CALLING Sir Fitzroy Maclean. Only a western diplomat of his calibre could hope to bring some sense to the situation in the Balkans now, if it isn't already too late. The continued "disastrous" military action will only make matters far worse, according to Rosemary Garvey, who served with two British diplomatic missions in the former Yugoslavia.
It was the unusual personal chemistry between the Scottish second World War hero and Josip Brod Tito, leader of the Communist Partisans, which helped to forge a united Yugoslavia after the war. Maclean, who died in 1996 at the age of 85, was a a member of the British SAS during the war and the acknowledged "real" James Bond - having been a friend of author and 007 creator, Ian Fleming. However, he was also a skilled career diplomat who understood the Balkans.
"We badly need another MacLean on the end of telephone now, but we haven't got one," Mrs Garvey says.
The current bombing campaign could prove to be another Vietnam for the US, she believes, and one from which NATO countries will find it difficult to withdraw. Ms Garvey, who lives in north Mayo, is the widow of Terence Garvey, former British ambassador in Belgrade. The couple served in Yugoslavia from 1958 to 1962 and from 1968 to 1971. "I spent seven years of my life there, and it is my favourite country by a long shot. It was Tito's dream, and it worked."
The Partisan leader had managed to defy the old mnemonic, cited by those who believed that a united Yugoslavia was an impossibility because it was "one country, with two alphabets, three religions, four languages, five nations, six republics and seven neighbours". She has long been a critic of the Serbian President, Mr Milosevic, and believes there was an argument for European intervention in 1994 during the Bosnian war.
However, she also believes the West has been guilty of terrible mistakes in relation to the initial outbreak of conflict in the Balkans in 1991.
One such error was the early EU recognition of both Slovenia and Croatia as independent states - a move influenced by Germany, and widely acknowledged as contributing to the break-up of the six-republic federation.
Another significant error was the failure to support the opposition movement in Serbia during the early 1990s, when the war in Croatia was escalating and spreading to Bosnia.
The situation in Kosovo is very different to Bosnia, and one which the West does not understand, she says. When she first visited it, Kosovo was desperately poor and did not lay claim to its Albanian connection.
"After all, Albania was then the hardest line communist country in Europe. So at that time the Serbian presence represented a sort of benevolent colonialism. During our second term in Belgrade, in the 1970s, there was a university and an educated elite and a very different situation. Economically, it had improved, in line with Tito's belief that the wealthier areas must help the poorer regions and the minorities.
"But every country which has gone through trauma has its particular attachments to particular historical events." The Serbian leader had used Kosovo to attain power in the first place, and it had long been predicted that he would use the region again for his own ends.
"Of course no one likes what he has been doing for the past few years, but you have to see that a lot of his Serbian commanders believe they are putting down an armed separatist movement. There have been some outrages, but before you go in with bombs you have to see what the effect is. And to my mind, the effect is entirely predictable - clearly, whatever the situation was, it has now been worsened dramatically."
In her view, the Rambouillet talks preceding NATO military action produced a "bogus peace plan", one which NATO member states knew that Milosevic would not accept. And how do you get off the hook? Because if you go in with bombs, you have to be prepared to carry the thing through, Mrs Garvey says. "I don't think the US government has considered another Vietnam, which is what one gets if one is not careful. "I also think that this is the ultimate sacrifice and betrayal of the large number of Serbs who have opposed their leader.
"There is nothing like the bombing of a bridge in Novi Sad, north of Belgrade, to push the Serbian population together."