ported on the issue is tightly controlled byrnmanagement. Recently, the AP carried arnlong stor)’ with a few paragraphs of proflagrncomment by Yours Truly. The “local”rnnewspaper cut my comments out.rnNormal journalistic practice would be tornemphasize the local angle of a story. Butrnpro-flag comments from a local semi-dignitaryrnwho has never belonged to the KurnKlux Klan could not be permitted to marrnthe official line.rnThe flag of our ancestors goes alongrnwith the Nazi swastika! That is the storyrnnow repeated everywhere. Nazi Germanyrnwas a totalitarian state. There wasrnno barbed wire around the plantations.rnThey were places where people werernborn and lived. Places that many ofrnthem, black and white, remembered asrnconsoling, at least compared to whatrncame later. The Southern Confederacyrnwas so free that, even in the midst of ruthlessrninvasion, the government never suppressedrnpersons, newspapers, or local orrnstate governments, something Mr. Lincolnrnfound necessary repeatedly. And wernnever tried to conquer another country.rnWe were the ones invaded and conc[rnuered by a stronger power. That ourrnflag represents Nazism would be a surprisernto the South Carolina captain whornraised it over the castle on Okinawa asrnpart of the first squad inside. And to hisrncommander. Gen. Simon Bolivar Buckner,rnJr., son of the CSA general of thernsame name. And to Gen. Nathan BedfordrnForrest, Jr., who died in the skiesrnover Germanv in 1944. Will we nowrnhave to change the name of the “MemphisrnBelle” to the “Cleveland Playmate”?rnClyde Wilson is a professor of Americanrnhistory at the University of SouthrnCarolina.rnLetter From Belgradernby Srdja TrifkovicrnSerbia Degradedrn”Serbia delenda est,” declared our postmodern,rnpost-civilized rulers in thernspring of 1999. Most European countriesrnwent along with the verdict. LikernMuscovites in 1938, they were thankfulrnthat the nocturnal knock was not on theirrndoor, and prayed that acquiescencernwould absolve them of the suspicion ofrndisloyalty. The alternative is to get Serbianized,rnand that prospect is truly frightening,rnas any visitor to rump Yugoslaviarnmay testify.rnTo this long-lost native son, returningrnto Belgrade last fall was a melancholy experience.rnIt brought to mind RobertrnLouis Stevenson’s warning that “there arernfew things more strange, more painful, orrnmore salutary, than such revisitations,”rnwith the traveler “smitten with an equalrnregret for what he once was and for whatrnhe once hoped to be.” The sight of thisrnonce vibrantly joyous, now impoverishedrnand utterly ruined city evoked memoriesrnof school trips to Budapest, Prague, orrnWarsaw almost three decades ago. Backrnthen, a Serbian teenager could onlyrnthank his lucky stars that his country wasrnoutside the Soviet bloc. Compared withrnthose drab citadels of “real” socialism,rnBelgrade was a paragon of joie de vivrernand reckless consumerism. Even on therneve of Yugoslavia’s violent disintegrahon,rnthe city’s cafes were brimming with life,rnits streets with color, its writing with talent,rnits young with energ}’ and hope.rnTwelve years of Slobodan Milosevic,rnseven years of punitive sanctions, and 78rndays of NATO bombing have changedrnall that. The city now combines an EastrnEuropean grayness and quiet desperationrnwith the poverty and lawlessness of thernThird World. Crumbling fagades ofrnonce-elegant neoclassical buildings,rnbelching Yugos long past their discard-bvrndate, and improvised cardboard bazaarsrnalong the city’s tree-lined boulevardsrnleave little to the imagination: Things arernevery bit as bad as they look. Eerie,rnburnt-out shells of structures bombed byrnNATO only add a surreal touch. Therneconomy is in free-fall, inflation rampantrnyet again, infrastructure in tatters, socialrnservices nearly nonexistent, and medianrnincome one-tenth that in the UnitedrnStates.rn”Wlien I look at the indicators, I wonderrnhow these people survive,” saysrnBranko Milanovic, a Belgrade native andrnnow an economist with the World Bankrnin Washington, D.C. Most workers didrnnot have much to do even before NATOrnreduced the country’s factories to rubble,rnand now many try to make ends meetrnselling Rumanian gas from canisters onrnstreet corners or smuggling a few cartonsrnof Bulgarian “Marlboros” to be sold inrnopen-air markets. The black marketrnflourishes: Even after having Kosovornsnatched from it by NATO, Serbia remainsrnunder sanctions. This ruins thernpeople but helps the regime maintainrncontrol, its loyalists growing rich throughrnsmuggling fuel, tobacco, timber, or fertilizer.rnThe middle class has been wipedrnout, its offspring dispersed from Torontornto Johannesburg to Wellington. The intellectualsrndespair over the fact that thernSerbs are fatally squeezed between thernhammer of “the West” and the anvil ofrnSlobodan Milosevic, a misshapen hrantrnwho will not flap his wings for as long asrnhe can feed on the ever-shrinking innardsrnof Inner Serbia.rnThat man, and his rabidly doctrinairerncommunist wife, embodv all that wentrnwrong with Serbia’s bod}’ politic over thernpast decade and a half Its power structurernhas not really changed since MarshalrnTito’s days, but the key players havernbecome infinitely more corrupt. Unlikernhis Croatian, Muslim, or Albanian counterparts,rnMilosevic had never been thern”hard-line natiorralist” of 10,000 Westernrneditorials. He is a cynical apparatchikrnwho cleverl}- exploited Serbian frustrationsrnwith Tito’s setup in order to grabrnpower back in 1987, and to ensure therncontinued survival of the power structure.rnOnly by kidnapping the mantle ofrnnationalism could he accrue some legitimacyrnfor himself and his party cronies,rnfrightened by the collapse of communismrnin the rest of Eastern Europe. Hernsubsequentiy betrayed his earlv supporters,rnof course, but by then it was too late.rnAs Dusan Batakovic, an historian activernin opposition politics, savs:rnMilosevic is a true friend of the policymakersrnin the West in fliat he isrnalso a deracinated, autocratic antitraditionalistrnwho fears all that isrnauthentic —including nationalism.rnThat explains the ease with whichrnMilosevic sold the Serbs of the Krajinarnand Bosnia down the river, andrnabandoned Kosovo without a realrnfight. That also explains his attrachvenessrnto the West—the usualrnrhetoric notwithstanding: In Washingtonrnthey know that he’ll alwaysrncave in, that he is the standingrnguarantee of all Serb defeats.rnVojislav Kostunica, president of thernDemocrahc Party of Serbia, agrees:rnThe U.S. administration will seekrnto keep Milosevic in power whilernJANUARY 2000/35rnrnrn