Several Serbian-American workers spoke with the WSWS during Saturday's protest in Washington against the bombing of Yugoslavia.
Mike, a 35-year-old from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, traveled more than 800 miles to attend the demonstration. He said, “The pretext for this intervention is Clinton having us believe that he cares for the refugees. Just as George Bush was supposedly for the Somalians, that he was all of a sudden concerned for the suffering and starvation of the Somalian masses. That was just a pretext for intervention in the interest of the Fortune 500 companies.
“I see that there is a Kurdish flag at this demonstration. That exposes the hypocrisy of the intervention in Yugoslavia. Turkey has trampled on the Kurdish peoples but is unharmed, and is in fact a member of the NATO powers warring against Yugoslavia.
“There are dozens of situations in the world which could be used for intervention, but the American government picks and chooses which one to intervene in for its own economic interest.”
Milorad and Slava Milinkovic, a couple from New York City who have lived in the United States for 24 years, carried a sign, “Peace makers do not throw bombs.”
Slava said, “Do you see the killing NATO and the USA are doing to our home country? The structures, many many lives, children, they bombed the hospitals. For two and a half months already, they are bombing like crazy. They want to make peace by bombing babies in incubators.
“Serbia was a rich country, with automobile, textile and chemical factories. To destroy all this, Clinton must be a very sick man.”
Milorad added, “I was young during the Second World War. I remember what Hitler did to the country. NATO and the USA are doing much worse than anything Hitler did. Hospitals have been destroyed. You don't see on CNN the truth of what is happening.
“What Hitler did not finish in World War II in the Balkans, NATO is now continuing. With NATO help, Croatia, a former Nazi-controlled country, swept 650,000 Serbs out. There was almost no coverage of this in the press.”