Reply #1: Kucinich certainly has a nuanced position here

[eridani]

However, these are the facts of US policy in the Balkans
1. In 1991, there was a deliberate decision to cram 'free' trade down Yugoslavia by hook or by crook, despite CIA warnings that this could precipitate serious ethnic conflict. FIRST MISSED OPPORTUNITY for avoiding war and ethnic conflict--DON'T DO THAT SHIT!
2. The US openly supported the Nazis Iztbecovic in Bosnia and Tudjman in Croatia. When negotiators had worked out a plan for ethnic spheres of influence in Bosnia before major conflicts had begun, the US urged Iztbecovic to reject it. SECOND MISSED OPPORTUNITY--the postwar areas of ethnic dominance in Bosnia are not too different from what the prewar agreement recommended in the first place.
3. US mercenary forces helped Croatia drive 350,000 Serbians out of the Krajina, killing 14,000. THIRD WRONG TURN. That sucked--don't do that shit, try negotiation instead.
4. The KLA was and is an Al Qaeda-linked, drug running terrorist organization. Don't support them. FOURTH MISSED OPPORTUNITY. There were certainly plenty of Albanians not in the KLA that could have been supported instead.
5. The Milosevic response to terrorism was exactly like the Sharon response to Hamas--brutal, stupid, and making the situation much worse. The 2/3 of members of Parliament who were in opposition realized this, and had an alternative plan to put Kosovo under UN (not NATO, note) management. Granted, the UN may have also found the problems intractable, but it wasn't necessary to bomb the shit out of the place in order to have a neutral outside force try to mediate the situation. FIFTH MISSED OPPORTUNITY.



What Kosovo is like now--the KLA has mostly driven out the other ethnic minorities, so it's a huge 'success' from their standpoint. http://web.amnesty.org/library/Index/ENGEUR700182004 , http://www.balkanpeace.org/hed/archive/jul04/hed6567.shtml