Japan can be criticized for its simplistic, one-track mind at times. But over problems like Yugoslavia, the one-tracked Western mind, hardened by ideology and moralistic bias, can do far more harm.
We now discover that the new Yugoslav president, Vojislav Kostunica, says he holds much the same views about Kosovo and Bosnia as the previous Belgrade regime, and that he does not want a visit from U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.
So what does the United States do now? Renew the bombing of Belgrade? Kostunica puts his finger on the nub of the problem, namely, that few Americans know anything about Serbian history. The same seems to be true for the Western Europeans. We can ignore Serbian claims that for centuries, and at great cost, they saved Europe from the advance of the Turkish Ottoman empire. But how can anyone ignore the brave Serbian resistance to Nazi Germany during World War II, and the resulting massacres of some 1 million Serbs, in Bosnia and Kosovo especially, at the hands of Nazi Germans assisted by their Croat and Muslim allies?