Word: balkanizing
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...French about-face, which was welcomed by the U.S. but received only a cool stare from British Defense Minister Malcolm Rifkind, reflects the schizophrenia at the core of the West's response to the Balkan war. Unable to choose between mounting a more muscular response and calling off the whole show, the allies' simultaneous pursuit of both alternatives leaves them hamstrung. On one hand they fear that a more assertive approach in Bosnia is likely to entangle them more deeply in the war. Yet admitting defeat and pulling out would not only humiliate NATO but also allow the conflict...
Rightly or wrongly, many Sarajevans lay the blame for the bankruptcy of Balkan policy at the feet of the U.N. and its Secretary-General, Boutros Boutros- Ghali. Their bitterness and desperation are reflected in the following dispatch by TIME contributor Zlatko Dizdarevic, which was translated by Ammiel Alcalay...
...rough treatment that Republicans could dish out to what remains of the new world order visibly worries the Europeans. At the least, the Republican- controlled Congress may try to gut the U.N. peacekeeping budget, in light of the Balkan experience. Dissension was not afflicting the U.S. alone though. In Germany the Suddeutsche Zeitung last week put on its front page a classified wire sent to Bonn by the German ambassador to NATO, Hermann von Richthofen, a grandnephew of the World War I flying ace known as the Red Baron. His complaints centered on what he styled an arbitrary U.S. push...
That said, there is a U.N. bureaucracy, and it is responsible for its actions. So when Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali went to Sarajevo two years ago and called the Balkan conflict a "rich man's war," it is perfectly appropriate to call him a blithering idiot--the blame is his alone. Similarly, when U.N. envoy Akashi or U.N. General Rose talk like the Serbs are just another warring faction, rather than the aggressor, we can justifiably accuse them of moral cowardice...
...Clinton Administration last week sent three ships with 2,000 U.S. Marines to the Adriatic Sea off the Balkan coast to provide support for NATO. The Pentagon was quick to point out that the action was a precaution and did not signify U.S. involvement in the conflict, much less the commitment of American ground troops. Karadzic declared that the U.S. risks another Vietnam by sending Marines to the region...