The U.S. government is continuing to review NATO's mistaken bombing of the Chinese Embassy and attacks on refugee convoys VIDEO CNN's Jamie McIntyre looks at the goals of the review Windows Media 28K 80K  ALSO: Russian peacekeepers arrive in Kosovo  MESSAGE BOARD: Rebuilding Kosovo  IN-DEPTH SPECIAL: Focus on Kosovo

July 7, 1999
Web posted at: 8:57 p.m. EDT (0057 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Defense Secretary William Cohen has ordered a high-level "after-action review" of NATO's air war against Yugoslavia.

In a memo to military leaders, Cohen said he hopes the review will provide insights to improve the military's fighting ability, now and in the future.

In a related development, the State Department announced Thursday that Undersecretary of State Thomas Pickering informed Chinese officials that the bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade -- perhaps the most high-profile miscalculation of the air war -- was the result of "several crucial errors."

In a meeting in Beijing on June 17, Pickering cited a "severely flawed" procedure used to locate the intended target -- the Yugoslav Federal Directorate for Supply and Procurement -- and "either inaccurate or incomplete" intelligence information, as well as the failure of the target review process to catch the errors.

"This terrible mistake occurred not because of just one organization or because of any one individual," Pickering said, adding that the United States has taken steps to prevent similar accidents in the future.

He also said the U.S. government is continuing its internal reviews, which will determine "whether any disciplinary action is called for."

After the meeting with Pickering, Chinese officials said his explanations were unconvincing.

Air war exposed problems with tactics, weapons

Despite forcing Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic to capitulate, the 78-day NATO air war revealed problems with both tactics and weapons.

There was a shortage of satellite-guided bombs used by B-2 stealth bombers, one of the few weapons unaffected by cloud cover over Yugoslavia. Also in short supply were EA6-B electronic jamming aircraft, which were the key to keeping NATO planes from being shot down.

The assessment also will look at how the need for consensus among NATO's 19 members may have delayed action, allowing time for ethnic cleansing by Yugoslav forces, and may have hamstrung NATO commanders by setting a goal of zero casualties and limiting targets.

"You don't have political selection of targets. That doesn't work very well," said retired Lt. Gen. Lawrence Farrell, a military analyst. "It didn't work in Vietnam, and, to some extend, it didn't work here."

The need for better targeting procedures will also be explored in the wake of the bombing of the Chinese Embassy and embarrassing attacks on refugee convoys.

The Pentagon will also examine Yugoslav claims that most of the tanks, artillery and other armor destroyed by NATO were decoys -- a claim NATO has largely dismissed as propaganda.

Another glaring deficiency was the inability of the NATO allies to provide the kind of high-tech weaponry and intelligence gathering that only the United States has. That is expected to be on Cohen's agenda as he leaves Washington this week to visit several key NATO allies.

Military Affairs Correspondent Jamie McIntyre contributed to this report.

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