herman et al, and the recent Modern Review issue given over entirely to Ed Herman's analysis of the Balkan wars.

As to michaelpetek's nasty little propaganda piece, I quote below from an article ' Natasa Kandic & the Propaganda War against Yugoslavia' by Ian Johnson. The refrigerator story originated from a paid propagandist, Natasa Kandic - read the full story on Mick Collins' 'Cirque Minime/Paris' website ( also essential for finding out what's really been going on in Rwanda, Uganda, and Congo) at:

http://tinyurl.com/5ctk2z

QUOTE:

" The story was published worldwide and the BBC even presented a 45-minute documentary on it, on the 27th January 2002 as part of their holocaust memorial season.

However subsequent investigations into this story revealed the following:

The local magazine quoted in the AP article was Timocka Kriminala Revija (criminal review) owned by Dragan Vitomirovic.

Timocka published two articles about a refrigerator truck full of bodies.

The first article, dated 15th September 1999, stated that the truck contained dead Kurds and that the licence plates were Swiss.

However, the second story, published 1st May 2001 the one that Natasa Kandic presented to the world and the source of the allegations against Slobodan Milosevic, the dead Kurds had become the dead Albanians and the Swiss licence plates had become Kosovo license plates.

It further transpired that Dragan Vitomirovic had a brother with a record of smuggling illegal aliens across the Romanian border and moreover, had been encouraged to write the second article by Interior Minister Mihajlovic, a member of the newly installed Nato backed Serbian government.

In regard to Kandic’s claim that, "Our investigations produced witnesses who can testify that many people were killed, their bodies buried only to be dug up again and later moved to another place" it is important to note the following:

Police officer Captain Dragan Karleusa, who was appointed to investigate the allegations, appeared in July 2002 as a prosecution witness at The Hague against Mr Milosevic and admitted that not a single witness deposition had ever been taken. (Trial transcript)."

branisd
17 August 2008 at 01:49

michaelpetek wrote:

"He's got it wrong about the timeline, too. Germany was, at first, reluctant to recognize Slovenia and Croatia as independent."

Not true - there is nothing wrong with the time line. Germany - after uniting - was "flexing her muscles" on ex-Yugoslavia. It is Mr.Kohl who accepted idea for independent Croatia from opposition to promote image of his party. Germany has the primary responsibility in breakup of former Yugoslavia - by giving support and recognition to it's former WWII ally Croatia.It was a well calculated move...

It is a common knowledge that Croat pro-Nazi supporters were protected in Germany after WWII.

fairplay
17 August 2008 at 10:18

michaelpetek is blinkered. check all his posts. he seems to support most of what the MSM media says and tends to toe the official line like a real patsy.

whether you agree with what pilger and the author say the top and bottom of it is, there are far better candidates to stand trial for war crimes in the hague, one being our own "tonyboy" blair. the day he is brought to justice for what he has done in the name of british people is the day the drinks are on me!

Ari Rusila
17 August 2008 at 16:07

Very interesting interview of former Hague Tribunal spokeswoman Florence Hartmann popped to my eyes from newspaper Blic few days ago. Referring the arrest of Radovan Karadzic she told, that "information about the fugitives' whereabouts was abundant, however, it would always turn out that one of the three countries – the U.S., Britain or France – would block arrests." She adds that former Bosnian secret police chief Momir Munibabi? was sacked on former High Representative Paddy Ashdown's orders, "for being efficient in his search for Karadži?, and for sending information to Del Ponte". "Now that Karadži? has finally been arrested, he can tell a lot about secret deals that led to the fall of Srebrenica. His testimony represents a great risk for the great western powers," Hartmann is convinced.

These statements of ICTY insider arouse few associations to my mind, such as

* Is the Holbrooke-Karadzic deal existing, like the accused has said ( Karadzic claims that his going into hiding formed part of a deal with Holbrooke, which included his withdrawal from public life in exchange for not being arrested).

* Was the secret deal made about Srebrenica (Bosnian Government and the Bosnian Serb party, possibly with the knowledge of one or more Contact Group States, had an understanding that Srebrenica would not be vigorously defended by the Bosniacs in return for an undertaking by the Serbs not to vigorously defend territory around Sarajevo. The capture of Srebrenica made it easier for the Bosniacs and Serbs to agree on the territorial basis of a peace settlement. The result of the tragedy in Srebrenica contributed in some ways to the conclusion of a peace agreement — by galvanizing the will of the international community, by distracting the Serbs from the coming Croatian attack, by reducing the vulnerability of UNPROFOR personnel to hostage-taking, and by making certain territorial questions easier for the parties to resolve).

* Are we finally getting more clear wider picture about connections between numbers (Srebrenica figure game), reports (as mean of one-sided propaganda) and political PR marketing considering events in Balkans during 1990's?

One can have different opinions about bias of ICTY but from my point of view it offers so far best forum to get some answer to questions mentioned before when both prosecutor and defence have made their case. Anyway the statements of Mrs.Hartmann - as well the book of her former boss del Ponte describing e.g. organ trafficking of Serb civils by Albanian mafia - are giving quite disgusting picture about "realpolitik" behind noble statements of international community.

Hugo Chav
17 August 2008 at 16:40

Wait a minute - what about Vukovar? Screbincia? Mostar? Sarajevo? Gorazde? What about the deliberate destruction of multi-ethnic Bosnia by Serb irregulars? What about the destruction of the library in Sarajevo? Mostar bridge?

The UN had a hand in it all, but mostly is was Serbian aggression. Really John.

Pencils
17 August 2008 at 18:38

* Is the Holbrooke-Karadzic deal existing, like the accused has said ( Karadzic claims that his going into hiding formed part of a deal with Holbrooke, which included his withdrawal from public life in exchange for not being arrested)." Art Rusila

Here's the deal ( from Neil Clark's website):

http://tinyurl.com/5afns5

TerryB
17 August 2008 at 21:01

dazza,

I read the link you posted - it is very interesting, and although even 10,000 deaths is 10,000 too many it's still not the genocide the western media portrayed. By the way, what is this Henry Jackson Society that the author is linked to? (which has played host to Richard Perle amongst others).

Hugo Chav,

I think Pilger's article here focuses on the Kosovo atrocities (and who committed them), not the Bosnian chapter of this dirty little war. Even so, the west played an instrumental part in that particular Bosnian war, which appears to have been a fight over a future greater-Croatia versus a greater-Serbia. The west ensured a Croatian victory, helped by a lot of anti-Serbian propaganda.

Ari Rusila
17 August 2008 at 22:29

To Hugo Chav: I agree that many brutalities happened places you mentioned but please note that most if not all were made by paramilitars or criminal clans not Serbian Army. If I remember right so Mostar bridge was destroyed by Croatian artillery.

To Pencils: I have seen the Holbrooke-Karadzig deal but I can not say if it real one or not. That's wayI hope that ICTY trial gives some clarification.

About Kosovo genocide: the KLA fabricated the stories of genocide and ethnic cleansing by the Serbian security forces that was used as the excuse to bomb Serbia. The total death toll in Kosovo during the two years of fighting before the bombing is estimated to be about 4000 killed -counting both Albanians and Serbs (some 2000 bodies have been found). The so called ethnic cleansing of the Albanians occurred after the NATO bombing started - not before - partly because actions by Serbs and partly because politics, PR and actions by KLA. After 78 days bombing ethnic cleansing has smaller scale made by Kosovo Albanians during first weeks of ceasefire as well March 2004 against Serbs.

writeon
17 August 2008 at 22:54

This is dangerous territory to get into. The complex history of the break-up of Yogoslavia and who was responsible. It's a moral, historical, ideological and emotional minefield. Also very powerful countries have traditionally intervened in the Balkans for centuries, in competition with each other, fighting over control and access, and all without regard to the suffering of the people of the Balkans.

What 's disturbing is that the official record and narrative about the conflict appears highly problematic when examined closely and impartially. The point here is that our media and the politicians they rely for the "framing" of the narrative, are not impartial at all, they were deeply involved in the conflict from the very beginning.

As far as I can see, taking an overall view, the "story" about the civil wars in the Balkans which most of us in the West have been told, has about as much connection to "reality" as the stories we were told about Iraq and the War on Terror.

Kosovo was the final act in the play and the most absurd. The stories about what the Serbs were doing in Kosovo, the stories, that "justified" the bombing campaign against Serbia, with massive destruction and substantial civilian casualties, were for the most part fabrications, wild exaggerations and distortions. Crude propaganda designed to soften us up for yet another war, the final war to destroy Serbia.

Now, this is hard to accept, because it makes our political leaders and our news media look like liars and knaves, but then they are, the evidence is before our eyes in the terrible history of Iraq and weapons of mass destruction. The Kosovo campaign was propaganda trial run, designed by many of the same people who brought us the Iraq story, outrageous as this seems.

Western powers interfered in the Yogoslavian civil war and chose sides, obviously our "side" cannot be bad, so the other side has to be. Wars are full of lies, everyone knows this surely? What frightens me most is the lies that people believe?

fairplay
18 August 2008 at 06:59

watch him meet his maker with "death from natural causes" in his cell awaiting trial. would love to hear his side of the story first though but i doubt that will happen as in the case of saddam

writeon
18 August 2008 at 08:40

Ah, yes, Saddam, the demon king, our Frankenstein who overstepped the mark, don't they always? Nothing in his life could match his courage in the way he left it. I would love to see Blair or Bush standing on the scaffold under the same circumstances and she how they'd react. But then I don't support the death penalty.

Saddam was murdered after a pathetic showtrial to shut him up. I rather admired the contempt he had for the entire process. He must have been darkly amused by the hypocracy and double-standards of the "friends" he's served so well over the years, when he was no longer useful and could be magically transformed from an ally into this season's Hitler.

And the historians are weeping and grinding their teeth, as Saddam had so many interesting stories to tell, especially about the Iran/Iraq war and the invasion of Kuwait, but now he's been silenced and only the official narrative will remain, though it's written on sand.

Hardtalk
18 August 2008 at 10:14

I really do not understand the reason why you Mr. John Pilger do not know or you don't want to know the true about Kosovo.

If you have never been in Kosovo, or if you have merely been informed wrongly about, shame on you.

Such a journalist shouldn't back the genocide the serbs commited toward Albanians. Please, ask yourself (and the rest) why NATO intervened in Kosovo, and why there are peacekeepers there.

Ari Rusila
18 August 2008 at 11:00

To Hardtalk: I do not know about Mr.Pilger but I have been living few years in Kosovo after bombing, listening stories from both local sides plus international community and updating situation daily basis. I am sure that brutalities have been happened with all ethnic groups, the question about genocides (Serbs towards Albanians and opposite) depends definitions. You ask why NATO intervened in Kosovo. I think that reasons include e.g. economical and domestic needs of US, pr-campaign of KLA, one-sided picture delivered by western main stream media based to falsified documents and covering made errors elsewhere Balkans. Some of these aspects you may red from my BalkanBlog address: http://arirusila.wordpress.com .

LazarOfSerbia
19 August 2008 at 04:49

Yugoslavia: The Avoidable War

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5860186121153047571&...

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6371060303901674397&...

mighyr
19 August 2008 at 07:55

A much needed pieces which tells the REAL TRUTH on Balkans. But it ignores the critical role of Saudis and their oil money in selling this illegal war as "Genocide" in US. Particular when it is the Serbs who faced the brunt of cleansing and violence.

The unaired movie Stolen Kosvo from Czech TV tells the real story and undermines the US & EU propaganda.

http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=0rDr85g0upc

The Arabist Albright, Holbroke, Clark and others have since made millions of dollars in consulting fees from their Saudi friends.

But I feel they ought to be tried for war crimes as the atrocities in Krajina, Kosovo, and bombing of civilians clearly warrant.

Neil Craig
19 August 2008 at 14:07

This article's mention in British media of the way NATO allowed the KLA (many of whom had been instantly sworn in as NATO "police") to kidnap 300-1,300 Serb teens & disect them, while still alive to fill out hospitals organbanks.

Even Hitler never did anything so obscene.

Does anubody doubt that if such things were happening in Zimbabwe ir Tibet or any of the other places our media want us to hate, it would have had massive front page coverage. Indeed I have been told that this couldn't possibly hace happened for that reason..

That the western media can, almost as monolithicly as stalin ever did, gensor acts of genocide & worse which our government are involved in shows how cery far from a free democracy we are.

Pencils
19 August 2008 at 16:26

I've encountered that story about Serb teens having organs removed before. I've also seen some doubts expressed about it, can't remember where. Anyone got any links for that? I wouldn't take it as a fact, without knowing more. What happened to the teens - did they die? How was this discovered? What evidence is there? It's not impossible that the Serbs too could be overstating their case.

Cybertiger
19 August 2008 at 17:23

@mighyr

"The Arabist Albright ..."

What's all that about? Madeleine Albright is a Catholic American Jew and could hardly be considered an Arabist. But the ghastly woman should certainly be tried for war crimes and every sort of crime against humanity.

KeLeMi
19 August 2008 at 19:36

Russia is doing in Georgia what we did in Yugoslavia. Russia also has Chechnya.

LazarOfSerbia
19 August 2008 at 23:39

Pencils, this horror is reported by Carla Del Ponte, former ICTY chief prosecutor in her book "The Hunt":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carla_Del_Ponte#Organ_smuggling...

baldyeric
19 August 2008 at 23:59

A Serb told a friend of mine,"we let them live in our country,then they wanted to rule us".

I am sure people of other ethnic groups would make similar claims.

The Serbs being demonised seems like 'winners justice' being meted out.

Trying to decide who is right or wrong is pointless and impossible.No one comes out with any credit.

Amongst the many aspects of this awful situation is that Yugoslavia was an artificial creation of Federalists......are you watching,Europe?

eric.A.

Ari Rusila
20 August 2008 at 00:07

To Pencils about organ case:

The case came public with memories of Carla del Ponte April 3, 2008. The book published under the title”The Hunt: “Me and Military Criminals”

Carla del Ponte writes that she got information from journalists in 1999 about 300 Serbs who were kidnapped in Kosovo and then taken to Albania. At first the prisoners were placed in the camps in Kukes and Tropya in north Albania, and later surgeons hired by Albanians removed their vitally important organs in field conditions. The Albanian village of Burel was also mentioned, where in a “yellow house” the prisoners were operated on after which their organs were delivered to Italy, and further on, to major West European medical centres. According to del Ponte, “only several months later investigators of the Tribunal and UNMIK arrived to Albania to see the “yellow house”, which journalists described as the place where prisoners were murdered for their bodily organs. A group of journalists led the investigators and one Albanian prosecutor to that place. The house is now painted white; and its host denies that it was repainted, even though the investigators find traces of yellow along the basement. They find pieces of sterile gauze. Lying nearby is a used syringe, two plastic vials, one of which contained muscle relaxant that is usually used in surgery. Application of special chemicals detects blood stains on the walls and the floor in one of the rooms and at a cleaned floor sections measuring 1.8 by 0.6 metres."

If I remember right so from UNMIK side one senior official was involved to investigations who later came famous about bringing bodyparts from Kosovo to his own private collections to US. Anyway UNMIK investigations have been slow today as well earlier. General Mini (COMKFOR) gives good explanation why - simply because “to put Albanians under arrest was difficult because the former UNMIK and KLA leaders were close relations.” The leaders of the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) were the culprits, its militants and currently the respected politicians Hasim Taci, Agim Ceku and Ramus Haradinai.

For international community it was necessary to maintain the idea of the Serbian guilt for everything that had taken place in the Balkans in the 1990s, that had been worked out for quite a long time, to sustain the reasoning that NATO activities in the Balkans with an eye at protecting Albanians in Kosovo in 1999, and prevent world public opinion from concluding that the international organizations in the ex-Yugoslav space practiced double standards.

Also the Hague Tribunal comes from the assumption that in all the hostilities in the Balkans in the last several years Serbs were aggressors or in their majority they committed military crimes, whereas other parties waged wars in line with the norms of international law, defending themselves against the aggressor.

My main source for this comment has been article of Elena Guskova about book ”The Hunt: “Me and Military Criminals” her translation from the Russian original.

Pencils
20 August 2008 at 01:54

Thanks Ari Rusila - that doesn't seem out of character for the KLA.

redtakesy
20 August 2008 at 13:12

writeon: "Kosovo was the final act in the play and the most absurd. "

You complain about the "framing" of the story and then make a similar error yourself. Kosovo, as most people seem to forget, was also the first act in this war - it was in reaction to Kosovan calls for autonomy that Milosevic became so popular. This is important because it seems like everyone assumes that Kosovo sprung out of nowhere and that the KLA emerged ex nihilo, when actually this was the end-point of a process that involved a significant amount of Serbian repression which, coupled with the free hand (and military matériel) Milosevic gave to milita groups to commit, among other things, acts of genocide in Bosnia (all sides most assuredly commited war crimes. But it was hard to rival the Bosnian Serb militias for murderous racism, though the Croats had a good go) which made it very easy to believe that Milosevic had large-scale unpleasantness in store for Kosovo.

'A Serb told a friend of mine,"we let them live in our country,then they wanted to rule us".

I am sure people of other ethnic groups would make similar claims.'

This is hilarious. Have you considered joining the BNP if you believe this kind of nonsense? Or are pieces of territory "eternally Serb"? How do you feel about the West Bank then - eternally Israel? We must reverse Hadrian's ethnic cleansing, Arabs are squatters - this is the kind of discourse we are getting into. If we are to be pragmatic, I'm sorry, but we cannot base policies on events which happened a very long time ago (and which may well be mythical in any case).

Meanwhile, Pencils: the KLA may well be a criminal gang, but then, the Serbian militias hardly kept their noses clean, did they? I'm all for impressing on people that the situation is more complicated than it is presented - that is true - but "it's more complicated" seems to translate into "it was the other side that was bad"

tpone
20 August 2008 at 13:48

great article; Don't forget Bill Clinton, The Vatican ie. the Pope and the German secret allignance on the deal. I think it's quite interesting that the drug trade was allowed to flurish in this deal to give Germany back what they lost in war #2. here comes number #3

pol123
20 August 2008 at 17:34

I disagree, partially.

1. Even if Nato participating countries used the term "genocide" to intervene in Kosovo, explain why Milosevic officials rapidly took bodies and buried them with asphalt. This is a traditional move: commit mass atrocities and then deny it ever happened.

2. Ethnic cleansing of 200.000 Serbs took automatically after they expelled 900.000 kosovo albanians. Yes, you cannot justify this, but it is important to consider it (and you are ommiting it).

3. I do not see corruption in Kosovo any worst than in Romania, Bulgaria, Italy or Israel. In fact, if this is an argument to counter their independency..its just simly a poor one.

4. Suffering by Kosovo albanians, romas, egyptians, ashkalis, and turcs came long before "the international community" paid any serious attention. As long as 10 years of blatant discrimination, extra-judiciary killings, and other gross and systematic violations of human rights.

I have always admired you. You are a source of inspiration. But hey, things on the ground can become even more complex and contradicting.

writeon
20 August 2008 at 19:18

Red,

I'm not sure what your point is exactly, and I'm not sure what my "error" is in "framing" the narrative about the final act in the breakup of Yugoslavia? I cannot frame or really reframe anything about the story of what happened, or didn't happen in Kosovo and NATO's response - the attack on Serbia. I don't own a television station or a row of newspapers, so, unfortunately I can't "frame" anything. It's the great media corporations that do the framing, not individuals.

My main point, and one that I'm really confident of concerns the way the Western media and politicians described what was happening in Kosovo in order to justify and ligitimize the bombing campaign against Serbia. I still remember the wild, unsubstatiated and ridiculous claims made by Western politicians very well. The lies and exaggerations were comparable to the propaganda campaign aimed at securing public support for the attack on Iraq, and they were overwhelmingly just as false.

You don't have to take my word for it, I'm sure you won't, however, if you go back and study newspaper reports from the time and compare them to what we now know about what actually happened, any half-way neutral person would find it impossible to disagree with my assessment. The intervention to save Kosovo was based on fabrications and propaganda that in no way justified the bombing campaign against Serbia, but none of this matters much anymore, except that the same media machine is now moving into action to present the world with another exciting narrative only this time the fairy story relates to Georgia. Our criminal leaders rely more and more on propaganda and creating an atmosphere of collective amnisia. The more things change the more they remain the same.

zoran
24 August 2008 at 09:30

This is pretty much how I see it. Yugoslav story was extremely messy looking from inside, and Serbs weren't angels either, but that was not the real topic of the article.

Somebody in comments questioned western values and democracy. With the reason.

From ancient Athens till today democracies carry the same kind of paradox. Free citizens will discuss politics and state matters while slaves will do all the work. It pretty much, from my perspective, stayed the same. Slaves got some rights, so they are a bit less exploited, free to vote etc. The thing is that democracies never stopped looking for "total slaves". Colonies, exploitation of Africa, South America, Asia, kids making Nike shoes for chewing gum a day etc. Yugoslavia is a part of the same story about "democracies" destroying other societies to keep themselves going.

Maybe naively, I still think that democracy is about freedom.

Can a society that is really democratic "dissemble" other countries?

I have big problem believing in that.

zack
28 August 2008 at 14:00

I thought it was all about distracting attention away from Monica Lewinsky