Contribution to the 8th International Communist Seminar, Brussels, 2-4 May 1999
www.icsbrussels.org , ics[at]icsbrussels.org
Yugoslavia defends its independence
and stands up to the criminal NATO aggression
Branco Kitanovic
General Secretary of the New Communist Party of Yugoslavia
Friends,
I am here with comrade Veselin Nikolic and we represent the New Communist Party of Yugoslavia, the only Marxist-Leninist party in Yugoslavia active in all the ex-Yugoslav republics. We left Belgrade on April 29. On the way to Hungary, we had to make a detour of 200 km because NATO has destroyed all bridges but one on the Danube. Last night, they aimed at the centre of Belgrade, only 250 m away from the NKPY (New Communist Party of Yugoslavia).
Comrades, on September 1st of this year, we will be commemorating the sixtieth anniversary of the outbreak of World War II. On April 6, 1999, the new fascists, in other words NATO, shamefully celebrated Hitler's aggression on Yugoslavia.
On this bloody jubilee, the descendants of Hitler and Goebbels, in the persons of Clinton, Blair, Schröder and Chirac, carried out the bestial murder of a hundred women, children and old people in our country and destroyed a huge number of factories, many bridges, as well as a dozen hospitals, schools and kindergartens. After 35 days of mad bombing, NATO has destroyed, wholly or partially, 50 large factories, 25 vitally important bridges, 220 schools, 45 kindergartens, 5 oil refineries, 12 power stations, 25 libraries, 12 university institutes, 18 churches and monasteries, including 2 architectural chefs d'oeuvre of world reknown, more than 700 years old, the patriarcates of Gratschanitsa and Petschkaya. It has destroyed many cultural and historical monuments, museums, art galleries, archives, post offices, stations, roads, railways, hotels, water systems, agro-industrial complexes, shops and health resorts.
Many splendid buildings have been lost. On a single day, April 27, in the pretty health resort of Soudroulitsa in the south of Serbia, 18 people, among whom were 12 children, were killed and around 150 wounded and 310 houses were destroyed.
During the attacks on the the television buildings in Belgrade 17 people were killed and 18 wounded. 18 hospitals have been totally or partially destroyed. In half an hour, the criminals of NATO murdered 75 Albanians and wounded more than 100 people on the outskirts of the city of Djakhovitsa.
The result of the NATO aggression is that more than 500 000 people are jobless and around 2 millions have no income.
The bloody invasion by the criminals of NATO goes on. The little country of Yugoslavia, with its 11 million inhabitants, suffers sadistic and systematic damages in front of the whole world, in spite of the heroism of its people. In any case Yugoslavia will not be conquered, because she protects her freedom, her progress, her independence as well as world civilisation from the insane claims of the "New World Order" and world capital which are transforming the entire world into their colony.
Comrades, during the fifty years’ existence of NATO, there have been 315 wars and armed conflicts during which more than 27 million people have died and 100 million have been wounded. In 305 cases, the United States prepared the wars indirectly or was their main inspirers. During these fifty years, there have been only 6 days without war. That is proof enough that NATO is a terrorist organisation of new fascists and criminals. Of course, during the existence of the socialist camp and of the USSR, the NATO aggressors were thwarted several times in their expansion. That was the case in Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, Angola, Cuba... The same fate awaits them today.
The criminal aggression of NATO in Yugoslavia clearly confirms for the hundredth time the words of Lenin, saying that by its very nature imperialism means war. Imperialism cannot exist without privation and robbery, without treachery and oppression, without terror, blackmail and bloodshed. The United States, as leaders of imperialism, has waged wars of aggression under the governments of Truman, Eisenhower, Nixon, Kennedy, Johnson, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush and the new Führer, Bill Clinton.
For the imperialists, war can only end in the cemetary. Their wish is to preserve the ideology, the politics and the practice of their shameful past.
The expansion of the new fascism, in its Clinton variant, has been theorised in the philosophy of the so-called ‘New World Order’. This expansion has become particularly brutal and insolent since the disappearance of the bi-polar system in the world, in other words since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Imperialism today, or ‘globalism’ claims to submit the entire earth completely to the financial interests of Western capital, i.e. of multinational companies, which do not recognise national borders and sovereign countries.
The countries of NATO, with the United States at their head, comprising roughly 700 000 people, want to create a neocolonial protectorate over the rest of mankind, which is nine times more numerous. I must insist that this ninth part of the world population is itself in the hands of a tiny internal minority.
The expansion of the so-called ‘New World Order’ is characterised by the use of force, by the pitiless destruction of whoever dares oppose it. Those who bear the main responsability for the collapse of the ex-Yugoslav Federation are the imperialists and their fifth column, but the majority of the population bravely opposed it and support the fraternity between Serbs and Montenegrins united in the Republic of Yugoslavia. In spite of everything, Yugoslavia is today the most left-wing state in Europe and that is why it has become the target of NATO aggression, which wants to destroy all that remains of socialism in our continent.
The second reason for the aggression is that NATO wants to set up a vassal state in Yugoslavia so as to pre-empt a possible return to communist rule in Russia, Byelorussia, Ukraine and the other states of the ex-USSR. That is why Kosovo has to be occupied, as the central region of the Balkans and why the Yugoslavia of today has to be fragmented into puppet states and a military base built on its territory. A future USSR would thus be deprived of access to the Mediterranean via the Adriatic Sea. In order to implement this policy, the problems which exist between Serbs and Albanians are blown up out of all proportion. For instance, the Albanian population living in Kosovo, which does not exceed 800 à 900 000, is constantly exaggerated to twice its size.
I cannot go into this problem, which I treated here in Brussels four years ago, but I conclude categorically that there are no serious objective reasons for conflict between Serbs and Albanians. They have lived side by side for centuries and their duty is to live in a friendly and equal way within the framework of Serbia and Yugoslavia, in other words in the autonomous region of South Serbia, Kosovo. The kind of autonomy Kosovo has exists nowhere else in the world. It is impossible to found a new Albanian state in Kosovo beacuse an Albanian state already exists and because Kosovo has been the historic and cultural cradle of the Serb nation for the past 1300 years.
The third reason for the NATO aggression against Yugoslavia is the need to terrorise any state, any people who dares contradict American dicates. According to the logic of the Washington military club, that means that anyone who opposes the United States and NATO will be punished like Yugoslavia today.
The fourth reason is that NATO considers the acquisition of its southern flag as necessary for its expansion and for the invasion that is on the cards of the territory of the ex-USSR and especially Ukraine and Russia. Hitler did the same in 1941: before attacking the Soviet Union, he invaded Yugoslavia.
The fifth reason is the strengthening of the "fifth column", which is represented by a capitalist network in the Balkans.
The sixth reason is to experiment new tactics which will be used in other areas, in particular against Russia and China, and to test new weapons on the field.
The seventh reason is to install military bases in Kosovo and in other regions of Yugoslavia, as well as in Bulgaria, Albania, Rumania, etc., to be used to react violently in the event of a return of progressive forces, in the first place communists.
On the eve of and during the NATO aggression against Yugoslavia, a propaganda machine appeared miraculously, a hundred times more powerful than that of Hitler. NATO brutally murders thousands of people and destroys Yugoslavia "to defend the interests" of Albanians and Serbs as if it were protecting their human rights.The most essential human right is the right to life. That right is violated nowhere more than in the United States, where human life is the least protected. The United States is top of the hit parade as far as murder, criminality, drugs, number of prisoners go. The United States is one of the rare countries which has not signed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Mors Serbs live today in the United States than Albanians in Yugoslavia. According to NATO logic, Yugoslavia should have the right to demand the founding of an independent Yugoslav state in Texas or in Pennsylvania. United States criteria confirm that only what is in the interests of American imperialists is just and acceptable. Never in history has imperialism protected the true interests of the people or supported their fight for freedom and independence. The main yardstick for judging who is right and who is wrong has always been and will always be: who supports the United States and its European satellites?
At present, the imperialists are supporting the Albanian separatists in Kosovo. The main organisers of the NATO gangs of drug-dealers murder chiefly civilians. Only 5% of the dead are soldiers.
NATO is paying dearly for its invasion of Yugoslavia. In defending our country, our regiments have captured around 60 of the most sophisticated planes belonging to the aggressor, 9 helicopters and about 190 Tomahawk missiles. More than 150 enemy soldiers have died and dozens of pilots and instructors have been captured. Of course, we do not want to kill Frenchmen, Turks, Italians, Spaniards, Americans, Englishmen and Germans, but we do not have a choice: our country is being bombed for the interests of imperialism. In the strict military sense, Yugoslav troops are much more efficient than those of NATO.
We protect freedom, independence and progress and in spite of suffering and losses, we will win. Yugoslavia is in favour of peace. Our entire population supports the patriotic government of Slobodan Milosevic. The number of traitors is insignificant. Obviously the NPKY (Marxist-Leninist) has a different point of view, as far as certain essential aspects go, from that of Milosevic's government. However, those are our internal affairs and at the moment the most important question is the protection of our country.
In our party, there are a significant number of Albanians from Kosovo. They are opposed to NATO, which has murdered more Albanians than Serbs in Kosovo.
We refuse to allow NATO to install its military bases in Kosovo. We are prepared to accept temporarily only unarmed observers from Russia, China, Cuba, Korea, Ukraine, Byelorussia or neutral countries.
We refuse to accept the setting-up of a puppet state in Kosovo of Albanian separatists, an American protectorate in other words. We want a world that is just; we want a real equality between Serbs, Albanians and the other sister nationalities in Kosovo; in other words, we want a large autonomy for this south Serbian province. The United States and their satellites have no right to interfere in that. We and the progressive majority of Albanians will act together. The Tomahawks, the bombs and the brutal aggression will not make us capitulate.
We appeal to all progressive forces in the world, in the first place to communists, to support the just struggle of the Yugoslav people actively and with all their hearts.
Communists brought about a defeat in the Second World War and they will do so again today. Communists have to unmask the lies of NATO propaganda and re-establish the truth. Western media, especially television, radio and the press, lie to the ignorant and deceive millions of people not only about NATO's criminal policy and aggression against Yugoslavia but also about the results of the war. However, it is useless talking about morals to those who do not have any.
If progressive forces do not defeat the NATO aggressors today, tomorrow Bulgaria, Ukraine, Russia, Byelorussia, China, Korea... will be the target of aggression. Before a Third World War can begin, all progressive forces must be organised in a union to prevent NATO from continuing its expansion and counter its plans for aggression. A world front for the protection of Yugoslavia must be created.
He who fights, who refuses to kowtow to imperialism, who does not bow to rapists and robbers, will win.
Victory of true human interests will be ours! Yugoslavia is fighting not only for its own freedom but also for that of all mankind. We are asking for the support of freedom-loving mankind.
Contribution to the 8th International Communist Seminar, Brussels, 2-4 May 1999
Theme: Imperialism means War