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July
4, 2002
Bosnia
As Chump Change
It
may have slipped in under the radar by now that the United
States vetoed
an extension of the UN mission in Bosnia this weekend, since
the UN could not be blackmailed into granting US troops immunity
from the new International Criminal Court. Since the Security
Council refused to compromise, and the threat of veto has
already
been publicized, there was little else the Empire could
do.
Retreat?
We Just Got Here!
Contrary
to some
speculation, this was not a setback for the Imperial occupation
of Bosnia. If only! No, the UN mission Empire's legate vetoed
involved 46 American police instructors, mainly concerned
with training the local constabulary to put the "force" in
"law enforcement." Since Bosnia's police specialize in shaking
down drivers on the country's poor excuse for roads while
ignoring an explosion of organized crime that has taken control
of society, one could say the mission's abrupt ending would
not be a major loss – despite the panicking
pleas of Bosnian authorities to the contrary.
Even
that judgment could be premature, though, as the mission was
provisionally extended for three more days to give the rest
of the world a final chance to bow to Empire's wishes.
Above
the Law
Why
such a fuss over a handful of peacekeepers? Actually, less:
according to Tuesday's Washington
Post, there are 677 police officers, 34 military observers
and exactly one peacekeeper serving in 15 UN missions.
So the veto has nothing to do with the US peacekeepers, or
Bosnia. It was simply the first mission up for renewal, and
the first to fall prey to blackmail from Washington. The Empire
is really after no less than a recognition that it is above
international law.
When
he vetoed the extension, US Ambassador to the UN John Negroponte
said it clearly:
"We
will not ask them [US personnel] to accept the additional
risk of politicized prosecutions before a court whose jurisdiction
over our people the government of the United States does not
accept… With our global responsibilities, we are and will
remain a special target, and cannot have our decisions second-guessed
by a court whose jurisdiction we do not recognize." (Reuters,
June 30)
The
sheer temerity of this, coming from the very people who just
about pulverized a country into submitting to just such a
court just three years ago, is almost unfathomable. Almost,
because it has long been obvious that leaders of the American
Empire reject all laws and even common logic.
What
one does is not important. What matters is who one is:
a world Empire, obviously, has "global responsibilities"
and "cannot have its decisions second-guessed." If you're
anyone else… tough luck. Take your place in line for ICC,
ICTY, NATO bombing, UN occupation, etc. Backed by American
bombs, human rights reign supreme and sovereignty is the thing
of the past. Did you not
receive the memo? Or should NATO bomb Belgrade again?
In
Arrogant Honesty
This
doctrine comes from the very top of Imperial establishment.
A few years back, Robert Kagan, a notorious neo-conservative
ideologue at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace,
co-wrote with William Kristol a foreign
policy doctrine based on "benevolent global hegemony"
of the United States. Kagan may not be the father of American
Empire – unfortunately, there are many who could claim the
dubious distinction – but he is certainly one of its foremost
advocates. This past weekend he addressed his flock, appropriately,
from the Washington Post's editorial
page. The unfiltered arrogance of power that simply oozes
from Kagan's text is responsible for its shocking honesty.
"American
officials fear some independent-minded prosecutor, answerable
to no one, might someday bring charges against an American
for war crimes," he explained, citing the bombing of "Slobodan
Milosevic's Serbia." This may sound right and reasonable,
until it becomes obvious that Kagan believes the very notion
that Americans might commit war crimes to be beyond comprehension,
and the terror-bombing of Serbia to be the epitome of justice.
What,
Me Crazy?
He
proceeds to ridicule the Europeans and other "less influential
and less worthy nations," (my emphasis) for trying
to create a world "where rules and laws are more important
than military power." That obviously cannot be allowed, for
"As the world's most powerful democratic power, the United
States is called upon—yes, called upon—far more frequently
than any other nation to dispatch its troops overseas for
any number of purposes."
It's
not as if Kagan is claiming the US is fighting a holy war
on behalf of the rest of the world. He makes no such claim.
To him, it's the self-evident truth:
"America's
entire global strategy is built around projecting military
power anywhere at any time […] the United States, which has
the lion's share of responsibility for defending the rest
of the civilized world against rogue states, will have
to worry every time it sends troops into hostile territory."
(my emphasis).
Well,
why shouldn't a country worry when it sends troops into foreign
territory? Wouldn't that be naked aggression, and thus a crime
against peace? Ooops, that's logic speaking. None of that
in Kagan's world.
Kagan's
insane ramblings are especially dangerous since neither he,
nor his think-alikes who run the Empire, actually understand
how insane they are. The idea that the United States is special,
divinely anointed to rescue the world from darkness of sovereignty
and free choice is pathologically demented. But who dares
object, when the Empire has the ships, the bombs, and the
planes to deliver them?
Defenders
of Empire
Signs
that the insanity is not rampant are deceiving. For example,
while that same Washington Post supposedly endorses
the ICC and accuses His Elevated Majesty of overreaching with
the UN veto gambit, it actually defends
Imperial conquest and complains that the ICC might "constrain
the Kosovo-style humanitarian interventions that human-rights
groups rightly advocate." How nice of them to clear that up,
no?
What
About Bosnia?
It's
not going anywhere any time soon. Sure, its former viceroy
Wolfgang Petritsch claims
that it is now a "functioning state with a clear European
perspective." Him and his two predecessors have had their
way in the hapless protectorate for six years now, and what
do they have to show for it? Well, they did impose unified
license plates, the new flag looks snazzy – and yes, lest
we forget, they rebuilt an entirely new repressive state apparatus,
in place of the one destroyed by the war. Perhaps most importantly,
Petritsh oversaw the imposition of new constitutional principles
that set up ethnic quotas in public
service. Human rights, at last!
That
is, until one is reminded that Bosnia had all that – a repressive
state apparatus, snazzy symbols, unified license plates and
ethnic quotas – under Socialism and just before the war, and
they didn't do a thing to stop the bloodshed. In fact, they
made it inevitable.
But
what would Petritsch know of logic, reason or facts? The former
Imperial viceroy got the job because of his efforts
in staging the Rambouillet "talks," that infamous failed attempt
by Mad Madeleine Albright and Tricky Dick Holbrooke to blackmail
Serbia into accepting NATO occupation, while calling it "peace."
Chump
Change
The
1995 conquest of Bosnia was merely a stage towards occupying
Serbia, thus completing the conquest of the Balkans and installing
the United States as the "benevolent global hegemony" that
could unleash "humanitarian bombing" anywhere in the world,
without so much as by-your-leave from the UN or anyone else.
A brave new world, indeed.
Empire's
lofty pronouncements of "peace" and "justice" ring absurdly
hollow in the Balkans, and not only because the "humanitarian
intervention" in Bosnia is used as a weapon of blackmail against
international law. Empire's own commitment to hunting "war
criminals" (i.e. anyone but itself) and trying them by the
(loyal, as opposed to "independent") Hague Inquisition has
long been pure politics. But it is truly pathetic when Imperial
stormtroopers ransack
the empty house of Radovan Karadzic, former Bosnian Serb
leader who's been evading capture for years, just to show
they can.
Whether
its paladins vent their impotent rage against Iraqi children,
Serbian hospitals, Afghan
weddings or Radovan Karadzic's hardwood floors, fact remains
that Empire sustains itself only through brute force designed
to instill fear, not respect.
All
the empty pronouncements about law, justice, human rights,
and peace are just that: empty. And the objects of their "salvation"
are just that: objects. Chump change, to be used and abused
in forwarding the only agenda the Empire really ever cared
about: power.
Quite
a far cry from "inalienable rights" to "life, liberty and
pursuit of happiness" from 226 years ago. How sad.
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