The Last Straw

0 Comments | Insight on the News, August 16, 1999 | by Jerome Zeifman

A career foreign-service officer takes final issue with President Clinton.

Foreign Service officer Thomas R. Hutson has left the State Department in disagreement with U.S. policy in the Balkans. For the last four years Hutson was stationed in Yugoslavia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia. His distinguished 32-year career included service as U.S. consul-general in Moscow. Hutson recently wrote in the Omaha World Herald:

"I am troubled ... that my country, whose Constitution grants the sole power of war to Congress, would be leading NATO into an undeclared war -- if only to maintain the credibility of Secretary Albright or NATO.... There are no quick fixes to these problems [of the Balkans].... We must adhere to the basic rules of a civilized world.... If not, the America that I proudly represented abroad -- no matter how modestly -- for the past three decades is diminished beyond my worst fears."

As first reported by Insight, the International Ethical Alliance, or IEA, has filed a formal indictment with the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia charging President Clinton and Secretary of Defense William Cohen with war crimes over these very issues. Now Hutson has expressed support for the indictment. In particular, he cites its first paragraph, which advocates the prosecution of Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic, and the sixth paragraph, which states:

"The Armed Forces of the United States have participated in non-defensive aggressive military attacks on former Yugoslavia, which have not been necessary to defend the national security of the United States and have also been violations inter alia of (i) Article 18 of the Geneva Convention On The Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, which provides, 'Civilian hospitals organized to give care to the wounded and sick, the infirm and maternity cases, may in no circumstances be the object of attack, but shall at all times be respected and protected by the Parties to the conflict'; and (ii) Protocol II (8 June 1977) to the Geneva Convention of 12 August 1949, Article 14, which provides, `It is therefore prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless ... objects indispensable to the survival for the civilian population, such as foodstuffs ... drinking water installations ... [and] works or installations containing dangerous forces ... even where these objects are military objectives....'"

Sitting on this reporter's porch on a hot July day, Hutson discussed his deep disagreement with the Clinton administration's national-security policy. He confirmed information that previously has been reported by former President Carter and Bishop Artemious of Kosovo -- both of whose factual allegations are quoted in other paragraphs of IEA's indictment: "If a democratic, anti-Milosevic resistance was conceivable in Yugoslavia" according to Hutson, it was aborted by NATO's cluster bombs. As President Carter has said, "The decision to attack Yugoslavia was counterproductive, and our destruction of civilian life senseless and excessively brutal."

The establishment of a democracy in Yugoslavia has the support of the Greek Orthodox Church, Crown Prince Alexander II of Yugoslavia and Crown Princess Katarina and large numbers of Serbian workers who assuredly are not on the Milosevic government's payroll. It also has the support of Pope John Paul II, the Roman Catholic Church, the Serbian and Russian Orthodox churches of America, the Bishop of Kosovo and other religious leaders around the world -- many of whom pleaded personally with our leaders, and prayed openly to God, that we not bomb Belgrade.

The bombing -- opposed by democratic champions in and outside of Yugoslavia -- had the effect of uniting communists and other bullies behind Milosevic more strongly even than before. It also has enhanced the standing of Russia and China in the region at the expense of the United States, Britain and other democratic states.

Hutson has had extensive first-hand experience in dealing with the Clinton administration's policies in the Balkans. As he explains: "President Clinton and his minions are telling lies. They would deceive the world into believing that to foster democracy in the Balkans we had no choice but to abandon diplomacy and bomb Belgrade. President Clinton is a more adept liar than was Richard Nixon"

Hutson's words revived recollections of a July day in 1974 when the House Judiciary Committee adopted its first article of impeachment. It charged that, even if President Nixon had not lied under oath, he had committed a high crime by "making false or misleading public statements for the purpose of deceiving the people of the United States."

One of the heroes of Watergate was former Republican senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona. Before such Democrats as Judiciary Committee Chairman Peter Rodino of New Jersey and I openly became advocates of Nixon's impeachment, Goldwater publicly called the leader of his own party a "damned liar." Today, unlike Goldwater in 1974, Hutson's voice is being ignored by most of the media, all of Clinton's Democratic supporters and most Republicans, but his message is the same as Goldwater's.