BRUSSELS (Reuters) - NATO published figures Thursday to challenge claims that its pilots barely scratched the Serb military in Kosovo and that commanders were lying about the damage the allied air campaign was inflicting.
Supreme Allied Commander Europe Gen. Wesley Clark, saying he regretted that some Western media had chosen to listen to Serb propaganda, produced evidence indicating that about a third of Serb army weapons and vehicles in Kosovo were hit.
Presenting a Kosovo Strike Assessment report to journalists at NATO headquarters, Clark said: ``The results are not so far off what we believed them to be at the end of the war.''
Using evidence from cockpit video, pilots' debriefings, aerial before-and-after imagery, witness accounts and studies made by teams on the ground after the March 24 to June 10 campaign, it concluded that NATO had hit:
+ 93 tanks
+ 153 armored personnel carriers
+ 339 military vehicles
+ 389 artillery pieces and mortars
Clark said he did not want to make too much of ''battle-damage bean-counting'' but NATO had an obligation to put the facts of the conflict before the public.
The study showed that at least half of the 1,955 hits reported by pilots in the 78-day campaign could be confirmed. Those that were probable but could not be backed up by two or more sources were discounted.
An inspection team which visited over 400 sites in Kosovo -- but which arrived some weeks after bombing ended -- had found 26 destroyed tanks or self-propelled guns.
The wreckage of 67 additional stricken tanks for which NATO analysts said there was conclusive evidence was not found.
In a further 60 cases, pilots reported hitting their tank targets but there was not enough corroborating evidence for NATO to conclude the strike was successful.
The same approach was used to count strikes on other armored equipment, heavy guns and vehicles.
Clark said NATO recorded ample evidence of how Serb forces had dragged away wrecked and damaged equipment to conceal the extent of the damage.
Backed up by testimony from some of the pilots and forward air controllers who flew in Operation Allied Force, the NATO commander's briefing showed examples of how the alliance kept score each day of its activities and their reported effect.
The files, lined up under a large video screen and marked for each day of the campaign, were marked ``Secret.''
Clark's study is restricted to NATO attacks on the Serbian armed forces in the province of Kosovo and does not concern the wider campaign against strategic, fixed targets such as the electricity grid, bridges, and barracks across Serbia.
The presentation, available on Internet site http://www.nato.int, did
not address accidental civilian casualties inflicted in the campaign and
Clark said he had no estimate of how many Serb troops may have died.
