U.S. Bombing of The Chinese Embassy in Belgrade - Observer/Politiken Investigation

Observer/Politiken Investigation

Acting on a tip-off, Jens Holsoe of Danish newspaper Politiken contacted UK paper The Observer with a view to conducting a joint investigation. Holsoe, together with John Sweeney and Ed Vulliamy of The Observer, interviewed numerous sources including a NATO officer "serving in an operational capacity at the four-star level", a staff-officer at two-star level, a "very high-ranking" former US intelligence officer, a NATO flight controller at the Naples HQ for Kosovo air operations, and a US NIMA official. After a four-month investigation, they published their findings on Oct 17.

According to the journalists' investigation the embassy bombing was a deliberate attack, a claim consistent with the pattern of strikes that night where, according to NATO's official briefing of May 8, "the focus was wholly on disrupting the national leadership" of Yugoslavia. Apart from "the FDSP weapons warehouse", every target that night was a command and control center.

A further report in The Observer of November 28, 1999 added more details. According to the report, American officials indicated that the reason behind the bombing of the embassy, was because they believe the embassy had provided signals facilities for Željko Ražnatović, commonly known as Arkan, a Serb paramilitary leader wanted by the ICTY for war crimes. NATO's briefing of May 8, which stated Arkan's HQ was at the Hotel Yugoslavia 500m/550yds away, is consistent with this interpretation.

Representatives of NATO governments dismissed the investigation. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright described it as "balderdash" and UK Foreign Secretary Robin Cook said there wasn't a "shred of evidence to support this rather wild story".

Initially, the New York Times refused to report on the investigation until its findings could be corroborated. Subsequently, Andrew Rosenthal informed letter-writers by post that the Times had found no evidence to support the allegations. Although the Times' attempt to corroborate the findings did not include contacting either its authors or their sources.

Other sources, including major American media such as the Washington Post, New York Times and Chicago Tribune maintained that while culpability rested with inaccurate strike planning, the attack was not deliberate. International News wires such as The Associated Press, Reuters, and Agence France Press (AFP) published numerous reports supporting both the accidental and deliberate attack theories. The American media was criticized for devoting very little attention to the incident, as well as for repeatedly referring to the "accidental bombing" as fact rather than as a claim contested by China.

The Observer/Politiken article was ignored by the US media for the most part. A Salon article by Laura Rozen, however did feature an interview of Washington Post columnist and former intelligence officer William M. Arkin, who was dismissive of the investigation. While acknowledging the investigators had indeed spoken to signals intelligence officers in NATO, Arkin told Rozen "The Chinese Embassy and the Hotel Yugoslavia, where Arkan's generals were believed to be commanding his paramilitary Tigers, are right across the street from each other, and in fact both were bombed the same night ... I think there were communications emanating from the Hotel Yugoslavia across the street. And I think that stupid people who are leaking rumors to the Observer have made that mistake."

While it is correct that the Hotel Yugoslavia was attacked on May 7, NATO was aware of its function and connection with Arkan. Arkin did not explain how NATO planners could both be aware of the HQ and target it successfully if they were confused about its location.