[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 35, Number 23 (Monday, June 14, 1999)]
[Pages 1070-1073]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on the Military Technical Agreement on Kosovo and an Exchange 
With Reporters

June 10, 1999

    The President. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I have just 
spoken with NATO Secretary General Solana, who, as you know, has 
determined that the Serb forces have begun their withdrawal from Kosovo, 
an essential step toward meeting NATO's conditions and restoring peace.
    Accordingly, NATO has suspended its air campaign against Serbia. An 
International Security Force, including American troops, is preparing to 
enter Kosovo. I will address the Nation this evening, but I would like 
to make a few points now.
    We and our Allies launched our campaign in the face of Serbia's 
brutal, systematic effort to remove Kosovars, ethnic Albanians, from 
their land, dead or alive. From the beginning, we had three clear 
objectives: the withdrawal of Serb forces, the deployment of an 
international security force with NATO at the core, the return of the 
Kosovars to their home to live in security and self-government. Serbia 
now has accepted these conditions and the process of implementing them 
is underway.
    The Kosovars have been victims of terrible atrocities. Their only 
hope was that the world would not turn away in the face of ethnic 
cleansing and killing, that the world would take a stand. We did, for 78 
days. Because we did, the Kosovars will go home.
    Our policy was designed to achieve our objectives in Kosovo and to 
do so in a way that advanced other important interests:
    First, to prevent the violence from spreading to other nations in 
southeastern Europe and undermining the progress they have made toward 
deeper democracy, greater ethnic and religious tolerance, and broader 
prosperity. They felt the greatest strain, but they never wavered. And I 
thank them for that.
    Second, to achieve our aims as an alliance, 19 democratic nations, 
with 780 million people, working together in the first sustained 
military operation in NATO's history, the Alliance did stay together. It 
is now stronger and more united than ever. And I thank my fellow leaders 
in the Alliance for their fidelity and their fortitude.
    Third, to act in a manner that would strengthen, not weaken, our 
vital relations with a democratic Russia. Russia played an important 
role in achieving this peace, and we hope that, as in Bosnia, it will 
join us in securing the peace.

[[Page 1071]]

    There are so many people to thank: first, Secretary General Solana 
and General Clark, who were steadfast and effective, our NATO Allies--I 
have spoken already with Prime Minister Blair and have calls out to many 
others. I hope to speak at least to President Chirac, Chancellor 
Schroeder, Prime Minister D'Alema, Prime Minister Chretien, Mr. Kok, Mr. 
Aznar, and many others. They were all--all 19 held together so well.
    I want to thank President Ahtisaari and Mr. Chernomyrdin for their 
diplomatic mission, which played a critical role in this. I want to 
thank President Yeltsin for his strong instructions to his team to 
resolve these matters so that we can go forward.
    I want to thank our allies in Congress in both Houses and both 
parties for believing in America's mission in Kosovo. I want to thank 
our team very much, those who are not here: the Vice President, who 
played a large role in putting together the Chernomyrdin-Ahtisaari team; 
Secretary Albright, whose passionate commitment to this cause is well-
known; and Deputy Secretary Talbott, who was pivotal in the diplomatic 
efforts. I want to thank Secretary Cohen and General Shelton, who 
persevered with great confidence and calmness amidst criticisms and the 
early rough-going to achieve the victory that they have achieved.
    And I want to say a special word of thanks to Mr. Berger, who has 
barely slept for the last 3 months and who has done a superb job. He and 
Mr. Podesta and Mr. Steinberg, our entire national security team has 
done a very, very good job.
    And finally, let me say I am enormously proud of our men and women 
in uniform, and those of our Allies, who have performed with tremendous 
skill and courage, striking at Serbia's military machine and aiding the 
refugees. I am profoundly grateful for what they have done. I am very 
grateful that the loss of life was limited to the tragedies in the two 
training incidents and that we only lost two planes in the combat 
operation.
    And I am grateful to the American citizens, who felt enormous 
compassion for the suffering of the people in Kosovo and understood the 
importance of standing up to the war crimes involved in ethnic cleansing 
and killing, and the kind of ethnic and religious bigotry and violence 
we have seen against innocent civilians.
    Now we are waiting for the United Nations to pass a resolution that 
the G-8 nations have embraced. We expect the Security Council to adopt 
it shortly.
    We must be mindful that even though we now have a chance to replace 
violence with peace, ethnic and religious hatred with a democratic 
future, a bloody century in Europe with a Europe undivided, democratic, 
and at peace, there is still quite a lot to be done:
    First, we have to make sure that the Serbs keep their commitments. 
That means the forces must rapidly and peacefully leave Kosovo under the 
agreed timetable, 11 days from yesterday. NATO's air campaign is 
suspended. It is not formally terminated, and Secretary General Solana 
retains the authority to resume strikes if Serbia violates its 
commitments.
    Second, we face challenges and risks in bringing home the refugees 
and restoring stability. With determination and cooperation, an 
International Security Force of roughly 50,000 troops, including 7,000 
Americans, can give the people of Kosovo the confidence to return, to 
lay down their arms, to heal their wounds, to live in peace. But there 
are operational difficulties with this, as well, which you will see over 
the next few days as we come to grips with them.
    Finally, we face the broader challenge of preventing future crises 
by promoting democracy and prosperity in this region which has been so 
troubled. With our Allies and partners, we must intensify these efforts. 
In the past 4 months, we have seen some of the worst inhumanity in our 
lifetime, but we've also seen the bravery of our troops, the resolve of 
our democracy, the decency of our people, and the courage and 
determination of the people of Kosovo. We now have a moment of hope, 
thanks to all those qualities. And we have to finish the job and build 
the peace.
    Thank you.

KFOR Timetable

    Q. Mr. President, sir, is there anything you can tell the American 
people as to how long

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the NATO peacekeepers will have to be in Kosovo, including the American 
forces?
    The President. I don't think we should put a timetable on it. We 
will define our objectives and proceed to implement them.

Serbian Leadership

    Q. Can you see the NATO peacekeeping force leaving Kosovo with Mr. 
Milosevic still in power?
    The President. Well, I would put it in a different way. What I would 
like to see is all the nations of southeastern Europe built up. I'd like 
to see them coming closer together, and then I'd like to see them 
becoming more integrated with the economic and security structure of 
Europe, so that we will see them growing and prospering the way Poland, 
Hungary, and the Czech Republic did after the fall of communism, for 
example. And I don't see how Serbia can participate in that unless they 
have a leadership that is committed to a multiethnic, multireligious 
democracy and to genuine democracy and human rights.

Success of Airstrikes

    Q. Do you feel vindicated against the criticism that the air war 
would not work, sir?
    The President. Well, I think--again, I would say, I think that our 
people in uniform performed superbly, and they performed risking their 
lives. We regret the fact that there were any civilian casualties, but 
our pilots risked their lives to minimize those casualties. And there 
were far fewer here, for example, than there were in the Gulf war--far, 
far fewer.
    And I think it's a tribute to Secretary Cohen and to General Shelton 
and the others who believed that, given these facts--given these facts--
and given the capacity of our forces, that this strategy could work. We 
never took other options off the table; we had planned and thought about 
them. But I think that our people in uniform, starting with our 
Secretary of Defense, are the ones that have been vindicated by this. 
And I'm grateful for what they have achieved.
    But in terms of America, the United States should feel vindicated 
when the people go home and when they're safe and when we can say that 
we, as a nation, have played a role in reversing ethnic cleansing. 
Because if we do that, after what we have done in Bosnia and the work we 
have been doing in Africa to set up a crisis response team to try to 
prevent a Rwanda from ever occurring again, then we will be able to see 
the world go into the 21st century with a more humane future, not able 
to stop all conflict, not able to stop all ethnic conflict, but at last 
able to prevent this sort of thing.

Serbian Willingness To Reach Agreement

    Q. Why do you think he gave in now, Mr. President?
    Q. Apart from the air campaign, was it also the indictment as a war 
criminal; was he getting pressure from his own people, from his 
military?
    The President. They paid quite a high price for this; they were hurt 
very badly.

Reconstruction of the Balkans

    Q. Mr. President, sir, it's going to cost a lot of money to 
reconstruct Kosovo and also the neighboring countries are going to need 
a lot of aid. How much is the United States willing to put up, and will 
this be a European endeavor with help from the United States?
    The President. Well, as I said, I would expect that most of the 
money would come from Europe because most of the costs of this campaign, 
the air campaign, have been borne by the United States. I don't quarrel 
with that. We had the capacity, and we did what we should have done.
    But I don't want us to get into a haggling situation, either. We 
should do this because it's the right thing to do. And it will be--let 
me say this, it will be far less expensive--far, far less expensive--for 
us to make a decent contribution to the long-term development of these 
people than it will be to wait around for something like this to happen 
again and run the risks, all the risks we had to deal with this time 
that it might spread and all of that.

[[Page 1073]]

    So I hope that we will be forthright. I hope the international 
institutions will do their part. And I think we need to focus on this 
because this is the last big challenge.
    Thank you very much.

Note: The President spoke at 10:15 a.m. in the Briefing Room at the 
White House. In his remarks, he referred to NATO Secretary General 
Javier Solana; Gen. Wesley K. Clark, USA, Supreme Allied Commander 
Europe; Prime Minister Tony Blair of the United Kingdom; President 
Jacques Chirac of France; Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder of Germany; Prime 
Minister Massimo D'Alema of Italy; Prime Minister Jean Chretien of 
Canada; Prime Minister Wim Kok of The Netherlands; President Jose Maria 
Aznar of Spain; President Martti Ahtisaari of Finland; former Prime 
Minister and Special Envoy Viktor Chernomyrdin and President Boris 
Yeltsin of Russia; and President Slobodan Milosevic of the Federal 
Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro). The President also 
referred to the Military Technical Agreement Between the International 
Security Force (KFOR) and the Governments of the Federal Republic of 
Yugoslavia and the Republic of Serbia.