No I hadn't noticed the Dutch thing. My mistake.
Why I think NATOs war in Kosovo was wrong:
Please read this short Guardian article. It will give you Deja Vu.
Here is the BBC's (shortish) account of the war
- NATO did not want to pursue diplomatic or economic means of solving the problem. They wanted to jump to war (as they the collation has jumped to war in Iraq). So they gave Milosevic a set of proposals that would unacceptable to any state leader, especialy a stubborn one. These included (a) giving Kosovo a referendum and (b) allowing *NATO* troops unrestricted access into all of Yugoslavia.
He, as we thought he would, refused. So then we bombed. And we bomed some more. And we kept on bombing. But it wasn't working. Then Russia (who we had deliberately ignored) allied with Germany to send in a secret diplomatic mission. This turne out to be successful and Milosevic agreed to let UN and Russian troops jointly enter Kosovo.
Where are those two demands that proved to be deal breakers before? Nowhere. Kosovo remains a part of Yugoslavia and *UN* troops remain confined within it.
All that bombing achieved nothing beyond what could have been agreed at Rambouillet and in the end it was Russia's diplomacy that brought about a resolution and saved NATO face.
- The bombing turned 45,000 refugees into 800,000 and took three times as many lives per day as the events before it had.
- NATO got into the problems they did and caused the mass exodus they did because they refused to be patient with diplomacy and as soon as it looked like Russia might veto, they ingored the UN and went to war. In the end it was Russia and the UN that had to pick up the pieces.
Other articles:
"Kosov and the UN"
The NATO war was illegal - even the British think so
Amnesty International accuses NATO of war crimes
Some books:
Masters of the Universe: NATO's Balkans Crusade
Nato's Empty Victory
Kosovo: Contending Voices on Balkan Intervention