Another Selling Job on Bosnia

It’s all in or all out for NATO troops in Bosnia, and it has been since the alliance first dipped a toe into the sticky Balkan conflict. President Clinton, a sensible and politically cautious player, is expected to announce this week that an American force will stay on with its European allies once the current NATO mandate expires June 30. This weekend he will depart for Bosnia to give the GIs the news. Another extension, another commitment to try to sort out--militarily if necessary--what has proved so far to be an unsortable problem.

Once again it’s incumbent upon the president to make his case to the Congress and the public why American and European troops must extend their stay in this pit of antipathy. What’s to say beyond the obvious? If NATO doesn’t stay on as a unified peacekeeping force it may have to return in an offensive mode. Those are the sad pickings of getting involved in Bosnia. Mr. President, you owe it to the American public to set clear and attainable goals. What must be achieved in terms of peacemaking and reconstruction over what period?

Through the NATO force and U.S. diplomats and civilian advisors, this nation has played a significant role in Bosnia’s postwar change. But it has not been able to make the Serbs do what they choose not to. Nor has it been able to rid the Bosnian Muslim regime of Middle Eastern elements clearly inimical to NATO interests in Europe.

Clinton’s secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, European by birth, takes the issue closer to heart than the president. Washington has supported NATO, she said, “because it did not serve American interests to see aggression undeterred, hatred unleashed, genocide unchecked and unpunished in the heart of Europe.” She is correct. But there was no wholesale willingness on the part of NATO partners to get into the fight in the first place. Now they have little heart for staying on if the Americans leave. The answer lies in achievable goals. That is what the president has to sell to Congress.