Page 183 - The CNN Effect in Action - How the News Media Pushed the West toward War ini Kosovo

1403975191ts08.qxd 19-2-07 05:08 PM Page 148
148
THE CNN EFFECT IN ACTION
flawed, however, because it was made between NATO and the FRY
57
As Milosevic had feared
and, to its peril, largely ignored the KLA.
while negotiating the agreement with Holbrooke, the KLA had no
incentive to comply with the cease-fire. Instead, they took advantage
of the power vacuum left by the FRY military withdrawal to recapture
territory lost during the summer offensive. According to General
Agim Ceku, the KLA’s military leader, “The cease-fire was very useful
58
for us, it helped us to get organized, to consolidate and grow.” This
perceived favoritism would have long-term consequences for the con-
flict that would lead the Serbian side to reexamine its attempts to
appease the West, which it increasingly saw as one-sided and against
Serb interests.
The international outrage that followed the Drenica and Gornje
Obrinje massacres were certainly not lost on the KLA, who seemed to
understand the power of favorable images in forwarding their cause.
Canadian general Michel Maisonneuve of the OSCE monitoring
force, who was stationed in Kosovo at this time, has since been one
source to confirm that the KLA was well aware of the consequences of
provoking FRY authorities. According to the general, “If they [FRY
authorities] were hit by something they would retaliate with dispro-
portionate force . . . That’s something I always used to say to the
KLA—why do you do these things, you’re provoking them and
they’re going to retaliate on defenseless people.” 59
Attempts to draw the FRY authorities into reprisals were common
over this period. With the large international monitoring presence in
Kosovo starting in mid-November, the tactics of the KLA were now
transparent and were recorded by those on the ground. According to
General Klaus Naumann, chair of the NATO military committee,
“Ambassador Walker stated in the NAC that the majority of the viola-
tions were caused by the KLA.” 60 Such tactics led the U.S. State
Department in November and December to raise the issue on at least
two occasions in press releases that condemned the KLA. In the first
press release on November 10, the KLA was condemned over the
abduction and murder of two Serbian policemen in Kosovo. 61 On
December 18, a press statement described the kidnapping and execu-
tion of a Serbian mayor in Kosovo as an act of “savage brutality.” 62
Perhaps anticipating Serb retaliation, both statements warned against
such an outcome, stating that “provocations from one side do not jus-
tify violence in return” and that “retaliation for violence by another
party is unacceptable.” 63 By the end of December, the Holbrooke-
Milosevic Agreement was unraveling, as Milosevic openly accused the
United States of backing terrorists by blocking UN Security Council