Now that the alliance, while celebrating its 50th anniversary, has used its troops to help resolve another nation's internal problems, which country will be next?
by Melvin Rhodes
In hindsight, wars are often turning
points in world history. They alter the balance of power, boundaries
are redrawn, leaders are replaced and peoples are uprooted. As it has
been throughout history so it will be with Kosovo. Perceptions take
time to change, but there will be significant changes over Kosovo.
Clear signals have been sent by
allies America and Britain that ground troops will likely not be used
in future conflicts, except in short minor wars. This could have grave
consequences and not only in the immediate situation. Imagine if, in
World War II, Churchill and Roosevelt had stated at the onset of hostilities
that they would not use ground troops in their attempt to defeat the
Axis powers. The reluctance to use ground forces was compounded by
announcements on both sides of the Atlantic that they would not be
used-sending a message to Serbia's leadership that there was a limit
to what the NATO alliance would do to try to defeat them. Lessons from
the last conflict in the Balkans seem to have been lost-it wasn't western
air power that defeated the Bosnian Serbs against the Moslems earlier
this decade, but Croatian ground forces helped by allied air power.
Television has made ground wars
less likely as public opinion could not stomach the nightly coverage
of carnage and of body bags arriving back on home soil. Opinion among
voters is always fickle with people quickly changing their minds on
the issues of the day. This has long been the case, predating television.
In 1876 public opinion in Britain was antagonistic toward the Turks
after atrocities they committed against the people of Bosnia-Herzegovina,
(the scene of more atrocities earlier this decade at the hands
of Serbia's present leadership). Less than two years later the same
public was supporting the Turks against the Russians who had come to
the aid of their Slav brothers in the Balkans. A former British Foreign
Secretary wondered at the time how any democratic government could
possibly have a foreign policy "if within 18 months the great majority
of them are found asking for things which are directly contradictory."
