there is a current of opinion within the workers' movement with the call for UN military action to halt bombardment of Bosnian 'safe havens'. Fed on a diet of media coverage emphasising the sheer barbarism of the Serbian shelling of hospitals and defenceless civilian targets in Gorazde, many conclude that there is no alternative but for NATO or the UN to strike back and 'reach them a lesson'. Here HARRY SLOAN answers five possible arguments for supporting UN action, and insists that the only consistent policy for socialists is to call for the arming of the Bosnians to defend themselves. Q: Surely the NATO ultimatum, backed up by the threat to mount air strikes against the Serbs if they do not withdraw from Gorazde is simply defending the Bosnian muslims? A: Far from defending the Bosnian muslims, the UN role has been actively to disarm those living in enclaves in Gorazde, leaving them prey to the advancing Serbs. Before the situation in Gorazde hit the headlines, disarmed muslim communities in Zvornik, Foca and Visagrad had already fallen in precisely this way.
The UN-imposed "peace' in Sarajevo similarly brought in blue- beret 'peacekeeping' troops to impose the partition of the city, enabling the Serbs to move their heavy guns on the Gorazde.
The UN's ultimate objective is not to defend the national ANALYSIS right of self determination for Bosnia, but to secure a settlement which carves up the country between Serbia and Croatia.
Already the Bosnian government, weakened by a ruthlesslyimposed arms embargo, has been forced into a deal with Croatia which involved heavy territorial concessions while offering no security to the remaining muslim enclaves.
ANA The experience over three years shows that the very last people to be considered or defended by the UN are the Bosmane. Q: But shouldn't we punish the Serbs for their brutal attacks on unarmed civilians? They pay no attention to cease-fires or agreements: force is the only language they understand. A: None of the decision-making in this situation is under any democratic control. It is not 'we', but our government which is taking action, and deciding on what basis force should be used. We have no say in this, and should not give any support whatever to John Major's reactionary whose motives are very different from working people.
The most immediate impact of any bombing of Serb positions would be to reinforce the position of Serbian leader Milosevic and the Bosnian Serb leadership, who would revel in the situation.
In practice the governments which favour air strikes are not so much proposing punishing the Serbs as saving face, having failed to deliver their previous promises of protection.
The tactic of air strikes is dangerous in itself. As the Gulf War showed, large numbers of bombs will miss their intended military targets and hit innocent civilians. In Bosnia, there is a real threat that Bosnian muslims could themselves get caught in the crossfire.
The probability is that the Serbs who come under under air bombardment will take reprisals not against the well-armed and technologically superior NATO jets flying overhead, but against unarmed Bosnian civilians on UN QUT BONA Intornational APMS TO the fact that 500,000 troops with state of the art weaponry were air-lifted under UN banners to protect oil supplies in the Gulf by fighting Iraq, while the slaughter in Bosnia - with no strategic value to the USA - has been met by a few F16s and a complete absence of US ground forces.
Under the UN flag, over 100,000 retreating Iraqis were senselessly massacred by USled forces in what some described as a 'turkey-shoot'. The indifference of the UN to human suffering is underlined by the timing of its withdrawal from Rwanda.
In practice, conceding some kind of independent role for the UN amounts to subscribing to the concept of a 'new world order', policed by the USA, with license to kill - or to withdraw as it sees fit. Q: The Serbian policy of ethnic cleansing is the latter-day equivalent of fascism. Are you saying that the international community should sit back and watch these developments in the heart of Europe? A: There is no such thing as an international community, only governments and the The probability is that the Serbs who come under under air bombardment will take reprisals not against the well-armed and technologically superior NATO jets flying overhead, but against unarmed Bosnian civilians on the ground. class interests.
What is being proposed is not some kind of International Brigade to lend enlightened proletarian support to the Bosnians, but a brutal blitzkrieg against Serbian troops by imperialist warplanes.
The British and US governments which now pose as opponents of ethnic cleansing have been quite happy to do deals with Pol Pot's Kampuchean Khmer Rouge, who slaughtered millions in their brutal period of rule.
We have to ask who claims to speak for the international community, and which class interests they represent. It is clear that the ruling classes in Europe would be perfectly content to strike a deal with the Serbs for the permanent partition of Bosnia - provided only that they could guarantee that the shooting would stop, or be confined to the inside pages of the press. O: At the end of the day, it is obviously an impossible situation. How can you deny it would be better to save a few lives by intervening now, than to leave the Serbs to run riot and massacre who they please? A: At the end of the day, the only sure defence of the Bosnian muslims is to ensure they are armed and supplied to defend themselves.
This must be linked to a solidarity effort aimed at strengthening anti-war movements and left wing opposition to the Milosevic regime in the Serbian working class.
The Bosnians have been quite consciously left stranded by imperialism, and would be left stranded again once the air strikes had concluded. They have learned the hard way how foolish it would be to entrust their fate to benevolent outsiders. The British left must learn this lesson too and redouble the campaign to lift the arms embargo.