U.S. Must Not Surrender Bosnia

When the world didn't seem to care about what was happening to them the Bostonians always held out hope that the Americans would come to their aid. "We are waiting for Clinton!" shouted a Sarajevo hospital worker several months ago as she tended to one of the thousands of sniper victims. Now that hope has been firmly dashed. The U.S., which had been hedging for months, has decided to turn a cold shoulder on Bosnia.

Since April of 1992, the Serbs have been waging a war to create a Greater Serbia in the former Yugoslavia--at the expense of the internationally recognized states of Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. Their tactics have included massive ethnic cleansing, systematic rape and the use of concentration camps. Serb snipers have especially targeted non-combatants in their attempt to terrorize Muslim populations. The recent picture of a seven-year-old gunned down in a Sarajevo Street was only a small reflection of the Serb campaign that has lasted for almost two years. The United Nations Commission sent to document war crimes has laid the blame squarely at the doorstep of the Serbs and concluded that they may have committed genocide. The conflict has spawned more than a million refugees and has cost hundreds of thousands of lives.

The response of the world community meanwhile has been misguided at best, complications at worst. The UN-imposed arms embargo on the former Yugoslavia has aided the Serbs, who possessed large stockpiles of weapons before the war. The Bosnia's still suffer from shortages of heavy weapons. Moreover, the UN troops in Bosnia have been mere pawns in the Serbian advance, able to provide relief only with Serb permission and used as hostages against any more significant help for the Muslims. These polices have largely been the result of a British and French resistance to any concerted action against the Serbs.

Almost from the beginning of the conflict, though, the U.S. had taken a different approach--at least rhetorically--from that of its European allies. Both the Clinton and Bush administrations were more willing to label the Serbs as the aggressors, both were more supportive of arming the besieged Bosnian Muslims and both were more willing to consider military action on their behalf. These sentiments led to little action because of European opposition, but at least they were there.

Now they too are gone. The U.S. has capitulated to the cowardice and moral relativism of Britain and France. No longer do American officials describe the struggle as that of victim and aggressor; now it is an "intractable" civil war. White House Chief of Staff Leon Panetta sounded the new line this week: "Our only hope is that at some point the parties recognize that there's no use continuing the kind of carnage that's going on there at the present time." Panetta speaks as if all the parties were equal, as if the victim were as responsible for the war as the aggressor. Defense Secretary William Perry joined the chorus, saying that the Serbs had already won--this only a week after the Bosnian force gained ground. Seeing the American turnabout, negotiators are now revising peace proposals to ward the Serbs even more land. After all, with the U.S. now on the side of appeasement rather than the side of the Bosnians, there can be little hope that help will arrive from the outside. The Bosnians have no one left to turn to.

What could the U.S. do had it the will? Many things. First and foremost, it could escalate its aggressive push for the lifting of the arms embargo. If such an effort failed, the U.S. would be morally justified in skirting the embargo and supplying the Bosnians unilaterally. The embargo is, after all, a violation of Bosnia's right to self-defense, a right guaranteed in the U.N. Charter. Air strikes against Serb supply lines and heavy weapons would further increase pressure for a more just settlement. And all else failing, ground troops should be a possibility--the stakes are that high.

Sadly, such actions seem a distant possibility. The American surrender only caps what has become one of the most sordid tales in recent history. With the polarizing effect of the Cold War diminished and the world's strongest military alliance standing right next door, the Western powers had all the right conditions to make a stand for international civility when the carnage began in Yugoslavia. Instead, they have allowed crimes unseen in Europe since the Nazis.

Along the way, their pusillanimous policies have discredited all the institutions that touched the conflict. The UN, in the midst of a post-Cold Wal renaissance when the Yugoslav conflict began, now stands guilty of abetting Serb aggression. NATO, fresh from victory against the Warsaw pact has shown itself impotent in its own backyard.

These consequences have been unfolding for some time. Before this week, the U.S. could at least take some solace in its opposition to European passivity. now America stands with the others.