Random thoughts on a war that is intensifying, mindlessly and horrifically, with the sort of slow-motion speed observers report seeing in the seconds before head-on auto collisions. These are rather cranky; the result of watching a country lurch blindly toward full scale war for no particular reason.

Any ten-year-old could have predicted that the NATO air strikes of the last two weeks would have resulted in an immediate escalation of both the war and civilian atrocities. Either the Clinton Administration wanted to make it worse or they are imbeciles. Milosevic controls the ground, and he can't fight back--but he has hostages. What else is he going to do? Cracking the whip in Kosovo also is shrewd militarily, preparing the area for an easier defense against the seemingly inevitable NATO ground invasion to come.

Military history suggests that air campaigns alone don't force enemies to capitulate; it's like trying to get checkmate with two knights. It's never enough. Ground troops will make it worse still. The Balkans are a mountainous, densely populated terrain that, as many successive empires have learned ovre the millenia, cannot be held easily by force. Comparisons of shooting wars to Vietnam are cliches, but in this case apt--with the additional grim factor of having triggered a human rights catastrophe. Nice move, Slick. Maybe Clinton has finally found a way to be remembered for something other than fucking every big-haired young woman who triggers his prodigious lust for power. Not that that's discernably different from his military policies.

The human rights catastrophe now paralyzing good liberals isn't just caused by Serbs, either. Most of the player in the Balkans have their human rights hands dirty, and now we're part of the problem, too. Air strikes are by definition, myths of surgical precision aside, attacks on civilian populations. They are one of the reasons the 20th century has seen such an unprecedented increase in death counts from war, and increase in the percentage of deaths that are civilian. Should Serbia execute its captured American soldiers, their perspective is blood-curdling but simple: vengeance for the civilian casualties NATO has already exacted. In this case, moreover, the soldiers put on uniforms and put themselves in harm's way; the bombing victims were in their homes, just trying to stay out of the way. This is war. It's why war is the worst, most horrific, and most inexcusable abuse of the nation-state.

Another forgotten analogy with Vietnam: the potential for escalation to World War III. It's been reported that at various times Russia, China, and the U.S. all threatened the use of nuclear weapons in response to Southeast Asia. Now, we have Russia, whose decaying and highly erratic military is feeding weapons to their buddy Milosevic. (After all, he was only doing to Kosovo what they did to Chechnya.) Their ships don't have enough fuel to get there, their soldiers haven't been paid since the Wall fell, but they've still got the second-largest nuclear arsenal in the world, and their easiest recourse, should the destruction of Belgrade proceed as is now apparently desired, is to threaten to start pushing buttons. This conflict is terrifying. It is much, much worse than Iraq, or anything else this generation has seen.

Clinton's attack on Serbia, which--despite Kosovo's plight--has horrified much of the rest of the world, also brings up the issue of the rogue superpower. If we somehow find a way out of this (let's all repeat, loudly: IMMEDIATE CEASEFIRE. NEGOTIATE.), we are still left with a military bully that has launched unprovoked acts of war against four countries (five, if you count the errant missiles that landed in Pakistan) since last August. Combine that with the economic bullying represented by the IMF-led global economy, and the U.S. leadership in arms sales, and countries--Russia, China, and the entire third world, for example--may well start to consider forming counterbalancing alliances. Clinton's legacy may well be that his leadership of the United States' lust for excessive, abusive power leads to a new millenium with a new Cold War: Us (and Great Britain, and maybe a few stragglers) against the world. So much for the beacon of democracy. Such geopolitical speculation may sound farfetched, but it's the risk we're taking--apparently without thinking much about it.

You'll note that I'm tending to use the terms "U.S." and "NATO" interchangably. Well? The NATO members opposed to this atrocity (generally the ones closest to the action, like Greece and Italy) are being utterly trampled by Germany, the U.K., and the U.S. Inxcidentally, the use of NATO forces (sidestepping the U.N.) is not only a violation of international law, but intentionally left Russia out in the cold, cementing their possible adverserial role.

Closest to the epicenter, there's no mention of the Kosovars themselves, or the KLA (the other warring party), and what they want. We're not even asking them, which puts the lie to the myth that we're doing this for humanitarian reasons. Why, then? There's speculation about oil, or Serbia's role as one of the last European countries outside the WTO's orbit. And every missile shot is another one to be replaced, at huge profit, by some defense contractor. But I suspect the main driving force behind this mess is the rogue superpower, that can't stand the idea of not being able to force any country, anywhere at any time, to do its bidding. Serbia is supposed to be yet another example: defy us and we will destroy you.

I was somehow not surprised to learn that one of the main political insiders pushing for an escalation of NATO hostilitiees to include ground troops was none other than Henry Kissinger. Isn't he dead yet? Hank, you'll recall, was an expert at escalating wars (especially when they could include adjacent countries), which makes him a natural for the Balkans. Tell ya what: let's settle this thing by locking Kissinger and Milosevic in a room, no weapons, mano-a-mano, fight to the death. It might take a while, as these seasoned war criminals are both cowards who prefer that other people die for their ideas. But it would be worth it, as it would rid the world of one of them. The winner, of course, would promptly be executed by being bludgeoned to death with the still-warm body of Bill Clinton. There you have it: binding arbitration, with a level of accountability not seen since Nuremberg.