[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 43 (Tuesday, April 19, 1994)]
[House]
[Page H]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: April 19, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]


                              {time}  1050
 
                           GENOCIDE IN BOSNIA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Danner). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of February 11, 1994, the gentleman from Indiana [Mr. 
McCloskey], is recognized during morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. McCLOSKEY. Madam Speaker, today is truly on this beautiful, quiet 
Washington day an important historical watershed day as to not only 
Bosnia, but our role in the world and the immediate future and 
international security of this planet.
  As we talk here, thousands and thousands of people are dying. They 
are dying in Gorazde, they stand to die elsewhere in Bosnia, Zepa, 
Srebenica, Tuzla, and now perhaps even Sarajevo. As we know, the Serbs 
have reconfiscated various heavy weaponry which had been in the 
possession of the United Nations, now leaving Sarajevo, besides all 
these other places, awaiting their tender mercies.
  Quite frankly, what are we doing? We are talking about it. We are 
reviewing it. We are studying it. We then are consulting with allies. 
But as months and months go by and as some 200,000 Bosnians have died, 
we continue to be in a stilted and almost inert position.
  There is more at stake here than Bosnia and the people in it. What 
truly is at stake is our political leadership, our moral leadership, 
and, indeed, the feeling that somehow, with this semicollapsed post-
card war order, that we can have a role in making this planet the 
secure and stable place it needs to be for all its citizens.
  Over the Easter break I had the fortunate opportunity to be in both 
Mostar and Sarajevo. One of the most joyous experiences of my life was 
to attend Easter Sunday mass at Sarajevo with Archbishop Pulish, I 
might say a Croat, speaking out for unity and peace and tolerance and 
civil rights in Bosnia, regardless of relgious or ethnic background. I 
might note he is a Croat who has gone through the agonies of the deaths 
of hundreds of thousands of people, of his people, of all backgrounds. 
And still, since that time, since we have had credit for the ceasefire 
in Sarajevo, since we have had credit for the implementation of the 
Bosnian-Croat alliance, we stand now on the verge of losing all that as 
people are openly slaughtered in Gorazde, as NATO planes are shot down, 
as British soldiers are murdered on the spot by Serbs, as U.N. forces 
are in essence, one way or another, our own Western personnel, are 
seized by these thugs, and in essence we hear Mr. Akashi and others 
talking about getting out of the country.
  As Mr. Bonior so eloquently stated, and I think we will be addressing 
this concern in a special order again tonight, what we need now, among 
other things, is air strikes, real air strikes, and a lifting of the 
arms embargo. We do not need two puny, pinpoint numbers where, 
unfortunately, whatever happened with the technology, four of five 
bombs did not go off. We do not need to pretend to continue to impose 
an illegal arms embargo, which is illegal and immoral on its face, in 
contravention of the U.N. charter and the right of every country and 
every people to defend themselves. It is illegal on its face. It is 
also contrary, I think, to any reasonably gifted person as to any 
aspect of natural law.
  So as we do these air strikes, hopefully as President Clinton 
exercises real leadership at this most important time in the Bosnian 
conflict, we should not confine ourselves to pin strike attempts. We 
need to be knocking out the supply bridges over the Drina and the Sava. 
We need to be knocking out tanks. We need to be knocking out roadways. 
We need to show the world, show the Bosnians and the Croats and the 
Serbs, that our military and moral authority means something, and that 
we will not continue to stand by and abdicate any moral leadership 
while a genocide goes on. What do the words ``never again'' mean if we 
all of us together allow genocide to go on?

  So again, as tragic as Bosnia is, this issue is bigger than Bosnia. 
It is as big as the planet. It is as big as the personal and national 
security of every person and good citizen in it. If we do not act 
today, Mr. President, not a bunch of more deliberations and reviews, we 
all stand imperiled and we all stand fearful of the collapse of 
American moral authority.

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