BRITAIN, NATO AND THE LESSONS OF THE BALKAN CONFLICTS 1991–1999
THE SANDHURST CONFERENCE SERIES ISSN 1468-1153 Series Editor: Matthew Midlane 1 The Media and International Security Edited by Stephen Badsey 2 Aspects of Peacekeeping Edited by D.S. Gordon and F.H. Toase 3 Negotiation in International Conflict: Understanding Persuasion Edited by Deborah Goodwin 4 Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Edited by Stephen Badsey and Paul Latawski
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts 1991–1999 Edited by
STEPHEN BADSEY and PAUL LATAWSKI Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
THE SANDHURST CONFERENCE SERIES General Editor
Matthew Midlane
FRANK CASS LONDON AND NEW YORK
First Published in 2004 in Great Britain by FRANK CASS 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2004. and in the United States of America by FRANK CASS 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 1001 Copyright collection © 2004 Frank Cass Copyright chapters © 2004 contributors British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data: Britain, NATO and the lessons of the Balkan conflicts 1991–1999. – (The Sandhurst Conference series; 4) 1. North Atlantic Treaty Organization – Congresses 2. Operation Allied Force, 1989 – Congresses 3. Great Britain – Foreign relations – Serbia – Kosovo – Congresses 4. Great Britain – Foreign relations – 1997– – Congresses 5. Kosovo (Serbia) – Foreign relations – Great Britain – Congresses 6. Great Britain – Military policy – Congresses 7. Kosovo (Serbia) – History – Civil War, 1998– – Congresses I. Badsey, Stephen II. Latawski, Paul III. Royal Military Academy 949.7′103 ISBN 0-203-49528-4 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-203-58265-9 (Adobe eReader Format) ISBN (0 7146 5190 7 (cloth) ISBN (0 7146 8192 X (paper) Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data: Britain, NATO, and the lessons of the Balkan conflicts, 1991–1999/edited by Stephen Badsey and Paul Latawski. p. cm – (The Sandhurst conference series; 4) Based on a meeting which was held at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, Feb. 22–23, 2000. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-7146-5190-7 (cloth) – ISBN 0-7146-8192-X (pbk) 1. Kosovo (Serbia)–History–Civil War, 1998–1999–Participataion, Foreign. 2. North Atlantic Treaty Organization–Armed Forces–Serbia and Montenegro. 3. Balkan Peninsula–History–20th century. 4. Peacekeeping forces. 5. Humanitarian intervention. 6. Armed Forces and mass media–Great Britain. I. Badsey, Stephen. II. Latawski, Paul C. (Paul Chester), 1954– III. Series. DR2087.6.F65B75 2003 949.703–dc21 2003053127
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise without the prior written permission of the publisher of this book.
Contents
Contributors
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Series Editor’s Preface
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Editors’ Preface
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List of Abbreviations
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Introduction: Experience of Kosovo THE RT. HON. GEOFFREY HOON MP
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Part 1 The Image of the Past 1. SIMON TREW Yugoslav Quagmires: The Image of the Past and the Fear of Intervention 2. KLAUS SCHMIDER The Wehrmacht’s Yugoslav Quagmire: Myth or Reality?
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Part 2 The Military Legacy of the Balkans 3. MAJOR-GENERAL F.R. DANNATT Doctrinal Change: The Experience of Bosnia and Kosovo
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4. AIR VICE-MARSHAL PROFESSOR TONY MASON Kosovo: The Air Campaign
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Part 3 The Media and the Kosovo Conflict 5. BRIGADIER S.J.L. ROBERTS Media Operations: Lessons from Kosovo
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6. STEPHEN BADSEY Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict
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7. JAMIE SHEA Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example
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Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Part 4 Contested International Responses 8. PAUL LATAWSKI NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo: The Conceptual Landscape After the Battle
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9. MARK SMITH Russian Policy during the Kosovo Conflict
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10. MARTIN A. SMITH Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations
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Part 5 Conflict Termination and Peace-building 11. STUART GORDON From Antipathy to Hegemony: The Impact on Civil–Military Cooperation
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12. MUKESH KAPILA The Role of Humanitarian Aid in Conflict Management
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Part 6 Balkan Futures 13. CHARLES DICK Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict
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14. JAMES GOW Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict
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STEPHEN BADSEY
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AND
PAUL LATAWSKI Conclusion
Index
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Contributors
DR STEPHEN BADSEY MA FRHISTS is a senior lecturer in the Department of War Studies at RMA Sandhurst. He is the editor of The Media and International Security, Number 1 in the Sandhurst Conference Series. DR PAUL LATAWSKI is a senior lecturer in the Department of Defence and International Affairs at RMA Sandhurst. He is also an Associate Fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London. His principal research interests include contemporary Poland and security in Central and South-Eastern Europe. MATTHEW MIDLANE is Director of Studies at RMA Sandhurst. THE RT. HON. GEOFFREY HOON MP is Secretary of State for Defence. DR SIMON TREW is Deputy Head of the Department of War Studies at RMA Sandhurst, and the author of Britain, Mihailovic and the Chetniks 1941–42. DR KLAUS SCHMIDER is a senior lecturer in the Department of War Studies at RMA Sandhurst. His doctoral thesis of Axis counter-insurgency in Yugoslavia 1941–45 was published in 2002. MAJOR-GENERAL F.R. DANNATT CBE MC BA was General Officer Commanding British 3 Division during its role as part of KFOR in Kosovo in 1999. AIR VICE-MARSHAL PROFESSOR TONY MASON is Director of the Postgraduate Centre for Studies in Security and Diplomacy at the University of Birmingham. His books include Air Power in the Nuclear Age (with Sir Michael Armitage), The Soviet Air Forces, War in the Third Dimension, Air Power: A Centennial Appraisal and The Aerospace Revolution: Revised Roles and Technology.
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts BRIGADIER S.J.L. ROBERTS OBE MA is a former Director of Corporate Communications (Army) in the Ministry of Defence. DR JAMIE SHEA was the NATO Spokesman during the Kosovo conflict. DR MARK A. SMITH is a senior lecturer in the Conflict Studies Research Centre at RMA Sandhurst, specialising in the study of Russian internal politics and foreign policy. DR MARTIN A. SMITH is a senior lecturer in the Department of Defence and International Affairs at RMA Sandhurst. He is the author of On Rocky Foundations: NATO, the United Nations and Peace Operations in the Post-Cold War Era and NATO in the First Decade after the Cold War, and the co-editor of Uncertain Europe. DR STUART GORDON is a senior lecturer in the Department of Defence and International Affairs at RMA Sandhurst. He is the co-editor of Aspects of Peacekeeping, Number 2 in the Sandhurst Conference Series. DR MUKESH KAPILA is Head of the Conflict and Humanitarian Affairs Department of the Department for International Development. CHARLES DICK is Head of the Conflict Studies Research Centre at RMA Sandhurst. DR JAMES GOW is a Reader in the Department of War Studies, Kings College, University of London. He is the author of Triumph of the Lack of Will and co-editor of Bosnia by Television.
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Series Editor’s Preface
This is the fourth in the Sandhurst Conference Series of books charting important themes for the British Army, and perhaps for the armed forces of every country, in the post-Cold War era and into the twenty-first century. The first volume in the series, The Media and International Security, edited by Stephen Badsey, explores the impact of the media on conflict and military operations, and has already been well received by the defence and academic community. The second volume, Aspects of Peacekeeping, edited by D.S. Gordon and F.H. Toase, begins to unpack many of the features of contemporary peace support operations. For an institution such as the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst, seeking to understand the often complex relationships present in these operations is of obvious importance. For any academic institution exploring the issues that bind and divide the diplomatic, humanitarian and military communities in peacekeeping, this book provides an exceptionally useful multidisciplinary introduction. The third book, Negotiation in International Conflict: Understanding Persuasion, edited by Deborah Goodwin, is a discussion of negotiation at all levels of command from the strategic to the tactical. This fourth book in the series, edited by Stephen Badsey and Paul Latawski, examines the broad impact of the dissolution of the former Republic of Yugoslavia, and in particular the role of the British armed forces and of NATO. While it is not intended as a primer on the Balkans, it provides a survey of issues ranging from the historical roots of conflict in the region and the influence of the Second World War through to humanitarian–military relationships in the course of NATO’s campaign over Kosovo. A separate section on military relations with the media reflects the continuing importance of this issue, while an analysis of the historical mythology of the region reveals how badly ‘lessons’ from history may mislead contemporary opinion. For the British Army, indeed the armed forces, the dissolution of Yugoslavia has been a formative experience. It has affected doctrine, ix
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts attitudes to the use of force, relationships with the humanitarian community, the UN and with other British government departments. Ultimately, the experiences of the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) and the NATO-led Implementation and Stabilisation Forces (IFOR and SFOR) have underpinned the British 1998 Strategic Defence Review and the emergence of British expeditionary strategy. The experience of Yugoslavia has also stimulated changes within the transatlantic alliance both in terms of relationships between allies and the force structures themselves. In short, it has served to define our attitudes and responses to a vast range of operations below the threshold of general or regional war. We hope you enjoy reading the series, which is now set to continue, with further conferences and their associated volumes already being planned. Matthew Midlane, Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
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Editors’ Preface
As the fourth in the Sandhurst Conference Series, this book owes its origins to the international conference of the same title, held at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst on 22–23 February 2000. A number of contributors to this book are either serving or past members of the British armed forces, or employed by the British Ministry of Defence or by NATO. The views expressed in this book are those of the authors of individual chapters only, and do not necessarily reflect those of NATO, the Ministry of Defence, the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst or any other institution. Military ranks and appointments, and other titles, are those held at the time of the conference. Thanks are due to Brigadier S.J.L. Roberts OBE MA, Director of Corporate Communications (Army) in the Ministry of Defence, and his staff. Without the support of the Commandant of Sandhurst, Major-General A.G. Denaro CBE, and his successor Major-General P.C.C. Trousdell CB, this book would not have appeared. The conference organising committee was chaired by Matthew Midlane, with Carl Lawson, Dr Paul Latawski and Dr Stephen Badsey as its principal members. The three departmental heads of the Sandhurst Academic Faculty – John Allen of the Department of Communications Studies, Dr Francis Toase of the Department of Defence Studies and International Affairs, and Dr Duncan Anderson of the Department of War Studies – and their staffs all provided support. Those who spoke at the conference also included Lieutenant-General Sir Michael Jackson, Tim Butcher of the Daily Telegraph, Dr Susan Woodward and Brian Donnelly. Additional displays and assistance were provided by Dr Peter Thwaites, Curator of the Sandhurst Collection, by Andrew Orgill, the Sandhurst Librarian, and by members of the Sandhurst staff. Sandhurst public relations and protocol were overseen by Major (Retd) I.C. Park-Weir.
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Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts The editors’ thanks are due for help, both with the conference and the production of this book, to Alison Cox, Pat Alner, Yoland Richardson, Christine McLennan and Marian Matthews. Supervision of this book at Frank Cass was in the capable hands of Sally Green. Stephen Badsey and Paul Latawski Royal Military Academy Sandhurst
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Abbreviations
AA ABM AFSL AMRAAM ANA APD ARRC AWACS BBC BDA CAG CAOC CIA CIMIC CMTF CNN COMCENTAG DEA DCC(A) DOS DSS EADRCC EU EUCOM EW FBI FCO FRY FTX FYROM G-8
Anti-aircraft Artillery Anti-Ballistic Missile Armed Forces of Sierra Leone Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile Albanian National Army Army Doctrine Publication Allied Rapid Reaction Corps Airborne Warning and Control System British Broadcasting Corporation Bomb Damage Assessment Civil Affairs Group Combined Air Operations Centre Central Intelligence Agency Civil–Military Cooperation CIMIC Task Force Cable News Network Commanding Central Army Group Drug Enforcement Administration Directorate of Corporate Communications (Army) Democratic Opposition of Serbia Democratic Party of Serbia Euro-Atlantic Disaster Relief Cooperation Centre European Union US European Command Electronic Warfare Federal Bureau of Investigation Foreign and Commonwealth Office Federal Republic of Yugoslavia Formation Training Exercise Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia Group of Eight xiii
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts GOC HNS HQ ICRC IFF IFOR IISS IMF IPTF IT JNA KFOR KLA KPC LSW MLRS MoD MSF MUP NAC NATO NBC NCO NDH NGO NLA NRG OCHA ODA OHR OMG OSCE PfP PGM PIC PJC PJHQ PR PSO RAF
General Officer Commanding Host Nation Support Headquarters International Committee of the Red Cross Identification Friend or Foe Implementation Force International Institute for Strategic Studies International Monetary Fund International Police Task Force Information Technology Yugoslav National Army Kosovo Force Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK in Albanian) Kosovo Protection Corps Light Support Weapon Multiple-Launch Rocket Systems Ministry of Defence Médecins Sans Frontières Yugoslav Interior Ministry Forces North Atlantic Council North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Warfare Non-Commissioned Officer Nezavisna Drzava Hrvatska, Independent State of Croatia Non-Governmental Organisation National Liberation Army News Release Group Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, UN Overseas Development Administration Office of the High Representative Soviet Operational Manoeuvre Group Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe Partnership for Peace Precision Guided Munitions Press Information Centre Permanent Joint Council (Russia-NATO) Permanent Joint Headquarters Public Relations Peace Support Operations Royal Air Force xiv
Abbreviations RoE RTS RUC RUF RUSI SACEUR SAM SCF SDR SFOR SFRY SPS TLAM UAE UAV UCK UCPMB UHF UK UN UNHCR UNMIK UNPROFOR UNSCR US/USA USAF VJ ZANU ZAPU
Rules of Engagement Radio-Television Serbia Royal Ulster Constabulary Revolutionary United Front Royal United Services Institute Supreme Allied Commander, Europe Surface-to-Air Missile Save the Children Fund Strategic Defence Review Stabilisation Force Socialist Federated Republic of Yugoslavia Serb Socialist Party Tomahawk Land Attack Missile United Arab Emirates Unmanned Aerial Vehicle See KLA Liberation Army of Presovo, Bujanovac and Medvedja Ultrahigh Frequency United Kingdom United Nations United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo United Nations Protection Force United Nations Security Council Resolution United States/United States of America United States Air Force Yugoslav Army Zimbabwe African National Union Zimbabwe African People’s Union
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Introduction: Experience of Kosovo1 THE RT HON. GEOFFREY HOON MP
The Balkans is a subject which is never far from our minds. It was in Bosnia that we first deployed significant numbers of forces with UNPROFOR (the United Nations Protection Force) back in 1992. Since then, British forces have made a major contribution to stability with IFOR (the Implementation Force) and SFOR (the Stabilisation Force). Today we have some 3,000 soldiers in Bosnia as well as support elements in Croatia. As the security situation has stabilised, we have been drawing down and hope to get down to 2,000 soldiers by the end of the year 2000. Britain is handing over command in Banja Luka to Canada, but we remain committed to the job which still needs to be done in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Turning to Kosovo, let me start by repeating that – contrary to some revisionist opinion – the campaign was a resounding success, and a success for NATO in particular. Anyone who doubts that should visit Pristina, as I have done, and canvas opinion there. We were right to intervene. The international community achieved its objectives: Slobodan Milosevic’s repression has ceased, and more than 800,000 refugees have returned to their homes. A great deal went right in Kosovo. Alliance cohesion held together through the most trying period in NATO’s history. The decisions we took in the 1998 Strategic Defence Review (SDR) were vindicated. The conflict proved that we were right to refocus our capabilities to provide more mobile, rapidly deployable forces which can work together in the field. I am amazed that some have sought to question the validity of the SDR’s outcomes following the Kosovo conflict. Far from undermining it, our operational experiences in Kosovo – and surely there can be no more stringent and transparent test of our defence policy than actually putting it into action – have reinforced the key conclusions of the review. xvii
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Perhaps the most significant lesson of all is that the sheer quality of the British forces shone through, and continues to do so. The professional qualities, training and leadership of the British armed forces are second to none. In this setting I am sure I can be forgiven for focusing on the British Army, but the same is true of the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. At every stage British soldiers have shown the world exactly why we are so proud of them: in March, April and May 1999, when they showed the way in caring for refugees in camps in Albania and Macedonia; in June when British soldiers led the advance into Kosovo as the Serbs withdrew; and since, when they have handled a difficult security task with the skill, toughness and sensitivity that we have come to expect. I pay tribute to everyone who has been involved. We now have a tough task on our hands to repair the damage which Milosevic did to Kosovan society. I feel we may see more incidents like that at Mitrovica in February 2000, when snipers opened fire on French KFOR (Kosovo Force) troops. But I know that we have the officers, men and women for the job. It would be wrong to think that there are not lessons to be learned from even the most successful military action. A clear example is the problem of overstretch. We had to do what we did, but equally we must recognise the consequences of committing such a high proportion of our troops to operations. We keep our operational commitments under constant review, and we will not leave our forces deployed longer than is absolutely necessary. In Kosovo, this was demonstrated in the last few months where we have reduced our force numbers from a peak of around 10,400 to the current level of around 3,500. By deploying quickly, British forces can make a decisive difference in the early stages of peacekeeping operations. East Timor is a recent example. But we cannot do so if they are all on apparently never-ending commitments. I inherited from George Robertson an organisation keen to learn these lessons, and to do something about them – an attitude which I know is shared among NATO allies. Too often in the past, we have analysed operations in considerable detail, but then not applied the same rigour in implementing our conclusions. I do not intend that mistake to occur again, particularly when we have such a wealth of raw material to draw on in our process of learning lessons. The basic raw material is, of course, the experience of the operators – the commanders on the ground and their pilots and soldiers. Lessons can also be learned from how things went in the headquarters at home and abroad. Together, these give us a fairly comprehensive picture. All inputs are being coordinated and evaluated at the appropriate level. Action xviii
Introduction can be taken on some inputs straight away in the units. But others require decisions higher up, particularly if large sums of money are involved. We will not shirk these decisions. We live in the real world. And the bottom line is that if we are serious about increasing our capability to solve crises such as those in the Balkans, we need to make the best use of the available resources. That means focusing on priorities – there are limits to what we can afford. As well as learning lessons and preparing ourselves for the next time, we must not forget that there is still a job to be done on the ground. If we risk becoming too esoteric in our deliberations, we may forget that the main expression of our policy is the individual British soldier, quietly getting on with the job whether it is in Pristina, Podujevo, Banja Luka or Mrkonjic Grad. These four places – together with many others where British forces are currently deployed – are indicative of this country’s, and NATO’s, commitment to Balkan security. In London, the work under way on Kosovo is designed to tackle specific problems and to come up with practical solutions. There have been some real shortcomings exposed in allied – especially European – capabilities in several important areas. We, and our European allies, are seeking to improve our ability to put more forces into the field, and to put them there more rapidly. Looking at the air campaign, there were shortfalls in fields such as precision attack, secure communications and the crucial force multipliers such as electronic warfare (EW) and air-to-air refuelling. To demonstrate that we are acting rather than just talking, it might be useful to describe what is going on with the two most frequently quoted examples of equipment failures: the Clansman radio and the SA-80 rifle. We know there is a problem with Clansman. The system is old, and while it was very good it is now showing its technical age. This is why we are developing the Bowman tactical combat radio system to replace it. It is the Army’s highest-priority equipment project, and we want to get it up and running as soon as possible. But there have been problems with the cost and the risk associated with the original proposal. We have taken firm action to address this, putting Bowman on a Smart Procurement footing. I am confident that this will help us find an affordable solution that will deliver the effective capability we need. SA-80 has also had problems, particularly in extreme weather conditions, although it is wrong to say that it did not come up to the mark in Kosovo. A number of modifications to the rifle have now been thoroughly tested, and we plan to implement a modification programme as soon as we can. We are also looking at modifications to the Light Support Weapon (LSW) variant, which did attract some adverse comment xix
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts in Kosovo, and in the meantime we are making sure that the units which need them also have access to other weapons. I am sure that many people in this room will confirm that the crisis provided a steep learning curve for all those involved in the political– military decision-making chain. Allies needed to consult and take decisions quickly. And so did departments within government. The fact that all elements of NATO’s headquarters, political and military, as well as its armed forces, had exercised regularly together in crisis management scenarios helped enormously. NATO had already had experience of a major peacekeeping operation in Bosnia, and had engaged in offensive air operations against the Bosnian Serbs in 1995. But it had never before encountered a challenge on this scale. The Kosovo crisis taught us the vital importance of keeping close to our allies, regularly consulting between capitals and in Brussels on issues of importance. The fact that the alliance held together over a protracted and difficult period, despite attempts by Milosevic to drive a wedge between us, was in my view one of the key reasons why Milosevic realised that he could not win. Our continuing diplomatic efforts, particularly with the Russians, also played a fundamental part in the overall equation. Our relationship with the Russians illustrates the need to involve nations from outside the alliance if we are to maintain pan-European security. The joint statement issued when George Robertson met Mr Vladimir Putin recognised that operations between NATO and Russia should be a cornerstone of European security. As George Robertson remarked, ‘We have moved from permafrost to softer ground’. During the course of the conflict, we needed to liaise closely with our allies to coordinate our public presentation, to ensure that we got the truth out quickly, and to prepare to rebut the lies coming out from Belgrade. The role of the media during conflicts has changed radically, and we need to ensure that we are able to cope with this reality. Responding to reports filed from the battlefield, with instant images of things that may have gone wrong, is a major challenge for all of us. I make no apology for the importance that we place on our media operations. As part of an alliance it is vital that we get our message across – after all, the alliance is based on democracy and we need the support of our peoples or otherwise we will fail. It is not without significance that during the course of the Kosovo conflict the vast majority of people in Britain were supportive of our actions. The Kosovo crisis showed the importance of our armed forces becoming even better than they are now at working together. It also demonstrated the importance of working as a team at the diplomatic and political level, and getting behind agreed policies. Another area where xx
Introduction the same applies is in humanitarian tasks. In many ways this is the most difficult, given the variety of agencies involved, military and civilians, governments and charities. During the Kosovo conflict, there were excellent examples of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and charities working hand in hand with NATO soldiers and host governments to deal with the desperate humanitarian suffering instituted by Milosevic and his regime. The scale was overwhelming and there was a great deal of improvisation, but experts in humanitarian relief were instrumental in stabilising the situation. The various international organisations, nations and charities can learn much from each other. So often, we find ourselves in the same place, dealing with aspects of the same situation. We need to do much more to be prepared for similar emergencies in future. I would apply this lesson in particular to the process of reconstruction. Here we have tangible evidence of international cooperation. In Kosovo, the UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) and KFOR are the key pillars of the international effort. They need to work together. UNMIK itself is a team effort, with the European Union (EU) and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) taking important parts of the agenda. And we remain involved in the reconstruction of Bosnia. But have we learned the lessons of Bosnia? In some respects, yes. But we could and should have done more. It is particularly worrying that yet again it took time to get the civil structures up and running – though this time we were quicker. We have been accused of losing the peace. This is a distortion. But the failure to get a civil administration in place, and in particular to get civil policing and justice quickly established, has caused real difficulties. Soldiers are not police officers, and we should strive to ensure that they are not seen as such. I understand the problem – there simply are not battalions of police officers around the world waiting to be deployed on peacekeeping missions. But the lesson that police will be needed too is inescapable. We must do better. However, I should say that here, too, the United Kingdom is setting an example. The Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) officers deployed in Pristina, and elsewhere in Kosovo, are recognised as far and away the best in the province. There is no doubt that we are in for a long haul in the Balkans. Many local institutions were destroyed by Milosevic back in 1989 and cannot be replaced overnight. There is no recent history of self-government and many people have fled their homes. There should be no doubting our commitment, but it takes time to rebuild a shattered society. However, this is to dwell too much on the negatives. We need to make sure that we make the most of our experiences. We should do more xxi
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts in peacetime to prepare ourselves for these tasks. Although the details will differ, we know broadly what needs to be done. In short, we need to make sure that we win the peace. Although by no means perfect, the current stability in Bosnia illustrates what a difference we can make. Contrary to some ill-informed media speculation, we also have much to be proud about in our involvement in Kosovo. We were right to intervene, and there is now a future for its people. Much has been achieved but much remains to be done, and armed forces cannot do everything. The work of UNMIK, although often criticised, is beginning to bear fruit. Over 810,000 refugees have returned to Kosovo, 300,000 children are back in school, the UCK has demilitarised2 and the Kosovo Protection Corps (KPC) is beginning to find its feet; the crime rate is decreasing, although we must remain alert and determined to deal with those who seek to unravel what has been painstakingly put into place. KFOR has a robust presence throughout Kosovo, and has the flexibility and ability to deal with flashpoints – current events in Mitrovica are an example of this. The rapid deployment of KFOR soldiers, including British soldiers of the 2nd Battalion, the Royal Green Jackets, sent a clear signal that KFOR will not tolerate threats to security, from whichever side they may come. This momentum needs to be maintained and we must remain vigilant to potential threats from within and outside of Kosovo. In Kosovo, no one should doubt that we remain absolutely committed to securing a just outcome for its citizens, Albanian and Serb, and we are determined to achieve a peaceful and democratic society, able to substantially govern itself. I can assure you that the political will exists in the United Kingdom to secure a lasting peace in the Balkans, and there are some helpful signs from the region itself. The recent parliamentary and presidential elections in Croatia suggest that the country has turned a corner – we hope that it will have a positive impact in Bosnia, too. We need to remain vigilant to developments in the region. As I noted earlier, this is a combined effort, and our continued determination must be shared by our NATO allies and partners. We have built an astonishingly wide consensus, and a hugely diverse international presence in the Balkans, and this clearly signals the strength of international desire to see the job through. Geoffrey Hoon Sandhurst, 2000
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Introduction NOTES
1. Mr Hoon’s remarks were delivered to the Conference on 22 February 2000. They do not, therefore, necessarily reflect events in the region since that date. 2. Also known as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA).
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PART 1 The Image of the Past
1
Yugoslav Quagmires: The Image of the Past and the Fear of Intervention1 SIMON TREW
INTRODUCTION
Even to the most casual observer of foreign affairs, it was apparent that reporting and analysis of the wars in former Yugoslavia 1991–99 involved widespread use of imagery drawn from the past, comparisons with previous wars, and attempts to draw lessons. This is hardly surprising. Given the scale of the Yugoslav tragedy and its possible repercussions, many outside the country wanted to understand the motives of the various belligerents and the likely consequences of their actions. But, unlike other scenes of tragedy in the 1990s such as Rwanda and Chechnya, many Europeans would have claimed some familiarity with Yugoslavia’s history even before the outbreak of war in 1991–92, and this may have reinforced a desire to understand why the country disintegrated so spectacularly, and to understand the nature of the international response. Add to this the argument that the causes of Yugoslavia’s collapse can only be properly understood in terms of the manipulation of the country’s recent history, and the many references to the past that occurred in the media coverage of the Balkan conflicts are easy to understand. From the perspective of the professional military historian, the main point of interest is the manner in which past conflicts have been used by the media and by others, including commentators from the field of politics and international relations, to shed light on the Yugoslav Wars of Dissolution. Particularly worthy of attention is the manner in which historical references were used to support or to warn against direct military intervention by the United Nations or by NATO. In particular, 3
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts it is valuable to explore this topic in the light of Western historical views on Yugoslavia in the Second World War as they stood during the conflict, in comparison with the picture that has emerged from subsequent research. In order to enquire as to whether comparisons, images or ‘lessons’ from the past have been used accurately and relevantly, it is necessary to deal with a number of related issues. Firstly, there is the issue of the extent to which references to past Yugoslav conflicts were in fact made in the Western media in the 1990s, and what kind of references these were. Secondly, there is the source of these images and impressions, and the question of their accuracy. Thirdly, there is the difficult issue of whether these historical references had any impact on actual policy. In particular, unless the alleged influence of the threat of ‘Balkan quagmires’ drawn from past Yugoslav wars can in some way be contextualised, there is a risk of overstating their significance.
C O M PA R I S O N S W I T H O T H E R WA R S
Firstly, then, how widely were images of past conflicts and analogies with those conflicts used by the British media and others to clarify our understanding of the Yugoslav wars? And, as an extension of this question, what images were actually used? Detailed examination of the role of the media in the Balkan conflicts has been undertaken elsewhere.2 Suffice it to say here that there is considerable evidence of a desire to reflect ‘lessons of the past’ in the analysis of recent events in the Balkans. Admittedly, only a very small proportion of the media’s output has dealt exclusively with the military history of the region. However, from June 1991 all British broadsheets, especially the Sunday newspapers, contained frequent and fairly detailed features on the historical background to what was then the emerging Yugoslav crisis. Much the same has been true of popular weekly journals such as Time or The Economist, as well as less widely read but possibly more influential British publications like the Spectator or New Statesman. British television and radio have also devoted considerable effort to trying to explain the region’s history, a tendency – to take but one example – illustrated by Channel Four’s documentary series ‘Bloody Bosnia’ as early as August 1993. Although coverage elsewhere has perhaps been more patchy, nevertheless it appears that at one time or another in virtually every part of the developed world considerable attention has been paid to the background to Yugoslavia’s collapse. Much of the content of these newspaper and documentary pieces was of a general historical kind; however, there were also numerous references 4
Yugoslav Quagmires to the details of past conflicts. The overall impression that is left to the researcher is of a reasonably close association between the events of the 1990s and violence in the Balkans at other periods of history and in other locations. This impression has been conveyed through the use of a number of different images and associations; there have been frequent, vague and unexplained allusions to ‘Balkan quagmires’ and these have sometimes been linked to remarks allegedly made by Bismarck or some other nineteenth-century statesman, but generally they have represented little more than a modern version of the medieval ‘Here Be Dragons!’ Nevertheless, they have been common enough to deserve a mention, and when viewed in the context of other more precise references they may have been of some significance.3 Secondly, and much more important, have been specific references to the achievement of Marshal Tito’s Partisans in the Second World War. An analysis of British newspaper articles of the period from 1991 onwards reveals many articles, editorials and letters which made reference – as an established and indisputable fact – to Tito’s guerrillas having tied down large Axis forces in Yugoslavia; and also many which spoke in terms of the Partisans’ military heroism and ultimate victory over German and Axis forces. To take just one example, as late as 23 April 1999 during the debate over a ground war that formed part of the Kosovo conflict, a full-page article in the Guardian entitled ‘What it Means if the Troops Go In’ claimed that by early 1943 the Communist-led guerrillas were tying down seven German and thirty Italian divisions in Yugoslavia. The same piece made much of the ‘steady bleeding’ of Axis forces in Yugoslavia between 1941 and 1945, and it also described the battle of the Sutjeska Gorge in June 1943 as ‘one of the decisive battles on the eastern front during the Second World War’, which by any standards is something of an exaggeration. Similarly, in the Guardian on 12 August 1992 Edward Pearce wrote that ‘the detention of nine [German] divisions in Yugoslavia against the Serbian Chetniks and Communist Partisans may have been the item in a tight balance which defeated Adolf Hitler’.4 In a similar vein, in May 1993 Time magazine carried a feature based on interviews with German veterans of the Second World War which argued that ground fighting in Yugoslavia was ‘virtually untenable, even by a seasoned and well-equipped force’.5 Added to this were numerous articles which focused on the civil wars which were fought in Yugoslavia after 1941, but which nevertheless contributed to the impression of a nightmare scenario should a substantial ground intervention be carried out in 1999. By contrast, other newspaper articles of the period took a more sceptical view, although perhaps not one that was necessarily better 5
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts informed. In particular, the stunning success of the 1941 German invasion, in which ‘only 166’ Germans died, was frequently cited as a reason not to fear confrontation in the 1990s.6 That the total number of German casualties was 558, that their operations left huge areas of the country unoccupied and hundreds of thousands of enemy soldiers uncaptured, or that almost 3,500 Italians became casualties in the same campaign, were facts that tended to be ignored.7 Other comments showed even less desire to investigate the intricacies of the wartime situation. For example, a leading article in the Guardian in April 1993 stated categorically that helicopters would have given the Germans victory over Tito.8 Remembering the problems encountered by the US Army in 1999 in operating its AH-64 Apaches based in Albania, the veracity of this claim may at least be questioned. That considerable attention was devoted to wartime events in the Balkans should also be linked to the tendency to contextualise numerous specific features of the 1990s conflicts with the events of 1939–45. Whatever the changes both to world politics and to warfare itself since 1945, the jargon of the Second World War permeated both reporting and commentary in the British and other Western media. Alleged parallels between the Holocaust and Balkan ‘ethnic cleansing’ rapidly became commonplace in the reporting of the war, and indeed an important factor in the propaganda battle. At a press conference during August 1992, Muhammed Sacirbeg, Bosnian ambassador to the UN, stated that ‘the truth is, we have become the modern world’s Warsaw Ghetto of fifty years ago’. Later, on the eve of the Kosovo intervention, President Clinton compared Serb attacks on ethnic Albanians in Kosovo to Nazi atrocities.9 Slobodan Milosevic was sometimes described as another Adolf Hitler,10 the use of rape as a weapon prompted references to the systematic sexual violence encountered on the Eastern Front in the Second World War,11 and the Hague War Crimes Tribunal was compared directly with the Nuremberg process. Serbian and Croatian offensives in 1992 and 1995 were described as ‘Blitzkriegs’, suggestions of a British withdrawal through Split in 1993 elicited references to a ‘Dunkirk-style evacuation’, and descriptions of the hilly, wooded terrain of Bosnia conjured up in some minds another vision of 1940, the ‘impenetrable’ Ardennes. Similarly, the effects of NATO airstrikes in 1999 were often viewed by commentators through the prism of the strategic bombing campaigns of the Second World War, something that was reinforced by the fact that both German and Allied airmen had done their best to flatten Belgrade in 1941 and 1944 respectively.12 Criticism of Western policy was often based on alleged similarities with the ‘appeasement’ of the 1930s,13 and the widespread use of the term ‘fascist’ – if less clearly focused – 6
Yugoslav Quagmires compounded the impression of history repeating itself. Add to this the terms used to describe the belligerents – as ‘Chetniks’ or ‘Ustashe’ – even if only as terms of abuse by their enemies, and the plethora of references to the Second World War made by the warring factions in their doctrines, equipment, insignia, flags and slogans, and the idea that all that was happening in 1991–99 was a replay of earlier events appeared rather seductive. Of course, not all images of the past have been drawn solely from the Second World War, its origins and immediate aftermath. For instance, European Union Chief Commissioner Jacques Delors was reported in August 1992 as shuddering at the prospect of a battle to liberate Sarajevo because it reminded him of Dien Bien Phu, the epic siege of 1954 in which French and French colonial forces were defeated by the Viet Minh.14 Vietnam also loomed large in reporting of the US position, as did the spectre of Mogadishu in 1993 during its forces’ involvement in Somalia.15 These references and comparisons also informed views from other perspectives. Interviewing members of the 1st Cheshire Regiment Battalion Group before its deployment to Bosnia in 1992, a correspondent from The Sunday Times was told by one soldier, ‘I think we could be sucked into something that’s not really a good thing. The point is where would it stop? It’s got all the makings of another Vietnam’.16 For their part, the Russians and others made occasional references to their war in Afghanistan 1979–89; and general remarks about the problems of counter-insurgency illustrated by reference to a range of other conflicts can also easily be traced in the media’s analysis of the Balkans conflicts.17 Last, but by no means least, insofar as they were not compared with the London ‘Blitz’ of 1940, the air campaigns of 1995 and 1999 brought forth a stream of articles comparing them to the use of air power in the Gulf War of 1991.18
T H E A C C U RA C Y O F H I S T O R I C A L C O M PA R I S O N S
If it is the case that interpretation of events in Yugoslavia between 1991 and 1999 were often expressed in terms of alleged similarities with other conflicts, it seems sensible to ask from where these comparisons were taken. Furthermore, were the resources used and the conclusions drawn actually accurate? In a general sense, it is not difficult to identify the material that was available to journalists and others during the 1990s. Secondary sources, memoirs of the Partisan struggle of 1941–45 and collections of documents existed in large quantities. Veterans of the Second World War, among them 7
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts British officers who had served with the Yugoslav Resistance, were happy to be interviewed. Some, such as the well-known Fitzroy Maclean, were even involved in briefing units which were being deployed as part of UNPROFOR (the United Nations Protection Force). Expert opinion from serving or retired soldiers, diplomats, the universities, the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) or other bodies was easily accessible. With Western journalists flooding into former Yugoslavia by late 1991, the native population also found a ready audience for its own perspectives on Balkan history. The belligerent leaders and their external supporters were equally keen to articulate historical justifications for what they were doing, or warnings to those who might try to stop them. If anything, there was an embarrassment of riches when it came to finding out about Yugoslavia’s past and the apparent similarities between conflicts there and elsewhere. Nevertheless, there were problems in using these sources appropriately. Most accounts of the Second World War in Yugoslavia available in the West in the early 1990s were ideologically distorted propaganda. A few balanced studies of the Partisan struggle existed, but most either covered a limited period, or were little more than general or superficial overviews. The US Army’s Center for Military History had produced a pamphlet on German anti-guerrilla operations in the Balkans as early as 1954, and it was perhaps not by chance that this was reissued in 1989, when the break-up of Yugoslavia was being widely predicted.19 However, this document was only 82 pages long, and less than a third of these dealt with operations in Yugoslavia. Bizarre as it may seem, the doctoral thesis written by Klaus Schmider of the Department of War Studies at Sandhurst, and awarded in 2001, almost certainly represents the first comprehensive analysis of Axis counter-insurgency in Yugoslavia written. Such a study is rather overdue.20 It could also be argued that far too many statements about Yugoslavia in the Second World War were taken at face value during the 1990s. For example, Fitzroy Maclean’s Eastern Approaches, despite being a wonderful book to read (which probably explains its huge sales since its first publication in 1949) puts forward only one, not necessarily reliable, interpretation of the effectiveness of the Partisan resistance.21 Eagerness to fill column inches or air-time also appears to have allowed some very peculiar assertions to be reported without question. Again, to give only one example, just as the first significant demands for military intervention were being made in summer 1992, a lengthy interview in the Guardian reported without comment the words of General Stojadinovic, who was at the time the Yugoslav Army’s official spokesman; ‘The Bosnian topography cost the Germans twelve divisions in the Second World War, and 8
Yugoslav Quagmires the defenders at the time were armed only with light weapons’.22 This was, to be blunt, pure unhistorical nonsense, but it was nonsense of a kind that was widely repeated outside Yugoslavia at the time, and for some years afterwards. The rush to offer opinions on the Yugoslav conflicts in the 1990s also produced numerous problems in interpreting the past accurately. Some commentators clearly knew what they were talking or writing about. Others, however, did not. In a ‘Late Show’ programme broadcast on 23 January 1993 the Guardian’s Maggie O’Kane, often an outspoken critic of the conduct of wars, admitted that, ‘I basically got on a train and arrived there very ill-prepared. I think initially a lot of journalists weren’t really prepared when they went out there, or hadn’t come to grips with what was going on there. And I think it was reflected in the reporting’. Referring even more explicitly to the fact that close experience with one conflict did not necessarily make one an expert on another, the reporter Ed Vulliamy added that, ‘When the veterans of Vietnam, Afghanistan, Lebanon and other places came to Yugoslavia they were rather like uncles at first. But it became clear they were as lost as we were’.23 This is a depressing picture. Nevertheless, it would be unfair to allege that no light at all was shed on the conflicts of the 1990s by references to recent history. Given the deliberate self-identification of many of the belligerents within Yugoslavia with their 1940s predecessors, the ideas and aspirations of at least some of them could indeed be better understood by comprehending the past. A number of analysts were also able to identify genuine similarities and differences between, on the one hand, the Second World War, the Vietnam War or other conflicts, and the conflicts in the Balkans on the other, and to assess the implications for possible intervention operations. Thus, Simon Jenkins of The Times wrote in April 1999 that ‘Kosovo is not the same as Vietnam and if NATO cannot hold a province the size of Yorkshire it is in dire straits’.24 Similarly, Sir John Keegan, Defence Editor of the Daily Telegraph, noted the historical weaknesses of Partisan forces when confronted by well-trained regulars; and Martin Woollacott of the Guardian, on several occasions in the first half of the 1990s, pointed out that the Serbs in Bosnia were massively overextended and had rather low morale. As Woollacott observed of the chances for a successful NATO airstrike against the Serbs as early as 1992, ‘We ought at least to entertain the possibility that they would run away in fear instead of assuming that they would leap behind a bush and then re-emerge as reincarnations of Second World War Partisans’ (emphasis added).25 Although even Woollacott’s writings, as well as many other articles, continued to overestimate the effectiveness of Tito’s Partisans in the Second World War, 9
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts and to misunderstand the circumstances in which the Germans fought them, remarks of this kind nevertheless reflected a considerably better understanding of the relevance of the past than the contentious statements that emerged in the same period from such pundits as the Rt. Hon. Tony Benn MP, Professor Germaine Greer or, to take a very extreme case, the journalist Julie Burchill, who wrote in April 1999 that ‘Blair keeps telling us it’s legit [sic], because it’s like the Second World War. He’s right. It is. Except this time, by reducing Serbia to rubble, side by side with our buddies, the Luftwaffe, we’re the fascists’.26
T H E I M PA C T O F H I S T O RY O N P O L I C Y
There is one very obvious difficulty in answering the question as to whether these references to the past, and the images that they invoked, had any real impact upon policy. Until sufficient documents became available, it will probably remain impossible to quantify the influence of such images of ‘Yugoslav quagmires’ on decisions taken in the 1990s. As far as is known, no president or prime minister has ever explicitly stated (either on or off the record) that a major reason behind the policies that were pursued was a fear of repeating history; nor should any such statement be expected. Indeed, it is possible to suggest or identify many reasons why particular policies or positions were adopted during the 1990s, and most of these had little or nothing to do with interpretations of the past. Even if such interpretations were relevant, it seems unlikely that they represented a sufficient or independent cause for action, or for that matter for inaction. Yet it is equally hard to make a convincing case that images of the past were irrelevant to the policy-making process, particularly in Western behaviour towards the Balkans during 1991–99. The mere fact that so much attention was devoted to analysing Yugoslav history or alleged parallels with other conflicts itself presumably implies some belief that useful lessons could be learned from studying the past. It is also unrealistic to imagine that, in the context of frequent debates about the practicability of military intervention, previous operations in this or other areas should have been ignored by ministries of defence and military planners. Certainly, sufficient sources exist to suggest that close attention was paid to trying to investigate whether or not historical analysis could assist in decision-making. And it would seem rather odd if such studies were entirely ignored. In April 1999 Kim Sengupta commented in the Independent that ‘NATO’s most experienced planners are poring over US Army textbooks written in the sixties [sic] which 10
Yugoslav Quagmires analyse Marshal Tito’s tactics against occupying Nazi troops during the Second World War’.27 By way of a conclusion, and as an attempt to assess the impact of these historical studies on policy, a number of observations may be made that are themselves likely to withstand the test of time. Firstly, for a number of reasons, many commentators and analysts were tempted to present the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s in terms that drew strongly on recent historical events and their associated images, particularly with respect to the Second World War. Secondly, and much more seriously, these images and comparisons were drawn from conflicts that had taken place both inside and outside Yugoslavia, but few actually reflected any deep understanding of these conflicts; many of the alleged parallels were therefore both inappropriate and misleading. Thirdly, although there has been some objective discussion of how understanding the past can help us better to comprehend our options in the present, far too often commentators used historical examples extremely selectively, with the primary aim of reinforcing existing prejudices or in support of their own agendas. Finally, as a result, anyone who might have tried to integrate historical analysis into policy-making was most likely to have been highly confused in the process. Under such circumstances it is likely that the image, based on past wars, of ‘Yugoslav quagmires’ in the 1990s may well have existed in many minds, but that any influence such images might have had would have been exercised mainly at a secondary, or even subconscious level. In the final analysis, history during the period of the Balkan conflicts in 1991–99 was seen and treated, all too often, as little more than a prostitute, and a cheap and dispensable one at that.
NOTES
1. Since this chapter was first presented as a paper, the appearance of Brendan Simms, Unfinest Hour: Britain and the Destruction of Bosnia (London: Allen Lane, 2001), particularly Chapter 6 ‘The Hour of the Experts’, has cast considerable further light on the subject matter that it covers. 2. See Stephen Badsey (ed.), The Media and International Security (London: Frank Cass, 1999), Nik Gowing, Real Time Television Coverage of Armed Conflicts and Diplomatic Crises: Does it Pressure or Distort Foreign Policy Decisions? (Harvard University Working Paper 94–1, 1994) and J. Gow, R. Patterson and A. Preston (eds), Bosnia by Television (London, British Film Institute, 1996). 3. For examples, see ‘West Nearer Use of Force’, Guardian, 7 August 1992 and ‘Fears of Balkan Quagmire Haunt the Cabinet’, Guardian, 19 August 1992.
11
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts 4. ‘What it Means if the Troops Go In’, Guardian, 23 April 1999; Edward Pearce, ‘Lessons for the War Party’, Guardian, 12 August 1992. For other examples, see ‘Serbs must Draw on Fierce Fighting Spirit that Nazis Failed to Crush’, The Times, 26 March 1999 and William Rees-Mogg’s ‘Keep Out and Stay Out: A Ground Invasion of Kosovo Would Be a Disaster for a Divided NATO’, The Times, 19 April 1999. 5. James Jackson, ‘Ask the Men who Fought There’, Time, 31 May 1993, p. 18. 6. For example by Martin Wollacott, ‘Take the Bully by the Horns’, Guardian, 6 August 1992. 7. See Simon Trew, Britain, Mihailovic and the Chetniks, 1941–42 (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1998), particularly Chapter 1 ‘Occupation and Reaction’. 8. General Sir Anthony Farrar-Hockley, ‘Price May Be a Soldier’s Life’, Guardian, 20 April 1993. 9. ‘UN “Impotent” Says Bosnia’, Guardian, 14 August 1992; ‘The Second Holocaust’, Guardian, 30 April 1993; ‘NATO Orders in the Bombers’, The Times, 24 March 1999. 10. For example by Ken Livingston MP in the House of Commons on 25 March 1999 (The Times, 26 March 1999). 11. ‘Yugoslav Forces Use Ancient Ways to Break Civilian Spirits’, Guardian, 14 April 1999. 12. For example, Tim Judah, ‘A Violent Interloper on the Stage of European History’, Independent, 27 March 1999. 13. For example Paul Anderson, editor of Tribune, quoted by Patrick Wintour ‘Rift Grows in Britain on Sending in the Troops’, Guardian, 14 August 1992. 14. ‘West backs aid force for Bosnia’, Guardian, 11 August 1992. According to one source, as at Dien Bien Phu consideration was given to using nuclear weapons to assist French troops on the ground; see ‘French Weighed Nuclear Threat in Bosnia’, Independent, 23 April 1997. 15. ‘US edges towards Bosnia force’, Guardian, 5 August 1992. ‘Clinton Hesitates as a Nation Divided Shies away from War’, Guardian, 29 April 1993. ‘The Incredible Changing US Policy on Bosnia’, International Herald Tribune, 16 July 1997. ‘Washington in Dread of Another Vietnam’, Daily Telegraph, 29 March 1999. ‘US Memories of Vietnam Chip Away at Morale’, The Times, 2 April 1999. 16. Quoted in The Sunday Times, 23 August 1992. 17. For example, General Sir Michael Rose, ‘Bombing No Match for Moral Fervour’, The Times, 26 March 1999. 18. For example, General Sir Charles Guthrie, ‘Air Power will Save us from a Bloody Fight’, The Sunday Times, 28 March 1999. For a Serbian ‘Blitz spirit’ see Patrick Bishop, ‘A People who Glory in the Prospect of Defeat’, Daily Telegraph, 16 April 1999. The Times, 26 March 1999, used a November 1940 photograph of the destroyed Coventry Cathedral when illustrating an article on the bombing of Belgrade. 19. R.M. Kennedy, German Antiguerrilla Operations in the Balkans (1941–1944) (Washington, DC: Center of Military History, US Army, 1989 facsimile edition). 20. K.H. Schmider, ‘“Ein Kriegschauplatz, auf dem man Ehre und Reputation Verlieren Kann”. Krieg und Besatzung in Jugoslawien, 1941–1944’, University of Mainz PhD thesis, 2001. 21. Fitzroy Maclean, Eastern Approaches (London: Cape, 1949) was reprinted ten times in 1949, reissued in hardback in 1966 and again in 1975. It has
12
Yugoslav Quagmires
22. 23. 24. 25. 26. 27.
also gone into at least four paperback editions, the last of which (Penguin, 1991) was still in print in February 2000. It is difficult to imagine that any single source on the Second World War in Yugoslavia has been more widely read in the West. ‘Army Involvement “Could Spread War”’, Guardian, 8 August 1992. Quoted in the Guardian, 18 January 1993. ‘Three Strikes and Out’, The Times, 21 April 1999. ‘Take the Bully by the Horns’, Guardian, 6 August 1992. See the Guardian, 10 April 1999. Kim Sengupta, ‘Lessons of History’, Independent, 17 April 1999; see also Paul Rogers, ‘Giant-Killer Dogs of War’, Guardian, 17 August 1992.
13
2
The Wehrmacht’s Yugoslav Quagmire: Myth or Reality? KLAUS SCHMIDER
INTRODUCTION
The perception in the West of the German occupation forces’ failure in Yugoslavia during 1941–44 contributed to making intervention in that country a daunting prospect for both the United Nations and NATO in the 1990s. This chapter will attempt to analyse both the causes of the German defeat in Yugoslavia in the Second World War, and the extent to which the events of that period offered any useful lessons for intervention in the same area 50 years later. For the sake of clarity, the focus will be on events within the wartime ‘Independent State of Croatia’ (Nezavisna Drzava Hrvatska or NDH), which were usually referred to in the context of the debate on intervention in the early 1990s. The ease with which Bulgars and Germans policed Serbia for most of the Second World War with only a minimum of first-line units obviously made this country a less useful example.1 When, after the Second World War, numerous German officers of general rank were tried before Allied courts for war crimes perpetrated in the course of their campaigns against irregulars, the Yugoslav case – involving what was arguably the most intense counter-insurgency campaign ever waged by the German Army – came in for particularly close scrutiny. One of the main lines of argument of the defence, soon adopted by some of the accused in their published memoirs, involved the problems raised by the ‘Balkan way of war’, as they seemed to see it: centuries of internecine strife and ethnic cleansing, as well as an all-pervading disregard for human life, proved an ideal breeding ground for an insurgency of such 14
The Wehrmacht’s Yugoslav Quagmire: Myth or Reality? unparalleled savagery that only the sternest countermeasures would do to contain it.2 In view of the fact that NATO in the 1990s would not be in a position to show a comparable disregard for human rights, this seemed to make a Western intervention an even more daunting, not to say impossible task. Accordingly, this theory endeared itself to those pundits for whom the mere idea of intervention was already anathema on account of the fond memories associated with the part played by ‘plucky little Serbia’ in two world wars on the Allied side.3
T H E Y U G O S L AV I N S U R G E N C Y
1941–1944
Closer scrutiny reveals other factors apart from historical precedent that materially aided the Yugoslav insurgents in the Second World War, and which were quite unique to the setting provided by the Axis occupation of the Balkans. First and foremost among these was the nature of the indigenous ultra-fascist and ultra-nationalist regime to which Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini had bequeathed the newly created Independent State of Croatia or NDH (comprising the modern-day states of Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina as well as the Serb province of Srem). Although its minute Ustasha movement along with the tepid loyalty of the rather ineffective Croat armed forces would not have made for much of a power base at the best of times, its leader Ante Pavelic immediately embarked on a programme of genocide aimed primarily at the Jewish and Serb minorities living within its borders. In the case of the Serbs, their sizeable numbers (approximately 1,950,000 people) as well as the fact that they settled in a few compact areas, in addition to the unquantifiable input of their warrior tradition, allowed them to actively resist this design to a point that by early 1942 most Serb-settled regions had become no-go areas for NDH government forces. At the same time the unwillingness of the Ustasha regime to reverse this policy, as well as its persistent incapability to govern the country by means other than pillage and anarchy, caused an increasing number of Croats and Muslims to turn away from it as well. Even while still showing a marked reluctance to cast their lot with the Serb-dominated Partisans, their lack of enthusiasm for taking up arms on behalf of a thoroughly discredited government was reflected in a growing number of incidents in which entire regiments of the Croat Army would surrender to the insurgents without so much as a shot being fired. By mid-1942 the predictability of this response had turned the Croat armed forces into the Partisans’ most important source of arms and ammunition.4 15
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Even though it should by this time have become glaringly obvious that the Ustasha regime had turned from a dubious asset into an outright liability, both Mussolini and Hitler, for reasons of their own, decided to stand by it. From the Italian dictator’s point of view Pavelic, who had spent more than a decade in exile in Italy, was very much his ‘man in Zagreb’ and a more-or-less pliable tool of Italian foreign policy. Replacing him with any other personality or arrangement would as likely as not have resulted in a loss of influence, and Italian foreign policy went to great lengths to prevent a contingency of this kind from ever developing.5 Similar considerations precluded decisive action from Berlin. In the beginning, Hitler insisted on avoiding anything that might compromise Italy’s standing as the hegemonic power of the western Balkans; and after the fall of Italian Fascism in summer 1943 the view that Pavelic – tainted as he was because of his own previous record – could at least be relied upon to remain completely loyal to the Axis at all times became the leitmotif of Germany’s relations with the NDH.6 This political stalemate allowed the military situation to deteriorate even further and provided the insurgency movements – especially the communist Partisans – with an almost limitless pool of human and material resources. Another element in the partitioning of Yugoslavia which worked decisively in the insurgents’ favour was the role allotted to the junior Axis partner. In pursuit of old dreams of Balkan hegemony, Mussolini had managed not just to annex a large slice of Dalmatia but also to have Italy appointed as overseer of the new Croat NDH state. This fact was underscored both by the appointment of an Italian prince as its king, and by the garrisoning of the southern half of the country by the Italian Second Army with more than 200,000 troops. Unexpected losses to insurgent action as well as Croat opposition to this arrangement soon led to widespread disenchantment on the Italian side, and to an increasing unwillingness to shoulder their share of military occupation duties. Quite apart from a marked reluctance to aggressively engage the Partisans, this was also expressed by an Italian retreat from the Bosnian heartlands in June 1942, which coming as it did as the Partisans were on the verge of losing their safe base area in Montenegro facilitated the escape of their main forces to western Bosnia. In addition to this, through a series of prisoner exchange deals and an increasing number of military defeats, the Italians supplied the Partisans with the kind of heavy armament that not even defecting Croat regiments could usually provide. Several contemporary documents testify to the serious deterioration of the morale of most Italian units serving in Yugoslavia, starting at some point after mid-1942. By early summer 1943, this had reached the point at which the general officer commanding the Second Army had 16
The Wehrmacht’s Yugoslav Quagmire: Myth or Reality? to admonish one of his corps commanders that he should impress upon his men the fact that they were at war.7 Only slightly less important were the benefits that the insurgents derived from the fact that they fought as members of a powerful alliance which from early 1943 onwards could be seen to be heading for total victory. Quite apart from the substantial assistance which, from October 1943 onwards, shipments of arms and ammunition as well as close air support meant for the Partisans,8 there was also the dimension of morale to consider. Even though overly sanguine expectations of a Soviet victory in the summer of 1941 had materially contributed to the Partisans’ most devastating defeat in Serbia, by 1944 the almost daily displays of Allied air power over war-torn Yugoslavia drove home the lesson to every civilian and insurgent that Germany had irrevocably lost the war. German diplomats, endeavouring to drum up Serbian and Montenegrin support for the German cause in late 1943 and early 1944, repeatedly went on record as saying that of all the obstacles they faced, the one posed by these daily demonstrations of Allied air supremacy was probably the most insurmountable.9
G E R M A N S T RA T E G Y I N Y U G O S L AV I A
1942–43
Even though by late 1942 the Partisans were operating in what can only be termed an extremely insurgent-friendly environment, the fact remains that carving out for themselves a safe base area the size of present-day Slovakia within the NDH10 would probably not have sufficed to draw the German High Command’s attention to this particular problem. Only the threat that this state of affairs posed in conjunction with a possible Allied amphibious landing in the Balkans sometime in late spring or early summer 1943 compelled the occupying power to plan a campaign aimed at the crushing of what was by then called the ‘Partisan state’.11 The Axis forces were aided in this intention by the fact that by this stage most of the Partisans’ military assets were concentrated in so-called ‘brigades’ which in structure and fighting methods were much closer to ordinary military formations than to those of genuine guerrillas. Although they could bring to bear considerable firepower, they were also much easier to target and fix. Accordingly, the series of operations code-named ‘Weiss I’, ‘Weiss II’, and ‘Schwarz’ that began on 20 January 1943 took the form of a running fight between Tito’s main forces and a group of German and Axis divisions that was remarkably similar to an ordinary military campaign in mountainous terrain. Beginning in western Bosnia and ending in north-west Montenegro, it featured several last-minute 17
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts escapes by Tito and the core of his forces from shrinking encirclements that must undoubtedly rate among the most dramatic in recent military history.12 Notwithstanding crippling losses, the campaign was undoubtedly an important strategic and morale victory for the Partisans, and became a cornerstone of their post-war mythology. In spite of the failure of this five-month campaign and the persistently high level of the German counter-insurgency effort, it would be misleading to attribute rising German troop levels within the NDH, which were over 80,000 by August 1943,13 solely to the need of keeping the Partisans in check. Ever since the coup against Mussolini on 25 July 1943, the need to insure against an imminent Italian defection had become at least as important. Also, with two Allied armies slowly battling their way up the Italian peninsula since early September there was no telling when the notion of a Balkan short cut might suggest itself to the Anglo-American Combined Chiefs of Staff.
T H E G E R M A N F O R C E S I N Y U G O S L AV I A
It is at this point that a closer look is required at the different types of unit deployed by the Wehrmacht High Command for counter-insurgency duty in this part of the Balkans. The original three divisions tasked with occupying Serbia in April 1941 were 704th Infantry Division, 714th Infantry Division and 717th Infantry Division, plus 718th Infantry Division occupying northern Croatia.14 These were understrength divisions made up of reservists and each consisting of two regiments only, and still in the process of completing their large-unit training when in late summer 1941 the Serb rebellion erupted all around them.15 One year later, these formations still formed the backbone of the German occupation force; two full-strength front-line divisions detached to Serbia to bear the brunt of the fighting had left immediately after the crushing of the revolt in late November and early December 1941. In November 1942, the arrival of the 187th Reserve Division (later designated 42nd Jäger Division) in northern Croatia heralded the continuation of this trend in German counter-insurgency policy: in future the deployment of divisions that originally served training purposes only or were still in the process of completing their large-unit training to Yugoslavia would become the rule, thus freeing other divisions for the Eastern Front, and making a virtue out of necessity. By the same token great care was taken by the Germans to garrison Croatia with foreign volunteers, who for political reasons could not have been deployed on other fronts anyway. For instance, 1st Cossack Cavalry 18
The Wehrmacht’s Yugoslav Quagmire: Myth or Reality? Division, which arrived in late October 1943, had been pulled out of the Eastern Front, where the turn of the tide and a propaganda campaign exhorting its troops to desert back to the Red Army again threatened to turn it into a liability. Only Yugoslavia offered the opportunity of keeping the Cossacks in the anti-communist struggle while at the same time offering very little incentive to prospective deserters.16 Similarly, 4th SS Brigade ‘Nederland’ arrived in Yugoslavia in late August 1943, and its Yugoslav sojourn throughout the autumn was caused by a combination of the reasons mentioned so far. On the one hand, the formation was still short of finishing its large-unit training; on the other hand the Waffen-SS men (most of them Dutch volunteers) would have refused to fight British or American troops and thus could not have been employed on, say, the Italian front.17 The scope of employment was even more restricted in the case of 13th SS Mountain Division ‘Handschar’, which arrived in early March 1944. Entirely made up at first of Bosnian Muslim volunteers, it was to all intents and purposes a huge and lavishly equipped ethnic militia more than 21,000 men strong, and had as its sole driving force the desire of the eastern Bosnian Muslims to be shielded from the outrages that had been repeatedly visited on them in the past by their Serb neighbours. Any attempts to deploy the division beyond the borders of Bosnia, never mind Yugoslavia, would have resulted in its disintegration – as indeed happened in September–October 1944.18 A variant on this theme was the deployment of locally recruited formations that might conceivably have been employed on one of the main fronts, such as the 7th SS Volunteer Mountain Division ‘Prinz Eugen’ (ethnic Germans from the Banat), or 369th Infantry Division, 373th Infantry Division and 392th Infantry Division, all recruited from Croats and known collectively as the ‘Legionnaire’ divisions.19 By virtue of the fact that their manpower (with the exception of officers and senior NCOs) did come from the country they were helping to police, it could be argued that they constituted no drain on the German manpower pool. As the number of German divisions deployed on the territory of the NDH, Montenegro and Albania peaked in December 1943, it might be of interest to take a closer look at the units concerned, and try to assess how many of them were prevented by events there from serving on one of the main fronts. On 3 December 1943, Second Panzer Army’s order of battle listed a total of sixteen divisions and one brigade.20 Of these, two divisions – 173rd Reserve Division and 187th Reserve Division – were training outfits that under less pressing circumstances would never have left the training areas to which they had been allocated. Four other units were still in the process of finishing their large-unit training – 19
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts 277th Infantry Division, 367th Infantry Division and 371st Infantry Division, along with 4th SS Brigade ‘Nederland’. Of these, 367th Infantry Division had arrived in Yugoslavia as basically an administrative skeleton, the General Officer Commanding (GOC) Southeast having to make up the difference from his reserves. Of the remaining divisions, owing to an entirely defensive brief 264th Infantry Division was completely static and would therefore have been next to useless on the battlefield; and as already mentioned, in the case of the Cossacks political considerations all but dictated their deployment in Yugoslavia. This leaves a total of eight formations which, as things stood in December 1943, could not have been gainfully employed in orthodox land warfare. Two of the so-called ‘Legionnaire’ infantry divisions made up of Croat conscripts, as well as two German divisions – 181st Infantry Division and 297th Infantry Division – that were repeatedly described as ‘average’, could conceivably have been deployed elsewhere other than Yugoslavia, such as by standing guard on some invasion-threatened stretch of coast of German-occupied Europe.21 The fact that for much of their time in Yugoslavia they did exactly that may give a hint of the German High Command’s priorities with regard to Yugoslavia by that time. Assessing the role played by the formations deserving of the classification ‘good’ or ‘very good’ is a more complex matter. Any such formation diverted from serving in Italy or the Eastern Front by the Partisans for any length of time would have to be seen as a genuine loss to the German war effort and thus a tangible success of Tito’s war against the Wehrmacht. Five divisions fell within this category in December 1943: 1st Mountain Division, 7th SS Volunteer Mountain Division ‘Prinz Eugen’, 100th Jäger Division, 114th Jäger Division and 118th Jäger Division. But even though 1st Mountain Division was indeed to be fully engaged against the Partisans for three months, a cautionary note must be sounded: GOC Southeast only managed to secure this unit for anti-Partisan operations because it was already on standby in Macedonia as an operational reserve in case of an enemy landing.22 After February 1944, 1st Mountain Division was shifted back to the Eastern Front, this time for good. Similar redeployments awaited 100th Jäger Division and 114th Jäger Division, as well as 367th Infantry Division and 371th Infantry Division. Only 118th Jäger Division and 7th SS Volunteer Mountain Division ‘Prinz Eugen’ stayed on to spend the rest of the war in Yugoslavia; by mid-March 1944, Second Panzer Army was thus left with 11 divisions, of which only these two divisions could be considered as first-rate outfits. This trough, which followed after the peak of December 1943 to January 1944, essentially forced Second Panzer Army to renounce major 20
The Wehrmacht’s Yugoslav Quagmire: Myth or Reality? operations above the level of regiment until late April. As such it is a good indicator of both the ratio between high-quality and average formations (two good divisions compared with nine average divisions) as well as the overall level of forces which the occupiers deemed necessary to carry out the least demanding mission, which was to repel a possible Allied landing while at the same time keeping the main routes of communication to the rear open: five divisions for guarding communications, five divisions for garrisoning the coastline, and at least one mobile division kept as an operational reserve. Without the threat posed by the Partisans, it is probably fair to assume that the number of (low-grade) divisions guarding the hinterland could have been cut down to one or two. The insurgency thus increased for Germany the cost of garrisoning Yugoslavia by four divisions of average quality which in any case would have been of little value in Italy or Russia. Only during peak times of military activity, as during the winter of 1943/44, with a whole series of corps-sized operations being undertaken against the main body of Tito’s troops, did this extra cost rise to a total of three divisions of high quality, and three or four divisions of average or poor quality. What was the extent, then, of the Partisans’ achievement in tying down German units that could have made a difference elsewhere? First and foremost, they must certainly be given credit for drawing onto themselves from late 1942 onwards virtually the entire manpower potential of the new Croat state. Had this not been the case, the Croat regiment that fought and died at Stalingrad would probably have been replaced in the course of 1943 by one or possibly even two full-strength divisions. As regards purely German units, the fact remains that it took the spectre of an Allied invasion fleet steaming up the Adriatic for the German High Command to bestir itself and take up the war against Tito in a big way. Having said that, it is important to note that without a major insurgency in progress, the Germans very probably would not have started to garrison the NDH to any great extent before July 1943, when the Allied landings took place in Sicily followed by the fall of Mussolini. It is probably fair to assume that in such a case, Croatia would have tied up only one, or at most two, German divisions during the first half of 1943, instead of the six that were actually used. In fact, the NDH had one sole division, 718th Infantry Division, as its permanent German garrison from May 1941 until June 1942. However, the threat posed first by the imminent Italian defection and then, more importantly, by the establishment of Allied airfields and naval bases in southern Italy would in any case have brought about a major alteration in the German deployment. Even without the threat posed by 21
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts a powerful insurgency movement, the Allied presence on the other side of the Adriatic would still have made necessary the deployment of at least four or five average divisions for coastal defence only, backed by an operational reserve of one or two elite formations further inland. From this, it follows that the extra strain to fight the war against Tito was taken up by low-grade units, as well as two or three good divisions whenever a special, although brief, effort was planned, such as during the winter of 1943/44. Only between January and June 1943 did the struggle against the Partisans by itself necessitate the presence of six Wehrmacht divisions, of which five would otherwise most likely have been deployed elsewhere. Though impressive, this is a far cry from the 15 divisions or so which the fight against Tito is usually said to have consumed.23 When seen against the backdrop of the extraordinary political events which had made the insurgency possible in the first place, it is no more than should have been expected.
CONCLUSION
Anyone seriously interested in the early 1990s in gleaning some operationally or strategically relevant lessons from the events of the Second World War in Yugoslavia would have faced a thankless task. Even though the background of ethnic strife made for a superficial similarity between the two conflicts, a completely different political environment, a new strategic context and new tools available to counter-insurgency forces in particular would have made a comparison that went beyond the uttering of meaningless generalities practically impossible. To give but the most obvious example: compared to the Ustasha regime’s truly unique mixture of genocidal insanity and utter incompetence, even the Serbia of Slobodan Milosevic becomes a paragon of efficiency and the rule by law. Virtually the fascist equivalent of Pol Pot’s Kampuchea, the NDH government consistently managed to generate both a maximum of disaffection among its citizens and a minimum of effective mobilisation for the war effort. It was this regime, rather than any particularly bellicose genetic inheritance on the part of the Bosnian Serbs, which conferred upon Tito’s Partisans the stamina to see their war through to a victorious end.
22
The Wehrmacht’s Yugoslav Quagmire: Myth or Reality? NOTES
1. For this point, and others not discussed at length in this chapter, see the author’s forthcoming book on the struggle of the Axis occupation forces against the Yugoslav Resistance (Hamburg: Koehler and Mittler, 2002). 2. The best example is probably the line taken by Generaloberst Lothar Rendulic, commanding Second Panzer Army, in his memoirs: Lothar Rendulic, Gekaempft, gesiegt, geschlagen (Heidelberg u. Wels: Verlag Welsermuehl, 1952), pp. 157–64. 3. For a thorough discussion of this thorny issue see the excellent account by Brendan Simms, Unfinest Hour: Britain and the Destruction of Bosnia (London: Allen Lane, 2001), especially pp. 223–72. 4. For German assessments of the NDH armed forces of this period, see Bundesarchiv-Militaerarchiv (henceforth BA/MA), RH 24-15/2, Bfh.d.dt. Tr.i.Kroatien Ia, Beurteilung der Lage vom 26.11.–6.12.1942 (no date given); RH 26–118/30 718. ID Ia, Gefechtsbericht Unternehmen Tuzla II (28.12.1942). 5. For a sampling of sources on this issue see I Documenti diplomatici italiani (henceforth: DDI), Nona serie, vol. VII (Rome: Libreria dello Stato, 1987), pp. 416–18, Il ministro a Zagrabia, Casertano, al ministro degli esteri, Ciano (1.8.1941); DDI, Nona serie, vol. IX, p. 344, il capo dell ufficio armistizio e teritori occupati, Pietromarchi, al ministro degli esteri, Ciano (25.11.1942); as well as Politisches Archiv des Auswaertigen Amtes (henceforth PA/AA), StS Kroatien, Bd. 4, 693, Mackensen an Auswaertiges Amt (23.4.1943). 6. Akten zur deutschen auswaertigen Politik (henceforth ADAP), series E, Vol. VI (Goettingen: Vandenhoeck und Rupprecht, 1979), pp. 503–7, Aufzeichnung des Gesandten in Agram (Zagreb) Kasche (8.9.1943). 7. ‘Bisogna che tutta la truppa del C.d.A … si convinca che “siamo in guerra”,’ Commando della 2a Armata all’ excellenza il generale Spigo comandante del XVIII. Corpo d’ armata (26.6.1943) in: Odonne Talpo, Dalmazia. Una cronaca per la storia, 1943–44 (Rome: Libreria dello Stato, 1994) pp. 979–84. 8. For the impact of this Allied air support on the conduct of Wehrmacht operations in 1944 see BA/MA, RH 24-15/59 XV. Geb. AK an 2. Panzerarmee (7.6.1944). 9. PA/AA, Sonderbevollmaechtigter Suedost R 27306 Kramarz an Neubacher (29.4.1944). 10. Estimate of a Partisan officer: see Vladimir Dedijer, The War Diaries of Vladimir Dedijer (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1990), Vol. II, p. 29 (entry of 24.12.1942). 11. On German preparations for such an Allied landing see Walther Hubatsch (ed.), Hitlers Weisungen fuer die Kriegfuehrung 1939–1945 (Koblenz: Bernard und Graefe Verlag, 1983) S. 209–214 (Führer Directive 47 dated 28.12.1942). 12. Milovan Djilas, Wartime (London and New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1977) gives a participant’s first-hand account of these battles, which is largely borne out by German reports such as BA/MA, RH 24-15/41 Gefechtsund Erfahrungsbericht ueber das Unternehmen ‘Schwarz’ (20.6.1943). 13. The figure quoted in BA/MA, RH 21-2/609 Lagebeurteilung des deutschen Befehlshabers der deutschen Truppen in Kroatien fuer die Zeit vom 16.7.– 15.8.1943 (17.8.1943) includes Luftwaffe, Kriegsmarine and Organisation
23
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts
14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.
20.
21. 22. 23.
Todt personnel, and even prisoners of war, the total of which should not be equated with the units that were actually among that part of the Army actually responsible for land warfare, the Feldheer. These divisions were redesignated as 104th Jäger Division, 114th Jäger Division, 117th Jäger Division and 118th Jäger Division respectively in spring 1943. See BA/MA, RH 20-12/121 O.B.-Reise Serbien (no date given, probably early August 1941) for a report on the readiness of the units in question at the time. BA/MA, RH 21-2/590 War Diary of Second Panzer Army (entry for 20.10.1943). Wilhelm Tieke, Tragoedie um die Treue. Kampf und Untergang des III. (germ.) SS-Panzerkorps (Osnabrueck: Munin Verlag, 1968). George Lepre, Himmler’s Bosnian Division: The Waffen-SS ‘Handschar’ Division, 1943–1945 (Atglen-PA: Schiffer, 1997). Otto, Kumm, Vorwaerts Prinz Eugen! Geschichte der 7. SS-FreiwilligenGebirgsdivision ‘Prinz Eugen’ (Osnabrueck: Munin Verlag, 1978); Franz Schraml, Kriegsschauplatz Kroatien: die deutsch-kroatischen Legionsdivisionen – 369., 373., 392. Inf.Div. (kroat.) – ihre Ausbildungs- und Ersatzformationen (Neckargemuend: Kurt Vowinckel Verlag, 1962). These were: 1st Mountain Division, 7th SS Volunteer Mountain Division ‘Prinz Eugen’, 173rd Reserve Division, 187th Reserve Division, 100th Jäger Division, 114th Jäger Division and 118th Jäger Division, 369th Infantry Division and 373rd Infantry Division (both of them ‘Legionnaire’ divisions), 1st Cossack Cavalry Division, 181st Infantry Division, 264th Infantry Division, 277th Infantry Division, 297th Infantry Division, 367th Infantry Division and 371st Infantry Division and 4th SS Brigade ‘Nederland’. See BA/MA, RH 24-21/98 Generalkommando XXI. Geb.AK an Panzerarmeeoberkommando 2 (16.3.1944) for an estimate on 181st Infantry Division. Percy Ernst Schramm (ed.), Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht, Vol. III. 2 (Frankfurt a. M.: Bernard und Graefe Verlag, 1963), p. 1266 (diary entry of 9.11.1943). Vladimir Dedijer, Tito: Autorisierte Biographie (Berlin u. Frankfurt a. M.: Ullstein, 1953), p. 201; Djilas, Wartime, p. 443; John Ellis, One Day in a Very Long War: Wednesday October 25th 1944 (London: Jonathan Cape, 1998), p. 159. Ellis’s calculation of 11 divisions gives ample proof of the longevity of this belief.
24
PART 2 The Military Legacy of the Balkans
3
Doctrinal Change: The Experience of Bosnia and Kosovo MAJOR-GENERAL F.R . DANNATT
When I was first invited to contribute to this book, the original topic floated was ‘The Impact of Kosovo on British Military Doctrine’. I thought about this briefly and was minded to decline, for a number of what I believe were legitimate reasons. Firstly, my involvement in Kosovo was relatively brief, only about three months in total during summer 1999. Secondly, the experience of General Sir Michael Jackson on this issue is much wider than my own and recorded in his own writings, and there seemed little point in offering a narrower view. But also, thirdly, I believe there is a danger in learning doctrinal lessons from one campaign alone, whereas to draw some thoughts from several may prove more productive. Therefore drawing on the experience of UNPROFOR (the UN Protection Force) in Bosnia 1992–95, IFOR (the NATO-based Implementation Force) in Bosnia since 1995 and also KFOR (the NATO-based Kosovo Force) since 1999 might provide a more balanced baseline from which to comment.
DOCTRINAL BACKGROUND
By way of a further preliminary comment, it is worth reminding ourselves of the British Army’s recent doctrinal history. ‘Pamphlets’, the somewhat derogatory name traditionally given to what usually passes as doctrinal handbooks, have equally traditionally either gathered dust in unit training offices or adorned the coffee table of swots keen to make their name. But doctrine has become a much more respectable phenomenon 27
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts in the Army within the last ten years. All British Army officers are now familiar with the ‘Bagnall Initiatives’, which gave us manoeuvre warfare, mission command and the British Military Doctrine.1 In the aftermath of the Cold War and the 1991 Gulf War, the Commandant of the former Army Staff College at Camberley was invited to put work in hand to produce a contemporary war-fighting doctrine, and subsequently a companion peacekeeping doctrine. Eventually three documents were published in 1994–95, by the new Directorate General Development and Doctrine, housed in the former RAF airbase at Upavon. These were Army Doctrine Publication [ADP] 1: Operations and ADP 2: Command, and an Army Field Manual called Wider Peacekeeping. Of these, ADP 1: Operations and ADP 2: Command set out the basic manoeuvrist tenets of operations to find, fix and strike the enemy, integrated on the basis of deep, close and rear operations, delivered by a mission command process. These have been accepted, taught and practised by our Army in the past five years. In their own way all three publications have made a significant impact, and the appearance of Wider Peacekeeping in 1994 also caused quite a stir on the international scene.
UNITY OF DOCTRINE
This gives rise to a very serious point. At the time, those three publications, influential in their own ways, gave the Army two doctrines: one for war-fighting, and one for peacekeeping. On reflection, I believe that this was a mistake. It is my contention, based on more than 30 years of experience, that any army should only have one operational doctrine. The scope of that doctrine should cover all operations and the purpose of that doctrine should be to maximise success in those operations. Simplicity has always been held up to be a key military principle, and in the complex environment in which we now live, we do not need to complicate our training and preparation by two doctrines. A doctrinal guide to the way that we approach all operations is what is needed in order to provide clarity of thought, confidence in the minds of all concerned and the elimination of the chances of confusion. After all, who knows whether an operation that begins as war-fighting will end as a peacekeeping exercise or – more dangerously – transform to be the other way around? I stress that I am referring to higher-level doctrine and that I accept the need for a range of differing tactical techniques and procedures, but they must all have a common doctrinal root. 28
Doctrinal Change: The Experience of Bosnia and Kosovo KEEPING IT SIMPLE
Having argued (or some may say asserted), the need for a single doctrine, I would like now, as my second main point, to place doctrine in its proper context within the overall military process. I suspect that General Sir Rupert Smith would say, as he often has, that the military process is all about harmonising ‘ways, means and ends’. If I were to depict that trilogy as a Venn diagram, then the three interlocking circles would have ‘Success on Operations’ locked into the centre. Within that trilogy, doctrine is the principal instrument for illuminating the ‘way’ for commanders and planners. But if the interrelational dimensions of that trilogy are accepted, then, in addition to writing about the ‘way’, I also need to devote some thought to the ‘ends’, and also to the ‘means’. Firstly, let us consider the ‘ends’. I think that it is generally accepted that our Bosnia experience in the UNPROFOR days showed us that a loose collection of United Nations Security Council Resolutions do not in themselves constitute a useful end-state, nor the strategic guidance for its attainment.2 I would contend that the tragic massacre of thousands of Muslim men at Srebrenica in 1995 was the woeful conclusion of a process that started in the Security Council in New York, via the fateful stepping stones of a ‘Safe Areas’ policy without the teeth (or perhaps the will) to enforce it. Even the fact that thousands, probably tens of thousands of other civilians in Bosnia did not die of hunger and deprivation in the winters of 1992–94 probably owes more to the initiative and bravery of UNPROFOR soldiers than the Security Council Resolutions that sent them there. However, the 1995 Dayton accords and the birth of IFOR was a completely different story. The Military Annex to the Dayton accords had a clear aim and a clear programme. It also had very prescriptive timelines that told the NATO force exactly what it had to do, and indeed what not to do. Actually, laying down what the force was not to do gave a whole new dynamic to the term ‘mission creep’. The second chapter of our involvement in Bosnia was therefore far better focused than our first chapter, and it seemed that the need for the articulation of a clear end-state had been firmly understood. Then the focus changed to Kosovo. But sadly, the Rambouillet Agreement of 1999 was not the Dayton Accords. The military were given no clear end-state to work towards, to the point that as the commander of KFOR General Jackson had to write his own ‘interim end-state’ before commencing operations. And this, of course, is the dilemma. Dayton could be viewed either as a peace settlement, or perhaps just as 29
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts a large-scale ceasefire agreement. Similarly, the negotiations that led to KFOR entering Kosovo in June 1999 were either a settlement or a largescale ceasefire and withdrawal agreement. Even now, dare I ask what is the final end-state for Kosovo? It would seem to have many of the characteristics of a moving target, and even that is erring on the side of the charitable. Having posed that particular question I have no intention whatsoever of trying to answer it, save to comment that the articulation of a clear end-state is the fundamental prerequisite of a soldier, so that he can plan his way to its attainment. The impact of Bosnia and Kosovo has been to ram that point home to even the most casual observer. Now, to return to General Smith’s trilogy, I should not pass on without some mention of the third component, the ‘means’. After all, a clearly articulated end-state, and a well-understood doctrinal way to attain it, are worthless unless the means are provided to do the job properly. As a previous Director of the Defence Programme Staff, I am realistic enough not to launch a plea for greater defence funding. But what I would underline is the requirement, within the resources available, to make sure that our soldiers are equipped in the best possible way to conduct their operations. This is not just an issue of hardware. Soldiers will always want more and better equipment, but they must also always have appropriate rules of engagement (RoE), and I believe that sometimes we are deficient in this regard. Despite operating under the banner of multinational forces such as the UN or NATO, all national contingents are constrained to operate not only under international law but also under their own national law. This can, and does, have implications for rules of engagement. A specific issue for British soldiers has been authority to use lethal force in the protection of property. The NATO RoE card issued in Bosnia and in Kosovo authorised soldiers to use such force for that purpose; but British national law prohibits this. When confronted by a mob looting and burning houses – an event with potentially far-reaching implications – a British soldier could not use lethal force, while his French, American or Italian colleagues could. This was bad for what we call ‘force cohesion’, but also challenging for British soldiers, who therefore needed to resolve the situation in other ways that are not always easily identifiable. So to conclude this overall point: there needs to be a balance in the ways, means and ends of a campaign to ensure success. If one of those legs of the stool is deficient then the balance is lost. But for the remainder of this chapter I will confine myself to the ‘way’ part of that trilogy, and so concentrate specifically on doctrine. 30
Doctrinal Change: The Experience of Bosnia and Kosovo A S I N G L E D O C T R I N E F O R O P E RA T I O N S
I would now like to develop further the issue of the need for a single doctrine for the British Army. From the early 1990s, the key issue that seemed to drive us down a twin-track doctrinal path was the issue of ‘consent’. This issue was popularised following the United States involvement in Somalia 1992–94. It was held that a peacekeeping force could not cross the so-called ‘Mogadishu Line’ or line of consent. If it did so, then it forfeited its impartial status as a peacekeeper, and instead became a combatant with all the implications of that changed status. What became Wider Peacekeeping doctrine also held that, once this line was crossed, the force could not re-cross it to become peacekeepers again. This emphasis on consent lay at the heart of Wider Peacekeeping. In the confused days of the UNPROFOR deployment, this notion gained considerable currency and appeared to have much merit. The frequently used analogy was that of the peacekeeping force as the ‘referee’. Framed against the chaotic early days of the UNPROFOR deployment, Wider Peacekeeping accepted that the players occasionally challenged the referee, and on extreme occasions the crowd came down from the terraces and themselves actually had a go at the referee. But despite these periodic aberrations the basic principle was that the players and the crowd consented to the referee’s authority to run the game according to the rules. Events in Bosnia in summer 1995 finally exposed the flawed basis of that approach. The status quo in Bosnia for UNPROFOR was becoming increasingly untenable and withdrawal options were being considered. This withdrawal could not have been dressed up in any other way than as a defeat, both for the United Nations and for the many states who had invested heavily in that venture, and as a significant climb down from the moral high ground. The alternative was to raise the stakes, to put the issue on a more military footing, and shape the circumstances to the point at which a confrontation could produce the possibility of a resolution. Although many agendas were running at the time, it is fair to say that the demands placed on the Serbs which placed them at odds with a clear ultimatum from UNPROFOR in turn led directly to NATO (as the UN’s agent) undertaking a widespread air strike and artillery campaign. In so doing, UNPROFOR indeed crossed the Mogadishu Line: it became a combatant and it certainly acted without the consent of the Serbs. The referee had got in among the players and the spectators in a spectacular way, equipped not with a whistle but with a machine gun and a handful of grenades. And what was the result? Did we see wholesale attacks on UNPROFOR leading to an undignified and bloody retreat? Not at all, rather we have 31
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts seen a process that led to Dayton, to IFOR and to a relative peace since then overseen by SFOR (the Stabilisation Force). As a corollary, arrests of indicated war criminals since 1999 are part of a process moving us substantially from simple peace to peace with justice, a much more lasting formula for a stable future. This brings us back to the point that ‘consent’ is not the Holy Grail of peacekeeping doctrine. It is my belief that a doctrine based on consent is not only fallacious, but that the tenets of the Army’s mainstream manoeuvrist doctrine are acceptable for all operations that require military involvement. Put simply, if a situation requires the use of soldiers it needs them for what they are: a cohesive disciplined body that understand the use of force. If a situation does not require the use (or the threat of the use) of force in some shape or form, do not call on the Army. That is not to say that in certain circumstances individual military personnel cannot be called upon to act as observers or monitors, in the same way that policemen are called on to join international police task forces, or firemen rush to earthquake zones to search for bodies. But it is my contention that formed units of soldiers should only be deployed on clearly identifiable military tasks that they can conduct according to the tenets and training of their operational doctrine. Again, Kosovo showed that we had learned some of our previous lessons. Individual soldiers took part in the original OCSE Observer and Verification Mission, while a formed battlegroup was deployed as part of the initial Kosovo Extraction Force. I find it rather sad to discuss television drama programmes in public (or even at all) but I have been involved in several discussions recently about the BBC drama series ‘Warriors’, set in Bosnia and shown on television late in 1999. My reply to those who ask my view as to its authenticity is that the filming, the setting and the behaviour of the actors was a very good portrayal of the real experience of British soldiers in Bosnia. But I was saddened by the apparently aimless way that the soldiers were depicted wandering around the debris of someone else’s war. When we choose to make an intervention, our professional soldiers need a clear end-state to achieve, the means to do so and an uncompromised way – a clear doctrine – to show them how to do it. For myself, I wish to see no more military tourists depicted in television programmes about future campaigns.
MANOEUVRE PEACEKEEPING
If readers will accept that I have now argued (rather than just asserted) the case for a single Army doctrine suitable for all military operations, I 32
Doctrinal Change: The Experience of Bosnia and Kosovo would like to develop some further strands of application of that doctrine: first of all the applicability of the principle of ‘manoeuvre’. For those unfamiliar with the concept, the Army’s ‘manoeuvrist approach’ has relatively little to do with movement or mobility as such. Rather, the basis of the manoeuvrist approach is to apply our strengths to any enemy’s or opponent’s weaknesses. The fundamental requirement is to identify those weaknesses and exploit them, and this is the essence of using brain rather than brawn. The same idea can be found in the concerns that we have at present in facing asymmetric threats to our own security. Our own weaknesses must be protected, and this may be necessary in a physical sense, prompting calls for armour plate, flak jackets and sandbags. But that quickly becomes a ‘bunker mentality’, a static approach and a recipe for defeat in detail. British forces in Bosnia, in both UNPROFOR and IFOR, earned justifiable reputations for themselves by being willing to be proactive in force protection. They were ready to dominate situations by aggressive patrolling, and by a willingness to return fire if necessary. In the ‘bully boy’ environment of the Balkans such an approach earns respect, and respect buys force protection. Put simply, I would always prefer not to bury myself amongst a mountain of sandbags in case I am shelled. I would rather patrol vigorously, sow uncertainty, be unpredictable and shoot dead the man who is about to fire his artillery piece before the shell that demolishes the sandbags ever takes flight. Now that is deliberately oversimplifying in order to make the point. But to borrow Sun Tzu’s terminology, in any of our recent peacekeeping endeavours from Northern Ireland to Kosovo, the ‘Ordinary Force’ is the uniformed Army that the population (or the enemy, or the terrorist) sees moving about on patrol, occupying its bases and carrying out routine tasks. But Sun Tzu’s ‘Extraordinary Force’ is today’s Special Forces, that pops up unexpectedly from the unprotected flank, and brings the big pay-offs. I am in no doubt that what we now call ‘manoeuvre peacekeeping’ is a very close cousin of manoeuvre warfare, if not actually its twin brother. One of the battlegroup commanders of my brigade commented in Bosnia in 1996 that, if mission command, the command ethos that underpins manoeuvre warfare, had not been invented before, it would certainly have to have been invented in Bosnia.3 Within a clearly constructed mission, focusing on a well defined end-state, subordinate commanders can be allowed the freedom to develop their actions to a common purpose. This is properly using brain not brawn, it is entirely manoeuvrist, and it is applicable to all military operations. 33
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts My second point about the applicability of this single, all-embracing, doctrine is to advocate the universal utility of the framework of operations. This framework should be based on what the Army now calls ‘Close, Deep and Rear’ operations. Some have found the term ‘Deep’ to have difficult doctrinal connotations, and the expression ‘Shaping Operations’ may be an alternative, but I choose to stick with the published doctrinal term ‘Deep’. Also, I do not wish to enter the esoteric argument about the relative emphasis on the spatial rather than the functional relationship between Deep and Close Operations. I would simply say that, particularly in what we now call Peace Support Operations,4 what are known as Deep Operations (or Deep Activities for the sensitive), are characterised by a longer time frame. They are essentially operations or activities designed to shape the environment, and will probably make the likelihood of success in Close Operations greater. Close Operations are those things that must be immediately carried out on the ground – enforcing the terms of a peace settlement, ensuring the safe delivery of humanitarian aid, or whatever – and Rear Operations will both protect and sustain the force. Despite my views on armour plate and sandbags, such things as safe driving, respect for the environment, and preventative hygiene are all essential elements of maintaining the operational effectiveness of the force. And as a comment on the relative importance of Close and Rear Operations, it is a sobering thought to realise that the British Army has suffered more fatalities in Bosnia since 1992 in failed Rear Operations than in Close Operations. But like the activities of the Extraordinary Force, the big pay-offs are likely to come if we get our Deep Operations right. The possibilities are almost endless here, probably constrained only by the bounds of the imagination. Of these, I would like to discuss particularly Media Operations and Information Operations.
M E D I A O P E RA T I O N S
To the relief of the media themselves, the military distinction between Media Operations and Information Operations as two separate categories is clear, essential and must be maintained. In my view, Media Operations themselves fall into two broad categories dictated by two different target audiences. There is the ‘internal audience’ within the conflict or victim country, and the ‘external audience’ which comprises the rest of the world, but especially the governments and peoples of the nations whose armed forces are contributing to the mission. How the armed forces interact with (a term that I prefer to ‘handle’) journalists feeding those 34
Doctrinal Change: The Experience of Bosnia and Kosovo two principal audiences is determined by the purpose for which we are present. We need to get certain messages across to the internal audience, and this may mean buying into the local media or setting up parallel media operations using radio or television. Whatever route is taken, the means must be professional and convincing, or otherwise the whole thing backfires and becomes risible. I am reminded of the early days of IFOR in Banja Luka in January and February 1996 when we needed to get certain messages across the Bosnian Serb population. Bearing in mind that NATO had been bombing them only weeks before, the task of getting the people to have confidence in us was considerable. One ploy developed was using Radio Big, the most popular independent radio station in the region. Our route in was through putting the most popular local Serb disk jockey on our payroll and requiring him to invite the likes of General Jackson, myself and the local IFOR battalion commander onto his show as his guests. The format was something between ‘Desert Island Discs’ and a Majorie Proops phone-in, but it worked. Between the appalling music (in my case usually chosen by my driver or my interpreter) there was ample opportunity to get our messages across and also to discuss issues with locals who phoned in. Much misunderstanding was cleared up, and the programme even became compulsory listening for the soldiers of 2nd Battalion The Light Infantry, who claimed it was the only way they could find out what was going on. So much for the internal audience; but the key purpose of our interaction with the external or international media is to maintain support for the mission so that operations can be continued to a successful conclusion. The obvious antithesis of this was the erosion of American support for continuing the war in Vietnam that, some believe, led to its negotiated conclusion and ultimate failure. This contrasts very starkly with the positive images that (I am told) filled British television screens on 12 June 1999 as KFOR moved into Kosovo and Pristina. Before leaving the issue, I would emphasise as a doctrinal point that we do not think in terms of controlling the media. The presence of the media is a fact of life, and working relationships based on respect and a mutual understanding of all parties’ requirements and objectives is the way forward. But it also seems to me that occasions do arise when the military’s agenda and that of the media are naturally running in parallel. It is not a question of one side using another, but it is a useful coincidence of objectives. I do not think it matters whether Lieutenant Colonel Bob Stewart as commander of the 1st Cheshire Regiment Battlegroup took advantage of the presence of a BBC camera team to expose the Ahmici Massacre in early 1993, or whether Martin Bell as 35
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts the BBC reporter on the spot took advantage of Bob Stewart’s colourful language and palpable anger to ensure his story got a slot on the ‘9 O’Clock News’. The effect was to accelerate the War Crimes Tribunal process and bring those responsible to justice in The Hague. I would argue that Bob Stewart’s actions, though probably instinctive, stemmed from an understanding of the value of the ‘Indirect Approach’, with manoeuvre in its fullest sense as its core. Had he been trained and brought up in a procedural environment which favoured regulation and tidiness over initiatives and risk-taking, then his response to the arrival of the BBC camera crew would have been to resort to prepared ‘lines to take’ or to seek authority from Whitehall to give an interview.
I N F O R M A T I O N O P E RA T I O N S
Moving away from Media Operations, I have a few comments on Information Operations, in which I include Psychological Operations (Psyops), deception and electronic warfare (including computer attack) in both an offensive and defensive sense. As technology becomes more and more sophisticated, the possibilities of influencing in a ‘Deep Operations’ sense an enemy, an opponent or a warring faction by the use of active Information Operations is almost limitless. I have referred earlier to the use of the brain not brawn, and Information Operations are at the heart of this. Some may be squeamish about aspects of what I am suggesting, but I always find that clarity comes from flicking the coin over. If we are reluctant to use offensive Information Operations ourselves, as sure as anything our opponents in any conflict will certainly be using them against us and our capabilities. Entering the ring with one arm tied behind your back is not a formula for success. Pinning one of his arms behind his back is, however, much more on the right lines. As an example of this, on our arrival as part of KFOR in Pristina in June 1999 we found that there was an intermittent mobile telephone network, based on one transmitter operated by a Serb. Despite having its own military combat net radio, KFOR made some use of this mobile system, while the civilian NGOs (non-governmental organisations) and the UN civil administration seemed to have predicated their whole communications policy on mobile phones. Which was more valuable to the Serbs: to switch off the transmitter and exacerbate our communication problems, or to leave the system on and have a clear of idea of virtually everything that we were doing? The transmitter stayed on! 36
Doctrinal Change: The Experience of Bosnia and Kosovo CONCLUSION
Let me now try to draw a line under these ideas and move towards some conclusions. Firstly, our experiences in Bosnia and Kosovo have shown without doubt there is a need for a balance between the ways, means and ends in any campaign. The end-state needs to be clear, the means need to be appropriate, the way needs to be unambiguous and to be understood by all. The ‘light along the way’ is our doctrine, and it is my contention that our Army needs only one doctrine, applicable and adaptable to all operations. The manoeuvrist approach provides us that doctrine, while Wider Peacekeeping, focused as it was on consent, took us down a worthy, but essentially blind alley. The manoeuvrist approach, employing brain not brawn, the surgical knife not the sledgehammer, has equal applicability in manoeuvre warfare and manoeuvre peacekeeping, with operations articulated on the basis of Deep, Close and Rear requirements. For those who are concerned that my approach may appear too confrontational in a peace support setting, my response is simple: armies are by nature confrontational and conflict is their business. To return to my earlier football analogy; soldiers join to play in the team, not to be the referee. Our experience in Bosnia in the early UNPROFOR days of 1992–94 should, in my view, be regarded as atypical and not become a doctrinal driver. Our interventions as part of IFOR, KFOR and our involvement in East Timor are all examples of situations where military forces can and do make a difference. The danger for the military is when the media highlights a problem, and sets the ‘something must be done’ lobby going. This danger is exacerbated when there is a temptation for some military adventurers to say ‘well, there is something that we could do’, driven by the budgetary fear and fuelled by the ‘if you don’t use it you may lose it’ argument. We got away with Bosnia in the UNPROFOR days, but personally I believe we should be reluctant to elect to go down that track again, once more placing ourselves in a situation where we play to our weaknesses and are denied using our strengths. So to conclude, within the context of our manoeuvrist approach to operations we plan, train and equip for warfighting. We can adapt our approach for Peace Support Operations, but we do not need a separate doctrine, founded on an atypical situation into which we do not wish to be drawn again. Thus, in the future, our doctrine should tell us that when we enter a conflict we do so in a military way, focused on an achievable end-state with appropriate means at our disposal. Once the situation has been stabilised, it is then appropriate to get into peacekeeping and peacebuilding tasks. But for a small, highly trained professional Army such as 37
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts ours, it is probably even more appropriate to seek to withdraw as soon as possible, to get ready for next time. After Bosnia there was Kosovo – and after Kosovo? As the Americans put it, would NATO be willing to step up to the bar a third time? This is essentially a political question, and very debatable, but one thing is certain: if we had allowed President Slobodan Milosevic to fix large numbers of our forces in ongoing civil operations in Bosnia and Kosovo, we might not have had the strength to make it a military question if faced by the need for another intervention in Montenegro and Macedonia. The recent reduction of the size of our forces in both Bosnia and Kosovo at least allows us to start to train properly again and be ready for next time – and we will be training to our single, all-embracing manoeuvrist doctrine.
NOTES
1. For those unfamiliar: General Sir Nigel Bagnall (later Field Marshal Sir Nigel Bagnall) was responsible for starting a British Army reform programme in the early 1980s based on the concept of ‘manoeuvre warfare’; one of the results of this was Design for Operations: the British Military Doctrine (1989), the British Army’s first-ever written doctrinal statement. 2. ‘End-state’ is a military doctrinal term meaning the situation towards which a military operation is to be directed. There is a distinction between the ‘preferred end-state’, as the result that the military effort intends to achieve, and the ‘actual end-state’ as the real result when the military operation ceases. 3. Again for those unfamiliar with the terminology: ‘mission command’ is the British version of a command style of some antiquity, known to the Germans as Auftragstaktik, and fundamental to manoeuvre warfare. In this system, rather than a constant stream of orders and responses, subordinate commanders are given a broad task within the overall mission, and left largely up to themselves as to how they carry it out. 4. The doctrine of Peace Support Operations was adopted by the British Army in 1998, replacing Wider Peacekeeping. It distinguishes between ‘peacekeeping’ and a more militarily robust form called ‘peace enforcement’ in circumstances when there is no peace to keep.
38
4
Kosovo: The Air Campaign AIR VICE-MARSHAL PROFES SOR TONY MASON
T H E A P P R O A C H T O WA R
Plans for the air campaign in Kosovo in the spring of 1999 began to take shape in the previous year. On 12 June 1998, British Defence Secretary George Robertson ordered six Royal Air Force (RAF) Jaguar ground attack aircraft and one Tristar tanker to be prepared to take place in ‘a possible NATO air exercise over Albania and Macedonia’. He commented: Mr Milosevic must understand that diplomacy to end the escalating Kosovo violence is being backed up by the threat of force. This is not just defence ministers rattling sabres – it is time for Belgrade to get the message that NATO means business. A multinational NATO exercise will show Belgrade how high the stakes have become.1 Phased air operations were intended by allied aircraft and cruise missiles. A demonstration element could be included but, if Belgrade failed to comply, the air operation would be extended to strikes throughout the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY), against the integrated air defence system, command and control assets, airfields and/or aircraft and deployed heavy weapons within Kosovo, logistic sites, operational bases and so on. These were all military targets. Ground forces would include contingents from Germany, Italy, France and the USA, possibly providing a NATO force of 36,000 troops ‘to implement the military aspects of a peace agreement’. There was no mention of ground forces being used in combat. On 12 October, the North Atlantic Council (NAC) formally approved the Activation Order for NATO forces to undertake air strikes against the FRY. Execution of the order would begin on 17 October unless Belgrade agreed to comply with UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1199. 39
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts On 15 October, President Slobodan Milosevic agreed to cease hostilities and withdraw mobilised forces from Kosovo, and to allow international verification of compliance by all parties with UNSCR 1199. By 19 October, Milosevic had not fully complied and the 96 hours deadline was extended to 27 October for full compliance. Meanwhile, NATO readiness states were maintained and deployment of aircraft to the theatre continued. Despite Milosevic’s further failure to apply restraint in, and withdraw from, Kosovo, the second deadline came and went with nothing more than a statement that ‘NATO remains ready to act … The NAC will keep the situation in Kosovo under constant review and if they see evidence of substantial non-compliance in the future, NATO is ready to use force’. NATO’s focus, meanwhile, remained on ‘ensuring the effectiveness of the verification regime’.2 The Rambouillet proposals, including broad autonomy to Kosovars and 28,000 NATO peacekeepers to be deployed in Kosovo, were rejected by President Milosevic. Heavy fighting began on 23 February, compelling 80,000 ethnic Albanians to flee their homes by mid-March. By 22 March 1999 the situation in Kosovo had deteriorated to the extent that the North Atlantic Council authorised NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana to decide, subject to further consultations, on a ‘broader range of air operations, if necessary’.3 NATO leadership was confident. ‘Mr Milosevic is wily, shrewd and calculating, but we are in a good position today because he respects NATO air power and is very much aware of what it can do’, said SACEUR (Supreme Allied Commander, Europe) General Wesley K. Clark before the air campaign began.4
O B J E C T I V E S O F T H E A I R C A M PA I G N
The initial NATO objectives were for the refugees to return safely home, for all Serb forces to withdraw from Kosovo, for an international force that should oversee the peace, for Kosovo to be granted a wide measure of autonomy and for multicultural democracy to be established in the province. The moral tone, and justification for NATO action, was set by Prime Minister Tony Blair at the European Union Berlin summit meeting at the outset of the air attacks. ‘We are taking this action’, Blair said, ‘to prevent Milosevic from continuing to perpetuate his vile oppression against innocent Kosovan civilians’.5 Secretary-General Solana said that ‘military action would be directed towards disrupting the violent attacks being committed by the Serb army and special police forces and weakening their ability to cause further humanitarian catastrophe’.6 40
Kosovo: The Air Campaign From the outset, official statements of alliance military objectives shared a common theme. General Wesley Clark stated: We are going to systematically and progressively attack, disrupt, degrade, devastate and ultimately destroy those forces and their support unless Milosevic complies with the demands of the international community. The operation will be just as long and as difficult as Milosevic wants it to be.7 George Robertson said NATO had no intention of committing ground troops in Kosovo. General Sir Charles Guthrie, the British Chief of the Defence Staff, observed on Thursday 25 March, in a Ministry of Defence (MoD) briefing after the first night of bombing: This is a limited humanitarian action with a strictly humanitarian objective which we believe we can achieve through air strikes. We do not think it would be right to escalate this into a major ground invasion, in which many lives would be lost and the humanitarian crisis made worse.8 The original mission given to the air forces was thus to diminish Serbian military capabilities; not to stop genocide in Kosovo.
A I R O P E RA T I O N S A N D D I L E M M A S
Plans had existed in both the MoD and in NATO Headquarters since at least December 1998 for a ground invasion of Kosovo. They had concluded that even a relatively small Serbian force could disrupt or even block the movement of NATO forces seeking to cross from Macedonia along the narrow Lepenac valley. Other routes through Albania and Macedonia were poorly maintained, difficult for armoured vehicles and other heavy traffic, and would face mined bridges and other anti-tank and anti-personnel mines. Operations to move NATO troops by helicopters behind Serbian lines would be constrained by the mountains restricting their range and endurance. Nonetheless, at the outset of the air campaign, misgivings were expressed in the more thoughtful areas of the media. The Economist was not overly optimistic about the decision by NATO to rely on air power alone until a peace settlement was reached: ‘In Serbia, if NATO was not prepared to commit itself fully and wholeheartedly, it might have been better not to threaten to attack at all, rather than to attack from the relative safety of the sky alone’.9 41
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts But there was obviously a belief among senior policy-makers that President Milosevic would be easily coerced. Just before the air campaign began, MoD media briefing notes reflected the Robertson statement ten months previously: Phased air operations [will be] conducted by allied aircraft and by US and British cruise missiles. Phases could include a demonstration element but, if no compliance, would extend progressively to military strikes throughout the FRY. The operations would be controlled, minimal and proportionate. A possible NATO peace implementation force of 36,000 troops was being considered.10 ‘In other words,’ as The Economist observed, ‘the first wave of bombs was intended as a warning and only if it were ignored would NATO start seriously destroying the Yugoslav arsenal’.11 Unlike the air campaign against Iraq in the 1991 Gulf War, there were insufficient aircraft to launch parallel attacks on air defences and deployed forces powerful enough to induce shock or paralysis. Priority was, in the traditional manner, given to achieving control of the air, while all air attacks were initially made from medium level, that is, 15,000 feet, to protect aircraft from anti-aircraft artillery (AA) and low-level surface-toair missiles (SAMs). Coalition guidelines about friendly casualties were stimulated partly by legitimate concerns for force protection and partly by worries, especially in the USA, about adverse public response to United States Air Force (USAF) casualties. General Wesley Clark was reported as issuing a ‘no loss of aircraft’ restriction in November 1998.12 Lieutenant-General Michael C. Short USAF, Alliance Joint Forces Air Component Commander, subsequently denied receiving such an order, but acknowledged that ‘zero losses were a major goal’.13 In fact, General Clark included a specific reference to aircraft losses in a video conference at 9 a.m. on 14 March, when he made the formal announcement to his commanders and staffs of the order to execute Phase One of the air campaign. He subsequently wrote: But we had to move the campaign along some general paths, in addition to minding the legal constraints in the order. I termed these ‘measures of merit’ … I dropped them onto the command: ‘As we start working through this, there are three measures of merit for the operation overall from the military standpoint. The first measure of merit is not to lose aircraft, minimize the loss of aircraft’. This addressed Mike Short’s biggest concern – to prevent the loss of aircrews. It drove our decisions on tactics, targets, and 42
Kosovo: The Air Campaign which airplanes could participate. But I was motivated by a larger political-military rationale. If we wanted to keep this campaign going indefinitely, we had to protect our air fleet. Nothing would hurt us more with public opinion than headlines that screamed, ‘NATO LOSES TEN AIRPLANES IN TWO DAYS’. Take losses like that, divide it into the total number of aircraft committed, and the time limits on the campaign would be clear. Milosevic could wait us out.14 The ‘measure of merit’ was well judged, but it encouraged a view that occasional civilian casualties, not the lives of the military, were an unfortunate but acceptable risk for humanitarian objectives. It also had an inevitable impact on operations when cloud frequently precluded or impeded target identification, acquisition and attack from medium level. Milosevic’s military advisers understood that American aversion to casualties was a weak link in the NATO air campaign. A Serbian officer was reported to have referred, in a conversation with a visiting American counterpart, before the conflict began, to the number ‘eighteen’: the number of US army soldiers who were killed, in widely publicised circumstances, in the fiasco of Somalia in 1993. That incident led to the withdrawal of US forces. On 24 March 1999, 80 aircraft were involved in the first air attacks against 40 widespread targets, including air defences, other military installations and arms factories, near Belgrade, Pristina, Nis, Mitrovica and Podgornic. Cruise missiles were launched from US Navy surface ships and submarines and also from HMS Splendid against air defences south of Pristina, to create a gap for manned aircraft to exploit against Serbian forces deployed in Kosovo. It was a valuable example of combined operations in support of air power. Initial Serb AA and SAM response was light, with associated radars frequently being switched off, making it difficult to establish the positions of mobile SAMs such as the SA-6. The FRY air forces did, however, respond. On 24 March, a Dutch F-16 Fighting Falcon from 322 Squadron at Leeuwarden Air Force Base destroyed a Yugoslav MiG-29 with an Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM) missile at a range of 18 kilometres after being given warning of the MiG’s take-off and heading by an Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS) aircraft. One-third of NATO fighter strength was subsequently reported to be flying combat patrols over Macedonia, Albania, Bosnia, Hungary and the Adriatic, reflecting a residual alliance caution about an air-to-air threat. The caution was justified when a further MiG-29 was shot down by a USAF F-16 on 4 May. 43
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts In the first seven days of the war, NATO air forces flew 1,700 sorties, of which 425 were attack, and more than 100 cruise missiles were fired against more than 70 targets. They included four secret police bases, three ammunition dumps and one helicopter field in Kosovo, and 42 assorted attacks on air defence facilities across the FRY.15 These figures were frequently and critically compared with the 2,000 sorties flown on the first night of Operation Desert Storm in 1991. General Guthrie admitted on 30 March that bad weather had forced cancellation of planned NATO air attacks on three of the six nights since the air campaign began. Laser and optical weapon guidance systems could not work through cloud. The fundamental dilemma affecting the air force planners was how practically to stop the atrocities committed by small groups of Serbian forces who mingled with the ethnic Albanians they were persecuting. Rules of engagement demanded positive identification of targets and, wherever there was a risk of civilian casualties or damage, the use of precision-guided munitions (PGMs). But all-weather PGMs were only available to the USAF. Frequently, RAF Harriers were reported to be returning to base from sorties with a full load still on board after failure to locate and identify Serb forces in Kosovo. Meanwhile, oppression and atrocities against ethnic Albanians in Kosovo were intensifying. Refugees reported that NATO planes were bombing empty barracks. Yugoslav troops had moved, with their vehicles and other equipment, among the civilian population: into factories, warehouses, barns, houses and even wine cellars. On 27 March, Secretary General Solana initiated Phase Two of Operation Allied Force, saying: I have taken the decision with the support of all allied governments, which are determined to bring a halt to violence in Kosovo and to prevent further humanitarian catastrophe. With this in mind, the broader range of operations will allow NATO commanders to intensify their action against Yugoslav forces.16 Later that day, Serbian television gleefully displayed the wreckage of an F-117 ‘stealth’ fighter shot down 40 miles west of Belgrade, to the considerable embarrassment of the USAF. The pilot was rescued the following day. The loss of the F-117 prompted a number of critical procedure allegations, including weak coordination between the stealth aircraft, RC-135 electronic warfare (EW) aircraft, and radar-suppressing F-16CJs and EA-6B Prowlers. If, however, weak coordination with those EW assets was a contributory factor, the implication arose that even the 44
Kosovo: The Air Campaign ‘stealthy’ F-117 depended on EW support for its penetration. General Henry H. Shelton, Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, conceded that F-117s had flown similar routes on four consecutive nights before the loss: a surprising occurrence after the disasters of similar routines over Vietnam. The extent of Serbian jubilation was a testimony to the aura of invincibility which had hitherto surrounded the F-117. It was also a salutary reminder that advances in any offensive military technology will sooner or later be caught by defensive riposte. Amid increasing press references to the failure of air attacks to halt, or even slow down, Serbian oppression in Kosovo,17 George Robertson stated on 29 March the arguments against using NATO ground troops offensively in Kosovo. European members did not have the forces that would be required. Even if they did, it would take two months or more to assemble and train them, with the risk of heavy combat losses. He emphasised the chances of success of the air campaign, with the possibility of Serbian armed forces overthrowing Milosevic as a result of the destruction of the FRY military infrastructure by NATO, and from fear of being indicted as war criminals, but added, ‘It’s not going to be quick and it’s not going to be easy’.18 This appears to have been the first suggestion from a NATO leader that Milosevic might not be quite so easily coerced as had been expected. An early report from Washington referred to gloom in the White House because of fears that ‘the confident hope of Secretary of State Madelaine Albright, Defense Secretary William Cohen and National Security Adviser Sandy Berger, that a brief spell of bombing would bring Belgrade to heel, is proving unrealistic’.19 There is substantial subsequent, albeit uncorroborated, evidence to suggest that this trio was responsible for driving through a political assessment which was not supported by alliance military commanders. On 1 April, NATO Secretary-General Solana asserted that ‘We are degrading [Serbia’s] ability to carry out the current acts of violence in Kosovo … The ring is closing around the Yugoslav armed forces. The impact of our air campaign will be increasingly cumulative’. At the same briefing, however, General Clark introduced a rather different note: We have always said from the outset that air power cannot stop paramilitary power on the ground. We know that. It has been widely recognised. As for what else might be done, I am going to defer that to the political leaders of NATO and NATO’s governments, because these are questions governments have to resolve. They are not questions the military can resolve.20 45
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts At the very least, this was an interesting comment from NATO’s military commander responsible for the strategy currently employed against Milosevic. By the beginning of April, air operations were being intensified with the addition of five B-1 bombers and five EA-6Bs, six Royal Canadian Air Force F-18s and four RAF Tornado GR1 bombers. NATO ambassadors met to consider extending targets to include ministries in Belgrade and other key components of Milosevic’s regime. Previous references to a ‘Phase Three’ in the bombing campaign were replaced by intentions to extend ‘the range and tempo of operations to maximise the effectiveness of the operation’.21 Rumours continued to spread about disagreements among NATO members about authorising air attacks on the targets in Belgrade, and agreeing to an alleged request by General Clark to ‘intensify and broaden’ the assault on Yugoslavia. Such a request clearly indicated that original strategic expectations had not been met. The bombing campaign was extended dramatically on 1 April, when a bridge over the Danube was destroyed at Novi Sad, 75 miles north of Belgrade. Two days later, eight cruise missiles struck the Interior Ministry and Police Headquarters in Belgrade in the early hours. No collateral damage or casualties were reported. Early reports of the impact of the limited attacks on Belgrade were contradictory, noting defiance, panic and paranoia. By 3 April, vivid publicity given to the plight of Albanian refugees led to NATO spokesmen acknowledging that Serbian oppression had not diminished. One comment, however, by official spokesman Jamie Shea was to prove surprisingly accurate: ‘NATO pressure will build up and up and, suddenly, without any prearranged signals, the dam will burst and the Yugoslav forces will withdraw from Kosovo’.22 Fuel installations then became primary targets. NATO estimated that 40,000 Serb troops in Kosovo would depend for mobility on some 7,000 vehicles, with a daily requirement of some 150,000 gallons. It was apparently believed that a fuel-deprived Serbian Army could be severely constrained in facing a NATO ground force. The strategy was widely debated. Attacks on oil installations were difficult to justify in the circumstances of the conflict. Serbian troop movements were on a relatively small scale: fuel supplies were readily available in Kosovo and at least one United States oil company, as well as Russian and Libyan tankers, were delivering oil via the Montenegrin port of Bas.23 Cutting such supply lines without UN authority could be provocative, with Russia naturally opposing such a move. Nor could such operations be a substitute for direct attacks on deployed Serbian forces. 46
Kosovo: The Air Campaign Such attacks, however desirable, were also difficult to make within the humanitarian rules of engagement. In one instance, reconnaissance photos showed Serbian forces taking people and burning houses in the Kosovan village of Clodjane but they could not be attacked because of the presence of the civilians.24 Early difficulties were encountered over Kosovo by aircrew in identifying vehicles in convoys, whether carrying troops or refugees. The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office lamented that, ‘We did not expect Slobodan Milosevic to move the levels of population that he is moving. Perhaps, that was a failure of imagination’.25 It certainly suggests a failure by NATO to consider the range of options open to Milosevic when NATO attacked. Only his rapid capitulation seems to have been expected. Nevertheless, Prime Minister Blair reaffirmed on 5 April that sending in ground troops ‘is not an alternative’. Alliance sensitivities to the use of ground forces emerged when the Greek Foreign Minister, George Papandreou, said, ‘Macedonia has already said it will not be the launching pad for any military operation. Therefore, any troops coming through Salonika will be sent purely for humanitarian reasons’.26 Every official statement was minutely examined for signs of strategy revision. On 11 April, a ground offensive appeared to be no longer totally excluded in Washington. John Podesta, White House Chief of Staff, observed, ‘Last autumn, NATO did do an assessment of putting ground troops in and those plans and assessments could be updated quickly if we decided to do that, needed to do that’; and General Shelton added that, ‘the build up of force of this size would depend on how many entry points you used, and we haven’t excluded using more than one point of entry’.27 It seemed, however, a little disingenuous to suggest that plans which had been discarded for both political and military reasons could now be easily resurrected and implemented, and the statements did not reinforce any sense of clear-cut alliance strategic purpose. On 7 April, General Clark said he needed more strike and reconnaissance aircraft, confirming by implication that the scale of the task had been underestimated at the outset. Six days later, he affirmed that he had asked for 300 more US aircraft and more than 100 from other NATO allies. Hopes of increasing attacks on the Serbian deployed forces were raised when the Pentagon announced on 4 April that 24 AH-4A Apache helicopters, each equipped with Hellfire anti-armour missiles, unguided rockets and a 30 mm machine gun, would deploy to the Balkans from their base in Germany. They began to arrive in Albania on 20 April, and were supported by 26 other utility and heavy-lift helicopters, an artillery battalion with 18 MLRS (Multiple-Launch Rocket systems) with a range of 165 kilometres, a light mechanised battalion equipped with 47
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts M-3 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles and M1-A1 Abrams battle tanks for force protection, a 580-man logistics unit, and a Deep Operations Control Centre. These 24 helicopters were expected to begin operations in Kosovo within seven days. Unfortunately, such hopes were ill-founded. The helicopters were vulnerable to low-level air defences and were prepared only for operations in which such defences had been suppressed by MLRS and/or jammed by supporting fixed-wing aircraft. They would also have required top cover against hostile fighters. As long as Serbian air defences had not been destroyed, Apache operations would be severely inhibited. Operations were further delayed after the loss of an Apache while night flying in the mountains prompted a 24-hour safety stand-down. Meanwhile, by 20 April, the number of aircraft committed to the campaign had risen to 1,000, of which 800 were from the USA, flying four-fifths of all sorties. Of 268 combat aircraft, 142 were American, 30 French, 27 British, 16 Dutch, 14 German, 12 Belgian and the remainder from Canada, Denmark, Norway, Spain and Portugal. Only American, British and French aircraft could deliver precision-guided munitions. Serbian air defences still posed a threat to NATO aircraft. These increased numbers, together with better weather, enabled attacks on military communications, fuel depots, vehicle parks and bridges, frequently in urban areas. Refugees constantly reported that Serbian forces in Kosovo were using houses as barracks, and deploying artillery, anti-aircraft weapons and tanks between civilian houses. As air attacks on ground forces in Kosovo intensified, the risk of civilian casualties increased proportionately. Levels of expectation of PGM capabilities were highlighted when one misdirected bomb fell in a residential suburb of Pristina, causing public outcry and extracting official NATO ‘regrets’. Targets lists were expanded still further on 20 April, to include President Milosevic’s Party Political Headquarters in Belgrade, which was struck by eight US Navy Tomahawk cruise missiles at 3.30 a.m. the following morning. Two pro-Milosevic radio and television stations, housed in the Party Headquarters building, were also destroyed in the attack. NATO spokesman Jamie Shea observed on 21 April, ‘From now on, any aspect of [Milosevic’s] power structure is deemed a legitimate target’.28 Next day, Milosevic’s official residence was destroyed, presumably as part of psychological pressure upon him. An example of imaginative and complementary targeting of morale and coterie was the destruction of a cigarette factory at Nis, which created a shortage in Belgrade and removed a primary source of income for President Milosevic’s family and friends. 48
Kosovo: The Air Campaign Meanwhile the British position on the employment of ground forces was changing, from their use as a peace implementation force to moving into Kosovo without coordinated armed resistance: that is, after the Serbian ground forces had been disrupted and weakened by air attack. On 22 April, immediately before the 50th Anniversary NATO Summit Conference in Washington, Prime Minister Blair sought to persuade President Bill Clinton of the value of a ‘lightweight’ invasion after Serbian troops had been weakened. The President rejected the suggestion in what General Clark referred to, albeit at second hand, as ‘a stormy session’.29 At the summit meeting, the alliance rejected an invasion by ground troops but agreed to extend the target list by adding militaryindustrial infrastructure, media and other strategic targets. They also conceded that, while any peacekeeping force would be NATO led, it could include non-NATO troops, including a substantial Russian contribution. A NATO press release on 27 April affirmed that only 33 per cent of Serbian oil stocks had been destroyed, that Serbia’s air defence system was still operating, and that only 20 per cent of ammunition storage depots had been significantly damaged. Five major bridges across the Danube had been destroyed and one damaged. But 35 days of air attacks had failed to destroy the country’s military infrastructure, and left President Milosevic’s ability to continue his repression in Kosovo largely untouched. On 2 May, however, came signs that the bombing was beginning to affect Serbian civilian morale. BBC World Affairs Editor John Simpson, reporting from Belgrade, noted a change in attitude among the civilian population: they were no longer instinctively supporting their President and were becoming fearful of the bombing campaign. On 3 May, Serbian morale was further dented when F-117s dropped non-lethal carbon graphite filament bombs on five main electricity power grids and transformer yards, with the primary objective of disrupting Serbian military headquarters communications and computer services across the country. The power supply to Belgrade was cut off for several hours. The graphite particles were still causing short circuits in generating plants three days later, intermittently cutting power to water supplies, domestic appliances, transport systems and telephone switchboards. Meanwhile, petrol was severely restricted in Belgrade and the cumulative impact of sleepless nights was being noted. There was, however, no internal consensus in Serbia about the overall impact of the cuts on public support for Milosevic. After 50 days, the air campaign was widely criticised. NATO briefings were usually upbeat and consistently emphasised the number of sorties flown, targets attacked and bombs dropped. Such ‘input’ could readily be counted. Assessment of destruction inflicted and, even more important, 49
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts the coercive effect on Milosevic of such destruction was proving impossible to assess. But no one had any better ideas, other than to prepare for an invasion, which still had no political support. Both Blair and Clinton repeated the alliance’s determination and emphasised the horrors of ethnic cleansing. The USAF preference was to hit targets associated with Milosevic and his inner circle: homes, businesses, command facilities; and others such as bridges, electrical grids and other targets used by civilians, to bring pressure on the population. This was classical air power strategy of direct attack at (in Colonel John Warden’s language) the inner circle, plus pressure on civilian morale.30 Unfortunately, it was the plight of the refugees which was attracting international concern. The pressure on Milosevic did not seem to be bearing fruit while oppression in Kosovo was, if anything, increased. On 12 May, Dr Shea’s words reflected NATO’s awareness of, and sensitivity to, criticisms of the air campaign: ‘We don’t know when we are going to turn the corner. But we know we will, sooner or later … We are satisfied that we are now having the type of military impact that will impress President Milosevic and will start making him think how he is going to get himself out of this crisis.’31 The statement coincided with the arrival in theatre of the 300 more combat aircraft requested by General Clark, including additional A-10 Thunderbolt IIs and F-15E Strike Eagles, and the prospect of using airfields in Hungary and Turkey. NATO now deployed three times as many aircraft as at the start of the campaign, and their increased impact was soon obvious. Unfortunately, public alliance disagreements on the use of ground troops continued. On 17 May, British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook called in Brussels for preparation for a ground force to be deployed before the Yugoslav government had given any agreement. Comments were made by spokesmen in Downing Street, suggesting that it was now a question of when troops invaded, rather than if.32 Opposition came swiftly from French government officials and, by inference, from Jamie Shea who reiterated the alliance agreement on an international security force ‘once the violence has stopped’. The following day, Chancellor Gerhard Schröder and Italian Prime Minister Massimo D’Alema reiterated their opposition to such a move, and the Alliance was widely seen to be in disarray. It is not difficult to judge Milosevic’s satisfaction at the appearance of another straw to clutch. But increasingly, as air attacks intensified, straws were all that were left to the President. On 10 May, Milosevic had offered to withdraw some of his troops from Kosovo. It was seen at the time by NATO spokesmen as a propaganda ploy and a possible sign of weakness. In retrospect it could indeed have been an indication that 50
Kosovo: The Air Campaign the President was beginning to feel some pressure from the air campaign. Further cracks occurred on 20 May, with anti-war demonstrations in Krusevac and reports of desertions among Serbian reservists deployed in Kosovo. On 25 May, a Yugoslav Army statement outlawed ‘illegal public gatherings’, as reports increased of anti-war protests and desertions. Meanwhile, NATO increased the pressure by agreeing to expand its ‘peace implementation force’ from 28,000 to 50,000 troops. On the same day, Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic, on an official visit to London, asserted that dissent was rising in Serbia and President Milosevic was preparing to sue for peace. On 27 May, 308 air strikes took place, including more than 50 on Belgrade. The attacks followed close upon the indictment by the International War Crimes Tribunal of President Milosevic for crimes against humanity. By the end of May, B-52s and B-1s were dropping unguided ordnance on Kosovo daily, in an attempt to drive Serbian forces into the open where they could be struck by PGMs.33 An initial strategy of coercion had appeared to drift into one of attrition. But two essential ingredients of a strategy of attrition had been missing. The first was the continual uncertainty in NATO of the location and constitution of the Serbian ground forces in Kosovo. The second was the extreme difficulty of assessing how much damage the air attacks were inflicting on them. The shortage of ‘real-time surveillance assets’ to track Serb forces was quickly realised, even though more than 50 United States and European spacecraft were involved in communications, intelligence gathering and reconnaissance. E-8 Joint Stars, RC-135V/W Rivet Joint and U-2 reconnaissance aircraft were all handicapped by the mountainous terrain. Two Lacrosse imaging radar satellites provided pre-strike intelligence and battle damage assessment when optical and infra-red systems were obscured by bad weather, with images of 1–3 feet resolution. KH-11 digital imaging satellites provided more precise visible and infra-red imagery, but they could not penetrate foliage or cloud. The problem of consistently providing timely target information on mobile Serb forces was never resolved, but the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) considerably enhanced the volume and quality of reconnaissance. UAVs began to be dispatched to Kosovo in early April, flown by six nations. In early June, the long-endurance Predator UAV was deployed for the first time to enhance the search for mobile Serbian forces. UAVs provided IFF (Identification Friend or Foe), target detection and identification, and battle and collateral damage assessment. In 2,000 flight hours, Predator datalink photographs were sent to NATO’s Combined Air Operations centre in Italy, via Mildenhall in Great Britain and the Pentagon, within 90 seconds. This almost real-time imagery allowed 51
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts much faster attack reaction time and enabled aircraft already airborne to switch targets. Only four UAVs could be productively flown at any one time because of lack of bandwidth to transmit real-time video. It was not the capability of the UAV which was constrained, but the umbilical links between it, ground control and potential users of its information. More than 20 NATO UAVs were lost in the conflict, compared to two manned aircraft in 14,000 strike sorties. None, however, was accompanied by the political, psychological or operational consequences of the loss of manned aircraft. By comparison, the United States flew 500 manned missions to rescue Captain Scott Grady when his F-16 was shot down over Bosnia. At the end of May, fighting between Serbian forces and the KLA intensified near the Albanian border. Consequently, NATO reconnaissance could be more readily focused and Serbian vulnerability to NATO air attack increased as they had to forsake their small-unit mobility and concentrate in defensive positions. The situation was well suited to the USAF A-10s. On 1 June, 197 strike sorties were flown against Serbian forces near Mount Pastrik opposing 4,000 KLA irregular troops. By that date, total NATO sorties had risen from less than 100 a day in March, to over 700 a day. Reports of deserters from the Serbian Army and the impact on their morale of NATO bombing continued to appear in the Western media, but there were no signs of any large-scale loss of control from Belgrade. Nonetheless, moves towards a diplomatic resolution to the conflict continued. On 1 June, President Milosevic was reported to have accepted the G-8 peace proposals after diplomatic pressure from Russia, but the position of Serbian forces in Kosovo after a peace agreement remained in doubt. On 3 June, the Yugoslav Parliament accepted the peace proposals, but uncertainties remained over the nature of the Russian participation in the peacekeeping force. NATO, however, sustained its position that a ‘verifiable, substantial, Serbian withdrawal’ had to begin before the bombing would cease. On 5 June, LieutenantGeneral Sir Michael Jackson, commanding NATO forces in Macedonia, met Serbian commanders on the Kosovo frontier to begin preparations for their withdrawal. Negotiations on Serbian withdrawal concluded on 9 June. The bombing campaign ceased a few hours later. NATO flew 35,000 missions over Yugoslavia, losing only two aircraft and no aircrew to hostile fire. They faced SAMs at three times the rate of those in Desert Storm but, in fact, constant NATO pressure forced many of these to be launched without radar guidance. The possible casualties among NATO invading ground forces, against even weakened Serbian resistance, can by comparison only be speculated about. Of 23,000 52
Kosovo: The Air Campaign bombs and missiles delivered, 35 per cent were ‘smart’. The US Navy launched 218 Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles (TLAMs) at 66 targets, with 181 reaching their aim points. HMS Splendid launched 20 missiles of which 17 struck their targets. The 85 per cent rate was reported to be similar to previous TLAM operations. Eight TLAMs were used against the building housing the Socialist Party and state-run television headquarters in Belgrade. During and after the conflict, various numbers were claimed and disputed for destruction inflicted on Serbia and its armed forces. The ‘Report to Congress: Kosovo/Operation Allied Force After-Action Report’ asserted that approximately 60 per cent of ‘target-hit’ claims made during the air campaign had been confirmed. They included 100 Yugoslav aircraft destroyed on the ground, in addition to 6 shot down; 10 airfields significantly damaged; 14 command posts; 93 out of 181 tanks; 153 out of 317 armoured personnel carriers; 339 out of 800 military vehicles; 389 out of 857 artillery or mortars; 11 railroad bridges; 34 highway bridges; 29 per cent of ammunition storage; 57 per cent of petroleum storage; all oil refineries.34 In one sense it was the accumulated strategic effect which mattered, not disputed figures, but reliable data was essential to establish the efficiency, not just the effectiveness, of the air campaign. Forty thousand Serbian troops had been reported to be still in Kosovo at the beginning of June. ‘We had to admit that ethnic cleansing we couldn’t stop’, admitted NATO spokesman Major-General Walter Jertz of the German Air Force.35 But despite alliance indecision, mistakes and problems, after 78 days of NATO air operations those Serbian troops and auxiliaries left Kosovo and the much smaller NATO peacekeeping forces entered the province unopposed. President Milosevic accepted the conditions demanded by NATO and the G-8 plan. The refugees began to return. The civilian casualties suffered (all accidentally except for those in the television centre) were infinitesimal compared to the potential numbers had Kosovo become a battleground for opposing armies. The air campaign had enabled NATO to achieve its political objectives.
B O M B I N G E R R O R S A N D T H E M E D I A WA R
By the end of May, 9,000 attack sorties had been flown, but only ‘some 15 incidents’ of civilian casualties had occurred.36 They were, however, incidents in the war which overlaid the air campaign: the war of the international media. The effectiveness of a bombing campaign can only be illustrated by images of its impact, not by uplifting pictures of brave aircrew departing or returning from ‘successful’ missions. The problem 53
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts for NATO was that Milosevic controlled access to the impact points, while NATO’s own bomb damage imagery was sparse and tardy. Civilian casualties, always in small numbers, increased as NATO aircraft hit bridges, barracks, power supplies and some oil refineries. Civilian deaths and destruction were reported with pictures, facilitated by Serbian authorities. Justification or apologies came later by word, from NATO Headquarters briefings. Conversely, pictures of the refugee tragedy were relayed by the uncontrolled international media facilitated by NATO, while defensive explanations came later from Belgrade by word. A typical tragedy occurred on 14 April. A refugee convoy in western Kosovo was mistakenly struck by a USAF F-16. In his subsequent debriefing to his squadron commander, the pilot described how he had circled the convoy for several minutes seeking to identify what he came to believe was a column of military tracked vehicles. Eye-witness reports were conflicting, but several referred to the presence of Serbian troops and vehicles in the vicinity of the refugee convoy. The incident was not an example of indiscriminate air attack but rather a tragic example of human error even with the most rigid rules of engagement. A single lowlevel pass over the convoy might have left no doubt about its refugee content. On the other hand, had it indeed been a military convoy, protected by mobile low-level air defences, such a pass would have been most hazardous for the pilot and non-compliant with command guidance on aircrew risk. The incident was shown to the world on 14 April. The full NATO explanation, accompanied by cockpit imagery, was only given on 19 April, revealing eight attacks before an additional OA-10 pilot, with binoculars, identified possible civilian vehicles among the convoy. The briefing also revealed the limited imagery available to the F-16 pilots on the monochrome 4g-inch screens in their cockpits. The British media was generally understanding about the convoy attack error, while noting the contribution of an operational height of 15,000 feet to problems of target identification. Perceptions were, however, affected by the uncertain initial NATO response. In fact, Serbian television broke the news before NATO Headquarters, or even the pilot who dropped the bomb, was aware that any mistake had been made. NATO spokesmen could not accept responsibility solely on the evidence of anonymous destruction presented by a hostile news source. Unfortunately, verification delayed apologies for nearly two days. Even responsible sections of the media did not understand the difficulties faced by NATO in identifying which aircraft could have made a mistake, or even if a mistake had been made. The Guardian unwaveringly asserted, ‘If the cause was right before, it’s still right now … no war comes without risk’, but, it went on: 54
Kosovo: The Air Campaign NATO’s handling of the episode has only made matters worse, starting with what looked like a news manager’s attempt to sow confusion and thereby reduce the heat on the Allies. If there was deliberate truth dodging, then that was a bad error. NATO is fighting a war in the name of humanitarian values. Its credibility is undermined if it can be charged with deceit.37 The convoy incident was prolonged by media requests to see aircraft camera evidence but the fog of war proved difficult to penetrate and questions remained unanswered as to which convoy, how many convoys, which aircraft – Serbian or NATO aircraft – and what kind of weapons. All the ingredients of a first-class media story were present: death, destruction, error and conspiracy theories. Nonetheless, opinion polls in Great Britain showed strong sustained support for the bombing campaign, albeit with a slight fall. Ten days later, the air campaign and the media war converged. Serbian authorities were regularly escorting foreign journalists around carefully selected bomb damage. On 8 April, NATO Headquarters spokesman Air Commodore David Wilby RAF had warned that the Yugoslavian state television station’s main antennae and facilities would be bombed unless it began to broadcast two three-hour sections of Western news and ceased transmitting ‘lies’.38 The television station was regarded by NATO as a legitimate target after its ‘biased and distorted’ coverage of the conflict, alleging that ethnic Albanians were fleeing Kosovo because of alliance bombing, rather than from Serb ethnic cleansing. After 24 hours, NATO withdrew its threat to attack the television station because of concern about adverse international reaction should Serbia level accusations of bombing civilian targets. Concurrently, Air Commodore Wilby was removed from his briefing duties. General Clark, however, continued to press for such an attack, and on 20 April, the French government withdrew its opposition and strikes were authorised.39 As noted previously, two television stations in President Milosevic’s Party Headquarters building were attacked in the early hours of the following morning, without casualties. Three nights later, on Friday 24 April, the RTS Belgrade Television Centre was destroyed by a B-2 attack. Earlier warning had been ambiguous, and attacks could have been expected on antennae, not the studio. Twelve people were killed, and not surprisingly, images of dead television workers were flashed around the world. The attack on the studios and associated facilities, inflicting civilian casualties, was questionable in international law. In a campaign during which favourable television coverage was eagerly sought by both sides, it was politically and psychologically misjudged. 55
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts (The author was in a BBC television studio when the images of the attack were received. Empathy with the dead Serbs was palpable.) Militarily it failed, because the station quickly got back on air, and its transmitters in the hills outside Belgrade had to be attacked within 24 hours. Every so often an accidental attack which took civilian lives would be given prominence in the media. On 1 May, it was a passenger bus destroyed near Pristina. During the night of 6–7 May, however, the most serious mistake of the campaign was made: the Chinese Embassy was hit by three PGMs dropped from a B-2 bomber. The attack on the building was deliberate; but the belief that it was a Yugoslav Army headquarters was totally wrong. Apparently, targeting information provided by the CIA was based on an out-of-date map. This mistake had severe political implications. It diverted international efforts to move ahead with the G-8 formula at a time when the G-8 was seeking to persuade China to agree to their peace plan. It compelled the Russian government to issue strongly worded criticisms and postpone visits to the West, and it provided unexpected relief and a major propaganda coup for President Milosevic. Its cumulative impact was to delay the ending of the conflict and thereby unnecessarily prolong the suffering of the ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. Jamie Shea sought to put the Chinese Embassy error into military perspective by noting that so far allied planes had hit ‘1,900 aim points’ and out of a total of 9,000 missiles and bombs, only 12 had gone astray.40 But any military perspective would have been overwhelmed by the international political reaction: a hostile mix of righteous indignation, suspicion, anger, incredulity and ridicule. On 13–14 May, 679 sorties were flown. Electricity distribution was again disrupted, while many targets were struck in Kosovo itself. Despite General Clark’s ‘measures of merit’, NATO pilots were reported to be attacking well below 15,000 feet. But such reports were overshadowed by images of an attack on the Kosovo village of Korisa, killing 80 ethnic Albanian citizens. The village was first struck by two F-16s, dropping four laser-guided bombs. Ten minutes later, a third F-16 dropped six unguided bombs.41 On the following day the Pentagon released aerial photographs showing military defensive positions around the farm compound which had been hit. In the media war, however, the clear winner of this skirmish was again Serbian television, with its speedy access for international journalists to the stricken village. As a result, despite the continued, programmed brutality towards the ethnic Albanians, another targeting error forced NATO onto the international defensive. Heavier bombing inevitably increased the instance of weapon malfunction or human error. And yet, despite media cover, such mistakes 56
Kosovo: The Air Campaign – the Chinese Embassy apart – had no effect on NATO’s strategy and targeting, no influence on the outcome of the campaign and little or no impact on public support. The impact on public opinion of the plight of the Kosovan refugees was much greater, and more sustained, than the occasional images of NATO bombing errors. By the end of April, polls indicated support in the UK for the bombing campaign rising to more than 3 to 1. It may be argued, therefore, that the impact of isolated incidents, however dramatic or tragic, may have as transient an effect on public opinion as non-military disasters such as a rail crash or flood. Even so, a combination of high public expectations, international media access, real-time image transmission and unscrupulous political manipulation will continue to ensure that air power, especially in humanitarian operations, will pay a heavy political penalty for even the rarest mistake, no matter how genuine and extensive the contrition. As Benjamin Lambeth, the pre-eminent American air power analyst, put it: Thanks to unrealistic efforts to treat the normal friction of war as avoidable human error, every occurrence of unintended collateral damage became over inflated as front page news and treated as a blemish on air power’s presumed ability to be constantly precise.42 Airmen, however, had tended for a decade to emphasise the enormous impact of precision weapons, and not so much their limitations and the unpredictability of malfunction. Consequently, air power was yet again being criticised for its apparent failure to make good its alleged promises, rather than being appraised on its actual achievements.
LOOKING TO THE FUTURE
Attempts to draw ‘lessons’ for the future from any conflict should be made with caution. Quite apart from deciding which features are likely to reoccur and which were transient and localised, no one can be sure about who will set the next exam questions and in which classroom. That said, the air campaign revealed a disconcerting number of operational weaknesses in the alliance. Many could be resolved by resource allocation and restructuring. Less amenable to correction were political and strategic problems arising from coalition warfare. Although the campaign was launched by NATO, a formally constituted alliance, its objectives were only very loosely associated with the terms of the Atlantic Charter. In effect, in the Kosovo crisis, NATO behaved like an ad hoc coalition. 57
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Despite the overall strategic interoperability – the result of many years of NATO exercises – with aircraft from 14 nations flying from 47 bases, there was no compatible secure radio communication, frequently compelling target information and aircraft positions to be passed over open transmissions. There was no common IFF system, which seriously impeded the work of AWACS controllers. There was no alliance-wide reliable threat warning system for use against SAMs. There was a severe shortage of aircraft capable of designating targets for attack. Only the United States and, to a much lesser extent, France and Great Britain were able to deploy precision-guided bombs. Even the United States began to run short of some kinds of PGM, including cruise missiles, by the beginning of May. There were further shortfalls in transport aircraft, refuelling tankers, electronic warfare and reconnaissance. When targeting information on Serbian forces in Kosovo was available, it was often out of date, or the targets were concealed by the time NATO aircraft were able to react. Overall, the conflict sharply underlined the enormous gap between the technological capacity of the United States’ air forces and that of the rest of the alliance. Moreover, in every conflict fought by the USA, with and without allies, from Korea (1950–53) onwards, electronic warfare assets were inadequate. Each time, the lessons of inadequacy were subsequently forgotten. Kosovo was no exception. After the 1991 Gulf War, the USAF’s EF-111 Raven EW aircraft were retired, theoretically to be replaced by US Navy EA-6Bs, with a handful of Raven crews retraining on the Navy aircraft. The operational electronic warfare branch on the USAF air staff was disestablished and levels of EW expertise on squadrons were criticised. A RAND report in 1998 highlighted the atrophy of EW assets and prompted the creation of a new EW office in the Pentagon, with input to training, manning and equipment. In the Kosovo campaign, EA-6B crews flew daily, six days a week, logging 90 hours a month, but the US Navy had to reinforce the squadron with instructors from training posts. Planned upgrades to several on-board jamming systems were justified by the campaign. The need to provide jamming support for the F-117 and B-2 ‘stealthy’ aircraft was, apparently, unexpected.43 When the F-117 was lost there were only between 12 and 15 US Navy EA-6Bs deployed, of which only a proportion was available at any one time. The USAF made enemy air defence suppression a prerequisite for all other missions, but steadfastly failed to make adequate resource provision for it. Another perennial electronic warfare coordination problem emerged with the difficulty experienced by signals intelligence gathering aircraft such as EC-135 Rivet Joint, the US Navy’s EP-3 and Army RE-12 58
Kosovo: The Air Campaign Guardrail, when their Serbian target signals were simultaneously being jammed by EC-130 Compass Call and EA-6B Prowlers. Parallel United States and NATO command structures complicated operational planning and unity of command. Sensitive American systems, such as B-2, F-117 and cruise missiles, were allocated by US European Command (EUCOM) rather than by NATO. Within the Combined Air Operations Centre (CAOC) there were separate EUCOM and NATO targeting teams. On some occasions, AWACS crews were not notified of the presence in their areas of ‘sensitive’ United States aircraft. Against more formidable opposition, and with less intelligent and skilful AWACS crews, such duplication and omission could prove tragically costly. In testimony to the US Senate Armed Services Committee on 3 November 1999, General Klaus Naumann of the German Army, recently retired Chairman of NATO’s Military Committee, observed, ‘Kosovo taught us that NATO’s force structure is in contrast to NATO’s integrated command structure and no longer flexible enough to react quickly and decisively enough to unforeseen events’.44 Some of the apparently unforeseen events were the adoption by the Serbs of traditional defensive techniques of deception, concealment and camouflage, and ‘cheating’ by placing military targets among civilians. Yet these had all been used by Saddam Hussein in 1991 in Desert Storm. Asymmetric opposition is not a novelty of the air power age. By 2001, military weaknesses had been comprehensively identified within the alliance, even if remedial measures were proving too difficult, too expensive or politically unpalatable. Problems of alliance cohesion were equally well defined, but did not lend themselves so easily to resolution. General Naumann, on his retirement, referred to the fundamental problem of coalition warfare: ‘Coalition warfare means a balance between the various interests of the different nations and you automatically end up with the lowest common denominator if you want to keep the coalition together’.45 In his final press conference on 4 May, the General reiterated the problems of waging war by coalition. His comments underline the basic problems faced by NATO whatever kind of force was used. The fact that they emerged in an air campaign was purely coincidental: We need to find a way to reconcile the conditions of a coalition war with the principle of military operations such as surprise and overwhelming force. We did not apply either in Operation Allied Force and this cost time, effort and potentially additional casualties. The net result is that the campaign is undoubtedly prolonged. We need to find a way to seize the initiative in a coalition effort which, by its very nature, takes time to conceive a consensus.46 59
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts The difficulty was recognised by USAF commanders who believed, in accordance with USAF doctrine, that ‘aerospace power is usually employed to greatest effect in parallel, asymmetric operations. This includes precision strikes against surface forces, information attack against command and control systems, or precision strikes against infrastructure and centers of gravity’.47 Or, as summarised by USAF Chief of Staff General Michael Ryan: The campaign did not begin the way that America would normally apply air power – massively striking at strategic centres of gravity that support Milosevic and his oppressive regime. A month into the campaign, it became apparent that a constrained, phased approach was not effective. NATO broadened the campaign to achieve strategic effects.48 Two testimonies to the US Senate Armed Forces Committee in October 1999 graphically illustrated the distance between USAF preferences and the reality of coalition warfare. Firstly, Lieutenant-General Michael C. Short USAF, Alliance Joint Forces Air Component Commander: I believe the way to stop ethnic cleansing was to go at the heart of the leadership, and put a dagger in that heart as rapidly and directly as possible … I’d have gone for the head of the snake on the first night. I’d have dropped the bridges across the Danube. I’d have hit five or six political and military headquarters in down town Belgrade. Milosevic and his cronies would have waked up the first morning asking what the hell was going on … A nation that’s providing less than eight percent of the sortie contribution to an effort [France] should not be in a position of restricting American aviators who are bearing seventy per cent of the load.49 Secondly, joint testimony by Defense Secretary Cohen and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Henry H. Shelton: The fact that NATO needed to obtain and hold a consensus on its strategy required that a more gradualist approach be taken to the operation. Some NATO allies were reluctant to attack anything other than the troops and vehicles actually carrying out the ethnic cleansing of Kosovo, while others insisted that the fastest way to obtain Milosevic’s compliance was with a strategic bombing effort on Serb centres of gravity … Cohen however insisted that the campaign would never have been launched at all – and Milosevic 60
Kosovo: The Air Campaign would have gotten away with ethnic cleansing – if demands had been made by some NATO members to pursue anything other than a gradually increasing air campaign … Gaining consensus among 19 democratic nations is not easy [Cohen and Shelton] added.50 In interviews during the war, General Short had expressed similar opinions, raising the spectre of ‘gradualism’, the USAF memory of the air war in Vietnam: Airmen would like to have gone after that target set [the Serbian leadership] on the first night and sent a clear signal that we were taking the gloves off from the very beginning, that we were not going to try a little bit of this and see how you like it and try a little bit of that and see how you like it.51 Twelve months later, the British House of Commons Defence Committee, in a painstaking and very objective report, could not solve the dilemma: It is clear to us that to have launched an all-out attack against Serbia on 24 March would have destroyed the cohesion of the Alliance. On the other hand, the Alliance’s graduated approach to the air campaign evidently failed to convince Milosevic that the subsequent escalation would happen.52 Below the disagreement over the use of air power in Kosovo lay a more fundamental issue: the relationship between any strategy and the political objective which it was designed to achieve. ‘No major proposal required for war’, wrote Clausewitz, ‘can be worked out in ignorance of political factors; and when people talk, as they often do, about harmful political influence on the management of war, they are not really saying what they mean. Their quarrel should be with the policy itself ’.53 Military effectiveness can be measured by its ability to facilitate political objectives through an appropriate strategy. If the objectives are uncertain and the strategy inappropriate, air power or any other kind of military power is likely to prove a blunt instrument. In March 1999, air power was the only military instrument NATO was willing to use. It may be cogently argued that by coercing Milosevic while still sustaining alliance cohesion, the incremental strategy was most suited to the political objective in this conflict. The refugees returned; the Serbian oppression stopped; Russia cooperated with NATO; NATO’s credibility and cohesion were sustained; the 61
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts European Union took a major step towards the idea of a common foreign and defence policy. And much later, Milosevic was overthrown. Until Milosevic gives an honest interview, there can only be speculation about the reasons for his capitulation. They may include Russian diplomatic pressure, instead of the political support which he looked for. His coterie support was eroded by the destruction of factories and other sources of income. His popular support was ultimately weakened by the cumulative impact of the bombing. His indictment for war crimes, and his isolation from the international community, may have had some influence. The KLA offensive in the later part of May dramatically illustrated the vulnerability of his ground forces to air attack if they had to confront a NATO ground offensive. By the beginning of June, such an offensive was no longer out of the question. But the primary, and sole military, coercive instrument was air power. The absence of any one of the other factors could have delayed the outcome, but the air campaign was the indispensable catalyst for its achievement.
NOTES
1. British Ministry of Defence (MoD) Press Release 148/98, 12 June 1998. 2. NATO Headquarters Allied Forces Southern Europe briefing notes, posted at http://www.afsouth.nato.int, 27 March 1999. 3. Ibid. 4. Guardian, 29 March 1999. 5. Guardian, 25 March 1999. 6. NATO Headquarters media conference, 23 March 1999. 7. Aviation Week and Space Technology, 29 March 1999, p. 30. 8. MoD media briefing, 25 March 1999. 9. The Economist, 27 March 1999, p. 17. 10. MoD media contributors’ briefing, 23 March 1999. 11. The Economist, 27 March 1999, p. 43. 12. Washington Post, 30 May 1999. 13. Washington Watch, US Air Force Association, 10 June 1999, p. 5. 14. General Wesley K. Clark, Waging Modern War (New York: Public Affairs, 2001), pp. 182–3. 15. MoD and United States Department of Defense (DoD) briefings, 31 March 1999. 16. Daily Telegraph, 28 March 1999. 17. See for example, John Keegan, ‘Why Air Strikes Are Not Working’, Daily Telegraph, 30 March 1999. 18. Guardian, 30 March 1999. 19. Daily Telegraph, 2 April 1999. 20. Ibid. 21. Dr Jamie Shea, NATO Headquarters briefing, 31 March 1999. 22. NATO Headquarters media briefing, 2 April 1999.
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Kosovo: The Air Campaign 23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28. 29. 30.
31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53.
Daily Telegraph, 26 April 1999. NATO Headquarters briefing, 5 April 1999. Sunday Telegraph, 4 April 1999. Guardian, 6 April 1999. Daily Telegraph, 12 April 1999. NATO Headquarters media briefing, 21 April 1999. Clark, Waging Modern War, p. 268. Colonel John Warden, USAF (Retd) is the author of The Air Campaign: Planning for Combat (New York: NDU Press, 1989), a major contributor to USAF planning for Operation Desert Storm and an important influence on USAF doctrine in the past decade. Guardian, 13 May 1999. Daily Telegraph, 18 May 1999. Washington Post, 30 May 1999. Aviation Week and Space Technology, 14 February 2000. NATO Headquarters media briefing, 1 June 1999. The Hon. John Spellar, British Junior Defence Minister, speaking on BBC Radio 4, ‘The World at One’, 31 May 1999, after reports of a sanatorium in Surdulica being attacked. Guardian, 16 April 1999. NATO Headquarters briefing, 8 April 1999. Clark, Waging Modern War, p. 249. NATO Headquarters briefing, 8 May 1999. Spokesman Major-General Walter Jertz at NATO Headquarters media briefing, 16 May 1999. B.S. Lambeth, ‘NATO’s War for Kosovo, A Strategic and Operational Assessment’, RAND DRR-2449-AF, December 2000, p. xviii. Aviation Week and Space Technology, 15 November 1999. Jane’s Defence Weekly, 10 November 1999. Daily Telegraph, 28 April 1999. Daily Telegraph, 5 May 1999. US Air Force Doctrine Document 2, ‘Organisation and Employment of Aerospace Power’, USAF, 28 September 1998, pp. 6–7. Washington Post, 4 June 1999. Lieutenant-General Michael C. Short, Testimony to the United States Senate Armed Forces Committee, 21 October 1999, as reported in the Washington Post, 22 October 1999, p. 14. William S. Cohen and Army General Henry H. Shelton, in a joint statement before the Senate Armed Service Committee, October 1999, as reported in Air Force Magazine, December 1999. New York Times, 13 May 1999. House of Commons Defence Committee Report, Lessons of Kosovo, 23 October 2000, paragraph 94. Carl von Clausewitz (ed. and trans. M. Howard and P. Paret), On War (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press), p. 608.
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PART 3 The Media and the Kosovo Conflict
5
Media Operations: Lessons from Kosovo BRIGADIER S.J.L. ROBERTS
It was high summer, 1987. The British 4th Armoured Brigade was poised to conduct a counterstroke into the flank of two divisions of III US Corps, at the crescendo of Exercise Certain Strike, the largest – and last – Formation Training Exercise (FTX) of the series of Reinforcement of Germany Exercises (REFORGER). The Challenger main battle tanks and Warrior infantry fighting vehicles of the brigade had slipped out of a concentration area on the Soltau training area, on radio silence, through Saxon hamlets and towns in the short night, into forward hides on a start line at the edge of the Hohne ranges. By dawn, a huge armoured ambush-at-the-charge was ready. We were testing how we planned to deal with Soviet Operational Manoeuvre Groups or OMGs,1 slashing into the brains and guts of the new blitzkrieg. All depended on excellent intelligence and security, speed and stealth in movement, teamwork and discipline, and above all timing. We had tracked the enemy divisions for days, allowed their formation reconnaissance to drift past us; we had disappeared off the electronic map, and now we stalked forward to strike. Dawn came and went. The two divisions of III US Corps representing the OMGs stopped. We waited in our hides: three battlegroups of the Queen’s Royal Irish Hussars, 17th/21st Lancers and 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards in attack formation with Brigadier Walter Courage in his Tactical Headquarters between the leading tanks on the start line. In the Main Brigade Headquarters, some 10 kilometres to the rear, the Chief of Staff waited for the first ‘contact’ reports to break radio silence and announce that battle was joined. The sun climbed in a clear sky. Only birds, animals and umpires moved and broke the silence. Minutes, then hours, passed. 67
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Suddenly helicopter noise shattered the stillness above Brigade Headquarters. We had been discovered by an American UH-60A Black Hawk. The defence section deployed as the helicopter landed, but there emerged not a Special Forces team, but a four-star American general. He was escorted into the small complex of armoured personnel carriers, and ushered into the Plans vehicle. ‘What’s going on, Chief?’ he asked as he introduced himself: General Glenn K. Otis, General Officer Commanding Central Army Group (COMCENTAG), observing the exercise. ‘Not a lot’, was the answer: H-Hour had been delayed now some four hours, and the shock effect at dawn was looking likely to be a damp squib around elevenses. ‘What’s it all about, Chief?’ Well, certainly it was not about training the troopers of the Hussars and Lancers, or the Guardsmen, or any of the thousands of soldiers from the supporting arms. The delay was because the VIPs and the media were late getting into the stands which had been erected to watch our great armoured ballet, and it was more important to convey the messages of our training to the international audience – the people and politicians of the United States, Western Europe and the Warsaw Pact – than to teach and test good tactics. ‘You’re right, Chief ’, said General Otis, ‘public support is the 11th Principle of War’. It was a frustrating way to learn an absolutely fundamental truth. Today, little more than a decade later, but an operational world away, the lesson must be clear to all. No military activity can take place successfully anywhere on earth without a degree of public support. Even the most secret operations or activities need support if and when they become public; and the only safe working assumption in Media Operations (or Media Ops) is that everything will become public eventually. Public support gives commanders freedom of action; without it, ultimately they have none and of course the media are the omnipresent eyes and ears of the public. If there are any Rip van Winkles left who still think that military operations can be conducted without the media’s attention, then the Balkans have been their wake-up call. The media are now as much part of the operational environment as the weather or the terrain. They are omnipresent and inescapable. Developments in technology mean that reporters can carry their own communications and recording equipment, and transmit their reports directly to the broadcast or print media. BBC News 24 anchorman Nik Gowing has christened the new journalist ‘robohack’. He speaks strikingly about footage of the NATO bombing of refugee coaches during the Kosovo campaign arriving live on his monitor, and being broadcast there and then, hours before NATO commanders received reports of contact or bomb damage assessment.2 The footage did not come from a BBC reporter, either, but from an agency ‘robohack’ (Agence France Presse, as it happened). Nor is such 68
Media Operations: Lessons from Kosovo near real-time speed just the province of the broadcast media. Kate Adie, Chief News Reporter for BBC Television, has an equally striking Kosovo story. At the start of the 1999 air campaign against Yugoslavia, she was on board an American cruiser when it fired the first Tomahawk cruise missile of the campaign. Standing next to her on deck, an American reporter took a photograph of the missile launch, and transmitted it to his paper. It was on the front page before the missile struck its target. The size and cost of the technology which allows this are reducing all the time, to the extent that ‘robohack’ is no longer confined to the richest of the world’s media. Most of the 3,574 journalists who are said to have been accredited to KFOR (Kosovo Force), the NATO-based force deployed into Kosovo at the end of the air campaign (nearly one journalist for every two soldiers who crossed into Kosovo on D-Day), were self-equipped freelancers. They differ enormously in many ways, especially in their experience and understanding of military operations. It is not just that few of them can tell a frigate from a cruiser, a fighter from a bomber, or a tank from a self-propelled gun; most could not tell a parade from an ambush. But what they lack in military knowledge, they make up for in their speed and reach. They are genuinely omnipresent. It is often said that this is only true of the land environment, that maritime and air commanders can still exclude the media from their craft, their stations and their operating space; but an RAF Hercules pilot put me right recently by pointing out that he had twice been contacted in the cockpit by the BBC during operational sorties, once over the Balkans, and once over East Africa. This sort of reach can penetrate to even the most isolated campaign; it makes the military attempts to control the media in the Falklands conflict of 1982 unthinkable now. Even if no journalists cover the operation directly, access to technology, and changing attitudes to freedom of information (think of the pressures on the Official Secrets Act, and Special Forces Confidentiality Contracts) mean that civilians and even military participants are likely to report events themselves. In this regard one of the most significant aspects of the Kosovo campaign was the Serbian Orthodox monastery which reported the situation on its website. Everyone from governments to individuals can now tell their own stories to the world instantaneously over the Web. If any evidence were needed of this new reality, one need look no further than the Kosovo campaign, in which cyber attacks on British government, NATO alliance and United Nations websites became commonplace. The Web may change how most people get their news, but it certainly means that they will get it; the media now monitor websites as assiduously as they monitor the wire. 69
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Kosovo not only demonstrated the speed, reach and omnipresence of the media; it also proved their power. In a very real sense, national and NATO engagement sprang from media reporting of ethnic cleansing which persuaded public opinion, and politicians, that ‘something must be done’. There are many other examples of direct media impact on decision-making: one of the most striking was the CNN footage of a mutilated US serviceman being dragged through the streets in Mogadishu in 1993, which shocked President Bill Clinton into disengagement from Somalia. Northern Ireland provided some equally powerful evidence of the effect of media coverage on tactics; whatever other, wider impact reporting of ‘Bloody Sunday’ in 1972 had, it certainly influenced the crowd-control tactics of the British Army, which up to that point were largely unchanged since colonial days. Of course other factors were even more important, but one has only to compare and contrast the reactions of the British in 1987 and the Israelis in 2000 to the lynchings of their respective NCOs who drove into different funeral processions in Belfast and in Ramallah, to see that media reporting can have a profound influence on tactics as well as policy. The power of the media also extends beyond democracies with rich and powerful free presses; satellite communications mean that even totalitarian regimes are vulnerable. Travelling in the Democratic Republic of Germany (East Germany) in early 1990, immediately after the Berlin Wall was first breached, was most instructive. Satellite dishes in every village, in striking contrast to the cobbled streets and horsedrawn transport, showed why Erich Hoenneker had been unable to order his pre-positioned security troops to open fire on the demonstrators in Dresden and Unter den Linden. He knew that the people of East Germany had seen Tiannamen Square, and the Velvet Revolution in Prague, on television, and hence he could not suppress them. The media reach even into the most despotic regimes, and even despots must recognise that with the media, with communications, you are never in control. This key recognition lies at the heart of the British Media Operations doctrine which has emerged from the Kosovo campaign. In a war of choice in which the United Kingdom took a leading international role, sophisticated Media Operations were crucial to maintaining public support; Media Operations which took account of the media’s speed, reach and omnipresence, and therefore linked the political, strategic, operational and tactical levels.3 The relationship between political and military decision-making, public support and the media was of great importance throughout the Kosovo campaign. This had three main causes. Firstly, the media played a key part in mobilising Western public opinion and political military 70
Media Operations: Lessons from Kosovo engagement in Kosovo. This owed much to geography – many of the journalists were able to drive to Yugoslavia or its borders directly – and it generated the widespread call that ‘something must be done’. So the media were not only present and involved from the beginning; they had in a very real way taken the initiative, and were in terms of public opinion setting the agenda. This leads on to the second principal cause: the media consciousness of governments. Though there is nothing new in this, there can be few administrations as enthusiastic and assiduous in managing perceptions as those of the last years of the twentieth century. It is not an accident that the very term ‘spin doctor’ dates from the Clinton and Blair years. These leaders in particular recognised that to take and maintain the initiative in Kosovo, ‘to set the agenda’, they must manage perceptions through the media, as they had in their election campaigns and day-today government. The third, related, reason for the significance of the policy–media– public support triangle in the case of Kosovo was growing awareness and understanding of the media’s importance in defence thinking. As an aside, it is very difficult to determine which comes first in the policy– media–public support triangle. For example, did the Sun newspaper shift its support from Conservative to Labour before the 1997 election because it sensed its readership had shifted their support, or did the millions of Sun readers follow their paper’s move? Furthermore, whichever was chicken and whichever egg, did they affect the election just by shifting votes, or also by influencing the manifestos, policies and campaigns of the political parties involved? Similar questions about the policy–media– public support triangle in respect of Kosovo are equally difficult to answer with certainty, whether at the political level (did ‘something must be done’ originate with the media, the public or politicians?) the operational level (how did the triangle affect the air campaign?) or even the tactical level (the causal connections in the debate on British Army small arms and radios which followed the land entry into Kosovo). The answers are not just complex, but various. In some cases, the media starts the ball rolling, in others, public opinion was responsible, in yet others it was the political direction. The one general truth is that there is a connection, a triangle, which affects and circumscribes all public activity; and therefore a degree of perception management is required to influence and facilitate any such action. ‘Perception management’ has a faintly sinister ring to it; hints of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty Four, of propaganda and psychological operations (Psyops). As far as I am aware the term was first used in a defence context in 1992 by General Sir Peter Inge, Chief of the General 71
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Staff (now Field Marshal Lord Inge), and in relation to the Coleraine speech given by Sir Patrick Mayhew, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland (now Lord Mayhew). In examining the impact of this speech, Lord Inge identified the need to analyse, predict and be prepared for the impact of actions and utterances on the various constituencies of public opinion. He also bemoaned the lack of a planning tool to manage perceptions, which would bring together all those departments and agencies (and in the multinational context, allies) with an interest in the outcome. Throughout the rest of the 1990s thinking in this area developed, principally in the military doctrinal world, related in particular to the burgeoning focus on ‘Information Operations’ and ‘Command and Control Warfare’ (C2W). This work is still ongoing in doctrine and policy areas in most countries, but we saw its practical fruits over Kosovo, certainly in the United Kingdom. Led by the Operations Policy and (nascent) Corporate Communication Directorates,4 regular meetings of the government’s News Release Group (NRG), linking the Ministry of Defence, Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Department for International Development with the Permanent Joint Headquarters (PJHQ) at Northwood and NATO Headquarters in Brussels, and with other relevant departments and agencies, tried with growing success to think through the impact of our words and deeds in advance. This approach is now a well established part of the political–military planning process, which in the following year was applied to events as diverse as the British intervention in Sierra Leone, the possible military involvement in the petrol tanker strike, and the tenth anniversary of the Gulf War. Even the terminology of News Release Group work is fraught with difficulty, especially in multinational operations. The semantics and relationships, like Media Operations doctrine, are still being debated at present, and arcane semantic arguments will doubtless provide livelihoods to the neo-theologians of military doctrine for years to come. But real advances have already been made, not least that the NRG exists and is used. Without seeking to invite doctrinal inquisition (I write with feeling as a former Colonel Land Warfare responsible for British Army Doctrine), it is important to allay fears of psychological manipulation in all of this. In very broad terms the NRG brings together the Policy, Media Operations, Information Operations, Intelligence and Operations staffs, to plan and coordinate activities at all levels, from the political to the tactical. This coordination is also reflected at all levels, from the NRG, which is interdepartmental (and indeed international when required) to activities in the theatre of operations (or ‘in theatre’). The underlying principles are truth, timeliness, coordination, openness and separation. 72
Media Operations: Lessons from Kosovo Truth is key; demonstrable and interesting, it is the greatest weapon in the Media Ops (and indeed Psyops) arsenal. Working on the only safe assumption – that the truth will come out, usually sooner than later – all British Media Operations (and Psyops) are based entirely on truth. In emerging British doctrine, probably the main practical distinction between Media Operations and Psyops is that in the former we do not control the national and international media, whereas in the latter we do control our own media, such as radio broadcasts and leaflets. To be effective, Media Ops and Psyops must be mutually reinforcing. It is no good if a Psyops leaflet or broadcast is at odds with The Times newspaper, Agence France Presse or the BBC World Service. Though some other countries may still try to conduct black propaganda (that is to say, invention or lies) British policy and doctrine is always to tell the truth, and if we are not certain of the facts, to say so. This is why, for instance, the British government and Ministry of Defence sought constantly throughout the Kosovo campaign to steer clear of claims about specific numbers of Serb vehicles destroyed, or refugees displaced, unless we could verify them. Some of NATO’s worst failures in Media Operations were unsubstantiated claims. Because substantiation is often difficult, especially when the enemy controls the ground (and hence the media environment), timeliness is also a considerable challenge. In addition, as we have seen, the media have real-time communications, and a much lesser (and declining) imperative to verify their reports. It is, for instance, no longer strict policy in the BBC that every story must have two independent and corroborating sources before it is broadcast; their guideline is now merely that the second source is desirable if possible. Other agencies are less rigorous still. This means that it is essential that those at every level who are likely to be quizzed by the media must be in possession of the same facts and the same answers, as soon as possible. In the case of military operations, the media focuses on two places: the theatre, and the political–strategic decision-making focus. In multinational operations these are multiplied by the number of participating nations, plus the relevant multinational supreme headquarters, which adds considerably to the difficulty of coordination. In the case of Kosovo separate national press information centres (PICs) in theatre, and briefings in all the different MoDs, plus NATO Headquarters (HQ) in Brussels, did not make media operations easy; but they underlined the vital need for coordination, and also offered some clues to maintaining the initiative. The principal way to maintain the initiative in Media Operations is coordination of both planning and operations. This can only be done by 73
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts regular conferences enabled by technology; international video conference calls are probably the best mechanism currently available. This depends on first-class communication, linking dedicated and expert Media Operations staff in all the key headquarters. The key coordination mechanism is setting the timetable of press briefings to suit our operational needs. Probably the best option currently available, arrived at in Kosovo, is regular planned and coordinated briefings (daily if necessary, depending on the tempo of operations, but aiming to fill the news day when required), at the supreme HQ, at the theatre HQ, and in MoDs. Other nodal points in the decision-making process, like intermediate HQs, should be kept informed and consulted, but only hold media briefings and conferences in support of the strategic or theatre levels, not on their own account. In fast-moving and high-profile operations, the media spotlight falls on two places: the front line, and the strategic– political (usually MoD) level, and they must be linked as seamlessly as possible, even if on occasion this means that intermediate echelons are skipped or kept informed rather than allowed to slow the passage of information by interposing themselves. Here slavish adherence to the military chain of command in Media Ops spells delay and hence loss of tempo and the initiative. Whether military commanders like it or not, it is the coordination of message between Cabinet and front line which is crucial. In this respect, Media Ops’ command, control and coordination has much in common with Special Operations.5 This is not to say that Media Operations should be micro-managed in theatre by the head of state; far from it. Nor should the military chain of command be kept in the dark; on the contrary, clear and full visibility at every level is key to successful Media Operations. It is just that the mechanism and the understanding must exist for direct and immediate coordination from top to bottom when necessary. A good example from Kosovo of this need, if under tragic circumstances, was the deaths of Lieutenant Evans and Sergeant Rai of the Gurkha Engineers while dealing with unexploded ordnance, part of the role of the British contingent of KFOR. Direct communication between Directorate of Corporate Communications (Army) (DCC(A)) staff in Whitehall and in theatre managed to ensure that the first British Army deaths of the campaign were reported accurately and consistently from both Kosovo and London; and only after the next of kin in both the United Kingdom and Nepal had been informed. Without direct DCC(A) communication, and media management in London and in theatre, the details, including speculative names and unit identities, would have been on Sky News, CEEFAX and the wire live from theatre. As it was, security was maintained and the tragic story was broken when 74
Media Operations: Lessons from Kosovo and where we chose, by a press briefing from theatre timed to hit the London evening news broadcasts. After truth, timeliness and coordination comes openness. It is as important to have openness between participating nations, departments and agencies as it is for them to be open with the media. Unless the participants know each others’ aims, agendas and aspirations there can be no effective coordination, and the media will exploit any inconsistencies ruthlessly. The three crucial areas for internal openness are between nations, between decision-making levels and between agencies. Openness between nations is problematic because there are always differing politically driven agendas. Nations vary hugely in their attitudes to the media. In Kosovo, for instance, there was considerable disagreement between allies about the release of bomb damage assessment (BDA) and aircraft film to substantiate claims. Notably, the Germans seemed more instinctively open in this area than the United States or the British. It seems unlikely that we will achieve complete international glasnost, but it is certainly sensible (and achievable) that we should have informed views of our allies’ Media and Information Operations needs and plans. A useful analogy is military rules of engagement (RoE): each country may well continue to work on different ones, but it is surely desirable that each knows its allies’ RoE lexicon, which ones they are employing, and on what criteria. Openness between decision-making levels should be just a matter of communication, but it is blurred by national agendas, and this again argues for understanding of each others’ ends, ways and means at least. This is particularly important between the national strategic–political level, and the theatre level. It is most clearly highlighted in dealing with media in theatre, where the commander’s freedom of action may well depend on an Information Operations-led campaign engaging, say, local radio. This has to be truly understood and coordinated with the top-level Media Operations directed at NRG, which may have distinct messages to get out over the same local radio. The corollary is that the theatre commander may have important messages for which the best medium is the BBC World Service, which must obviously be coordinated with briefings to that organisation in London. Further, at every level, openness must be balanced with evident separation between different players: nothing is more certain to provoke and antagonise the media than that they should be used for propaganda or Psyops. So while it is vital that the Media Ops and Psyops staff and operators (and indeed all the branches and agencies involved in conducting the campaign) know and understand each others’ aims and 75
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts activities, the Psyops and Media Ops staff must be seen rigorously to be separated. There must be a glass fire-wall between them. In every aspect of perception management, Kosovo was something of a watershed. It was the first war that saw widespread cyber attacks, notably by Yugoslavia and her supporters on NATO and NATO nations’ information systems. It was also the first time that people logged on to participants’ websites to get information, and this may prove to be a revolution in how news gets to the public without going through the prism of the media. As we have observed, another related new facet of operations in Kosovo was the ubiquity of hand-held, privately owned information technology (IT). Practically every British military sub-unit used its own e-mail and Web access; individuals e-mailed or telephoned home on their mobiles; regimental sites reported operations, sending video and pictures as well as text. In Kosovo we saw for the first time that individual participants, whether they be soldiers, monks or freedom fighters, can supplant journalists and be ‘robohacks’ themselves. For the military, these developments require regulation; for the media, though they do not necessarily spell the end of news as we know it, they certainly mean a shift in how news is gathered: visiting Sky News after the liberation of Kosovo it was striking to see how many staff in the newsroom now monitor the Web rather than the wire. For governments, the Kosovo conflict, the first Internet war, pointed the way to projecting news directly themselves. The British MoD website now offers a 24-hour news service, providing not only factual releases and updates, but also the means to correct and rebut stories in the media. If nothing else, this raises interesting questions about the relationship between Media Operations and Psyops. Hitherto, one of the principal distinctions between the two (in British understanding at least) has been that while in Psyops we control the means of dissemination, in Media Ops we seek to get our message across through the independent media. Currently in Great Britain, it is Media Ops, not Psyops staff who run the MoD website, and its contents are always simple truth; but British ‘white’ Psyops are also founded on demonstrable truth, targeting specific audiences; and increasingly media operations, like the media themselves, also target specific audiences. This implies that despite our continuing instinctive apprehension about propaganda and Psyops, the reality is that the distinctions between them and media operations are breaking down, if they ever really existed. In effect they are all perception management, and if they are all based on ‘demonstrable truth, simply and interestingly told’ (the core of British Media Operations philosophy), the distinction is indeed instinctive, rather than rational. 76
Media Operations: Lessons from Kosovo This brings us full circle to the trump card of the free media: messages delivered through their independent prisms are much more credible than government statements, however well presented. So, one of the biggest lessons from Kosovo is that expert Media Operations have increased both in scope and importance. Further, one of the Media Ops and Corporate Communications staffs’ most important tasks is to ensure the coordination and mutual support of internal and external public relations. Real credibility is achieved when soldiers read the same truth in the newspaper and in the service journal. Another important lesson about perceptions, reinforced in Kosovo, is the matter of the posture and appearance of soldiers. More and more, impact is achieved by film and pictures as opposed to words, and Kosovo brought memorable images into every home. The difference in appearance and posture between different national contingents was very evident. Any viewer could tell which nations placed the most stress on force protection, or on ‘hearts and minds’ operations.6 The point is not to make odious or arrogant comparisons, but to underline the lesson that the commander – or indeed the nation – that desires freedom of action (including the ability to escalate) and the requisite impact, must consider how their troops appear, as well as what they say. Kosovo has taught us some new lessons, and confirmed some old ones. Among the new ones, perhaps the most important is the need to invest people, resources, training, doctrine and coordination in Media Operations, to help to achieve freedom of action at all levels. As for the old lessons confirmed: above all, ‘Tell the Truth!’
NOTES
1. The ‘Operational Manoeuvre Group’ or OMG is the NATO translation of a formation first demonstrated by the old Soviet Union in training exercises in 1981. The OMG was essentially one or more very powerful reinforced armoured divisions held in readiness until a gap had been made in the enemy lines, and then released to drive deeply into the more vulnerable enemy rear areas. Considerable NATO thought went into the problem of how to stop these OMGs in the event of their being used in war. 2. These are NATO technical terms. A ‘contact’ report means that the formation sending the report has seen or engaged the enemy; bomb damage assessment (BDA) is a later attempt to assess the effectiveness of a bombing attack. 3. These are also technical military terms in British and NATO doctrine, used as a commonplace by most officers, and largely self-explanatory. The ‘political level’ refers to policy; the ‘strategic level’ to the military level of command which deals directly with how to carry out political directives; the ‘operational level’ to the conduct of actual military operations; and the ‘tactical level’ to the
77
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts details of how these operations are conducted. The related term ‘theatre level’ refers to forces within the geographical area (or ‘theatre’) where operations are being conducted. 4. Of these, at the time of writing the author heads the Army’s Directorate of Corporate Communications, or DCC(A). 5. For those unfamiliar with this doctrinal term, Special Operations refers to the use of troops for unusual or clandestine reconnaissance and raiding; characteristically the role in the modern British armed forces of the SAS. It has long been military doctrine that such forces should be tasked and controlled from the highest possible level of command, usually the political–strategic level. 6. ‘Hearts and minds’ is another doctrinal term of long standing, probably first used in the Malayan Emergency of 1948–60. Its central idea is that progress towards peace should be made by winning people’s confidence and trust more than by the threat or use of military force.
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6
Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict STEPHEN BADSEY
INTRODUCTION
It was the official position of the British government, and indeed of NATO, that despite its recourse to military force over Kosovo between 24 March and 12 June 1999 it was not at war with the Yugoslav people.1 This phenomenon of undeclared war was a commonplace of the second half of the twentieth century. Nevertheless, the Kosovo conflict was the first inter-state war of any size fought since the Gulf War of 1990–91, and certainly the first fought since then by Great Britain, the United States or other Western powers. Among the features which distinguished the conduct of the Kosovo conflict, both in comparison to the Gulf War and to other, lesser conflicts that had occurred in the intervening years, was the role of both the national and international media. Technological, social and political developments both in the manner in which military force was used, and in civilian mass news communications, interacted together to render this war more media permeable, and interpermeable, than any other in history. This media interaction with military force and with political responses had been largely understood and predicted both by theory and from other experiences in the 1990s. However, as is usual in such matters, the degree of prediction was not exact. By way of an introduction, three episodes or anecdotes should serve to demonstrate the degree of media interpermeability of this war, and in particular the use of novel news and communications sources. All of these episodes represent a use of ‘new media’ in war, or a use of the media in a way that was at the time unique to Kosovo. Firstly, it was apparent from the start of NATO bombing that public opinion in all countries involved would have a critical role to play in the 79
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts war’s conduct. On 25 March, after one day of NATO bombing, the BBC announced via its Internet on-line website the result of various opinion polls, including a telephone poll conducted by its CEEFAX television text service in Britain, which showed roughly twice as many respondents opposed to the bombing as supporting it. As more polling evidence accumulated, this was rapidly shown to be a rogue result, with roughly 60 per cent of respondents to most British opinion polls supporting NATO action against Yugoslavia (for example a Gallup poll for the Daily Telegraph on 29 March gave NATO a 58 per cent approval rating). On the same day the Yugoslav state news agency Tanjug picked up the CEEFAX poll and released it as a press statement, saying that a BBC analysis had shown two-thirds of the British public to be opposed to NATO’s actions. This release was also placed on the Tanjug website. Also on the same day, and contrary to the NATO official position, the Assembly of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia determined that a state of war did exist, and recalled its ambassadors from the United States, Britain, France and Germany, all the countries whose aircraft had taken part in the first night’s bombing. Closing the loop of this story, on leaving London early in the morning of Monday 29 March the Yugoslav Deputy Ambassador to Britain gave an interview to BBC Breakfast News, in which he stated as fact that two-thirds of the British people supported Yugoslavia.2 An event such as this, involving the deliberate selection of data from an apparently neutral or even enemy source in order to generate propaganda and misinformation, could theoretically have happened in any war, although no parallels from the past show the same speed and ubiquity of media interaction. The same is not true of the second example, which depended entirely on technology unavailable before the 1990s. From the start of military operations the British Ministry of Defence (MoD) and Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) set up a joint daily live televised press conference, together with a special joint Internet website. This was followed on 26 March by an FCO website in the Serbian language. The practice of creating such websites was also followed by most of the major participants in the conflict. At the MoD/FCO press conference on 31 March, Defence Secretary George Robertson announced that the joint website was receiving 150,000 hits a day, 1,400 of them from within the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. He offered in response the website address, and also the website address of the International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague. At the MoD/FCO press conference next day on 1 April, Foreign Secretary Robin Cook announced that the FCO Serbian-language website had since its opening five days earlier received 10,000 hits from within Serbia alone. This compares with approximately 50,000 Serbs 80
Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict with access to the Internet at the time, about 1,000 of them in Kosovo. The FCO website invited the inhabitants of Kosovo to e-mail accounts of Serb atrocities to London, as part of an evidence database for future war crimes prosecutions. Within the first week they announced that ‘hundreds’ of such accounts were being received.3 The last illustrative episode is both more complete in its forms of media interaction with military action rather than politics, and also more controversial as one of the more notorious events of the war. On Wednesday 14 April, US F-16 aircraft of 315th Fighter Wing flying from Aviano in Italy misidentified a convoy of Kosovar Albanian refugees in tractors near Djakovica as military trucks, and bombed them, causing multiple casualties. The principal reason for the misidentification was that the rules of engagement required the pilots to fly no lower than 15,000 feet for their own safety. This in turn was the result of a conviction within the United States government that any casualties to their aircrews, reported through the media, would provoke a mass public outcry against the war. Reports of the bombing came first from the RTS (Radio-Television Serbia) studio in Pristina. As in the case of Baghdad during the Gulf War, there were a number of senior Western print journalists and camera teams in Belgrade with the permission of the Yugoslav government, based at the Hyatt Hotel. They were present to report events from Yugoslavia, on the understanding that although there was no official censorship, Yugoslav political control would prevent them reporting openly. The first information received about the bombing by the Chief Press Spokesman at NATO Headquarters in Brussels, Dr Jamie Shea, came by means of a telephone call from a sympathetic Western journalist in Belgrade, warning Shea that the Yugoslav government was offering them transport to the scene of the incident. The first television pictures of the devastation appeared that evening broadcast by RTS, picked up and repeated globally by CNN; while Western journalists were indeed shown the devastation at the location. Watching these television pictures on CNN was the first notification that the NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR), US General Wesley Clark, received of the incident. NATO at first believed that there had been two convoys, one civilian and one military, and that its aircraft had hit only the military convoy. Three hours later General Clark was interviewed on radio, in the course of which he speculated that Yugoslav aircraft had hit the tractor convoy. This radio broadcast was made virtually simultaneously with the afternoon Pentagon press conference, at which it was admitted that American aircraft had done the damage. There then followed a period of confusion behind the scenes, leading to the NATO announcement next day that there had been two separate incidents, and the release of 81
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts an audiotape of the pilot involved – which turned out to be the wrong tape. Dr Shea was for a few days in the difficult position of being able to say nothing, while arguing in private that NATO must get its story straight. Finally, five days after the incident, the commander of the F-16 wing responsible, Brigadier General Dan Leaf, came to NATO Headquarters to give a special press conference, explaining what had really happened. Two days earlier, RTS broadcast what it claimed to be an audio tape recording of the bombing incident, with an American AWACS ordering an F-16 pilot to bomb civilian tractors. The clumsiness of this forgery caused much amusement among Western analysts familiar with real NATO radio procedure.4 The Djakovica tractor bombing had strong parallels with two episodes from the Gulf War. One of these was the bombing of the Amiriyah bunker on 13 February 1991 by an American F-117A Nighthawk stealth aircraft, which has remained controversial. The other was the lesser-known bombing of a market at the town of Fallouja by RAF GR1 Tornados on 16 February 1991, when after a very similar argument behind the scenes the British opted to announce the truth, that their bombs had failed to guide properly in aiming for a bridge.5 The difference in 1999 over Kosovo was that the speed of response required from a greater degree of media interpenetration, and at a higher command level, had wrongfooted NATO in a military operation in which both sides placed credibility very high on their list of aims. As Prime Minister Tony Blair later remarked, it was ‘frustrating’ that the Yugoslavs had ‘to some extent, control of the media agenda’.6 As a final point, although all the events regarding the Kosovo conflict detailed above happened, and are documented with notes at the end of this chapter, none of the references given is to a conventionally ‘published’ print article or book, other than those relating to events before 1999. The author holds copies of all of this evidence, chiefly downloaded from the Internet in the course of the conflict, but there is no centralised ‘archive’ that is open to the public to be consulted. Much of the evidence of the Kosovo conflict is of this nature.
M E D I A WA R A N D T H E C O N T E X T O F KO S O V O
Inevitably, the conduct of political–military–media interaction during the Kosovo conflict contained a few unexpected events. But generally this interaction conformed to themes of the development in the 1990s of the political–military–media relationship that were quite well understood under the broad heading of ‘media war’. First appearing in the immediate 82
Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War, this term has now entered general political discourse. The expression ‘media war’ was used in relation to Kosovo as a simple synonym for a deception or propaganda campaign, both by Dr Shea at NATO Headquarters and by President Slobodan Milosevic in his only English-language television interview.7 If this is the trend of the future then ‘media war’ may join ‘Ministry of Information’ as just another transparent euphemism for propaganda. But in its origins and intent the term ‘media war’ conveys a rather more sophisticated idea: that in warfare in the 1990s the interaction between politics, public opinion, the media in all its forms, and military force had become a central issue. Developments in Western political thinking, in concepts of the use of armed force, and in the mass media since 1991 meant that this was particularly true of Kosovo. In addition to ‘media war’, which attempts as a concept to embrace the entire gamut of political–military–media interaction, the events of Kosovo were also influenced, and to some extent governed, by other conceptual developments in all three spheres which had taken place since 1991. The notion of a major shift in Western military strategy was a commonplace by the end of the decade, reflected particularly in the United States PDD 25 of 1995, the NATO Rome Declaration, the British government’s Strategic Defence Review of 1998, and in a host of other ways, reaching a final form in the announcement of the NATO new strategic concept at its 50th anniversary commemoration in New York, which coincided with the Kosovo conflict. American reluctance to deploy ground troops, fear of a ‘quagmire’, and reliance on air power had been evident as a developing trend since 1991 (and as a long-term attitude for more than a century before). The basic American approach to the use of air power had developed shortly before the Gulf War, and fitted well both with the concepts of PDD 25 and the considerable American numerical, technological and electronic superiority in the air (including space systems) over all other countries including their NATO allies. The concept of Air Operations was based on a very powerful initial airstrike in the first 24 hours of a conflict, using stealth technology, electronic jamming and precision-guided munitions, and aimed at high-value political and communications targets rather than military forces, with the intention of inflicting communications paralysis on the enemy. This method, sometimes characterised as ‘insideout warfare’, was used first in the 1991 Gulf War as the preliminary to an extensive and largely conventional air campaign, followed by an equally largely conventional ground war. It was used next in August 1995 in Bosnia in Operation Deliberate Force in a rather different way. A preliminary American airstrike against the Serb forces of the Krajina, 83
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts backed up by the first airstrikes conducted in anger by NATO as an organisation, destroyed the ability of the Serbs to resist effectively against an attack by Croat forces trained clandestinely by American civilian firms. The United States and some of its allies also conducted two further air operations, Operation Desert Strike in March 1996 and Operation Desert Fox in December 1998, against air defences, communications and other targets in Iraq, using a similar mix of precision-guided munitions and cruise missiles.8 The most confident statement of the validity of this paralysis through air power before Kosovo came in 1996 with the announcement from the National Defense University in Washington of the concept of ‘Rapid Dominance’ through the use of such methods, with the objective of engendering ‘shock and awe’ in the enemy.9 As is not uncommon for a new method of warfare, various poor historical analogies have been advanced by American defence theorists in justification of this use of air power, including those equating such bombing to the legions of Rome, or eighteenth-century siege warfare. Except for a small number of commentators, the US media (and that of other countries including Britain) appears to have no grasp of this new concept of air power, equating bombing in the 1990s to that of the Second World War, and frequent warnings were issued during the 1990s by airmen not to expect the impossible from air power. Political advantages to the United States from this approach included general popular support for bombing as a policy, and a low American casualty rate. Indeed, it was already apparent from the experience of Deliberate Force that the United States government viewed any combat deaths or captures among their aircrew as unacceptable, and would go to remarkable lengths to retrieve them safely. The American-led NATO air campaign starting on 24 March 1999, Operation Allied Force, was in the tradition of this use of air power. But whereas the method depended heavily on an initial paralysing strike, American airmen were not on this occasion permitted, as they put it, ‘to go for the head of the snake’. Instead, the United States pursued a coercion strategy through air power with far weaker forces and smaller targeting options. It was widely believed at the time that the American political leadership had somehow become convinced that only a few days of symbolic bombing would be enough to cause a Yugoslav surrender. As this failed to happen and the bombing campaign continued, objections within the United States military mounted, and although muted during the war, they later became overt. It was not until after more than a month of bombing that the United States and NATO developed the resources and rules of targeting engagement to pursue what its airmen regarded as a proper strategy. This had implications both for the relationship between 84
Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict a coercion strategy and propaganda on all sides, and for the manner in which both Yugoslav military and civil communications were attacked in the course of the campaign.10 The other major development in conception of the uses of force and their link with communications and the media to emerge from NATO in the 1990s owed rather more to the British than the United States, chiefly through British leadership of the NATO commanding headquarters for its intervening ground forces, the ARRC.11 The British (with input from other NATO countries, including particularly the United States and Canada) spent much of the 1990s in an attempt to develop concepts of military force that would equate to new United Nations Organisation political concepts, particularly as expressed in Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghalli’s policy statement ‘An Agenda For Peace’ of 1992. British ideas were based on the UN concept, revived from being defunct since the Congo in 1960, of ‘Chapter 6g Operations’ (sometimes also known as ‘second-generation peacekeeping’), lying conceptually somewhere between peacekeeping by consent of all parties and outright war. The object was to provide ground forces that would not necessarily fight a war, but would be able to deploy rapidly to control a volatile political and military situation. After a first attempt with the doctrine of Wider Peacekeeping of 1994, which proved unsatisfactory, the British produced in 1998 Peace Support Operations (PSO), which distinguished between conventional UN blue-beret peacekeeping and ‘peace enforcement’, the threat or use of military use of force but in an impartial manner.12 Clearly, the success of any such operations depended heavily on issues of perception and communication at all levels. From 1992 the ARRC Headquarters had begun to develop a concept of Media Operations in response to the likely impact of the media on its deployments; and it had already conducted a largely successful peace enforcement and information campaign in Bosnia as the headquarters of IFOR, the Implementation Force in Bosnia for the 1995 Dayton accords.13 The resolution of conflict in Bosnia in 1995 was very much a NATO conceptual model for Kosovo: an American-led bombing campaign leading to the agreed deployment of the ARRC Headquarters, this time with the much smaller KFOR (Kosovo Force). The option consistently less favoured by NATO throughout was modelled on the 1991 Gulf War: a protracted air campaign to cover a substantial build-up of ground forces, followed by a ground war to secure Kosovo. Just as the conduct of the 1991 Gulf War was itself conservative in comparison with pre-war military theory, so despite late 1990s announcements concerning ‘cyber war’ and ‘information warfare’, the actual events over Kosovo in 1999 gave only moderate support to the view that new communications technologies had promoted a radical 85
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts departure from the strategies of earlier wars.14 Nevertheless, this combination of new military ideas was sufficient to promote confusion in the mind of anyone still thinking in terms of the Second World War, which formed a frequent cultural reference point for all sides throughout the conflict. The final military development of the 1990s which had an impact on Kosovo, closely associated with developments in peacekeeping, was the admittedly tentative idea of ‘humanitarian intervention’ or even ‘humanitarian war’.15 Taken much further as a concept by NATO over Kosovo in 1999, this was also acknowledged from its beginnings to be closely related to media representations of events. These political and military developments were accompanied through the 1990s by developments in media and communications technology that also had a major effect on the political–military–media interaction over Kosovo. First was a trend traceable to the United States in the immediate aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War (and possibly earlier) which had spread to Europe by 1999, of a switch by major television companies from news to entertainment.16 In Britain this was symbolised in 1999 by Independent Television News briefly dropping its flagship news programme ‘News At Ten’ which had run since 1969, in order to show late evening feature films without interruption. It was part of a wider trend, including newspapers, and involving complex social, cultural and commercial factors, which is characterised as the decline of ‘old media’ or ‘old news’ (network television, broadsheet newspapers and weekly current affairs journals) against the rise of ‘new news’ (satellite and cable television, television and radio chat shows, tabloid newspapers) as the principal means by which most people obtain their understanding of the world.17 Added to this was the marked decline of the professional or specialist defence correspondent, the increasing youth and inexperience of military affairs of television or newspaper staff, and the ‘information stream’ offered on a global and continuous basis to media outlets. The final significant development was the establishment in 1992 of the World Wide Web, and the corresponding increase through the decade in Internet use for civilian and commercial purposes.18 This, together with the common use, at least in the developed world, of video cameras and mobile telephones promoted the arguments that ‘everyone is a journalist’, at least potentially, and that ‘the media are everywhere’. Whereas in the past the media had conducted a critical ‘gatekeeper’ function by literally mediating the news, multiple alternative methods by which individuals might obtain raw news data had come into existence. The issue has become one of the credibility and reliability of such ‘new news’ sources. From these developments, it was broadly predictable that the NATO military strategy over Kosovo would not be well understood or reported 86
Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict by the international and Western news media. But the fragmentation of the news media, together with the rise of ‘new news’ and of use of the Internet, would also give the ‘media war’ a degree of greater speed and interpretability, to the extent of moving the political–military–media interaction to a new level – as had been seen once before in the Gulf War. It was also highly likely that, given NATO’s preference for an air war and sophisticated understanding of Media Operations, together with certain advantages enjoyed by the Yugoslav government, this interpermeability would not overcome the ability of governments on all sides to control and regulate the news flow. To this should be added the wellestablished frames of reference held by all sides before the start of the bombing, and developed over some years, which provided a context from which it was virtually impossible to report objectively.19 This problem once more raised the issue of credibility, which was central to the political positions of all sides over Kosovo.
T H E KO S O V O C O N F L I C T A N D M E D I A I N T E RA C T I O N
The extent of material generated by the media in the course of the Kosovo conflict, including website transcripts of press conferences and briefings, and reports from within Kosovo and Serbia themselves, made it possible to record the public image of events – if not the actual events themselves – with unusual detail and precision. In addition to its own official media headed by Tanjug and by RTS, the Republic of Yugoslavia also had a number of tolerated (rather than strictly independent) media outlets that were anti-government without being pro-NATO. The most famous of these, Radio B92 Belgrade, was closed down at the start of the bombing on 24 March, having its transmitter confiscated, but resumed ‘transmission’ almost immediately through a website in Serbian and English, with technical support coming from Amsterdam. On 29 March, this website carried the transcript of an interview recorded in London with Foreign Secretary Robin Cook. The end came most dramatically on 2 April with a notice posted on B92’s website that at 9 a.m. the police had arrived to remove its director, Sasa Mirkovic, and replace him with a government appointee, after which the station remained closed. In what became known as ‘the war of the Web’, the opposing sides vied with each other throughout the conflict to place their version of events in cyberspace. In addition to the official Yugoslav sites, students at Belgrade University volunteering their services to the government found a way of tracking and recording frequent visitors to the NATO 87
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts website; and on 13 May they sent out an e-mail inviting those users to hit their own Yugoslav Anti-NATO Organisation website for a different perspective.20 Independent news sources from within Kosovo also supplied material to external websites. The most famous of these was the website run by the ‘Cybermonk’, Father Sava Janjic of the Serbian Orthodox Visoki Decani Monastery in Kosovo. Pristina’s radio and television station RTPSAT broadcast a daily news report in Albanian on the Internet, while Kosovo’s Albanian-language Radio 21 even continued to broadcast music over the Web. Montenegro welcomed foreign reporters and encouraged the re-broadcast of overseas news by privately owned radio stations, seeing this as part of its own broad political strategy to resist domination from Belgrade. When in mid-April the Serb-dominated Yugoslav Army in Montenegro tried to close down the tolerated radio stations and introduce censorship on the Serbian pattern, this was successfully blocked by the Montenegrin government. In addition to the formal websites there were also Internet chat-rooms, with contributions apparently from private Serbian citizens (although often appearing in English), which provided a nightly running commentary on NATO bombing.21 One website even provided a real-time camera view of a main street in Belgrade. Evaluating the accuracy and credibility of this material was virtually impossible, both for the Western media and for others. The degree of apparent openness on all sides marked the Kosovo conflict as different from most previous wars. This was reinforced by the NATO position that it was not at war (although this ran in contradiction to the repeated evoking of the Second World War as a motif). In Britain particularly, the government noticeably made use of ‘new media’, with appearances by ministers on radio chat shows, breakfast television, and in prepared interviews or articles for tabloid newspapers. There was no move to the kind of media ‘war footing’ that had been seen in the 1991 Gulf War: no attempt to take war films off television or restrict music on radio. Even the notoriously bellicose British tabloid press was subdued after the first day’s headlines. Unlike other recent conflicts, prisoners of war also never became a major media issue. On 1 April, RTS showed three captured American soldiers, ostensibly taken prisoner while on routine patrol, with a later announcement that they would be tried by a military court for war crimes.22 After the expected angry reaction from the United States this came to nothing, and the men were eventually released at the end of April in another flurry of publicity after interventions by President Kiprianou of Cyprus and then by Jesse Jackson. After the collapse of the Rambouillet talks on 19 March, international reporters had a choice of where to locate themselves for the forthcoming conflict. In 1990–91 for the Gulf the main contest had been to achieve 88
Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict a ‘front line’ place, and this had remained true to a large extent of the fighting in Bosnia during 1992–95. But on this occasion, many senior journalists and their editors judged that the focus of the story would be found at NATO Headquarters in Brussels. Other senior reporters went to Belgrade, where they had very comparable experiences to those in Baghdad in 1991, including harassment and threatened expulsion in the first few days, and being escorted to report on damage allegedly caused by NATO. BBC reporter Jacky Rowland, taken under escort on Sunday 23 May from Belgrade to Korisa, which NATO had bombed one day previously as a military target causing casualties to a refugee encampment, confessed the impossibility of determining the facts in the face of Yugoslav press management. In a war-reporting first, John Simpson of the BBC had established by 14 April an Internet chat-room from Belgrade, replying to questions including a number from within Yugoslavia itself. A marked difference between Kosovo and previous conflicts was that a British government under the strain of a war found an unusual degree of solidarity among the news media. On 14 April, the day of the Djakovica tractor bombing, John Simpson reported his impression from interviews in Belgrade that President Milosevic was ‘stronger than ever as a leader’, but that support for him should decline when the bombing halted. Shortly afterwards London newspaper journalists received one or more confidential Whitehall briefings attacking Simpson and the BBC for being insufficiently patriotic. In previous wars, notably Suez 1956 and the Falklands 1982, the BBC had tended to be more critical of the government than the print media, and government attacks on its patriotism had produced echoes of support from the newspapers, and also from many Members of Parliament. This time, on the contrary, major newspapers ran editorials in support of the BBC. Also, rather than receiving cross-party support, the Prime Minister faced a hostile parliamentary question on 21 April, which was shown by the BBC itself on that day’s television news.23 The two major related problems in terms of media interaction for NATO in conducting its campaign were lack of coordination between its military and media strategies, and lack of resources to cope with the demands of a modern ‘media war’. Given the experiences of the 1990s, and the corresponding levels of preparedness of the ARRC, this lack of resources came as a surprise after the bombing campaign opened. The Prime Minister’s Press Secretary Alastair Campbell, speaking in July 1999, recalled that: Neither at NATO nor in capitals did we fully factor into our thinking and planning the need for the kind of media operation 89
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts that was going to be required. NATO thought capitals could cope. Capitals just assumed NATO had a communications outfit to deal with the biggest story in the world.24 Dr Shea at NATO was under-resourced and lacked institutional authority until after the Djakovica tractor convoy bombing. On 16 April, following a telephone offer of help from Prime Minister Blair to President Bill Clinton, Alastair Campbell was invited by Secretary-General Javier Solana to visit NATO Headquarters in order to improve its media operation. According to Campbell, ‘By the time of the Chinese Embassy bombing’ of 7 May, ‘we’d all learned our lesson’.25 Early analysis of opinion poll data suggests that in the United States public support for continued NATO action held solid throughout the campaign. There was also strong evidence of public opposition to a possible ground war involving substantial American casualties, and some sense of an actual falling-off of interest as the campaign progressed.26 While opinion poll data also suggested that support for NATO actions among the British public remained solid throughout the campaign, an important section of elite public opinion, with access to the mass communications media, was strongly opposed to NATO’s actions. This opposition became prominent towards the second half of April, based on the argument that NATO’s actions were misguided or ineffectual: bombing was not working, a ground war was politically impossible, while Serb ethnic cleansing in Kosovo had succeeded. These arguments were to some extent reflected in the much more muted criticisms given by General Klaus Naumann, the retiring Chairman of the NATO Military Committee, on 4 May.27 The playwright and actor Harold Pinter, a strong opponent of NATO’s actions, turning himself into a journalist, appearing at the daily London press conference on 30 April. Pinter followed this up with an article in the Sunday Telegraph and on 4 May a half-hour television slot for himself on BBC television. The opposition campaign peaked on Saturday 22 May with a special television programme constructed as a mock trial of NATO’s strategy, in which the prosecution was led by Bob Marshall-Andrews QC, Labour MP for Medway since 1997. A majority (61 per cent) of the studio audience supported the motion that NATO had ‘blundered’ into the Kosovo crisis, so making the situation worse.28 This attempt by opponents of NATO’s action to transfer the debate from the conventional political arena to television was a significant one, if ultimately unsuccessful.
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The pattern of events which shows perhaps most clearly the interaction between politics, military strategy and the media during the Kosvo conflict is that which culminated in the controversial airstrike against the RTS Belgrade television centre in the early hours of 23 April, killing a number of civilian employees. Western reporters judged Kosovo too dangerous for them to enter at the start of the conflict, influenced both by the dangers of NATO bombing and by the 76 journalists killed in former Yugoslavia during 1991–95 (some of them deliberately targeted by Serb forces). As the conflict lengthened more reporters did get in to Kosovo, but few were able to observe the events of ethnic cleansing closely, and several were killed, injured or temporarily detained. The absence of Western reporters from Kosovo particularly at the start of the conflict meant that Belgrade controlled the news from the region, including visual images. The Yugoslav government was able to draw attention to episodes of NATO bombs and missiles hitting civilian targets in both Serbia and Kosovo, while at the same time starving NATO’s preferred media story, about ethnic cleansing, of visual images, so controlling the international media agenda to an extent that not only Prime Minister Blair found frustrating. Both NATO’s main justification for its actions, and the main line taken at all its press briefings, was that it was acting to prevent ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. According to Alastair Campbell, he and his fellows were simply unable ‘to force this pictureless story onto the news agendas’.29 The first videotape of Albanians being killed by Serb forces, filmed privately in Djakovica by local wedding photographer Shpepin Bytyci on 27 March, did not reach the West until handed to the BBC in Tirana on 17 April. The conclusion from the Prime Minister’s Office to the Ministry of Defence was that visual images, by television or other methods, were what would matter in the future: ‘No Pictures – No News!’30 In addition, Tanjug and the other organs of Yugoslav government information kept up an endless series of claims about NATO. To take a typical day, on 9 April Tanjug repeated stories from the Greek newspaper Athinaiki that an entire German brigade had deserted in Macedonia, and that to date 32 NATO aircraft had been shot down.31 While few of these stories had any credibility, in the absence of any other news Dr Shea with his limited NATO press resources was obliged to respond to them, becoming increasingly preoccupied with the preservation of NATO’s credibility. On 7 April, Yugoslavia closed its Kosovo borders for three days, forcing refugees back from their destinations in Albania and Macedonia; and then mocked NATO claims of substantial refugee 91
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts numbers as propaganda fictions, as reporting teams were faced with almost empty camps. That evening, Western reporters and camera crews were also escorted round a devastated Pristina; and back in Belgrade they were encouraged to film and photograph a human chain of ‘NATO targets’ across a main bridge. The same day saw an outpouring of antiNATO propaganda from RTS. At next day’s NATO press conference, 8 April, spokesman Air Commodore David Wilby warned that RTS would be a target for attack, unless Western programmes were given six hours of uncensored airtime daily, divided as three hours between noon and 6 p.m., and three hours between 6 p.m. and midnight. According to Air Commodore Wilby, the justification for this was that RTS had ‘filled the airwaves with hate and lies over the years and especially now. It is therefore a legitimate target in this campaign’, and that the same transmitters were being used for military purposes.32 Next evening, 9 April, NATO airstrikes hit a radio and television transmitter near Pristina, forcing Radio Belgrade to use UHF transmitters, and raids against radio and television relay stations continued over the next weeks. The idea that transmitters broadcasting hate propaganda or incentives to murder and ethnic cleansing were legitimate targets was not new to the Kosovo conflict; the issue had first been raised in the light of experience in Rwanda, Somalia and Bosnia.33 Against this were legal considerations of freedom of speech, and NATO’s claim to hold the moral high ground. The Yugoslav success in the ‘media war’ was forcing NATO into a controversial position. On 21 April Slobodan Milosevic stole the thunder of the NATO 50th Anniversary speeches in New York by giving his only interview of the war to the Western media. He talked for an hour in English to the small Houston-based television station KHOU TV, from which the major network rebroadcast segments. Milosevic’s very first answer went to the heart of the media’s role in the war and the issue of credibility. He told the American people in his uncertain English: Your government is running two wars against Yugoslavia. Against our people. One is military war and the other is media war or if you like it better, propaganda war. Propaganda war started long before military war, and its goal is to Satanise this country, our people, leadership of this country, individuals, and whatever was needed to create artificially of course, public opinion in United States which will be supportive to aggression they committed later.34 This was the context of political–military–media interaction in which, on the following night, a NATO airstrike targeted the RTS main studio 92
Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict in Belgrade, taking it off the air until 7 a.m. The studio included the satellite facilities used by Western journalists to send their reports. The incident brought sharply into focus NATO’s claims to legitimacy and legality, with Amnesty International coming out against the action, and the International Committee of the Red Cross expressing its concern. Condemnations were also received from the International Federation of Journalists in Brussels, Reporters sans Frontières in Paris, and both the Committee to Protect Journalists and the Overseas Press Club in New York. On 30 April the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, also expressed concerns about NATO’s bombing policy in an official report, which noted that ‘large numbers of civilians have incontestably been killed’ and that ‘the principle of proportionality must be adhered to’.35 On his return from the NATO 50th anniversary commemorations in the United States, Prime Minister Blair also faced questions in the House of Commons. One in particular came from Martin Bell MP, the former BBC war reporter who had covered both the Gulf War and Bosnia. Bell argued that for the first time NATO had attacked a target knowing that this must cause civilian casualties, and that in doing so ‘NATO crossed a Rubicon which, in my judgement should not have been crossed’.36 NATO continued to target relay and transmitting stations only for the rest of the air campaign, but never struck a civilian media target again. On 26 May, the European Telecommunication Satellite Organisation meeting in Paris decided to discontinue relaying RTS transmissions, on the grounds that it showed hate propaganda. Exactly a week later, on 2 June, the International Court of Justice declined to accept, on technical legal grounds of its own competence, a Yugoslav petition that NATO bombing was a war crime, while remaining seized of the case. On Milosevic’s fall from power a year later the Director of RTS Belgrade was attacked in the street by an angry mob, convinced that he had received prior warning from NATO of the airstrike and had still ordered his staff to continue working.
THE CONFLICT RESOLUTION
Having generally failed to explain the events and conduct of the war, the mass Western news media equally failed to explain the peace settlement that emerged from the first two weeks of June. Since the media were largely excluded from both the diplomatic negotiations and from the ‘military technical agreement’ which allowed KFOR peacefully into Kosovo, the Yugoslav government had little difficulty in portraying itself 93
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts and its armed forces as undefeated. The NATO military strategy regarding Kosovo owed more to ideas and experiences developed through the 1990s, and less to new revolutionary concepts, than was apparent to many early pundits. But in respect of the media, particularly the role of ‘new news’ and the Internet, there had clearly been a major change in the political–military–media relationship. Possibly Kosovo stands in relation to these new media as the Korean War (1950–53), the world’s first true ‘television war’, stood in relationship to what was then the relatively immature phenomenon of television news.37 If so, then the obvious question exists of what adjustments in thinking will be required before a possible ‘Internet Vietnam’, and what such a war would be like for all sides.
NOTES
1. A version of this chapter was also given as a paper to the United Kingdom Political Studies Association 50th Annual Conference (PSA 2000) at the London School of Economics and Political Science, 10–13 April 2000. 2. CEEFAX telephone poll results posted at http://www.news.bbc.co.uk at 17.46 GMT, 25 March 1999; ‘British Citizens Against the NATO Aggression’, posted at http://www.serbia-info.com.news 26 March 1999; interview with Yugoslav Deputy Ambassador, BBC1 ‘Breakfast News’, 7.47 GMT, 29 March 1999. 3. The joint MoD/FCO website with transcripts of the daily press conferences was posted at http://www.mod.uk.news; see also ‘Kosovo – The Conflict on the Web’ posted at http://news.bbc.co.uk at 13.59 GMT, 29 March 1999. 4. A full account including interviews with the leading participants appears in the television programme ‘War In Europe: Episode 2’ first transmitted on UK Channel 4, February 2000; see also the relevant NATO press conferences 14 to 19 April 1999, transcripts on the NATO website posted at http://www.nato.com. For the Yugoslav ‘transcript’ broadcast on RTS late 17 April, see the Tanjug press statement 18 April, posted at http://www.serbiainfo.com for that date. For his own very incomplete account of this incident, as well as several observations on the media, see Wesley K. Clark, Waging Modern War (New York: Public Affairs, 2001), especially p. 255. 5. See Stephen Badsey, ‘The Media War’ in John Pimlott and Stephen Badsey (eds) The Gulf War Assessed (London: Arms and Armour, 1992), p. 236; Philip M. Taylor, War and the Media: Power and Persuasion in the Gulf (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1992). 6. Interview with Prime Minister Tony Blair, in ‘War in Europe: Episode 2’ (see note 4). 7. Dr Shea, edited interview used on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation ‘Lateline: A War of Words’ transmitted ABC Australia, 15 July 1999; President Milosevic interview with HOUSTON-KHOU-TV, transmitted KHOU USA 21 April 1999 (see note 34). 8. John A. Warden III, The Air Campaign: Planning for Combat (New York: Pergamon Brassey’s, 1989); Shaun Clarke (ed.), Testing the Limits (Canberra:
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9. 10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
Air Power Studies Centre, 1998); Christopher Bellamy, Knights in White Armour (London: Hutchinson, 1996), pp. 116–19; Tim Ripley, Operation Deliberate Force: The UN and NATO Campaign in Bosnia 1995 (Lancaster: CDISS, 1999). Harlan Ullman (1996), ‘A New Defence Construct: “Rapid Dominance”’, Journal of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies, 141, 5 (October 1996), pp. 8–12. Michael Rose, ‘An Attack Force Without The Teeth For Victory’, The Sunday Times, 28 March 1999; Editorial ‘Stumbling Into War’, The Economist, 27 March 1999; Edward Luttwak, ‘Call This An Air War?’, Sunday Telegraph, 4 April 1999; ‘War In Europe – Episode 1’ (see note 4); Robert A. Pape, Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996). Allied Command Europe (ACE) Rapid Reaction Corps. The ARRC is a multinational ‘framework’ headquarters, with a British commander and organised on British lines. This is not to deny the reliance of all other NATO members on US resources, in this case particularly the US Army’s 4th Psychological Operations Group, which has no equivalent elsewhere in NATO. Peace Support Operations: Joint Warfare Publication 3–50 (London: Ministry of Defence, 1998); Bellamy, Knights in White Armour, pp. 149–70; John Hillen, Blue Helmets: The Strategy of UN Military Operations (New York: Brassey’s, 1998), pp. 139–82; John Mackinlay and Randolph Kent, ‘Complex Emergencies Doctrine: The British Are Still Best’, Journal of The Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies, 142, 2 (April 1997), pp. 39–44. R.C.L. Clifford and T.J. Wilton, ‘Media Operations and the ARRC’, in Stephen Badsey (ed.), The Media and International Security (London: Frank Cass 2000), pp. 11–33; Pascalle Combelles Siegel, Target Bosnia: Integrating Information Activities in Peace Operations (Washington, DC: CCRP, 1998). Roger Beaumont, War, Chaos and History (Westport: Praeger, 1994), p. 173; Stephen Badsey, ‘The Conceptual Origins of Information Warfare’, Global Transformation Research Group, 1999 Series, 4, January; James Adams, The Next World War (London: Hutchinson, 1998); Chris Hables Gray, Postmodern War: The New Politics of Conflict (London: Routledge, 1997). Adam Roberts, ‘Humanitarian War: Military Intervention and Human Rights’, International Affairs, 69, 3 (1993), pp. 429–49; Robert Murray Lyman, ‘Possibilities for “Humanitarian War” by the International Community in Bosnia-Herzegovina 1992–1995’, The Occasional Series Number 27, (Camberley: Strategic and Combat Studies Institute, 1997); Nicholas Hopkinson, ‘Humanitarian Intervention?’ Wilton Park Paper 110 (London: HMSO, 1996); Noam Chomsky, The New Military Humanism: Lessons From Kosovo (London: Pluto, 1999). Arthur Kent, Risk and Redemption (Viking: Toronto, 1996); Editorial ‘Britain’s Media Giants’ and ‘UKTV Blues’, The Economist, 12 December 1998; Editorial ‘Here Is The News’, The Economist, 4 July 1998; Peter J. Humphreys, Mass Media and Media Policy in Western Europe (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1996). ‘Old News Ain’t Beat Yet’, The Economist, 18 May 1996; Philip M. Taylor, Global Communications, International Affairs and the Media since 1945
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18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23.
24.
25. 26.
27.
28. 29. 30.
31. 32.
(London: Routledge, 1997), pp. 1–26; Susan L. Carruthers, The Media At War (London: Macmillan, 2000), pp. 201–5. Brian Winston, Media Technology and Society: A History – From the Telegraph to the Internet (London: Routledge, 1998) pp. 321–36; Philip M. Taylor, ‘Propaganda and the Web War’, The World Today, June 1999, pp. 10–12. Editorial ‘Too Many Truths’, British Journalism Review, 10, 2 (1999), pp. 3–6. The e-mail address of this venture was
[email protected]; and the website was http://www.antinato.org.yu. The present author was a recipient of one of their e-mails. For an example see Taylor, ‘Propaganda and the Web War’ (note 18). The men were identified at the time as members of Task Force Able Sentry, part of UNPREDEP, the UN Preventive Deployment Force in Macedonia. Hansard, 21 April 1999, Prime Minister’s Question Time, Question 2 (80323) Mr Edward Garnier (Harborough); Editorial ‘Too Many Truths’, British Journalism Review, 10, 2 (1999), pp. 3–6. The source of government criticism of Simpson is given firmly as Alastair Campbell by Martin Bell, An Accidental MP (London: Penguin Revised Edition, 2001), pp. 149–50. For a more general criticism of British and NATO policies and the role of the media see Anthony Weymouth, ‘The Media: Information and Disinformation’, in Anthony Weymouth and Stanley Henig (eds), The Kosovo Crisis: The Last American War in Europe? (London: Reuters, 2001), pp. 143–62. Alastair Campbell, ‘Communications Lessons for NATO, the Military and the Media’, Journal of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies, 144, 4 (August 1999), p. 332; ‘War in Europe – Episode 2’ (see note 4). Campbell, ‘Communications Lessons for NATO, the Military and the Media’, p. 333. Steven Livingstone, ‘Media Coverage of the War: An Empirical Assessment’, in Albrecht Schnabel and Ramesh Thakur (eds), Kosovo and the Challenge of Humanitarian Intervention: Selective Indignation, Collective Action, and International Citizenship (Tokyo and New York: United Nations University Press, 2000), pp. 360–84. Press conference, General Klaus Naumann, NATO Headquarters, 4 May 1999; Simon Jenkins, ‘Three Strikes and Out’, The Times, 21 April 1999; General Sir Michael Rose, ‘Crass, Crude and Confused’, The Times Higher Educational Supplement, 23 April 1999. ‘NATO On Trial’ first transmitted UK Channel 4, 22 May 1999. Campbell, ‘Communications Lessons for NATO, the Military and the Media’, p. 35. Ibid, p. 34; Oona Muirhead, ‘My Job: At the Sharp End of the Media Operation’, Journal of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies, 144, 4 (1999), pp. 37–43; Jane’s International Defense Review, 32 (September 1999), p. 3. Tanjug press releases posted at http://serbia-info.com for 9 April 1999; ‘Analysis: Propaganda War Hots Up’, BBC News posted at http://news.bbc.co.uk at 16.55 GMT, 9 April 1999. NATO Press Conference 8 April 1999 posted at http://www.nato.int. A rather carefully phrased passage in Clark, Waging Modern War, pp. 249–50 implies that Wilby was unfairly dismissed, at the insistence of NATO Secretary-General Solana, as a scapegoat for the policy of television station bombing.
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Media Interaction in the Kosovo Conflict 33. Stephen Badsey, ‘The Media and UN “Peacekeeping” Since the Gulf War’, Journal of Conflict Studies, 17, 1 (1997), pp. 7–27; Mark Thompson, Forging War: the Media in Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina (London: Article 19, 1994); J.F. Mezl, ‘When Switching Channels Isn’t Enough’, Foreign Affairs, 76, 6 (1997), pp. 15–20; Richard Connaughton, ‘The Media of Hate’, in Badsey, The Media and International Security, pp. 39–48. 34. Interview with President Slobodan Milosevic by Dr Ron Hatchett, transmitted on Houston-KHOU-TV 21.00–22.00 CDT, 21 April 1999, text on KHOU-TV website http://www.khou.com; the official Yugoslav transcript of the interview posted at http://www.serbia-info.com for 25 April 1999 is essentially the same, except that it corrected Milosevic’s fractured English, and also deleted some remarks by the interviewer comparing him to Hitler. 35. ‘Report on the Human Rights Situation Involving Kosovo Submitted By Mary Robinson High Commissioner For Human Rights’, Geneva, 30 April 1999, OHCHR/99/30/A. 36. Hansard, 26 April 1999, Statement by the Prime Minister, Question by Martin Bell (Tatton). 37. I owe this point to Professor Philip M. Taylor.
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7
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example JAMIE SHEA
MODERN CONFLICTS AND THE MEDIA
Conflict is always controversial, even if it remains ultimately necessary as a last resort to stop gross human rights violations. Modern societies are based on the premise that differences of view must be reconciled peacefully. Using force is the most difficult option for them to take, and they take it rarely. The chance of being killed in a military conflict is at a historical all-time low, compared to the risks that our great-grandfathers or great-great-grandfathers would have faced. In fact, military conflict is probably the least likely cause of premature fatality today in Western democracies, compared with cancer, heart disease, traffic accidents or the easy availability of guns in the United States (which produce over 17,000 murders annually). As a result, when Western democracies do go to war, public opinion needs clear and compelling reasons, particularly when the media focal point is a modern European city like Belgrade at the end of the twentieth century. A public which increasingly sees its armed forces as peacekeepers rather than as warriors and engaged in humanitarian or disaster relief missions more often than in combat, finds it difficult to accept a reversion to the traditional practice of warfare. Moreover, most interventions these days are what we call humanitarian interventions. They are voluntary. No vital national interest is at stake, and the main motivation for governments is the moral argument that they are upholding human rights, not narrow national self-interest, and doing ‘the right thing’. But that argument is an appeal to the emotions. Rational arguments in themselves are frequently 98
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example insufficient to mobilise public opinion behind a conflict. They have to be supported by an emotional echo in public opinion. The ‘CNN factor’ is now an established phenomenon. Emotive images of human suffering, of amputated limbs in Sierra Leone, of raped women in Bosnia, of starving children in Ethiopia or ethnically cleansed Kosovars, all create the public pressure on governments to act. We know, however, that emotions are the least stable basis for sustaining action once started. They can change from attraction to revulsion quickly, and often with little or no intermediate phase. The US mission to Somalia in 1993, or the Belgian role in the United Nations mission in Rwanda in 1994, were situations in which public support for intervention changed dramatically after 18 US Rangers were killed in a firefight in Mogadishu, and after 11 Belgian paratroopers were gunned down by Hutu rebels. Television showed the body of an American soldier being dragged through the streets – an image which American public opinion found as shocking, if not more so, than pictures of thousands of starving Somalis before the US intervention. Strategically, nothing changed because of that incident. A single casualty, however regrettable, did not imply that the mission was failing or less worthwhile. A single casualty was not in itself a strategic reason to change the operation, but because this intervention was based largely on the appeal to emotions, the idea that dictated events was not whether hungry people were being fed or warlords brought to heel, but whether Western soldiers should be required to sacrifice their lives in order to help other people. Once it became clear that interventions do not always earn the lasting gratitude of the very people that one is trying to save, popular sympathy can turn quickly to anger. In this case, the US intervention in Somalia was soon terminated. Its course had not been determined by how much the United States was succeeding but by whether or not the television pictures could sustain emotional sympathy for the Somalis among American television audiences. Today, governments are using the language of moral rectitude to justify international interventions. Doing the right thing and upholding human rights have replaced territory and treaties as the spur to action. The British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, spoke of Kosovo as ‘the first truly humanitarian conflict in modern history’. This modern emphasis on the ‘Just War’ has created a new situation. Today public opinion, and certainly the media and the multitude of non-governmental organisations (NGOs), are focusing not only on whether a conflict achieves its aims but also on how it is fought. The tactics are receiving as much attention as the final result. It is not enough to win. One must win in the right way. Whereas governments frequently believe that the only necessary argument is legitimacy, the media puts the most value on technique and 99
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts methodology. Unfortunately, the technology of war-fighting is not perfect or necessarily moral. The actual execution of a conflict will rarely meet the same high standards of the Just War that has become the conflict’s chief rationale. The Just War concept demands that there be absolute proportionality of means: not one bomb more or one day more of operations than is strictly necessary to achieve a clear, pre-announced objective. Moreover, this doctrine also demands that there should be a clear improvement as the result of fighting to justify the cost that has to be paid. It states further that there should be discrimination between civilian and military targets so that only those guilty of repression and atrocities be targeted while the innocent, even when they are intermingled with the ethnic cleansers, are spared. Moreover, conflict itself should be only a last resort after every other conceivable avenue has been tried and failed. This is a difficult standard to apply in practice. There is always somebody who will argue that one more final visit to Belgrade to negotiate with Slobodan Milosevic should be attempted or that diplomacy or economic pressures, given more time, will achieve the same result at smaller cost. In short, if international law (or, at least, the way in which certain NGOs interpret international law) runs too far ahead of human and technological possibilities, there will always be a danger of even the most reputable organisations, such as NATO, being accused of war crimes for failing to take all necessary precautions. Indeed, this is what happened after the Kosovo campaign. Amnesty International accused NATO of war crimes and the International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague felt obliged to investigate the legality of the alliance’s action (even if only to conclude that there were no grounds to proceed with its enquiry). As there have been 100 major armed conflicts since the end of the Cold War, and as 80 of those have been internal conflicts, the Western democracies are going to have to adapt to the new dynamics of situations in which the objective is to uphold the rights of peoples rather than the rights of states. They are going to have to learn to better manage conflicts where popular support at home is based on emotions and on a heightened sense of the sanctity of human life and minimum standards of human decency. Frequently, however, these moral standards cannot be durably upheld without identifying a permanent solution to the internal problems of the countries in which we intervene. Realpolitik inevitably comes face to face with Moralpolitik; absolute moral values have to be squared with geopolitical possibilities. Is a regime only slighter better than the previous one, for instance, still a worthwhile outcome? 100
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example T H E M E D I A A N D KO S O V O
The key difficulty is that there is a dichotomy between, on the one hand, somebody like Slobodan Milosevic, who was fighting in Kosovo for strategic objectives, and Western democracies, which were fighting for moral objectives. Moral objectives are powerful mobilising factors, but democracies are only willing to tolerate small costs. Unless our populations have been attacked directly and feel correspondingly threatened (due to terrorism for instance), public opinion is not willing to tolerate much loss of human life, whether of the enemy’s civilian population or of their own military forces. The objective is to come as close to zero as possible. Success is judged as much by proximity to that zero as by whether the political objective has been fully achieved. If military operations go high above the zero mark, no matter how necessary to procure ultimate success, public support can collapse very quickly. Recent conflicts in which the United States lost through hostile fire, for instance, fewer than 150 lives in the Gulf War, 20 in Grenada, 19 in Somalia, only two in Kosovo, or so far none at all in its Peace Support Operations in the Balkans, have accredited further this notion. Conversely, a dictator like Milosevic was willing to accept a high cost before giving in. He had no problem with his domestic public opinion. This left him free to focus his attention and resources on influencing NATO’s public opinion, safe in the knowledge that the same means of control prevented NATO from gaining access to his public opinion. Milosevic was helped by the irony that when democracies take action against a dictatorship or manifestly rogue regime, even the radical opposition in that country has a tendency to side with the government in the name of the union sacrée or national solidarity. The Serbian opposition leader, Vuk Draskovic, was not only in the Yugoslav government but, for a while at least, Milosevic’s main media spokesman during the Kosovo conflict. Because the dictator was fighting for a strategic objective, namely to keep control of Kosovo (and to some extent his own political survival), he was willing to absorb a great deal of damage. At the very least, it was a good bet for him to sustain some initial damage merely to test NATO’s resolve. There was always hope that NATO’s political solidarity would collapse before Yugoslavia’s infrastructure. Napoleon used to say: ‘If I have to fight, let it be against a coalition’. Dictators are able to make these brinkmanship calculations. Moreover, when the Western media showed the Yugoslav people not hiding in shelters but attending patriotic rock concerts or gathering on bridges in gestures of defiance, the assertions of NATO governments that the air campaign 101
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts would delegitimise Milosevic in the eyes of his own public opinion seemed something of a straw in the wind. There is no certainty of being able to succeed rapidly with military force, even when the objective is limited and Western coalitions have complete technological superiority. Sometimes force has to be used for a long time both to demonstrate resolve and to allow time to produce cumulatively its full impact. The objective may be a limited one: Yugoslav troops out, NATO troops in, refugees back. But what NATO discovered in Kosovo was that in order to achieve that extremely limited objective, it had to deploy an armed force normally reserved for a major international conflict. It started with 300 aircraft, of which only 50 were strike aircraft, in the hope that a warning shot would be enough. Once Milosevic became ready to absorb high costs, NATO had to deploy five times as many aircraft and ultimately fly 38,000 sorties and drop 23,600 bombs and missiles on the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. It also needed to attack a wider set of strategic objectives, including targets in urban areas such as Belgrade, in a campaign that lasted 78 days. Moreover, whatever their reluctance at the start of the campaign, the NATO allies also had to begin to prepare seriously a ground invasion option involving as many as 200,000 troops. In other words, military force cannot be nicely calibrated to strategic or humanitarian objectives. There is no discount on destruction because the objective is a morally superior one. You need a sledgehammer to crack a nut. As a result, with armadas of high-tech aircraft in the sky striking often low-value military targets on the ground, the public and the media quickly perceive a disproportion between the means and the end. Military force does not work in small packages. It was only when NATO realised that it needed to use enough force to win that it succeeded in the final analysis. Vis-à-vis the media, this became a major problem because, although greater force made the air campaign much more effective and hastened the achievement of NATO’s objectives, it also appeared to be inflicting lasting damage on the Yugoslav infrastructure and economy and excessively victimising the civilian population. It also increased the risk of mistakes or ‘collateral damage’. In using too little force at the beginning, on the other hand, NATO looked ineffective and the Yugoslav army more tenacious and resilient than in reality. Many journalists declared from the outset that air power would never work. It was insufficient and too limited, particularly in ferreting out troops hiding in civilian buildings. Only a massive ground invasion would secure the objective. Unfortunately, from a public perspective, there is no happy medium here which, once identified, enables governments to demonstrate convincingly that they are using enough force to produce concrete results 102
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example while avoiding lasting damage to a country like Yugoslavia. Destroying the power structure of the regime frequently means destroying the country itself, such as communications networks, the electricity grid and key industrial sites. Force is either too much or too little. Another feature of modern conflicts is that virtually all campaigns today are fought by coalitions. Even the most powerful nations, such as the United States, seek the legitimacy and the burden-sharing that coalitions provide. But we have not yet witnessed a surge of patriotism for international organisations. When the United Kingdom waged war over the Falklands in 1982, many British journalists probably thought it strange to go so far for a territory that many people in Britain had not even realised was a dependency of the United Kingdom, let alone knew anything about. But where the symbols of national identity were involved, there was a patriotic feeling that few wanted to criticise. Some, of course, were more exuberant than others, particularly in the popular press. Nevertheless, there was a mood of widespread patriotic discipline that came from the fact that the nation was standing alone in a conflict situation. In modern-day coalition operations such as Sierra Leone, BosniaHerzegovina, Kosovo or East Timor, there are often between 10 and 40 countries involved. In such circumstances, it is easy for media to blame the international organisation involved for everything that is going wrong, without being accused of patriotic disloyalty. The key challenge with coalitions is that there is not one national public opinion to look after, but, as in the case of NATO and Kosovo, 19 public opinions. One country’s domestic problem rapidly becomes a problem for the entire coalition. If public opinion in Greece, for instance, had forced the government to drop out, NATO would have lacked access to air space and the use of the port of Thessaloniki. It could not have deployed troops in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia ready to enter Kosovo, nor could it have made the threat of a ground invasion credible to Milosevic, one of the factors that, in the final analysis, made him give in. Because of the NATO rule of consensus, one ally’s defection would have stopped the operation. Consequently, public opinion in Greece was potentially more important to the alliance than public opinion in Washington. That is why Tony Blair, the politician who perhaps more than any other staked his personal and political credibility on winning the campaign, spent nearly as much time out of the United Kingdom as inside it, preaching the message in Brussels, Berlin, Paris or Chicago. In a coalition, somebody else’s public opinion problem becomes your public opinion problem immediately. 103
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts THE MEDIA AND THE SPOKESMAN
This is an age in which the media are more sceptical about government, particularly in conflicts. Nobody could be proud of the way in which journalists were briefed in Vietnam. Veteran reporters will remember the ‘5 o’clock follies’ in Saigon, the absurd figures for the body count or the notion that those figures proved that the United States was winning the Vietnam War. French journalists feel that they were grossly misled in Algeria in the 1960s. After the Gulf War or the Falklands campaign, journalists believed they had ample reason to suspect that governments were not always telling them all of the facts where they were not wilfully misleading them. This view inherited from the past is not always fair. Governments now do a better job in giving honest, accurate information about conflicts, given the need to protect lives, operational secrecy and the all-pervasive presence of Clausewitz’s ‘fog of war’. Even for the best commanders with the best technology, it is sometimes difficult to know everything that is going on. Given the inevitable margin of uncertainty in military briefings, many journalists conclude that what is said during a conflict cannot be trusted. By contrast, what they learn after the conflict has ended must be the real story. NATO had an experience of this with Newsweek, which in spring 2000 published a story accusing the alliance of lying in Kosovo because it did not admit that only 14 Yugoslav tanks had been destroyed by allied air forces. For Newsweek, this proved that the military campaign was a failure. However, whether NATO hit 14 Yugoslav tanks or 140 tanks was far from being the key criterion in judging success or failure. The military campaign fulfilled unconditionally the three objectives that the alliance set for it. Success was not about achieving specific levels of damage but making an adversary accept certain conditions. Moreover, how did Newsweek know that there were only 14 tanks destroyed? Where was the proof? It reported this story on the basis of ‘a secret Pentagon report’ which stated that NATO only found 14 Yugoslav tanks after KFOR (Kosovo Force) entered Kosovo. But does the fact that NATO may have found only 14 tanks (in fact it found 26) constitute absolute proof that only 14 tanks were destroyed? The Yugoslav Army had tank transporters. At night, or on cloudy days, they could easily take those tanks out and back to Serbia for repair. The Yugoslav Army repaired its equipment, like every other army. NATO never claimed, incidentally, that it had destroyed 93 tanks, but rather that it hit 93 tanks, some of which are probably operational today. Regrettably, Newsweek disregarded the fact that the alliance conducted a two-month investigation in which a specialist team looked at all of the 104
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example aircraft camera footage. After proving secondary explosions, where clearly a fuel tank had been hit because it produced a major explosion (in contrast to what happens if only a decoy is struck) NATO concluded, based on four or five different but concordant sources of information, that it had hit 93 tanks. In doing so, it revised downwards its initial estimate of 120 tanks. NATO officials admitted after the investigation that NATO’s aircraft had not hit as many Yugoslav tanks as had been hoped. When a magazine publishes such a story, it immediately goes into many other newspapers and makes headline news because it is something that comes out after the conflict. Therefore, it is deemed to be more accurate than what came out during the conflict. Writing a column based on the Newsweek story, but without bothering to check it for himself, the American journalist William Pfaff claimed in the International Herald Tribune that because NATO got that figure wrong, then it must have got everything else wrong about the Kosovo conflict as well. There is, however, a difference between deliberate deception and uncertainty. If a spokesman is not certain about something, this does not mean that he is lying. The fact is that we will probably never know how many people were killed in Kosovo. We will probably never know how many tanks were destroyed by NATO. This margin of uncertainty about facts is not a reason to delegitimise a just cause or to believe that everything said during the crisis has somehow to be corrected afterwards, particularly when the information which purports to correct the original information does not necessarily produce more truth or clarity. Sometimes it produces more confusion. Some journalists also find it easier to repeat what their colleagues are reporting than to go in search of their own stories and undertake original research. Today governments no longer have a monopoly over information. That is probably a good thing. The ‘man from the ministry’ is no longer the person who keeps the facts all to himself. We have witnessed of late a proliferation of other information-gathering sources. There has been an enormous growth in print and audio-visual media, particularly following the liberation of the airwaves, and a major reduction in the costs of research, printing and distribution. There are hundreds more journalists in the world today than 20 years ago. It is much cheaper and legally easier to set up a media organisation. The advent of the video recorder makes each citizen into a potential journalist able to record aircraft crashes or terrorist attacks in real time and pass them on to the nearest television network. Compared to the world of 20 years ago, 90 per cent of human activity can be recorded, and known and seen as it is happening. The Internet not only distributes information but creates it, and allows everyone to contribute to the news or the collective 105
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts production of reality. Modern news-gathering technology, satellite phones and real-time transmissions all add to this effect. This prevalence of the image enables all aspects of modern conflicts to be shown, from strategic bombing to the injury of a small child. But does a series of images, no matter how dramatic or moving, really add to our understanding of what is going on? Can we determine who is really winning or losing? The more that images become the medium of war reporting, the more we need the written press to go beyond the emotions and provide the essential background and analysis to make sense of it all. Our reliance upon journalists to process this proliferation of images and commentary and to identify the underlying trends and causalities has never been greater, nor the responsibility of journalists to get it right more demanding. As conflicts increase the media’s appetite for information 24 hours a day, the definition of what constitutes legitimate reportable information inevitably becomes more permissive. During the Yugoslav air campaign, Belgrade’s news agency Tanjug (or Taniuk) would regularly report that it had shot down six NATO aircraft, and most networks would run with that immediately. It was sufficient that Tanjug should report it. And then the onus was on myself as the NATO Spokesman to spend hours waiting for the pilots to return, making sure that everybody had been interviewed about the operations, before being able to deny these reports. No matter how unlikely this disinformation would appear, it would be reported until such time as NATO could authoritatively rebut it. The press kept us tied up for hours with the simple checking and rebuttal of false information. This is going to become an increasingly difficult problem of crisis management in future. The longer you take to deny a story, the smaller space accorded to the denial, and the less opportunity a spokesman has to communicate his side of the story rather than react to the opponent’s story. The Yugoslavs, knowing that, used their Internet site to proliferate stories based on rumours, exaggerations and bad information and all kinds of allegations which Western journalists would then pick up and play with in their reporting. One of the features of modern conflicts is asymmetrical warfare, which means that adversaries cannot beat technologically advanced nations or alliances like NATO cruise missile for cruise missile, or tank for tank. During the Kosovo conflict, NATO had a massive superiority in the military field. Such a margin of technological superiority is essential because it not only secures objectives but does so at an acceptable cost with minimal ‘collateral damage’ against the adversary’s civilian population. It is, however, a potential public relations deficit, because it enables the adversary to portray himself as the victim. Milosevic wanted to be seen 106
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example as a defenceless David in the face of brute aggression by the Goliath of NATO. He wanted the ‘cure’ of NATO’s operations to become the story which was criticised, and not his own ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, which was the original incentive for NATO action. It reminded me of those stories where the techniques that the police use to catch criminals become more the focus of public attention than the original crimes of the criminals themselves. He who controls the ground controls the pictures, and this was the major problem that NATO faced. It had nobody on the ground to assess the results of air strikes and establish the facts. A spokesman sometimes relies on journalists. He needs them not only to help him get his story across, but also to tell him what is happening. In Bosnia, there were hundreds of journalists on the ground throughout the NATO air campaign in September 1995 which led to the Dayton peace negotiations. I was in touch with many of them every day to exchange information. They were almost like a police force that could go to the scene of a car crash within minutes and objectively establish the facts (or at least ask the probing questions where the facts were not clear). For me, it was extremely valuable because they were invariably faster than NATO soldiers or NATO satellites, certainly faster than our Intelligence community, demonstrating again that ‘you can’t beat CNN’. We were at a disadvantage in Kosovo because Milosevic made sure that there were no journalists there except for a few that could be relied upon to portray the situation as near normal. There were a few true independents, but they were in hiding and could not operate freely. There was consequently no media posse on the ground to go to Djakovica after the tractor convoy bombing on 14 April and tell me immediately what had happened. There were only Milosevic’s soldiers and Milosevic, by controlling the ground, controlled the pictures. He gathered together groups of Western journalists in Belgrade and bussed them south to Kosovo. The windows were blacked out. They arrived in Kosovo and were allowed to film the tractor incident but nothing else. How I have wished that Western television crews would agree to participate in such bus tours only if they can film whatever they want to, and not just those scenes as directed by the Serbian police. But in a media environment where pictures, the lifeblood of television reporting, are scarce, any offering is eagerly embraced. Minutes later the harrowing images were on television all over the world. NATO lost 20 percentage points of public support in Germany alone, which it took weeks of hard effort to make up. There was a sense that NATO was killing the very people it was trying to save. Ironically, the only time Milosevic seemed to care about the human rights of the Kosovar Albanians was when he could exploit their deaths for propaganda 107
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts purposes to convey an impression that NATO alone was responsible for their suffering. The challenge in dealing with an incident like the Djakovica tractor convoy incident was that it was not a manipulation. The television pictures clearly showed that the destruction had been caused by aerial bombs, and therefore NATO could not deny it. But there was an obvious danger for NATO’s public support if the only pictures that Western television stations were able to obtain – and broadcast – were those of NATO’s errors and not those of Milosevic’s crimes. Not only did this present a confusing moral picture, but it conveyed the impression of a moral equivalence between the alliance and the Serbs – as if the crimes of the latter were somehow less serious because they had come in response to NATO ‘aggression’. But if television shows the truth, it is not the entire truth. It is simply that maximum exposure of one incident on television all day long creates the impression that this is the whole truth or at least the ‘essential truth’ about a conflict. In the same way, photographs of young children fleeing napalm or of a Vietcong prisoner being shot in the head in the middle of a street in Saigon sum up our experience of Vietnam a generation later. Before NATO acted there was no shortage of television pictures of the situation in Kosovo. As soon as NATO intervened, the air campaign itself became the main story, and any military campaign removed from the context in which it is taking place will seem heavy-handed and unduly destructive. Milosevic was deliberately expelling many people, both before and after the Djakovica convoy incident. We had no pictures to demonstrate that reality, and where there are no pictures, there is no news. NATO needed to counter with its side of the story – burning houses, deportations, mass graves – and then ask people to judge who was right and who was wrong based on the presentation of a fuller picture. NATO was not able to do so, because it had nobody on the ground to provide those images and therefore it could not easily create news out of what it was saying. A battle between pictures and words is like a battle between science and religion. As NATO Spokesman, I would like to believe that my words were more descriptive of the overall situation than Milosevic’s pictures, but who did the public find it easier to believe? Whereas pictures have the scientific ring of proof about them, words could be dismissed as speculation, rumour, the exaggerations of a hard-pressed spokesman. In future, NATO will have to devote far more of its military resources, such as satellites and drones, not only to look for military equipment and to produce a good battle damage assessment but also to gather broader evidence on what is going on down on the ground. This may impose some difficult choices because sometimes 108
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example it is unwise to let an adversary know what we know. If officials publicly released pictures of a mass grave, Milosevic could send a bulldozer to the site, like the one the Bosnian Serbs used in Srebrenica to try to destroy the evidence so that the International Criminal Tribunal in The Hague would have no proof, and therefore more difficulty in issuing indictments for war crimes. Sometimes pictures have to be kept secret because they have a greater usefulness. Other times it is simply a problem of declassification. But there is no doubt: the only way to fight pictures is with other pictures. A dictator like Milosevic was not fighting NATO on its own terms, except with some erratic anti-aircraft fire. We were fighting him with weapons and he was fighting us back with pictures. There was the air war and there was the war of the airwaves. We had no access to his public opinion, no level playing field in trying to alienate his support in the way that he was trying to alienate ours. Because of the Western media’s preoccupation with fairness, Milosevic had free access to our media. Virtually every time I gave an interview, the BBC or Sky News would insist that I be together with a Yugoslav spokesman or be immediately followed by one. Nothing else would be fair or balanced in their view. Media often believe that it is only in the confrontation between two arguments that the truth is going to emerge, even if that sometimes produces a caricature of respective opinions. Does something called ‘truth’ really emerge in the middle? Is the public really enlightened about an issue by being exposed to contradictory arguments? Is balance – as a rigid notion – always the best guarantor of objectivity? Nevertheless, this approach is a reality that we have to deal with, because the media will not change its modus operandi. Favouring one side, even if it is a better source of reliable information and accuracy, will inevitably bring accusations of censorship or self-censorship. Allied governments need also to be exposed to the views of their opponents even if only to know which arguments they need to refute. And I must recognise that on occasion I have used the argument of balance to obtain media access when I believed opponents were receiving unfair air time.
FUTURE CONFLICTS AND THE MEDIA
Democracies at war will have to work harder in future conflicts to get access to an adversary’s media. In other words, if Milosevic was playing asymmetrical warfare against NATO, why could not NATO play asymmetrical warfare back against him, by also trying to influence his population against what he is doing? I appeared on Serb Television many times during the Kosovo air campaign, but as a hate figure and a basis 109
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts for caricature. NATO tried using the Internet to reach Yugoslav public opinion, because the Internet is still a relatively uncontrolled medium. Yugoslav citizens, particularly in Belgrade, have many Internet connections, but Milosevic recognised this and organised a systematic ‘ping bombardment’ of our server that went on for ten days, and totally incapacitated it with a virus. It took us a long time and considerable investment before we could fix this problem in one of the first examples of cyber warfare. In future, allies will have to think more imaginatively about setting up radio stations, and how they can use technology to help recognisably objective Western media, such as the BBC, ZDF or Deutsche Welle, to have access to an opponent’s public opinion. Neighbouring countries could be enlisted to set up transmitters (as Hungary did in 2000 to help the independent Serbian media shut down by Milosevic). The Serb-language output on other international radio stations was also increased. In order to limit the pernicious influence of state-controlled media preaching ethnic violence, international satellite authorities, such as Eutelsat, can be asked to disconnect channels that refuse to follow standards of fair journalism. Psychological Operations (‘Psyops’ or ‘Psyop’ to Americans), such as trying to beam in snowy, erratic television pictures or drop leaflets, have proved of limited use because of their obvious propaganda overtones. There is also the ultimate recourse of attacking an adversary’s media facilities as NATO did by bombing the television studios of RTS in Belgrade during Operation Allied Force. Whatever the legal justification for such ultimate acts, they are bound to be intensely controversial with journalists who will never accept that their profession can be a legitimate target in war. Just as the best propaganda is the truth, so the best way to defeat an adversary’s propaganda is to do a better job oneself of reporting the facts accurately and honestly. A further challenge is revisionism. Controversy does not stop in the media the day that the air campaign actually ends. If anything, it increases afterwards. Because so little is actually known during the conflict itself and because no government can give a totally complete view of reality at the time, there are journalists who will never accept that they have lost the battle for the ultimate historical verdict. Each new fact that comes out will be seized on to claim ‘I was right after all’ and reopen the entire debate about all the previously settled facts. The depleted uranium scare, about the use of such material by NATO, no matter how little justified by the scientific and medical evidence, was one such example. After every conflict a great deal of information comes out, and for obvious reasons: access to the territory, investigations, research, interviews with people that one was unaware of at the time, and so on. This can be positive to the extent that we better understand that what 110
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example we have seen on television is not the full story. Indeed, those who watched television during the NATO air campaign saw largely the history of a failure. The infamous ‘collateral damage’, and the eviction of thousands of refugees, created in many a mind the impression that NATO bore the main responsibility for turning a humanitarian problem into a humanitarian catastrophe of biblical proportions. The length of the NATO air campaign itself – 78 days – became a media issue as crises make minutes seem like hours and days like months. Innumerable talkshows with ‘talking heads’, for instance retired generals and admirals, recommended an entirely different course of action, basing their credibility on their past responsibilities and expertise. The only person I know who had the courage to say ‘I was wrong’ was Sir John Keegan, a British military writer for the Daily Telegraph, who publicly acknowledged that he had erred in claiming that air power alone could not win a conflict. Most people watching television would have had the impression that the air campaign was going wrong and NATO was failing. The roundthe-clock coverage and hours of reporting failed to convey the most elementary fact: that NATO was in reality succeeding, that images of failure hid a more profound reality of alliance solidarity and resolve. Television failed to predict the final outcome – the public was thus surprised and for a long time afterwards did not link diplomatic success to the actual military campaign. Television has a lot of space to fill, sometimes without much actually happening. Most of us have watched BBC television on a rainy day in the summer when it is covering a cricket match, for instance at Lords or the Oval, but there is no play. We are then obliged to watch veteran commentators exchanging banter or recalling past sporting feats to kill time, hoping of course that at any minute the rain will stop, the sun will come out and the players will come back to the crease. If there is no news, commentary and speculation replace action. At the beginning of the Kosovo conflict I suddenly saw television bureau chiefs from Bangkok, Sydney, Tokyo and New York arrive at NATO Headquarters. In overconcentrating on Brussels and draining their resources elsewhere, many television channels decided that for 78 days no other story in the world would merit attention. There would only be one story and that story would be covered 24 hours a day. The Kosovo air campaign was important, but in my view, it did not merit 24-hour coverage. It was as if the reality of the conflict had to be made to fit the reality of a 24 hours a day, seven days a week news cycle rather than the other way round. There were consequently two conflicts: the virtual war that NATO often seemed to be losing on television, and the real war that NATO in fact won. What television showed was Milosevic refusing to give in and 111
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts pushing refugees over the frontiers, and NATO failing to defeat him and hitting innocent civilians with ‘collateral damage’. How could the solution be worse than the problem? NATO intervenes to stop ethnic cleansing and what do we get? More ethnic cleansing! It was difficult for people to accept that conflicts can make the situation worse initially. Democracies use violence to stop violence and the temporary result is more violence. The initial impression is frequently confusion as television focuses on the all too clear human consequences of force while giving little sense of the impact that force is having on the immediate military objective. Covert operations which require special secrecy and media exclusion illustrate this phenomenon more than most. NATO prevailed because of all of the things that television did not show: the alliance’s determination, Milosevic’s declining will, secret negotiations with Moscow and the secret option on ground troops. None of that appeared on television, and that is not the fault of television which cannot show things it cannot film. Nonetheless, the tip of the iceberg which is filmable is not the total reality. It is what is below the surface that determines the iceberg, its shape, its direction, its ultimate fate. A historian today would probably say that most of what television showed was secondary. It was certainly dramatic according to the old adage, ‘if it bleeds, it leads’. The Djakovica tractor convoy incident was undoubtedly a setback and a tragedy for NATO. But it failed to stop Milosevic, or NATO, or the Albanians, or affect the outcome of the war. It was not a shaping factor, and would only have been one if NATO governments had allowed themselves to be swayed by it to call a halt to the air campaign. The bombing of the Chinese Embassy was, again, highly visual. It was news because it was so unexpected. I complained to one television producer that his channel had been showing the Chinese Embassy bombing for five days, every hour on the hour, despite the fact that the Belgrade fire service had extinguished the real flames 24 hours earlier. During this period Milosevic had expelled 200,000 refugees. His reply was, ‘We did refugees last week’. Refugees were an ongoing process, and as such no longer news. More often, what is news is not always what is important. The feel for the important changes with the perspective of time. Looking back, we see the same things but in a different order of value. The key challenge is not to write the history books until we know the whole story, and this takes time as well as proper (not pseudo) research. For example, revisionists have said that because ‘only’ about 2,500 bodies have been retrieved from mass graves in Kosovo, the figure of 10,000 that many Western leaders gave must be wrong. NATO must therefore have exaggerated the deaths to justify its intervention. But as long as the digging continues and more bodies are found, most recently 112
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example since Milosevic’s departure in numerous sites in Serbia, the figure of about 2,500 is changing all the time, even if 10,000 confirmed deaths may never be reached. There are also over 5,000 persons still missing from Kosovo who are not believed to be in prison in Serbia. Moreover, does an intervention require a proven death toll in excess of 10,000 to be justified? Is not a gross violation of human rights justification enough? Is not the whole point of a humanitarian intervention to prevent deaths rather than enact a belated retribution on warlords once those deaths have occurred? The media sometimes focus disproportionately on the costs of action rather than the benefits, and action always has costs. The same commentators, who usually push for military action when it is a conveniently abstract notion, rarely ask what would be the situation if NATO failed to act; or whether an imperfect air campaign is not better than no air campaign at all. How many refugees would there be in Albania and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia today, how many thousands of people would have died in Kosovo, had NATO not acted? How much would the region have been durably destabilised? Many NGOs called for a temporary halt to the bombing campaign to allow food supplies to be dropped to internally displaced people inside Kosovo. Those appeals received a great deal of media attention and public support. The humanitarian objective seemed to be put in jeopardy by the military objective. But this is a false dichotomy. Suspending the air campaign would only have allowed the Yugoslav forces to regroup, thereby delaying the moment of ultimate military success. This was also the moment when the humanitarian crisis would not be just temporarily relieved but definitively ended. If this is the media environment constraining Western military actions, how is NATO to respond? One of the ironies is that the alliance spent 50 years rehearsing to deter wars, but had almost no experience in fighting them. Therefore, even though NATO is a military organisation, Kosovo was a novel experience in conflict management, showing how the real thing is always different from the manual. One of the key lessons is that spokesmen and media operations have to be better at finding out information. If they do not know about a mass grave, for instance, the media can accept a degree of uncertainty because no one is suggesting that NATO is involved. But the media, rightly, expect NATO to explain its own actions. The problem that we had with the Djakovica tractor convoy incident is that it took us five days to establish clearly what had taken place. And we made the worst mistake of giving information before we knew the actual facts. It is always tempting with the media putting you under pressure to say almost anything, just to give the journalists something to write about and try to take the pressure off 113
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts yourself. It is also easy to believe that because your organisation is acting for the best of motives, you cannot be responsible for something so bad as hitting civilian tractors. But contradictory briefings, however well intentioned, suggest there is something being hidden or, worse still, a deliberate cover-up. Given that in modern coalitions there are many spokesmen up and down the chain of command, it is essential to impose discipline on all of them. This applies not only to consistency of information but also to tone, for instance optimism versus pessimism. Silence is impossible. But it is important to compose a line with no speculation incorporating what you know. And you can say, ‘when we know more, we will tell you’. But not having the information immediately does not remove the obligation to provide it as it becomes available. Having made the promise to tell the truth, the truth must be told. Transparency has to apply 100 per cent. If you are not willing to confess your errors, you will never be believed when you claim successes later on. Journalists will also respect the need for secrecy on certain sensitive military operations if they are convinced that you are being honest with them about everything else. I promised the journalists during the Djakovica tractor incident that we would present the facts. The suppression of information is precisely the way to keep the story going. The worst thing you can do is either break your promise to supply information, or let the facts come out little by little and in a way that adds to the confusion. Either you say nothing or you say everything. There is no intermediate ground. We managed, fortunately, to get this message across within the alliance. As a result, an air force squadron at Aviano Air Base in Italy spent the weekend looking at video tapes of the Djakovica tractor convoy incident to explain what had happened. At the time, this work was more important to NATO’s success than flying missions. An attitude of ‘win first and investigate and explain afterwards’ is unsustainable. I regret that it took a major public relations disaster for us to learn that lesson, but at least we learned that lesson before it was too late. Once we provided a full explanation of the Djakovica convoy incident, I was asked comparatively few questions about it. On one of the last days of the air campaign, a NATO bomb landed very close to an apartment block in a town on the border with Montenegro. By that time, our information system was working very well. I had somebody at every military headquarters in the chain of command to collect the information fast and to move it up to NATO Headquarters in real time. As a result, I was able to begin my morning briefings by volunteering all the relevant information about this incident, including the aircraft involved and the size of the bombs, before the journalists were even aware that it had happened. In this way, we 114
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example prevented the media handling of the incident becoming the story rather than the incident itself. Obtaining information is all the more difficult when you are no longer a direct observer of or participant in events. The essential action was at NATO Headquarters until 24 March when Operation Allied Force began. At that time the emphasis was on diplomacy. I could come out of a NATO meeting and tell assembled journalists what happened as I was a direct observer. On 24 March the action moved from Brussels to Kosovo. I was neither in the planes, nor on the ground. Decisions were being taken as much in capitals as at NATO Headquarters. The spokesman became to some extent a journalist dependent on his sources to supply him with the essential daily facts. Truth is a jigsaw puzzle which is put together piece by piece until a reliable picture emerges. One of the things that spokesmen in conflicts certainly have to do is improve their ability to know what is going on and insist that their political bosses and the military commanders actually tell them. But it will often be a matter of judgement to determine what is true from what is false. A spokesman sometimes has to rely on his gut feeling. One example: I was under mounting pressure from the media to show that we were being effective against Yugoslav tanks. One day, I saw some intelligence reports that we had attacked a Yugoslav Army brigade exposed on Mount Plastrik and destroyed 30 out of 40 tanks. Initially, it was heartening news. Finally, I thought that I would be able to say to the journalists that we were being effective. It is important to remember that in conflicts, effectiveness impresses the media far more than moralising rhetoric. I phoned a number of people and looked through all of the intelligence, then I wrote a detailed script. At five minutes to three, I tore it up. I had plenty of information, but I did not believe it or have the feeling that it was right or added up in view of NATO’s previous difficulty in hitting significant numbers of Yugoslav tanks. I am glad I did not give that story, because after the war KFOR entered Kosovo, went to Mount Plastrik, and did not find any damaged tanks. So one has to exercise one’s best judgement as to what is true or not, and err on the side of caution. If unconfirmed information is nonetheless given, it should always be sourced (for example, ‘refugees have reported that …’). As far as pictures are concerned, NATO should be wary of excessive showing of videos of gun-camera footage again during its news conferences. This is because what, sometimes, is your biggest success story can also be your Achilles’ heel. During the Kosovo conflict, like the Gulf War, video pictures of bombs travelling down laser beams and hitting the target, with incredible accuracy, gave the impression initially of a military well in control. But at the same time, these videos created the 115
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts impression that the conflict was not real, but rather a computer game or virtual war. Such video clips, however, only show a fragment of a reality that continues. For instance, there could be a person behind that building, on a bicycle, who is going to be killed, and therefore it will be collateral damage. But the video is interrupted, because the camera is blown up on impact, with the result that the public does not see what happens next. This creates in the public mind the impression of perfectionism by NATO. Then suddenly, people are shown the Djakovica tractor convoy incident: real children, real blood, real disaster, and discover with shock that it is still old-fashioned real war about which they have been deceived. So, governments must not try to create an image that they cannot substantiate with reality. It is better to declare your faults at the beginning and therefore not disappoint anybody, than to try to overplay your success, because then the mood of disillusionment will be all the greater when mistakes occur, as they invariably do (and always will).
CONCLUSION
Education is a key issue. Wars do not come out of nowhere. But public opinion is only aware of the nation’s involvement in a crisis the day bombing begins. In other words, public opinion perceives a crisis only in its most extreme manifestation of war-fighting, whereas the crisis may have been going on for years. In the case of Kosovo, there was one year of diplomacy with negotiations in Rambouillet and Paris. However, the public saw little of the good things that democracies did to try and stop the war, but massive amounts of the 78 days of controversial things democracies then had to do to finally achieve their diplomatic objective through the use of force. This absence of context fosters the belief that, because democracies occasionally use extreme means, they must be the moral equivalent of their adversary. Democracies, however, do not become like their adversaries because they use extreme methods like force. They remain democracies and different in every way. Therefore, it is important to educate publics about all these complicated realities and explain repeatedly what governments are doing and why they are doing it. Television’s obsession with the immediate does not have time for context or background. It focuses on ‘what’ but rarely on ‘how’ or ‘why’. If you show Djakovica ‘raw’, it is of course terrible, but if you explain why NATO pilots were flying over Yugoslavia in the first place at 3 o’clock in the afternoon, what had gone before, what would happen if you were not acting, what is going to come afterwards, then 116
Modern Conflicts, the Media and Public Opinion: The Kosovo Example it is somewhat different. Whereas success for NATO lay in creating the broadest possible grasp of context, linking the present to the past history of the conflict and prospects for a future settlement, Milosevic’s tactics were exactly the opposite. He tried to magnify and overblow secondary incidents and give the impression that they were the only important reality, namely that NATO was killing innocent civilians, and therefore worse than him. Consequently, it is essential to educate and not only inform, or at least incorporate both aspects into briefings. It would be ideal to begin the education before the air campaign, but that is not realistic, because force is not inevitable until the moment it is used. During my briefings I tried hard to do this, and asked my assistants to look into Milosevic’s record. I wanted to know how much money he was spending on his special police, and how much ethnic cleansing was going on in Kosovo before NATO started bombing. The public needed to know about the circumstances in which Milosevic took away the autonomy of the Albanians ten years ago. It is essential to factor these issues in, because it is only if people understand the context that they will be prepared to give you the benefit of the doubt. Ultimately, media campaigns do not win conflicts. Diplomats, politicians and soldiers do that. But a bad media campaign can lose a conflict. Therefore, there is nothing to be ashamed about at being organised. Public relations (PR) is often a dirty word when applied to conflicts. But the fact is that conflicts represent an extreme activity and anything which is extreme creates extra-dimensional public opposition. All kinds of people will oppose you in your own society, not only your adversary. Indeed, it is very difficult to know in advance of a conflict who your supporters and opponents are going to be. Conflicts produce strange alliances of people and many surprises. NATO saw in Kosovo how many anti-nuclear protesters of the 1960s had become fervent humanitarian interventionists by 1999, while many Cold Warriors had turned into the apologists of national sovereignty at any price. There is nothing wrong with good PR techniques even to justify a war, provided the product is truthful and it does not lie or mislead. But if you do not organise a media campaign properly, even though you may have the finest moral cause in the world, you are never going to be able to deal with public unease and outright opposition effectively nor ultimately prove you were right. Staying engaged even for years after the conflict is essential, as critics will claim NATO’s air campaign was not justified in Kosovo until NATO forces are able to leave the province as a democratic, multi-ethnic, prosperous society. The media are very good at constantly moving the goalposts for judging success – from the return of refugees one minute to the promotion of inter-ethnic reconciliation the next. It is much easier 117
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts to achieve physical goals, like the return of refugees, than moral or spiritual ones, like ethnic harmony. In conclusion, military victory is in itself not enough to carry conviction. Without a well-organised media campaign, it is all too easy to lose the peace; and with it the definitive verdict of history.
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PART 4 Contested International Responses
8
NATO’s Military Action over Kosovo: The Conceptual Landscape After the Battle PAUL LATAWSKI
INTRODUCTION
NATO’s employment of military power against the regime of Slobodan Milosevic over the issue of Kosovo has been controversial. The alliance’s armed conflict has been variously described as ‘war’, ‘humanitarian war’, ‘virtual war’, ‘intervention’ and ‘humanitarian intervention’ by the many commentators and critics on the event. The proliferation of descriptors of the military action are related to the many doubts that have been raised over its legality and legitimacy, its ethical basis and its impact on the doctrine of non-intervention in the domestic affairs of nation states. This chapter examines NATO’s military action in the context of these issues by focusing on two key questions: what kind of armed conflict did NATO engage in when it employed military power over Kosovo? and how can such a resort to force be justified?
N A T O ’ S J U S T I F I C A T I O N F O R M I L I TA RY A C T I O N
At the onset of military operations on 23 March 1999, NATO’s SecretaryGeneral Javier Solana outlined the reasons behind the alliance’s decision to begin airstrikes against Yugoslavia. Solana indicated that NATO action resulted from the fact that ‘all efforts to achieve a negotiated, political solution to the Kosovo crisis having failed, no alternative is open but to take military action’. He further emphasised that ‘NATO is not waging war against Yugoslavia’, but instead military action had been initiated to 121
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts ‘support the political aims of the international community’. At the core of his statement, however, Solana stressed that NATO’s action was to ‘avert a humanitarian catastrophe … Our objective is to prevent more human suffering and more repression and violence against the civilian population of Kosovo’. Solana repeated this point on three occasions in his press statement. He indicated the alliance’s preference to see the end of human suffering embodied in a ‘political settlement’ with an ‘international military presence’. Moving beyond humanitarian concerns, Solana also introduced a strategic rationale for military action. Clearly worried about the Kosovo crisis leading to wider problems in the Balkans, he stated that an additional overarching aim of NATO was to ‘prevent instability spreading in the region’.1 A second press release, issued by NATO on 23 March, reinforced the themes evident in Solana’s statement. This press release, however, shifted more emphasis to the view that military action was being undertaken to support the aims of the international community to find a political solution: NATO’s overall political objectives remain to help achieve a peaceful solution to the crisis in Kosovo by contributing to the response of the international community. More particularly, the Alliance made it clear in its statement of 30 January 1999 that its strategy was to halt the violence and support the completion of negotiations on an interim solution. Alliance military action is intended to support its political aims. To do so, NATO’s military action will be directed towards halting the violent attacks being committed by the VJ [Yugoslav Army] and MUP [Interior Ministry Forces] and disrupting their ability to conduct future attacks against the population of Kosovo, thereby supporting international efforts to secure FRY [Federal Republic of Yugoslavia] agreement to an interim political settlement.2 During the alliance’s Washington summit, the most definitive statement of NATO’s aims was issued as intensive air operations continued in April 1999. In a comprehensive statement, accented by forthright language, NATO reiterated that military action was driven by compelling humanitarian reasons and in support of the political aims of the international community: The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) has repeatedly violated United Nations Security Council resolutions. The unrestrained assault by Yugoslav military, police and paramilitary forces, under the direction of President Milosevic, on Kosovar civilians has created a 122
NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo massive humanitarian catastrophe which also threatens to destabilise the surrounding region. Hundreds of thousands of people have been expelled ruthlessly from Kosovo by the FRY authorities. We condemn these appalling violations of human rights and the indiscriminate use of force by the Yugoslav government. These extreme and criminally irresponsible policies, which cannot be defended on any grounds, have made necessary and justify the military action by NATO. NATO’s military action against the FRY supports the political aims of the international community: a peaceful, multi-ethnic and democratic Kosovo in which all its people can live in security and enjoy universal human rights and freedoms on an equal basis.3 The statement issued at the Washington summit went further than any earlier ones in providing a comprehensive articulation of the rationale for NATO military action. The alliance made clear that exhaustion of all diplomatic avenues, urgent humanitarian considerations and a desire to support the political aims of the international community justified its decision to employ military power. Furthermore, the desire to avoid a spillover of the conflict into neighbouring states with the consequential destabilisation of the region was an important component in NATO’s military action.4 All of these reasons for embarking on military action over Kosovo were important because of the fact that NATO undertook the military action without an explicit United Nations resolution authorising the use of force. Because of the absence of an explicit authorisation by the UN Security Council, the operation was bound to generate a great deal of international controversy. NATO’s military action pushed the envelope of international politics beyond its political comfort zone. As a consequence, it reopened conceptual debates that are important not only for their impact on the international system, but to the understanding of the employment of military power in the post-Cold War international security environment.
WA R O V E R KO S O V O ?
NATO’s military action over Kosovo has been most frequently referred to as a war. Indeed, many of the principal military figures believed that they were fighting a war. General Wesley K. Clark, the Supreme Allied Commander, Europe (SACEUR), the highest-ranking military officer in NATO and leader of the alliance’s military operations in the Kosovo conflict, commented in his memoirs that ‘we were never allowed to call 123
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts it a war. But it was, of course’.5 In his memoirs, General Clark gave a fuller picture of his analysis of the Kosovo ‘war’: Operation Allied Force was modern war – limited, carefully constrained in geography, scope, weaponry, and effects. Every measure of escalation was excruciatingly weighed. Diplomatic intercourse with neutral countries, with those opposed to NATO’s actions, and even with the actual adversary continued during and around the conflict. Confidence-building measures and other conflict prevention initiatives derived from the Cold War were brought into play. The highest possible technology was in use, but only in carefully restrained ways. There was extraordinary concern for military losses, on all sides. Even accidental damage to civilian property was carefully considered. And ‘victory’ was carefully defined.6 Respected academic figures such as Adam Roberts echoed General Clark’s view: ‘NATO leaders were reluctant to call their action “war”. However, it was war – albeit war of a peculiarly asymmetric kind. It indisputably involved large-scale and opposed use of force against a foreign state and its armed forces’.7 Lawrence Freedman, commenting on the conflict in the published, post-conflict, version of his E.H. Carr Lecture delivered at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, observed that ‘with national survival no longer at stake, wars are now fought in the name of a better world – as vital an interest as can be imagined but also one that demands a clear framework of values’.8 Sir John Keegan, Defence Editor of the London Daily Telegraph, made his views crystal clear when he rounded on ‘doomsayers [that] continue to deny that NATO has won a war’.9 From across the Atlantic, the prolific American analysts Ivo H. Daaldler and Michael E. O’Hanlon were in no doubt that NATO had fought a war over Kosovo. Daaldler and O’Hanlon stated that ‘NATO went to war for the first time in its fifty year history’ and won ‘the last war in Europe in the twentieth century’.10 The commentator Michael Ignatieff called the Kosovo conflict a ‘virtual war’, one in which it ‘obtained its objectives without sacrificing a single Allied life’. Ignatieff went on to argue that Kosovo was a ‘paradigm of … [a] paradoxical form of warfare: where technological omnipotence is vested in the hands of risk-adverse political cultures’.11 Others simply called the armed conflict a ‘humanitarian war’. From Charles Krauthammer’s point of view, ‘humanitarian war requires means that are inherently inadequate to its ends’.12 Given this spectrum of opinion, can NATO’s military action over Kosovo be accurately termed a war? 124
NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo Turning to reference sources, war has been defined as the ‘systematic application of organised violence by one state to another to accomplish adjustments in political, economic, cultural, or military relations’.13 The Penguin Dictionary of International Relations defines it as ‘direct, somatic violence between state actors’.14 On first reflection these broad definitions seem to describe the armed conflict over Kosovo. War, however, is a complex phenomenon. Such broad definitions inevitably only really begin to scratch the surface of the concept of war. When considering Clausewitz’s ideal type of a ‘total’ or ‘absolute’ war, there is an enemy against whom war is to be waged employing all available resources until the ‘terms of victory’ can be dictated.15 With NATO pursuing limited aims and exercising serious constraints on the use of force, the Kosovo conflict did not match Clausewitz’s criteria. General Clark’s analysis, however, does qualify his view of war in an important way. He described Kosovo as a modern ‘limited’ war. The idea of ‘limited war’ has been around for a long time. One of the 1950s proponents of the idea, Robert E. Osgood, noted that ‘the concept and practice of limited war are as old as war itself ’.16 Limited war was the object of considerable interest during the Cold War. In particular, it was an area of great interest and study from the mid-1950s to the early 1960s, particularly in the United States. Osgood was one of the major contributors to the discussion of limited war in this period. He defined it in the following way: A limited war is one in which the belligerents restrict the purposes for which they fight to concrete, well-defined objectives that do not demand the utmost military effort of which the belligerents are capable and that can be accommodated in a negotiated settlement.17 Osgood’s definition has since been built upon. Limited wars are conflicts that are said to be limited geographically, are fought over limited objectives, use limited means (weaponry) and have limitations regarding the targets subjected to attack.18 A more recent view of the characteristics of limited war suggests that another limitation needs to be added. Limited war now has a requirement to prevail with a minimum cost in lives: ‘casualties may soon represent a dominant, perhaps the dominant measurement of success or failure in wars of limited ends and means such as Operation Allied Force in Kosovo’.19 A succinct definition maintains that limited war means ‘that either the ends or means or both, are limited in the conflict’.20 Characterising the Kosovo conflict, however, as a limited war in conceptual terms may be largely situational. Such limited war as 125
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts expounded by General Clark is consistent with the theoretical canon of war studies imparted to military professionals at service academies around the world. This same body of knowledge also tells us that one of the problems of waging a limited war is that those asked to fight it are inculcated with an absolutist perspective of war that works against limitations on the use of force.21 This suggests an underpinning conceptual framework that sees war in its total or ideal guise as forming the intellectual foundation of the profession of arms. Such an intellectual grounding, however, more narrowly places the accent on the nature of the military conduct of the conflict rather than fully integrating its political dimension. As Clausewitz has long reminded us, ‘war is the continuation of political intercourse, carried on by other means’.22 This factor reduces the utility of the concept of limited war as applied to the Kosovo conflict. The ‘limited war’ concept in the case of Kosovo only contributes in the most generic terms to the understanding of the conflict, principally in terms of the limitations placed on the military dimension of the conflict. The strong association of that concept to the Cold War is another constraint on seeing the Kosovo conflict as a limited war in conceptual terms. Although of long lineage, limited war thinking of today grew and was decisively shaped by the experience of the Cold War in the 1950s and 1960s. Limited war became very much linked to the need to avoid a total war that would entail the massive employment of nuclear weapons by the then two superpowers, the United States of America and the Soviet Union. According to John Garnett, this established an important contextual linkage because ‘only conflicts that contain the potentiality for becoming total can be described as limited’.23 The inheritance of Cold War thinking on limited war clearly suggest that it is not applicable to the conflict over Kosovo. Current discourse may be challenging the conventional definition of war to move it beyond the realm of states and see it in terms of non-state actors, but it is nevertheless clear that the Kosovo conflict is better described metaphorically rather than conceptually as a war or limited war.24 Indeed, in some but by no means all cases, use of the term ‘war’ is no more than a convenient synonym for the more clinical legal phrase of ‘armed conflict’ preferred by foreign and defence ministries of states. Constructions such as ‘humanitarian war’ or ‘virtual war’ are probably no more than labels bereft of any real conceptual meaning. If the Kosovo conflict cannot be conceptually best understood as being a war or limited war, then how can it be conceived from the perspective of the international system? 126
NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo I N T E RV E N T I O N ?
Intervention is another frequently used term to describe NATO’s military operations over Kosovo in 1999. The concept of ‘intervention’ is welltrodden ground in terms of the international relations discourse, but it has spawned a variety of permutations, from ‘collective’ to ‘humanitarian’ intervention.25 Intervention, however, is controversial. It is often viewed critically against the backdrop of the doctrine of non-intervention in the affairs of states. The doctrine of non-intervention in the affairs of sovereign states is a well-understood facet of the international system. Non-intervention, grounded in the principle of sovereignty, is what many consider to be the grundnorm or default setting of the statecentred Westphalian international system that emerged after 1648. Sovereignty is the key element of the doctrine of non-intervention. Defined simply, sovereignty means the independence of a territorially defined state, enjoying the right to order its internal affairs within its boundaries as it sees fit. Stemming from this central tenet of a state’s right of domestic jurisdiction is the idea that a state should be free from outside interference, therefore forming the substance of the doctrine of non-intervention.26 Because of the desire of states to be free from outside interference, intervention is generally not perceived as a desirable activity. As Richard Little has written, ‘in the international arena intervention is generally seen to be a violation of sovereignty, and a threat to world order’.27 Others such as Hedley Bull, however, see intervention as a ‘ubiquitous feature’ in the international system. He argues that ‘no serious student can fail to feel that intervention is sometimes justifiable’ and that there are ‘exceptions to the rule of non-intervention’.28 From this polarity of views it can be seen that intervention is a contested concept. Intervening in the affairs of another state raises a number of questions regarding the ethics, legality and ultimately the legitimacy of the intervention. These controversies associated with intervention are not particularly new in terms of the international system. Since the end of the Cold War, and in particular in the wake of Kosovo, the debate over them has been reinvigorated. Because of its many permutations, defining ‘intervention’ is a difficult business. Thomas G. Otte has commented on the challenge of finding a single definition when, as he wrote, ‘there is no precise and generally acknowledged concept of intervention’.29 The elusiveness of definition is often reflected in standard definitions. Indeed, one dictionary of international relations describes intervention as ‘a portmanteau term which covers a wide variety of situations where one actor intervenes in the 127
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts affairs of another’.30 A major academic figure such as Hedley Bull has called it a ‘dictatorial or coercive interference, by an outsider or outside parties, in the sphere of jurisdiction of a sovereign state’.31 His definition points to the fact that intervention can embrace military, political and economic means or even normative ones through institutions acting on behalf of the international community. John Vincent has defined it in a similar manner to Bull. Vincent, however, attaches an important proviso that intervention is ‘not necessarily lawful or unlawful, but it does break a conventional pattern of international relations’.32 These broad definitions do not offer much precision or utility when considering NATO’s military action over Kosovo. Nevertheless they underscore the importance of considering the ways and means of intervention. Although intervention can take many forms in the international system, military force continues to be ‘the most widely available instrument’ for intervening in a country’s domestic affairs.33 ‘Military intervention’, as defined by Thomas G. Otte, ‘is the planned limited use of force for a transitory period by a state (or group of states) against a weaker state in order to change or maintain the target state’s domestic structure or to change its external policies’.34 Military intervention, however, produces its own admixture of challenging political and military decisions.35 Typically, military intervention means embarking on a conflict where there is an asymmetry in military power. The intervener almost invariable enjoys considerable military advantages over the target state. An asymmetry of military power in favour of the intervener does not guarantee automatic success, however defined by the circumstances. Military interventions risk protracted involvement by the intervener and entrapment in a spiral of escalation.36 It is much easier to become enmeshed in a military intervention than to find a viable exit strategy. Because of such risks the intervener must practise ‘selectivity’ before undertaking military intervention.37 For understanding NATO’s action over Kosovo, Otte’s definition of military intervention is certainly useful. The utility of Otte’s definition, as in the case of the consideration of ideas of limited war discussed earlier, is bound by the fact that it does not take into account the political reasons for the military intervention. Stanley Hoffman’s view that ‘the purpose of intervention is the same as that of all other forms of foreign policy; it is to make you do what I want you to do, whether or not you wish to do it’,38 indicates the underlying generic political purpose of military intervention. What is missing from Hoffman’s view is the reasons why a state or group of states launches a military intervention. It omits those crucial initial factors of political motivation or aims that trigger military intervention in the first place, which shape its ethical qualities, legality and legitimacy. This forms the line of confrontation 128
NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo between defenders of military intervention (particularly to uphold norms) and the doctrine of non-intervention in the sovereign affairs of states. For that icon of the realist school of international relations, Hans Morgenthau, the rationale for military intervention was clear. ‘All nations’, wrote Morgenthau, ‘will continue to be guided in their decisions to intervene and their choice of intervention by what they regard as their respective national interests’. Moreover, for Morgenthau, the doctrine of non-intervention was such that political leaders ‘never ceased to play lip service to it’. The conclusion that he drew was generally dismissive of international norms supplanting national interest when it came to justifying a military intervention. Morgenthau argued, ‘it is futile to search for an abstract principle which would allow us to distinguish in a concrete case between legitimate and illegitimate intervention’.39 Others have taken a broader view and have considered that other systemic factors contribute to military intervention even if ultimately national self-interest lies at the foundation of the decision to intervene. Chas. W. Freeman Jr typified this view when he wrote: A state or society that descends into civil strife or anarchy is a cancer on the international body politic that endangers its neighbours and its region. Segments of its population may destabilise neighbouring states by seeking refuge there. Its domestic violence may spill over its borders. Such internal disorder is a threat to international order and the interests of other states. It invokes the logic of reason of system … Direct or indirect intervention by states in the internal proceedings of others is never disinterested. States carry out such intervention as a matter of self-interest, the interest of the international state system, or both. Of these motives, the most compelling is self-interest.40 Hedley Bull, however, represented the opposite polarity to Morgenthau when he envisaged circumstances where the norms of international society could lead to intervention: It is clear that the growing legal and moral recognition of human rights on a world-wide scale, the expression in the normative area of the growing interconnectedness of societies with one another, has as one of its consequences that many forms of involvement by one state or society in the affairs of another, which at one time would have been regarded as illegitimate interference, will be treated as justifiable.41 129
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts The idea that universal norms could provide the legitimacy to military intervention and override the doctrine of non-intervention moves the intervention debate in political terms beyond the paradigm of national interest guiding the intervener. It also moves the intervention discourse onto its most contested ground, as illustrated by the Kosovo case. Whether or not military intervention can be driven by norms such as human rights is a major facet of the debates surrounding NATO’s military action over Kosovo. Interventions for humanitarian reasons are among the most contentious, as its claim to legitimacy can arguably supersede the authority of the UN or any other legitimating international organisation.
H U M A N I TA R I A N I N T E RV E N T I O N ?
‘The concept of humanitarian intervention’, observed James Mayall, ‘occupies an ambiguous place in the theory and practice of international society’.42 Not only does humanitarian intervention occupy an ambiguous place in terms of the international system but it is also a concept steeped in controversy. The controversy concerns the ethics and legitimacy of humanitarian intervention. Again, as in the case of intervention, in terms of defining the concept there is not yet a consensus on its meaning. One factor, however, seems to predominate – the issue of violation of human rights. Sean Murphy provides one of the most succinct definitions in focusing on this raison d’être: Humanitarian Intervention is the threat or use of force by a state, group of states, or international organization primarily for the purpose of protecting the nationals of the target state from widespread deprivations of internationally recognized human rights.43 Francis Abiew has defined humanitarian intervention in a way similar to that of Murphy: ‘Humanitarian intervention, understood in the classical sense, involves forcible self-help by a state or group of states to protect human rights’.44 Developing this line of argument to its limits, Mervyn Frost went so far as to say that ‘humanitarian intervention must be understood as directed at maintaining civil society – the global society of rights holders which has no borders’.45 There are dissidents, however, from the narrow rationale of humanitarian intervention being to protecting human rights. In contrast, Oliver Ramsbotham has argued that ‘humanitarian intervention means crossborder action by the international community in response to human 130
NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo suffering’. Furthermore, he identifies various forms of humanitarian intervention including ‘coercive’ and ‘non-coercive governmental humanitarian intervention’ and ‘transnational, intergovernmental and non-governmental humanitarian intervention’.46 Implicit in all of these are drivers of humanitarian intervention which diversify the rationale for humanitarian intervention beyond simply upholding human rights. Broader considerations are evident where the concept of humanitarian intervention has made its way into the world of policy-makers. The Finnish Security and Defence Policy paper published in June 2001 defined humanitarian intervention with a broader perspective: Humanitarian intervention means military intervention by the international community or some other actor in an internal or international conflict, if necessary without the consent of the country in question, in order to save human lives, protect human rights and to ensure that humanitarian aid reaches its target.47 The Finnish definition incorporates the related concept of ‘military– civilian humanitarianism’ that postulates the need to alleviate human suffering resulting from natural disaster, famine or conflict, thus providing more reasons for humanitarian intervention than simply thwarting human rights abuses.48 Humanitarian intervention for whatever reason presents the challenge of addressing an important paradox – the use of lethal armed force applied in the name of saving life.49 This paradox makes plain the daunting ethical issues in attempting to establish a set of criteria necessary to initiate and justify a humanitarian intervention. Although academics and commentators have long been willing to provide criteria for humanitarian intervention, politicians and policymakers alike have been more reticent. Britain in this respect represents a unique attempt to articulate criteria for humanitarian intervention. Prime Minister Tony Blair identified the key issue in a speech given in Chicago in April 1999 when he said that ‘the most pressing foreign policy problem we face is to identify the circumstances in which we should get actively involved in other people’s conflicts’. Blair’s analysis pointed to the fact that there were ethical considerations that took precedence over the established norms of the international system. In particular he argued that: The principle of non-interference must be qualified in important respects. Acts of genocide can never be a purely internal matter. When oppression produces massive flows of refugees which unsettle 131
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts neighbouring countries, then they can properly be described as ‘threats to international peace and security’. In practical terms, the Chicago speech went on to suggest a test consisting of a series of questions to determine the appropriateness of an intervention: First, are we sure of our case? Second, have we exhausted all diplomatic options? Third, on the basis of a practical assessment of the situation, are there military operations we can sensibly and prudently undertake? And finally, do we have national interests involved?50 What some have labelled the ‘Blair doctrine’ was further elaborated nearly a year later by Robin Cook, then British Foreign Secretary. In a July 2000 speech Cook raised what is the central conundrum concerning the ethics and criteria of humanitarian intervention: ‘How can the international community avert crimes against humanity while at the same time respecting the rule of international law and the sovereignty of nation states?’ Furthermore, his speech was intended to offer: Guidelines for intervention in response to massive violations of humanitarian law and crimes against humanity: First, any intervention, by definition, is an admission of failure of prevention. Second, we should maintain the principle that armed force should only be used as a last resort. Third, the immediate responsibility for halting violence rests with the state in which it occurs. Fourth, when faced with an overwhelming humanitarian catastrophe, which a government has shown it is unwilling or unable to prevent or is actively promoting, the international community should intervene … It must be objectively clear that there is no practicable alternative to the use of force to save lives. Fifth, any use of force should be proportionate to achieving the humanitarian purpose and carried out in accordance with international law. Sixth, any use of force should be collective. No individual country can reserve to itself the right to act on behalf of the international community.51 These criteria are undoubtedly an important statement. However, one of the key issues that stems from the above is how to determine the 132
NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo specific criterion regarding genocide and massive violations of human rights that will trigger humanitarian intervention. This is the crux of the problem facing policy-makers however elaborate the early-warning mechanisms that can be put into place.52 One of the first hurdles to overcome is obtaining incontrovertible evidence of which actor is responsible for the massive human rights violations. Such an assessment is a difficult enough issue for individual governments, let alone amorphous bodies such as the international community. Military intervention since the Cold War has generated a number of dilemmas for the intervener. The contradictory desire of the populations of democratic states is to enforce norms such as human rights, while simultaneously being unwilling to pay the price, either in lives or in treasure, to see such norms enforced.53 For those governments and international institutions capable of undertaking humanitarian intervention in response to genocide and other massive violations of human rights, the option of doing nothing also does not seem credible. These dilemmas make humanitarian intervention central to the problem of applying morality to politics and conflict. This problem is certainly nothing new. Indeed, the well-articulated principles of the ‘Just War’ doctrine organised around jus ad bellum and jus in bello (meaning the ‘justice in going to war’ and the ‘justice in the conduct of war’) were in fact designed to address the problem of morality and conflict.54 The criteria of Just War embrace a set of principles that include among them just intention (goals must be just), last resort (military force employed as a last resort), proportionality (military actions limited by necessity) and discrimination (non-combatants protected from intentional attack). What is striking is the way in which the ideas propounded in Blair’s and Cook’s speeches emphasising last resort, proportionality and legitimacy reflect criteria of the Just War doctrine. As the Just War doctrine is about establishing moral and just criteria about the use of force, its application to the problem of establishing ethical criteria for humanitarian intervention is seen as being highly relevant. ‘In seeking a framework that is simultaneously both ethical and political for discussing decisions to resort to force, the Just War tradition seems a self-evident path to explore’, according to Mona Fixdal and Dan Smith writing on ‘Humanitarian Intervention and Just War’.55 Indeed, J. Bryan Hehir has argued strongly in favour of the application of the Just War doctrine to problems of humanitarian intervention in the post-Cold War international environment: The post-Cold War setting for intervention is shaped by two realities: the erosion of sovereignty and intensifying interdependence. These 133
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts two distinct features of international politics promise an increase in the kinds of intervention and its incidence. To assess the moral character of intervention will require an emphasis on the political aspects of the just war ethic.56 This view, however, has its critics that question the Just War doctrine’s relevance to the problem of humanitarian intervention. Arguing against its role as a guide to humanitarian intervention, Mervyn Frost stresses that: Humanitarian intervention is not best understood as an action which fits into theories of just warfare, as they do not involve war between states. The concerns of just war theory about proper authority, just cause and just means are not readily applicable to humanitarian intervention.57 Despite this important caveat the Just War doctrine has undoubtedly occupied an important place in the debate to establish criteria for humanitarian intervention.58 In many cases analysts seeking to do so draw on the Just War doctrine whether or not they make an explicit link between it and their criteria.59
CONCLUSION: NEEDS MUST?
Interventions or humanitarian interventions driven by ethical considerations reveal important contradictions in the international system. ‘Humanitarian intervention’, wrote Nicholas J. Wheeler, ‘exposes the conflict between order and justice at its starkest’.60 The North Atlantic Alliance’s attempt to square the circle in its ‘humanitarian intervention’ over Kosovo reflects the contradictions in attempting to uphold some norms while seemingly violating others. As Adam Roberts has argued, such circumstances make it a dubious precedent for action in the international system.61 According to the British Ministry of Defence’s published assessment of the lessons of the Kosovo crisis, having exhausted all other means of resolving the crisis ‘armed intervention was justifiable in international law as an exceptional measure to prevent an overwhelming humanitarian catastrophe in Kosovo’.62 What this analysis suggests is that given the ethical dilemmas associated with humanitarian intervention, each has to be treated on a case-by-case basis. What can be concluded in conceptual terms is that NATO’s military action over Kosovo is less convincingly classified as a war, a limited war or even a ‘humanitarian 134
NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo war’. Its action, however, can be more credibly viewed as an intervention or even a humanitarian intervention. The North Atlantic Alliance mounted a military intervention against a sovereign state, driven by a distinctive set of humanitarian and strategic issues that were as compelling as they were challenging in their ethical implications not only for the alliance but also for the international system.
NOTES
1. Press statement by Dr Javier Solana, Secretary-General of NATO, 23 March 1999, Press Release (1999) 040 posted at: http://www.nato.int/docu/pr/ 1999/p99-0402.htm, 3 April 1999. 2. ‘Political and Military Objectives of NATO Action with Regard to the Crisis in Kosovo’, 23 March 1999, Press Release (1999) 043 posted at: http://www.nato.int/docu/pr/1999/p99-043e.htm, 3 April 1999. 3. Statement issued by the North Atlantic Council, 12 April 1999, Foreign and Commonwealth Office website posted at: http://www.fco.gov.uk/text_only/ news/newstext.asp?2250&printVersion=yes. 4. Some have gone so far as to argue that NATO action might have been justified as collective self-defence under Article 51 of the UN Charter. See Patrick T. Egan, ‘The Kosovo Intervention and Collective Self-Defence’, International Peacekeeping, 8, 3 (Autumn 2001), pp. 39–58. 5. General Wesley K. Clark, Waging Modern War: Bosnia, Kosovo, and the Future of Combat (New York: Public Affairs, 2001), p. xxiii. The very title of General Clark’s memoirs gives away his thinking on how the conflict should be conceptually understood. 6. Ibid, p. xxiv. 7. Adam Roberts, ‘NATO’s “Humanitarian War” over Kosovo’, Survival, 41, 3 (Autumn 1999), p. 102. 8. Lawrence Freedman, ‘Victims and Victors: Reflections on the Kosovo War’, Review of International Studies, 26 (2000), p. 336. 9. John Keegan, ‘Yes, We Won this War: Let’s Be Proud of It’, Daily Telegraph, 24 June 1999. 10. Ivo H. Daaldler and Michael E. O’Hanlon, Winning Ugly: NATO’s War to Save Kosovo (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2000), p. 1 and p. 21. 11. Michael Ignatieff, Virtual War: Kosovo and Beyond (London: Chatto and Windus, 2000), pp. 162–3. 12. Charles Krauthammer, ‘The Short, Unhappy Life of Humanitarian War’, The National Interest (Fall 1999), pp. 5–8; see also Roberts, ‘NATO’s “Humanitarian War” over Kosovo’. 13. Chas. W. Freeman Jr, Arts of Power: Statecraft and Diplomacy (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 1997), p. 61. 14. Graham Evans and Jeffrey Newnham, The Penguin Dictionary of International Relations (London: Penguin Books, 1998), p. 565. 15. Michael I. Handel, Masters of War: Classical Strategic Thought, 3rd edition (London: Frank Cass, 2001), p. 24. See also Chapter 3 on the definition of war.
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Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts 16. Robert E. Osgood, ‘The Reappraisal of Limited War’, Adelphi Papers 54 (London: Institute for Strategic Studies, February 1969), p. 41. For an in-depth analysis of limited war by the great strategic thinkers see Handel, Masters of War, pp. 287–95. For a very good summary of the evolution of ‘limited war’ thinking see Christopher M. Gacek, The Logic of Force: The Dilemma of Limited War in American Foreign Policy (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994). 17. Robert Osgood, Limited War: The Challenge to American Strategy (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1957), pp. 1–2. 18. John Garnett, ‘Limited War’, in John Baylis et al. (eds), Contemporary Strategy: I Theories and Concepts (London: Croom Helm, 1987), pp. 191–2. 19. Major-General Robert H. Scales Jr, ‘From Korea to Kosovo: America’s Army Learns to Fight Limited Wars in the Age of Precision Strikes’, Armed Forces Journal International (December 1999), p. 36. 20. Gacek, The Logic of Force, p. 16. 21. Garnett, ‘Limited War’, p. 201. 22. Carl von Clausewitz (transl. Michael Howard and Peter Paret), On War (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1989), p. 87; see also Handel, Masters of War, p. 38. 23. Garnett, ‘Limited War’, p. 192. 24. Jeremy Black, War: Past, Present and Future (New York: St Martin’s Press, 2000), pp. 272–97. 25. See Hedley Bull (ed.), Intervention in World Politics (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984). 26. For useful discussions of the concept of sovereignty see Alan James, ‘The Concept of Sovereignty Revisited’, in Albrecht Schnabel and Ramesh Thakur (eds), Kosovo and the Challenge of Humanitarian Intervention: Selective Indignation, Collective Action and International Citizenship (Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2000), pp. 334–43 and Friedrich Kratochwil, ‘Sovereignty as Dominium: Is there a Right of Humanitarian Intervention?’, in Gene M. Lyons and Michael Mastanduno (eds), Beyond Westphalia? State Sovereignty and Humanitarian Intervention (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995), pp. 21–42. See also Evans and Newnham, The Penguin Dictionary of International Relations, pp. 379–80 and pp. 504–5. 27. Richard Little, ‘Recent Literature on Intervention and Non-Intervention’, in Ian Forbes and Mark Hoffman (eds), Political Theory, International Relation, and the Ethics of Intervention (London: St Martin’s Press, 1993), p. 13. 28. Hedley Bull, ‘Introduction’ and ‘Conclusion’, in Bull (ed.), Intervention in World Politics, p. 2 and p. 190. 29. Thomas G. Otte, ‘On Intervention: Some Introductory Remarks’, in Andrew M. Dorman and Thomas G. Otte (eds), Military Intervention: From Gunboat Diplomacy to Humanitarian Intervention (Aldershot: Dartmouth, 1995), p. 3. 30. Evans and Newnham, The Penguin Dictionary of International Relations, p. 278. 31. Hedley Bull, ‘Introduction’, in Bull (ed.), Intervention in World Politics, p. 1. 32. R.J. Vincent, Non-Intervention and International Order (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1974), p. 13.
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NATO’s Military Action Over Kosovo 33. Evans and Newnham, The Penguin Dictionary of International Relations, p. 279. 34. Otte, ‘On Intervention: Some Introductory Remarks’, in Dorman and Otte (eds), Military Intervention, p. 10. 35. See Charles A. Kupchan, ‘Getting In: The Initial Stage of Military Intervention’, in Ariele E. Levite, Bruce W. Jentleson and Larry Berman (eds), Foreign Military Intervention (New York: Columbia University Press, 1992), pp. 243–60. 36. Otte, ‘On Intervention: Some Introductory Remarks’, in Dorman and Otte (eds), Military Intervention, pp. 6–10. 37. Hans J. Morgenthau, ‘To Intervene or Not to Intervene’, Foreign Affairs, 45, 3 (April 1967), p. 436. 38. Stanley Hoffman, ‘The Problem of Intervention’, in Bull (ed.), Intervention in World Politics, p. 9. 39. Morgenthau, ‘To Intervene or Not to Intervene’, p. 425 and p. 430. 40. Freeman, Arts of Power: Statecraft and Diplomacy, p. 55. 41. Hedley Bull, ‘Conclusion’, in Bull (ed.), Intervention in World Politics, p. 193. 42. James Mayall, ‘The Concept of Humanitarian Intervention Revisited’, in Schnabel and Thakur (eds), Kosovo and the Challenge of Humanitarian Intervention: Selective Indignation, Collective Action and International Citizenship, p. 321. 43. Sean D. Murphy, Humanitarian Intervention: The United Nations in an Evolving World Order (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996), pp. 11–12. 44. Francis Kofi Abiew, The Evolution of the Doctrine and Practice of Humanitarian Intervention (The Hague: Kluwer Law International, 1999), p. 18. For a thorough review of the literature on the concept of humanitarian intervention see Penelope C. Simons, ‘Humanitarian Intervention: A Review of Literature’, Project Ploughshares Working Paper, September 2001, posted at http://www.ploughshares.ca/content/WORKING%20PAPERS/wp012.html. 45. Mervyn Frost, ‘The Ethics of Humanitarian Intervention: Protecting Civilians to Make Democratic Citizenship Possible’, in Karen E. Smith and Margot Light (eds), Ethics and Foreign Policy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), p. 52. 46. Oliver Ramsbotham, ‘Humanitarian Intervention 1990–5: A Need to Reconceptualize?’ Review of International Studies, 23 (1997), pp. 456–7. A similarly broad view is taken in Christopher Greenwood, ‘Is There a Right of Humanitarian Intervention?’ World Today, 49, 2 (February 1993), p. 34. 47. ‘Finnish Security and Defence Policy 2001’, Report by the Council of State to Parliament, 13 June 2001, Ministry of Defence of Finland, p. 5, posted at http://www.vn.fi/plm/report.htm. 48. Thomas G. Weiss, Military–Civilian Interactions: Intervening in Humanitarian Crises (Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 1999), p. 3 defines ‘military– civilian humanitarianism’ as ‘the coming together of military forces and civilian agencies to deal with the human suffering from complex emergencies’. 49. See Hugo Slim, ‘Violence and Humanitarianism: Moral Paradox and the Protection of Civilians’, Security Dialogue, 32, 3 (September 2001), pp. 325–39. 50. Speech by Prime Minister Tony Blair, ‘Doctrine of the International Community’, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, London, posted at http://www.fco.uk/text_only/news/speechtext.asp?2316&printVersion=yes.
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Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts 51. Speech by the Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, ‘Guiding Humanitarian Intervention’, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, London, posted at http://www.fco.gov.uk/text_only/news/speechtext.asp?3989&printVersion =yes. 52. See John G. Heidenrich, How to Prevent Genocide: A Guide for Policymakers, Scholars, and the Concerned Citizen (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2001), pp. 73–92; and David Carment and Frank Harvey, Using Force to Prevent Ethnic Violence: An Evaluation of Theory and Evidence (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2001), pp. 13–24. 53. Barry M. Blechman, ‘The Intervention Dilemma’, Washington Quarterly, 18, 3 (Summer 1995), p. 65. 54. For two recent books discussing the Just War see A.J. Coates, The Ethics of War (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1997) and Richard J. Regan, Just War: Principles and Causes (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1996). 55. Fixdal and Smith, ‘Humanitarian Intervention and Just War’, p. 22. 56. J. Bryan Hehir, ‘Just War Theory in a Post-Cold War World’, Journal of Religious Studies (Fall 1992), p. 254. 57. Frost, ‘The Ethics of Humanitarian Intervention: Protecting Civilians to Make Democratic Citizenship Possible’, p. 52. 58. General Sir Hugh Beach and Roy Isbister, ‘Old Wine, New Bottle: The Just War Tradition and Humanitarian Intervention’, ISIS Briefing on Humanitarian Intervention, No. 3, October 2000, posted at http://www.isiuk.demon. co.uk/0811/isis/uk/hiproject/no3_paper.html; and Brian Orend, ‘Crisis in Kosovo: A Just Use of Force?’, Politics, 19, 3 (1999), pp. 125–30. 59. For a range of examples of criteria see Robert C. Johansen, ‘Limits and Opportunities in Humanitarian Intervention’, in Stanley Hoffmann with contributions by Robert C. Johansen, James P. Sterba and Raimo Vayrynen, The Ethics and Politics of Humanitarian Intervention (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1996), pp. 68–83; Robert L. Phillips and Duane L. Cady, Humanitarian Intervention: Just War vs. Pacificism (London: Rowman and Littlefield, 1996); Oliver Ramsbotham and Tom Woodhouse, Humanitarian Intervention in Contemporary Conflict (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1996), pp. 225–31; and Julian Wathen, ‘Humanitarian Operations: The Dilemma of Intervention’ The Occasional Series Number 42 (Camberley: Strategic and Combat Studies Institute, 2001), pp. 26–30. 60. Nicholas J. Wheeler, Saving Strangers: Humanitarian Intervention in International Society (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 11. 61. Roberts, ‘NATO’s “Humanitarian War” over Kosovo’, p. 120. 62. Kosovo: Lessons from the Crisis, Ministry of Defence Paper, Cm 4724 (London: Stationery Office, June 2000), p. 21.
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9
Russian Policy during the Kosovo Conflict MARK SMITH
R U S S I A’ S R E S P O N S E T O T H E C O N F L I C T
The commencement of NATO’s Operation Allied Force in March 1999 against Yugoslavia, following Belgrade’s decision not to sign the Rambouillet Accord on Kosovo, preceded by one month the promulgation of NATO’s new strategic concept, which Moscow feared could result in NATO using military force without the authorisation of the United Nations.1 Operation Allied Force confirmed Russian fears that NATO was seeking to dominate Europe and impose a security order by diktat on the rest of the continent. As Operation Allied Force began just 12 days after Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic joined NATO, it is very likely that these two events were seen by many in the Russian leadership as linked and part of a common strategy. Indeed, Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov suggested as much in his speech to the Duma on 27 March 1999. When criticising NATO’s military action against Yugoslavia, Ivanov commented that, ‘having only just acquired three new members, NATO has immediately demonstrated its aggressive nature’.2 The Russian leadership saw the NATO action as going beyond merely upsetting the European balance of power and undermining attempts to create a single democratic space in Europe. It saw NATO’s actions as imperialistic, and as part of a US strategy to establish a global hegemony. Moscow was also angered that NATO had not adequately consulted it on this issue in the NATO–Russia Permanent Joint Council, so making a mockery of the 1997 Russia–NATO Founding Act. As NATO had acted without the specific authorisation of the United Nations Security Council, the bombing of Yugoslavia was seen as undermining the United 139
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Nations and the entire post-1945 global security system. On the day Operation Allied Force commenced, Boris Yeltsin stated: Only the UN Security Council has the right to take the decision on what measures, including measures of force, should be undertaken to maintain or restore international peace and security. The UN Security Council has not taken any decisions with regard to Yugoslavia. Not only has the UN Charter been violated but also the founding act on mutual relations, co-operation and security between Russia and NATO. In effect what we have here is an attempt by NATO to enter the 21st Century in the uniform of world policeman. Russia will never agree to this.3 The then Prime Minister, Yevgenny Primakov, condemned NATO’s action in similar terms. He said NATO’s attack on Yugoslavia was ‘a strike against the world order which has taken shape and became confirmed following the Second World War and it seemed it would develop after the end of the Cold War’. He noted that ‘NATO undertakes operations which are outside the framework of the objectives that were the raison d’être for setting up this organisation in the first place. This is an assault on the world order’.4 The Russian leadership faced a tremendous dilemma during the Kosovo conflict. On the one hand, it could not be seen to condone NATO’s use of force against Belgrade, yet at the same time, neither was it willing to risk a major confrontation with the West. Moscow lacked the military strength to oppose NATO, and also wanted continued cooperation with the West for financial reasons. Moscow also probably did not desire that its relations with the West be jeopardised because of the intransigence of the leadership of Slobodan Milosevic in Yugoslavia. On the other hand, the Yeltsin leadership genuinely opposed NATO’s decision to use force without UN authorisation, and it also had to take into account nationalist forces within Russia that were even more hostile to NATO policy and would demand more vigorous opposition to the Atlantic Alliance. The rhetorical response was predictably harsh. In addition to the attacks on NATO for undermining the United Nations and the OSCE, NATO was also accused of attempting to dismember Yugoslavia by separating Kosovo from the rest of the Yugoslav federation. On 31 March, Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov accused the USA of planning to introduce ground forces into Yugoslavia. He later stated that NATO planned to break up Yugoslavia.5 Ivanov also accused NATO of committing genocide and repeated Belgrade’s line that Kosovan Albanian refugees were fleeing 140
Russian Policy during the Kosovo Conflict NATO bombs. Ivanov also said that NATO was planning to set up a KLA (Kosovo Liberation Army) government in Kosovo, and warned that Montenegro and Vojvodina could face a similar fate. The Russian leadership depicted the KLA as an effective ally of NATO, and NATO’s claims that it was not seeking to dismember Yugoslavia were not accepted. The fiercest attack came from Yeltsin on 9 April, when he accused the USA of wanting to seize Yugoslavia and make it a protectorate, and said that Russia could not let this happen. He said that he had warned NATO, the Americans and the Germans not to push Russia towards military action, otherwise this could lead to a European or even a world war.6 Yeltsin repeated his claim that NATO wanted to turn Yugoslavia into a protectorate ten days later on 19 April.7 Alongside the verbal condemnation of NATO policy, Russia ceased all cooperation between its Ministry of Defence and NATO that took place within the framework of the Russia–NATO Founding Act. Various other forms of cooperation with Western defence ministries were cancelled. Russia also sent an intelligence-gathering ship from the Black Sea to the Adriatic in late March, and the General Staff warned that it would supply Yugoslavia with intelligence information. However, alongside these measures, the Yeltsin leadership made it clear that it would not become involved militarily, and neither would it supply Yugoslavia with arms, despite a Duma appeal in April to do so. The day after the Duma appeal, Yeltsin ruled out arms supplies and said that Russia would only use diplomatic means to resolve the crisis. Interestingly, in early April, Deputy Foreign Minister Aleksandr Avdeyev said that the Yugoslav leadership was responsible for the crisis.8 This was followed a few days later by a comment by Igor Ivanov stating that neither Washington nor Moscow desired any situation that would harm bilateral US–Russian relations.9 Russia did seek to use the UN to halt NATO’s military action, by introducing a resolution to the UN Security Council to that effect on 26 March, which was defeated by nine votes to three. However, there was a wish to cooperate with the West to bring about a diplomatic resolution of the conflict. Underneath the rhetoric, there was no desire on the part of the leadership to break with the West, and there was probably a realisation that Milosevic bore a high degree of responsibility for the crisis. In addition to Avdeyev’s comments, Yeltsin himself criticised Milosevic’s intransigence and urged him to accept peacekeeping forces. Desire for continued financial assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) influenced Russian policy. The visit of IMF Director Michael Camdessus to Moscow for talks on further loans almost coincided with the start of Operation Allied Force. Moscow confined its 141
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts ‘sanctions’ against the West to the largely symbolic action of halting cooperation with NATO. Russian financial needs meant that it was impossible to risk a complete break in relations with the West, and these financial reasons prompted Russia to play the role of mediator and broker a diplomatic outcome. To do otherwise would have risked Russian isolation from the international community, and this was not a stance that the leadership was prepared to take. At the start of the conflict, Primakov said that NATO action would not affect Russian ties with the IMF,10 and this could be taken as an implicit admission by the leadership that its financial weakness would require Moscow to cooperate with the West and play the role of honest broker. From the outset of the conflict, Yeltsin instructed Ivanov to arrange a meeting of the Contact Group. Ivanov sought a meeting of G-8 foreign ministers in early April, and Primakov flew to Belgrade and then Germany at the end of March as part of a process of attempting to mediate a diplomatic settlement. The Russian leadership faced pressure from the Duma to pursue a more pro-Milosevic policy, including supplying arms, and some senators in the Federation Council, notably Aleksandr Rutskoy and Aleksandr Lebed, also favoured military assistance to Belgrade. The Russian military probably also favoured a more pro-Milosevic policy, although it is unlikely that it sought to pressurise the Yeltsin leadership to change course. Verbal criticism of NATO by the Russian leadership was partly aimed at appeasing the Duma and public opinion.
THE CHERNOMYRDIN MISSION
Yeltsin’s decision to appoint Viktor Chernomyrdin as his special envoy on Yugoslavia in mid-April can be taken as a clear sign of his desire to play the role of mediator and broker a settlement. Chernomyrdin enjoyed the blessing of the West when he was Prime Minister in 1992–98. The West saw him then as a moderate stabilising influence in the Russian political scene. It seems reasonable to regard his appointment as a signal to the West that Russia wanted to cooperate with it over Yugoslavia. The appointment also effectively took the main thrust of the diplomatic effort away from the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. This was arguably a rebuff to Prime Minister Yevgenny Primakov, who had been Foreign Minister from January 1996 to September 1998, and who was probably more hostile to NATO widening and United States ‘unipolarity’ than Chernomyrdin. Primakov’s dismissal from the premiership in May 1999 would have further enhanced Chernomyrdin’s authority in the formulation of Russian policy on the Kosovo crisis. 142
Russian Policy during the Kosovo Conflict However, Chernomyrdin’s task of mediating a settlement was far from easy. He was caught between NATO’s insistence that it continue to bomb until its demands were met, and Milosevic’s insistence that the bombing halt before Serb forces be withdrawn, that the future Kosovo peacekeeping force operate under UN auspices and consist only of nonNATO forces, and that Yugoslavia must retain some forces in Kosovo. Although Russia and the West reached some agreement on principles for ending the conflict at the G-8 foreign ministers’ meeting in Bonn in early May, Chernomyrdin himself stated that NATO must halt bombing before any settlement could be reached. As a result of Chernomyrdin’s ‘shuttle diplomacy’, Russia’s role did largely become that of a courier, which caused irritation in Moscow.11 The possibility of NATO using ground forces also resulted in Russia threatening to end mediation. On 18 May the process began which eventually led to the end of the conflict. Chernomyrdin had talks with Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari and United States Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott in Helsinki. Ahtisaari was acting as the European Union’s representative. Chernomyrdin then flew to Belgrade to present to Milosevic peace proposals worked out in Helsinki. Chernomyrdin still insisted that NATO halt airstrikes. The process of the trilateral Chernomyrdin–Ahtisaari–Talbott talks proved to be the means by which the conflict ended. On 24 May Chernomyrdin said that these trilateral talks should lead to an end of the conflict. He also stated that Milosevic was prepared to accept the participation of NATO forces that had not been involved in combat, in the international force to be deployed in Kosovo. On 1 June, Chernomyrdin flew to Germany for a further round of trilateral talks, in which German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder also participated. These talks agreed on the final set of proposals that were presented to Milosevic by Chernomyrdin and Ahtisaari in Belgrade on 3 June. The proposals were not for negotiation, they were very much ‘take it or leave it’, with the implication that NATO would step up its military action were Milosevic to reject them. Milosevic accepted the proposals. This effectively led to the end of the conflict. Yugoslav forces started withdrawing from Kosovo on 10 June. This resulted in NATO suspending its bombing campaign. Once the bombing had been suspended, Russia was able to support United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244, which laid out the principles for a Kosovo settlement. The resolution was passed by the Security Council on 10 June. The peacekeeping operation hence became a UN rather than a NATO operation, which was a success for Russian policy. The passing of Resolution 1244 effectively ended the Chernomyrdin mission. Kosovo Force (KFOR) forces began entering Kosovo from 143
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Macedonia on 12 June. However, although KFOR was operating under UN auspices, it was in reality very much a NATO-led force. Russia stole a march on NATO by entering Kosovo first, by sending forces from SFOR (the Stabilisation Force) in Bosnia which travelled through Serbia, entered Pristina and took control of the airport on 11 June. This seemed to be a measure taken by the Russian military to strengthen Russia’s hand in negotiations with the USA over the role to be played by Russian forces within KFOR. The Chernomyrdin–Ahtisaari proposals accepted by Milosevic on 3 June differed little from either NATO’s five demands put forward on 12 April, or the principles agreed by the G-8 on 6 May. The G-8 plan, Chernomyrdin–Ahtisaari proposals and UN Security Council Resolution 1244 all called for substantial self-government for Kosovo, taking full account of the Rambouillet accords. The Chernomyrdin–Ahtisaari proposals stated that an effective international civil and security presence would be deployed in Kosovo under UN auspices with ‘substantial NATO participation’. This presence was to be deployed under unified command and control. A footnote to the proposals stated that it was understood that NATO considered an international security force with ‘substantial NATO participation’ to mean unified command and control, and having NATO at the core. This in turn meant a unified NATO chain of command under the political direction of the North Atlantic Council in consultation with non-NATO force contributors. All NATO countries, partners and other countries would be eligible to contribute to the international security force. Annex 2 to UN Security Council Resolution 1244 said that the international security presence would have ‘substantial North Atlantic Treaty Organisation participation’, and would be deployed under unified command and control. Although these agreements all affirmed Yugoslavia’s territorial integrity, the references made to the Rambouillet Agreement imply that Kosovo’s final status could come up for review, as the text of the agreement stated it was to last for three years from the time of its entry into force. After three years, an international meeting should be convened to determine a mechanism for a final settlement for Kosovo, on the basis of the will of the people, the opinions of relevant authorities, each party’s efforts regarding the implementation of this agreement, and the Helsinki Final Act. The Rambouillet Agreement also intended that NATO would constitute and lead a military implementation force to ensure the fulfilment of all provisions of the agreement. Non-NATO nations could also take part, but the implementation force would operate under the authority and be subject to the direction and the political control of the North Atlantic 144
Russian Policy during the Kosovo Conflict Council through the NATO chain of command.12 The outcome of the conflict indicates that much of the Rambouillet Agreement may be realised. It also makes clear that the Chernomyrdin mediation mission largely (although not wholly) accepted NATO’s agenda regarding Kosovo, despite the initial outrage at and condemnation of Operation Allied Force. Russia managed to ensure that the peacekeeping operation in Kosovo would be under the auspices of the UN, not under NATO as would have been the case under Rambouillet. The Rambouillet Agreement also stated that NATO forces would have the right to deploy and exercise throughout the whole of Yugoslavia. This was not part of the settlement of June 1999. There was also no specific commitment to consider the status of Kosovo after three years, although many in the Kosovo Albanian political elite still expect this. Rather than persuading both NATO and Belgrade to compromise, Chernomyrdin managed to persuade Milosevic that he had no choice. Milosevic may in the end have capitulated when he realised that Moscow was not going to pull his chestnuts out of the fire, and Chernomyrdin may well have convinced him of the futility of such a hope. Given Russian opposition to the use of force by NATO over Kosovo, and to NATO’s new security concept, the acceptance of NATO’s Kosovo agenda must have been reluctant, as the high degree of eventual cooperation could almost be seen as a Russian endorsement of NATO’s use of force. That is very probably how it was seen by many opposition forces in Russia, which explains the Duma’s call for Chernomyrdin’s dismissal as Balkan envoy on 10 June. Chernomyrdin’s acceptance of NATO’s position reflected the Yeltsin leadership’s unwillingness to risk a major confrontation with the West, not least for financial reasons. The leadership’s awareness of Russia’s own economic and military weakness made it unwilling to adopt an uncooperative approach towards the West over Kosovo. Russia’s military weakness made confrontation with NATO unwise, and refusal to cooperate in seeking a diplomatic settlement ran the risk that NATO would have resolved the conflict on its terms without any Russian involvement. This would have resulted in Russia having no influence at all in the post-conflict settlement. Chernomyrdin’s mediation enabled Russia to have continued influence in the settlement process, even if this process is largely dominated by NATO. As Chernomyrdin himself said on 22 June, Russia had the opportunity to ‘go to the Balkans and stay there’.13 The Russian military were extremely unhappy with the Chernomyrdin– Ahtisaari plan, with Colonel-General Leonid Ivashov, the head of the Ministry of Defence administration for International Military Cooperation, 145
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts stating that parts of it threatened Yugoslavia’s sovereignty. The surprise deployment of Russian forces in Kosovo on 11 June appears to have been undertaken by the military behind the backs of both Chernomyrdin and the Ministry for Foreign Affairs. This action can be considered as a case of the military pursuing its own foreign policy, with the aim of presenting NATO with a fait accompli, whereby Russian troops could create ‘facts on the ground’ and establish their own sector in Kosovo as part of KFOR. This sector would probably have been based in northern Kosovo where the majority of Serbs live, and could have possibly resulted in a de facto partition of the province. This bid failed when Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary made it impossible for Russia to reinforce the units deployed from Bosnia by refusing overflying rights to Russia. Russia was thus forced to accept that it could not have its own sector in Kosovo, and Russian forces were instead allotted zones within sectors controlled by NATO forces.
R U S S I A A N D T H E D O W N FA L L O F M I L O S E V I C
Throughout 2000, the new leadership of Vladimir Putin maintained the same foreign policy over Kosovo as its predecessor. The Russian Federation continued to condemn what it saw as the NATO doctrine of humanitarian intervention. It participated in KFOR, but was unhappy at what it considered to be an ineffective implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1244. Moscow was concerned about persecution of the Serb community in Kosovo by Kosovo Albanian forces, failure to disarm properly the KLA, Kosovo’s possible slide towards a de facto independence, what it saw as the West’s refusal to involve Belgrade in any final settlement of Kosovo’s status, and the West’s demand that indicted Yugoslav leaders be handed over to the War Crimes Tribunal at The Hague. These concerns were accompanied by threats that the Russian forces would pull out of KFOR if Kosovo became independent or if the safety of Russian forces was jeopardised. However, the Putin leadership has been committed to keeping its forces in KFOR. Russian policy has been caught between the dilemma of feeling the need to cooperate with the West, yet at the same time acting as an advocate for Belgrade, in order to demonstrate both at home and abroad that Russia is capable of pursuing an independent foreign policy. The Russian Federation was in something of a quandary when Milosevic initially refused to accept that Democratic Opposition of Serbia (DOS) candidate Voislav Kostunica had received more than 50 per cent 146
Russian Policy during the Kosovo Conflict of the vote in the first voting round of the Yugoslav presidential election held on 24 September 2000. Popular pressure for Milosevic to step down mounted. Supporting Milosevic ran the danger that Moscow might back a loser and be seen to oppose democratic change in Yugoslavia, and be in bad odour with the post-Milosevic leadership. Moscow would also be seen as an unreliable partner by the West. Western powers have seen Moscow’s main role in the crises in the former Yugoslavia since 1991 as being able to use her special relationship with Yugoslavia to attempt to induce cooperation from Belgrade. An unwillingness to mediate in this crisis would have undermined the value to the West of Moscow’s special relationship with Belgrade. At the same time, opposing Milosevic, especially if he were to remain in power, ran the danger of Moscow being perceived as following a proWestern policy over Yugoslavia, and being unable to back her allies. The communist Duma Chairman Gennady Seleznev described the election controversy in Yugoslavia on 6 October as a NATO coup, and therefore the Putin leadership could have been domestically vulnerable to accusations of complicity in an alleged NATO coup. Moscow did indeed face diplomatic pressure from the West to use her influence with Belgrade to attempt to secure a peaceful resolution of the electoral deadlock in Yugoslavia. On 1 October US President Bill Clinton requested Russian mediation in the crisis. Putin had already said that he was prepared to send Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov to Yugoslavia. Putin invited both Milosevic and Kostunica to Moscow in an attempt to mediate, and sent Chizhov to Belgrade. On 5 October, popular support for Kostunica in Belgrade was overwhelming, and Putin was still extending his invitation to Milosevic and Kostunica to come to Moscow. But Moscow must have decided on that day to recognise Kostunica as the new President of Yugoslavia, as on 6 October, Putin sent a message congratulating Kostunica on his election victory. Igor Ivanov arrived in Belgrade on 6 October and congratulated Kostunica on winning the Yugoslav presidential election. He also held talks with Milosevic. It was after these talks that Milosevic held talks with Kostunica and acknowledged his victory. On 9 October Putin sent further congratulations following Kostunica’s swearing in as President and invited him to Moscow. Once Moscow decided that Milosevic was a spent force, it wasted little time in backing Kostunica. Among the Russian leadership there was probably relief that Milosevic had departed and been replaced by a leader more congenial to the West. In 1999, Yeltsin had openly criticised Milosevic for his intransigence, and in the latest volume of his memoirs (Midnight Diaries) he again criticises Milosevic for attempting to jeopardise Russia’s relations with the West, writing that: 147
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts In his relations with Russia, he had wagered on an explosion of popular dissatisfaction with my foreign policy. He anticipated a split in Russian society and hoped to push Russia into a political and military confrontation with the West.14 Russia would continue to plead Yugoslavia’s cause in the international arena, and this would become an easier task now that Yugoslavia had lost her pariah status in the international community. Yugoslav foreign policy under Kostunica changed radically from that of Milosevic, and he embarked upon a policy of ending Yugoslavia’s international isolation. This has led to an end to the close reliance upon Russia that marked the Milosevic years. The wish that was expressed during Operation Allied Force, that Yugoslavia join the Russo-Belarusian union state, has now been dropped. The Kostunica leadership now sees the European Union as Yugoslavia’s main strategic partner.15 This is not, however, a setback for Russia. Kostunica still desires a good relationship with Moscow, and it is arguably of greater benefit to Russia to act as the advocate of a rehabilitated (as opposed to a renegade) Yugoslavia, which was always a liability. Judging from the comments he made during his visit to Moscow in late October 2000, Kostunica still desired Russia’s active involvement in the Balkans, in order to act as a counterweight to the USA and NATO. Among his remarks were that ‘The Russian presence must be felt in all the intersecting strategic geopolitical influences in the Balkans’, and a call for ‘a balance of European, Russian and US influences’ in the region.16 His aim of developing a close strategic partnership with the European Union (EU) also dovetails closely with the Putin leadership’s objective of developing a close Russia–EU partnership which includes security as well as economic cooperation. It is therefore quite possible that a more ‘organic’ Russo-Yugoslav relationship (or Russo-Serb relationship, if Montenegro secedes) may develop under Kostunica, that will give Russia a more solid foundation than existed during the Milosevic era for an enduring involvement in the development of a regional security system in the Balkans. To paraphrase Chernomyrdin, the change of leadership in Belgrade makes it easier for Russia to stay in the Balkans.
RUSSIAN VIEWS ON THE FUTURE
The G-8 summit in Cologne in June 1999 marked an attempt by the West and Russia to resume business as usual following the strains in relations caused by the Kosovo crisis. The forgiving of part of the 148
Russian Policy during the Kosovo Conflict Russian debt can be regarded as a reward for Russian cooperation over Kosovo. However, despite the move back towards a more cordial relationship, Russia remains extremely unhappy with the role that NATO now seems to envisage for itself, as exemplified by NATO’s handling of the Kosovo crisis. Statements made following the conflict make clear Moscow’s dissatisfaction with the current security regime in Europe. On 11 June, a Ministry of Foreign Affairs official said that the Russia–NATO Founding Act of 1997 needed rethinking. He accused NATO of violating that act by using military force against Yugoslavia.17 On 8 July, Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov described the NATO action against Yugoslavia as a ‘major conceptual challenge’ facing modern Europe, and he said it raised the question of whether Europe will remain unified or will again face division and confrontation.18 These criticisms of NATO have been accompanied by calls to strengthen the UN’s role in peacekeeping. Russia sees two trends emerging in the post-Cold War international system. The first, which Russia opposes, is that of a United States-led unipolar international system, with NATO playing the role of world policeman, usurping the traditional role of the United Nations. The second, which Russia supports, is that of a multipolar international system, with several power centres, and the United Nations as the main security organisation, with the OSCE (Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe) playing the major role in maintaining security in Europe. This second trend is favoured by Moscow as it would ensure an important role for Russia, and would in some sense satisfy her great power aspirations. However, although Russia’s determination to promote a new European security system will remain unchanged, Moscow currently lacks the means to achieve her objectives. After the ending of Operation Allied Force, Russia continued its policy of freezing its relationship with NATO. However, there were significant moves in 2000 towards a thaw, although Moscow made clear that a full thaw was dependent on NATO consulting fully with Russia over any security crisis in Europe. The Russian concern was to prevent any repetition of the events of 1999, where NATO decided to take military action against Yugoslavia without consulting Russia. In reality it is highly unlikely that NATO would consult with Russia in the event of a similar crisis, if NATO believed that consultation with Moscow would delay or prevent it from acting effectively, as was the case over Kosovo in 1999. In some ways, therefore, the process of discussion between NATO and Russia in 2000 over improving consultation mechanisms may be regarded as a way of soothing wounded Russian pride in order 149
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts to thaw out a frozen relationship. The rapprochement began with the visit of NATO Secretary-General Lord (George) Robertson to Moscow in February 2000. This was followed by Russian Chief of the General Staff Anatoly Kvashnin attending a meeting of the NATO–Russia Permanent Joint Council (PJC) in Brussels in May 2000, and Igor Ivanov attending a JPC meeting at foreign minister level in Florence, also in May. In June 2000 Defence Minister Igor Sergeev attended a PJC meeting in Brussels at defence minister level. All these contacts had been suspended in 1999 by Moscow in protest at Operation Allied Force. Although relations improved, Moscow remained hostile to NATO widening, and believed that NATO saw Russia as an enemy. Moscow would also like to see NATO transformed into a political organisation under the aegis of the OSCE. In March 2000, Defence Minister Igor Sergeyev said: ‘NATO could evolve from a military-political organisation into a political-military one’, and ‘could integrate into the OSCE’.19 Russia has accepted the uncongenial reality that she cannot ignore NATO, and so has returned to dialogue with it, but accompanies this dialogue with attempts to encourage trends and developments that may in the long term reduce NATO’s relevance, and weaken its commitment to its traditional collective defence role and the more ambitious roles envisaged in the 1999 strategic concept.
CONCLUSIONS
Russia’s opposition to NATO’s role changing from being a collective defence organisation towards being a self-appointed regional, or possibly even global, policeman is long-standing. It predates NATO’s strategic concept of April 1999 and Operation Allied Force by several years. Russia’s demand that the OSCE become the major security organisation for Europe also dates back to the early 1990s. The promulgation of the new strategic concept and the military intervention against Yugoslavia have intensified these sentiments. The events of 1999 have strengthened Russian fears that NATO is a direct threat to Russia, and that NATO could usurp the roles of both the UN and OSCE in managing global and European security. Russia’s line is to continue demanding the development of the OSCE’s role by promoting the OSCE European security charter adopted at the OSCE summit in Istanbul in November 1999. The new strategic concept and the Kosovo intervention initially impelled Russia to try and reduce its contacts with NATO, in order to weaken the North Atlantic Alliance’s role as European security manager. If Russia is able to ignore NATO, then NATO’s relevance as a security 150
Russian Policy during the Kosovo Conflict organisation may diminish. In April 1999, Nadezhda Arbatova argued that Russia should try to work out a resolution of the Kosovo crisis by cooperating with the European Union, rather than with NATO.20 This view was echoed by the Mayor of Moscow, and possible presidential candidate, Yury Luzhkov, in mid-May.21 Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov took a similar line, when he chaired a meeting of the Russia–EU cooperation council in Brussels in May, saying Russia would not hold talks with NATO, this implying that Moscow was prepared to cooperate with the EU in contrast to NATO.22 Moscow would also like to pursue cooperation on a bilateral basis with individual states as another way of bypassing NATO and hopefully reducing it to an irrelevance. Moscow may also try and use the network of bilateral friendship treaties she signed with individual European states in the early 1990s in order to achieve this. Another possible strategy would be to try and encourage the transformation of NATO into an essentially political organisation under the control of the OSCE. Russia’s prospects for achieving this are currently limited, hence the decision to end the post-Kosovo freeze in NATO–Russia relations. The Russian Federation is simply not strong enough to persuade individual European members of NATO of the superior merits of the OSCE and European Security Charter. Russia has neither the sticks nor the carrots to intimidate or beguile European members away from NATO. Currently only possible future developments within NATO and the EU offer Russia any potential opportunity to encourage the emergence of a non-NATO European security system. Russia has cautiously welcomed the European Union’s development of a defence identity and its plans to develop a military capability, seeing it as something that may either diminish or supplant NATO in Europe. Moscow has made clear its willingness to cooperate closely with the EU military structures once they come into being. If the EU ever does develop a military force that eventually replaces NATO, then the problems posed for Russia by NATO in 1999, when it took military action over Kosovo without consulting Russia in the Permanent Joint Council, may become irrelevant.
NOTES
1. See B. Kazantsev, ‘NATO’s new strategy is causing serious concern’, Mezhdunarodnaya Zhizn (February 1999), pp. 31–5; B. Kazantsev, ‘The obvious forceful creed of NATO’, ibid (June 1999), pp. 54–8; and V. Kulagin, ‘International Relations on the eve of the 21st Century’, ibid (July 1999), pp. 21–34. 2. The British Broadcasting Corporation, BBC Summary of World Broadcasts (hereafter SWB) 29 March 1999, SU/3495, B/3.
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Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22.
SWB, 26 March 1999, SU/3493, B/1. SWB, 27 March 1999, SU/3494, B/3. Russian Public Television, 31 March 1999. SWB, 12 April 1999, SU/3506, B/1. SWB, 20 April 1999, SU/3513, B/1. SWB, 6 April 1999, SU/3501, B/10. SWB, 9 April 1999, SU/3504, B/10. SWB, 27 March 1999, SU/3494, B/4. See then FSB Director Vladimir Putin’s comments in SWB, 13 May 1999, SU/3533, B/6–7. For the text of the Rambouillet Agreement, see http://kosovainfo.com/english/ politics/990305-peace.htm, June 1999. SWB, 24 June 1999, SU/3569, B/6. Boris Yeltsin, Midnight Diaries (London: Weidenfield and Nicholson, 2000), p. 265. See the interview with Yugoslav Foreign Minister Goran Svilanovic in Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 28 December 2000. SWB, 30 October 2000, SU/3984. SWB, 12 June 1999, SU/3559, B/9. SWB, 10 July 1999, SU/3583, B/7. SWB, 8 March 2000, SU/3783. Nadezhda Arbatova, ‘The most painful lesson of recent times’, Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 6 April 1999. SWB, 17 May 1999, SU/3536, B/13. SWB, 19 May 1999, SU/3538, B/11.
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10
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations MARTIN A. SMITH
INTRODUCTION
Among the most controversial aspects of NATO’s action over Kosovo during the key year of 1999 were the twin issues of the legality and legitimacy of its activities; most especially the prosecution of Operation Allied Force. The discussions in this chapter will focus on these controversies and on the closely related issue of NATO’s institutional relationship with the United Nations and, especially, the UN Security Council, which is formally charged in Article 24 of the UN Charter with ‘primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security’.1 Before Kosovo moved centre stage in 1998–99, NATO and the UN had already developed a track record of working together in South-East Europe. This had evolved in the context of the civil war in Bosnia since 1992. This Bosnia phase, and the state of NATO–UN relations by 1998, will be examined in the first part of this chapter. Attention will then turn to the controversies attending the NATO–UN political and diplomatic interface, or rather the lack of one, during Operation Allied Force. Despite not seeking the formal sanction of the UN Security Council for its air operations, NATO and its member states went to considerable lengths to justify the operations within a frame of reference to the UN and to international law. These efforts, and their basis, will be assessed in the main body of this chapter.
P R E L U D E A N D P R E C E D E N T: N A T O A N D T H E U N I N B O S N I A
No institutional relationship of any kind developed between NATO and the UN during the Cold War years. This did not mean that the UN had 153
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts been absent as a factor in NATO members’ deliberations, however.2 A key debate during NATO’s formative period concerned the application of Chapter 8 of the UN Charter to relations between the UN and NATO. This section of the Charter deals specifically with the responsibilities and obligations of ‘regional arrangements and agencies’. It contains three articles (52–4). Article 52 formally blesses the existence of regional arrangements and agencies. Articles 53 and 54 proved to be the contentious ones. Article 53 stipulates that the [UN] Security Council shall, where appropriate, utilise such regional arrangements or agencies for enforcement action under its authority. But no enforcement action shall be taken under regional arrangements or by regional agencies without the authorisation of the Security Council [emphasis added]. The next article states that regional agencies should ensure that the Security Council is kept ‘fully informed’ of any actions which they undertake ‘for the maintenance of international peace and security’. Also relevant, though outside Chapter 8, is Article 103, which confirms the institutional primacy of the UN over regional agencies of all kinds. It states that ‘in the event of a conflict between the obligations of the Members of the United Nations under the present Charter and their obligations under any other international agreement, their obligations under the present Charter shall prevail’. In the period leading up to NATO’s creation in 1949, there was a debate among the officials working on the draft of its treaty about whether the final document should come explicitly within the framework of Chapter 8 of the UN Charter. Most of the national representatives involved thought that it should not. Their reasons were summarised by the leader of the British delegation who argued that if it did, ‘there would be no power to act [and] everything would have to be reported’.3 Instead, it was agreed to link the treaty to Article 51 of the Charter. This, as is well known, recognises the right of states to provide and make arrangements for individual and collective self-defence against acts of aggression; though even here, according to the Charter, this pertains only until the Security Council has had time to take the matter in hand.
D E V E LO P I N G R E L AT I O N S I N B O S N I A
During 1992 and early 1993, as a NATO–UN working relationship was first being developed in Bosnia,4 NATO officials consistently emphasised 154
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations that the UN was the lead institution with regard to the conduct of humanitarian operations there, and that NATO was acting to provide support. For example, John Kriendler, Deputy Assistant SecretaryGeneral for Political Affairs, wrote in June 1993 that ‘NATO is not prepared to undertake a peacekeeping operation on its own initiative; it is unlikely that such an approach would find consensus among the Allies’.5 In part this was undoubtedly due to the sensitivities of France and other NATO members who were unsure about the extent to which NATO should become actively involved in any operations beyond the Article 5 mission of the territorial defence of its member states. But there was also the question of international legitimacy. The United Nations Security Council is today widely accepted by its member states as having the right to confer legitimacy on international peace operations. NATO officials and member states seemed to appreciate that NATO, as a sub-regional grouping of Western industrialised countries, could not claim legitimacy by acting alone in Bosnia during the early 1990s.6 The then NATO Secretary-General, Manfred Wörner, had publicly acknowledged this in October 1993. He told an American audience that ‘co-operation with the UN facilitates the Alliance’s new role in crisis management; it places our efforts in a broad, internationally accepted context’.7 However, a UN mandate for NATO action did not necessarily have to take the form of a direct authorisation from the Security Council. As NATO developed its working relationship with the United Nations in Bosnia from 1992 it did so frequently in response to requests from the then UN Secretary-General, Dr Boutros Boutros-Ghali, who was seeking NATO support for the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) there. The Security Council did not task NATO directly in Bosnia prior to 1995. Following initial contact with NATO Secretary-General Wörner in the spring of 1992, Boutros Boutros-Ghali began sending requests for practical support for UNPROFOR operations. These requests for help from the UN headquarters were dealt with by Western governments largely through the North Atlantic Council (NAC) in Brussels.8 According to Nelson Drew, the decision by the UN Security Council to enforce a ban on flights over Bosnia in November 1992 was a key staging post in the developing institutional relationship. This was the catalyst for acceptance on the part of senior officials in the UN Secretariat that direct institutional links with the NATO headquarters should, from henceforth, be maintained and utilised on an ongoing, rather than an incremental and ad hoc, basis.9 Thus, in mid-December 1992, Manfred Wörner received a letter from Boutros-Ghali requesting ‘NATO support of future UN resolutions in former Yugoslavia’ (emphasis added).10 155
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts The UN Secretary-General’s letter arrived in Brussels three days before the regular half-yearly NAC foreign ministers’ meeting, and Western minds were suitably concentrated. The key passage in the subsequent NAC communiqué outlined the preparedness of our Alliance to support, on a case-by-case basis and in accordance with our own procedures, peacekeeping operations under the authority of the UN Security Council, which has the primary responsibility for international peace and security.11 From this agreement the start of the formal relationship between NATO and the United Nations can be dated. The December 1992 NAC agreement stopped short of placing NATO under Chapter 8 of the UN Charter. Under the terms of the agreement, NATO members also reserved the right to refuse UN requests for help. Nevertheless, in institutional terms this decision was a watershed. As Nelson Drew later noted, ‘it was not until after’ the decision ‘permitting NATO to respond directly to the UN on peacekeeping matters that a direct liaison was established between the two organisations, permitting advance co-ordination’.12 The informal channel of communication between the two secretary-generals could now be both extended to cover other officials and planners, and supplemented by more structured and continuous contacts. Soon, however, tensions began to surface in the relationship. The most intractable and enduring concerned the possible use of air power in Bosnia. Disagreements in this area were so deep because they cut to the crux of the burgeoning NATO–UN relationship. The key question was ‘who is in charge?’ or, rather, ‘who should be in charge?’. Ought operations to be run by the UN, which invested them with political authority and legitimacy and gave them their mission? Or should they be run by NATO with a free hand? The grounds for this second view were that NATO and its member states provided the bulk of the forces and other military resources and also that the institution possessed multinational military command and planning structures, which the UN lacked. In spring 1993, recognising that the UN itself could not organise it, the then head of UN peacekeeping, Kofi Annan, had written to Manfred Wörner reportedly requesting NATO ‘to take over responsibility for the co-ordination of air cover for the safe areas and the UNPROFOR’ in Bosnia.13 The June 1993 NAC meeting formally accepted this request and NATO military planners were duly authorised to go to work on it. When Annan made his original request what he almost certainly had in mind was 156
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations close air support; the use of air power specifically to protect or facilitate UNPROFOR personnel going about their UN-mandated business. However, some in the NATO camp, in the United States in particular, favoured the more general and coercive use of airstrikes as a means of forcing the Bosnian Serbs to halt military activity. These differences were to become the source of much friction and argument.14 During 1993, the UN Secretary-General secured the so-called ‘dual key’ arrangement governing decisions to use Western air power in Bosnia. What ‘dual key’ meant in practice was that the permission of the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative in the former Yugoslavia was required before NATO could use air power. In addition, the UNPROFOR commander had to agree before air operations could actually take place. The UN and UNPROFOR reportedly used their authority to block airstrikes on several occasions, to the chagrin of the United States which threatened to abrogate the whole arrangement at least once.15 US Navy Admiral Leighton Smith, who had been in command of NATO’s contributions to Bosnian operations from 1994, publicly lambasted the dual key arrangement on his retirement in 1996. ‘I hated the dual key’, he was quoted as saying, ‘I thought it was the worst thing we could possibly have become involved in’.16 The decision to mount Operation Deliberate Force, the large-scale and protracted airstrikes against Bosnian Serb military positions and bases in August and September 1995, was essentially a NATO one. Boutros Boutros-Ghali in effect acquiesced, despite concerns and some opposition among senior staffers in the UN Secretariat in New York. In his memoirs, the then UN Secretary-General stated that he was seeking to ‘streamline the decision making’.17 According to Lord (David) Owen, however, he was fearful of becoming isolated from the United States and United Kingdom in the Security Council.18 The UN’s 1999 Srebrenica Report – effectively a ‘lessons learned’ study of the UNPROFOR deployment – notes that the Secretary-General gave up the UN’s right to be consulted on the use of air power in July 1995. This was after the calamitous fall of the designated ‘safe area’ of Srebrenica to the Bosnian Serbs amidst allegations that the UN could and should have done more to defend and protect its citizens. This report indicated that Boutros-Ghali overruled his own Special Representative in reaching his decision.19 Following the negotiation of the Dayton peace accords in the autumn of 1995, the transition from UNPROFOR to the new NATO-led multinational Implementation Force (IFOR) was formally accomplished by the passing of Resolution 1031 by the UN Security Council in December 1995. The net effect of this resolution was to allow the activation of Annex 1-A (the military annex) of the Dayton agreements. The UN resolution 157
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts authorised ‘Member States acting through or in co-operation with the organisation referred to’ in this annex ‘to establish a multinational implementation force under unified command and control in order to fulfil the role specified’ in the Dayton accords. Although Resolution 1031 did not mention NATO by name, everybody knew what ‘the organisation referred to’ in the Dayton annex was. It was stated quite clearly there that ‘it is understood and agreed that NATO may establish’ a force, ‘which will operate under the authority and subject to the direction and political control of the North Atlantic Council through the NATO chain of command’.20 The wording here left no doubt that the era of dual key operational control between NATO and the UN in Bosnia had ended. Resolution 1031 was important in another respect. For the first time, the United Nations Security Council was tasking and authorising NATO to undertake a designated mission. Since late 1995 this mission has continued; though with IFOR giving way at the end of 1996 to a slimmed-down Stabilisation Force (SFOR).
T H E B O S N I A L E G AC Y F O R N AT O – U N R E L AT I O N S
NATO and the UN had worked together in Bosnia for over three years prior to the negotiation of the Dayton accords. NATO had worked during this time without a direct UN mandate in the sense of specific Security Council resolutions that tasked it with particular missions or tasks. Rather, NATO’s involvement had been ‘within the spirit’ of relevant resolutions as it undertook tasks in support of UN operations on the ground, usually at the request of Secretary-General Boutros-Ghali or head of peacekeeping Kofi Annan. The Bosnian experience, most especially the restraints which the UN Secretary-General had imposed on NATO’s freedom of action between 1992 and 1995, also, some contend, left a significant legacy of distrust towards the UN on the part of leaders and policy-makers in the United States. The Americans certainly did not forgive Boutros Boutros-Ghali. The Bosnian experience was one of the main reasons why they sought, successfully, to deprive him of a second term of office in 1996. The US negotiators at Dayton had earlier ensured that there was no ambiguity about NATO’s role in implementing the accords and, specifically, that there was to be no further operational deference to the UN. The legacy of the period since the Dayton accords has been somewhat more positive. Despite a somewhat shaky start, the ongoing implementation of the accords since the beginning of 1996 has demonstrated that NATO and the UN can work together reasonably harmoniously and with 158
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations increasing effectiveness on the ground, and within the same overarching framework (though with different specific tasks).21 The Dayton model of NATO–UN cooperation of an overall ‘enabling act’ in the form of a Security Council Resolution and functional cooperation within a ‘division of labour’ framework on the ground, was to be followed closely when the time came to establish a post-Operation Allied Force administration in Kosovo from June 1999.
N A T O , T H E U N I T E D N A T I O N S A N D KO S O V O
This section divides into three parts, which dovetail chronologically with the main phases in the Kosovo crisis from the NATO perspective. The first part covers the period between the Holbrooke–Milosevic agreement of October 1998 and Operation Allied Force. The second part deals with the single most contentious decision which NATO leaders took – to launch their air operations in March 1999 without seeking authorisation from the UN Security Council. The third and final part examines the role played by the UN in facilitating a settlement and the concurrent deployment of international civil and military presences in Kosovo in June 1999. At first sight, the negative aspects of the legacy of Bosnia seemed most clearly visible during the early stages of the active involvement of the United States and NATO in the Kosovo crisis during 1998; specifically in the context of the Holbrooke–Milosevic agreement, which was concluded in October of that year.22 The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) was tasked with the job of providing unarmed verifiers in order to monitor Milosevic’s compliance with the terms of the agreement. This was despite the fact that the OSCE had never attempted a mission of comparable magnitude before (some 2,000 verifiers were required) and was seriously underprepared for the task, as its subsequent inability to deploy substantial numbers of personnel quickly was to demonstrate. There have been allegations that the UN was deliberately excluded from involvement at this time at the instigation of the United States. Closer analysis reveals a much more nuanced picture, however. To begin with, the overall framework for these negotiations between the US Special Ambassador and the President of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) was provided by UN Security Council Resolutions (UNSCRs). Particularly important in this respect was UNSCR 1199, which had been passed on 23 September 1998. The key elements of the Holbrooke–Milosevic deal, reached three weeks later, closely followed 159
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts the core demands made of the FRY in this resolution. They were ‘the withdrawal of [Serb] security units used for civilian repression’, the monitoring of these withdrawals, the safe return of refugees and displaced persons, and a timetable for a political settlement of the Kosovo question. Holbrooke had been explicitly dispatched to Belgrade by then US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright on 4 October 1998 to ‘underscore [to President Milosevic] the clear requirements of UN Security Council Resolution 1199 and to emphasise the need for prompt and full compliance’.23 Further, his mission to Belgrade was announced by the US State Department on the day after publication of a report to the Security Council by UN SecretaryGeneral Kofi Annan dealing with the FRY’s (lack of) compliance with relevant UNSCRs. In this report Annan ‘appealed to the international community to undertake urgent steps in order to prevent a humanitarian disaster’ in Kosovo during the winter.24 The close proximity of timing suggests that this call provided both the spur and the justification for the Holbrooke mission. The UN, via Resolution 1199, was therefore centrally, if indirectly, involved in the framing of the terms of reference for the Holbrooke mission and his subsequent agreement with Milosevic. What had developed had been similar to the indirect political and diplomatic relationship witnessed during the pre-Dayton phase of NATO–UN cooperation in Bosnia. The Security Council would pass resolutions relevant to the crisis, and NATO (or in autumn 1998 its leading member state) would take these as the starting point for their own activities. Although not specifically tasked by the Security Council, they could fairly claim to be acting ‘within the spirit of ’ the relevant resolutions and, perhaps more contentiously, ‘in support of ’ the United Nations more generally. One week after Holbrooke reached his agreement with Milosevic, including on the role of the OSCE verifiers, the arrangement was formally welcomed by the Security Council in Resolution 1203. This is something that, by definition, could not have occurred had Security Council permanent members Russia and China been seriously concerned about the absence of a direct UN role in verifying FRY compliance with the terms of the agreement. Even more significantly, UNSCR 1203 explicitly endorsed a role for NATO (which was to mount an air verification operation over Kosovo to complement the OSCE’s efforts on the ground) as well as for the OSCE, in verifying the agreement. It stated that the Security Council: Endorses and supports the agreements signed in Belgrade on 16 October 1998 between the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the OSCE, and on 15 October 1998 between the Federal Republic of 160
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations Yugoslavia and NATO, concerning the verification of compliance by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and all others concerned in Kosovo with the requirements of its resolution 1199 (1998), and demands the full and prompt implementation of these agreements by the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The significance of this was that, as Adam Roberts has put it, the UN Security Council, from October 1998, ‘accepted that the [NATO] Alliance had a direct standing and interest in the Kosovo issue’.25 It has been suggested that the UN was cut out of implementation tasks at the insistence of the FRY rather than the United States.26 This is plausible. On 6 October 1998 – one week before Holbrooke and Milosevic concluded their agreement – the Chairman-in-Office of the OSCE received a letter from FRY Foreign Minister Zivadin Jovanovic reportedly inviting the organisation ‘to witness first hand the positive evolution of the most crucial processes’ in Kosovo.27 This had all the hallmarks of a pre-emptive move by the FRY authorities to ensure that the OSCE, rather than any other international organisation, was tasked with monitoring developments in Kosovo. It may have been motivated mainly by a desire to ensure that NATO did not deploy on the ground. Equally, however, there may have been a desire not to let the UN organise an operation in Kosovo. Again, coincidence of timing is suggestive. The letter to the OSCE was sent just three days after publication of Kofi Annan’s report to the UN Security Council, referred to above, which had been damming in its indictment of Serb activities in the province. It is, therefore, credible to suggest that the FRY authorities were not at that time prepared to accept the UN on the ground as an objective and impartial referee of any international agreement reached with regard to Kosovo. In summary, the period between the signing of the Holbrooke– Milosevic agreement in October 1998 and the launching of Operation Allied Force in March 1999 saw the US/NATO and the UN working, if not together, then at least in tandem. The great controversies were not to come until the decision to launch NATO bombing operations was taken. The UN Security Council had never explicitly endorsed or authorised the use of force against the FRY should it fail to implement the terms of relevant UNSCRs. With Operation Allied Force, NATO members made the decision to go ahead without having obtained, or even sought, authorisation through a UNSCR. There were charges that the air operation was thus illegal because NATO was neither using force with UN authorisation nor for self-defence; the only two instances when the use of force is permissible under the UN Charter. 161
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts In responding to these accusations, NATO as an institution started at a disadvantage. It was unable to formulate a common position on the legal status of the operation, owing both to the sensitivity of the issue and its lack of any formal supra-national competence. When people enquired as to what the official NATO position was, ‘they were told that there was no consolidated NATO position, but that it was up to the governments and capitals of the participating member states to assess the international law situation and produce the justification(s) they saw fit’.28 In consequence it soon became possible to discern a number of different arguments being put forward by NATO member states. One of the earliest, utilised even before the launch of air operations, focused on the Bosnia connection. Two arguments were made in this respect; one explicit and the other implicit. The explicit argument was that an unrestrained crisis and possible conflict in Kosovo risked spilling over and jeopardising the Dayton peace process in Bosnia. This had been a powerful concern for NATO governments when they first took an active interest in Kosovo in early 1998. A March 1998 NAC statement on the situation there asserted that ‘NATO and the international community have a legitimate interest in developments in Kosovo, inter alia because of their impact on the stability of the whole region which is of concern to the Alliance’.29 Two months later, the more substantive ‘Statement on Kosovo’ made the Bosnia connection explicit: ‘the violence and the associated instability [in Kosovo] risk jeopardising the Peace Agreement in Bosnia and Herzegovina’.30 The implicit element in this argument was based on the fact that, as noted earlier, the UN Security Council had granted NATO (under UNSCR 1031) a mandate to organise and command a force to undertake the military tasks associated with the implementation of the Dayton peace accords in Bosnia. On this basis it was possible to argue, by extension, that a perceived threat to the implementation of the Dayton accords was a ‘threat to international peace and security’ and thus the use of force could be justified in response under the terms of Chapter 7 of the UN Charter.31 UNSCR 1031 had indeed been based explicitly on Chapter 7 and premised on the assumption that a threat to peace and security continued to exist in South-East Europe. Arguably, therefore, NATO did have a mandate for military action, based on its role in underwriting the peace settlement in Bosnia. Once Operation Allied Force was under way, however, the Bosnia connection was seldom used in order to justify it. Possibly this reflected doubts about its real legal weight. More likely it reflected a desire not to risk a self-fulfilling prophecy. If NATO and its members had referred frequently to the threat to peace in Bosnia as part of the justification for 162
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations Operation Allied Force, the Serb authorities might have been tempted to try to open a ‘second front’ against NATO by stirring up trouble there. A second argument used to justify the air operations was that NATO had sought and received the de facto blessing of the UN SecretaryGeneral. The legacy of the Bosnia experience is again visible here. Between 1992 and 1995, NATO and its member states became used to working with the Secretary-General as the personification of the UN institution. Boutros Boutros-Ghali had, in 1993, appointed Kofi Annan to be his envoy to NATO. This ensured that Annan personally had the chance to become acquainted with NATO and its member states, and vice versa, before the Kosovo crisis moved up the international agenda. Tomás Valásek has claimed that NATO ‘sought and obtained an indirect endorsement’ of the right to use force over Kosovo from Kofi Annan in January 1999, two months before Operation Allied Force was launched.32 This view rests heavily on comments made by Annan on a visit to NATO Headquarters in Brussels towards the end of that month. In his public remarks before meeting the North Atlantic Council, Annan did say that ‘the bloody wars of the last decade’ had not ‘left us with any illusions about the need to use force, when all other means have failed. We may be reaching that limit, once again, in the former Yugoslavia’.33 According to Bruno Simma, he also told a press conference that ‘normally a UN Security Council Resolution is required’ to authorise military action by member states; suggesting, perhaps, that one might not have been with regard to Kosovo.34 Annan’s views were, however, at best ambiguous. In his Brussels remarks he also spoke of Bosnia and stated that ‘the success of the NATO-led mission operation under a United Nations mandate is surely a model for future endeavours’ (emphasis added). Taken as a whole, the sense of Annan’s Brussels remarks conveyed support for robust action, including the use of armed force if necessary, but only within a context where Security Council authorisation had been obtained. That this was his view with regard to Kosovo seemed confirmed in the widely quoted remarks that he made to the press on the day that Operation Allied Force was launched on 24 March 1999: It is indeed tragic that diplomacy has failed, but there are times when the use of force may be legitimate in the pursuit of peace. In helping maintain international peace and security, Chapter 7 of the United Nations Charter assigns an important role to regional organisations. But as Secretary-General, I have many times pointed out, not just in relation to Kosovo, that under the Charter, the Security Council has primary responsibility for maintaining international peace and 163
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts security, and this is explicitly acknowledged in the North Atlantic Treaty. Therefore, the Council should be involved in any decision to resort to force [emphasis added].35 The UN Secretary-General could not, in any event, have bestowed international legitimacy on Operation Allied Force even if he had been so minded. He does have the right, under Article 99 of the UN Charter, to ‘bring to the attention of the Security Council any matter which in his opinion may threaten the maintenance of international peace and security’. He cannot, however, give authorisation on behalf of the Security Council or force its members to do so. In sum, the argument that Kofi Annan had given a de facto green light to the use of force by NATO over Kosovo did not hold water. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that following Annan’s public remarks on day one of the air operation, this argument was scarcely heard thereafter. Much more frequently heard from NATO and its member states was the argument that Operation Allied Force was justified and hence rendered legitimate by the humanitarian imperative of stopping Serb oppression of and violence against the Albanian population in Kosovo. This rationale, indeed, became, over the three months of the air operation, the justification of choice for NATO and its spokespeople. They often used it to develop the argument that, while the action might not be compliant in every respect with the letter of the UN Charter, NATO was acting in support of the basic humanitarian purposes of the world organisation, and therefore within the spirit of the Charter. The then NATO Secretary-General, Javier Solana, encapsulated this argument at his first press conference after Operation Allied Force got under way. He declared that: the NATO countries think that this action is perfectly legitimate and it is within the logic of the UN Security Council [sic] and therefore that is why we are engaged in this operation in order not to wage war against anybody but to try to stop the war.36 The humanitarian imperative argument was bolstered by reference to the language of key UNSCRs. The first UN Kosovo resolution (1160) had been passed by the Security Council in March 1998. It spoke of ‘the serious political and human rights issues in Kosovo’. In September 1998 UNSCR 1199 used stronger language. It spoke of the need to ‘avert the impending humanitarian catastrophe’ in the province; a form of words which was repeated in UNSCR 1203 the following month. In addition, as we have seen earlier, the October 1998 Holbrooke mission to Belgrade 164
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations was undertaken after the UN Secretary-General had called upon UN members to take action to prevent a ‘humanitarian disaster’ in Kosovo. Given the inclusion of such phrases in the relevant UNSCRs there is some basis for the NATO claim to have been acting in the spirit of the resolutions and of the UN Charter more generally. Weighed against this, however, even if one accepts the argument that there was a pressing humanitarian imperative for tackling the Kosovo crisis, there exists at present no generally agreed right of humanitarian intervention in world politics. Since the end of the Cold War there has certainly been a lively debate on the question of whether or not such a right is evolving, and whether it should do so in future.37 No accepted conclusions have as yet been drawn. This has not stopped Peter Rodman from asserting that: The controversy over whether a UN Security Council mandate was needed for such nondefensive NATO interventions (which the United States opposed) seemed virtually settled. The Kosovo precedent validated an exception for ‘humanitarian catastrophes,’ perhaps hinting of future unconstrained NATO action in other, more geopolitical emergencies.38 Yet this view is, at best, premature. In practice, most UN member states continue to instinctively base their views and policy on Article 2(7) of the UN Charter. This says that ‘nothing contained in the present Charter shall authorise the United Nations to intervene in matters which are essentially within the domestic jurisdiction of any state’, unless the Security Council has specifically mandated otherwise. This leads on to the issue of possible NATO ‘self-authorisation’. The term was not used officially by NATO representatives or member states during the course of operations. There are some suspicions, however, that the references which were made to acting ‘in the spirit’ of the UN Charter and UNSCRs constituted a polite way of asserting what amounted, in practice, to the same thing. This was not a new issue on the NATO agenda. It had been apparent as far back as February 1995 when, apropos of a particularly difficult time in Bosnia, the then NATO Secretary-General, Willy Claes, had stated publicly that ‘NATO is more than a sub-contractor of the UN’, and that ‘it will keep its full independence of decision and action. There may even be circumstances which oblige NATO to act on its own initiative in the absence of a UN mandate’ (emphasis added).39 Four years later, at the NATO Washington summit, the then US Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott used similar language: ‘we must be careful not to subordinate NATO to any other international body or 165
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts compromise the integrity of its command structure’, and ‘the Alliance must reserve the right and the freedom to act when its members, by consensus, deem it necessary’.40 Closely related to arguments that NATO and its member states were effectively forced to take military action over Kosovo because of a looming ‘humanitarian catastrophe’, is the view that it was able to act with the implicit authorisation of the Security Council. The meaning of ‘implicit’ in this context is, by definition, somewhat slippery. In making a case that de facto authorisation for the use of force was given by the Security Council, two main arguments were brought into play. The first drew attention to the fact that all three of the UNSCRs on Kosovo which were passed between March and October 1998 stated that the Security Council was ‘acting under Chapter 7’ of the UN Charter. Chapter 7 deals, as noted, with action that the UN can take or authorise ‘with respect to threats to the peace, breaches of the peace, and acts of aggression’. It is under Chapter 7, in short, that the UN can decide to take or authorise enforcement measures against recalcitrant states. Yet the mere citation of Chapter 7 in a UNSCR was hardly a sufficient basis for NATO to claim authorisation to conduct its airstrikes. To begin with, Article 39 of Chapter 7 is quite clear in stating that it is the Security Council which shall both determine when a threat or breach of the peace exists, and decide what measures to take to deal with it. The citing of Chapter 7 in UNSCRs 1160, 1199 and 1203 demonstrated that the Security Council had determined that the Kosovo crisis did constitute a threat to peace. None of the three resolutions authorised military enforcement measures, however, or clearly pointed in that direction. In this latter regard, the only wording from which even a hint of possible future authorisation for military action could be gleaned were the references in UNSCRs 1160 and 1199 to consideration of ‘additional measures’ by the Security Council if the FRY authorities failed to comply with the terms of the resolutions. But, as Catherine Guicherd has pointed out, citing resolutions on Bosnia as an example, established UN practice has been that ‘resolutions including such wording have usually been interpreted as requiring further action by the Security Council to allow military action’. This understanding was given added clarity and weight in the cases of UNSCRs 1160 and 1199 by the fact that ‘Russia and China both had accompanied their votes by legally valid declaratory statements spelling out that the resolutions should not be interpreted as authorising the use of force’.41 The second argument that NATO members could and sometimes did use was based more specifically on UNSCR 1203. The argument went that, by ‘welcoming’ the October 1998 Holbrooke–Milosevic agreement, 166
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations the Security Council had in effect implicitly legitimised the NATO airstrike threat which had accompanied the negotiating process. The threat of airstrikes had first been made just before the deal was finally clinched, clearly with a view to coercing the FRY President into signing up.42 The October 1998 ‘Activation Orders’ by which NATO members had first signalled their willingness to use coercive air power were never formally rescinded prior to the launch of Operation Allied Force in March 1999. It could, therefore, be argued that the Security Council had implicitly authorised the air power threat that NATO implemented, finally, six months later. There are substantial flaws in this argument, however. As in the case of earlier UNSCRs, Russia and China both made clear that their voting on 1203 was premised on the understanding that it did not authorise the use of force in any way.43 Such statements, by two of the Security Council’s five permanent members, were sufficient in themselves to convince some that the whole implicit authorisation argument was, in Bruno Simma’s assessment, ‘untenable’.44 Moreover, the text of Resolution 1203 contained a statement that undoubtedly reflected Russian and Chinese concerns. It reasserted that ‘under the Charter of the United Nations, primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security is conferred on the Security Council’. Far from granting implicit authorisation for military action by NATO, it could be argued that, on the contrary, the terms of Resolution 1203 were an explicit reaffirmation of the UN Security Council’s primacy in any decision to resort to force. A negative argument for NATO self-authorisation could be made on the basis of the obstructive and unconstructive approach of Russia and China in the Security Council over the Kosovo issue. These two states’ shared desire to prevent the Security Council from even seriously considering the use of force was deep-seated and persistent. The Russians, in particular, were unbending. Richard Holbrooke recounted a conversation that illustrated this, dating from early October 1998. He described an informal discussion among the foreign ministers of the six-country Contact Group, which consisted of the United States, Russia, Germany, France, the United Kingdom and Italy. This had originally been formed in 1994 to try to put together a peace plan for Bosnia. In 1998 the Contact Group was reinvigorated for the same basic purpose with regard to Kosovo. Holbrooke described the course of the ‘discussion’ between the then German Foreign Minister, Klaus Kinkel, and his Russian counterpart, Igor Ivanov: Ivanov said: ‘If you take it [the issue of using force] to the UN, we’ll veto it. If you don’t we’ll just denounce you.’ Kinkel says he wants 167
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts to take it to the Security Council, as do the British and French … So, Kinkel says: ‘Let’s have another stab at it.’ But Ivanov says: ‘Fine, we’ll veto it.’ And Kinkel asks again and Ivanov says: ‘I just told you Klaus, we’ll veto it’.45 In a report on the Kosovo crisis and the future of the province, published in 2000, an Independent International Commission concluded that Russia’s ‘rigid commitment to veto any enforcement action’ constituted ‘the major factor forcing NATO into an unmandated action’.46 This contention is plausible. In October 1998 NATO members were debating whether to issue the Activation Orders for the possible use of air power. Secretary-General Javier Solana summed up the discussions that had taken place. One of the key issues, he said, had been ‘the fact that another UNSC Resolution containing a clear enforcement action with regard to Kosovo cannot be expected in the foreseeable future’. Four days later, NATO first threatened the use of coercive air power against the FRY.47 The inflexibility of the Russians and Chinese was even criticised – albeit indirectly – by the UN Secretary-General. In his annual report to the organisation’s General Assembly in September 1999, Kofi Annan criticised the taking of ‘military action outside the established mechanisms for enforcing international law’. But he also stated that ‘the choice, as I said during the Kosovo conflict’, must not be between ‘Council division, and regional action’. He added that ‘the Member States of the United Nations should have been able to find common ground in upholding the principles of the Charter, and acting in defence of our common humanity’.48 None of this gives NATO the a priori right to simply bypass the Security Council and, in effect, opt for self-authorisation of its activities. An alternative option that it might have pursued with regard to the Kosovo crisis was suggested by the British House of Commons Select Committee on Foreign Affairs in May 2000. It would have involved seeking authorisation from the UN General Assembly under the terms of the Assembly’s ‘Uniting for Peace’ Resolution.49 Uniting for Peace was passed by the General Assembly in November 1950. At its heart was the agreement that: If the Security Council, because of lack of unanimity of the permanent members, fails to exercise its primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security in any case where there appears to be a threat to the peace, breach of the peace, or act of aggression, the General Assembly shall consider the matter 168
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations immediately with a view to making appropriate recommendations to Members for collective measures, including in the case of a breach of the peace or act of aggression the use of armed force when necessary, to maintain or restore international peace and security. Uniting for Peace, which requires a two-thirds vote in the General Assembly, has been used sparingly over the years since its adoption. On the other hand, it has been used to deal with critical security breakdowns such as the Korean War in the early 1950s (which provided the impetus for its adoption in the first place) and at the time of the Suez crisis in 1956. The General Assembly can be called into emergency session under Uniting for Peace if nine Security Council members request such a session. Could NATO have used this mechanism to secure UN endorsement for Operation Allied Force? On 26 March 1999, two days after the launch of the airstrikes, the Security Council rejected, by a vote of twelve to three, a draft resolution tabled by Russia calling for an immediate end to the bombing.50 One can infer from this that the United States and its NATO allies on the Council could probably have obtained the nine votes necessary to activate the Uniting for Peace mechanism had they chosen to do so. At least one NATO government (the United Kingdom) reportedly did consider the option but, in the end, balked at it. This was largely because the British government was not sufficiently confident that the necessary two-thirds majority in the General Assembly could in fact have been obtained.51 The United States, United Kingdom and France were used to operating within the framework of the 15-member Security Council. To have taken the decision out to all 189 UN members in the organisation’s plenary forum was a move with too many uncertainties and risks to be palatable. In the final analysis, therefore, NATO members found it easier to proceed with their air operations without an explicit UN mandate, than to take the risk of seeking approval from two-thirds of the totality of the UN’s membership. From May 1999 diplomatic overtures and manoeuvrings over Kosovo began to take place with increasing frequency. Virtually all the proposals which were put forward for ending the crisis envisaged an explicit role for the UN, through Security Council authorisation for any ‘international presence’ which might undertake civilian or military tasks apropos of the implementation of a peace settlement. The diplomatic pressure was being exerted from various quarters. The most important was Germany. This was a leading NATO member state, indeed part of the core ‘Quints’ group within NATO (the label given to the informal caucus of leading NATO members – the United 169
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts States, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Italy – which, in effect, took the day-to-day decisions during Operation Allied Force). The Germans had consistently been among the keenest of the NATO allies to secure formal UN authorisation for what NATO was doing, as illustrated by the Klaus Kinkel story related earlier. This basic approach survived a change of government in the autumn of 1998. If anything, it was adhered to even more strongly by the new ‘Red/Green’ administration of Gerhard Schröder. Although the German government did not try to block the launch of Operation Allied Force in the absence of a Security Council mandate, and indeed committed aircraft to the operation, the UN dimension to its approach was never far from the surface. As early as the middle of April 1999, just three weeks after the launch of air operations, the German government put forward a peace plan. Under this the UN would play a central role, both in sanctioning any agreement that was reached and also in running post-conflict Kosovo itself. Thus was born the proposal for what was eventually to become the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) from June 1999.52 Barry Posen has made a convincing argument that this German initiative effectively triggered off what became a second source of pressure for a UN-friendly settlement in Kosovo – from Russia. Without being explicit, Posen hints at the existence of informal contacts between the Germans and Russians on the Kosovo issue in the lead-up to the German peace proposals being put forward. He notes that on the same day as the Germans put forward their plan, the Russian government formally appointed former Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin as its peace envoy. Overall, Posen concludes that ‘although the German proposal could scarcely be counted a great victory, it did show that the Russians had a wedge into NATO’.53 The German proposals, as developed by Russia, were to form the basis of the agreed plan which was put forward by the foreign ministers of the G-8 (that is, the major NATO members plus Russia and Japan) in the first week of May 1999. This in turn formed the basis of UNSCR 1244, which was passed in June and accompanied the FRY’s agreement to comply with demands for a Serb military withdrawal from Kosovo and the deployment of international civil and military presences in the province. Sensing, by the time of the G-8 proposals, that a majority of NATO members was beginning to appreciate the key role that the Security Council would have to play in any settlement, Kofi Annan was quoted as saying that: 170
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations We have also discovered that even in Kosovo, to have any real chance for real and long term solutions, we need to return to the Security Council. And I am happy that this is happening and I hope it does happen and so it proves that the Council and the UN is needed. And whether one likes it or not, sooner or later one may be required to return to the UN. I hope it will be sooner rather than later. And so what may seem initially to have weakened the organisation may in the end reaffirm a central role, its relevance and its importance.54 Annan’s sentiments may have played a role in helping keep NATO members’ ‘feet to the fire’ during the crucial endgame negotiations which took place in early June. According to Posen, the question, ‘how significant a role would the UN have in Kosovo?’ was the dominant one in these negotiations, which were essentially trilateral, involving Russia, NATO and the FRY.55 The bargaining resulted in the drafting and passage of UNSCR 1244, as noted above. The passing of this resolution represented a substantial victory for those who had favoured a significant UN role in a postsettlement Kosovo. For a start, the passage of a UNSCR was recognised on all sides as being an integral part of the overall settlement package. In other words, it was accepted that the settlement would require the explicit authorisation of the United Nations. The very first sentence in UNSCR 1244 reflected this in reasserting again ‘the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations, and the primary responsibility of the Security Council for the maintenance of international peace and security’. The substance of the resolution was concerned with the deployment of ‘international civil and security presences’ in Kosovo. It in effect adopted the G-8 proposals of the previous month, which were attached to the text of the resolution as two annexes. The ‘civil presence’ (UNMIK) would be run by the UN itself. The ‘security presence’ would be deployed ‘under United Nations auspices’. It would include ‘substantial North Atlantic Treaty Organisation participation’ and would ‘be deployed under unified command and control’. This last phrase meant in plain English that there would be no UN command structure, as there had been in Bosnia during the UNPROFOR period. Rather, the Kosovo Force (KFOR) would be NATO-led, although not restricted to NATO members’ participation. KFOR would thus be akin to IFOR/SFOR in Bosnia. The net effect of UNSCR 1244 has been to create what the House of Commons Select Committee on Foreign Affairs has called ‘an unprecedented constitutional role for the UN’ to take the place ‘of a government 171
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts which has abused its own citizens in the way the Milosevic government did in respect of the majority population of Kosovo’.56 In similar vein, the Independent International Commission on Kosovo has argued that ‘Resolution 1244 created a unique institutional hybrid, a UN protectorate with unlimited power whose purpose is to prepare the province for autonomy and self-government – but in the framework of the FRY’.57 They might also have added that Resolution 1244 is potentially of unlimited duration; the international civil and security presences are to remain in Kosovo ‘unless the Security Council decides otherwise’. Under these circumstances it would be very difficult politically for any NATO member participating in KFOR to unilaterally terminate that involvement.
C O N C L U S I O N : N A T O A N D T H E U N I N KO S O V O A N D B E Y O N D
If nothing goes seriously wrong for the UN in Kosovo in the future (admittedly a fairly sizeable ‘if ’), Ivo Daalder and Michael O’Hanlon would seem to be justified in their opinion that ‘Kosovo ultimately says more about the UN’s continued strength than its weakness’.58 Analysis that sees NATO as having cut the UN out of the Kosovo crisis per se is overly simplistic. By dividing the crisis into three distinct phases, between October 1998 and June 1999, the discussions in this chapter have shown that the world body was almost continuously involved in one way or another. During the first phase (the October 1998 Holbrooke– Milosevic agreement) the UN’s involvement came via the legitimising framework of successive Security Council Resolutions. In phase three (the settlement and the deployment of the international presences), the UN was the lead actor. The Security Council played a crucial role through passing Resolution 1244. This has created, as noted above, an unprecedented de facto UN protectorate in Kosovo. Only during Operation Allied Force did the UN appear sidelined. Yet in practice this was very short-term. Within three weeks of the launch of the operation, the issues of UN involvement in a settlement of the crisis and the subsequent UN role in Kosovo were placed on the NATO agenda as a result of the German peace proposals. Although subject to much hard bargaining, these proposals never subsequently dropped from view completely. What, then, of the future? At the NATO Washington summit in April 1999, held when Operation Allied Force was in full swing, a deliberate effort seemed to have been made to build UN-friendly language into the key declarations. Both the Washington Summit Communiqué and the new 172
Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations NATO Strategic Concept included affirmations that, ‘as stated in the Washington Treaty [NATO’s founding treaty], we recognise the primary responsibility of the United Nations Security Council for the maintenance of international peace and security’.59 The Strategic Concept, in formally setting out the new role for NATO of being prepared to engage in ‘crisis management, including crisis response operations’, stipulated that these would be undertaken ‘in conformity with Article 7 of the Washington Treaty’. Article 7 states that: This Treaty does not affect, and shall not be interpreted as affecting in any way the rights and obligations under the Charter of the Parties which are members of the United Nations, or the primary responsibility of the Security Council for the maintenance of international peace and security.60 Various causal factors have been suggested in explanation of the inclusion of what seems, at first sight, to be a clear statement of intent in Washington to ensure that NATO does not undertake military action without UN authorisation again. It has been argued that the UN-friendly language was included at French insistence, with the United States acquiescing in order to preserve allied unity in the midst of a pressing crisis.61 Others have suggested that the failure of Operation Allied Force to coerce Milosevic into backing down by the time of the Washington summit had ‘tempered the interventionist urge considerably’ among NATO members generally.62 Voices have also been heard arguing that the overall tone of the 1999 Washington documents does not suggest that NATO is now bound by acceptance of UN primacy. Dick Leurdijk and Dick Zandee have drawn attention to passages in the Washington Summit Communiqué and Strategic Concept where NATO is described as ‘an Alliance of nations committed to the Washington Treaty and the United Nations Charter’. This form of words seems innocuous but, according to Leurdijk and Zandee: By thus binding itself once more to both documents, NATO appears to give itself an equal position to the UN and not a subservient one … Thereby NATO assures itself of an autonomous freedom of action, also in those cases where an explicit consent by the Security Council would be impossible. From a legal point of view it comes down to a lessening of the importance of the UN as compared to that of NATO.63 The wording of the 1999 summit statements is ambiguous and capable of being interpreted in different ways. As with many diplomatic documents, 173
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts such ambiguity is almost certainly intentional – if only to satisfy the differing agendas of NATO member states. However, in a crisis not involving responding to a direct attack on one of their number, NATO and its members are, in practice, unlikely to cut out or ignore the United Nations for very long.
NOTES
1. Charter of the United Nations and Statute of the International Court of Justice (New York: UN Department of Public Information, n.d.), pp. 15–16. All subsequent references to the UN Charter are taken from this document. 2. See Martin A. Smith, ‘At Arm’s Length: NATO and the United Nations in the Cold War Era’, International Peacekeeping, 2, 1 (1995), pp. 56–73. 3. Sir Oliver Franks, ‘Minutes of the 18th Meeting of the Washington Exploratory Talks on Security, 15 March 1949’, Foreign Relations of the United States 1949 IV (Washington, DC: US Government Printing Office, 1975), p. 215. 4. Martin A. Smith, On Rocky Foundations: NATO, the United Nations and Peace Operations in the Post-Cold War Era (Bradford: University Department of Peace Studies, 1996). 5. J. Kriendler, ‘NATO’s Changing Role: Opportunities and Constraints for Peacekeeping’, NATO Review, 41, 3 (1993), p. 18. 6. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, Unvanquished: A US–UN Saga (London: I.B. Tauris, 1999), pp. 72–3. 7. Quoted in A. Henrikson, ‘NATO and the United Nations: Toward a Nonallergic Relationship’, in V. Papacosma and M.A. Heiss (eds), NATO in the Post-Cold War Era: Does it Have a Future? (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1995), p. 108. 8. For a good account of developments in the key year of 1992 see [Anon.] Co-operation in Peacekeeping and Peace Enforcement (Brussels: North Atlantic Assembly, 1993), pp. 9–10. On progressive NATO involvement in Bosnia from 1992, see G. Schulte, ‘Former Yugoslavia and the New NATO’, Survival, 39, 1 (1997), pp. 19–42; M. Stenhouse and B. George, NATO and Mediterranean Security: the New Central Region (London: Centre for Defence Studies, 1994), pp. 18–23; Steven Rader, ‘NATO’, in T. Findlay (ed.), Challenges for the New Peacekeepers (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996), pp. 142–52; and D. Leurdijk, The United Nations and NATO in Former Yugoslavia (The Hague: Netherlands Atlantic Commission/ Netherlands Institute of International Relations, 1994). 9. N. Drew, ‘Post-Cold War American Leadership in NATO’, in K. Thompson (ed.), NATO and the Changing World Order (Lanham: University Press of America, 1996), p. 21. 10. Co-operation in Peacekeeping and Peace Enforcement, p. 11. See also D. Leurdijk, ‘Before and after Dayton: the UN and NATO in the former Yugoslavia’, Third World Quarterly, 18, 3 (1997), p. 459. 11. Press Communiqué M-NAC-2(92)106 (Brussels: NATO Press Service, 1992).
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Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations 12. N. Drew, NATO from Berlin to Bosnia: Trans-Atlantic Security in Transition (Washington DC: National Defense University, 1995), p. 13. 13. Co-operation in Peacekeeping and Peace Enforcement, pp. 14–15. 14. On this see especially General Sir Michael Rose, Fighting for Peace (London: Harvill Press, 1998). Rose was commander of UNPROFOR in Bosnia during 1994. See also David Owen, Balkan Odyssey (London: Victor Gollancz, 1995), pp. 246–8. Owen was the EU’s South-East Europe mediator during the early 1990s. 15. Rose, Fighting for Peace, pp. 209–10. 16. Quoted in M. Evans, ‘UN “held back NATO help for Muslims”’, The Times, 31 July 1996. See also G. Wilson, ‘Arm in Arm after the Cold War? The Uneasy NATO–UN Relationship’, International Peacekeeping, 2, 1 (1995), pp. 82–5. 17. Boutros-Ghali, Unvanquished: A US–UN Saga, p. 240. 18. Owen, Balkan Odyssey, pp. 321–2. 19. Report of the Secretary-General Pursuant to General Assembly Resolution 53/35 (1998): ‘Srebrenica Report’ (New York: United Nations, 1999), p. 121. 20. ‘The General Agreement: Annex 1-A (Agreement on the Military Aspects of the Peace Settlement)’ posted at http://www.nato.int/ifor/gfa/gfa-an1a.htm 21. See A. Zukic and A. Poolos, ‘Bosnia: Official Optimistic About Progress This Year’, posted at http://www.rferl.org/nca/features/2000/01/; ‘The Delicate Balkan Balance’, The Economist, 19 August 2000, pp. 35–6; ‘One Step Forward, One Step Back’, The Economist, 7 April 2001, p. 28. 22. See I. Daalder and M. O’Hanlon, Winning Ugly: NATO’s War to Save Kosovo (Washington, DC: Brookings, 2000), pp. 45–62 and M. Weller, The Crisis in Kosovo 1989–1999 (Cambridge: Documents and Analysis Publishing, 1999), Ch. 13. 23. ‘Ambassador Holbrooke Travel to Brussels and Belgrade’ posted at http://secretary.state.gov/www/briefings/statements/ 24. ‘Report of the Secretary-General Prepared Pursuant to Resolutions 1160 (1998) and 1199 (1998) of the Security Council’ posted at http://www.un. org/docs/sc/reports/1998/s1998912.htm 25. Adam Roberts, ‘NATO’s ‘Humanitarian War’ over Kosovo’, Survival, 41, 3 (1999), p. 105. 26. Richard Connaughton, Military Intervention and Peacekeeping: The Reality (Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing, forthcoming), p. 198. 27. ‘Press Release by Professor Bronislaw Geremek, Chairman-in-Office the OSCE, Warsaw, 7 October 1998.’ Reprinted in The Crisis in Kosovo 1989–1999, pp. 292–3. 28. O. Bring, ‘Should NATO Take the Lead in Formulating a Doctrine on Humanitarian Intervention?’, NATO Review, 47, 3 (1999), p. 24. 29. ‘Council Statement on the Situation in Kosovo’ posted at http://www.nato. int/docu/pr/1998/p98–029e.htm 30. ‘Statement on Kosovo’, posted at http://www.nato.int/docu/pr/1998/ p98–061e.htm 31. See R. Tomes, ‘Operation Allied Force and the Legal Basis for Humanitarian Interventions’, Parameters, 30, 1 (2000), p. 48. 32. T. Valásek, ‘NATO at 50’, Foreign Policy in Focus, 4, 11 (1999). 33. ‘Statement by Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations’, January 1999.
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Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts 34. B. Simma, ‘NATO, the UN and the Use of Force: Legal Aspects’, European Journal of International Law, 10, 1 (1999). 35. ‘UN Sec-Gen Kofi Annan on NATO Air Strikes March 24 1999’ (Washington DC: US Information Service, 1999). 36. ‘Press Conference by Secretary-General, Dr Javier Solana and SACEUR, Gen Wesley Clark’, posted at http://www.nato.int/kosovo/press/p990325a.htm 37. A large literature has been generated by this debate. See N. Rodley (ed.), To Loose the Bands of Wickedness: International Intervention in Defence of Human Rights (London: Brassey’s, 1992); J. Chopra and T. Weiss, ‘Sovereignty Is No Longer Sacrosanct: Codifying Humanitarian Intervention’, Ethics and International Affairs, 6 (1992), pp. 95–117; C. Greenwood, ‘Is There a Right of Humanitarian Intervention?’, World Today, 49, 2 (1993), pp. 34–40; Adam Roberts, Humanitarian Action in War (Adelphi Paper 305) (London: IISS, 1996); E. Luttwak, ‘Kofi’s Rule: Humanitarian Intervention and Neocolonialism’, National Interest, 58 (1999/2000), pp. 57–62; M. Ortega, Military Intervention and the European Union (Chaillot Paper 45) (Paris: WEU Institute for Security Studies, 2001). 38. P. Rodman, ‘The Fallout from Kosovo’, Foreign Affairs, 78, 4 (1999), p. 46. 39. ‘Speech by the Secretary General at the Munich Security Conference, February 3–5, 1995’ (Brussels: NATO Press Service, 1995), p. 2. 40. Quoted in R.S. Mangum, ‘NATO’s Attack on Serbia: Anomaly or Emerging Doctrine?’, Parameters, 30, 4 (2000–2001), p. 48. 41. C. Guicherd, ‘International Law and the War in Kosovo’, Survival, 41, 2 (1999), pp. 26–7. 42. ‘Statement to the Press by the Secretary General Following Decision on the ACTORD’ posted at http://www.nato.int/docu/speech/1998/s981013a.htm 43. Daalder and O’Hanlon, Winning Ugly, p. 49 fn. 91. 44. Simma, ‘NATO, the UN and the Use of Force’. 45. Quoted in T. Judah, Kosovo: War and Revenge (London: Yale University Press, 2000), p. 183. 46. Independent International Commission on Kosovo, Kosovo Report (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 161. 47. Simma, ‘NATO, the UN and the Use of Force’. 48. ‘Secretary-General Presents his Annual Report to General Assembly’ (Press Release SG/SM/7136GA/9596) posted at http://www.un.org/news/press/ docs/1999/19990990.sgsm7136.html 49. Kosovo: Volume I Report and Proceedings of the Committee, House of Commons Select Committee on Foreign Affairs, Fourth Report, Session 1999–2000 (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 2000), p. xlvii. 50. ‘Security Council Rejects Demand for Cessation of Use of Force Against Federal Republic of Yugoslavia’ (Press Release SC/6659) posted at http://www.un.org/ news/press/docs/1999/19990326.sc6659.html 51. Kosovo: Volume I Report and Proceedings of the Committee, p. xlvii. 52. Daalder and O’Hanlon, Winning Ugly, p. 165ff. See also D. Leurdijk and D. Zandee, Kosovo: From Crisis to Crisis (Aldershot: Ashgate Publishing, 2001), pp. 86–7. 53. B. Posen, ‘The War for Kosovo’, International Security, 24, 4 (2000), p. 67. 54. ‘Transcript of Press Conference by Secretary-General Kofi Annan at Geneva, on 14 May’ (Press Release SG/SM/6993) posted at http://www.un.org/news/ press/docs/1999/19990514.sgsm6993.html
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Kosovo, NATO and the United Nations 55. 56. 57. 58. 59.
60. 61. 62. 63.
Posen, ‘The War for Kosovo’, p. 76. Kosovo: Volume I Report and Proceedings of the Committee, p. lxi. Independent International Commission on Kosovo, Kosovo Report, p. 9. I. Daalder and M. O’Hanlon, ‘Unlearning the Lessons of Kosovo’, Foreign Policy, 116 (1999), p. 135. Washington Summit Communiqué (Press Release NAC-S(99)64) posted at http://www.nato.int/docu/pr/1999/p99–064e.htm; The Alliance’s Strategic Concept (Press Release NAC-S(99)65) posted at http://www.nato.int/docu/ pr/1999/p99065e.htm [Anon.] The North Atlantic Treaty Organisation: Facts and Figures (Brussels: NATO, 1989), p. 377. N. Butler, ‘NATO at 50: Papering Over the Cracks’, Disarmament Diplomacy, 38 (1999). B. Møller, The UN, the USA and NATO: Humanitarian Intervention in the Light of Kosovo (Working Paper 23) (Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute, 1999), pp. 6–7. Leurdijk and Zandee, Kosovo: From Crisis to Crisis, p. 50. See also Simma, ‘NATO, the UN and the Use of Force’.
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PART 5 Conflict Termination and Peace-building
11
From Antipathy to Hegemony: The Impact on Civil–Military Cooperation1 STUART GORDON
INTRODUCTION
Civil–military cooperation, or CIMIC, has become an increasingly important albeit contentious activity in post-Cold War NATO armies. For many it represents an attempt, particularly by Western militaries, to create a post-Cold War raison d’être with the result of encroaching both upon issues best left to humanitarian and civil agencies and creating an increasingly problematical confusion of roles and identities.2 For others it has represented a practical response to a range of issues catapulted into the public consciousness by events, principally in the former Yugoslavia. However, military involvement in such areas is not a new phenomenon and its contemporary rise largely parallels experiences during the Second World War, particularly during the planning for the invasions of Italy and North-West Europe. Even before this, in 1940 as part of an army in retreat British officers found large-scale movements of civilians to be a major impediment to military operations.3 Displaced civilians frequently screened the movements of advancing enemy forces and provided cover for infiltration by enemy agents. They also congested roads and prevented the advance of resupply convoys and latterly the withdrawal of troops. Later as an invasion force the Allies confronted not only the obstacles and distractions caused by large numbers of civilians moving away from the fighting, but also the problems of restoring sovereignty, reviving civil administration in liberated states and discharging legal obligations to civilians in newly occupied territories. Pragmatism also drove the Allies to assume responsibility for the rapid resuscitation of ‘rule-of-law 181
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts institutions’ in territory liberated from the Germans, both in order to remove one of the reasons for population movement and in order to manage the transition of administrative power. Competition between rival resistance groups and governments in exile was expected to be problematical, particularly in France and the Netherlands. More generally, the settling of scores between resistance groups and suspected collaborators was expected to contribute to a broader breakdown of the rule of law which would destabilise the areas to the rear of the front lines and disrupt military operations. Even in circumstances where responsibility for civil administration had simply passed to an indigenous government, the occupying military were likely to retain practical and residual interest in maintaining the security of the military lines of communication and the areas through which they passed. This also entailed broader interests and responsibilities for other areas of civil administration in support of the civil authorities, themselves lacking resources and existing only in emergent form. The end of this process was the creation of military government in both Italy and briefly in post-war Germany. The term ‘civil affairs’ arose out of necessity. The administration of enemy territories generally came to be referred to as ‘military government’, but the prospect of liberating occupied countries meant that a more acceptable designation was required, hence ‘civil affairs’. This reflected the terminology used by American forces. By 1943 the British War Office department charged with responsibility for civil affairs, MO11, had been expanded to the status of the Directorate of Civil Affairs. In total the Allies employed over 15,000 troops in civil–military type roles, and notwithstanding the frequently generalist nature of their activities it could be argued that by the end of the war civil affairs had become an increasingly influential sub-profession within the British Army, able to directly manage or influence a wide range of largely civil issues. Despite the diversity of function and purpose during both the Second World War and the short period of military government in post-war Germany, the profession of civil affairs was largely forgotten during the Cold War period. The civil affairs structures within the Anglo-Canadian 21 Army Group in Germany largely decayed until, by the beginning of the 1950s, there were comparatively few of the wartime capabilities remaining in the British Army. The emphasis of Cold War civil affairs practitioners became progressively more narrowly defined, reflecting the experiences of preparing for a conventional war on the North German plain with the national federal German authorities assuming responsibility for its own population. Arguably it also reflected the fact that conventional warfare under NATO’s policy of ‘flexible response’, adopted in 182
From Antipathy to Hegemony 1967, essentially became a means of buying time for NATO leaders to take the decision to use nuclear weapons. Hence, conventional warfare was a means for ensuring the nuclear deterrent worked rather than an activity in itself. In such a context civil affairs became rather narrowly defined as ‘host nation support’, and increasingly equated with both community and public relations. For example, within the US 5th Corps in Germany ‘host nation support’ (HNS) is an extremely varied task. One function is to act as the executive agent for all United States forces for the coordination and use of training areas in Germany. In addition it serves as the 5th Corps agent and representative for developing and maintaining host nation relations in Germany. Host nation relationships may include everything from ensuring access to training facilities to providing recommendations to commanders relating to social events and broadly supporting German– American community relations. The absence of an effective definition also led to the confusion of civil affairs with the provision of low level politico-military advice provided by the civil service. The result of such confusions was to contribute to British civil affairs increasingly exhibiting a distinctly ad hoc and improvised approach. Without dedicated and earmarked civil affairs units it was perhaps inevitable that the civil affairs role degenerated into amorphousness. Nevertheless, while dedicated civil affairs capabilities decayed after the Second World War, the importance of the civil–military interface was not lost on British commanders; nor were they insensitive to the civilian dimension of operations or the penalties to be endured for mishandling relations with a civil community. Experiences after the Second World War, in Palestine, Aden, Malaya, Cyprus and Northern Ireland, illustrated that a strong civil–military component was an integral part of British counter-revolutionary warfare doctrine. Nevertheless, this did not translate into a specific civil affairs capability of the type seen in 21 Army Group. Rather, if anything, the ascendant theories of police and civil supremacy tended to crowd out the experience of a dedicated civil affairs structure and a limitation of the military role to that which was essential in support of the non-militarised elements of the executive branch of government.4 Perhaps the key point is that while the idea of a generalised sensitivity to the civil–military interface was deeply ingrained by post-war experience, there was a generalised lack of idea on how to capitalise on opportunities or provide the institutions necessary to structure this relationship. The result was that for the British, civil affairs activities were largely relegated to being the ad hoc initiative of transitory individual local commanders. The United States’ experience of civil affairs was very different. In 1943 the US Army created a separate Civil Affairs Division from the Provost 183
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Marshal’s Corps. It undertook operations in both the Pacific and European theatres and played a key role in the administration of occupied Germany prior to the establishment of the Control Commission. At the point when the British capabilities had largely decayed, the US civil affairs capability played an important role in the management of displaced civilians during the Korean conflict and the restoration of civil administration in recaptured territory. It also played an important role during the Vietnam War, developing its current linkage to Special Operations. More latterly it was also deployed early and in force in the invasions of both Grenada and Panama. Even in the relatively civilian-free context of the Gulf War, civil affairs units performed a wide variety of tasks including liaison duties with the host nation government, humanitarian relief activities, planning for non-combatant evacuation operations and educating United States units about Saudi Arabian culture. Several civil affairs soldiers accompanied French infantry as they attacked the small town of As Salman in order to deal with civilians caught up in the fighting, and enemy prisoners of war. Subsequently, they administered the town – something that had not been done since the Korean War. The administration was conducted in order to reduce civilian interference with military operations, identify and acquire local resources, fulfil legal obligations and moral considerations in accordance with international law agreements, and terminate hostilities with conditions favourable to the long-term national interest of the allied coalition.5
T H E E V O L U T I O N O F C I M I C S I N C E T H E C O L D WA R
With the end of the Cold War CIMIC received a much greater degree of attention within the British Army. It became a central feature of British Peace Support Operations (PSO) doctrine and its importance was also reflected in the increasing numbers of posts, from battalion to Ministry of Defence level, dedicated to aspects of managing the civil–military interface. The increasing emphasis placed upon CIMIC was a product of a variety of factors, but in particular the growth in the numbers of UN missions brought about by the end of the Cold War.6 Several of these missions also had what could be described as a multifunctional nature, combining a range of developmental and peacebuilding aspirations.7 The resulting holistic and solution-oriented approaches harnessed an array of institutional actors bringing the UN military into a far closer 184
From Antipathy to Hegemony relationship with other civilian aspects of the mission. The end of the Cold War also ensured that former Cold War protagonist states such as Great Britain could contribute troops more frequently to peacekeeping operations than had been the case in the past. The increase in complexity and size of humanitarian emergencies and the volatility and danger of the environments also combined with the lack of rapid implementation capacity of other civil and humanitarian institutions to increase the occasions upon which the military were deployed alongside humanitarian agencies. The scale of these emergencies and the relative lack of implementing capacity within the non-governmental organisation (NGO) and UN community has generated a degree of frustration within governmental donor agencies, leading them to seek to play a direct role in several emergencies. For example, at the end the Gulf War in March 1991 there were 450,000 Kurdish refugees on the Turkish border and 1,200,000 on the Iranian border. Within 18 months, 1,500,000 Bosnians were trapped in Central Bosnia. Emergencies in Rwanda and Zaire were also of a similar scale. While the capacities and expertise of several major NGOs (such as Oxfam, Save the Children Fund (SCF) or Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF)) have increased dramatically, the bulk of NGOs make only modest contributions. Several NGOs have also been criticised for incompetence and political dependence.8 Consequently, governments have been unable to rely upon NGOs to be the major providers of humanitarian relief. Similarly while UN specialised agencies have also increased in competence, their performance has frequently been hampered by inter-agency rivalry, the overlap of mandates and a frequent lack of support from donor governments as well as problematical administration and procurement procedures. The process of operationalising departments such as the British ODA (now the Department for International Development) led to even greater linkages between ministries and troops operating under the same national flags. Such processes have also been reinforced by the changing purpose underlying military action. Without the mobilisation of clear national interests, Western governments in particular have been perceived as utilising military action for ostensibly humanitarian ends and as a substitute for more traditionally robust military responses.9 This has caused a general blurring of the distinctions between military and humanitarian activities which has also been compounded by a confusion of the traditional, local-level consent-building activities of militaries with the various relief, development and peace-building programmes of a variety of civil agencies. This process of blurring has been furthered by UN intervention in wars taking place largely in urban environments, particularly in the former 185
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Yugoslavia. During the Bosnian war the urban populations, dependent upon comparatively sophisticated economic and social infrastructures, proved to be unable to provide for their own basic survival once these structures were destroyed or undermined by warfare. This combined with the high levels of insecurity experienced by humanitarian agencies and the routine obstructionism by warring factions to lead the UN Protection Force (UNPROFOR) soldiers into routinely conducting activities such as needs assessment and infrastructure repair, in marked contrast to a reluctance to move into ‘protection’. Such programmes have generally required skills beyond those of most Western militaries, geared largely for high-intensity warfare. Hence, the military have been drawn into actively facilitating the programmes of other agencies. UNPROFOR also offers another explanation for the increased salience of CIMIC. The challenges and controversies of UNPROFOR were, to some extent, legitimised by the increasing focus of the UN military on civil projects from February 1994.10 CIMIC offered a means of legitimising a controversial and inadequate intervention which also lacked reference points in terms of national interest clearly communicated to a domestic audience. The need for legitimisation in such circumstances was made more pressing by the rise of a global and more intrusive media. In such a context the relationship between civilian and military institutions, and the treatment of the local population in the area of operations, inevitably was subject to increased media scrutiny. Furthermore, the conditions and attitudes of the indigenous populations were an increasingly important consideration for commanders in the determination of the end-state of the campaign and in gaining minimum levels of acceptance of UNPROFOR’s presence. However, CIMIC’s role in legitimising a controversial presence was, arguably, part of a broader change in the nature of Western warfare brought about by the spread and deepening of its liberal norms. Sir John Keegan, for example, has written of liberal society’s rejection of warfare and its consequences, thereby redefining the conventional connotations of the phrase ‘post-war society’. However, the new military technologies of the 1980s, and later the Gulf War itself, also created the mirage of the bloodless and distant war and the possibility of a precise application of military means for both political and humanitarian ends. Arguably, to a degree this eroded governments’ capacity to hide behind casualty intolerance and caused them to seek more creative forms of military engagement with a crisis. CIMIC offered exactly that possibility. The increasing salience of the civil–military interface also reflected the changed nature of military deployments. In 1996, Field Marshal 186
From Antipathy to Hegemony Sir Peter Inge, the British Chief of the Defence Staff, argued that, ‘We now realise through experience that we could be required to fight for extended periods without nearby well-found bases and without the benefit of good host nation support.’11 Clearly he had in mind operations in Bosnia. The new environments and crises have required something more than raw military capability. Crises (particularly, although not exclusively, in Bosnia) demonstrated an unavoidably ‘human’ nature with international interventions set within complex diplomatic processes. Engaging with these processes became essential if the coercive power of the military was to be employed successfully. This engendered a greater reliance upon civil–military interactions than a simple dependence on the raw actual or potential use of firepower. Thomas Schelling had drawn a similar distinction when he argued that ‘the power to hurt is bargaining power. To exploit it is diplomacy’.12 The process of exploitation required from the military a much broader range of capabilities.13 The need for such new capabilities was presaged with the deployment of British troops to Bosnia-Herzegovina as part of UNPROFOR in October 1992. This presented enormous practical challenges for which British military doctrine and operational experience appeared to offer few solutions. The problems appeared in a number of guises. First, the UNPROFOR forces were confronted with a range of UN and humanitarian NGOs in the context of a mandate that while humanitarian in principle was increasingly incoherent and contained enforcement elements that placed a supposedly impartial UN force in the position of a belligerent.14 For a wide range of NGOs, including household names such as Médecins Sans Frontières and Save the Children Fund, this complicated their relationship with the UNPROFOR military, forcing them either to brave the Bosnian battlefields alone (with all of the attendant security risks) or to associate with an increasingly belligerent UNPROFOR. For the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) delegates the dilemmas went further, for while UNPROFOR’s support was necessary in order to achieve their own humanitarian mandate, overt association with UNPROFOR contradicted both their own operating principles and potentially compromised their position as the guardians of international humanitarian law. For the British military at least, engagement with this confusing and fiercely independent humanitarian community was both necessary, given the mandate, and frustrating. For many they were little more than ‘a pestilential nuisance’ (a phrase used by David Owen),15 for which the military had ill-defined obligations and little authority to direct. Relationships were also complicated by preconceptions held by both sides. For some within the humanitarian community, their experience of operating 187
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts alongside militaries had been conditioned in the context of complex emergencies where the military were barely subjected to elected civilian control or the rule of law. For others, the military were perceived as conservative representatives of officialdom and the state system – a system fiercely in opposition with the self-image of independence and individuality that fuelled their humanitarian zeal. The mutual incomprehension arising from ignorance over decision-making procedures and profound differences between the humanitarian and military communities, attitudes towards risk tolerance were all compounded by gender and generational differences, themselves exacerbated by a controversial mandate and a dangerous and demanding operational environment. Nevertheless, for the military, disengagement was not an option. Instead, understanding the basis upon which cooperation, in any form, could be constructed was necessary, time-consuming and confusing, requiring dedicated, full-time officers at the level of the battalion battle group and above. Consequently, while civil–military cooperation represented a burden, it was also an unavoidable necessity that generated obvious organisational consequences in terms of effort and structures for managing the interface. The lack of effective implementing capacity within UNHCR also combined with UNPROFOR’s mandate to lead to what could be described as military encroachment onto humanitarian issues. In the absence of sufficient staff, soldiers routinely engaged in access negotiations and needs assessment projects best left to the humanitarian community. UNHCR, at one point, even trained UNPROFOR officers in needs assessment procedures. Furthermore, this process of military encroachment into humanitarian issues was paralleled at the other end of the organisational spectrum by the blurring of distinctions between the UN and NGO humanitarian communities. In an effort to intentionally blur the distinctions between the various humanitarian actors in order to facilitate access, UNHCR issued identity documents, vehicle registration plates and stickers that made it very difficult to differentiate UN from NGO staff. The increasing operationalisation of donor agencies compounded this process of homogenisation, causing the international military and humanitarian efforts to blur with the humanitarian policies and actions of donor governments, many of which were also major troop contributors to UNPROFOR itself. This blurring of distinctions and the militarisation of humanitarian efforts was also matched by their broader politicisation. For UNHCR this was felt most keenly in terms of the pressure from donor governments to offer in-country and in situ solutions to asylum requests.16 However, without sufficient personnel and resources, UNHCR found it impossible 188
From Antipathy to Hegemony to provide sufficient protection, leaving them exposed to criticisms that they responded to donor government pressure at the expense of those requiring protection. The politicisation of humanitarian assistance was also felt in terms of the Sarajevo airlift. Begun in 1992 and lasting, albeit intermittently, until Sarajevo’s siege was lifted in 1995, this was based on an agreement known as the ‘Agreement of 5 June 1992 on the Reopening of Sarajevo Airport for Humanitarian Purposes’. The agreement was largely brokered by UNPROFOR’s Head of Civil Affairs, Cedric Thornberry, with limited input from and consultation with UNHCR. The agreement was negotiated in the context of UNPROFOR’s profound weakness vis-à-vis the Bosnian Serbs. Consequently, the final document contained a range of unavoidable concessions with profoundly negative consequences. In particular it created a system legitimising Bosnian Serb administrative control of emergency food deliveries to Sarajevo and also to areas beyond, while also basing food aid deliveries on population figures rather than humanitarian need. Furthermore, it also allowed for Serb ‘inspectors’ at the airport, a system which rapidly developed into a crude mechanism for restricting the flow of aid.17 While the concessions were understandable in 1992, once the Croat–Moslem war ended in 1994 and land corridors became available it was possible to suspend the airlift operation and renegotiate the terms of access to Sarajevo in order to obtain a more favourable agreement. However, UNHCR favoured continuing the airlift both as a response to pressure from donors (in order to counter domestic criticism that little was being done to ameliorate the plight of those besieged) and as a result of their own conclusion that once halted it would be difficult to obtain persuade aircraft donating governments to restart aid flights. Consequently, both the politicisation and militarisation of humanitarian responses served to complicate the relationship between the humanitarian NGOs, the UNHCR and UNPROFOR. Furthermore, the failure by the international community to respond to Bosnian Serb and Croat ethnic cleansing with anything more than what amounted to a humanitarian placebo ensured that UNPROFOR was heavily criticised in its own right. As a mission designed both to ameliorate suffering and to buy time for negotiations to produce a political settlement, it had some merit. However, as the settlement increasingly proved elusive, UNPROFOR effectively appeared to become a strategy in its own right. Western governments, constrained by casualty intolerance and dire warnings as to the cost in blood of ground-based enforcement action against the Serbs, were unwilling to take action that raised the potential of a ground war against the Yugoslav National Army (JNA). Consequently, it increasingly appeared as if the international community 189
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts had responded to the crisis by substituting a humanitarian mandate. Given the evident divisions within the UN Security Council, this was largely inevitable.18 It was also a process that had more subtle origins, reflecting the growth of what has subsequently been described as the ‘Integration Model’ – the belief that political, humanitarian and military action under UN auspices can be placed within a common and mutually reinforcing strategic framework that aids the creation of a sustainable peace. This model saw its most vivid formal expression in the then UN Secretary-General Dr Boutros Boutros-Ghalli’s An Agenda for Peace. Published in 1992, prior to the deployment of the bulk of UNPROFOR’s Bosnia Command, this represented the intellectual bones of the UNPROFOR structure, leading many to believe in the possibility of new and more creative forms of international engagement with a crisis. As a consequence it ushered in what Hugo Slim has described as a period of ‘humanitarian experimentation’. If this is the case then UNPROFOR was a laboratory in its own right. This ‘integrated’ approach was also a product of the increasing operationalisation of government donor agencies referred to earlier. While this was itself a product of the increasing scale of emergencies such as that in the former Yugoslavia, it arose, too, from the increasing need for a foreign policy return on development and emergency assistance. It was also possibly even a reflection of the liberalisation of foreign policies, reflecting the ending of the Cold War and the gradual coalescence of foreign policies around vague and shifting liberal norms rather than their subjugation to the strategic imperatives of the Cold War. Whatever its purpose, in operational terms the elision of foreign policy objectives and governmental humanitarian action served to strengthen pressures towards the creation of a strategic framework approach to the relationship between humanitarian, political and military action. Consequently, such pressures led to the UN’s operational involvement in Bosnia to being characterised as humanitarian action, supported by a limited military presence being used as a catalyst for peace while also ameliorating the worst effects of the war on the civilian population. While this was the intended strategic framework, the reality saw a mission plagued with problems that undermined this goal. Under-resourced, illequipped, driven by strategically ill-considered Security Council resolutions and increasingly lacking the consent of the belligerents, the UNPROFOR mission failed to promote the emergence of peace. In such a context the consequences of militarising a humanitarian endeavour in the course of an active conflict became increasingly apparent. The novelty and complexity of the environment, combined with the unfamiliarity and multiplicity of humanitarian actors to spawn a new 190
From Antipathy to Hegemony British doctrine first as Wider Peacekeeping in 1994 and then as Peace Support Operations (PSO) in 1998. Wider Peacekeeping focused upon the maintenance of consent.19 While seen by many as too fragile a concept upon which to build a doctrine for volatile environments such as those in Bosnia and Somalia, it proved enormously influential in the early 1990s and stimulated the development of mechanisms designed to build and maintain consent. According to senior British UNPROFOR commanders, CIMIC and in-theatre military–military liaison were critical to this. The British position as the lead nation in NATO’s Allied Command Europe Rapid Reaction Corps (the ARRC) ensured that this emphasis placed upon CIMIC also developed within NATO’s crisis reaction structures, supported by United States civil affairs capability within NATO.
C I M I C A F T E R T H E D AY T O N A C C O R D S
The development of CIMIC within Great Britain and NATO was given a tremendous boost by NATO’s implementation of the Dayton peace agreement and its own post-Cold War adaptations. The impact of the former was charted by Colonel William Phillips, former director of NATO CIMIC policy. He argued that the wide variety of international and non-governmental organisations attempting to ‘assist in a wide range of political, humanitarian, economic and social tasks’ ensured that CIMIC became a key consideration for NATO commanders.20 But NATO’s involvement in CIMIC tasks was not simply about facilitating the work of these organisations. Phillips argued that CIMIC activities eventually broke down along two main lines: those in support of the military force and those in support of the civil environment. In effect the former served largely to legitimise the NATO presence, while the latter contributed to the restoration of essential public services and economic reconstruction – viewed as essential in order to provide a range of benefits to cement the peace. NATO’s CIMIC activities also developed chronologically. During the winter of 1995–96 the CIMIC focus of IFOR (the NATO-based Implementation Force for the Dayton agreement) was largely on supporting UNHCR’s emergency efforts, ICRC’s prisoner release programmes and NATO’s own short-term, immediate projects, with civil–military relations being essentially reactive. From spring 1996, Phillips argues that IFOR’s interaction with the civil partners evolved along a range of additional dimensions, including ‘humanitarian support, national elections, longer term projects, and infrastructure 191
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts reconstruction’.21 In early 1997, the themes expanded further with SFOR (the Stabilisation Force) activities supporting the efforts of civil organisations in ‘repatriation, reconstruction, capital investment projects, municipal elections and civil institution building’.22 Phillips attributed this expansion to the increasing presence and effectiveness of key civil implementation organisations, such as the Office of the High Representatives, Joint Civilian Commissions, the World Bank, the OSCE and the United Nations Mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina International Police Task Force (IPTF). However, the expansion of NATO’s CIMIC activities reflected other factors as well. In part the slow pace and lacklustre implementation of the civilian aspects of Dayton drew the military into the civil dimension more than perhaps would otherwise have been the case. In part this may also have served to counteract increasing and widespread criticism that NATO troops were failing to deal sufficiently with the issue of arresting Bosnian war criminals. The number of states contributing troops to the CIMIC tasks also expanded significantly in 1998, largely due to the reappearance of the burden-sharing debate within NATO. Until December 1997 the bulk of NATO’s CIMIC staff in Bosnia were drawn from the United States, reflecting the absence of CIMIC capabilities in many NATO armies. In order to make the burden – itself a reflection of the difficulties encountered by the United States in sustaining a CIMIC Task Force (CMTF) that was largely manned by reserve soldiers – more equitable, from August 1997 there was an attempt to restructure CIMIC provision through the creation of a CMTF with approximately 50 per cent of the personnel drawn from European states. This obviously had a broader effect in stimulating increasing attention and resources directed towards CIMIC by European NATO members. The CMTF contained specialists who dealt with issues as diverse as small business assistance, new enterprise programmes, poultry inspection, agricultural education, the restoration of airport control systems and telecommunications networks, health education, health systems, school assessments, and building restoration. There was also a diverse range of engineering projects, including restoration of the Srpski Brod oil refinery in the Respublika Serpska, the Bihac railway, the Doboj lime facility, Jajce waterfall, various sewerage treatment plants and Sarajevo Zoo. NATO’s increasing focus on CIMIC also reflected the adoption of a crisis management role and increasingly broad approaches to the concepts of security and stability. This was matched by recognition of the increasing need to take into account ‘social, political, cultural, religious, economic, environmental and humanitarian factors when planning and conducting military operations’.23 There was also a need to manage and institutionalise 192
From Antipathy to Hegemony relations between the military force and large numbers of ‘increasingly sophisticated international and non-governmental civilian organisations’.24 CIMIC also potentially offered a means of dealing with resource shortages in national logistics capabilities made more apparent by operations conducted beyond the NATO area. In the context of declining and increasingly overstretched defence budgets, there was a general and growing need to reconsider and broaden the mechanisms for facilitating the provision of logistic and host nation support as well as reducing the reliance on military resources. The growing importance of CIMIC also reflected the vulnerability of NATO troops deployed in former Yugoslavia and the intolerance of many NATO governments to casualties. NATO implicitly identified this as a reason by arguing that: The force may be partially dependent on the civilian population for resources, information, and rely on the civil authorities to provide security in certain areas. It may even be impossible to gain full freedom of action and movement without their co-operation. Moreover, merely establishing good relations might be enough to deny the same advantages to hostile potentially hostile forces.25 This theme was explicitly adopted in NATO’s ‘New Strategic Concept’ of April 1999 which highlighted the protective role of CIMIC in the adoption of the new concept of ‘Civilian Environment Protection’. CIMIC’s development was also reinforced by other NATO adaptations, particularly its outreach programmes, where it was increasingly used as a means of strengthening Partnership for Peace (PfP) cooperation and contributing to NATO becoming an agency for change in promoting European stability. There was also a growing recognition of the legally and morally inescapable nature of CIMIC. NATO argued that ‘whatever the situation, allied commanders have a moral and legal responsibility towards the civilians in area which can only be met by co-operating with the civilian authorities and organisations’.26 As such, CIMIC represented more than a practical response to the problems of managing the civil–military interface; it became an expression in warfare of both Western liberal norms and casualty intolerance. The development of these themes led to a further broadening of thinking within NATO, particularly relating to CIMIC utility within North Atlantic Treaty ‘Article 5 Operations’ (under which NATO military operations are conducted). NATO increasingly recognised the requirement for CIMIC in Article 5 Operations and Peace Support Operations. Its precise role in high-intensity operations will 193
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts obviously depend upon the location of operations and extent to which fighting degrades national authorities. Its principal task is to monitor civil factors affecting military operations, but it also offers a means for facilitating the withdrawal of military units in the context of a self-sustaining peace.27 In part this reflected the received wisdom of US civil affairs formations on the subject, reinforced by their experience in the 1991 Gulf War. But it was also a logical extension of thought processes stimulated by European NATO members’ involvement in the implementation of the Dayton accords. Increasingly within NATO, CIMIC was viewed as having utility throughout the spectrum of conflict. Consequently, the NATO Military Committee encouraged the development of CIMIC capabilities as a responsibility of member states, rather than a specifically NATO capability.28 The increased focus on CIMIC capabilities represented more than a simple means for discovering a post-Cold War NATO purpose. While it clearly was a major paradigm shift in concepts of military professionalism it was more in terms of a return to, rather than creation of, more creative mechanisms for managing the civil–military interface. In effect, it could be seen as part of a broader renaissance in conventional and expeditionary warfare. The approach to CIMIC was based upon an unshakeable belief that an integrated approach with the humanitarian community was largely possible and desirable from all perspectives. Such thinking fostered a conviction that emergency and, particularly, development assistance would and should be provided through semi-formal conditional strategic frameworks. However, this view is not universally shared.29
T H E KO S O V O C R I S I S
The next major boost to the development of CIMIC capabilities and the emphasis placed upon them arose from the 1999 Kosovo crisis. In many ways the terms of the civil–military relationship were profoundly different during the onset of the crisis, particularly after the NATO bombing campaign had begun. Whereas the civil–military relations that prevailed throughout UNPROFOR’s existence were often characterised as antipathetic, the Kosovo crisis demonstrated the preponderance of military humanitarian response capacities over those of the humanitarian community – even the UNHCR. The military emerged as the hegemonic humanitarian actor.30 Military involvement in the establishment of the refugee camps in both Albania and Macedonia was a predominantly political, rather than 194
From Antipathy to Hegemony humanitarian, agenda on the part of NATO states. Such actions contributed to the stabilisation of both Balkan states and could be viewed as part of the web of semi-formal security assurances offered to both by NATO.31 Such action also legitimised NATO air action, itself conducted under dubious legality, and added to calculations that good outweighed bad in terms of the consequences of NATO’s overall strategy. Furthermore, military encroachment onto the humanitarian sphere also contributed to avoiding accusations that the humanitarian disaster was precipitated by NATO air action, itself legitimised in terms of preventing an impending humanitarian catastrophe. It may also have drawn attention away from the surprisingly controversial absence of a ground offensive. Civil–military coordination in Kosovo, particularly that between UNHCR and NATO military contingents, was also complicated by UNHCR’s own humanitarian operating principles. UNHCR faced what could be described as a structural dilemma: because of the scale of the crisis and its own lack of resources it lacked the capacity to respond without military assistance, but the provision of that assistance by NATO threatened perceptions of UNHCR’s impartiality, and would also have undermined its ability to coordinate NGOs reluctant to associate with an increasingly politicised UNHCR.32 Hence, initially at least, it rejected NATO’s standing offer of military assistance, made on 2 September 1998, until the first week after the bombing campaign began. This situation was compounded by UNHCR’s lack of proactive planning in the early stages of the crisis. This put it in a weak position to match the speed and scale of NATO’s planning (which was necessary to legitimise the military operation to domestic audiences, but also due to NATO’s legal obligations resulting from the Hague and Geneva Conventions), or even that of individual NATO states operating outside of the NATO planning process. There were significant efforts by UNHCR to avoid the militarisation of assistance through endeavouring to limit NATO’s role to that of supporting camp administration, the management of logistics depots and airlifts. But the lack of effective consultation between NATO and UNHCR, arising from UNHCR’s lack of preparedness for the crisis, left the agency with little choice but to accept the relationship on NATO’s terms. This situation enabled the NATO military to largely dictate the agenda and began what was widely perceived to be a process of militarising the relief efforts. It also stimulated the development of bilateral relationships over relief and other efforts by NATO (and individual NATO states) with the governments of Albania and Macedonia, thereby further bypassing the UNHCR and reducing its coordination role. Such politicisation may also have had more direct effects on military–humanitarian relationships 195
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts and coordination structures. In particular, both Albania and Macedonia dealt bilaterally with NATO rather than using the coordination structures established by UNHCR. In the case of Albania this extended to creating a coordination structure, the Emergency Management Group, with the implicit aim of marginalising UNHCR. This reflected their own sense of vulnerability but also their broader foreign policy priorities in terms of strengthening their relationships with NATO. Several senior UNHCR officers viewed this as a deliberate attempt to circumvent the UNHCR’s coordination through a rejection of the UNHCR’s competence, in order to play a more prominent role in the humanitarian programmes to legitimise NATO’s ‘humanitarian war’ and their own involvement. Bilateral relationships also developed between Albania and both Italy and Greece. Both states had deployed troops previously as part of military assistance programmes and simply switched their efforts to humanitarian ones in support of containing Albanian population movements. These were followed by the deployment of French and United States troops who engaged in camp construction under largely bilateral arrangements with the Albanian government. As a consequence there was a marked tendency to bypass NATO coordination structures as well as the arrangements established between NATO and UNHCR on 3 April 1999. This nationalisation of the relief effort was also reflected in the management of the refugee camps which were increasingly run by national contingents. It could be argued that this was partly a reflection of the lack of standing institutional capacity for CIMIC embedded within NATO (as opposed to national military structures) for the management of such activities, combining with strong national preferences to show the flag, such as was also reflected in Germany’s insistence on World Food Programme use of German-donated food within the German military area of responsibility within Kosovo.33 The capabilities for military encroachment in areas such as funding agencies, national NGO implementing partners, and civil affairs troops, largely lay within member states’ military capabilities rather than NATOs. Nationalisation was therefore also a product of NATO’s own incapacity enabling the intrusion of other national agendas. The extension of NATO into this area should not be seen as inevitable. There are voices within NATO that resist most extensions of its role. France, for example, has traditionally held what could be described as a minimalist view of the alliances role and, more recently, its functions. Nationalisation also reflected the weakness of NATO’s own command and control capabilities.34 Militarisation and nationalisation of relief efforts also reflected the blurring of humanitarian and political priorities. For example, German participation in the construction of camps in Macedonia 196
From Antipathy to Hegemony arose partly out of efforts to overcome Macedonian government resistance to their extension, and formed part of a broader set of diplomatic and economic packages (including a European Union stabilisation package in mid-April) designed to both stabilise Macedonia and shore up its support for NATO in the face of mounting domestic opposition. Nevertheless, the result was a range of camps that varied considerably in quality and adherence to standards of best practice. For example, there was marked variation in the quality of camps constructed by the Germans, the Turks and troops from the United Arab Emirates (UAE). This reflected a number of factors: the rapid onset of the crisis and the deployment of national military contingents prior to the creation of effective NATO command and control structures; the limited coordinating and standardsetting role played by UNHCR (reflecting both a lack of resources and, in Albania, its deliberate marginalisation); a general failure to effectively coordinate with the humanitarian community; and, finally, the absence of common professional standards for humanitarian activity across the NATO contingents. The problem of nationalisation was not restricted to Germany. British and French military humanitarianism in Macedonia resulted from a request from the Macedonian government on 1 April 1999, itself prompted by the offer of financial assistance. For the British and French such action contributed to resolving a range of problems such as the contentious Blace crossing point issue, as well as reducing the probability that the Macedonian government would renege on its support for NATO’s military campaign, and serving as a compelling demonstration of NATO’s humanitarian face. Also, once more an explanation for military encroachment can be found in terms of UNHCR’s lack of capacity. The request for assistance was passed to UNHCR who turned it down as a consequence of their lack of ability to respond sufficiently quickly. Consequently, it may be possible to conclude that in the context of large-scale emergencies engaging Western national interests and military responses, the future militarisation of humanitarian efforts and coordination structures may well be largely unavoidable. Nevertheless, such processes may be mitigated through the creation of greater planning capacities within UNHCR and, perhaps rather strangely, the creation of a permanent and rapidly deployable NATO CIMIC organisation, rather than simply national civil affairs capabilities. Seen as a pro tem measure the extension of NATO’s Euro-Atlantic Disaster Relief Cooperation Centre (EADRCC) into broader humanitarian issues, pushed by the United States and Italy, could potentially be a positive development.35 197
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts CONCLUSION
Certainly for Western European armies their experiences of a variety of operational deployments in the Balkans has stimulated the development of structures and policies aimed at managing the civil–military interface. However, the terms of that relationship frequently remain troubled both by the political context of the operations and as a product of disparities in the relative implementing capacities of the military and humanitarian agencies. The creation of mechanisms for effective coordination between civilian and military agencies is also complicated by generic difficulties with UN coordinating mechanisms such as OCHA (UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs), and the Lead Agency concept, neither of which are universally accepted and, consequently, fail to provide an obvious and uncontested focal point for liaison within the humanitarian community.36 The net result of this is that humanitarian representation in coordinating structures can tend to exhibit a schizophrenic and amorphous nature – directly paralleling that of militaries engaged in multinational operations, even within the context of established military structures such as NATO. This is part of a much broader problem relating to the enfeeblement of UN coordination structures. As part of the 1997 reform package, OCHA’s role was deliberately limited to that of facilitation of coordination rather than its more positive or active forms. Its capacity has been further reduced by its limited size and what Mike Pugh has described as the ‘persistence of the lead agency concept’.37 Pugh also argues that the bilateral agencies are themselves heavily politicised through both their funding and constitutional arrangements. OCHA’s lack of authority is paralleled in the Office of the High Representative’s (OHR’s) role in implementing the Dayton agreement. In particular, the requirement to respect the autonomy of the agencies has ensured that the OHR’s role has been limited to the provision of ‘general guidance’ under the Dayton peace agreement. Obviously such unpredictability among both sets of organisational partners complicates both the creation of an integrated approach or strategic framework for action, and the relationship in general. Nevertheless, while the terms of the civil–military relationship may be highly context-dependent, it is fair to say that most NATO countries have begun the process of creating civil affairs-type capabilities that may, with time, enable a more structured, predictable and enduring form of civil–military relationship to be created. In the British case this is seen most clearly in the creation, in 1997, of the British Army Civil Affairs Group (CAG), a mixed regular and reserve unit dedicated towards 198
From Antipathy to Hegemony facilitating the management of the civil–military interface in support of other non-specialist Army units and formations. Nevertheless, despite the formative experiences of operations in the former Yugoslavia, and the organisational changes that have resulted, this is a relationship that is likely to continue to defy predictability.
NOTES
1. Some elements of this chapter are based upon an earlier work, S. Gordon, ‘Understanding the Priorities for Civil–Military Co-operation (CIMIC)’ published in the Journal of Humanitarian Assistance posted at http://www.jha. ac/articles/a003.htm 2. Sadako Ogata, for example, has argued that there was a requirement to ‘define the increasingly blurred boundaries and limits of humanitarian action’. See the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) document Executive Committee of the High Commissioner’s Programme, 50th Session A/AC 96/914, 7 July 1999, paragraph 46. This was seen graphically in terms of the management of Tirana airport by US forces during the Kosovo crisis. These troops became involved both in helping with the relief effort and in the management of the airport for obviously military purposes. See ‘The Kosovo Refugee Crisis: An Independent Evaluation of UNHCR’s Emergency Preparedness and Response’, February 2000, posted at http://www.unhcr.ch/ evaluate/kosovo/toc.html paragraph 540. This process was made more complete with the deployment of NATO’s Albanian Force (AFOR). AFOR was established with ‘an exclusive humanitarian mandate and under NATO command’ (paragraph 541) but this was viewed with suspicion by UNHCR staff, resulting largely from the ‘lack of transparency, co-ordination and clarity concerning its creation and purpose’ (paragraph 544). The evaluation of UNHCR’s preparedness states that, ‘The distinction between the two spheres was blurred in the case of dual use facilities, and virtually erased when NATO forces built refugee camps and provided security and other camp services in FYR Macedonia and Albania’ (paragraph 522). See also P. Erikson, ‘Civil–Military Co-ordination in Peace Support Operations: An Impossible Necessity’ in Journal of Humanitarian Assistance posted at http://www/jha.ac/articles/a061html on 16 September 2000, p. 16. He elaborates on the difficulty of defining problems as purely military or civil. This obviously contributes to difficulties in determining an appropriate and agreed-upon division of labour between humanitarian, civil and military institutions. 3. F.S.V. Donnison, Civil Affairs and Military Government: Central Organisation and Planning, The History of World War II, United Kingdom Military Series (London: HMSO, 1966). 4. P. Williams, ‘From Counter Insurgency to Internal Security: Northern Ireland 1969–1992’, Small Wars and Insurgencies, 6, 1 (Spring 1995). Furthermore, during the Cold War the military involvement in civil issues was regulated (legally and normatively) through the concept of ‘Military Aid to the Civil Authorities’ (MACA) which tightly circumscribed the military role largely
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5. 6.
7.
8. 9.
10. 11. 12. 13.
14.
15. 16. 17.
to the provision of labour and resources while vigorously maintaining civilian supremacy. Major Douglas E. Nash, ‘Civil Affairs in the Gulf War: Administration of an Occupied Town’, Special Warfare (October 1994), pp. 18–27. D.C. Jett, Why Peacekeeping Fails (London: Macmillan, 2000), pp. 21–35. See also H. Slim, ‘Military Humanitarianism and the New Peacekeeping: An Agenda for Peace’, the Journal for Humanitarian Assistance posted at http://www.jha.ac/articles/a003.htm on 3 June 2000, pp. 1–2. See United Nations Organisation (UNO) document ‘Supplement to An Agenda for Peace’, A/50/60-S/1995/1, 1994; M. Pugh, ‘Peacebuilding as Developmentalism: Concepts from Disaster Research’, in Contemporary Security Policy, 16, 3 (1995); UNO document An Agenda for Peace, S/24111, 1992. J. Macrae, ‘The Death of Humanitarianism: An Anatomy of the Attack’, Disasters, 22, 4 (December 1998), pp. 309–17. For a discussion of this see L. Minear and T.G. Weiss, Humanitarian Politics (New York: Foreign Policy Association, 1995) pp. 36–42; and L. Minear, ‘Humanitarian Action and Peacekeeping Operations’ in Journal of Humanitarian Assistance posted at http://www.jha.ac/articles/a018.html on 11 June 2000, p. 3. See also International Federation of Red Cross/Crescent Societies, World Disasters Report (Oxford: OUP, 1997), pp. 23–4. Kosovo 1999 can also be seen as an example of substitution in the sense of substituting a large-scale ground-based humanitarian effort for a ground offensive. UNO document ‘Report of the Secretary General Pursuant to General Assembly Resolution 53/35 (1995) “Srebrenica Report”’ (Advance Copy for Delegations 15 November 1998). Field Marshal Sir Peter Inge, ‘The Roles and Challenges of the British Armed Forces’, Journal of the Royal United Services Institute, 141, 1 (February 1996), p. 1. T. Schelling, Arms and Influence (Yale: Yale University Press, 1966), p. 2. Others have argued that the nature of applying military force has changed. For example, H. Ullman, ‘A New Defence Construct: Rapid Dominance’, Journal of the Royal United Services Institute, 141, 5 (October 1996), pp. 8–12 has argued that the focal point of an attack becomes much wider than the purely military. He argues that the intention is frequently to destabilise (rather than to destroy) the enemy through concentrating on affecting and understanding their perceptions. He describes this as ‘Rapid Dominance’. For an excellent analysis of the UNPROFOR mandate see W.J. Durch and J.A. Schear, ‘Faultlines: UN Operations in the Former Yugoslavia’, in W. Durch (ed.), UN Peacekeeping, American Policy and the Uncivil Wars of the 1990s ( London: Macmillan, 1997), pp. 193–275. D. Owen, Balkan Odyssey (London: Victor Gollancz, 1995), p. 208. A. Cunliffe and M. Pugh, ‘The UNHCR as Lead Agency in the Former Yugoslavia’, in Journal of Humanitarian Assistance posted at http://www.jha.sps.cam.ac.uk/a/a007.htm on 1 April 1996. M. Cutts, ‘The Humanitarian Operation in Bosnia, 1992–95: Dilemmas of Negotiating Humanitarian Access’, UNHCR Working Paper No. 8 (UNHCR: Geneva, 1999). See also S. Gordon, ‘Negotiating for Life’, in D. Goodwin (ed.), Understanding Persuasion (London: Frank Cass, 2001).
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From Antipathy to Hegemony 18. UNO document ‘Report of the Secretary General Pursuant to General Assembly Resolution 53/35 (1995) “Srebrenica Report”’ (Advance Copy for Delegations, 15 November 1998), p. 11. 19. See The Army Field Manual Volume 5: Operations Other Than War, Part 2: Wider Peacekeeping, Army Code 71359(A) (London: HMSO, 1994) together with the analysis of this by Slim, ‘Military Humanism and the New Peacekeeping’, p. 7, and the criticism by R.M. Connaughton, ‘Wider Peacekeeping – How Wide of the Mark?’ British Army Review, 111 (December 1995). 20. Colonel W.R. Phillips, ‘Civil–Military Co-Operation: Vital to Peace Implementation in Bosnia’, NATO Review, 1 (Spring 1998), pp. 22–5. 21. Ibid. 22. Ibid., p. 23. 23. See NATO Allied Command Europe (ACE) Directive Number 86–2 dated 13 January 1998, paragraphs 1–4, which argues that ‘recent operations’, particularly those in the former Yugoslavia, have identified ‘that the limited mechanisms and narrow definitions of Cold War civil–military co-operation are no longer able to cope with the demands of modern conflict’. This is also reflected in NATO MC 411 dated 18 August 1997: ‘NATO CIMIC Policy’, paragraphs 3–5. 24. Ibid. 25. Ibid., and see also MC 411, paragraph 5. 26. NATO Allied Command Europe (ACE) Directive Number 86–2 dated 13 January 1998, paragraphs 1–2. See also MC 411, paragraph 5. 27. Background briefings from senior NATO CIMIC officers, but also reflected in Exercise burning harmony (1998). The range of CIMIC tasks is detailed in chapter 3 of NATO Allied Joint Publication 9: NATO Civil–Military Co-operation (CIMIC) Doctrine. 28. NATO Allied Command Europe (ACE) Directive Number 86–2 dated 13 January 1998, paragraphs 1–5. In the case of NATO this has been translated into efforts by its Military Committee to create dedicated CIMIC capabilities throughout the membership and the multinational commands (see also MC 411). This has been described as ‘CIMIC 2000’. Capabilities include developing planning procedures, doctrine, interoperability standards and force development targets. NATO’s retention of an Article 5 collective defence role has also caused CIMIC staffs to consider the relevance of planning for civil contingencies throughout the spectrum of conflict. 29. See my criticism of the ‘integrated approach’ in S. Gordon, ‘Understanding the Priorities for Civil–Military Co-operation (CIMIC)’, Journal of Humanitarian Assistance (forthcoming) posted at http://www.jha.ac/articles/a003.htm 30. See M. Pugh, ‘Civil–Military Relations in Kosovo’, Security Dialogue, 31, 2 (June 2000), p. 238. The author believes that Mike Pugh was the first to draw attention to NATO’s hegemonic role in this respect. 31. K. Aldred and M. Smith, NATO in South East Europe: Enlargement by Stealth? (London: Centre for Defence Studies, 2000). 32. See ‘The Kosovo Refugee Crisis: An Independent Evaluation of UNHCR’s Emergency Preparedness and Response’, posted at http://www.unchr.ch/ evaluate/kosovo/toc.html, para 554, February 2000. 33. Ibid., paragraphs 533–9 and 551–2. 34. ‘The Interaction of NATO-Related Military Forces with Humanitarian Actors in the Kosovo Crisis’, a discussion note prepared by the Humanitarianism
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Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts and War Project and the Humanitarian Law Consultancy for a conference at The Hague, 15–16 November 1999, describes NATO’s command and control in the early stages of the bombing campaign as ‘freewheeling’ and ‘exercised only after national military presences had been established and even then not extended to all military contingents’. 35. ‘The Kosovo Refugee Crisis: An Independent Evaluation of UNHCR’s Emergency Preparedness and Response’, paragraphs 530–1. 36. M. Pugh, ‘The UNHCR as Lead Agency in the Former Yugoslavia’. 37. Ibid., p. 233. See also M. Pugh, ‘The Withering of Humanitarian Reform: A Rejoinder’, Security Dialogue, 29, 2 (June 1998), pp. 159–61 and Erikson, ‘Civil–Military Co-ordination in Peace Support Operations’, p. 11.
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12
The Role of Humanitarian Aid in Conflict Management MUKESH KAPILA
This chapter is written from both a professional and a personal perspective, the result of my struggle with the issues raised in this book. Being a government bureaucrat does not stop one from thinking, and feeling, too. I have been struck by the debate on ‘what do we mean by humanitarian principles?’ and whether they are adequately articulated or not. On this I have two sets of personal reflections to offer. Firstly, there is a basis for principled humanitarian action in international law, and that is the only legitimate basis. However, there is only one fundamental humanitarian principle that is of overarching importance and the most universally accepted: the principle of impartiality at the point of delivering of a service. What this means in practice is that, if you have children whose families belong to two different factions, for example in Sierra Leone an RUF (Revolutionary United Front) child on the one hand and an AFSL (Armed Forces of Sierra Leone) child on the other, you do not worry about their affiliations, and you do what our common humanity says that we must do for both children. That is what I mean by impartiality. But then you get to the stage of being in the position of being able to help two children from different warring sides, and that is contentious territory on which we do not have full agreement. Some would say: ‘only work if certain conditions hold’; others would say: ‘do not use the word “conditions” at all in this debate’; a third would say: ‘anything goes, let’s be pragmatic, let’s build a process – so long as we help the children, it does not really matter’. I would caution against holding the equivalent of a Geneva Conference on ‘Humanitarian Principles for the Twenty-First Century’ because, sadly, I doubt that we would achieve today the consensus that was achieved a generation ago on this subject. That is why we must not 203
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts open the debate on refugee conventions, because I think we will go backwards, rather than forwards. That is a sad state of affairs. Secondly, I would say that I am very optimistic about the future, despite the setbacks we have had in recent years. Just because some of the principles are difficult to apply in practice, and we do not have many success stories to tell (and even among the successes there have been many problems), it does not mean that the principles themselves are wrong. None of us have seen God, but it does not stop many of us in continuing to believe in Her! We must have faith, and keep faith. If we do not believe in the good of our humanitarian principles, then we believe in nothing. And believing in nothing is, I think, part of the problem nowadays. But let us also be honest. Much of the practical work that has been done on humanitarian principles has not been about ‘humanitarian space’ but about ‘agency space’. It is about finding territory, in which agencies can operate according to their convenience, so that, for example, when such-and-such a person goes to Kabul he will not be too uncomfortable or get shot at. This is nothing at all to do with the poor victims who are out there, it is about our own safety and welfare. There is an assumption that if we are able to function in dangerous environments, then somehow the world will be transformed. Now, there might be a link between the two, but it is certainly a weak link, and it is certainly not a sufficient link. This is, not least, because – as anyone who has studied the economics of war and the financial aspects of humanitarian aid will tell you – such assistance makes only a marginal difference when set in the context of the coping abilities and the endeavours of the populations themselves affected by the crisis. So, let us be honest about what humanitarian aid achieves in practice. By all means try to kid those from whom you are trying to extract funding for humanitarian projects – but be careful that you do not deceive yourself. Having said that, all is not hopeless, and we are not all helpless. The historical trend is quite clear. Despite recent difficulties this trend is in the right direction, in terms of the gradual ascendancy of values represented by humanitarianism. Much of this is common sense, because humanitarian values are what ordinary people the world over feel is right and decent. Does one need to agonise and intellectualise more than this? Sometimes our feelings may be a truer guide. Then there is the question of judgement on whether articulating complex norms precisely will help or hinder in the real world. I do not have the answer to that, but sometimes I think that living in a grey world (rather than demanding black and white answers to everything) actually helps when you are trying to do complicated things. 204
The Role of Humanitarian Aid in Conflict Management Thus, my reaction to some of the issues raised is a mixture of optimism and pessimism: but overall optimism that we are heading in the right direction. There is an agreed goal, and though we are not quite sure how to get there, the ‘core’ is, I think, quite agreed. So, let us not try to reinvent things, because we might actually make matters worse than they really are. Let us improve things where we can, and do no harm along the way, lest we throw the humanitarian baby out with the (murky) bath water of conflict management. Now let us consider the role of donors. I would like to make a distinction between being a donor and being a government representative of a member state, because this is important for the debate on conflict and humanitarianism. In our present British government we are fortunate in being able to reconcile the two interests through agreement on a common policy. This is not without internal debate and there are tensions to resolve, but this is healthy, and we can achieve a consistent position which then, of course, has to be sustained. ‘Positions’ that stand still become irrelevant or worse, because the context keeps on changing. But not all governments around the world are necessarily nimble or responsive on all issues, in all places, all the time. The trick is to work out where you think you can influence change and (if the gods also favour it) make a difference. Speaking now as a representative of a member state of the global community (as opposed to a donor), there is a lot more that we can do. But this is not a short-term project. I have four ‘action points’. Firstly, we as member states can do something about influencing the global popular culture. I think that one of the major problems we face today is how to ensure that powerful governments behave responsibly on these issues, because their electors expect them to do so. How can we create a more positive climate of opinion, in order to keep the public constituency supportive of international humanitarism, so that governments can be positively willed on? In Great Britain, I was struck by the positive response to the Mozambique floods disaster of 1999, over which people were clamouring for us to do more. Popular will can change attitudes: nowadays the BBC, CNN and similar networks are all over the world, and it is a globalised world. A particularly outrageous militia leader (in, to mention no names, West Africa perhaps) may not like himself to be discussed by the world’s media as if he is mad and bad; he may pretend to ignore it, but it actually hurts his pride. There is a strong climate of opinion all over the world on why certain things are intolerable, and this is contributing towards the advancement of humanitarian values. I think we could do much more on building on that. It is long-term work to nourish such thinking. 205
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Secondly, we can tighten up on compliance mechanisms. There is no point talking about humanitarian principles and codes of conduct without some guarantee of measures against people who will not comply. There are good developments on the way; for example, we will have an International Criminal Court. Another example is on ‘smart sanctions’ where the debate has moved on. Slowly and painfully, we are beginning to understand how international financial mechanisms work and what we can do to hit war-makers where it hurts them most. Wars do not happen out of nothing, somebody is profiting, somebody is fuelling it. At one time we thought perhaps that this was all just too complicated, but piece by piece, little by little, we are beginning to understand how things work. We are doing much more thinking about the role of strategic materials like drugs and diamonds. Not everyone is on board, and there may be domestic and other vested interests which are fighting a rearguard battle, but we should be open in holding these debates. Tackling compliance mechanisms is by no means a theoretical pursuit. Steady progress is being made, and as science and technology help us more, we will be able to do more. Thirdly, we can be much more serious on reducing the means of waging war. Staff from our department are seconded to Sierra Leone and also to Albania, and they have been talking to each other. Our Sierra Leone staff informed their Albanian counterparts that among the weaponry that had been handed in by some recently disarmed RUF people was some with Albanian markings. We are getting a better understanding of small-arms flows from Eastern and Central Europe through Central Africa into West Africa. Between us, we have contacts with all these countries, including in many cases an aid relationship, and we could tighten up on these linkages. Fourthly, and this is the most difficult area, we can do something about looking hard at the effectiveness of the United Nations. In this context, let us turn to the particular question of humanitarian action in conflict management, and take some real examples. Many UN individuals have done a great job, for example in Afghanistan, the African Great Lakes and elsewhere. But how many of them are out there, where do they come from, and what do they stand for? We give so much authority and responsibility to UN teams who are sat down in far-flung places with very little command and control, and very little accountability. They are honest and good people, but I am not sure how much one can trust them, and what games they are playing, including their own preoccupations to stay on the greasy pole of UN careerism. Perhaps we need a completely different ethos reflected in a radically different staffing policy. In this new policy, nobody should get a career out of the UN, or get promoted 206
The Role of Humanitarian Aid in Conflict Management within the UN. Instead, people would move in and out of the UN at their existing grade, and if they wished to go to a higher level they would have to go out for a while first. People who work in the UN should look upon it as a form of global social service and as a personal sacrifice they are making, and not as a mechanism for enhancing their personal prestige. All this is, of course, grossly unfair to the many excellent, thoughtful and caring people, at all levels, in the UN system. Many of them are close colleagues that I respect (and I hope that they will still talk to me). Let there be no doubt that we must support the UN, recognising that it is only as good as we allow it to become. But do we perhaps need a ‘Code of Conduct of member states for interacting with the UN system’ so that member states do not abuse the UN? In conclusion, we need to be clear about the links between humanitarism and political actions. Peacemakers are political people who, by definition, have to be pragmatic about being accommodating and making compromises, because that is the art of peacemaking. Peacemaking is about give and take, swallowing your pride and taking risks. Mind you, the lesson from shabby peace deals is that they do not stick. Obviously, this form of deal-making sits uncomfortably alongside ‘principled humanitarianism’, and there may be contradictions to resolve. Thus I believe that increasingly it is more practical to talk about ‘complementary’ political and humanitarian actions, rather than ‘coherence’ or a merger between the two. But to balance this, I have also tried to argue here that the protection and expansion of humanitarian space is not just the preserve of relief workers who can simply be left alone to get on with it. It is a responsibility for all who are working from a range of perspectives, trying to deal with the causes of humanitarian crises and not just picking up the pieces. Relief workers are motivated for genuine reasons to preserve, as they see it, the integrity of their humanitarian actions. We revere the noble intention behind this, but their ‘Holier than Thou’ attitude is, at times, humbug. Are they ready to admit this?
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PART 6 Balkan Futures
13
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict CHARLES DICK
INTRODUCTION
On 24 March 1999, the United States and NATO thrust their fingers further into the former-Yugoslav mangle, this time over Kosovo. The United States Air Force, with some alliance help, embarked on an aerial bombardment of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) to compel the Belgrade government to accept the diktat that NATO had presented to it at Rambouillet earlier in the month. To the surprise and dismay of alliance leaders (and even more, of some publics), the Serbs did not immediately cave in. To bend the Milosevic government to its will, NATO had to fly 37,465 sorties over 78 days, begin to threaten the possibility of a land operation as well, enlist the help of Russia (hitherto, despite membership of the Contact Group, largely excluded from the process of dealing with the Kosovo conflict), and compromise on the terms of the ultimatum presented at Rambouillet. The war was ended under the terms of UN Security Council Resolution 1244. These terms placed Kosovo under UN administration, and the international security presence would be deployed under UN auspices ‘with substantial NATO participation’. Serbian security personnel were to be allowed to return to maintain a presence at key border crossings and patrimonial sites. Kosovo was to gain ‘substantial self-government, taking full account of the Rambouillet accords and territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia … and the demilitarization of UCK’ (otherwise known as the Kosovo Liberation Army or KLA). The presence of international security forces would be limited to Kosovo. Thus, there was a considerable watering down of the Rambouillet diktat. Despite great reluctance, the United States had to accept UN and Russian involvement. Yugoslav sovereignty 211
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts over Kosovo was affirmed, and the Rambouillet proposal for an interim period of three years followed (it was implied) by an independence referendum, was dropped. Above all, also dropped was Annex B to the accords, the status of forces agreement by which NATO forces would have been able to move and act at will throughout the whole of the FRY, becoming an occupation force in all but name. The war may well prove to have been a turning point in the development of the post-Cold War world. As a result of it, international perceptions of NATO and, to a lesser extent, the alliance’s perception of itself, have changed. In consequence, many countries’ attitudes towards the alliance and to their own security affairs may also have changed. The war has also shaken yet again the kaleidoscope that is the territory of former Yugoslavia.
I N T E R N AT I O N A L R E P E R C U S S I O N S O F T H E C O N F L I C T
By the beginning of 1999, the international community found itself yet again between a rock and a hard place in former Yugoslavia. On the one hand, there was a settlement of sorts in the November 1995 Dayton agreement which halted the fighting that had characterised the previous five years, and it had been achieved without a breach in the cherished principle of the inviolability of international borders. The preservation of the post-Dayton status quo was considered fundamental to stability. On the other hand, yet another minority was being brutally repressed – this time the Albanians of Kosovo, by a key signatory of Dayton, the FRY. Trapped by their initial inaction, then ineffectual action in the period up to September 1995, and haunted by their failure to prevent or respond to the Srebrenica massacre, the United States and NATO could not again fill the role of passive bystanders. Moreover, they had responsibility for the Dayton settlement and that would be endangered by further strife in the area. This outcome was, of course, entirely predictable and of NATO’s own making. For years, Kosovar Albanians had followed the leadership of Ibrahim Rugova and met Serbian repression with Ghandiesque passive resistance in the hope that they would thereby gain international support. When the Kosovo issue was studiously ignored at Dayton, Rugova and his policy were discredited and the KLA’s approach to the struggle for independence became inevitable. The United States and NATO would have been happy if FRY security forces had been able to suppress the KLA without too much fuss; after all, the KLA had been condemned by America’s FBI and DEA as a terrorist organisation, and Germany maintained that it was the main 212
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict source of the narcotics trade in the country’s south. However, the KLA proved to be a popular, mass movement. Its suppression was beyond the capabilities of the security forces without the employment of the state terror that was their usual last resort. Once again, the international media spotlight fell on the region and the something-must-be-done lobbies clamoured for action. Unfortunately, there was another pressure acting on NATO. April 1999 was to see the alliance’s celebration of its 50th anniversary and the admission of three new members. To mark the occasion and prove NATO’s continuing relevance to the post-Cold War world, a new strategic concept was to be unveiled. This calls for the alliance to be prepared for new (non-Article 5) missions ‘to respond to a broad spectrum of possible threats to Alliance common interests, including: regional conflicts, such as in Kosovo and Bosnia; the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery; and transnational threats like terrorism’.1 The alliance wished to demonstrate its credibility and authority before the Washington summit convened. NATO wanted a peaceful settlement of the Kosovo conflict. But it wanted more to impose its will on Slobodan Milosevic, the alleged source of all that was evil in the Balkans, to save the latest victims of his repression, and thus demonstrate that NATO was a powerful force for good. Diplomacy backed by the threat of force was tried, culminating in the Rambouillet conference. Perhaps the Western negotiators simply tired of the negotiation (justified in believing that Milosevic, as in the past, was insincere and merely playing for time); perhaps, given the imminence of the Washington summit, they just ran out of time; or perhaps the USA by this time actually wanted a demonstrative use of force to humiliate Milosevic and establish credibility. The fact that the accept-it-or-bebombed ultimatum (with its shades of Austria-Hungary’s ultimatum to Serbia in 1914) contained unacceptable provisions that were later dropped, lends credence to the last supposition, as do descriptions of the goings-on at Rambouillet. It is all too easy to paint a picture of the United States, as the alliance leader, being parti pris in favour of the (hardly innocent) KLA and trying to manufacture an excuse for aggression. It is at least possible that the terms of UNSCR 1244 would have been accepted by the FRY if offered earlier; indeed, a resolution of the Serbian National Assembly of 23 March, with the offer renewed by Milosevic on 22 April through the Russian envoy Viktor Chernomyrdin, went almost as far as the terms eventually settled on. For whatever reason, the Paris continuation of the Rambouillet conference culminated in an ultimatum to the FRY that was couched in terms unacceptable to any sovereign state. Milosevic rejected the diktat 213
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts and resumed his war against the KLA with heightened ferocity, and on 24 March NATO started its air offensive. In this way, NATO embarked on its first war by attacking another state. In doing so, it went against its own statutes by failing (at least in some people’s eyes) to exhaust the possibilities of diplomacy, by initiating aggression and by doing so outside its declared area of responsibility. By failing to gain UN authorisation, either from the Security Council or through a ‘uniting for peace resolution’ in the General Assembly, it almost certainly broke international law by committing aggression to interfere in the internal affairs of a sovereign state. NATO avoided the UN routes to legitimacy precisely because it feared, probably correctly, that neither would actually sanction action. It maintained, somewhat contradictorily, that its action was justified by UNSCRs 1199 and 1203 (a dubious contention) and that anyway general international law allows for action without UN sanction in cases of overwhelming humanitarian necessity. Britain was insufficiently confident of this case to submit it to the International Court of Justice, instead relying on jurisdictional technicalities to avoid having the case heard. It is reported that, when the then British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook told US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright that his department’s lawyers doubted the legality of bombing, Albright’s response was a curt ‘get new lawyers’.2 The debate on the legality of NATO’s action will doubtless continue for some time; the morality of its intervention is much less controversial, at least to Western liberals. The important issue for the purposes of this chapter, however, is how NATO’s action is perceived by others. To many countries, NATO in general and the USA and Britain in particular seem to have arrogated to themselves the combined roles of prosecutor, judge, jury, policeman and executioner in any case they deem to offend against their conceptions of what is right and moral. This perception is reinforced by the habit of the USA, Britain and NATO of describing themselves as ‘the international community’. This assumption that a Western clique, sometimes as small as Washington and London alone, knows best and can speak and act for the whole world is resented and rejected by many states. The more that Western countries ignore their own failings and act as if they represent the civilised world, with other countries being inhabited by morally inferior beings, the more opposition they will stir up. During the Cold War, NATO was more than a defensive alliance. It was an example to many of a collective dedicated to upholding and promoting democracy and the rule of law, a moral force to be respected and followed. Some of the gilt has been rubbed off that gingerbread by the attack on Yugoslavia. Of course, the Serbs do not make convincing innocent victims in view of their dreadful excesses over the past decade, 214
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict but the US and NATO’s self-image of a Daniel come to judgment is not shared by many other countries. Far from being history’s first disinterested, purely humanitarian war (as some Western leaders have portrayed it), the attack on the FRY is seen in Russia, Ukraine, China, India and indeed most of the Third World as part of an attempt to reshape the world in an image acceptable to the West. There is a perception that ‘humanitarian intervention’ is the latest camouflage, indeed licence, for neo-colonialist interventionism in pursuit of great power interests, just as much of nineteenth-century imperialism was clothed in terms of moral righteousness. The image of disinterested morality as a driver of policy is given a further knock by the obvious partiality and double standards shown by Western powers, especially the United States, as to where their humanitarian consciences are stirred. If the right to return to their homes should be achieved by force for ethnically-cleansed Kosovar Albanians, then why not for Palestinians too? Or for the Serbs expelled from Krajina by the Croats? If NATO believes it necessary to act when faced with a humanitarian catastrophe in Kosovo, why does it not react to a much larger one, with similar origins and in its area of responsibility, in Kurdistan? Could it be because this is created by an ally, the Americanequipped Turkish Army? Why does it do nothing about Chechnya? It would appear that the lesson is, if you wish to be an oppressor, either make sure that you are a friend of the United States, like Israel, or that you are too powerful to be intimidated, like Russia. (Or perhaps the real lesson for Western leaders should be, avoid moral absolutes and oversimplifications, and excessive hype and spin when justifying policy.) The United States and NATO see themselves as a force for good in the world. With some justification, they reject the above interpretations of both the facts and their motives. However, it is perceptions that shape policy and much of the world perceives their actions, including the new NATO strategic concept and the sidelining of the UN, as threatening. Other unilateral American actions reinforce the image of the United States as a hegemonic state: the continuing sanctions and bombing against Iraq; the mid-1998 bombing (without clear justification and in defiance of international law) of a pharmaceutical plant in Sudan; the rejection of the nuclear test ban and anti-ballistic missile (ABM) treaties and the jurisdiction of the putative International Criminal Court; and the attempt to apply sanctions against countries that trade with USdefined ‘rogue states’. Fear of American intentions, which may be backed by a NATO seen by many as the United States’ poodle, will provoke reactions undesirable to the West. Indeed, the terrorist outrages perpetrated against the USA on 11 September 2001 provide an awful example. 215
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Of course, the image of NATO as a compliant tool of the USA is, to say the least, a misperception of the nature of the alliance and the way its system of checks and balances actually works, but it is a misperception that exerts more influence than the reality. The end of the Cold War was welcomed, among other reasons, for ending an expensive arms race and reducing the likelihood of nuclear war. The perception of US/NATO hegemonic ambitions (however misguided) will encourage not only so-called rogue states but also other countries to look to their defences. They will not be able to compete across the board in high-tech weaponry, but they may seek to achieve capabilities in niche areas and combine these with effective asymmetric approaches to limit the effectiveness of Western armed forces. Above all, driven by the lessons of the Gulf and Kosovo wars, some will work to acquire weapons of mass destruction and the means to deliver them. Their efforts in both conventional and nuclear, biological and chemical warfare (NBC) areas may well receive increased help from Russia and China. Moreover, some countries and non-state actors will refuse to accept that massive technological superiority will enable Western powers, especially the United States, to inflict pain with impunity. They will wish to strike back at their tormentors, and to do so where the effect will be greatest – in the homeland. Terrorism can be as effective as missiles, and even more difficult to counter. The September 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon illustrate the point to perfection; expect more attacks, both physical against targets such as nuclear or chemical plants, and cyber attacks against air traffic control, financial institutions and so on. Spectacular terrorist incidents do not merely satisfy a need for retaliation, of course. They might be intended to deter a great power from pursuing a line of policy. They can also be employed to provoke reprisals, even war, to polarise opinion in the international community, and to unite disparate communities against a common foe. The 11 September attacks may well have been intended, at least in part, to bring closer Samuel Huntington’s ‘clash of civilisations’. Thus, not only is the postCold War peace dividend likely to prove illusory, but the world may become an even more dangerous place than it was during the stable Cold War period.3 History is replete with examples of rivals, even enemies, being driven into bed together by fear of an even greater threat. If the United States and NATO do not succeed in removing the growing perception of their wish to remodel the world along lines that are pleasing to them, they could accomplish this feat. For instance, much divides Russia, China and India. However, common fears about Muslim fundamentalist and Western 216
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict threats could yet lead them to form a bloc for mutual protection (a project already talked about by Russian strategic thinkers). Another unfortunate consequence of NATO’s bypassing the UN and resorting to force over Kosovo is the precedent that it sets. Why should other countries or regional blocs not act similarly in their own neighbourhoods when they identify humanitarian problems, or wish to resolve grievances not susceptible to diplomatic solutions? Has Russia the right to intervene in sovereign states to protect the interests of Russophones living there? Why should the Muslim world not take action against Israel in defence of oppressed Palestinians? Can China use force to achieve reunification? In short, others have as much, or as little, right to set themselves up as regional policemen, and the world has taken a step back from the rule of international law and towards its previous condition in which a state’s right to wage war was untrammelled. Somewhat paradoxically, in view of the perceptions outlined above, it may well be that the Kosovo adventure will weaken NATO’s will to face up to future crises. On the one hand, the United States is irritatedly aware that it bore the brunt of the action and the cost (as it did in the Gulf War of 1990–91, in Bosnia in 1995 and is doing presently over Iraq). As the primary Western player, the United States is most at risk from those seeking to inflict reprisals. At the same time, non-contributing allies are seen to snipe and cavil at American decisions and actions. Tiring of its allies, the United States could move further towards the unilateralism already displayed in the first eight months of the George W. Bush presidency, though the need for allies in the ‘war against terrorism’ may make this development less likely than it once appeared. But even if it remains engaged, its dislike of moral interventionism and apparently open-ended peacekeeping missions may intensify as a result of its Kosovo experience. The United States may wish to restrict its future role to war-fighting in the national interest, even though its presence as part of a peacekeeping force may be seen as essential to credibility by NATO partners and those in the conflict area alike. On the other hand, some European members of the alliance were worried at the time of the Kosovo conflict, and more are worried retrospectively, about the justification for the bombing and about its conduct. Some countries, too, regret being involved in the mess that is post-war Kosovo. In one or two participating countries, anti-Americanism is already quite strong and fears may grow that the United States is trying to use NATO to pursue its own political and strategic interests. And few European publics show much enthusiasm for the political and cash expenditure required to make their militaries capable of meeting the demands of the new NATO strategic concept. It may well be even more difficult to 217
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts achieve alliance solidarity and an active coalition of the willing when future interventions are mooted. It remains to be seen whether many of NATO’s Europeans will be willing to go much beyond words of sympathy and political support in the war and subsequent peacemaking in Afghanistan, the invocation of Article 5 notwithstanding.
T H E WA R A S A D E T E R R E N T T O F U T U R E E T H N O - N A T I O N A L I S T CONFLICT
Many people hope that the victories of the coalition in the 1991 Gulf War, and of NATO in Kosovo, together with the change in international law many believe that the latter intervention has wrought in allowing for humanitarian interventions, will make at least Europe a safer place. Potential aggressors will have learned the lesson that they cannot attack other states with impunity, and would-be oppressors will realise that they cannot get away with seriously maltreating their own people. Quite apart from Hegel’s aphorism that the only lesson that one can learn from history is that people do not learn from history, there are reasons to question the assertion. Even if one accepts the dubious contention that future wars can be won through air power alone, peace enforcement and peacekeeping can be expensive in manpower and resources. It can lead to an all but open-ended commitment if the task is seen through to the end – a fact now reluctantly being faced by those involved in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo. Moreover, it can lead to casualties in even the most altruistic of interventions, as the Americans and others discovered in Somalia (and may yet find in Kosovo and Macedonia). Will sufficient NATO members have the political will to build up and maintain such strong intervention forces that the alliance will have the capacity both to keep the peace in places where it already has responsibilities, and to intervene elsewhere? There is currently little evidence of this among European electorates. The peace dividend will not be given up lightly. On the contrary, there appear to be second thoughts in many quarters about the advisability of the Kosovo commitment. It may be more difficult to muster a coalition of the willing in the future, as demonstrated by the United States opting out of the Macedonian mission. It cannot be assumed that the political will shown in the recent war will automatically translate into effective deterrence for the future, even if the capability is fielded. Leaders change, and so do public moods. Future potential aggressors and/or oppressors may well calculate that new democratic leaders, or the societies they govern, will lack the political 218
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict will of their predecessors. Alternatively, they may believe that their cause is just and that this self-evident fact will prevent intervention. Furthermore, dissatisfied ethnic groups will also draw their own conclusions from the Kosovo conflict. Rejecting Rugova’s policy of passive resistance to Serb rule, the KLA embarked on war. The result of its resort to arms and the excessive Serbian reaction, captured on television, was NATO intervention. The lesson may be: go for a military option, even if it appears hopeless, and fight a good information war and you win a NATO air force. Other disgruntled minorities, ignoring the unique nature of the Kosovo case, will surely follow in the footsteps of the KLA in the expectation of the same result. Indeed, the ethnic Albanian National Liberation Army or NLA in Macedonia (an offshoot of the KLA) has already done so. NATO success may thus be making future ethno-national conflicts more and not less likely.
R E P E R C U S S I O N S O F T H E C O N F L I C T I N F O R M E R Y U G O S L AV I A
Ever since the Socialist Federated Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY) began its tortured disintegration, the European Union and NATO, never mind the wider international community, have failed to take a holistic approach to the problem. They seem to have lacked a clear idea of a desired end-state. They also seem to have followed contradictory principles. They were concerned to preserve existing borders when they initially favoured salvaging the SFRY and then again when they insisted on them for its successor states, even though these were often merely arbitrarily drawn former-communist internal boundaries. Once disintegration was in train, they favoured self-determination for Slovenia and Croatia, but not for the Serbs in Croatia and Bosnia or the Croats in Herzegovina. The Dayton agreement compelled the Serbs and Croats, over half the population, to belong to a state they fought to escape from. It refused to address the issue of justified Albanian grievances in Kosovo, for that would raise the question of Serbia’s borders. Thus, Dayton has all the hallmarks of a temporary expedient designed to solve (or shelve) immediate problems while inevitably creating new ones. Bosnia-Herzegovina continues to exist only because of the presence of SFOR. But, despite US$5 billion in aid, it does not prosper. Croat and Serb politicians in particular, with popular support behind them, have no desire to make the state work; while paying lip service to Dayton, they devote their efforts to preventing the central government from functioning properly and thwarting reform. Dayton has simply frozen the conflict; there is no conflict resolution, rather conflict perpetuation. And the Kosovo 219
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts conflict was an inevitable consequence of that agreement and the refusal of the international community to do anything about the Albanian Kosovars’ plight until fighting had begun. However well-intentioned the eventual Western intervention, it has created some new difficulties and exacerbated old ones – though to be fair, other, probably worse consequences would probably have flowed had Milosevic’s Serbia been given free rein. However, the war has not solved the Kosovo problem. It has merely changed the nature of the problem, and brought on or exacerbated others in wider former Yugoslavia.
KO S O V O
Albanian Kosovars have fought against Serb rule since the League of Prizren (the first Albanian nationalist organisation) was formed in 1878, the struggle intensifying when the province was forcibly incorporated into Serbia in 1913. The desire for independence has grown, not lessened, with time. Indeed, the KLA’s insurgency was simply the latest in a series, an attempt to further the unfinished business of Albanian unification. It is inconceivable, after their long history as victims of repression, culminating in the mass expulsions and murders of 1998–99, that they should consent to revert to Serbian domination; even republican status within a democratic and economically vibrant FRY would be unacceptable as any federation would inevitably be dominated by the more numerous Serbs. There have been times when the boot was on the other foot and the Albanians have been the oppressors, such as when Kosovo was under Axis occupation during 1941–44 and, to a lesser extent, through circumstances rather than desire, during the period of autonomy 1974–89. Now back on top, the Albanians are generally keen to make life in the province unendurable for most, though admittedly not all, ethnically Serb Kosovars. Although Rugova still favours a patient and peaceful road to independence, in cooperation with the international community, it is likely that a lengthy deferment of hope would result in a resurgence of KLA military activity; this time, international community (mainly NATO) occupiers will be the targets. It is easy to imagine a Northern Ireland type of struggle, though with the vast majority of the population on the side of the guerrillas. Indeed, political frustration in Kosovo helped to fuel the rebellion in Macedonia that started in 2001. The international community (really a euphemism for the most significant states in NATO) is reluctant to move with any speed towards independence for Kosovo, however. It is reluctant to sanction border 220
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict changes accomplished by force even if it was its own force that wrought the change, even though it accepted self-determination elsewhere in former Yugoslavia. Moreover, UNSCR 1244 recognises Kosovo as part of a sovereign FRY and one slap in the face for the United Nations is enough to be going along with. It also fears, probably with good reason, that other potentially secessionist ethnic groups might take heart from the KLA’s success. Especially, there is a fear, now being realised, that Macedonia – known to some as the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia or FYROM – will become destabilised. But other minorities such as those in Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Sandjak, Vojvodina and Transylvania could follow the KLA example. Indeed, the ambitions of many leaders of the KLA itself are not confined to Kosovo; they would like to continue the struggle for a pan-Albanian state (no matter that Tirana gives them no encouragement). Furthermore, the international community is aware that the establishment of de jure independence any time soon would doom most remaining non-Albanian Kosovars to expulsion or worse, including in the largely Serbian area north of the Ibar. It would also sanction the existence of a state where, it is feared, narcotics, people and gun smuggling and other criminal enterprises may flourish with impunity. Finally, wresting Kosovo from even the nominal control of Belgrade would endanger the fragile beginnings of a move away from authoritarianism and ultra-nationalism in Serbia; the moderate nationalists that succeeded Milosevic are prepared to discuss everything but independence with Rugova, and the latter is ready to talk about nothing but. In taking on Kosovo as a protectorate in all but name, the inevitable outcome of its success in war, NATO has paid a high price for maintaining its credibility and reversing the Serbs’ ethnic cleansing. Will UNMIK (the United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo) and KFOR – and most importantly, their contributing nations – be able and willing to work together, and to co-opt sufficient Albanian support, to impose policies that will be deeply unpopular with many in the Albanian community? These include a crack-down on political violence, organised crime and support for secessionist movements elsewhere, such as those of the Albanians of the Presevo valley in south Serbia and in Macedonia; a delay of full independence until the dangers of some of the possibly adverse consequences have receded; acceptance of minority and Serbian rights. Or will the international community, as in BosniaHerzegovina, shrink from proactive measures to stabilise the area for fear of violent opposition? That course, again as in Bosnia-Herzegovina, will simply freeze the situation for as long as the protectorate lasts. One thing is certain: there is no easy, morally justifiable exit strategy in sight for the foreseeable future. 221
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts MACEDONIA
(FYROM)
Long portrayed in the West as a model of multicultural democracy since its independence in 1992, Macedonia has, in reality, been a state run by and for Slavs with an increasingly resentful Albanian minority.4 After almost a decade of not very post-communist governments failing to bring in reforms, many Albanians have tired of waiting for redress of their legitimate grievances. More radical Albanian politicians have increasingly supplanted those prepared to cooperate with the Slavs. The international community’s fight for the rights of Kosovar Albanians gave birth to the hope that it might at long last pay attention to those of their cousins in Macedonia also. However, after the ousting of Milosevic in the wake of the war, the focus of international attention shifted to bolstering presumed moderate Slav nationalists in both Belgrade and Skopje. In response, significant numbers of Macedonian Albanians started to support the NLA (and since August, the new, even harder-line Albanian National Army or ANA) in an armed struggle. This direct copy of the Kosovo approach to the internationalisation of the problem has the active support of the KLA, which like the ANA, harbours pan-Albanian aspirations. Thus, the long-feared destabilisation of Macedonia has come to pass. Ironically, given that the prevention of this development was one of NATO’s aims in the Kosovo conflict, an important catalyst in bringing it about has been the polarisation of the two communities over the conflict and the military, and then political, defeat of Milosevic. If the FRY had been left to crush the KLA without outside interference, he might not have embarked on full-scale ethnic cleansing, with the consequent destabilising of Macedonia resulting from an influx of 200,000 Kosovar refugees that increased Macedonia’s Albanian population by 50 per cent. Doubts have been expressed about Milosevic’s so-called ‘Operation Horseshoe’, to do just this.5 This argument, however, presupposes that an anti-KLA campaign could have been won without such mass expulsions, a dubious contention in the light of the Serb military failures in 1998 and the apparent lack of an alternative strategy. Now NATO has been drawn willy-nilly into the internal affairs of Macedonia. The alliance has brokered an agreement between the government and the Albanian parties and rebels, and despatched troops (significantly without a United States contingent) to disarm the NLA – now, like the KLA before it, promoted from being ‘terrorists’ to ‘insurgents’. However, the disarmament bids fair to being a largely token exercise in confidence-building where none exists. And the Ohrid political agreement, which pleases neither party, is highly unlikely to 222
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict survive the process of ratification by the Slav-dominated Parliament; even key members of the government dislike it. The renewal of fighting by the ANA in early November 2001 is a harbinger of things to come, and the West’s assumption of the role of honest broker seeking a fair settlement is losing credibility in both Slav and Albanian communities.
T H E Y U G O S L AV F E D E RA T I O N
One positive result of the Kosovo conflict has been the ousting of Milosevic. The international community is determined to support the apparently westward-looking moderates that ousted him, believing that this will spell the end of extremist nationalism as the dominant political force in Serbia. That happy ending is not impossible; neither is it assured. The reformist DOS coalition won the December 2000 election with 64 per cent of the vote. Milosevic’s SPS slumped to under 14 per cent, with the ultra-nationalist parties doing rather better. The turnout, however, was only 57.7 per cent. The election, with only about 37 per cent of the electorate actively supporting reform, was not quite the ringing endorsement of change that has been hailed. Plainly, there is still much popular disillusion with politics, and DOS, the grouping representing the educated, liberal middle class and minorities, has yet to make real headway in the Serb heartland. Virulent Serbian nationalism has not been decisively defeated. There are reasons to fear its revival.6 Serbia, after its series of defeats in the Wars of Yugoslav Succession, displays many disturbing similarities to Weimar Germany after the First World War. It has a tradition of autocratic rule. This has been tempered by many of the prerequisites for democratic development – a Parliament, some media and interest groups not fully controlled by the government, and so on. However, legal guarantees of basic civil rights are weak, as is a free press, and there is no independent judiciary, no efficient and honest civil service. The Army and the security services are not fully under civilian control. There is an excessive concentration of power and authority in the centre and civil society is underdeveloped, with the middle classes having had their development stunted by inflation, repression and emigration. There is no overwhelming societal consensus on core issues and thus on the direction in which the republic should be heading. Intolerance of minorities and of political dissent is the norm. The economy is in ruins and remains in the hands of supporters of the old regime. Rebuilding it will inevitably be a painful process, with much unemployment and falling standards of living for most citizens. It may 223
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts also prove to be an incomplete and protracted process if a worldwide economic slump restricts foreign aid and investment. Turning Serbia into a properly functioning democracy and market economy will require a united and determined reforming government. DOS is unlikely to provide this. The 18 parties that formed the coalition only in early 2000 have a long history of disunity, indeed internecine strife. Disputes over ideology, the division of power and the spoils of office, together with personal rivalries, have already led to the first rift. Federal President Kostunica’s conservative, nationalist Democratic Party of Serbia (DSS) has become a new haven for former regime supporters and an ally of the army and old vested interests opposed to sweeping reform (and to cooperation with the international community). Serbian Prime Minister Djindjic seeks far-reaching reforms and there is an intensifying struggle for power between the two. Further infighting and dodgy deals are likely, to the detriment of political, judicial, legal, social and economic change. The chances of a resurgence of populism are also as high as they were in Weimar Germany. Given the absence of any sense of guilt for the wars of the past decade and their consequences but rather a feeling of victimhood, the Serbs may well be beguiled again by ultranationalist rhetoric. The fear of further concessions to supposedly secessionist minorities in Vojvodina, the Sandjak and south Serbia, and desire for anschluss with Republika Srpska, the full recovery of Kosovo and perhaps lands ‘lost’ to Croatia and about to be lost to Montenegro, still have plenty of political mileage in them. Bribes, such as the international community’s US$1 billion-worth of aid to the country to hand Milosevic over, will not change this fact. Federal institutions have progressively ceased to function in Montenegro since 1998. The republic has established de facto independence. President Djukanovic, conscious of his government’s dependence on pro-independence forces, appears to have decided that the time has come to make it de jure. It would appear that, as of late 2001, he can count on the support of up to 60 per cent of the population. This is not a decisive majority on such a fundamental, polarising constitutional issue and much of the remaining 40 per cent of Serbs and federalist Montenegrins, mostly concentrated in the lands bordering on Serbia, are deeply, potentially violently, opposed to secession. President Kostunica would like to preserve the federation through negotiations to redefine the relationship between the republics. Prime Minister Djindjic would be happy to see the creation of a much looser confederation, but would rather accept a split than risk bolstering his rival’s position and having the Montenegrin tail wagging the Serbian dog in a federation that would satisfy the demands of Montenegrin 224
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict nationalists. Doubtless, there will be complex negotiations between governments and parties, but it is unlikely that Serbia will attempt to maintain the federation by force, whatever the outcome. There is little stomach just now in Belgrade for another War of Yugoslav Succession. The situation will be fraught with uncertainties and dangers, however. What, for instance, would happen if pro-federation forces in Montenegro were to boycott a referendum on independence, or refuse to accept an adverse result? During the Kosovo conflict, the West encouraged anti-Milosevic elements in Montenegro to distance the republic from Serbia. Now that the situation has changed and there are more congenial governments in Belgrade, the West has changed tack. Pressure is being applied to Podgorica to keep the FRY alive. This change of heart is understandable, for the West is reluctant (as always) to see borders change for fear of the precedent it would establish for Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia, possibly even Serbia itself. However, such changes in direction suggest, once again, the lack of a strategic vision and the primacy of tactical improvisation. This latest attempt to resist the forces of nationalism may be as unsuccessful as the previous ones. It also risks encouraging those opposing change to adopt an unreasonably intransigent, stabilitythreatening line in negotiations.
CONCLUSIONS
It is obviously too early to say whether the terrorist attacks on the United States and the consequent ‘war against terrorism’ will ameliorate or exacerbate the adverse effects of the Kosovo conflict. There seems to be a growing rapprochement between Russia and the United States, and even China does not appear to resent military intervention in its neighbour, Afghanistan. On the other hand, Muslim peoples, if not their governments, are having their suspicions about American and other Western states confirmed. All will depend on the future direction of Western, primarily American, policy. A perceived excessive reaction to the events of 11 September, either in scale or geographic scope, could easily result in the dissipation of the already meagre credit accrued by the West for helping Muslim minorities in Bosnia, Kosovo and Macedonia, and greatly increased Islamic hostility towards ‘Christendom’. The war is likely to have adverse consequences in former Yugoslavia. Western governments and organisations are preoccupied with Afghanistan and terrorism. If this becomes an obsession which results in neglect of Balkan problems, the situation there can only deteriorate. The West 225
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts cannot afford to take its eyes off this ball, and it must learn from past mistakes when addressing the future. The West has made, and continues to make, fundamental errors in its approach to dealing with former Yugoslavia. Firstly, it fails to adopt a unitary approach to problems common to most of the former Yugoslav successor states. Economic ruin, the lack of development of civil society, widespread crime and corruption which hamper and distort development, and virulent, intolerant and exclusive nationalism are common to all the new states, save fortunate Slovenia which has shed the Balkan image and joined central Europe. The West has tried to deal with each country in succession, and almost in isolation, regardless of the fact that the problems are not only common but interact; individual solutions are wont to fail through their narrowness and the knock-on effect they have on other issues and other countries. Secondly, the West follows contradictory and incompatible principles in its efforts to bring peace to the region. It insists on democratic governance, minority rights, peaceful resolution of differences, and on the inviolability of frontiers. The successful development of democracy will merely emphasise ethnic divisions as majorities exercise their power over minorities in what is usually seen as a zero-sum game. It will also reinforce the desire of some ethnic groups to change borders at the expense of others, and to give such demands a form of legitimacy. Overwhelmingly, the peoples of former Yugoslavia are simply not interested in building multi-ethnic societies with inclusive national institutions. Nationalism and the fear of domination by another group are immensely strong. Each ethnicity asks the question: ‘Why should we live as a minority in your state when you could be a minority in ours?’ Sophisticated constitutions with built-in safeguards for minorities and an emphasis on civic (as opposed to ethnic) definition of national identity are not generally accepted as the answer in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Macedonia, Kosovo, Serbia or, if you dig beneath the surface, in Croatia. And neither states nor minorities within them are averse to the use of force to have their way over what they regard as core issues. The West hopes that economic progress and cooperation will ease tensions, reconciling minority groups to their lot and majorities to the loss of historic lands. But if relative prosperity has not had this effect even on many Quebecois, Basques and Irishmen, to name but a few, why should it be expected to still discontent in the more politically backward lands of former Yugoslavia? Moreover, the much-discussed answer of a Marshall Plan for the Balkans, including Serbia, ignores the fact that the region, unlike Western Europe after the Second World War, lacks the societal, legal and economic preconditions which made that American 226
Some Reverberations from the Kosovo Conflict effort a success. Aid in the Balkans is all too likely to disappear into a black hole of theft and corruption, or to be misspent. The example of Bosnia-Herzegovina provides a warning about what could be expected. The same lack of a climate which favours economic progress will also deter private investment on the scale the region needs. It is impossible to force communities to live together in harmony when they do not want to. Where ethnic cleansing has not been accepted as a fait accompli, they cannot be separated either. Peacekeepers can prevent ethnic conflict from exploding into violent confrontation. They can freeze conflicts, suppressing the symptoms, but they cannot remove the causes of the disease. They will not achieve conflict resolution, only conflict perpetuation, though short of armed struggle. Thus they will be needed for decades in former Yugoslavia, with no guarantee that the basis of lasting peace can be created by their presence. The fervent wish of Western peoples, governments and militaries to have their soldiers home by Christmas may be achieved – but it will be Christmas 2050 or later.
NOTES
1. Fact Sheet: NATO’s New Strategic Concept, released by NATO at the Washington Summit on 24 April 1999. 2. Quoted by James Rubin in the Financial Times of London, 29 September 2000. 3. The themes in this paragraph and the next are developed in two other articles by the author. See Charles Dick, ‘Conflict spills into the 21st Century’, Jane’s Intelligence Review (December 2000), pp. 46–50; and Charles Dick, ‘History Warns the West that Russia cannot be Ignored’, Jane’s Intelligence Review (November 1999), pp. 10–12. 4. According to a dubious census of 1994, of the population of 1,945,932, about 66.6 per cent were Macedonians, 22.6 per cent were Albanians, 4 per cent were Turks, 2.2 per cent were Roma, 2.1 per cent were Serbs and 2.4 per cent were others. The Albanians claim their true proportion today is around 40 per cent, with the real figure probably being around 30–35 per cent. Demographic trends suggest that the Slavs will be in a minority by as early as 2015. 5. See James Bisset, ‘NATO’s Balkan Blunder’, Mediterranean Quarterly (Winter 2001), p. 11. 6. See the excellent analysis of the context and results of the election by James Pettifer, ‘Prospects for a New Yugoslavia’, CSRC Paper G91, February 2001.
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14
Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict1 JAMES GOW
INTRODUCTION
The question should not be when the United States, its allies and partners, and particularly their militaries, will leave the Balkans, but how the character of its continuing presence will be changed and under which conditions such a change will be possible. The US presence is embedded in an international effort, focused in military terms around NATO, in the threefold, compound interest of maintaining peace and security in South-Eastern Europe, maintaining strategic alliances and partnerships, and maintaining the credibility and primary position of those alliances and partnerships with the United States at their core and on which the United States depends (not least for the domestic and international context they give to brute American power).2 Washington is destined to some level of engagement and military presence for the indefinite future. However, that presence cannot and should not be regarded as constituting eternal implementation and enforcement. The key strategic imperative and the main goal of security policy in the region for the United States, and others involved in the NATO-led peace forces in the region, is to reach a point of partnership with the armed forces, governments and peoples of the region. This means a transformation of the current implementation mode. When such a transformation becomes feasible and when, eventually, it has been achieved, these will be the measures of success. Such a transformation of role will be both a manifestation of the degree to which the conditions for a return to armed hostilities in the region have been tempered, or removed, and an instrument for managing and removing those conditions. 228
Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict Across the region and in the two countries which are the particular focus of this chapter, Bosnia-Herzegovina and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia, including Kosovo, and Montenegro), there is a set of security challenges and political conflicts, each element of which might be affected by and affect others. The key international objective in the region is to remove the potential conditions for a return to armed hostilities. This involves dealing with a number of outstanding political and military–political questions, which will be addressed in the course of this chapter. The key issues that affect the conditions for renewed armed hostilities, aside from continuing international engagement, are the shift from implementation to partnership and establishing viable political communities (the sum of three elements: statehood, governance and justice). To some extent, the intertwined nature of the region’s challenges means that discrete treatment of them is either impossible or false.
V I A B L E P O L I T I C A L C O M M U N I T I E S A N D C O R R E L AT I N G A R M E D F O R C E S A N D S TA T E H O O D
The Yugoslav war was about statehood. International engagement was about the maintenance of order in an international society predicated on the existence and protection of states involved in mutual recognition of sovereignty and the exercise of sovereign rights, in normal circumstances, at least. The key purposes of international engagement have been to contain and bring to a close armed hostilities in the region, and then to work towards achieving a secure and stable environment in which there can be no return to armed hostilities. International intervention was generated by a complex of security and value concerns. None of these alone would necessarily have prompted engagement, but together they constituted a significant interest. The key elements were: regional and sub-regional destabilisation in Europe, both as a result of demographic outflows from the region and disruption of communications and trade; the upholding of key principles of international order – most notably, that there should be border changes resulting from a use of force; the credibility of international and especially Euro-Atlantic security structures and capabilities in the face of an intricate but ostensibly minor military campaign; and a set of humanitarian concerns, in terms both of displaced persons and of upholding Western values in the face of gross abuses of human rights. It would be wrong to assert that international engagement was purely a matter of moral impetus, and to dismiss credibility as an issue.3 While 229
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts there was certainly a moral component to the decision to deploy armed forces initially, this was only one element in the equation and almost certainly would never have resulted in deployment in the absence of the other considerations. The humanitarian dimension was quickly and superficially prominent because it turned out to be an effective marketing device for the operation: when officials were explaining to the first forces to be sent to Bosnia why they were bring sent, it was the label ‘humanitarian’ that appeared to be comprehensible and to be a motivating factor for the forces and their families.4 The humanitarian aspect of the operation was linked in an essential way to its strategic purpose in Bosnia, and in the later but different case of Kosovo. In Bosnia, the initial primary role in support of the UNHCR as it strove to enable populations to remain in their homes, was a means of resisting and attempting to curb the Serbian strategic programme of ethnic cleansing as far as possible.5 The Serbian campaign was to ensure the absence of armed resistance on territory under its control by removing the population – thereby addressing the Maoist dictum that a guerrilla is like a fish in water: no population, no water; no water, no guerrilla. By using military means to support communities to remain where they were, in a far from straightforward situation, the international force was resisting the Serbian strategic campaign. In Kosovo, the strategic and humanitarian were joint forces once more, but the distance between them was wider, leading to many misplaced criticisms over NATO’s addressing the strategic aspect of Serbian capability, rather than seeking to put troops on the ground to help the victimised population. In what was again a difficult and complex situation, and where the motivation was again not purely humanitarian, but had a vital humanitarian aspect without which there would not have been an operation, Western forces confronted a strategic challenge from the Serbian forces which, given Belgrade’s complete unwillingness in the face of Western attempts to avoid armed hostilities at Rambouillet in February 1999, and afterwards, outside Paris, in March, which, inter alia, became an even more paramount concern of strategic credibility. The majority of authors, in what seems to be a false orthodoxy, appear to see Rambouillet as an American pretext to carry out military operations against Serbia, with the Western ultimatum to accept apparently unacceptable terms as the key issue. In fact, it was Belgrade that refused to negotiate over the much-discussed Annex B to the agreement, on arrangements for security and implementation, involving a NATO-led force, rather than the United States and its allies. Both Ambassador Christopher Hill, face to face with FRY President Slobodan Milosevic, and United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright 230
Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict in secret telephone calls placed to him, made it perfectly clear that the United States and its allies were open to Serbian suggestions over the military annex. Milosevic refused point blank even to begin to discuss the issue, enjoying the fact that Secretary Albright had already effectively humiliated herself by seeking privately to find a way to avoid armed hostilities. In the end, after the NATO campaign had succeeded, Milosevic was forced to accept a military agreement that was considerably worse than the one that he had rejected in February and March. Two key elements demonstrate how far this is the case. Firstly, the original proposal permitted a continuing presence of both Yugoslav Army and Serbian Interior Ministry personnel in Kosovo, whereas the June 1999 agreement saw all FRY and Serbian forces leave. Secondly, the NATO role in the original agreement was limited to supervision of demilitarisation and cantonment, which became a comprehensive role in providing security in the province, deterring a Serbian return without agreement, and providing extensive support to the UN civilian authorities in the province.6 The United States and its allies also, in both cases, addressed a broader strategic challenge, which involved the credibility of European and NATO forces. The challenge was not so much vis-à-vis Serbia itself, although this was the case, but more importantly, in view of perceptions of American and NATO military–political capability around the world, most notably in Moscow and Beijing.7 Credibility is a vital element in strategy, especially where deterrence and coercion are factors in the use of armed force – that is, planning and preparation, but with a view to limiting the need to resort to the destructive capacity of the armed forces in order to achieve political objectives. More can be achieved at lower cost if an opponent can be compelled by the mere idea of that which might happen with destructive capability, than may be feasible if there is the need actively to use that capability to accomplish the desired end. In this context, as much as there was a humanitarian concern over Kosovo and a strategic concern regarding Belgrade, there was a more important and wider question of demonstrating credibility around the world, rather than seeing the advantage of NATO’s enormous military– political asset wasted by a failure of will to use it against a considerably weaker, but stubbornly defiant opponent. In this context it should be noted that the outcome, while in NATO’s favour, was not straightforward. The decision to act and the outcome clearly fall on the benefit side of credibility. However, much of the perception of the air operations as they occurred, however misguided in some cases, and afterwards, removes some of NATO’s shine. Against this background, the long-term success of the NATO-led peace implementation operations in Bosnia and in Kosovo is strategically 231
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts vital – both to make sense of the great stake already placed and to ensure that NATO’s credibility is not damaged by humiliating failure and withdrawal, or by a re-emergence of armed hostilities. The key objectives, therefore, are to manage the military security situation in the region and to contribute to the removing of conditions in which armed hostilities might reappear. Given that the war was about statehood and one of the most important reasons for international engagement has been to uphold the fundamental rules of the international system, the focus of any attempt to identify the strategic imperatives for international achievement must be settled statehood. One reason for intervention in Bosnia was to deny Serbian and Croatian attempts to create new borders through the use of force and ethnic murder and expulsion. The reality is that, while these projects were resisted to some extent, they could not be completely reversed. Similarly, the separation of Kosovo from Serbia and the FRY, which is the objective of the ethnic Albanian majority in the province and which is de facto achieved, is also not politically, formally and legally acceptable either to Belgrade, or to outside governments without Belgrade’s agreement. Only when substantial challenges to whatever arrangements for statehood exist at a given moment have been removed, will ultimate success have been accomplished. An unavoidable problem has been the correlation of armed forces and statehood. While it is reasonable, in general, to assume an equation that may be stated as one country, one armed force,8 the reality for both Bosnia-Herzegovina and the FRY is different. In the former, there are three armed forces (two of which are extensively controlled, or influenced, from outside the country), two entities and one country, with the objective being to harmonise the three armed forces into one to match the state. In the latter, there is one formal armed force of the FRY, but three separate territories (Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo) that need to be considered. Connected to this is a complex of other relevant forces that cannot be ignored in considering the civil–military landscape. Firstly, each of the constituent states in the federation has its own internal force, Yugoslav Interior Ministry Forces (MUP), each of which embraces police and paramilitary units. Secondly, the Serbian Security Service has been responsible for the organisation and control of quasi-autonomous paramilitary forces and special military units. Thirdly, on the territory of the FRY, there have been two branches of an insurgent force, the major one is the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA or UCK) in the Serbian province of Kosovo, fighting for independence for the mainly ethnic Albanian land, while the other is the minor UCPMB (the Liberation Army of Presevo, Bujanovac and Medvedja), operating beyond the borders of Kosovo in neighbouring territory where there are ethnic Albanian communities. 232
Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict The conflict on the territory of the FRY between the UCK and Serbian and Yugoslav Forces also led to the deployment of an international force in the province, with NATO organisation at its core. Fifthly, the VJ and the Security Service paramilitary units have been engaged in war on the territory of two neighbouring former Yugoslav states, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. The FRY is exceptional in having such a complicated web of civil–military relationships. In large part, this tangle of civil–military relationships can be credited to a decade of war. This adds a third aspect to the equation of statehood and armed forces – the lack of stable international relations. In the first instance, this resulted from engagement in a series of campaigns involving Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Kosovo and the West, as well as international isolation and sanctions. The FRY is unlike any other case (even if Bosnia-Herzegovina has experienced its own form of uncertainty derived from war). Later, extending from that decade of war uncertainty at the interface of national and international relations persisted, even after the triumph of democratic forces – indeed, it became extended after the fall of Milosevic because of a continuing political dynamic to dissolve the FRY: Montenegro, as a sovereign state according to its own and the FRY constitutions, is entitled to independence, should a referendum there favour such a move, while the province of Kosovo lacks that formal qualification, but is in many senses de facto separated. Only when there is some reasonable correlation between armed forces and settled political communities will the conditions for armed hostility have been eradicated. That will be the moment at which the United States and others engaged in Western policy will know that they have completely won in the Balkans – and to get there, they will have transformed confrontation into partnership, both between the regional actors themselves and between those actors and the institutions of European and international security, most notably NATO.
I M P L E M E N TA T I O N A N D PA R T N E R S H I P
Over the past decade, and particularly since 1995, NATO has become increasingly engaged on the Yugoslav territories. It has twice used sustained force in this period, both times against Serbian troops. It has also provided the infrastructure for, then the whole military– political definition of, major peace enforcement, or implementation, operations in the region. In two places, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo, peace and stability depend on the presence of NATO-led forces – 233
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts SFOR (Stabilisation Force) in the former, KFOR (Kosovo Force) in the latter. SFOR succeeded IFOR (Implementation Force), which was deployed to Bosnia with 53,000 troops in implementation mode – ostensibly (though never realistically credibly) for one year. In the military sphere, IFOR gave way to SFOR, with SFOR planned to become DFOR. When the last of these did not emerge, there was much discussion about ‘SFORever’ and, what to some appeared to be the real question, ‘WhatFOR?’ To a lesser extent, the same kind of question came to be asked when KFOR was added to the acronymic lexicon, with over 20,000 troops deploying to Kosovo in June 1999, in the wake of Serbian withdrawal. Both forces remain because there is a need to ensure security in the region. Indeed, the scale of the problem was marked by 33,500 troops staying in Bosnia under SFOR – somewhat higher than the 20,000 envisaged at its inception, in what was termed ‘stabilisation’ mode, until the decision in December 2000 that finally, following the change of regime in Belgrade, SFOR could reduce to something like its intended level. It is curious that in March 2000 both the American and British media reported the implementation of this reduction as a unilateral American troop cut, rather than a scaling-down in line with long-standing plans, formally decided in December under the outgoing Clinton administration. This was despite the fact that around 11,000 troops from other countries were due to be cut from requirements, in addition to the under 1,000 troops from the United States. Although there has been some reduction in the force level, it would be very easy to slip into thinking that this level of force and mode of deployment will be necessary for ever. This should be avoided, as should any tendency to think that there is an option to throw one’s hands in the air and to walk away from the problem. It is necessary to project 15, or perhaps more, years ahead. An external military presence is likely to be required for many years to come. But, over the years ahead, to make progress and to achieve eventual success, there must be an ever more creative and proactive approach. This entails evolution from the external implementation, which the various ‘FORs’ entail, towards partnership: there will be a continuing need for international engagement, including armed forces, but this should gradually replace implementation with partnership. Ear-clipping must give way, when possible, to hand-holding. The pattern of evolution so far has to be understood. For the first year in Bosnia, there were two major goals. One of these was military disengagement and cantonment, which was successfully and, in the end, relatively easily achieved (although my own judgement was always that it would be relatively easy to achieve that part of the agreement, many 234
Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict had fears that this could not be done). The second goal was to provide security, needed to begin consolidation of the political environment. For this, the key objective was to get through the Bosnia-wide elections. Those elections were held in September 1996 and provided the initial validation of the Dayton process, following the signing of the agreement. Since then, further rounds of local, entity and Bosnia-wide elections have slowly encouraged and measured the very gradual, still far from complete, consolidation of the Dayton arrangements. The Bosnian government formed in February 2001 was testament to this trend over time, being drawn from moderate and social-democratic forces. While ethno-national parties remained strong, they were also in slow decline. After more than ten years, in some cases, they were excluded from government office for the first time. However, the real issue is the need to alter the philosophy and thinking behind international military involvement in Bosnia and develop more creative avenues to follow. It is necessary to move away from discussion of an eternal implementation mode and towards partnership. By analogy, this would be akin to seeing the external presence in Germany after the Second World War transformed from occupier to ally (although the analogy should not be taken to mean either that Bosnia should remain divided for 40 years or that the FRY should remain as it is now, or that either of them or their territories should necessarily become a member of NATO). There is a need for a phased programme for moving away from implementation towards partnership. Bosnia and the FRY, countries implicated in the Bosnian war, were the only countries in Europe not taking full part in NATO’s Partnership for Peace (PfP) programme. There is no realistic prospect of either of them doing so in the immediate future. But working towards such a prospect must be the target of those engaged with NATO in the region. Bosnia, certainly, will not easily be able to join until it has a single, joint armed force – a prospect that is many years away. For now, there is a need to establish programmes of preparation for Bosnia and for the FRY, as well as for their relevant components. This means getting to a situation in which there is a single armed force to be a partner for the alliance. Without this, there can be little prospect of full PfP engagement for Bosnia or the FRY, or their territories. There is a need to reconcile armed forces, territorially based political communities and statehood. To understand how implementation has begun to give way to preparation for partnership and will then lead to eventual partnership, it is necessary to project ahead. This projection outlines how things might develop in Bosnia in a way that would make it realistic for the international community to reduce its commitment to Bosnia, in terms 235
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts of external implementation, combat-ready forces. Instead, it will have a phased programme of activities working with the parties in Bosnia. The latter will gradually come to be seen as reliable partners, rather than as troublesome groups of armed forces, which it might be necessary to discipline through a use of force. This projection entails three phases. Phase One has two stages, both already begun: stage (a) means continued implementation; stage (b) involves implementation with elements of transition. If sufficient progress towards partnership cannot be made over perhaps ten years, there will be a case for the international community to say that the will among the Bosnian parties is not there and, so, to leave Bosnia, arguing that a good attempt had been made, but despite all efforts, it had failed. This would be hard to admit, but it would be an admission of failure with honour, whereas any attempt to argue such a case sooner would lack credibility and would be humiliating. During this phase of continued implementation, preliminary steps have been taken regarding a shift towards partnership. Croatia’s membership of Partnership for Peace has begun to be used in limited ways to engage the parties in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The OHR-linked Standing Committee on Military Matters, established by the Bosnian Constitution,9 has begun to drop an absolute ideological insistence on consensus and complete integration on all matters, but has rather begun to build towards such integration in its discussions with delegates from the three armed forces in Bosnia. More acutely, the parallel NATO mission has begun to open up possibilities of cooperation with the different militaries in Bosnia, with a view to bringing them more together, but on cooperative rather than driven (and unwanted) integration. This has been a move towards going with the grain, rather than against it, yet at the same time maintaining perspective. Specific measures include elements of (primarily English) language training for members of the various armed forces in Bosnia, as well as confidence-building seminars that bring soldiers from each community together, training programmes, and sending personnel on courses in NATO countries. Assuming that Phase One is accomplished over several years, that phase of continued implementation, supplemented by graduated transition, will be followed by a period of consolidated preparation for partnership. This will be Phase Two. International activity would facilitate training and exercises and, crucially, would be considerably less costly than implementation. This would encourage the training of the armed forces and assist in the creation of a joint armed force for the whole of Bosnia. Preparation for partnership, including integration of the armed forces, will be a slow and delicate matter, with integration, in particular, not impossible, but not easy and a matter that should not be forced. Integration 236
Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict in this kind of situation has been achieved in other cases, such as at the end of the Zimbabwe Civil War, where British assistance helped transform Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU) and Zimbabwe African People’s Union (ZAPU), forces divided by tribal and ideological hostilities, into one army. This was successful despite the pessimistic expectations of all involved, who believed that it could not be achieved. In Phase Two, there will also need to be training and professionalisation of a smaller Bosnian armed force. The key element in making this phase successful will be the design of the armed forces in Bosnia-Herzegovina (and there are similar, though not identical considerations regarding the FRY, which are not addressed here at this stage). If there are to be coordinated armed forces, these must be built on links to communities. It will be almost impossible to build a Bosnian army based on complete integration of the different ethnic communities, given that the starting point is three discrete armed forces. A more likely path to success lies in building on existing structures and strengths, with real integration only occurring at brigade level or higher. Thus, the perspective in which those seeking to consolidate the peace in Bosnia would have to work is one of territorially labelled units that would implicitly reflect ethnic majorities up to the battalion level, which units would not be capable of any major activity unless they were operating under integrated command at a higher level. However, development of this kind will only be possible through NATO-led partnership. The key to this is to understand that the sides will be brought together by engagement and working with them, rather than by threatening to beat them with a big stick. In a sense, there will be a small international military presence in the area acting as a restraining force. But restraint will come from holding hands and being together with the parties, rather than by standing at a short distance and threatening to use force against them if they do not behave. Only at the end of Phase Two will it be possible to envisage Bosnia’s having armed forces suitable for partnership. Full participation in PfP will be the central feature of Phase Three. Fifteen or more years down the road, this would represent the final phase of special international attention to Bosnia and, after a designated period, the end of the process. There can be no certainty about the time frame – it could be longer. But this is the only direction in which Bosnia and the international community can go, if Dayton is to be successful. That is also the case if the international community, notably the United States, is to avoid either humiliating failure, or an eternal and expensive implementation force. This projection can only be accomplished if evolution within NATO is properly understood, in particular, regarding the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council and the role that can be played there in terms of 237
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts combined planning. Above all else, it can only be achieved if there are successful moves in the sphere of civilian implementation. On that score, it is pertinent to underline that, whatever the military factors, ultimately political developments are necessary. The implementation force and action regarding the armed forces of the three Bosnian communities can make a contribution. But this can only be to create the opportunities and the space for political success and civilian implementation. An international military force will be required in the region indefinitely because of the potential military situation and the embarrassment that this situation would cause. It will be required because of the continuing need to support civilian activities and to create space for those activities in order to make Dayton work. Both of these are the case because the international community has made such an investment in the region that anything which could be seen as failure will serve grievously to undermine the credibility of NATO and the standing of the United States as a leader and the decisive power in international relations. It is not only a question of Bosnia. It is a question of NATO, its members and the role of the United States in the world as a whole. One outstanding issue that will affect, but not determine, the shift from one phase to another, is the arrest of war crimes suspects. This has been one of the most successful aspects of the international military involvement in the region. War crimes suspects detention operations will be needed until the conditions are right for them to cease – one major dimension of which is the absence of further suspects to arrest (at the time of writing, only a few suspects remain at large in Bosnia). However, in some ways, they could be counter to inducing partnership. There is a need, therefore, for a carefully managed process to make the apparently countervalent be seen as complementary. To avoid failure, or interminable and expensive commitment, it is necessary strategically to envisage a move from implementation to eventual partnership. This can only be achieved over 15 or more years and will entail at least three phases: Phase One (a), implementation, and Phase One (b), implementation and transition; Phase Two, preparation for partnership; Phase Three, full partnership. The time frame set out here should not be seen as made up of temporal periods, but as phases in which tasks have to be accomplished. The times suggested above are not exact, but indications of the time that each phase ought to take. The key thing is to accomplish implementation. The time frame should continue to be ‘as long as it takes’. The focus should continue not to be end-date, but end-state. In order to get to that end-state, however, it is necessary to consider the empirical situations that require outcomes. The United States, NATO 238
Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict and the West generally need to leave room for manoeuvre. The FRY is largely a fiction. It is certainly not a relationship of equals. Nor does it have effective federal institutions. A set of very difficult issues of constitution and statehood and sovereignty face Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro and Kosovo, as well as the international community. Some level of agreement should be relatively easy to achieve between Serbia and Montenegro. However, there may well be major difficulties over currency and defence. While these negotiations and their outcome may well complicate political and diplomatic discussion over Kosovo, a significant realignment of Montenegro and Serbia along the lines envisaged could also serve as a catalyst for some kind of interim agreement regarding the status of the province, albeit with a continuing international presence, within a newly defined association involving both clear recognition of statehood and new arrangements for defence for Serbia and Montenegro. This will not easily be achieved but constitutes the most realistic set of arrangements that might be achieved. Some form of change is inevitable and can be managed if it is embedded in cooperation and partnership. Only three years after the end of the Kosovo war, Belgrade had already started to talk about getting involved in NATO’s Partnership for Peace programme. NATO should move as quickly as possibly to get the country into PfP, even if special conditions may need to be attached. Closer ties could involve getting senior officers to study in military colleges in NATO countries, and joint NATO–Yugoslav training exercises. In spring 2002, there was significant progress on one of the most important, yet painful, aspects of security sector reform in Yugoslavia and obstacles to rapid progress regarding PfP: war crimes. In April, despite strong resistance, the Serbian government forced through a law allowing transfer of suspects to The Hague. Several leading figures from the Milosevic era then gave themselves up to the War Crimes Tribunal. Several other war crimes suspects were transferred in the weeks that followed. Confronting the war crimes record would remain essential to transformation of the VJ (Yugoslav Army). NATO countries have to keep up the pressure to make sure outstanding war crimes issues are resolved as soon as possible, letting Belgrade move on to more pressing matters, such as eventual European Union membership. In the context of transforming the VJ, the issues of security forces in Montenegro and Kosovo also have to be handled. Most importantly, if Serbia and Montenegro are to embrace democracy for real, the EU and NATO must assist in the birth of a broad, civilian security policy community. The territories of the FRY currently lack journalists, non-governmental organisations and academics who 239
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts understand defence issues. While outsiders can push on the most immediate and pressing questions, ultimately the FRY and its territories themselves must have people who can generate debate on policy and push for democratically accountable security institutions. Other issues will be problematic, but options are available to manage them. In Bosnia-Herzegovina, when outstanding enforcement needs are met, most crucially over the apprehension of war crimes suspects, then there will be a role for NATO in fostering integration (or, even if it is almost unthinkable, eventually agreed separation) through military engagement. Considerable political development has to accompany the military role. But the potential of the military role in forging partnership outstrips the prospect of speedy political progress in other areas. Over Kosovo and its border areas, there is a significant need to ensure that the current implementation mode in Kosovo is handled effectively to control the security situation there. However, it is important to ensure that there is no extension of KFOR into neighbouring areas (whether in Serbia or Macedonia) into a new implementation regime generated by ethnic Albanian armed activity. The limited security risks posed by that activity offer big opportunities for new approaches based on cooperation and partnership, as has already been demonstrated to some extent in the Presevo valley, where international observers have operated more as advisers.
CONCLUSION
Given that there will be international military engagement by the United States, its NATO allies and their partners, it would be better for it to be placed in as coherent a strategic and security policy context as possible. The definition of that context is vital not only for international activity, but also for shaping the perspectives of those in the region. The key to such definition is the move towards partnership. Every step towards partnership is a step closer to strategic success. The ultimate success will be when the armed forces and countries governed from Belgrade and Sarajevo are capable of being seriously considered as prospective members of NATO – irrespective of whether they actually seek to do so. When there are stable, viable states across the region, with a one-to-one correlation of armed forces and political community, and the only question is whether or not successful partnership between NATO and the armed forces of the region might be translated into something stronger, we will know that we have finally won. 240
Managing and Removing the Conditions for Armed Conflict NOTES
1. This chapter draws on more extensive work undertaken by the author for the US Army War College. 2. Significant research at the University of Maryland has demonstrated the linkage between low support for the exercise of US power and Washington’s acting alone, while support becomes substantial if the United States is seen to be acting with others. See Steven Kull, A Study of Public Attitudes on European–American Issues Part Two: Americans on the NATO Operation in Bosnia (Washington, DC: Program on International Policy Attitudes, 1998), also available at http://www.pipa.org (visited on 8 May 1998) where cognate research by the programme can be found. See also Seeking a New Balance: A Study of American and European Public Attitudes on Transatlantic Issues (Washington, DC: Program on International Policy Attitudes, 1998). 3. As does Richard Betts of Columbia University in a paper for the US Army War College review of commitments in the Balkans in 2001, where some of the material here was also presented. 4. Author discussion with senior British official, July 1995. 5. See James Gow, Triumph of the Lack of Will: International Diplomacy and the Yugoslav Crisis (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), Chapters 5 and 6. 6. The key elements in this view of Rambouillet are based for the most part on discussions with those directly involved, and this material contributes to my book, James Gow, The Serbian Project and Its Adversaries (London: C. Hurst, 2002). The information on Secretary Albright’s calls to Milosevic was given on the record by former Assistant Secretary of State James P. Rubin at the Royal Institute of International Affairs, London, 19 October 2000. For a generally excellent discussion of the Rambouillet ‘orthodoxy’ and its failings, see Alex Bellamy ‘Reconsidering Rambouillet’, Contemporary Security Policy, 22, 1 (2001). 7. Inter-agency discussions with author, US State Department, April 1999. 8. This is a truism, the exceptions to which, as Martin Edmonds has noted, in general ‘scarcely warrant close inspection’. Martin Edmonds, ‘Introduction’, in Martin Edmonds (ed.), Central Organizations of Defense (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1985), p. 1. 9. Annex 4, ‘The General Framework for Peace Agreement’, Wright Paterson Airbase, Dayton OH, 21 November 1995.
241
Conclusion STEPHEN BADSEY AND PAUL LATAWSKI
The break-up of Yugoslavia was one of the most important challenges for European security in the first decade that followed the end of the Cold War. For Great Britain individually and NATO collectively, the crisis in the former Yugoslavia meant a series of testing military operations and the acquisition of lasting commitments in South-Eastern Europe. Although the focus of this book has inevitably been on assessing the lessons, both military and political, of the Kosovo crisis at the end of the decade, it also seeks to draw out wider lessons from the process of Yugoslavia’s violent dissolution that began in the earlier 1990s. It is important to note that the stability of South-Eastern Europe had been earlier challenged by the conflicts in Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia, and that is why the scope of this book considered events preceding the Kosovo crisis. These earlier conflicts triggered responses from the international community that were considerable, if sometimes reluctant. In this tale of recurring Yugoslav crisis and international response, the Kosovo conflict during March–June 1999 owes its prominence to the fact that it represented something of a culmination point among these many conflicts. Drawing military lessons from a series of conflicts, let alone a single conflict, can be a dangerous business full of methodological pitfalls. Nevertheless, Kosovo and the earlier Balkan conflicts raise a number of important historical, political and military questions that warrant examination if any lessons are to be learned.
T H E I M P O R TA N C E O F T H E PA S T
It is clear from the opening two chapters that images of the past were a significant leitmotif in the story of Yugoslavia’s dissolution. The fact that the public, the media, and political and military leaders would draw on 242
Conclusion lessons of the past is not new, nor is misunderstanding or misapplying ‘historical lessons’ in dealing with international crisis and conflict. For successive US presidents, historical analogies drawn from the Munich Crisis in 1938, or the Vietnam War, have long conditioned decision-making and not always with happy consequences.1 Many historical lessons or images come from inherited national experiences and, often, bitter ones. Examples of this can be seen in the impact of the Suez crisis of 1956 on the external role of the United Kingdom, or the angst caused by the prolonged Vietnam War on the United States. Other historical lessons such as those stemming from Munich are seen as having more universal applicability. While one might be tempted to argue that the dominant historical lesson from the Yugoslav conflicts of the 1990s was a universal view that committing troops to ‘Balkan quagmires’ was something best avoided, as Simon Trew and Klaus Schmider indicate the story is much more complex. Historical lessons, such as they exist, regarding the Yugoslav conflicts overwhelmingly relate to perceptions of the experience of the Second World War. As Schmider and Trew make clear in their chapters, the reputation for fighting prowess of Josef Broz Tito’s Partisan forces as it existed in the 1990s was much greater than the historical facts would support. In the same way, the drain on German resources in terms of tying down quality units and manpower represented rather less than the major haemorrhage of human and material resources that has often been claimed. An Allied amphibious assault on the Adriatic coast was at least as important a worry of the German occupation forces as Partisan activity. The lesson of the German experience in Yugoslavia might be more accurately summed up as its being a not very taxing secondary or tertiary theatre in terms of German priorities. Historical analysis in the case of the break-up of Yugoslavia was inevitably mixed (and, one suspects, self-serving), and dependent on the given view of the desirability of military intervention. Putting aside the images of quagmires, what history tells us is that local military prowess may not be uniformly great, and the problems of the would-be intervener not insurmountable. In the end, as Schmider and Trew illustrate, the effect of historical lessons or images of the past in shaping public opinion and the views of decisionmakers can be exaggerated.
T H E M A J O R M I L I TA RY L E G A C I E S
The military experience of the members of the international community engaged in trying to bring to an end the conflicts associated with the 243
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts break-up of Yugoslavia centred on two important strands: various kinds of Peace Support Operations (PSO), and the employment of coercive air power. In Bosnia, the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) faced a daunting range of challenges that triggered serious doctrinal debates about peacekeeping, traditional and otherwise. UNPROFOR’s successors in Bosnia, the Implementation Force (IFOR) and the Stabilisation Force (SFOR), and also the Kosovo Force (KFOR), proved to be less contentious enforcement actions but ploughed new ground in post-conflict peacebuilding. Major-General Dannatt’s examination of doctrinal change highlights the dangers in drawing too many lessons from one experience, particularly UNPROFOR’s experience in Bosnia. Although he examines doctrine from the experience of the British Army, he also makes points of wider interest to other armies and armed forces. It is quite clear that the experience of UNPROFOR in Bosnia was of the ‘one-off ’ variety, as compared to the more defined and successful efforts of IFOR/SFOR and KFOR. One lesson, however, that is not likely to be a ‘one-off ’ is the reality that any doctrine will be applied within political limitations and complications. Although armies are inherently organisations that like to work to clear and unambiguous aims, international and domestic politics will invariably create situations that provide difficult processes and uncertain aims. Therefore, as soldiers encounter new challenges on the spectrum of PSO, the flexibility and adaptability of doctrine will be a vital ingredient to success, however defined by circumstances. MajorGeneral Dannatt’s argument for a single doctrine that embraces both ‘manoeuvre warfare’ and ‘manoeuvre peacekeeping’ seems to go in this direction of flexibility and builds on existing strengths in British Army doctrine. The use of coercive air power is the other major military legacy of the Yugoslav conflicts of the 1990s. In Bosnia, NATO employed coercive air power in Operation Deliberate Force in 1995, and again in Kosovo with Operation Allied Force in 1999. These air operations followed from the major use of air power in the Gulf War of 1990–91. Indeed, enforcement of ‘no-fly’ zones over Iraq meant an almost continual use of air power over that country by the United States, together with Great Britain, in support of UN Security Council Resolutions in the 1990s. The use of air power in Operation Deliberate Force in conjunction with artillery proved very effective in helping to bring about an end to the conflict in Bosnia. The fact that the targeted group, the Serbs, were warweary and their opponents were enjoying greater ascendancy on the battlefield meant that coercive air power was used at a crucial juncture, and the timing of the air operations undoubtedly contributed greatly to its success. 244
Conclusion The employment of air power in respect of Kosovo during March– June 1999 generated a much wider debate on the way in which air power itself was, and can be, used and its effectiveness. Air Vice-Marshal Tony Mason considers some of the deficiencies in the way air power was used during the Kosovo crisis. He notes among a number of issues criticism of ‘gradualism’ in terms of the volume of missions flown early in Operation Allied Force, and the effect it had, as well as the targeting issues that cropped up in NATO as operations developed. Apart from the critique of how air power was actually employed, another wider debate has emerged on the utility of air power as compared to other military instruments such as ground forces. Some commentators have argued that the case of Kosovo demonstrated that air power alone could deliver results.2 Conclusions from the majority of analysts, however, have been more cautious about drawing such sweeping lessons from the Kosovo episode. Ideas that air power alone could produce ‘bloodless’ victories with a minimal risk are generally seen as not realistic. There is no disputing that, in the first decade after the Cold War, air power is the military instrument highly favoured in the West and, in particular, by the United States. It does, however, bring serious risks concerning the predictability of the military instrument employed and its suitability for the goals being pursued.3 Most analysts see that air power is best employed in conjunction with other land and naval instruments, and also with coercive diplomacy and other forms of pressure and influence.4 Air Vice-Marshal Mason takes a middle view that air power was an ‘indispensable catalyst’ in delivering the outcome of the crisis, while recognising that other factors played a role. In the case of Kosovo this role had been limited by political considerations.
THE NEW MEDIA ASPECTS
Whereas a decade previously the media had been largely perceived as peripheral to military matters, the experience of the Balkans throughout the 1990s affirmed the centrality of media issues to modern conflicts. Although the involvement of the media in warfare has a long history, its importance was first made apparent to most analysts and practitioners by the Gulf War of 1990–91. The significance of the media in the international responses to Bosnia, and in the functioning of UNPROFOR and IFOR/SFOR, was apparent for all to see. Some of the problems and issues raised over Bosnia were dealt with by a previous volume in this series, The Media and International Security.5 But a full account of the interaction between the media and international perceptions, particularly those of 245
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts the United States, and the way that they were manipulated during the conflict, has yet to be written. As the decade recedes into the past, it is a matter of concern that new historical myths of events seem to be establishing themselves, based on these perceptions and on early media depictions, possibly to rival the myth of the Yugoslav Partisans of the Second World War in shaping future attitudes. The indignation with which some of those involved in the events in Bosnia during 1991–95 or in Kosovo in 1999, including some journalists, react to suggestions that they might be required to provide evidence for their statements and claims is perhaps less worrying than the agreement by some scholars that this is an acceptable position, and even one with which to sympathise.6 Just as they saw significant changes in the technology of warfare, particularly in the greatly increased use of precision-guided munitions (‘smart bombs’) in air operations, so the 1990s also saw major changes in the technology of mass reporting. The equipment, satellite dishes, cameras and computers with which Western reporters covered the Gulf War were largely all long obsolete by 1999. The speed of transmission of news through the media, and the emergence of a true 24-hour global media cycle, were significant preoccupations. The importance of visual images of all kinds, both television and still photographs, in dominating the news cycle was particularly seen as a lesson of Kosovo. The conflict also demonstrated clearly for the first time the emergence of the Internet as a significant factor in international media communication and the shaping of perceptions, although on a small scale. Long before the 1990s, senior officers of the US armed forces had identified public support as their ‘11th Principle of War’ (following on from their traditional ten principles), and engaged with the media in the belief that this was the way to obtain and maintain that support. Brigadier Roberts’s description of the role of ‘Media Ops’ and what the British Army expects to get out of its relationship with the media shows both the sophistication of modern British Media Operations doctrine, and the influence of Kosovo. While acknowledging concerns about the more sinister and politically sensitive interpretations of such ideas as ‘perception management’, as well as describing in detail the structures and mechanisms used in a Media Operations campaign, Brigadier Roberts emphasises the basis of Media Operations in truth and in openness, and also extends the same ideas to Psychological Operations (Psyops). This is, and has been throughout the decade of the Yugoslav conflicts, an area of great debate and concern, and seems set to continue to be so. The issue of credibility and the need to maintain public support for NATO’s actions was a major preoccupation of the Kosovo conflict, as was the genuine surprise from many governments that were active 246
Conclusion participants in the fighting, including Great Britain, that after a decade of ‘media war’ experiences NATO Headquarters itself was under-resourced and unprepared for the modern media cycle. As Dr Jamie Shea’s chapter demonstrates, NATO’s problems were not the result of ignorance or unfamiliarity with the media issues. Rather, Kosovo showed the sheer political complexity for a multinational alliance involved in the use of force in the name of humanitarian intervention, complexities of which the media are simultaneously a part and a conduit for transmission and discussion. There was also a very distinct difference, not always apparent to journalists at the time and perhaps never accepted by some critics of NATO, between uncertainty about events and a deliberate attempt to deceive the media. Once more, the relationship between the military objective, the media, and the level of actual or expected casualties is seen as critical, but in this case also including the level of enemy casualties, especially among civilians. The belief remains strong that public opinion, and public support for military action involving casualties, are highly volatile and susceptible to rapid change by visual images – at least in the context of an intervention such as Kosovo. Shea also reaffirms the centrality of truth to any official NATO dealings with the media. Kosovo gave a vivid demonstration of the full implications of the idea of ‘asymmetric warfare’. One side – NATO – fought principally with air power, and the other side fought principally with ‘media power’, mounting a political and propaganda campaign aimed both at elite opinion and the wider international public, in an effort to degrade and derail the NATO air campaign and to avert a ground war. Given the immense superiority of the United States in its war-fighting capabilities over any other country in the world, this strategy of seeking to prevent or degrade a military response through politics and perception management appears likely to be a standard gambit. Succeeding from the disputed ‘CNN effect’ of the earlier 1990s, it has become possible to speak of a ‘CNN defence’, although in the case of Kosovo this proved ineffective.7 Whereas in 1991 analysts talked of the ‘media war’ (or in Shea’s phrase the ‘virtual war’) ranking in importance with the ‘real war’ of air, naval and ground forces in determining the outcome, by 1999 it had become apparent that the division between the two was itself no longer realistic: the media war was an essential part of the real war, and was treated as such by all sides.
KO S O V O A N D L E G I T I M A T E I N T E RV E N T I O N
That NATO launched armed action without having an explicit mandate from the UN Security Council triggered a lively debate on the legitimacy 247
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts of the intervention. Although the decision to intervene was based on a variety of factors, among them was the aim to save lives of Kosovar Albanians threatened with ethnic cleansing. But however laudable NATO’s motive, intervention collides with the well-established doctrine of non-intervention in the international system. In short, NATO’s intervention entered a kind of international no man’s land between upholding the sanctity of state sovereignty and that of human life. While NATO members asserted that humanitarian considerations and the need to prevent the destabilisation in South-Eastern Europe justified the action, states such as Russia and China saw the doctrine of non-intervention being undermined. This question of ‘humanitarian’ intervention has produced both political controversy and academic debates that continue to simmer on. These debates raised important issues about how the armed conflict should best be viewed. Moreover, these debates have raised important conceptual questions as to how the military action over Kosovo is to be regarded with the descriptors employed ranging from ‘war’ to a ‘humanitarian intervention’. In the case of Kosovo, the question of the legitimacy of the action, particularly if it is to be regarded as a humanitarian intervention, is a matter of central importance. Humanitarian intervention may be defined as being forceful outside intervention in the affairs of a sovereign state to uphold human rights or save the lives of people threatened by the violent oppression of a regime. Conversely, such intervention might also be considered when human suffering is threatened as a consequence of state disintegration and civil war. Given the well-embedded doctrine of non-intervention, this presents actors in the international community with a paradoxical choice. Bruce Cronin highlighted the difficulties when he wrote that: On one hand, international law and diplomatic practice are clearly biased in favour of state autonomy in matters that are considered to be domestic … On the other hand, multilateral treaties and international institutions have long provided for collective action in situations where governments violate generally accepted norms of behaviour.8 What the Kosovo crisis brought to the fore is the lack of clarity over the issue of when the long-standing doctrine of non-intervention applies to a given situation, and when it can be overridden in the interests of the increasingly universal human rights norms of the international system. Therefore, the crux of the problem rests on the need to establish criteria for intervention, and humanitarian intervention in particular. It is crucial 248
Conclusion for establishing the legitimacy of any kind of intervention. Criteria for intervention inevitably bring one into the ethical issues associated with intervention, and these are far from being a simple and clear-cut matter. Some governments, such as that of Great Britain, have tackled the problem of articulating a set of criteria with all of the ethical challenges entailed, but there remains no consensus on this matter among members of the international community.9 On the matter of conferring legitimacy, Kosovo seemingly saw the United Nations sidelined as regards NATO’s military intervention. This was a significant event given the central role assigned to the UN on matters of international peace and security. For a state or group of states to engage in armed intervention, generally speaking, there are only a few recognised and well-established avenues for gaining legitimacy for the armed action. These options include military action undertaken as an act of self-defence (supported by Article 51 of the UN Charter) or at the invitation of the government of the country that is the target of the intervention, or with a mandating resolution from the UN Security Council. As Martin Smith suggests, although the UN was sidelined as regards NATO’s military intervention, the episode is far from marking the end of the UN’s role in conferring legitimacy on international intervention. The Kosovo crisis, however, demonstrated a structural attribute of the UN that inhibits its effectiveness regarding the kinds of crises typified by Kosovo. The UN Charter and the security role that derives from it make the UN an international body that is optimised for dealing with inter-state conflict better than intra-state conflict. In a world in which most conflicts are intra-state, and solutions involving the international community may include interventions of various kinds, this is a structural problem that will require some political finesse to overcome. The long-term impact of the Kosovo crisis on debates about intervention will undoubtedly continue, and have already been extended as a result of the threat of international terrorism. Following the events of 11 September 2001 (increasingly known as ‘9/11’) that prompted an international intervention in Afghanistan (albeit for reasons other than humanitarian imperatives), the problem of establishing agreed criteria for any kind of international intervention is unlikely to go away.
R U S S I A’ S R O L E I N E U R O P E A N S E C U R I T Y
During the Kosovo crisis, Russia was among the more vocal critics of NATO’s military intervention. As Mark Smith has argued, this opposition was fuelled by a number of factors, including lingering hostility to 249
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts NATO in the Russian political and defence establishment, and the strongly held view that the alliance should not violate the doctrine of non-intervention in the domestic affairs of sovereign states. The Kosovo crisis revealed a great deal about the ambivalence of NATO policy towards Russia, and the decline of Russia as both a regional and global power. The decline in Russia’s international influence is undoubtedly linked to its internal problems, and its economic decline underpins the erosion of its military power in terms of both conventional and nuclear forces. This was very evident in the manifest inability of Russia to contemplate any serious change to its military posture in response to the Kosovo crisis. With this decline come inevitable questions regarding Russia’s place in the international order. Can Russia be considered a regional power – let alone a superpower – given its palpable inability to prevent NATO from launching Operation Allied Force and exert military pressure of its own during the Kosovo crisis? Although Russia’s nuclear arsenal, together with its permanent seats on the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) and in the G-8, still affords it an importance in international affairs, this is a status that is likely to fade unless its domestic problems are addressed. On the plus side for Russia, its diplomatic role was influential and important particularly in bringing the Kosovo conflict to an end. Russia’s influence in South-Eastern Europe, particularly with Serbia, survived the Kosovo crisis and the departure of Slobodan Milosevic from power. Its relations with NATO have not been permanently damaged. Indeed, the terrorist attacks of 9/11 may have provided a common set of interests upon which to build a new Russia–NATO relationship.
P E A C E B U I L D I N G A N D H U M A N I TA R I A N A C T I O N
The break-up of Yugoslavia not only saw a number of conflicts throughout the 1990s, it also saw the termination of these conflicts and intervention by the international community that has led major efforts at peacebuilding. Whether in conflict or post-conflict situations, a host of international agencies, non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and the armed forces on the ground became engaged, and in these complex environments interacted with each other with varying degrees of effectiveness. Stuart Gordon’s chapter examines a very important aspect of this interaction in the form of civil–military cooperation (CIMIC). Indeed, the development of CIMIC occurred in a number of daunting environments: Bosnia during the conflict and the deployment of the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR), post-Dayton accord Bosnia 250
Conclusion with the Implementation Force and Stabilisation Force (IFOR/SFOR), and in the countries neighbouring Kosovo in response to the refugee crisis. The deployment of the Kosovo Force (KFOR) in June 1999 added another chapter to the evolution of CIMIC. Despite this wealth of experience from past and ongoing operations, CIMIC is still dogged, as argued by Gordon, with a lack of effective mechanisms for cooperation and the cultural differences between the practices of military and civilian organisations. The conflicts in South-Eastern Europe generated enormous humanitarian problems that particularly challenged governments and NGOs. Indeed, South-Eastern Europe was symptomatic of wider global problems. Mukesh Kapila, from the perspective of a government practitioner, critically examines the need to address more fundamental sources of violence and conflict if humanitarian action is to be fully effective. Kapila stresses the need to link politics and security to humanitarian action. In broad terms, this is an important lesson of the Balkan experiences of the 1990s.
T H E L E G AC Y O F T H E B A L KA N C O N F L I C T S
Predictably, the end of the Kosovo crisis of 1999 prompted a debate about what its ‘lessons’ might be for the region and the international system as a whole. Judah has offered the opinion that ‘there were no particular lessons’ to be drawn from the Kosovo crisis.10 Daalder and O’Hanlon similarly argued that ‘the overall verdict on Kosovo is less likely to offer new lessons than to affirm old truths’.11 Commentators who were more openly critical of the Kosovo episode included Mandelbaum, who opined that it was a conflict ‘marked by military success and political failure’,12 the latter being identified as its flawed goals and unsettled questions of sovereignty and self-determination. Certainly, the question of the future stability of South-Eastern Europe and the successor states of the former socialist Yugoslavia is far from assured. Despite the outpouring of attention of the international community throughout the 1990s, many conflicts in South-Eastern Europe, as Charles Dick notes, have been frozen rather than resolved. Many processes of questionable stability abound, but few fully peaceful end-states. In his view, the need to contemplate redrawing frontiers and granting independence to particular groups in pursuit of a comprehensive regional solution is an obstacle the international community has balked at surmounting. The usual fears of Balkanisation, that is the possibility of further fragmentation and the risky precedent of redrawing state boundaries, make such a solution unpalatable for many policy-makers. 251
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Other critics, such as Paul Rogers, believe that Kosovo illuminated a need for ‘greater commitment to conflict prevention, rather than concentrating so persistently on a military route to security’.13 Preventing conflict, or rather preventing conflict from reigniting again in South-Eastern Europe, is certainly relevant to peace-building in the region if the processes established are ever likely to achieve a lasting peaceful end-state. James Gow considers the resolution of South-Eastern Europe conflicts to require improved governance, more consolidated stateness and the application of justice. He argues that security sector reform – particularly of armed forces – is one of the keys to achieving lasting stability and turning Yugoslavia’s successor states into ‘partners’. Gow, however, is under no illusion that the pursuit of lasting solutions to South-Eastern European problems is anything but a long-term project. It will require a long period of patient commitment on the part of the international community to attain real partnership. Kosovo has made some considerable impact on the part of the debate focused on the vexing issues associated with international intervention. It is an aspect of the debate that has wide ramifications for the international system. What is evident in the Kosovo intervention is that it was a discretionary conflict for Western governments. Moreover, its aims, as Lawrence Freedman has argued, were ‘described in normative terms’.14 The idea that norms or values should impel intervention, and that it should not simply be driven by more traditional motives such as selfdefence or national interest, marks an important precedent regardless of its limitations in practical application. Already the intervention debate seems set to move on. With the global ‘war on terrorism’ driving political and military agendas, memories of intervention for humanitarian reasons seem likely to fade as intervention in the exercise of self-defence – as in Afghanistan – and, perhaps the need for ‘preventive’ intervention, will drive future debates. Despite the rapidity of change, one constant feature of the post-Cold War international order has been the frequency of intervention in response to the more complex and less predictable security environment. Kosovo, as the culmination of the Balkan conflicts of the 1990s, happened to be one of the more challenging ones, not the least because of its attendant questions and contested legacy.
NOTES
1. See Yuen Foong Khong, Analogies at War: Korea, Munich, Dien Bien Phu, and the Vietnam Decisions of 1965 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University
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Conclusion
2. 3. 4.
5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14.
Press, 1992); and Jeffrey Record, Making War, Thinking History: Munich, Vietnam and Presidential Uses of Force from Korea to Kosovo (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2002). See for example, General Merrill A. McPeak, ‘The Kosovo Result: The Facts Speak for Themselves’, Armed Forces Journal International (September 1999), pp. 62–3. Colin McInnes, ‘Fatal Attraction? Air Power and the West’, Contemporary Security Policy, 22, 3 (December 2001), pp. 28–51. See Daniel L. Byman and Matthew C. Waxman, ‘Kosovo and the Great Air Power Debate’, International Security, 24, 4 (Spring 2000), pp. 5–38; and Earl H. Tilford Jr, ‘Operation Allied Force and the Role of Air Power’, Parameters, 29, 4 (Winter 1999–2000), pp. 24–38. Stephen Badsey (ed.), The Media and International Security (London: Frank Cass, 2000). See for example Jonathan Glover, Humanity: A Moral History of the Twentieth Century (London: Pimlico, 2001), p. 5. Stephen Badsey, ‘Manipulating the Media’, in Keith Brent (ed.), Air Power and Joint Forces (Canberra: Aerospace Centre RAAF, 2000), pp. 107–20. B. Cronin, ‘Multilateral Intervention and the International Community’, in M. Keren and D. Sylvan (eds), International Intervention: Sovereignty versus Responsibility (London: Frank Cass, 2002), p. 147. See D. Sylvan and J. Pevehouse, ‘Deciding Whether to Intervene’, in ibid., pp. 56–74. T. Judah, Kosovo: War and Revenge (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000), pp. 307–8. I. Daalder and M. O’Hanlon, ‘Unlearning the Lessons of Kosovo’, Foreign Policy, 116 (1999), p. 129. M. Mandelbaum, ‘A Perfect Failure: NATO’s War Against Yugoslavia’, Foreign Affairs, 78, 5, (September/October 1999), p. 2. Paul Rogers, ‘Kosovo Crisis: Lessons to Learn’, World Today (August/ September 1999), p. 6. Lawrence Freedman, ‘Victims and Victors: Reflections on the Kosovo War’, Review of International Studies, 26 (2000), p. 336.
253
Index
A-10 (aircraft) 50, 52 Abiew, Francis 130 Adie, Kate 69 Agenda for Peace 190 Ahmici Massacre (1993) 35 Ahtisaari, Martti 143, 144 Air Force, British see Royal Air Force Air Force, Dutch 322 Squadron 43 Air Force, United States (USAF) 44, 50 casualties 42 doctrine 60 electronic warfare capability 58–9 air power in asymmetric warfare 60 in combined operations 43 in Second World War 17 in US strategic thinking 84 Albania 194, 196, in Second World War 19 Albanian National Army (ANA) 222, 223 Albanians, Kosovar see Kosovar Albanians Albright, Madelaine 45, 160, 230–1 Allied Rapid Reaction Corps (ARRC) 85, 89, 191 Amnesty International 93, 100 ANA see Albanian National Army Annan, Kofi 156, 158, 160, 161, 163, 168, 170–1 Arbatova, Nadezhda 151 Army, British casualties in Bosnia 34 Civil Affairs Group 198–9 deployment to Bosnia 187 development of civil affairs capability 183–5 doctrine 27–38 passim peace support operations (PSO) 184 Army, Croat / NDH in Second World War 15, 16, 21
Army, German Croat conscripts in (1941–44) 20, 21 Dutch volunteers in (1941–44) 19 strength in 1943–44 19–20 war crimes (1941–44) 14 in Yugoslavia (1941–44) 5–6, 8–9, 14–22 passim Army, Italian in Yugoslavia (1942) 16 Army, Serbian in Kosovo 9, 45, 46, 51, 52, 230 Army, United States Civil Affairs Division 183–4 Army Doctrine Publications 28 ARRC see Allied Rapid Reaction Corps (ARRC) asymmetric warfare 33, 59, 109, 124 Avdeyev, Aleksandr 141 ‘Bagnall Initiatives’ 28 Banja Luka 35 BBC 73, 80, 89 Belgium contribution to air campaign (1999) 48 Bell, Martin 36, 93 Benn, Tony 10 Berger, Sandy 45 Blair, Tony 40, 47, 49, 50, 82, 90, 91, 93, 99, 103 on ethics of intervention 131–2 ‘Blair doctrine’ 132 ‘Bloody Bosnia’ (TV series) 4 Bosnia-Herzegovina British forces in xix, 29, 32, 33, 37–8 civil-military cooperation in 186 comparisons with Vietnam 7 justification for international intervention 230 media reporting of 107 as model for Kosovo 85
254
Index NATO policy in 29 NATO / UN relationship in 155–9 post-conflict armed forces 236–7 post-conflict developments 219, 229, 235–40 in Second World War 16 United Nations policy in 155, 189, 221 see also Operation Deliberate Force; United Nations Protection Force Boutros-Ghali, Boutros 155, 157, 158, 163, 190 Britain civil-military cooperation in Kosovo 197, 198 contribution to air campaign 48 forces in Bosnia xix, 34 forces in Kosovo xx, xxi overstretch xx British Broadcasting Corporation see BBC British Military Doctrine (pamphlet) 28 Bull, Hedley 127, 128, 129 Burchill, Julie 10 Bytyci, Shpepin 91
Clausewitz, Karl von 61, 125, 126 Clinton, President Bill 6, 49, 50, 70, 90 Clodjane 47 Close Operations 34, 37 CMTF see civilian –military cooperation task force (CMTF) CNN see Cable News Network coalition warfare 59, 60, 103, 114 Cohen, William 45, 60–1 Combined Air Operations Centre (COAC) 59 command and control warfare 72 Contact Group 142, 167, 211 Cook, Robin 50, 80, 87, 132, 133 Croatia forces trained by US 84 Partnership for Peace programme 236 see also Nezavisna Drzava Hrvatska (NDH) Cronin, Bruce 248 cyber warfare 69, 110
Cable News Network (CNN) 81, 99 Camdessus, Michael 141 Campbell, Alastair 89, 90, 91 Canada contribution to the air campaign (1999) 48 CAOC see Combined Air Operations Centre casualties civilian (1999) 43, 44, 53, 54, 55, 56, 93 military (1999) 42, 44, 84, 101 Chernomyrdin, Viktor 142, 148, 170 mediation efforts 143–6, 213 China 166, 167, 168 Chinese Embassy, bombing of 56, 57, 90, 112 CIMIC see civil-military cooperation civil-military cooperation 181–99, 250–51 in Bosnia to 1995 186–91 Cold War civil affairs 182–3 after Dayton accords 191 in Kosovo 194–8 in NATO 191, 192–8 post-Cold War British doctrine 184–5 in Second World War 181–2 CIMIC Task Force 192 Claes, Willy 165 Clansman (radio) xxi Clark, General Wesley K. 40, 41, 42, 45, 46, 49, 50, 81 ‘measures of merit’ 42–3, 56 on status of Kosovo campaign 123–4, 125, 126
Daalder, Ivo 124, 172, 251 D’Alema, Massimo 50 Dayton accords (1995) 29, 32, 157, 191, 198, 212, 219–20, 235, 237–8 Deep Operations 34, 37 Delors, Jacques 7 Denmark contribution to air campaign (1999) 48 Department of International development 185 depleted uranium weapons 110 Directorate of Corporate Communications (Army) (DCC(A)) 74 Dien Bien Phu (siege, 1954) 7 Djakovica ethnic cleansing in 91 NATO bombing accident 81–2, 89, 90, 107, 108, 112, 113, 114, 116 see also Kosovar Albanians, accidental bombing of Djindjic, Zoran 224 Djukanovic, Milo 51, 224 doctrine, British 27–38 passim unity of doctrine 28, 31–2, 34 Draskovic, Vuk 101 Drew, Nelson 155 EADRCC see Euro-Atlantic Disaster Relief Centre (EADRCC) 197 Eastern Approaches (Maclean) 8 Economist (magazine) 41, 42 ethnic cleansing Balkan conflicts of the 1990s 6 in Balkan history 14
255
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts in Bosnia 189 in Kosovo (1999) 50, 53, 60, 70, 90, 91, 112, 117 mass graves 112–13 Euro-Atlantic Disaster Relief Cooperation Centre (EADRCC) 197 Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council 237 European Union 143, 151 Exercise Certain Strike 67
helicopter operations 47–8 Hill, Christopher 230 Hitler, Adolf 15, 16 Hoffman, Stanley 128 Holbrooke, Richard 164, 167 Holbrooke-Milosevic agreement (1998) 159–60, 161, 166 Holocaust 6 House of Commons Defence Committee 61 humanitarian assistance see civil-military cooperation ‘humanitarian intervention’ 86, 99, 130–4, 203–7, 230, 248–9 ‘humanitarian war’ 124, 126
F-16 (aircraft) 43, 52 F-117 (aircraft) 44–5, 49 Fallouja, accidental bombing of 82 Finland Security and Defence Policy paper 131 Fixdal, Mona 133 Foreign and Commonwealth Office 47, 80 France civil-military cooperation in Kosovo 196, 197 contribution to air campaign (1999) 48 NATO role in Bosnia 155 opposition to use of ground force (1999) 50 Freeman, Chas W. Jr. 129 Frost, Mervyn 130, 134 G-8 see Group of Eight (G-8) Garnett, John 126 Germany contribution to air campaign (1999) 48 civil-military cooperation in Kosovo 196, 197 diplomacy at UN 169–70 fighting in Yugoslavia (1941–44) 5–6, 8–9, 14–22 passim and the KLA 212–13 strategy (1942–43) 17–18 Gowing, Nik 68 Grady, Captain Scott 52 Greece 103 Greer, Germaine 10 Group of Eight (G-8) 142, 143 Cologne summit (1999) 148 peace proposals 52, 53, 56, 144, 170, 171 Guardian (newspaper) 5, 6, 8, 9, 54 Guicherd, Catherine 166 Gulf War (1991) 42, 79, 81, 83, 85, 86, 87, 88, 185, 186, 194 Guthrie, General Sir Charles 41, 44 Hague War Crimes Tribunal 6 Harrier (aircraft) 44 Hehir, J. Bryan 133
Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) systems 51, 58 IFF see Identification Friend or Foe (IFF) systems IFOR see Implementation Force Ignatieff, Michael 124 Implementation Force (IFOR) xix, 27, 29, 32, 33, 34, 37, 157, 171, 234, 244 civil-military cooperation 191 media operations 85 Independent 10 Independent International Commission 168 Independent State of Croatia see NDH information operations 34, 36, 72 Inge, General Sir Peter (later Field Marshal) 71–2, 187 International Court of Justice 93, 214 International Criminal Tribunal 100, 109 International Herald Tribune 105 International Monetary Fund (IMF) 141–2 Internet 80, 81, 86, 87, 89, 94, 105, 106, 110 see also Web, the intervention, concept of 127–30, 215, 248–9 see also humanitarian intervention Italy (in Second World War) relations with Croat / NDH state 16 defection to Allies 21 Ivanov, Igor 139, 140–1, 142, 151, 167–8 Ivashov, Colonel-General Leonid 145 Jackson, General Sir Michael 27, 29, 35, 52 Janjic, Father Sava 88 Jenkins, Simon 9 Jertz, Major-General Walter 53 Jovanovic, Zivadin 161 JPC see NATO Russia Permanent Joint Council Judah, Tim 251 Just War doctrine 100, 133–4
256
Index Keegan, Sir John 9, 111, 124, 186 KFOR see Kosovo Force KHOU TV 92 Kinkel, Klaus 167–8, 170 KLA see Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA UKC) Korean War 94, 169 Kosovar Albanians 40, 46, 107, 212, 220 accidental bombing of 54, 81–2 in Macedonia 222 mass graves 112–13 refugees 57, 112 Kosovo British forces in xx, xxi civil-military cooperation 194–8 media operations in 69–77 passim NATO air campaign 6, 39–62 passim, 84, 121, 212, 244–5 NATO bombing errors 53–7 passim NATO policy in 29–30 post-conflict developments 220–22, 239 status of NATO campaign 79, 123–6 Kosovo Extraction Force 32 Kosovo Force (KFOR) 27, 29–30, 35, 36, 37, 143–4, 221, 234, 244 command structure 171 deaths of Gurkha Engineers 74 and media 69, 93 Russia’s role in 146 Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA / UKC) xxiv, 52, 62, 141, 211, 212–13, 219, 220, 221, 222, 232 Kosovo Protection Corps (KPC) xxiv Kostunica, Voislav 146, 147, 148, 224 KPC see Kosovo Protection Corps (KPC) Krauthammer, Charles 124 Kvashnin, Anatoly 150 Lambeth, Benjamin 57 ‘Late Show’ (TV series) 9 Leaf, Brigadier General Dan 82 Leurdijk, Dick 173 limited war 125–6 Little, Richard 127 Luzhkov, Yury 151
media 245–7 balanced reporting 109 changes in the 1990s 86 influence on tactics 70 Kosovo bombing errors 53–7, 81–2 Kosovo conflict 79–94 passim, 101–18 passim ‘media war’ concept 82–3 references to Second World War 5–10 passim, 243 references to Yugoslavian history 3 websites 69, 76, 80, 81, 86, 87–8 media operations xxii, 34–6, 87 in Bosnia 85 command chain 74 deaths of Gurkha Engineers 74 in Kosovo 69–77 passim ‘perception management’ 71–2 as a principle of war 68 Milosevic, Slobodan 22 comparisons with Hitler 6 Holbrooke-Milosevic agreement (1999) 159–60, 161, 166, 231 Kosovo crisis (1999) 40, 45, 47, 48, 50, 52, 53, 60, 61, 117, 213 and the media war 92, 101–2, 106, 110 negotiations to end Kosovo conflict 143, 145 overthrow of 62, 147–8, 223 Russia’s relations with 140, 141, 145, 146–8 Ministry of Defence (British) 80, 134 Ministry of Defence (Russian) 141 Mirkovic, Sasa 87 mission command 28, 33 Mitrovica xx, xxiv ‘Mogadishu line’ 31 see also Somalia, US operations in Montenegro attitude to media 88 post-conflict developments 224–5, 239 in Second World War 16, 17, 19 Morgenthau, Hans 129 Murphy, Sean 130 Mussolini, Benito 15, 16
Macedonia 47, 194, 196, 197, 218, 219, 221 destabilisation of 222–3 Maclean, Fitzroy 8 ‘manoeuvre peacekeeping’ 33, 37 manoeuvre warfare 28, 33, 37 Marshall–Andrews, Bob 90 Mayall, James 130 Mayhew, Sir Patrick 72
NAC see North Atlantic Council National Liberation Army (NLA) 219, 222 NATO see North Atlantic Treaty Organisation NATO-Russia Permanent Joint Council (PJC) 139, 150, 151 Naumann, General Klaus 59, 90 Navy, United States 53
257
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Netherlands contribution to air campaign 48 News Release Group (NRG) 72, 75 Newsweek 104–5 Nezavisna Drzava Hrvatska (NDH) 14, 15, 16, 19, 21, 22 NLA see National Liberation Army (NLA) non-governmental organisations (NGOs) 36, 185, 187, 188, 189, 195 North Atlantic Council (NAC) 39, 40, 144–5, 155 December 1992 Agreement 16 North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) air campaign for Kosovo 6, 39–62 passim, 84, 111, 211 Article 5 operations 193, 218 Bosnia operations 31, 84, 154–9 civil-military cooperation 191, 192–8 cohesion of xix, 50, 59, 61 command structures 59 ‘dual key’ arrangement 158 force levels 102 ground campaign for Kosovo 41, 50, 52, 102 ‘humanitarian intervention’ 86 justification of use of force in Kosovo 121–3, 161–72, 213–15, 229–30, 231, 247–9 media 69–70, 81–2, 87, 89–93, 101–18 post-Dayton policy 29 post-war role in Bosnia 235–40 post-war role in Kosovo 144, 231–2 Quints group 169 relations with Russia xxii, 61, 139–46, 149–51 relations with UN 153–74 passim, 216–17 Strategic Concept (1999) 150, 173, 193, 213, 217 strategy 94 strategic interoperability 58 website 88 see also Allied Rapid Reaction Corps; Euro-Atlantic Disaster Relief Cooperation Centre; Partnership for Peace Norway contribution to air campaign (1999) 48 NRG see News Release Group OCHA see United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs O’Hanlon, Michael E. 124, 172, 251
OHR see United Natuins Office of the High Representative Ohrid agreement 222 O’Kane, Maggie 9 Operation Allied Force 44, 84, 153, 161, 162–3, 170, 172, 244 see also Kosovo, NATO air campaign Operation Deliberate Force 83, 157, 244 see also Bosnia Operation Desert Fox 84 Operation Desert Strike 84 Operation Horseshoe 222 Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) 150, 151, 159, 160–1 OSCE see Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe OSCE Observer and Verification Mission 32 Osgood, Robert E. 125 Otis, General Glenn K. 68 Otte, Thomas G. 127, 128 Owen, David (later Lord) 157, 187 Papandreou, George 47 Partisans (Second World War) 5, 9, 15, 16, 17, 18 impact of 21, 22, 243 Partnership for Peace programme (PfP) 235, 236, 237, 239 Pavelic, Ante 15, 16 Peace Support Operations (British doctrine publication) 85, 191, 244 peacekeeping doctrine 28, 31, 32, 85 ‘manoeuvre peacekeeping’ 33 ‘second generation’ 85 Pearce, Edward 5 Pfaff, William 105 PfP see Partnership for Peace programme (PfP) PGMs see precision-guided munitions Phillips, Colonel William 191, 192 PICs see press information centres Pinter, Harold 90 Plastrik, Mount 115 Podesta, John 47 Portugal contribution to air campaign (1999) 48 Posen, Barry 170, 171 precision-guided munitions (PGMs) 44, 48, 51, 58 Predator (unmanned aerial vehicle) 51 press information centres (PICs) 73 Primakov, Yevgenny 140, 141, 142
258
Index Pristina Airport incident 144 psychological operations 36, 71, 73, 75–6, 110 public opinion 68, 70–1, 79, 90, 98–118 passim Putin, Vladimir 146, 147 Radio 21 88 Radio B92 Belgrade 87 Radio Big 35 Radio-Television Serbia (RTS) 81, 82, 87, 88, 92 Television Centre bombed 55, 91, 92, 93, 110 Rambouillet Agreement (1999) 29, 40, 88, 144–5, 211, 212, 230 Ramsbotham, Oliver 130 ‘Rapid Dominance’ concept 84 Rear Operations 34, 37 refugees 194 accidental bombing of (1999) 54–5, 68 see also Djakovica Roberts, Adam 124, 134, 161 Robertson, George (later Lord) 80 Kosovo air campaign 39, 41, 42, 45 relations with Russia xxii, 150 Robinson, Mary 93 Rodman, Peter 165 Rogers, Paul 252 Rowland, Jacky 89 Royal Air Force 44 Royal Ulster Constabulary xxiii RTPSAT (radio / television station) 88 RTS see Radio-Television Serbia (RTS) Rugova, Ibrahim 212, 219, 220 rules of engagement (RoE) 30, 44, 47, 54, 75, 81 Russia Kosovo crisis 46, 56, 211, 249–50 loan from the IMF 141 Pristina Airport incident 144 relations with Milosevic 140, 141, 145, 146–8 relations with NATO xxii, 61, 139–46, 149–51 relations with US 140–1 role in KFOR 146 role as mediator 141, 142–6, 170 in the United Nations 166, 167, 168 Russia-NATO Founding Act 139, 141 Ryan, General Michael 60
Sarajevo airlift 189 comparisons to Dien Bien Phu 7 Schelling, Thomas 187 Schmider, Klaus 8 Schr/ der, Gerhard 50, 143, 170 Schwarz (German operation, 1943) 17 SDR see Strategic Defence Review Second World War 5, 88 Seleznev, Gennady 147 Sengupta, Ken 10 September 11 terrorist attacks 215, 216, 225, 249 Serbia civilian morale (1999) 49 post-conflict position 219, 220, 223–5, 239 in Second World War 14, 15, 17 SFOR see Stabilisation Force SFRY see Yugoslavia, Socialist Federated Republic of (SFRY) Shea, Doctor Jamie 46, 48, 50, 81, 82, 83, 90, 91 Shelton, General Henry H. 45, 47, 60–1 ‘shock and awe’ concept 84 Short, Lieutenant-General Michael C. 42, 60–1 Simma, Bruno 163, 167 Simpson, John 89 Slim, Hugo 190 Slovenia 226 Smith, Dan 133 Smith, Admiral Leighton 157 Smith, General Sir Rupert 29, 30 Socialist Federated Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY) see Yugoslavia, Socialist Federated Republic of (SFRY) Solana, Javier 40, 44, 45, 90, 121–2, 164, 167 Somalia, US operations in (1992–94) 31, 43, 70, 99 Spain contribution to air campaign (1999) 48 Splendid, HMS 43, 53 Srebrenica massacre (1995) 29, 109, 212 Srebrenica Report (United Nations) 157 Stabilisation Force (SFOR) xix, 32, 144, 171, 192, 219, 233–4, 244 ‘stealth’ fighter aircraft see F-117 Stewart, Lieutenant Colonel Bob 35–6 Stojadinovic, General 8 Strategic Defence Review (SDR) xix Sutjeska Gorge, battle of (1943) 5
SA-80 (rifle) xxi Sacirbeg, Muhammed 6 ‘Safe Areas’ 29
Talbott, Strobe 143, 165 Tanjug 87, 91, 106 website 80
259
Britain, NATO and the Lessons of the Balkan Conflicts Telegraph, Daily 9 television decline of news coverage 86 dependence on pictures 107, 108, 112 effect on US public opinion 99 twenty four hour coverage 111 Thornberry, Cedric 189 Time (magazine) 5 Times, The 9 Tito, Marshal Josef Broz 5, 11, 18, 21, 22, 243 TLAMs see Tommahawk Land Attack Missiles Tommahawk Land Attack Missiles (TLAMs) 53 UAVs see unmanned aerial vehicles UCK see Kosovo Liberation Army UNHCR see United Nations High Commission for Refugees United Nations 123, 130, 206–7, 249 agencies 185 relations with NATO 153–74 passim Russian view of UN role 139–40, 141, 143 ‘Uniting for Peace’ Resolution 168–9 United Nations Charter 154, 161, 162, 163–4, 165, 249 Article 2 165 Article 39 166 Article 51 154 Articles 53 154 Article 99 164 Chapter 7 162, 163, 166 Chapter 8 154, 156 United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) xxiii, 188–9, 194–7, 230 United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK) xxiv, 170, 171, 221 United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) 198 United Nations Office of the High Representative (OHR) 198, 236 United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) xix, 27, 29, 33, 37, 244 air support for 156–7 briefed by Fitzroy Maclean 8 civil-military cooperation 186, 187–91 command structure 171 NATO involvement with 155, 156–7 untenable situation in 1995 31–2 United Nations Security Council 139, 141, 154, 160–73 passim
Bosnia operations 155–8, 190 Resolution 1031 157–8, 162 Resolution 1160 164, 166 Resolution 1199 40, 160, 164, 166, 214 Resolution 1203 160, 164, 166, 167, 214 Resolution 1244 143, 144, 146, 170, 171–2, 213, 221 ‘Safe Areas’ policy 29 United States air power 83, 84 aversion to casualties 43, 84 civilian-military cooperation task force (CMTF) 192 contribution to Kosovo air campaign 48 implementation of Holbrooke-Milosevic agreement 159 and Kosovo crisis 212, 214, 230 and the Kosovo Liberation Army 212 post- Balkan conflicts role 228, 240 post-Cold War role 215–17 relations with Russia 140–1, 211 Somalia operations (1992–94) 31, 43, 70, 99 training of Croat forces 84 United States Army Center for Military History 8 United States European Command (EUCOM) 59 unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) 51–2 UNMIK see United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo UNPROFOR see United Nations Protection Force Utasha (Croat political movement) 15, 16, 22 Valasek, Thomas 163 Vietnam War 94, 104 comparisons with Balkan conflicts 7, 35, 45 Vincent, John 128 Visoki Decani Monastery 88 VJ see Yugoslav Army Vulliamy, Ed 9 war, definitions of 79, 123–6, war crimes German (1941–45) 14 NATO 93 Serbian 81, 112–13, 238 War Crimes Tribunal 36, 146, 239 Warden, Colonel John 50 ‘Warriors’ (television drama) 32 Washington summit (1999) 123, 172
260
Index Washington Treaty (1949) 173 Web, the / websites 69, 76, 80, 81, 86, 87–8 Weiss (German operations, 1943) 17 Wheeler, Nicholas J. 134 Wider Peacekeeping (Army Field Manual) 28, 31, 37, 85, 191 Wilby, Air Commodore David 55, 92 Woollacott, Martin 9 W/ rner, Manfred 155, 156 World Wide Web see Web, the
Yugoslav Army (VJ) 233, 239 Yugoslavia in Second World War 5–10 passim Yugoslavia, Federal Republic of 239 post-conflict foreign policy 148 post-conflict politics 223–5 post-conflict relations with Kosovo 221, 232 use of media 87, 91–2, 106 Yugoslavia, Socialist Federated Republic of 219
Yeltsin, Boris 140, 141, 142, 147
Zandee, Dick 173
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