General Scolds French Over Kosovo

In emotional testimony, the American general who commanded NATO warplanes over Yugoslavia blasted the French on Thursday for vetoing planned airstrikes, saying the moves heightened danger to young U.S. fliers.

Lt. Gen. Michael Short, whose son flew an A-10 Warthog plane in the conflict, declared before a Senate panel that French officials, by imposing “extraordinary” restrictions on targets, made North Atlantic Treaty Organization operations more predictable and “placed our troops at increased risk.”

France, whose fliers conducted only 8% of the sorties in the air war, should not have been “in a position of restricting American aviators who are bearing 70% of the load--and who are in harm’s way,” said Short, who retires from the military July 1.

While Short and other U.S. officers have previously expressed frustration about the operations, Thursday’s comments were by far the most forceful.

“I can’t remember a time when a senior military official involved in an operation . . . has publicly offered criticism like this,” said Daniel Goure, a former Pentagon official at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “It’s pretty unique.”

At the French Embassy in Washington, a spokesman declined comment.

But a European diplomat in Washington sharply disputed Short’s remarks, saying that French fliers accounted for 10% of NATO missions in the war and that NATO’s policy decisions affected their physical safety as well.

This diplomat, who declined to be identified, said NATO members could never give military leaders a free hand to conduct their operations without oversight. “This was not ‘sign and forget,’ ” he said. “That is not our concept of the conduct of war.”

U.S. officials have often boasted about NATO unity during the 78-day air war, but Short’s critique called attention to the stresses that lay just below the surface of the 19-nation alliance.

In testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, Short implied that the Clinton administration should have exerted greater pressure on the French to permit strikes on more targets.

“I understand how strongly the French feel their position,” Short said. “But I felt the United States of America was in a position to leverage our position of being the big dog to a degree that perhaps we did not.”

Short’s voice cracked as he praised the U.S. fliers and described how his emotional stake in the fight was deepened by the presence of his son, who flew 40 missions and whose plane was struck by a Serbian antiaircraft missile.

The general said his son “called me that night on a secure phone, and his first words were, ‘Don’t tell mom.’ ”

“This is a personal thing to me, senator,” Short told Armed Services Committee Chairman John W. Warner (R-Va.).

Short said the risks to U.S. troops were increased by French insistence that there be only two strikes on Montenegro, the smaller of the two republics that make up Yugoslavia. That shielded some Serbian weaponry, including MIG aircraft and surface-to-air missiles at the air base at Podgorica.

After civilians were killed in a NATO airstrike on a bridge in the Serbian city of Nis, the alliance was told to hit bridges only between 10 p.m. and 4 a.m., and never on weekends, market days or holidays, he said.

“That creates a sanctuary, and makes the kids [fliers] very, very predictable, as to how we’re going to do our business,” Short complained.

Had the choice been his, he said, he would have “gone for the head of the snake” on the first night by destroying all the bridges on the Danube and striking five or six key leadership targets in downtown Belgrade, the Yugoslav capital.

Short said he began his career as an F-4 pilot in the Vietnam War in the late 1960s, when the White House was seeking to gradually ratchet up bombing pressure on North Vietnam and President Lyndon B. Johnson chose targets from the West Wing.

Short said he saw “classmates in the Hanoi Hilton die” because of “a philosophy driven by incrementalism.”

At the Pentagon, chief spokesman Kenneth H. Bacon said Short “has been known for his candor throughout his career.”

He said that not only the French but also the Italians and Greeks sought at some points to limit military operations. But while there were differences over targeting and other issues, “these were resolved over time,” Bacon said.

The United States gained much by working through the alliance, including the right to base aircraft in nearby countries, he said.