To: Kosovo Talk
From: Barbara Ehrenreich
Subject: Question 2 SOMEONE has a responsibility to intervene in situations like the Balkans, Rwanda, etc. I am no big respecter of "national sovereignty" when the sovereign nation in question gets involved in ethnic cleansing, ethnic removal, or genocide.
In fact, I have frequently called -- and not entirely jokingly -- for a feminist militia to invade Afghanistan. Our concern should be for actual humans, not abstract entities called "nations." Of course, there is the huge issue of at what point does one intervene: when there are mere human-rights violations, a little "cleansing," or outright genocide? We can debate that case by case, but we should state as a principle that our moral responsibility does not stop at national borders.
As for what that intervening body should be, ideally, it should be the U.N., and certainly not NATO, which seems to exist largely as a market for U.S. weapons. Nor should it be the U.S. itself, which has its own national interests to pursue (though what they may be in this case is a bit murky, outside of giving its nasty spawn, NATO, a raison d'être).
Having said that, I must acknowledge that, for whatever reason, the U.N. has not so far distinguished itself in this role. Remember how fast it backed out from Rwanda. Or recall the Dutch peacekeeping troops (were they U.N. or NATO?) who quickly absented themselves when the Bosnian Serbs started eliminating the male population of Srebenica. While millions of nationalist fools around the world stand ready to die for their countries, hardly anyone seems ready to die to save foreign lives.
Furthermore, there is the general problem of the underdevelopment of peacekeeping tactics and technologies. Currently, we use militaries to make peace, which is like using arsonists as volunteer fire-fighters. What would real peacekeeping involve? Yes, there would have to be weapons, but what else? Troops who speak the local languages, for example, or who are skilled at conflict resolution? I don't know, but until someone solves this problem, every intervention -- no matter how ostensibly kindly in intent -- will probably serve to expand and deepen the conflict at hand.
In the meantime, I see two overriding priorities: Stopping the bombing and mobilizing to aid the refugees. The scariest thing I heard on CNN today was that the effort to bring in helicopters to fight Yugoslav troops in Kosovo might conflict with the airlift of food and supplies to the refugees. In that case, will they give up on the airlift?
