“All the NewsrnUnfit to Print” isnsi of tlje tKimesirnVol. 3 No. 1 January 2001rn”Target: America,” screamed the headlinesrnfollowing last October’s attack onrnthe U.S.S. Cole in Aden. The nation wasrnsupposedly outraged. But Joe Sobranrngave us a more accurate reading. “Nobodyrnreally cared,” he wrote; ordinaryrnAmericans know perfectly well that theyrnweren’t the targets:rnA warship, allegedly “their” warship,rnwas. Ihey are vague alxiutrnvihy their “defense” forces arernscattered all over the globe, butrnthey understand that i t ‘ s none ofrntheir business, really. Thesernforeign policy decisions are rtadernby comnittees of experts in somernWashington office, prattling ofrn”U.S. interests,” meaning theirrnown. The rest of us aren’t invitedrnto s i t in on the meetings.rnIn a democracy, the people arernallowed to vote. They have nornsay in running an enpire.rnBill Clinton promptly vowed revenge,rnbut—as Sobran pointed out—the thingrnabout private, unauthorized violence isrnthat we don’t know whom to retaliaternagainst:rnThere are no fleets of Arab destroyersrnoff the coast of Florida,rnno Chinese fleets off SanrnDiego . . . The only enemies wernhave are the enemies our governmentrncontinues to make for us,rnparticularly by meddling in thernMiddle East. Countless peoplernare “anti-American” in the sensernthat they don’t want to be ruledrnor bullied by this country andrni t s allies and clients; but theyrnaren’t anti-American in the sensernthat they would wish us i l l , letrnalone try to hurt us, if we mindedrnour own business.rnWhich is exactly what the Center forrnStrategic and International Studies inrnWashington, a think-tank with close tiesrnto the U.S. government, does not do. OnrnOctober 18, CSIS issued a draft report inrnwhich Palestinian leaders were urgedrnto forget about human rights when actingrnagainst opponents of the “peace process”rn(vvM’w. csis. org/stratassessment/reports/rnlsraelPalestine.pdf):rn[T]here will be no future peace,rnor stable peace process, if thernPalestinian security forces dornnot act ruthlessly and effectivelyrn. . . They must halt civil violencerneven if this sometimesrnmeans using excessive force byrnthe standards of Western policernforces. They must be able tornhalt terrorist and paramilitaryrnaction by Hamas and Islamic Jihadrneven if this means interrogations,rndetentions and t r i a l s that are toornrapid and lack due process.rnThe report’s author, Anthony Cordesman,rnargues that both sides will have tornconduct “aggressive security operationsrnfor years to come” which may have “arnhigh price tag in terms of human rights”:rnEffective counter-terrorism relrni e s on interrogation methodsrnthat border on psychologicalrnand/or physical torture, arrestsrnand detentions that are “arbitrary”rnby the standards of civilrnlaw, break-ins and intelligencernoperations that violate the normalrnrights of privacy, levels ofrnviolence in making arrests thatrnare unacceptable in civil oases,rnand measures that involve the innocentrn(or at least not provablyrndirectly guilty) in arrests andrnpenalties.rnSuch methods have already been testedrnin Kosovo. For the reality of life there,rnwe turn to eXile, an Internet magazinernpublished by American expatriates inrnMoscow. One of them, Mark Ames, filedrna report from Kosovo (October 26) that isrnpart Graham Greene, part Dante:rnThe internationals working herernfor the UN administration, forrnthe OSCE, for NGOs and news organizations,rnare the most demoralized,rncynical group of peoplernthis side of the Moscow Timesrnheadquarters. Most came in hatingrnthe Serbs, and found themselvesrnsoon hating the Albaniansrnat least as much, and now arernjust tirying to save their sanityrnand get out of this hellhole beforernthey’re dragged down withrni t . “We call the Albaniansrn”rats’ and “cockroaches,'” onerntop UNMIK official told me. “Ifrnthey gave guns to the internationalsrnhere, there’d be anotherrngenocide. Much bigger than whatrnthe Serbs did. Much worse.”rnThe U.N. administrators, Ames explains,rnare stuck with a monster of theirrnown creation and know that any open confrontationrnwith the officially disbandedrnKLA would lead to “a rapid undoing ofrnthe Western presence, a complete collapse,rnand bloodshed.” That may be happeningrnanyway:rnThe day before I arrived for arnpiece I was going to write on thernGerman occupation force . . . thernKLA had set off a car bomb inrnDragash, a Muslim Slav enclavernoutside of Prizren. The bombrnwent off one house away from anrnAmerican working for the OSCE,rnand in front of the house of anrnOSCE interpreter. The same day,rna bomb had gone off just a couplernhundred meters away from thernUNMIK police headquarters inrnPrizren.rnCompared to Kosovo, a tropical islandrnright in the middle of the Indian Ocean byrnthe name of Diego Garcia sounds likernparadise. But according to the LondonrnGuardian (September 1), Washington’srnconcern for human rights does not extendrnto the island’s less fortunate inhabitants,rnwho were removed in 1973 to make roomrnfor one of the biggest U.S. Air Force basesrnabroad. According to a confidential StaternJANUARY 2001/25rnrnrn