by Willy Wimmer, retired State Secretary of the Federal Ministery of Defence

For nearly 15 years the illegal war of aggression against Serbia has been justified with lies by the governments of the NATO countries. Willy Wimmer, former State Secretary at the German Ministry of Defence, could write a book about it. A few months ago at a new request sent to the German Ministry of Defence he once again got a standard response.
Denying the responsibility for the caused disaster, and refusing the necessary reparation is a prominent feature of the NATO countries’ law of the jungle.
To this day, the mixture of lies, threats, and the willingness to pursue power politics in violation of any law defines the policies of the NATO countries. That will only come to an end, if more forces will support, what Willy Wimmer demands: putting an end to the law of the jungle and a renewed commitment to international law.

Those who, in violation of applicable international law and in a flagrant violation of the Charter of the United Nations, used the NATO military machine against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 28 March 1999, driven by their mere political and especially economic power, want to enforce the acceptance of their aggression’s
consequences by those who were attacked. Their purpose is to achieve a delayed and subsequent legitimation of their bellicose aggression. In this effort they even willingly accept to compel certain NATO and EU Member States, who are particularly affected by the extorted resolution of disputes concerning the territory of the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. What they demand from the aggression’s victims on the territory of the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, strikes at the very heart of certain NATO and EU Member States and is sowing new
hatred.
In order to avoid any doubt on the occasion of the 15th NATO-war anniversary against the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia: to consider a domestic threat to NATO and the EU, to even commence a still refused relentless investigation of this war by all parliaments of NATO and the EU, are not at all sufficient. Who, if not those who, in violation of applicable international law, did wage a crude war of aggression against the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, should be punished by the War Crimes Tribunal in The Hague? Who, if not those who, in violation
of applicable international law, did wage war against the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, must restore the Republic‘ s status as it had existed before the outbreak of this war?
Who, if not those who, in violation of international law, have invaded a United Nations Member State in peace-time, must provide compensation for the damages to life and limb and infrastructure that were caused by their acts of aggression?
The damages to life and limb are sufficiently known. Estimates of the extent of damage to infrastructure as well. Damages caused by using uranous munition can only be estimated.
• Approximately 4,000 people have lost their lives as a result of the NATO aggression.
• About 10,000 people were among those injured as a result of the NATO aggression.
• The amount of damage to any form of infrastructure is over 100 billion dollars.
Today, it is clearer than ever, what led to this European disaster, for the war against the former Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia is nothing else. Europe was full of hope, when the consequences of 1945 seemed to have been
overcome with the national unification of Germany in 1990. Above all, the Soviet Union and the United States of America stood for the success of the Helsinki process.
The Helsinki Charter of 1975 did not only help to overcome the division of Germany and thus of Europe. The peoples of Europe could breathe again, and they cherished the well-founded hope to see that even the long-term consequences of the alleged peace conferences at the end of the First World War were solved by the scales and diplomatic means of the so-called Helsinki process.
Together with Mikhail Gorbachev – and as a close friend of George W. Bush – Helmut Kohl wanted to open a new
chapter in the German-Russian history of the 20th century, which had been determined by immense suffering. He
also had in mind this target with respect to the relations between the Germans and Serbs. At the same time he had in
mind the history since 1914. Only this way you can understand that he had already scheduled a visit to Belgrade in
the summer of 1999, and immediately after the completion of the internationally illegal war against the former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. The Honorary Citizen of Europe, Helmut Kohl in Belgrade – and that, after the NATO bombs had wiped out not only lives in Belgrade – it would have been a visible sign that there had existed – and still exists – a different Europe than a Europe of aggression. It is part of the tragedy of those years that it had been Henry Kissinger of all people, the so highly esteemed Henry Kissinger who – after Helsinki and its successes
– had not called for the further development of the valid international law, but had championed the destruction and
elimination of international law that had continuously been developed since the Thirty Years’ War and even before, and that his own government had followed him on this path. The law of the jungle – the power of the strongest – was to set the tone, exercised by the „indispensable nation“ as Mrs Albright had postulated. Not only that henceforth no peace dividend should be paid any longer in Europe and other parts of the world after the end of the Cold War; a war in Europe, in total disregard of international law, was the rejection of international law and the postulated
return to the law of the jungle that had always brought nothing but misery to the people.
It is now – after the wars against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia up to the war against Iraq – almost general understanding that there is no end of history, but there is a limitation to the time of the ruling fist law, such as the international treaties on the Syrian chemical weapons or the interim agreement with Iran demonstrate. Here we must understand that a number of questions from the period between Belgrade and Tehran shine through and demand
our answer:
1. Where were the United States as the haven of freedom and justice in the period from 1999 to 2013?
2. Can there be a prosperous world with international law as the backbone of the international community, without a
Russia that is capable of acting?
3. Is Europe more than the brat, with which everyone do as he likes? •
(Current Concerns, No 1, 26 January 2014)