Got most of those but a couple are still beyond me – that was fun!

Vortex…

Vortex,

“Once again ink (i’ve told you many times and for some reasons you failed to accept that even though a simple look at the timelines can easily see that) the US had no interests in the Balkans until those trio up there start accusing the US about not living up to the NATO responsibilities…”

I think your comment comes from a misunderstanding of why the US did get involved. Anyway, while I agree that perhaps it took longer to realise what its interests in the Balkans might be it certainly found them in the end. I don’t think France, Germany and Italy could diplomatically, financially, economically, militarily or in any way whatsoever, influence the actions of the US.

“so why you specifically point out about UK/US “lies” during the last decade in the Balkans? To me, if you’re fair, lump them under NATO ,fine, because those trio up there were way more eager IIRC…why just single out UK/US?”

Well ok, I’ll lump them under NATO if you prefer even though they generally came from the military services or politicians of the US or the UK.

As I’m sure you can imagine I haven’t the time nor the energy to list every specific incident and the lies that surrounded it. Instead I thought I’d give you a little flavour (apologies for the lack of dates… I really must dig out my file on Allied Force):

The incident where NATO bombed a train as it was crossing a railway bridge at Gurdulice is famous enough. IIRC an F-18 attacked a bridge just as a train was crossing it and then turned around and attacked the bridge again, while the train was still on it. Now, when the tape was shown at NATO press briefings it indeed looked like the train was travelling so fast that it took the pilot by surprise and that he couldn’t possibly have reacted in time. In fact, Gen Wesley Clark said this on the incident “you can see if you were focusing right on your job as a pilot, how suddenly that train appeared – it was really unfortunate”. Months later, long after the end of the conflict it was revealed that the tape had been speeded up by a factor of three in order to make it appear that the pilot accidentally bombed the train in an attempt to bomb the bridge.

Also, throughout the conflict we were told things like >>the Serb integrated air defense system has been totally destroyed<< When it kept woring right to the 78th day. We were told >>100,000 Albanian men are missing and we fear have been captured or killed by the Serbs<< only 4,500 ethnic Albanians died in Kosovo from late ’98 to summer ’99 (and most of them were AK wielding terrorists). There are lots more… Lots lots more.

Well this thread didn’t quite go as I’d planned… Anyway, I’ll just say one more thing then I’ll allow you all to get really worked up about it. One of the only reasons I didn’t go totally insane during ten years of sanctions, wars, air-campaigns, mass-inflation etc was some of the excellent humour that came out of those times. Naturally I’ve forgotten most of it but one piece of graffitti which I didn’t forget from Belgrade, just before the start of Allied Force:

Are you gonna start bombing or can I get the decorators in?

Still makes me chuckle today.

Adonis you pointless little man. I think I and my family have lived through enough wars for me to know that the best tonic for its depression is humour at its expense. How dare you question my ability to understand the loss of life caused by war? How insulting!

Jonesy,

I completely agree that expert analysis is important when viewing such a highly complex conflict live on Sky. The problem is that we generally receive all our expert opinion from one of the military sides. It’d be like watching Man Utd vs Arsenal live, with commentary from Sir Alex Ferguson. Admittedly it’d be just as bad if it was Arsen Wenger but thats the point isn’t it? I’d prefer to be more precisely informed about the military situation by someone who isn’t actually directly involved.
Anyway, the US and UK militaries have been discredited, in my eyes, as far as their truth telling credentials go.
However, you’ll be glad to hear that I’ve been running around telling all my non-military-enthusiast friends that the resistance put up so far has been less than significant.

IKBrunel,

The difference between a civil society and a savage, barbaric one is this. When someone is acused of a crime (however dispicable) in a civil society they are considered innocent until proven guilty and are given due legal process in a court of law. A good example is the guy that blew up a government building in Oklahoma, he was given a fair trail at the end of which a jury decided that based on the evidence he must be guilty and the judge sentenced him as he saw fit based on the defendent’s crimes and his conduct in court. America, as far as I can tell, is a civil society and frankly if I was American that would be the thing I’d be most proud of. After all it wasn’t all that long ago that there was massive discrimination against non-whites in America so the civility of current American society is something amazing and should be treasured. Anyone who tries to change this is in fact an enemy of America (at least thats how I’d see it) and should be stopped.

You know Yugoslavia (or Serbia & Montenegro as its now known) is fighting really really hard to reestablish a civil society for its people. You know why? Because we really missed it when it was gone… And so will you.

Come on guy!

There must be plenty of you out there with jokes about the war, I want to see more!