Re: Agression, other crimes & Pat Gunning

Gunder Frank wrote:


> by NATO's unprovoked, non-defensive=agressive  massive bombing and guided
> missiles, AND i metnioned  another dozen other statutes the US/NATO
> states have signed and now violate.
> 
> But since you ask for a 'definition of agression', here are some
> also formally subscribed to by the states in NATO:
> 
> NATO's attack on Yugoslavia is a violation of the Kellogg-Briand Pact,
> the Pact of Paris, of 1928. The signatories to the pact (including what
> were to become the the NATO countries) "condemned recourse to war for
> the solution of international controversies, and renounced it as an
> instrument of national policy."

Your reasoning assumes that the action in Yugoslavia is a war. It seems
to me that, press jargon notwithstanding, if it was really a war, it
would have been over in one day and Belgrade would look like Nagasaki.

Why not regard the precision bombing as a disciplinary action? NATO had
reason to believe that the Serbs would commit atrocities in Kosovo and
wanted to assure that they would not by sending observers. Milosovic
said no. So NATO sought an agreement between the Serbs and the KLA that
would make atrocities more difficult. Milosovic again said not. So NATO
started to punish him. When Milosovic answered by committing atrocities,
the rationale for the action changed. Moreover, the ultimate goal
changed from one of forcing Milosovic to be more transparent to that of
stopping the atrocities themselves and, more importantly, to deterring
future atrocities by other aggressors by means of punishing the war
criminals. Ultimately, everybody knows that unless Milosovic relents,
ground troops will be sent in and, assuming they are successful, at
least some of the Kosovars will be returned to their homeland. It is
also becoming evident that Milsovic himself will be punished if NATO can
catch him.

-- 
Pat Gunning, Sultan Qaboos University, Oman
Web pages on Subjectivism, Democracy, Taiwan, Ludwig von Mises,
Austrian Economics, and my University Classes
http://www2.cybercities.com/g/gunning/welcome.htm
http://www.fortunecity.com/meltingpot/barclay/212/welcome.htm