“All the NewsrnUnfit to Print” ignsi of t)t tCimesirnVol. 2 No. 4 April 2000rnThe fruits of NATO’s splendid little warrnin Kosovo are becoming apparent. Russiarnhas revised its defense doctrine to make itrneasier to press the nuclear button. Thernnew national security strategy promulgatedrnby Acting President Vladimir Putinrncalls for “expanded nuclear containment”rnwhile pledging to resist Western attemptsrnto dominate the globe. This policy changernwas sparked—according to Moscow—byrnNATO’s expansion into former WarsawrnPact countries and by the U.S.-led warrnagainst Serbia. The 21-page documentrnstates that “the term ‘partnership’ has beenrnconsigned to the past.”rnFor years, our Sunday-moming punditsrnand media global warriors have baited therndrowsy bear, finally kicking him oncerntoo often—and now they claim that hisrn”belligerence” proves them right. A morernaccurate view came from the MoscowrnTimes, in an editorial on January 15:rn[Cjonsider a June 1999 op~ed byrnNew York Times writer ThomasrnFriedman, which quotes a seniorrnNATO o f f i c i a l at headquartersrnin Brussels freelyrnadmitting, “Ever since thernCold War ended, NATO plannersrnhave been groping for a newrnmission . . . That’s why NATOrnneeds the Balkans as much asrnthe Balkans need NATO . . . “rnIf this is accurate, i t is anrnastonishing account. Justrnthink: NATO’s need for a post-rnCold War j u s t i f i c a t i o n surelyrninfluenced the mule-like U.S.rnposition that only a NATO-ledrnforce, not a UN force, could bernparked in Kosovo. After a l l ,rnthe UN already has a missionrn(one we a l l democraticallyrnagreed upon, by the way-unlikernNATO’s mission creep). ThernKremlin has opened a debate onrnthe architecture of internationalrnsecurity. We’d suggestrnc i t i z e n s of the Western democraciesrnrespond by demandingrnNATO b e t t e r j u s t i f y i t s existrne n c e – i t s massive expense, i t srnspread through Central Europeorrnstand down.rnThe news from Russia was welcomedrnin Peking and Delhi, and getting thosernthree together is no mean feat: Albright’srntrue legacy is already upon us. Delhi’srnHindustan Times (January 18) opined thatrnthe one country to be feared in today’srnworld is not Russia, but America:rnWhen i t comes to internationalrnforms of terrorism . . . withoutrna shadow of a doubt thernworse c u l p r i t is the UnitedrnStates of America. Surely thisrnpoint should need no elaboration-rnthe examples are innumerable,rnfrom the bombings andrnc i v i l i a n deaths in Kosovo andrnIraq to the a r b i t r a r i n e s s ofrnthe attacks on Sudan, Libya andrnAfghanistan.rnThis assessment was reinforced on Januaryrn6 by the German daily FrankfurterrnRundschau, which revealed that a videotapernused by NATO to explain the killingrnof at least 14 civilians aboard a passengerrntrain on a bridge in Serbia last April wasrnshown at triple its real speed. As AgencernFrance Presse reported on January 6:rnNATO warplanes fired two missrni l e s at the 50 metre longrnbridge . . . on April 12 . . .rnGeneral Wesley Clark shortlyrnafterwards showed two videotapesrnof the t r a i n appearing tornbe traveling fast on thernbridge, and said i t had thenrnbeen impossible to a l t e r thernm i s s i l e s ‘ t r a j e c t o r i e s . . . . Arnspokesman for NATO’s militaryrncommand in Mons, Belgium, acknowledgedrnin a telephone interviewrn. . . that those imagesrnhad been altered by “a technicalrnproblem.” The footage,rnrecorded by a camera i n s t a l l edrnin the warhead of one of thernmissiles that destroyed thernbridge and t r a i n , was alteredrnduring the process of beingrncopied for screening, said thernspokesman. He said NATO wasrnaware of the problem since lastrnOctober but did not consider i trn”useful” to disclose i t .rnThe videos iire available on the NATOrnwebsite: www.nato.int/kosovo/video.htm.rnIn the clip maiked “Railway I,” the pilotrnhas his cursor on the bridge. When allowancernis made for the speeded-up tape,rnit is clear that the train came into view atrnleast six (and more likely ten) seconds beforernthe hit. There was plenty of time forrnthe pilot to miss the oncoming civilianrntrain had he wished to do so.rnEven giving the pilot the benefit of therndoubt and assuming that the first hit was arnmistake, the second one certainly was not.rnIn the clip maiked “Railway II,” the pilotrnhas turned around after the smoke hasrnmostly cleared. The crippled train isrnstanding still; the pilot holds the cursor directlyrnon it for 12 seconds. It is clear whyrnNATO and the Pentagon “did not considerrnit ‘useful’ to disclose” the fact that thernvideo had been sped up. It takes a strongrnstomach to re-read the statement GeneralrnClark made in the aftennath of the bombingrn{www.nato.intAosovo/press/p990413a.rnhtm). According to him, the pilot wasrn”many miles” away when he launched hisrnmissile. And then:rnAll of a sudden, at the veryrnl a s t instant, with less than arnsecond to go, he caught a flashrnof movement that came into thernscreen and i t was the t r a inrncoming in. Unfortunately herncouldn’t dump the bomb at thatrnpoint, i t was locked. . . . Thernmission was to take out thernbridge. He realized when i trnhad happened that he had notrnh i t the bridge, but what he hadrnh i t was the t r a i n . He had anotherrnaim point on the bridge,rni t was a r e l a t i v e l y long bridgernand he believed he s t i l l had tornaccomplish his mission, thernp i l o t circled back around. Hern22/CHRONlCLESrnrnrn