I feel that I must respond to some of the rather more appallingly ignorant references to the American Civil War and the present crisis in Kososvo.

Mr. Cooper, surely you are aware that in 1864 NATO did not exist. Even had the North Atlantic Treaty Organization been chartered at that point in time, Sherman's actions in the South, while deplorable perhaps, did not qualify in any way, shape or form as genocide (a systematic attempt to eliminate a certain people of a specific national, racial, ethnic or religious identity).

Moreover, the Confederacy was in a state of rebellion against the Union. The Southern leadership had, in fact, declared war against the North. The Kosovar people have not attempted to secede from Yugoslavia. No state of war exists between Kosovo and Yugoslavia. The Kosovars have, however, been persecuted to the point where genocide is the only appropriate term for it.

Slobodan Milosovic refers to it as "ethnic cleansing." That is the term the Serbian leader publicly uses for his actions in Kosovar. Mr. Hamrick, how did you miss that? Hitler called it: "The Final Solution." Same thing. Another "victory" for politically correct speech.

Mr. Cooper, while there was much stress between the North and the South prior to 1860, Union soldiers were not coming into Southern homes raping and murdering Southerners because of their regional identity, or any other reason, before the war commenced. The North mostly wanted the South to quit owning other human beings. Not the complete elimination of the South's entire populace.

NATO was not solely created as a bulwark against Soviet Communism. It was created to keep peace in Europe. Says so right in the charter. Because Adolf Hitler's legacy was strong in the minds of the delegates to the first NATO conference, one of the first articles in the NATO charter requires all NATO members to act in the case of genocide. Then President Truman signed the charter. Thus, the United States is required by international law to participate in NATO defense against genocide. Law, Mr. Cooper, Mr. Hamrick.

The United States, as a member of the international community, expects the other nations to abide by international law, just as the other nations expect the U.S. to act in a similar fashion. This is how a civilized species survives as the next millennium approaches (1 Jan, 2001 by the way.).

Part and parcel with abiding by the law, be it at the municipal level or international, civilized peopled are also expected to fulfill their obligations.

Let's look at the mind set of the Yugoslavian military operating in Kosovo. The "special police" (Gestapo?) recently located one of the Kosovar leaders who signed the peace treaty that Mr. Milosovic refused to sign. This particular Kosovar was attending the funeral of another civic leader killed by the Special Police. He was pulled out of the crowd, along with his son, and both were murdered. (Check both the AP and Reuters news feeds. Don't take my word for it.)

The Yugoslavian Serbs aren't interested in the peace of democratic sovereignty. The want to exterminate the Kosovars because they aren't Serbs.

They tried the same thing, by the way, in Bosnia in 1995. The Bosnians weren't Serbs, so, "Death to them all!" Remember all the doom and gloom about NATO involvement in Bosnia. That mission has been a resounding success, because international law prevailed.

In 1945, many of our fathers and grandfathers discovered places Mr. Milosovic would probably approve of: Treblinka, Bergen-Belsen, Auschwitz. Had the League of Nations acted effectively in 1938, the year appeasement over Czechoslovakia further emboldened Hitler, the Holocaust would probably not have occurred.

Remember the Holocaust, Mr. Cooper, Mr. Hamrick? Six million people exterminated solely due to their religion, 7 million other human beings (Serbs, Slavs, Gypsies, etc.) wiped out alongside the Jews, because they weren't of the "approved" ethnicity, religion or race. Forty-five million people, all told, in World War II, before law and civilization prevailed.

Even if the United Nations did not exist and support Operation Allied Force, and if NATO was no longer functioning, our fathers and grandfathers made a promise upon liberating those hellish monuments to "ethnic cleansing." The promise was that genocide would not be permitted ever again.

Genocide will not happen again. We made that promise, Mr. Cooper, Mr. Hamrick. Civilized people keep their promises.