President Clinton’s address is important as it revealed the strength of NATO and, for the first time, publicly signaled a post-Cold War shift in U.S. foreign policy to privileging regional action. In the late 1990s, NATO seemingly found the answer to the tricky balance between protecting soldiers from undue harm and strongly upholding international law: airstrikes. General Wesley Clark, the Supreme Allied Commander Europe of NATO, recalled in the fall of 1998, “We had halted ethnic conflict [in Bosnia], given diplomacy a chance, and proved that NATO had an important role to play in the post-Cold War world.” In Kosovo, the Western alliance found the stage to showcase this newfound role and supersede U.N. authority for the first time in alliance history. While neither handcuffed by internal divisions nor hindered by a Soviet threat, NATO acted more decisively than ever before by first introducing a phased air campaign with limited air operations (known as ACTORD) before commencing airstrikes on March 24th. Despite initially acting in accordance with the U.N., the weak Security Council resolutions coupled with Miloševi?’s increased killing of Kosovars only frustrated the Western allies and forced them to take action.
In his address, President Clinton explained to the American people why. “[B]y acting now, we are upholding our values, protecting our interests, and advancing the cause of peace.” Clinton’s direct appeal was necessary as NATO never before had launched such aggressive air strikes nor superseded international authority. The intervention in Kosovo was truly unique. However, it should not be surprising. Looking at the longue durée of U.N.-NATO history reveals that the repeated favoring of superpower interests and refusal to define the U.N.’s relationship to regional organizations in Chapter VIII of the U.N. Charter, set the international organization on a course for failure. With a Security Council veto that enables inaction and the lack of a military arm, the foundational shortcomings of the U.N. provided the opportunity for NATO to answer Kosovo’s call. Operation Allied Force was not only a successfully impressive and crucial response to Miloševi?’s atrocities, but it also provided the solution to a decade consumed by ethnic conflict. NATO’s airstrikes thus symbolized an important, post-Cold War shift in power from the United Nations to a regional alliance.