Levin hopes for release of captured U.S. soldiers

''I think we should not get our hopes sky high because we're dealing with Milosevic, who will try to extract concessions,'' Levin said by phone while returning by military jet from NATO headquarters in Europe with Defense Secretary William Cohen and several other member of Congress.

One of the servicemen is Staff Sgt. Christopher Stone of Smiths Creek, Mich. The servicemen were captured along the Kosovo-Macedonia border March 31.

Cohen said the NATO bombing campaign will continue despite Milosevic's request for a ceasefire and the servicemen should be turned over without conditions.

''We're hopeful that Sgt. Stone and his two buddies will soon be back on a plane from Belgrade,'' Levin said. ''We will be very carefully doing everything we possibly can without urging a change of military course to our mission.''

The senator, ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, said he hoped to meet with Stone's father over the weekend.

During the three-day trip, the group met in Belgium with U.S. Army Gen. Wesley Clark, NATO's supreme commander, and then visited U.S. commanders and troops at Aviano Air Base in northern Italy, where most of the fighter and support aircraft involved in NATO operations are stationed.

They also flew to Ramstein Air Base in German, where they talked to U.S. soldiers making humanitarian aid flights to help Kosovar refugees.

Levin said that NATO should draw up a plan for using ground troops to fight Serb military forces in case it became necessary.

He said the chance of sending in allied troops to do the fighting was ''less than 50 percent, but nonetheless a reasonable chance.''

''It's premature to talk about authorizing ground forces but not premature to be starting a plan,'' Levin said. ''It's wise that we have such a plan ready in the event it becomes necessary or appropriate to have a NATO ground force go in.''

But Levin said the focus now was on the air campaign and he was hopeful it would succeed.

''There's still a significant possibility that our air campaign will work,'' he said.

''We're just a couple of weeks into this. There is a long way to go, weeks and perhaps months before this air campaign is completed,'' he said.

Levin accused Milosevic of creating a humanitarian disaster. ''With the burning of villages and the killing of people,'' Levin said Milosevic ''created not just a genocide through his executions but hundreds of thousands of refugees.''

04-09-99