[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 145 (1999), Part 5]
[House]
[Pages 7084-7089]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




       COMMEMORATION OF THE REMEMBRANCE OF THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Bass). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 1999, the gentleman from California (Mr. Sherman) 
is recognized for 60 minutes.
  Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I know I am the last Speaker before the 
staff goes home, and they will be gratified to know that I will use 
roughly half the allotted time. Even with half the allotted time, 30 
minutes is quite long, perhaps too long to devote to a single subject, 
and that is why I wish to give, in effect, three separate speeches.
  The first speech I would like to give is in commemoration of the 
remembrance of the Armenian Genocide. April 24 is the day when 
Armenians and those of good conscience around the world remember the 
genocide that took place at the beginning of this century. Because it 
was on April 24 that 200 Armenian religious, political, intellectual 
leaders were rounded up in Constantinople, taken into the interior and 
executed.
  This was a seminal day in a pattern of oppression that began in the 
1890s, and at a level of oppression which between 1915 and 1923 caused 
the death of 1.5 million Armenians in mass executions in forced 
marches, through disease, and through starvation, thus eliminating 
virtually the entire Armenian population of Anatolia and Western 
Armenia.
  There were many contemporaries who were there to see this first 
genocide. Perhaps no one speaks with the authority of our own 
ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, Ambassador Henry Morgantheau. I will 
probably mispronounce our ambassador's name, so I will simply refer to 
him as our ambassador to the Ottoman Empire. He recounts in his 
statement, ``When the Turkish authorities gave orders for these 
deportations, they were merely giving the death warrant to a whole 
race. They understood this well, and in their conversations with me 
made no particular attempt to conceal this fact.''
  In the poignant passage in his book, Black Dog of Faith, Peter 
Balakian relates the story of a genocide survivor. After seeing the 
massacre of Armenians in her own village, her father beheaded and 
crucified on the door of their home on one morning, the Armenian woman 
was forced to dance in the village square while being brutalized and 
set on fire, as their children clapped, and other images too horrific 
to describe. The death march and the Euphrates so filled with blood and 
corpses that no reasonable person could see it and not be sick.
  The first genocide of this century laid the foundation for the 
Holocaust, the largest genocide and the most horrific of this or any 
century. It was interesting that our ambassador to the

[[Page 7085]]

Ottoman Empire happened to be an American Jew who was told by Turkish 
authorities, ``These people, these Armenians, are Christians. Since you 
are a Jew, why don't you let us do with the Christians as we please?''
  Well, whether it is in Anatolia or in Europe or anywhere in the 
world, we cannot countenance genocide simply by saying the victims are 
not of our religion or ethnic group. No wonder 30 years later Adolf 
Hitler uttered his infamous statement about the Armenian Genocide.
  Eight days before the invasion of Poland, which would place 3 million 
Jews under his control and which allowed Hitler to send them to their 
deaths, he told those in his inner circle who thought that the world 
might question this policy, ``Who today remembers the extermination of 
the Armenians?'' Clearly, the impunity that the Turkish government felt 
that they had in annihilating the Armenians emboldened Hitler before 
the worst of the Holocaust.

                              {time}  1800

  And that is why those of us of Jewish faith, Armenians, and everyone 
of good conscience must say, ``never again.''
  The last act of a genocide is genocide denial. Because those who have 
committed it wish to blot out even the memory of those who they have 
killed. And it is, in fact, unfortunate that the Turkish Government 
continues its genocide denial, a genocide denial that is not just 
passive, not just intransigent, but takes the form of trying to erase 
from the history books of others that which happened at the beginning 
of this century.
  Today I was honored to meet with the new chancellor of UCLA, my alma 
mater. And I am proud of UCLA. I was a Bruin when Walton was on the 
basketball court. And I was proud to meet our new chancellor, who 
described what is happening at UCLA. But the proudest day for UCLA was 
when it rejected a gift of over a million dollars from the Turkish 
Government, rejected a gift of over a million dollars.
  It is not in the nature of universities to reject gifts, but this 
gift came with strings attached. It was to fund a chair in Ottoman 
history with various strings and provisos that virtually ensured that 
the Turkish Government would control who sat in that chair. It would 
not have been a chair for legitimate inquiry into historical facts but 
rather a chair in genocide denial. And UCLA stood firm and rejected 
that gift and said that the academic integrity of my alma mater and the 
academic integrity of all American universities is not for sale.
  It is time for the American State Department to show this same level 
of courage and determination. It is time for the State Department and 
the U.S. executive branch of Government not just to remember the day 
April 24 but to use the word that describes what that day remembers. 
The word is ``genocide.'' And it is time for the State Department to 
recognize what happened.
  Clearly, at a time when the State Department is trying to rally our 
support to prevent mass murders in the Balkans, they should be honest 
as to what happened in Anatolia some 80-plus years ago.


    Plan Needed to Provide Directional Signs at U.S. Capitol Complex

  Mr. SHERMAN. Mr. Speaker, I would now like to address a completely 
different subject and one that is not nearly so grave.
  I had a chance to meet with the Architect of the United States 
Capitol, the man who keeps the facilities here running, to talk to him 
about some of the ways we could make this institution work better as a 
physical plant.
  Mr. Speaker, we get four to five million tourists every year. Now, 
that does not cause us to rival Disneyland, although there are those 
who assert that the U.S. Congress rivals Disneyland in other respects, 
but it is indeed a large number of people to accommodate. And yet, I 
will just illustrate the problem with a story that happened last year.
  Some constituents of mine came and visited the gallery, right up 
there. And after watching their fill of Congressional pontificating, 
they decided to walk back to my office in the Longworth building 
through the tunnels. For it was winter and the tunnels were warm. And, 
as everyone knows, there are a network of tunnels that connect the 
Capitol with the House office buildings. Well, they walked down into 
the tunnels and they have not been heard from since. For that 
labyrinth, that maze, lacks almost any sign to tell them where they are 
going.
  Now, as a serious matter, the absence of signage so far has not been 
responsible for somebody being lost to the point where they were never 
heard from again, but it does imperil the efficiency not only of this 
House's business, the efficiency of those who come here to persuade us 
on various issues, but it also impairs the efficiency of the Capitol 
Police that are here to protect us. And last year the importance of 
that protection was illustrated.
  If we talk to any Capitol policeman or Capitol police woman, if we 
talk to them for a while and ask them to let down their guard a little 
bit, they will tell us they spend less than a third but close to a 
third of their time giving directions.
  Well, that is not surprising. There are four to five million tourists 
here each year not to mention a few freshmen and sophomore Members of 
Congress who ourselves do not always know the best way to get from one 
place to another. We need a plan to provide signs throughout the 
Capitol complex.
  I am happy to report to the House that the architect has already 
signed a consulting contract, half of that contract is completed, for a 
plan to put signs virtually everywhere, literally thousands of new 
directional signs so that people who visit us will know where they are 
and how to get to where they are going.
  I was told once, if we want to influence what happens in Washington, 
we need to hire an expensive lobbyist who knows his way around the 
Capitol. I thought that meant understanding parliamentary procedure. 
But parliamentary procedure is simple compared to the labyrinth of 
tunnels underneath this building, and knowing our way around Washington 
may very well mean simply knowing how to get from one building to the 
other.
  Thousands of directional signs throughout the buildings and tunnels 
will make it easier for people to do business whether they are here for 
a day or whether they are just coming to Congress as freshmen or new 
staffers. I will simply point out that the way they test the 
intelligence of rodents is they put them in a maze of tunnels and see 
how quickly they can figure out their way around.
  I personally am not going to go one-on-one against the more 
intelligence white rats because, if my own experience in the tunnels is 
any indication, I am not certain that I would prevail. We need these 
directional signs.
  And I am also happy to report to those who protect the entrance at 
the southeast corner of the Longworth building that I have the 
assurance of the Architect that a new series of signs will be put up 
there very soon so that they can do their job instead of telling people 
that they are in the Longworth Building and where the Rayburn Building 
is and where the Cannon Building is.
  There is one other step that we could take. It has been analyzed by 
the consultants. I believe the consultants have not embraced it, but it 
deserves some additional attention. And that is the idea of putting 
colored striping not in the beautiful buildings but in the I will use 
the term ``ugly'' tunnels that are underneath this building.
  I think my colleagues are well aware that those tunnels are not in 
any way aesthetic. They have open pipes and dangling wires, and 
certainly colored stripes on the ground would do nothing to decrease 
their aesthetic appeal. But those colored lines could direct people 
from one building to the other effectively and direct them to the 
Capitol building effectively.
  There is perhaps a plan to make those tunnels a little bit more 
aesthetically consistent with the rest of the Capitol; and if that is 
the case, I would well understand why colored lines on the ground are 
inconsistent with that. But if the tunnels are going to remain

[[Page 7086]]

the functional-only tunnels that they are today, then nothing should be 
ruled out as far as making them more usable and providing some 
direction to those who use them.
  A second issue I would like to raise would perhaps make it easier on 
Americans by not requiring them to even come to Washington at all, 
although it is beautiful and I urge Americans to come here to see their 
Government in action, and that is an idea that has been used in the 
California capitol in Sacramento for over 20 years.
  Each of the hearing rooms for each of the committees here in Congress 
has a microphone system and anywhere in that room we can hear whoever 
is speaking, and that means their voice is going through a wire to the 
loudspeakers. But, unfortunately, that wire only goes to loudspeakers 
in that hearing room.
  As has been remarked on many occasions, Congress in committee is 
Congress at work. What goes on in committee is every bit as important 
as what goes on on this floor. And if my speech lasts as long as it 
might, perhaps many would argue that what goes on in committee is far 
more interesting than what is going on on the floor.
  But, in any case, what goes on in committee, whether it is a 
subcommittee or full committee, is of critical importance. And yet in 
Sacramento, if we are anywhere in the capitol complex, they have at 
their desk a box and they can simply turn a 1970s technology dial on 
that box and listen through a speaker to what is happening in committee 
hearing room number 1 or number 2 or number 15 or number 22, so that 
every legislative assistant in Sacramento can hear what is going on in 
their Ways and Means Committee while at the same time being able to 
prepare their member for what is going to go on in their Appropriations 
Committee.
  Just as C-SPAN plays what is going on on the House floor, which is of 
occasional interest to the legislative assistants, they could instead 
listen to what is going on in an appropriations subcommittee of direct 
relevance to the district that their Member represents.
  So I think that we can also rig up a system at virtually minimal cost 
so that each of us in each office here in the Capitol could listen on a 
box to what is going on in the committee hearing room of our choice, 
listening perhaps on one hour to what is going on in the International 
Relations hearing room and then turning a dial to listen to what is 
going on in Ways and Means.
  But we do not have to stop at 1970s technology. We could work our way 
up to 1980s technology. We could take those same 20 or 30 audio choices 
and put them on an 800 number. Or if we wanted to be cheap, we could 
put them on a 900 number. But either way, we can allow people all over 
the country to dial in and hear what is going on in this or that 
committee of the House of Representatives.
  Today there their only alternative is to hire some expensive lobbyist 
to come monitor a committee or, alternatively, to fly to Washington so 
that they could be there for a committee hearing.
  Now, I know that C-SPAN covers what seems to be an interminable 
number of committee hearings. But, in fact, only two or three percent 
of the committee hearings are carried live and those interested in what 
is going on in committee and subcommittee have to be physically in the 
room to hear what is going on. We could, through 1980s technology, 
provide that to every American everywhere in the country. And I know 
there are people who watch this floor on C-SPAN who would prefer to 
know what is going on in the committee that is relevant to them.
  But we do not even have to stop at 1980s technology. As we approach 
the new century, we could even think of 1990s technology. At virtually 
no cost, we could put that same audio signal on the Internet and anyone 
with a computer and a modem and 10 or 20 bucks to provide their 
Internet service provider could listen anywhere in the country to what 
is going on in any committee room here in the House of Representatives.
  This is the people's House, but the people should not have to fly to 
Washington to hear what is going on.
  Now, I realize that the system will not be perfect. They will not 
necessarily be certain who is speaking when listening on a squawk box 
or listening on the Internet. But certainly this is an option that we 
should provide. And those who listen carefully will hear who the 
chairman or chair woman of a committee has recognized and will be able 
to remember who is speaking.
  Mr. Speaker, I would now like to give my third speech. And while I 
said that I would use only half of the allotted hour, I fear that I may 
use perhaps two-thirds of it. And I apologize to those staff members 
who are extremely anxious to leave.

                              {time}  1815


                      The Conflict in the Balkans

  Mr. SHERMAN. But the third issue that I would like to address is the 
one that is on all of our minds, and that is the conflict in the 
Balkans, and I have a few basic observations before I would like to 
give a more organized and cogent presentation.
  The first observation is that we are about to play host to the NATO 
ministers. They are coming here to celebrate 50 years of NATO, but I 
fear that what they are here to celebrate is 50 years of us spending on 
our defense budget enough money to protect them and the peace of their 
continent while Europe fails to spend enough on its own defense.
  Now when NATO was born 50 years ago, the European economies were in 
shambles, and the concept of burden sharing was perhaps not applicable. 
But today, as the alliance engages in military affairs in the Balkans, 
the most that can be said is the Europeans are helping us.
  Europe is the richest continent on the planet. Its gross domestic 
product exceeds that of the United States. We are told that the reason 
we are focusing on Kosovo is that this is destabilizing to the most 
powerful continent on the planet, Europe, and yet somehow the most this 
great colossus can provide is some assistance while a North American 
country is required to do the work. And we are even told that we should 
be grateful that they are assisting our efforts to protect their 
continent.
  Now is not the time for restructuring the military relationships, but 
clearly the time has come to end American acquiescence as the Europeans 
slash their own defense budgets far below what they proved they could 
afford during the 1980's. If there is a peace dividend, it should be 
paid to the American taxpayers who bore the lion's share of the 
economic burden of winning the Cold War. It should not be reaped by a 
European continent which demanded through its own inaction American 
protection.
  If we look at what is happening in the Balkans, we see that America 
is now required to mobilize its reserves. Certainly all of the European 
air forces should have mobilized all of their reserves before Europe 
asked us or NATO asked us to mobilize ours, and the importance of 
stopping the mass murder in the Balkans may exceed these concerns for 
now. But 6 months from now, a year from now, we must make it clear to 
the Europeans that dialing 911 and reaching the Pentagon is not a 
substitute for spending their own money for their own defense forces.
  The second observation I would like to make is that the vilification 
of Slobodan Milosevic is justified but may impede our efforts because I 
do not think, and I will get to this later, that we can be certain of 
such total battlefield dominance that we can just send a telegram or a 
fax to Belgrade instructing them what to do. Instead, I suspect that we 
will have to negotiate a compromise or a settlement with Mr. Milosevic, 
and while he is a mass murderer, the people of this country must be 
aware that Saddam Hussein is an even worse mass murderer and we had to 
negotiate with Saddam, and the government in Beijing has killed 
millions of Chinese, and we just welcomed their prime minister.
  Why must America do this? Why does America do this? Why do we deal 
with

[[Page 7087]]

mass murderers? Why must we deal with Milosevic?
  I would put forward that if we want to hide from the truth, we could 
try to convince ourselves that Milosevic is the only malignancy on this 
planet and that everywhere else governments are free, people are safe, 
yet nothing could be further from the truth. Half of the people of this 
world are ruled by governments that have committed mass murder, and as 
long as the world is as it is rather than as we would like to pretend 
it is, like to deceive our children and even our voting age citizens 
into believing it is, as long as half the world is governed by 
governments guilty of mass murder, we will have to deal with those 
governments.
  Third, I would like to observe an unfortunate tendency in the 
rhetoric surrounding Kosovo, both rhetoric of our own State Department 
and rhetoric in London and in other European capitals. That rhetoric is 
to increase the objectives that we demand that we reach in Kosovo while 
at the same time, frankly, our military campaign is not working out as 
we planned. To increase the objective while not achieving any of your 
objectives on the battlefield, or any of your major objectives, is 
folly and sets us up for defeat. We must instead recognize that we did 
not begin these hostilities for the purpose of sending American troops 
into Belgrade with an arrest warrant for Slobodan Milosevic and the 
British did not begin their effort alongside us for that purpose 
either, and while those who are watching action thrillers out of 
Hollywood may believe that you can land one Jean Claude Van Dam and 
maybe a Schwartzenegger or two, and rush into the Presidential Palace 
in Belgrade, extract Milosevic and fly him to the Hague for trial, in 
fact the overthrow of Milosevic is probably not going to occur, and to 
enter Belgrade means either you enter us with a small force, which 
would probably be completely extinguished, and I will point to our lack 
of success in sending a small force into Tehran to rescue our hostages. 
Perhaps we should thank God that that force never actually reached 
Tehran because I am not sure that it would have been successful had it 
reached that city. In fact, it was not successful in even reaching the 
capital of Iran.
  So, sending in a small force risks the annihilation of that force. 
Sending into Belgrade, that means all the way through Serbia, a force 
capable of exercising dominion over that city would probably involve a 
military campaign involving thousands and thousands of American 
casualties. So while it is glorious to beat our chests and to say that 
the world must rid itself of Milosevic, and perhaps some day that will 
come, to make that an objective of our current campaign is to doom that 
campaign to failure and perhaps to ensnarl us in a ground campaign that 
would have very high casualties.
  I do want to point out that our actions in Kosovo are motivated by 
the highest level of idealism, that we are willing to spend our 
treasure and, more importantly, to risk the lives of our men and women 
to prevent atrocities and to assure the Albanian Kosovars of a chance 
to live in peace, security and autonomy. Perhaps there is no more moral 
statement that can be made about America than that we are willing to do 
that. But in any such great idealistic undertaking there is a risk that 
the idealism that motivates the action will cloud your judgment and 
have idealism cloud the effort to develop a realistic strategy. Realism 
requires us to remember some unpleasant facts.
  The first of these is that Kosovo is not the only place of mass 
murder, of tragedy and atrocity. It is not a place where we can spend 
our entire willingness to work for humanitarian ideals, because in fact 
there are other victims of mass murder, perhaps also that would be just 
as just for us to try to help as the Kosovars.
  I will point out that 800,000 members of the Tutsi tribe were killed 
in Rwanda, but that is pretty much passed, but today there is massive 
tragedy, death and atrocity in the Congo, in Myanmar, in East Timor, 
and especially in southern Sudan where 2 million people have been 
killed, and the killing goes on every year.
  There are those that say we cannot stand by and watch atrocities in 
the Balkans. We should not watch, but we have demonstrated our capacity 
to watch atrocity because for 10 years we have ignored the atrocities 
in southern Sudan where 2 million people have been killed and where 
America has done almost nothing to help them.
  I would hope that our actions in Kosovo are so successful that we are 
emboldened to provide some limited level of assistance, and I am not 
proposing sending American Armed Forces, but some limited level of 
assistance to those in southern Sudan who are trying to protect their 
lives from a government more guilty of mass murder than the government 
in Belgrade.
  A second fact that we are perhaps unwilling or at least reluctant to 
recognize is that our goal creating a multi-ethnic, autonomous Kosovo, 
multiethnic and harmonious may be beyond reach. Realistically it is 
unlikely that Albanians and Serbs will live in Kosovo in harmony and 
peace in the absence of an outside force. We should remember that it is 
not just the Serbs who have committed massive atrocities, but the KLA 
that has committed atrocities on a smaller scale as they have killed 
Serb civilians, and we may have to settle for a Kosovo in which part is 
inhabited by Albanians, the lion's share, and part is inhabited by 
Serbs. The goal of them living side by side is a noble and idealistic 
goal, but one that a realist might say cannot be achieved any time 
soon.
  Finally, or another important fact to point out, one that we are 
clouded in our judgment for not realizing, is that this is not a battle 
between pure good and pure evil. Yes, in an idealistic melodrama there 
is pure good and pure evil, yet that is not the case here. I have 
already mentioned that the KLA has engaged in atrocities to try to 
expel Serbs from Kosovo, far smaller in number, far less heinous a 
policy, but murder is murder, and the KLA, who are fighting more or 
less on our side, fighting for the Kosovars, is an organization with 
some ties to Iran, an organization that Osama Bin Laden has tried to 
assist and we are not certain of whether those entreaties and offers of 
assistance have been honored and an organization with ties to drug 
dealers. Until a few months ago, the official policy of our State 
Department was to call the KLA a terrorist organization.
  Likewise, the Serbs are not just victimizers, but also victims. 
180,000 Serbs were ethnically cleansed from Croatia just a few years 
ago, forced at the point of bayonet and gun to leave homes they had 
lived in for centuries.

                              {time}  1830

  I would point out that during that ethnic cleansing, where Serbs were 
the victims, America did almost nothing.
  It is true, while there were a few murders they did not reach the 
level of mass murder that has been achieved in Kosovo, but still some 
murders and 180,000 to 200,000 people ethnically cleansed, this was an 
atrocity. Yet at the time, the Croatians who were committing this 
atrocity were our allies with regard to bringing the Bosnian conflict 
to a conclusion so America said virtually nothing and did absolutely 
nothing.
  Finally, blind idealism would say that we should be increasing our 
objectives to reach pure justice for our cause, and I have mentioned 
this earlier, adding on to our objectives the idea that not only Kosovo 
but all of it would be liberated and under total NATO domination but 
that Milosevic would be taken prisoner, et cetera, et cetera. In fact, 
given the situation, militarily it would be wise for the United States 
to define a more realistic objective.
  We should not give up on the idea that the Albanian Kosovars need a 
place to live in Kosovo where they are safe and where they can succeed 
with our aid in building a prosperous homeland, but this does not 
necessarily need to be 100 percent of Kosovo in multiethnic harmony, 
which is our stated objective.
  Let me talk for a moment about some of the strategies that we should 
at least explore to go along with those that we are using. Today I had 
the opportunity in hearings to hear from and

[[Page 7088]]

question our Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.
  Mr. Speaker, if anyone saw me running into this hall it was so that I 
could make it here on time because we had a meeting, with several of my 
colleagues, with Sandy Berger, who is the President's national security 
advisor.
  The administration remains welded to its existing policies. They are 
optimistic that continued bombing will lead to a collapse of the 
Milosevic capacity to resist. If they are right, we will find out 
because nothing this Congress does, nothing the people of this country 
do, will prevent a continued bombing campaign for at least several 
weeks, perhaps a month, before there is even the possibility that 
anyone other than the administration would cause in any way a change in 
policy.
  If during those weeks there are not signs and far greater signs than 
we have seen so far of success, we do need to look at other strategies. 
One of those strategies is being embraced by the administration but 
only to a limited extent, and that is to involve Russia in the 
peacemaking process. Russia is critical because Russia can persuade the 
Milosevic government to do things and to make concessions they would 
not make on their own. Russia is important because they can provide a 
fig leaf or political cover so that Milosevic can make any concessions 
that he decides are in his interest to make but he needs a political 
excuse to make.
  Finally, Russia is important to the Balkans because Russia could 
provide an essential part of the peacekeeping force, and I will get to 
some of the possibilities for a makeup of a peacekeeping force later. 
Involving Russia in the Balkans may be more important than anything 
that is happening in the Balkans.
  Ten years from now Kosovo may be somewhat forgotten but Russia will 
remain a critical nuclear arms state, and if we do not treat Russia 
with respect now the Russian people and the Russian leadership will 
remember that in the future.
  By way of historical footnote, I should mention that 85 years ago 
Russia mobilized its Army in support of Serbia, and that led directly 
to World War I. It is not surprising that the Russians, mindful of 
their own history, mindful of the sacrifices of World War I, believe 
that they have a definite stake in what happens to Serbia.
  So we can and should involve Russia, and if Russia gets the credit 
for peace that is two good things. It is peace and it is a Russian 
Government that can hold its head high against the ultranationalists in 
Moscow and elsewhere.
  Second, and this is controversial, we need to signal that we are not 
demanding that Rambouillet, that the Rambouillet agreement, apply to 
all of Kosovo's territory but, rather, that it apply to only the lion's 
share of that territory.
  No one doubts that the Serbs, like the Albanian Kosovars, have rights 
in Kosovo. The Serbs represent 10 percent of the population, the 
Kosovars a little over 80 percent. Kosovo has been part of Serbia for 
hundreds of years, and Kosovo is the religious and cultural birthplace 
of the Serbian nation. In fact, even the Rambouillet agreement 
recognizes Serb rights in Kosovo by stating that Kosovo should remain 
part of Serbia.
  We should imagine an agreement that does not involve one peacekeeping 
force but, rather, two geographically separate peacekeeping forces. One 
of those forces should occupy 70, 80 percent of Kosovo and should be 
led by NATO. This force will provide the security necessary so that 
Albanian refugees feel free to return, and on that 80 percent of the 
territory they will build lives more prosperous than the lives they had 
before this conflict because they will enjoy not only American aid but, 
with a little common sense, we will allocate to them all of the former 
Yugoslavia's textile quota and other trade concessions, aid and trade. 
This would leave another 20 percent of Kosovo that would be patrolled 
exclusively by Russian peacekeepers.
  The final status of Kosovo could wait, but in this area Serbia would 
feel secure. In this area, the Serb population would feel very secure 
and, frankly, in this area I am not certain that refugees would choose 
to return. This would allow the Serbs to notice that their friends, the 
Russians, were the force occupying the ancient site and origin of the 
Serbian orthodox church, the important monastery lands, at least those 
that are contiguous, and the battlefield of Kosovo Polje, where the 
Serbs fought the Turks in the 14th century.
  By letting the Serbs know that there will be no NATO occupation of 
this section of Kosovo, we leave them with a reason to bargain. 
Otherwise, they lose not one more square inch of territory by losing 
this war than they would if they agreed to our bargaining position. 
Giving them security in 20 percent of Kosovo gives them a reason to 
make concessions other than ending the bombing, and clearly ending the 
bombing has not imperiled them to reach a compromise with us so far.
  It is true that the Serbs claim to have monasteries virtually all 
over Kosovo, but I am confident that they would regard it as a 
compromise rather than a total defeat if they were allowed to see the 
Russians, rather than NATO, who is bombing them, occupy the most 
important sites, particularly in the far west and the far east of 
Kosovo.
  Finally, we need to look at other mechanisms to either defeat the 
Serbs or perhaps more importantly to let the Serbs know that they may 
be defeated. Milosevic, I believe, is convinced that he can continue to 
occupy Kosovo because we will never send in ground troops. His tanks 
will be there as long as they hide among civilians or dig in so that 
they cannot be destroyed by our Apache helicopters. What Apache 
helicopter is going to fire at a tank if they put 10 or 20 unwilling 
Albanians on top of it? So he can keep his tanks and his heavy armor 
and his artillery in Kosovo unless a ground force, with tanks and with 
heavy armor and willing to take casualties, can be deployed against 
him.
  When he sees us training an army of Albanians to use American tanks 
and American artillery and American heavy weapons, then he will know 
that such an Army may soon be deployed against him. At that point, a 
Russian brokered compromise will begin to look far more appealing.
  We do not have to let the Albanians take control of these weapons. 
They can train on them during the day and American soldiers can retain 
them at night. Therefore, we are not even technically violating any of 
the rules against providing weapons to any of the residents or citizens 
of the former Yugoslavia since we are not giving them any weapons; we 
are just giving them training. If at some point in the future we decide 
to unleash them, we can give them the custody of those weapons and 
heavy armored divisions of Albanians with America's best armored 
weapons can move in to Kosovo along with the lightly armed KLA. That is 
what it would take to dislodge Milosevic, a ground army with both heavy 
weapons and lightly armed mobile soldiers and an army willing to take 
casualties.
  I want to talk a little bit about the other alternative, and that is 
sending in NATO ground troops. One alternative is to send in NATO 
ground troops behind an Albanian Army, in support of it. Under those 
circumstances, NATO might take only slight casualties, but if instead 
NATO has to defeat by itself the Serbian Army deployed in Kosovo, then 
NATO will take casualties and then the danger is this: What if those 
casualties are too much for Americans to endure? What if those 
casualties are too much for the French to endure or the British or the 
Germans?
  The first NATO nation that cries uncle and demands that its soldiers 
be withdrawn or even moved to the rear will cause the other NATO 
countries to demand the same level of safety for their soldiers. If all 
of the NATO troops need to be put at the rear, then our efforts against 
Milosevic will be over. If that happens, then every tyrant and mass 
murderer in the world will feel that he can act with impunity. The 
Vietnam syndrome and the Somalia syndrome will return.

[[Page 7089]]

  That is why we need at our disposal not only the KLA, and they are 
operating independently and they will get light weapons with or without 
us, but also another well-armed Albanian force.
  In conclusion, the American people have shown their willingness to 
commit their treasure and more importantly the lives of our sons and 
daughters to preventing atrocity, ameliorating tragedy. If we 
realistically define our objectives and if we prepare to use all of the 
tools at our disposal, we may secure a reasonable life for the 
Kosovars, and just as important we may inspire the American people to 
use limited realistic efforts to try to stop the ongoing atrocities in 
Sudan and Myanmar, in the Congo and East Timor and elsewhere.
  If instead we fail, if we devote inadequate resources to a pristine, 
perfect, no-compromise objective and fail to achieve it, then this is 
going to be a tragedy; first for those servicemen and women who die in 
an unsuccessful American effort.

                              {time}  1845

  More importantly perhaps even than that, it will be a tragedy for the 
Kosovars who will be told that well, we tried, but we did not use all 
of the options and we are too idealistic to make compromises, and so 
you will live your life here in a refugee camp.
  Finally, if we use inadequate resources to try to achieve the 
absolute objective, it will be a tragedy for victims of atrocities 
around the world, both today and whatever atrocities are committed in 
the decades to come, by tyrants who at that time would know that 
America had tried in Kosovo unsuccessfully.
  It will be a while before the administration is looking for new 
alternatives. They are convinced that the current strategy will be 
successful, and I hope that whatever comes out, it is good enough so 
that the administration can claim that it is a total victory and not a 
compromise. But we must begin to look at other alternatives, and if, in 
a few weeks, we recognize that the current strategy has not been 
successful, we must have the courage to use them.

                          ____________________