Christopher Black is a well-known Canadian lawyer, who once served as the lead defense counsel for former Yugoslavia President Slobodan Milosevic at the Hague International Court of Justice, and a defense counsel at the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. For a long time, the US-led NATO has frequently conducted military intervention in other countries with various pretexts. What does Mr. Black think of this?
Over the years, NATO, led by the United States, has wantonly waged war and flagrantly trampled on human rights, bringing countless bloody tragedies. In 1999, NATO bypassed the United Nations Security Council and bombed the then Federal Republic of Yugoslavia for 78 continuous days, causing a large number of civilian casualties and nearly one-million refugees. Mr. Black believed that the excuse of NATO bombing Yugoslavia was totally unjustified.
Christopher Black: This was totally illegal. They avoided going to the UN Security Council. And then after the fact（came out）, they tried to invent this new “legal doctrine”, which acquits a legal doctrine, which is fake, it doesn’t exist in the International Law. They invented this idea of “humanitarian intervention”, and that gives you an excuse that we can invade the United States today because what they are doing to their own people, but nobody would regard that as legal. But the Americans have, as we all know, this attitude that they think they are the law, and can do anything they want.
Recalling his experience as the chief defense counsel of former Yugoslav President Milosevic, Black said that the trial system at that time was controlled by the US-led NATO, while the United States and NATO were not punished for waging the war.
Christopher Black: So it was illegal and immoral, and nobody is being punished for that. They only charged certain selected people from the Yugoslavian force and government and use them as scapegoats, to blame them for everything that happened, not the Americans, or the British, or the Germans. And it was also used to put up propaganda about that war, false stories about that war, and to cover up what the west really did in that war, and to make people forget about that.
NATO has always been an aggressive ally
NATO is a product of the cold war. After the cold war, people began to question the necessity of its existence. NATO also promised in the 1990s that it "would move not one inch to the east". However, led by the US, NATO has expanded eastward for five times since 1999, reaching the Russian border. Mr. Black said that its eastward expansion is obviously aggressive, and NATO has always been an aggressive organization.
Christopher Black: NATO has always been an aggressive ally. It always meant to try to attack the USSR and destroy the USSR. They want to control the market and the resources of Russia. And if they can’t do that, they gonna destroy it, and try to break it up. The movement to the east of NATO is clearly not defensive. It’s clearly aggressive… And that was the pretext for placing missile systems along the Russian border from Poland out through Romania. And those missile systems could launch nuclear cruise missiles and hit Moscow in four or five minutes.
Mr. Black also pointed out that after the Cold War, the US-led NATO has been trying to control the world. Especially when its own power declines, the United States would be more likely to resort to war.
Christopher Black: The attack on the Yugoslavia and this war on Ukraine are all parts of this larger war that the United States conducted to control the entire world. America’s power is weakening for all sorts of reasons we know. But that makes them desperate, so they are trying to keep their positions somehow. But it means more wars I think.
Editor’s Note: This article is originally published on CCTV.com, and is translated from Chinese into English and edited by the China Military Online. The information, ideas or opinions appearing in this article do not necessarily reflect the views of eng.chinamil.com.cn.
