A Yugoslav woman looks at the USA "socialist" Bernie Sanders

... justifying his support for the Clinton NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999

On 28th of April 1999 Bernie Sanders issued this statement on US-NATO action in Kosovo:

Five days later, Bernie Sanders hosted Public forum on the Kosovo crisis in Montpelier on 05/03/1999. Speakers there included Bernie Sanders, Dawn Kennett Tilapia, Shirley Giddeon, Roddy Cleary, and Bogdan Denitch.

I am posting a transription of this speech that can be seen and heard on the Archive.org at https://archive.org/details/cctv17vt-Sanders_on_His_Support_For_the_Clinton_Era_Bombing_of_Yugoslavia_and_Kosovo … with some of my comments added. ;)

“I think we are ... let me begin by saying that if anyone thinks there is a simple solution to this problem, that you know very little about this problem.

This is enormously complicated enormously difficult and there are honest sincere people on all sides of this issue.

Let me begin my remarks by quoting an interview that took place, it was written up in Newsweek on April 13th. (Nope, it was published on April 18th 1999: https://www.newsweek.com/we-have-win-164834)

And then Bernie’s going to quote Green party’s Joschka Fischer’s interview… which reminded me on this part in one of the many books on USA Military operations in Kosovo 1999:

”…However, the prime minister and the defense minister both indicated that Italy would contribute to a ground invasion if NATO decided to conduct one. Germany was in a more difficult position. Public opinion was evenly divided, and Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer had barely managed to maintain support from his Green Party for the air operation. At the Washington summit, Chancellor Gerhard Schröder openly opposed a ground invasion, and it is at least doubtful whether his Socialist-Green government would have approved German participation.”

As many of you know the German government is currently a coalition government of the majority Social Democrats working with the Greens. And the Foreign Minister happens to be a member of the Green party, his name is, I'm probably pronouncing it one ... but I think it's Joshka Fisher (Joschka Fischer).

And let me quote from the interview that he gave to Newsweek. Quote:

"I am a member of the Green Party and am sitting here giving an interview in NATO headquarters. I never dreamed about that. But [we cannot] accept Milosevic's policies and bow our knees in front of this ethnic cleansing.

I became a student radical, a real leftist--I never was a pacifist because I was fighting [a] revolution. I was against Vietnam because I always thought Vietnam was a colonial war. But my generation [asked] our parents, (this is Germany*)

"Why could [the Holocaust] happen in Germany--and why didn't you resist?" This is the question we have to ask ourselves now."

And the Newsweek asks: "You see a direct parallel to the Nazi era?"

"I see a parallel to that primitive fascism. Obviously, the '30s are back, and we cannot accept that."

And then later on, the end of the interview the question is:

"Aren't some people in your party unhappy with your position on Kosovo?

"Obviously! There are many pacifists who cannot accept it, but, on the other hand, my generation was brought up with two experiences.

The first is "Never Again War." And the second is "Never Again Auschwitz."

It means standing up against genocide. It's a contradiction, but we have to live with it.

If we accept Milosevic as a winner, it would be the end of the Europe I believe in."

I think where Mr Fischer, “herr” Fischer is coming from, is very close to where I am coming from.

BOTH OF YOU SOLD OUT!!! - yells the man in the background of the recording hahahaha!!!

That was hilarious.

I have spent my entire life fighting against war and I've opposed virtually every United States intervention. And yet we are standing here today wrestling with this terrible situation. For those good friends of mine, many of them who, sincerity is not in question, who say they detest war, they are appalled as I am, about the bombing of civilian areas in Belgrade, who say stop the bombing bring the troops home.

Then I ask you to think about what happens to the 8 hundred thousand men women and children who have been pushed out of their homes?

”Herr” Sanders, why didn’t you know?

In October 1998—two months before the Horseshoe plan was allegedly ratified—French and British papers had already published maps showing the deployment of Yugoslav troops in the form of a horseshoe along the Kosovan border. This, however, did not prevent 200,000 Albanian refugees from returning to their homes in Kosovo after US envoy Holbrooke brokered an agreement on the stationing of OSCE observers in the province. Along with these refugees many KLA activists returned. This was, according to the German defence ministry, a matter of great concern for the Yugoslav army and led to the drawing up of the Horseshoe plan. - Peter Schwarz on 29 July 1999 https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/1999/07/hs-j29.html

Then “Herr“ Sanders repeats some more CIA propaganda:

What do you do to a war criminal who has led for the first time in modern history the organized RAPE as an agent of war of tens of thousands of women ?

Herr Sanders, Michael Parenti wrote about this in his book, and this feminist imperialism CIA propaganda was also repeated recently in 2022 in Ukraine. Did you get the memo?

Also, “Herr“ Sanders, even our own, Yugoslav, our feminist Vesna Kesić desputed War propaganda of Catharine MacKinnon in January, 1994:

I give you “Herr“ Sanders, a PR “USA socialist”, that is really a warmonger in disguise:

What are you doing for a butcher who's lined up people and shot them?
Do you say to them you have WON Mr Milosevic, we are not going to stand up here we are going home? And if you do that what do you think happens next? You think he says I won this war that's the end of it. Anyone who understands anything about the history of this man understands that is not the case.

Also, even when you’re cosplaying a socialist in USA, you’re supposed to be patriotic about the USA troops in NATO coalition.

The Sanders propaganda was in WHO is going to do the “ground invasion”:

”It is unclear whether the North Atlantic Council would have approved a ground invasion and which members would have participated, either within the alliance or as a coalition of the willing. Greek public opinion strongly opposed the air effort and would likely have been vehemently against a ground invasion. Even so, the Greek government would probably have allowed use of its seaports because the NATO alliance is central to its security policy. Italian public opinion divided about evenly, and its administration openly disagreed on the question. However, the prime minister and the defense minister both indicated that Italy would contribute to a ground invasion if NATO decided to conduct one.”

The Italians. The Fucking Italians! Ahahahahaha!

”Herr” Sanders will keep gaslighting the USA public, nevertheless:

So as a member of Congress, as your Congressman these are the issues that I have to deal with. Now having said that what's the alternative? And I disagree with Roger. Some say that the best way you will address this issue was to line up 5 hundred thousand NATO troops and march in and throw that bastard out of Kosovo, once and for all. But there's a there is a problem, there is a problem with that too. The casualties would be [indistinguishable].

In my view there would be a guerrilla warfare taking place for years and years. And having gone through the Vietnam War, and having protested the Vietnam War, no I don't want to see American troops brought into the quagmire of another Vietnam and thousands of thousands more men and women coming home in body bags.

So...

[Applause]

I guess they’re all ok is some other country’s boys get slaughtered in Yugoslavia, or in Ukraine today? Well, YES.

How casually “Her“ Sanders omits the involvement of USA in arming the separatists in Kosovo!

That is where I find myself. Saying no civilized society cannot reward and tolerate ethnic cleansing that is bad for now and bad for the future.

No I do not want to see our young men and women and young men and women in Europe and young men and women in Yugoslavia getting killed in a ground war.

That leaves very little parameter for movement. What do you do? Well I don't know what you do, but I'll tell you what I am doing. And what I am trying to do.

After his speech to the congress in the end of April, he jumped on a plain and went to meet the Russians.
As some people said:

“He will usually be against U.S. intervention, but not always and not when it’s pursued cooperatively.”

”The NATO bombing would result in the death of 500 civilians, according to a Human Rights Watch report. The Yugoslav government would claim NATO was responsible for as many as 5,000 non-military member casualties.”

(Quotes from Kit Norton’s Aug 11 2019 peace at https://vtdigger.org/2019/08/11/peace-candidate-sanders-the-occasional-hawk/)

Yesterday, I returned from a very short weekend in Vienna Austria most of which was spent in a conference room in a hotel. And the reason that I was in Vienna was that I joined a delegation of eleven members of the United States Congress conservatives and progressives who went to this meeting in Vienna to urge Russian leaders of the Duma to take a leading role in trying to resolve this problem.

Some of us have believed from the very beginning that Russia who is Yugoslavia's strongest ally could play an important role in getting Milosevic to withdraw his troops.

And the meeting that we had was a very positive meeting. And let me just rarely, briefly, tell you what came out of it. What came out of it as a joint agreement that we are going to take to the United States Congress, I think we have a chance to pass it.

They're going to take it back Russian Duma and they have told us, that given the fact that we had three leaders of the three major factions it's going to pass that.

And what does this agreement says it says essentially a few basic things. It says that, in a simultaneous manner, that NATO should stop its bombing of Yugoslavia, and that Yugoslavia should begin the withdrawal of troops from Kosovo (province of Serbia - literal territory of the Yugoslav state in 1999!) and that the cessation of military activities of the Kosovo Liberation Army should also take place.

And the first demand that we made of Yugoslavia and of the United States was the release of all prisoners of war, and to be very honest with you, I would have two days ago, my thought was that I was going to Belgrade with the delegation to bring back the POWs. Thankfully Jesse Jackson did that and that's a step too.

[Applause]

I guess the applause was a complete lack of awareness on who actually was “brought back home“ to USA and FROM WHERE exactly?
Also, weren’t those pilots carrying depleted uranium bombs?

We think now, think now that the response of the United States should not be to say that that's a PR trick, we should immediately release for one Serbian POWs that we have.

[Applause]

Of course it was all - war mongering propaganda.

Our agreement also stressed, that the million people or 8 hundred thousand people who have forcibly been ejected from Kosovo should be able to return to their homes.

Kosovo Agency of Statistics: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Kosovo

It also stressed that, I want to remind you, this is a document signed by the leaders of the Russian Duma who told Milosevic he must withdraw his troops from Kosovo.

And in the very difficult issue of the nature of the international peacekeeping force that would be retained, NATO originally was very firm and saying it must be nailed.

And some of us said well, wait a second. What you're really asking of Milosevic is to accept the power that defeated him in a war, right in the middle of his country.

Why don't we be a little bit more flexible in the agreement that we reached is that the nation...the nature of the international peacekeeping force it should be determined by the Security Council of the United Nations…

“Herr” Bernie, you smugg trickster!!!

[Applause]

…in consultation with Macedonia, Albania Yugoslavia and the recognized leadership of Kosovo.

And what we also agreed upon is that the United States Congress and the Russian Duma would do our best to make these things happen.

I should tell you that I was really impressed and delighted by the, not the behavior but the attitude of the leaders of the Russian Duma.

They were prepared in my view to try to do the right thing. And I think we have made a mistake as a country by not going out to those people earlier.

And I'm delighted to see that the president today has been meeting for some of these Russian leaders.

Let me just conclude, by saying this. I don't believe that there's an easy solution and I think even all of the things...I was on the phone today with the White House telling them that I am very concerned about what I see as a lack of flexibility.

And well I am beginning to detect the side that are not to end this war on the proper... but simply to humiliate Milosevic of it and that is …one.

Ok?

Ok, “Herr“ Sanders. Of course, the master bullshiter war mongering peace of shit lier tells us Yugoslavian wars were PROXY WARS and REGIME CHANGE WARS, also know as “IMPERIAL WARS“:

But this is a complex problem of what we are going to try to do in the next few days is to put as much pressure as we can on the White House. We think our friends in Russian Duma will be doing the same in Russia. To have the NATO people and Yugoslavia sit down to negotiate a ceasefire, with the simultaneous withdrawal of Yugoslavian troops. And to begin the difficult negotiations establishing the armed peacekeeping force and the political future of Kosovo.

INAUDIBLE part of “Herr“ Sanders says the war will stop when Milošević stop fighting the KLA separatist militia that sought the separation of Kosovo, where many in its ranks supported the creation of a Greater Albania, which would encompass all Albanians in the Balkans, stressing Albanian culture, ethnicity and nation.

Which will have to be stop war…

Well, in 2023 Ukraine’s Donbass is the new playground for Imperial War, just like Kosovo. Parralels are staggeringly similar to those who want to open their eyes to the facts:

Ukraine harbors some of the world's largest reserves of titanium and iron ore, fields of untapped lithium and massive deposits of coal.

Kosovo has a varied geology that includes a variety of exploitable metal and mineral deposits, including gold, chrome, nickel, aluminum, copper, iron metals, and lead-zinc. Kosovo also possesses the world’s fifth-largest proven reserves of lignite. Kosovo’s coal mines are the fuel source for over 90 percent of Kosovo’s power.

Imperial plunder never stopped after the armed conflict stopped.