NATO's Balkan Air Show

BELGRADE: What's NATO's latest plan to stop Serbian aggression in Kosovo? An air show. The Western alliance's leaders met today to plan massive simulated air-attack exercises in neighboring Albania and Macedonia, as a warning to Serbia's President Slobodan Milosevic to end his campaign against civilians in the predominantly ethnic-Albanian region. "The big question remains whether Western leaders have the political will to order real military strikes if their simulation fails to deter Milosevic," says TIME Central Europe bureau chief Massimo Calabresi.

Serbian troops have been violently depopulating villages along Kosovo's border with Albania to cut the supply routes of the Kosovo Liberation Army, which wants independence from Serbia. Western leaders have urged action to avoid a repeat of the war in Bosnia. "Without a credible threat of military force, it's difficult to curb Milosevic," says Calabresi. But it remains to be seen whether Milosevic reads NATO's fly-by as a credible threat.