Kosovo

Your April 19 story, “NATO Cites Mass Graves as It Weighs Oil Blockade,” clearly shows the moral and political bankruptcy of President Clinton’s foreign policy. It reports that an oil blockade and other sanctions were used to punish Slobodan Milosevic and strangle Yugoslavia’s economy during the war in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. This would, according to Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, “tighten the screws on [Milosevic] economically” and, in the words of a senior diplomat in Brussels, “really hit Milosevic where it hurts.”

Why didn’t we apply economic pressures when Milosevic began military operations in Kosovo? Are Clinton, Albright and NATO incapable of learning from either past successes or current failures? Under Clinton and his Republican predecessors, it seems that America’s foreign policy is to use humanitarian rhetoric to mask two principles: Might makes right; promote arm sales everywhere.

A truly humanitarian alternative would seek disarmament of conventional and nuclear weapons. This would also be the best policy for the environment. It would make funds available for education, social justice, urban renewal and tax cuts.

STEVEN SHAFARMAN

Santa Monica

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At the risk of being accused of aiding and abetting the enemy, I would observe that the outlays for foreign nations’ intelligence services could be substantially reduced. In order to determine U.S. foreign policy or likely response to aggressions, penetration of the U.S. executive branch is unnecessary.

All that is required is a relatively modest outlay for polling U.S. public opinion. Then foreign nations would have advance knowledge of what the Clinton administration’s posture will be. My defense, of course, will be that the rest of the world figured out Clinton a long time ago.

TRISTAN KROGIUS

Monarch Beach

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Clinton’s message to Milosevic: “We’ll keep killing your people until you stop killing your people.”

SHIRLEY J. SHULTZ

Tujunga

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As Americans, but even more so as Jews whose legacy in this dark century includes unspeakable acts of inhumanity and evil, we applaud NATO for rising to the challenge of protecting and defending Kosovo’s ethnic Albanians against the madness of Milosevic.

Nineteen NATO countries are working courageously to stop the violence and safely return the Kosovars under international protection. At the same time, they are sending the unequivocal message that bullies cannot terrorize civilian populations and destroy the fabric of international order with impunity. What is at stake in Kosovo isn’t oil or commerce. What is at stake are basic principles of human rights and dignity, the credibility of deterrence and collective security. When diplomacy and reason fail, history has taught us the hard lesson that force is sometimes necessary. NATO is the one international force that had the resolve to stand up against Belgrade’s policy of barbarism. We are grateful to the alliance and pray that it will prevail.

RABBI GARY GREENEBAUM

Western Regional Director

American Jewish Committee

Los Angeles

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For $6 billion we could have bought Kosovo from Milosevic.

JIM DEVORE

Costa Mesa