Nato faces an enemy tougher than Serbia

By Catherine Field

Herald European correspondent

PARIS - The biggest enemy facing Nato in its offensive against Yugoslavia is time, and it is more powerful than a dozen armoured divisions.

As the alliance steps up airstrikes against Yugoslavia, cracks in its ranks are already starting to show.

The fissures are especially apparent in Greece, which is bound by ties of religion to Serbia, and in Italy, which suddenly finds itself in the frontline of the conflict and whose rickety Government is under pressure to demand an end to the attacks.

Conscious that alliance resolve may splinter, US President Bill Clinton at the weekend urged Nato to stay the course.

"We must, and we will, continue until Serbia's leader, Slobodan Milosevic, accepts peace or we have seriously damaged his capacity to make war," he said.

But Italian leaders stressed the need to end the bombing quickly.

"A question of days," said Foreign Minister Lamberto Dini when asked how much longer the attacks might continue.

Prime Minister Massimo D'Alema, reassuring Italians that they were safe from reprisals, echoed Dini when he said: "I don't believe that the bombardments can last indefinitely.

"I think military action must be rapid, efficient and open a path leading to the political solution that we are working for."

Despite some uncertainty in the coalition, Nato has been boosted on the diplomatic front by evidence of fresh atrocities in Kosovo.

The evidence is sketchy and cannot be confirmed independently - not least because Milosevic has expelled most foreign journalists.

Nato has seized on the brutality as the justification for its offensive, and public revulsion could win the alliance more time before its internal unity breaks. Yet Nato is unlikely to commit ground troops, the only forces that could stop the massacres.

At the same time, the refugee exodus is just what Milosevic wants: it will create tensions in neighbouring Albania and Macedonia, thus raising the stakes for Nato if it wishes to continue the offensive.

It would also enable him, at some later date, to divide Kosovo in two under a peace deal.

The northern part of the province, where the cradle of Serbian culture lies, could be incorporated into Serbia; the southern part, devastated and empty, would be handed over to whoever wants to run after it.

Against this backdrop of callousness and aware of its own weaknesses, Nato has intelligently set limited goals in its operation.

It wants to get Milosevic to sue for peace, as he did after the alliance's 11-day air offensive in Bosnia in 1995, or it will destroy his tools of repression.

Nato has not demanded a pullout of his forces from Kosovo, nor even specifically asked that he sign the draft peace agreement approved by Kosovo separatist rebels in Paris this month.

A truce, presumably brokered by Russia, which is Serbia's only major ally, could save Nato's face if its cohesion falls apart.