Word: bihac
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...amid the recriminations was a firm grasp of how the order of battle in Bosnia really stands. Have the Serbs won, as Defense Secretary William Perry pronounced on television early last week? He wrote off the Bosnian government's hopes of regaining turf. Yet even if the town of Bihac should fall, and assuming continued supplies of food, fuel and medicine from outside, the defenders of Bosnian sovereignty are actually better prepared than ever to fight for their homeland against the viciousness of tribal aggrandizement...
...heavy weapons, Sarajevo's infantry has an edge in manpower and a mobility advantage over tanks and artillery in winter. , The Bosnian army has a chance of holding its own and even of advancing -- which is probably a major reason why Serb commanders undertook to invade Bihac. At the practical level, the strategy was to take land needed to open a rail link between their forces and kindred units holding territory across the border in Croatia -- a prospect that prompted the Croatian government to threaten intervention. Beyond that, the unpunished siege of Bihac could and did shatter Western resolve...
...kept the dispute at arm's length and did not even attend last week's policy review. A former Administration official said, "Bill Clinton was not able to lead the Western alliance. Did he try? Who cares? He struck out." The ashes of the policy are being tasted in Bihac, but they have soiled every corner of the new world order...
...occasion for Dole's Bosnia posturing was the Serb attack on the Muslim area of Bihac. In fact, as the French pointed out accurately, it was a counterattack. The Muslims began this round with a fierce surprise offensive in late October that won them 95 sq. mi. of Serb-controlled territory and quiet applause from the U.S. Now that the gambit has backfired and the Bosnian government is blaming everyone but itself, Dole is pushing for more NATO bombing, for lifting the arms embargo and for other forms of flailing unilateralism...
These measures, as even Dole admits, hold out little hope of turning the tide of battle in Bihac or elsewhere in Bosnia. But they are guaranteed to do great damage to the foremost U.S. foreign policy asset in the world: NATO. Lifting the arms embargo and mounting air strikes against the Serbs would endanger the thousands of British, French and other peacekeeping troops on the ground in Bosnia. Conveniently, the U.S. has none there, which invites Dole's cowboy notions. The French and British are justifiably apoplectic at a U.S. that is unwilling to risk a single soldier...