Kosovo and the Just-War Tradition

NATO intervened against Serbian barbarism in Kosovo without a mandate from the UN Security Council. Nor did NATO get approval after the event when the Security Council adopted Resolution 1244 on June 10. Was the Alliance morally wrong when it took military action against the Milosevic regime's crimes against humanity and its gross and systematic violations of human rights? Or was it the Security Council that failed when it did not take a position in March (and the months prior), but then gratefully accepted the results of NATO's intervention, leading to the guarantee of peace in June?

Gross and systematic violations of human rights are a threat to international peace and security. If governments by their policies constitute such a threat, the Security Council is authorized under Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter to intervene. The framework of the just-war tradition should be applied to this situation to help the international community decide if and how it should resort to armed intervention. The following questions are relevant: Does armed intervention serve a just cause? Is the intervention initiated by the mandate of a legitimate authority? Do the rights and values at stake justify sacrificing human lives? Have all attempts at finding peaceful solutions been exhausted? Is the intervention undertaken with the right intention? Does it have a reasonable chance of success? Will it be able to protect non-combatants?

Applying Just-War Criteria

Obviously, combating mass deportations and ethnic cleansing constitutes a just cause. The Eighth Assembly of the World Council of Churches (Harare, December, 1998) declared that in such cases we should learn from the past and set up mechanisms of fast intervention when the danger signals appear. The moral indignation was enormous when the first testimonies of crimes committed by the Serbs in Kosovo came through on March 24. Something had to be done. It is easy to vent moral indignation, but it is much more difficult to take effective action. It was NATO that made a breakthrough by starting the bombing of Serbian targets that same evening.

On the question of whether all attempts at finding a peaceful solution had been exhausted, NATO's case is strong as well. In the past, the Belgrade regime took full advantage of the West's preference for peaceful solutions. On the basis of official declarations, one may also conclude that the alliance intervened with the right intention: redressing the policy of oppression, ethnic cleansing, and violence pursued by the Belgrade regime. Indeed, the fate of the victims of aggression and terror should be the first concern of those who intervene. Maintaining the credibility of NATO or the UN is a matter of secondary importance in this respect.

More complicated is the question of whether the bombing campaign had a reasonable chance of success. It now looks as if this was the case. The military capacity of Serbia was seriously weakened and internal resistance to the regime increased. More time will be needed, however, to give a final answer. NATO tried, with varying success, to avoid causing civilian casualties. Had the deployment of ground forces been necessary, the evaluation would have been much more complicated. There was serious risk of a protracted guerrilla war. It might also have led to a break in relations with Russia. A negotiated solution might then have been impossible. Fortunately, it did not have to come to that.

NATO did not have a mandate from the UN Security Council and, in this respect, did not meet the above mentioned criteria of authorization by a legitimate authority. Nor did it comply with the provisions of international law as they stand today. However, at their annual meeting in Geneva last April, the UN Human Rights Commission adopted a resolution (China abstaining and Russia voting against) in which ethnic cleansing in Kosovo was condemned. On the occasion, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said: "As long as I am Secretary-General, the United Nations as an institution will always place the human being at the center of everything we do. No government has the right to hide behind national sovereignty in order to violate the human rights or fundamental freedoms of its peoples." Later, on June 10, at a session of the UN Security Council, Kofi Annan gave this implicit endorsement to the NATO effort: "The commitment to peace is not enough. The will to implement it—in all its aspects—is what counts. This includes tasks for which the United Nations is not responsible, but which are vital if peace and stability are to be restored."

The Security Council itself failed to legitimize intervention by ground troops because it was paralyzed by the positions of Russia and China. At the Security Council meeting of June 10, the Russian ambassador continued to criticize NATO's action. China abstained from voting, arguing that the NATO air strikes were a violation of the UN Charter and a dangerous precedent in international relations. This reality will undoubtedly continue to haunt the Security Council. The Kremlin is hardly able to run its own country: it is led by a delirious president; it has no control over its army roaming around in Serbia; it thinks its alliance with the criminal Milosevic more important than the fate of the victims; but it still pretends to be a force to be reckoned with in the international community. China will continue to uphold the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of a state. Ten years after forcibly ending the demonstrations on Tienanmen Square, the Chinese government systematically violates the principles of democracy and respect for human rights and systematically oppresses the Tibetan people. Oppressed people have little to expect from such powers.

Post-War Assessment of Political Actions

Now that the war has ended, political intervention is taking over. As with the military actions, these political actions should also be subjected to moral judgment. The settlement ought to make sure that justice is done to the victims. A major condition for a stable settlement is the introduction of a genuine democratic system based on the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of minorities. For the Kosovar victims this is a necessity if they are ever to be able to trust the Serbs. But it also holds for the new rulers of Kosovo in their treatment of the Serbs.

Part of doing justice to victims is to establish the truth regarding the crimes against humanity that have been committed by and in the name of the Serbian regime. The trial of individuals is indispensable to the release of Serbian citizens from collective guilt. The region will not have peace as long as Milosevic remains in power as Serbia's leader.

The Security Council stipulates that Kosovo will come under an international civil and security presence under the auspices of the United Nations for an interim period. The Council envisages a substantial autonomy for Kosovo within the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. However, after everything that has transpired, the region will never be the same. Consequently, no one can side-step the question of how the people of Kosovo will determine their own future. Ultimately, the right to self-determination should not be denied them.

Even a moderate politician such as Ibrahim Rugova believes that Kosovo should be independent one day. Those who want a just peace will have to enable the Kosovo Albanians to determine their future in freedom. A democratic system under the rule of law in Yugoslavia is unthinkable if the Kosovars are forced against their will to be part of it.

In its intervention against Milosevic's gross and systematic violation of human rights, NATO did not exactly comply with the rules of international law. As long as countries that do not have clean slates in the field of human rights are permanent members of the Security Council, this may remain unavoidable.

My evaluation here of the international intervention in Kosovo can only be provisional. Only if the final results do justice to the victims will the world community have made a genuine step forward. If, on the other hand, a final settlement does not do justice to the victims of oppression and deportation; if the perpetrators of crimes against humanity are not put on trial; if the people of Kosovo are not enabled to determine their own political future, then it will be hard to conclude that the war for Kosovo was justified.
 

[Theo Brinkel conducts research on international relations for the policy institute of the Christian Democratic Appeal—the leading Christian political party in The Netherlands.]