councilor.org
| Source | Henry C.K. Liu |
| Date | 99/05/12/21:50 |
| China embassy bombing: Incompetence or conspiracy? BRUSSELS -- Was it simply a gross error, an instance of sheer incompetence, or was NATO somehow tricked into bombing the Chinese Embassy in the capital of Yugoslavia? How could the combined intelligence sources of the world's strongest military alliance have mistaken a large diplomatic mission, fenced off in ample grounds, with brass plate on the gate and fluttering national flag? Diplomats from NATO countries sipped cocktails in the embassy reception rooms that were gutted by alliance munitions. Amid profuse apologies at the weekend, NATO briefers ruffled at the suggestion that they might have used "an old map." There were plenty of sources of good intelligence, they insisted, without admitting they have eyes on the ground as well as sharp-eyed satellites in space. But of all the buildings in Belgrade that could have been bombed in error, what amazing coincidence drew NATO guided bombs with unerring accuracy to the embassy of the country that may hold the key to Yugoslavia's ultimate political isolation? The United States, apparently admitting its aircraft were involved, issued a statement on Sunday saying neither pilot nor mechanical error was to blame. It was "faulty information" which was not detected in the target validation process and "an anomaly that is unlikely to occur again." That would appear to indicate a basic if monumental error, an initial, gross targeting foul-up that slipped through the U.S. military's mesh of check-and-double-check procedures and sent NATO planes to the wrong address. The statement did not go into what misled NATO targeters who "believed that the (Yugoslav) Federal Directorate of Supply and Procurement was at the location that was hit." It did not say which of the 19 NATO allies, if any other than the United States, was involved in providing information that turned out to be so dramatically "faulty." An earlier statement from NATO's Allied Command Europe, issued in the middle of the European night by the staff of NATO Supreme Commander General Wesley Clark, said the intended target was the "weapons warehouse" of the procurement office. Could there be a hardened weapons bunker under the land that Belgrade sold to Beijing a few years ago for construction of its new embassy? Could NATO have known about the bunker but somehow failed to register that an embassy made it impossible to strike? NATO has not divulged what sort of munitions were used or what plane delivered them. If they were deep penetration "bunker-buster" bombs, perhaps the intended target was more than a five-story embassy compound. A Turkish newspaper on Sunday reported that Serbian national intelligence had moved equipment into the embassy 10 days ago, possibly to receive intelligence from China that would help Serbia defend its military against NATO attacks. Could NATO have decided it must destroy this link even at the risk of killing civilians and derailing diplomacy? A cloak of national security has been thrown over the incident, and as long as it remains such questions and speculations are unlikely to receive answers. But the dagger of investigative reporting is barely out of its sheath. "We are as mystified as you are," said a NATO official. "Everyone is searching for a satisfactory explanation. But no one knows if we'll ever have it." Both the statement from Clark's command and that in the name of U.S. Secretary of Defense William Cohen and CIA Director George Tenet were issued with unusual speed, as befitted the diplomatic urgency. The full investigation may not be over yet, and it cannot be excluded that new facts may emerge. But on the basis of what has been made public so far it is difficult to imagine how a hostile agent could have tricked NATO into bombing the embassy of the one power whose consent NATO needs in the United Nations Security Council to encircle Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic. Unless, that is, the hopeful conspirator was relying on the ally of incompetence. Source: Reuters |
Copyright (c) 1998, Joongpil Cho