So far, President Clinton has done little to prepare the American public for sending in the troops. Predictably, Republicans are seizing on the opportunity to raise doubts. Last week on Capitol Hill, a committee hearing to decide whether to extend the term of Joint Chiefs Chairman John Shalikashvili turned into an inquisition on Bill Clinton’s pledge to send U.S. troops. “Why can’t the Europeans carry out these peacekeeping duties them-selves?” asked GOP Sen, John McCain. Other senators piled on. Shalikashvili defended a U.S. contribution to NATO as a matter of leadership. But there were no ringing endorsements from the Oval Office. Rather, anonymous White House aides were left hoping that public support will miraculously materialize. “Nobody has given us a blank check,” says a senior White House official, “but we do feel there is support for the participation of U.S. forces.”
Just how many troops Clinton will be willing to send to Bosnia remains open to question. The administration is formally committed to NATO to provide up to half the total peace enforcement, up to 25,000 troops. The Pentagon wants its troops to go in full force ff they go in at all. What one insider refers to as the “if I were God” plan calls for up to 70,000 troops of nine heavily armed brigades deployed throughout Bosnia, with a 10th quick-reaction “fire fighting” brigade of light infantry and helicopters held in reserve. The United States would send 25,000 soldiers; the rest would come from Britain, France, Holland, possibly Germany and a non-NATO contingent. The advantages of going in big? The troops can easily deal with any resistance, and the White House has to get congressional approval only once. But the White House is more likely to back a smaller force that would require 15,000 to 18,000 U.S. troops and equal contributions from Britain and France. Clinton would want to pull them all out by Election Day. A major sticking point is what to do about Russian troops. “The Russians can act as spoilers,” says a senior administration official. “We’d better have them inside the tent.” Congress won’t want them included.
More vexing to Clinton than Republican congressmen or Pentagon planners will be the Croats and Muslims. After years of getting pushed around by the Serbs, they are suddenly taking back large chunks of lost territory. Success has made them greedy for more -greatly complicating the efforts of diplomats to divide up the country in a way that will produce a lasting peace. Last week, standing in the office of Secretary of State Warren Christopher, Holbrooke took out a ballpoint pen and drew a line west of the Serbian town of Banja Luka. He said it was the Serbs’ “line in the sand.” But the Muslims and their Croat allies will be tempted to breach it – risking further Serb counterattacks. Meanwhile, Muslims and Croats are taking potshots at each other, though the U.S.-manufactured alliance has to be considered a fragile success. It is far from certain that the three warring parties can settle their own differences at the bargaining table this week in New York.
Some of Clinton’s foreign-policy advisers are hoping that Clinton will step in, perhaps by moving the negotiations to Camp David. But at the White House, Clinton’s political advisers have long cautioned against presidential entanglement. His advisers are still urgently lowering expectations, just in case the civil war resumes. One aide described Holbrooke’s initiative as “one last effort to get peace before moving to more dangerous options,” like lifting the arms embargo against the Muslims, which would prolong the Balkan war indefinitely. If Clinton really wants Bosnia to go away, he may find himself in the highly public – and risky – role of peacemaker over the next few weeks.
