The 1999 war against Yugoslavia, if you look at how the West behaved, how self-righteously an aggression and a terror bombing against a country were justified, and afterwards the making up the minds for somebody else and the threatening were sold as „democratic policy“, is truly singular in history. Such a bold and unconcealed posture was second not even to the most arrogant gestures of a Hitler. The late Breshnew‘s theories about limited sovereignty are just peanuts as compared with how the West of today treats the whole world and presumes to determine election outcomes in several countries in advance.  It has already become a standard formula if Ms. Albright, US secretary of state, declares towards the leader of a country that there „will be trouble“ if the election doesn‘t produce the result that suits the US.  Interference like that would have lead to outcries in the past; every other country would have been utterly condemned.

All of that is being outdone by what is presently done with Yugoslavia

The present government has without doubt its weaknesses and provides targets. But indubitably it has kept up the banner of Serbian independence since 1995 and attempts to assert itself also against the great powers. In a time when almost all statesmen, especially in Europe, excel by incredible toadyism and bootlicking in front of US imperialism, this must be regarded as something exceptional and valuable.

Already before the elections there were warnings that all results which would not lead to Kostunica‘s absolute majority would be regarded as falsifications. And when the counting still was on, the Western media and statesmen for their part without further ado declared Kostunica the winner, although besides their own projections no figures were available yet, and even Kostunica‘s followers had not yet given figures. There are no considerable figures yet but Gerhard Schroeder already announces that an election victory by the so-called opposition is crystallizing itself clearer and clearer. Where does the chancellor Schroeder know this from?

Still some weeks ago even the men behind this so-called opposition in the Foreign Office in Washington or in Josef Fischer‘s office or elsewhere were very sceptical about the fragmented movement and doubted if it really would be able to gain ground in the elections.

Several times already there were attempts from the West to build an opposition in Serbia, in 1997 and later on again, and always this was a failure. During the war in 1999 probably 95% of the Serbian people backed the government and condemned NATO‘s terror attacks.

The main figures of this so-called opposition like Zoran Djinjic are infamous and discredited in Serbia. Because of their despicable behavior and their direct partisanship for those who threw bombs on Yugoslavia they had lost almost any credibility. The discreditation is also valid for the highly dubious figure of Vuk Draskovic who on the one hand makes deals with the West, too, and on the other represents an extreme Serbian chauvinism, in particular also during the time when the Serbian name by the acts of Serbian chauvinists in Bosnia but also in some other areas of conflict was deeply connected to wrongdoing - what is to be the pretext in 1999 and 2000.

It is very significant in this context that one of the figures who bear a good deal of responsibility for certain Serbian forces‘ latest inglorious tradition, Seselj - a radical rightist and in the war until 1995 intermediary of the Bosnian Serbs - stabs Milosevic into the back in the present situation and is working into the hands of the so-called opposition. And this is actually cherished by the West. Also the infamous butcher Arkan who not long ago lost his life by an attack, had connections into the US. And didn‘t their and German government‘s most compliant tool in Serbia, their „model democrat“ Djinjic, demonstratively travel to Pale still in 1995, when the official Serbia already had more and more distanced herself from Karadzic, and showed solidarity with Karadzic who is known to bear the responsibility for innumerable war crimes from the part of certain Bosnian Serbs? Which standards are employed here? And the same people claim the moral right for themselves to pass judgement over Serbia, to cover her with terror bombings, and in face of the present elections they even pretend to represent the interests of the Serbian people!
 

Kostunicas nomination as presidential candidate is the attempt to seemingly show a way out for Serbia with a new figure, in order to actually open the portal for those who want to get Serbia completely in their clutches; it is a trick in order to complete the dictate over Serbia by these forces from the US in coalition with other capitalists in Europe.

Who is that Vojislav Kostunica who bestowed to this so-called opposition at least a relative success in the elections?

From all what has become known Kostunica is a relatively unknown quantity, having so far kept himself more in the background. He is not stigmatized by open partisanship with NATO as it is the case with Djinjic. He appears as a patriot, recognizes Kosovo as part of Serbia and has condemned the bombings by the US and the NATO. There are however several recent interviews in which he unmasks himself as a fundamental admirer of the US and the EU, criticizing the US only because of his all too open support for the so-called opposition which would discredit it completely in front of the Serbian people. He even goes so far to support the EU ‚s extortionist policy to lift the embargo only for cities which are run by the so-called opposition, and to supply oil and food to them. 
[See also „Who is Vojislav Kostunica“ at http://www.neue-einheit.com/is/is2000-23e.htm ]

It cannot be called just interference what the West is doing regarding the elections in Yugoslavia. This would be a gross understatement. From the outset it is dominated by extortion. Already in July 1999, after the war was in the main over, Clinton declared that there would be economic aid for the country destroyed by NATO bombs only if Milosevic would disappear. (note) It is impossible to conceive of a more direct interference. And the same people who talk like this are now posturing and declare their resolve to look after correctness in the elections.

If the elections were rigged we cannot decide from here. If the administration or parts of it should have committed something like this it certainly must be investigated in detail, evaluated and lead to the corresponding consequences. But also this has to be regarded in relation to the general situation. One thing however is for certain: to flatten the economic fundaments of life with bombs, openly declaring that this is for creating need and hunger, in order to force the people to accept the government chosen by the West so that they can get oil and food, is the harshest variant of vote rigging which can be imagined.

Whatever the present government may be reproached of in detail: there is no right whatsoever for the West, for these terror bombers, these rogue politicians to raise such moral accusations. Their whole cause is extortion and interference from the beginning to the end. Serbia would even have the right to put every politician who sides with the West, and this is also in fact the case with Kostunica, on the ground of illegality in Serbia, because a country has the right to act against traitors.

Those who bombed and extorted Serbia now put forward the kind of logic that Belgrade has to acknowledge „the Serbian people‘s will“ - and they have the nerve to define that will - in order to prevent „an escalation of violence“.

We hope that the Serbian people will prick up their ears here, and that as much of this extortion as possible is also publicly clarified and denounced.

But even if now those should come to power who make deals with these criminals and blackmailers and are in cahoots with them, there will be no democracy at all in Serbia, notwithstanding the election mechanisms which might be installed. Then the unconcealed and brutal dictatorship of international capitalism in Yugoslavia will be the consequence, so that any movement of national independence and autonomy - and this is the precondition for democracy in Serbia and Yugoslavia - will be impossible from the start.
 

We still want to say some words about the hopes which, as it seems from here, are stirred by the so-called opposition‘s propaganda. The Yugoslavian people are promised opening and modernizing of the society, participation in the international progressive developments, probably also better and more interesting job opportunities etc. We see such wishes justified, actually much new has to happen in this respect, not only in Serbia and Yugoslavia. But to tie such hopes to a change of government towards the opposition built up by the West must be questioned. Russia also was promised the opening by the West, what became reality under the government of the forces supported and controlled by the West is such a disaster that many millions of Russians, up to 40 or 50 millions, have left the country.

In particular the integration into the EU as promised by people like Kostunica will be translated into reality only under the condition that Serbia makes the total inner kowtow in front of the Western political order of today, going as far as to self-denial.
The European countries‘ inner development not only shows positive signals. A doubtful extinction of great parts of the production basis, the discarding of parts of the own population, and the extinction of own identity are leading to considerable social problems which already begin to show and which will show with all of their consequences in the future.  As a negative example you can take Germany with a development of the own nation‘s population towards self-eradication, with its destruction of the will for independence and for future going to a dangerous limit, a development which took place in particular during the last 25 years. A lot is being just a façade here and actually the EU itself is in a deep state of crisis.

Because of all of these points named here we are not at all able to sympathize with the so-called opposition which actually is easily bought from top to bottom, or even hedge the slightest wish that it be victorious.  Very certainly there are social conflicts and problems in Serbia which must be solved. These however the Serbian and Yugoslavian people have to settle within their own framework, without any foreign interference.  Here, though, forces are active who work for the complete occupation of Serbia by the NATO, the US, France, Great Britain and the Federal Republic of Germany, and who in order to divert from this fact chose somebody who speaks of nation, of national independence etc. but who shall only serve for bringing these forces, with Zoran Djinjic in the first place, to power.

We can afford a prognosis: even if these forces should be successful - the US and the other NATO countries do not have a solution. How do they intend to solve the Kosovo question according to their wishes if their allies of yesterday, the Albanians, urge the total separation? The new government will have to save face. For that, civil war-like occurrences might be the consequence in Kosovo. The contradictions which today exist in Serbia won‘t be solved by the West by means of this kind of lackeys. Many of their promises will vanish into thin air. Capitalism does not make such attempts to corrupt without reason.

If the forces who stand for Serbia‘s national independence really want to grasp a chance yet, then they will have to attack the miserable essence of this so-called opposition to the full extent, and in the future they certainly will have to fight decidedly against privileges, mismanagement, corruption and other things within the bureaucratic state apparatus. This will be a precondition. A renewal of the state is needed but how and under which preconditions it will take place, this will be the decisive factor.

We want to express the hope that the Serbian people will resist the infiltrative methods as it resisted the war and the military threatening.

The whole of Europa is required to lift the sanctions against Yugoslavia immediately!

Editorial staff of Neue Einheit
October 4, 2000