SCEPTICAL US VIEW

AS the Balkan war begins to look more and more like Vietnam, of unhappy American memory, US public opposition to the Clinton initiative becomes ever more strident. With hostilities now well under way, Vietnam-type anti-war demonstrations are erupting ever more widely. Cal Thomas, a Los Angeles Times syndicated columnist, expresses the doubts many of his fellow countrymen hold:

"The situation in the Balkans isn't like Vietnam, we're told. Sure. And the situation when we first began sliding into Vietnam was different from the disastrous French experience in Indochina. The French warned us not to go there. We didn't listen, we're not listening still. History can teach, but only if students are willing to learn.

"In late 1961, President John Kennedy dispatched a small group to Vietnam. He told Gen. Maxwell Taylor, Gen. Edward Lansdale and aide Walt Rostow, 'Bear in mind that the initial responsibility for the effective maintenance of the independence of South Vietnam rests with the people and government of that country.'

"But Kennedy didn't take his own advice. While telling The New York Times that he remained 'strongly opposed to the dispatch of American combat troops to South Vietnam,' his written instructions to Taylor, were different: 'As part of your appraisal, I should like you to evaluate what could be accomplished by the introduction of SEATO or United States forces into South Vietnam, determining the role, composition and probable disposition of such forces.'

"Kennedy, like Lyndon Johnson after him, and Bill Clinton now, had an objective, but it was the wrong objective and the policies were also wrong, seeming to be made up as they went along.

"President Clinton says the purpose of the NATO bombing is to stop the ethnic cleansing of Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic. But the displacement of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Albanians from Kosovo is virtually complete. Now President Clinton says he wants to drive out Milosevic's forces so the

Kosovars can return home. To what, more death and destruction? Such a goal will require a permanent occupying force, as has existed in Korea for more than 50 years.

"According to press reports, the Joint Chiefs advised President Clinton that a bombing campaign would not stop ethnic cleansing in Kosovo and could end up rallying Serbs around Milosevic, which is precisely what is happening. The bombing of Belgrade has inflamed more than buildings.

"The CIA also warned the president, according to US News and World Report and the Washington Post, that bombing would lead Serbian forces to step up their ethnic cleansing.

"Clinton knows he can't afford large numbers of body bags because of his own failure to serve in the Vietnam war era and his immoral conduct in the White House. He'll take the first opportunity to declare victory and pull out, leaving others to pick up the pieces.

"Will President Clinton follow his hero, Kennedy, and Kennedy's successor, Johnson, and send large numbers of ground forces into Kosovo? He might, but it's not like him. He probably knows what Kennedy told Roger Hilsman, the chief of the State Department's intelligence bureau, as recounted by Richard Reeves:

"(The military wants) a force of American troops (in South Vietnam). They say it's necessary to restore confidence and maintain morale. But it will be just like Berlin. The troops will march in; the bands will play; the crowds will cheer; and in four days everyone will have forgotten. Then we will be told we have to send in more troops. It's like taking a drink. The effect wears off, and you have to take another.

"Nothing has changed since Georg Hegel observed in 1821: 'What experience and history teach is this - that people and governments never have learned anything from history, or acted upon principles deduced from It.' "