NATO general refused U.S. commander's order

Human Events, Oct 8, 1999 by Park, Scott

Brit Would Not Occupy Pristina Airport in Face of Russian Troops

When NATO called for Americans to risk their lives in a war against Yugoslavia earlier this year, U.S. forces went into action even though Congress refused under our Constitution to declare or authorize the war. In the aftermath of that war, however, a British NATO officer vetoed an important order by his U.S superior in the NATO chain of command.

Recent congressional testimony raises the question: Is NATO becoming a one-way street on which America walks point for allies who won't even cover our flank?

In the early phases of the Kosovo occupation, U.S. Gen. Wesley Clark, the NATO commander in chief, ordered British Gen. Sir Michael Jackson to seize the Pristina airport before Russian troops solidified their control of the most strategic plot of ground in the country. Jackson said no, the Russians kept the airport, and everyone involved has been promoted, except for Clark himself, who is being ushered out of his job.

This sort of insubordination could present a danger to American troops in similar NATO out-of-area interventions.

In early June the NATO bombing campaign against Serbia stopped. As U.S., British and French troops prepared to occupy the Serbian province of Kosovo, it was unclear what role, if any, Russian soldiers would play in the occupying force. The Russians wanted their own sector-such as they had for 40 years in Berlin. But NATO had agreed to slice the province just into American, British, French, and German sectors.

Russian `Buddy Ryan'

On June 10, a Russian convoy was on the move through Serbia. NATO didn't know what the Russians were up to but rightly suspected they might be trying a gambit to secure a larger role in the occupation in Kosovo. As things then stood, Soviet Premier Boris Yeltsin had little negotiating power-except for those forces.

Russia assured the West that its convoy would halt within Serbia proper until all NATO forces were ready to enter. But at 1:30 a.m. on June 11, a reinforced company of Russian Airborne Assault Forces rolled over,the border and into Pristina.

The Brits were planning to base their headquarters there at Slatina Airport. But that's exactly where Russian commander Lt. Gen. Viktor Zavarzin settled in with his 200 men and 10 armored personnel carriers. When British paratroopers arrived to secure the airport, they were rebuffed. Zavarzin, who is seen as a sort of Russian "Buddy Ryan," had carved out a negotiating position and a political victory for Russia.

Members of the Senate Armed Services committee suspect that Clark will have more to say about this incident once he steps down as NATO commander. Already, the official explanation has permutated from his July 1 testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee, in which he gave it the best possible spin.

"Why were we caught off guard? Why were we taken by surprise?" Clark was asked.

"Well, we did have advance knowledge," answered Clark, adding that he did not think the Russian move was "the sort of thing that you necessarily have to respond to with military force;' and that NATO had been assured by the Russians that they weren't going to do what they eventually did.

"We were prepared to respond, but a decision was made, at levels above mine, not to," said Clark.

There was no military requirement for that airfield, he said, and he had conveyed his interest in it to Jackson in the form of a question rather than an order. "In fact," said Clark, "I remember asking Mike Jackson: `Do you want to go in on the airfield right away? . . .' He said: `My forces would like to participate in this campaign by seizing the airfield....' He's the commander on the ground . . . '[F]rankly,' he said, `there's a lot of unexploded ordinance on the airfield. It's potentially hazardous for our troops to go in there. And we don't need it right away. So, you know, eventually we'll open the airfield.'"

Others contend this benign retelling papered-over a real dispute between Clark and Jackson that would normally be called insubordination and lead to a court-martial.

The Senate got a fuller version of the stand-off from Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen Henry Shelton during his reappointment hearing September 9.

"Did Jackson refuse to comply with Gen. Clark's order and use what is known as a `Red Card,' which. . . is not provided anywhere in law or regulation. . . but it's some sort of a practice of understanding that has grown up through the years in NATO, and override the order of the Supreme Allied Commander?" Committee Chairman John Warner (R.-Va.) asked Shelton.

"Gen. Clark's idea was that we should block the airfield. He looked at a combination of things," said Shelton. "The idea was to move something in on the airfield to ensure that no one used the airfield to reinforce or to start pouring in, until the KFOR commander had in fact sorted out who was going where, and until the agreements were reached as to what role the Russians would be in KFOR."

Weather shut down the airport that night, said Shelton, "So, the first thing the next morning, Gen. Clark told Gen. Jackson that he would like to move some armored vehicles up on to the [airport].... At which time Gen. Jackson said, `No, I'm not going to do that. It's not worth starting World War III'"