Posted on 05/08/2004 8:37:45 PM PDT by elfman2
German troops serving with the Kfor international peacekeeping contingent in Kosovo have been accused of hiding in barracks "like frightened rabbits" during the inter-ethnic rioting that erupted in the province in March.
A hard-hitting German police report sent to the Berlin government last week criticises the troops for cowardice and for their failure to quell the rioting in which 19 people died and about 900 others were injured.
The charges - the most serious made against the German army since the Second World War - have been levelled by police officers serving with Unmik, the United Nations civil administration in Kosovo.
During the two-day riots between Albanian and Serbs, an Albanian mob burnt and looted 29 Serb churches and monasteries in the southern city of Prizren, and caused several thousand Serbs to flee their homes.
Leaked excerpts from the report on the conduct of the 3,600-strong German contingent based in Prizren disclose that Unmik police were left to fend for themselves at the height of the rioting.
"Despite continuous appeals for help from Kfor, nobody from the military appeared to back up the police," the report said. "Kfor proved to be incapable of carrying out the duties to which it has been assigned."
Further damning evidence, based on interviews with Unmik officers, Serb church leaders and unnamed UN officials in Prizren, was published in Der Spiegel magazine.
The magazine concluded: "The German soldiers ran away and hid like frightened rabbits in their barracks. They only reappeared in armoured vehicles after the Albanian mob had wreaked its havoc and left a trail of destruction."
Col Dieter Hintelmann, who heads the German Kfor contingent in Prizren, insisted that his men had simply obeyed Kfor rules of engagement. They prohibit troops from protecting buildings and allow the use of firearms only in self-defence. "We were acting exactly according to the rules," he said.
However, the Unmik officers claim that the Kfor troops had breached their rules of engagement because they failed to protect them even though they were legally bound to do so.
The allegations have come as a severe embarrassment to Gerhard Schroder's government, which in the past has gone out of its way to praise the German Kfor contingent for the role it played in the troubled province through its excellent contacts with local people.
After the rioting, Serb Orthodox church leaders in Kosovo described the German deployment in the region as a mistake, and demanded the troops withdraw.
So far, the German government has refused to acknowledge publicly the complaints made in the police report. However, the defence ministry is believed to be recommending that the law be changed, allowing soldiers to use tear gas grenades for riot control.
Yes, Kerry thinks we could stabilize Iraq if we had German and French help (with the blessing of Coffee Inane.) In fact, the French would immediately surrender to the Germans who would then hide in the barracks "like frightened rabbits."
And remember - the Germans haven't told the World Court to take a flying leap...
Well, that's fitting: The entire Dutch government resigned almost *ten years* after their soldiers allowed a massacre of 6,000+ civilians by the Serbs in 1995.
As political humorist P.J. O'Rourke once wrote, the UN's 'Blau Helmets' dress up in nursery colors and are too chicken to shoot back.
American soldiers, on the other hand, are accused of beating the crap out of the hostile combatants we've captured -- and that's just our tiny female soldiers I'm talking about.
I'll let the readers decide for themselves which is more outrageous, but given the choice between the two I'd prefer to stick with the winners and suffer the repercussions.
Then move to Serbia.
Seriously. You should go where your heart is, not stick around where you're constantly embarrassing yourself in front of your fellow citizens who do things like point out that your heroes murder Catholic clergy and destroy Christian Churches in greater numbers than any other group when they think they can get away with it.
Hey Hoplite, any more Christian killing Muslim terrorists let out of Camp Bondsteel these days????
All the more reason for you to move to Serbia and be amongst your fellow travellers.
You leave no doubt where your loyalties lie, and they are not with America.
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