[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 56 (Tuesday, May 10, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: May 10, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
           LIFTING THE ARMS EMBARGO ON BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the order previously entered, the 
Senate will now resume consideration of S. 2042, which the clerk will 
report.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       A bill (S. 2042) to remove the United States arms embargo 
     of the Government of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

  The Senate resumed consideration of the bill.
  Mr. DOLE addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Republican leader.


                           Amendment No. 1692

             (Purpose: To propose a substitute for S. 2042)

  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I send to the desk a substitute amendment 
and amendments in the first and second degree.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Under the previous order, the Senator is 
authorized to offer a substitute amendment and first- and second-degree 
amendments and a modification to the second-degree amendment thereto.
  Mr. DOLE. I send the modification to the desk. I might say, this has 
been cleared by the other side.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will report the substitute 
amendment.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Kansas [Mr. Dole] proposes an amendment 
     numbered 1692.

  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       Strike all after the enacting clause and insert the 
     following:

     SEC.  . UNITED STATES ARMS EMBARGO OF THE GOVERNMENT OF 
                   BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA.

       (a) Termination.--The President shall terminate the United 
     States arms embargo of the Government of Bosnia and 
     Herzegovina upon receipt from that government of a request 
     for assistance in exercising its right of self-defense under 
     Article 51 of the United Nations Charter.
       (b) Definition.--As used in this section, the term `United 
     States arms embargo of the Government of Bosnia and 
     Herzegovina' means the application to the government of 
     Bosnia and Herzegovina of--
       (1) the policy adopted July 10, 1991, and published in the 
     Federal Register of July 19, 1991 (58 Fed. Reg. 33322) under 
     the heading `Suspension of Munitions Export Licenses to 
     Yugoslavia'; and
       (2) any similar policy being applied by the United States 
     Government as of the date of receipt of the request described 
     in subsection (a) pursuant to which approval is routinely 
     denied for transfers of defense articles and defense services 
     to the former Yugoslavia.


                amendment no. 1693 to amendment no. 1692

(Purpose: To propose a 1st degree amendment to the substitute amendment 
                              for S. 2042)

  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will read the amendment in the 
first degree.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Kansas [Mr. Dole] proposes an amendment 
     numbered 1693 to amendment No. 1692.

  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:

       At the appropriate place, add the following:

     SEC.  . UNITED STATES ARMS EMBARGO OF THE GOVERNMENT OF 
                   BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA.

       (a) Termination.--The President shall terminate the United 
     States arms embargo of the Government of Bosnia and 
     Herzegovina upon receipt from that government of a request 
     for assistance in exercising its right of self-defense under 
     Article 51 of the United Nations Charter.
       (b) Definition.--As used in this section, the term `United 
     States arms embargo of the Government of Bosnia and 
     Herzegovina' means the application to the Government of 
     Bosnia and Herzegovina of--
       (1) the policy adopted July 10, 1991, and published in the 
     Federal Register of July 19, 1991 (58 Fed. Reg. 33322) under 
     the heading `Suspension of Munitions Export Licenses to 
     Yugoslavia'; and
       (2) any similar policy being applied by the United States 
     Government as of the date of receipt of the request described 
     in subsection (a) pursuant to which approval is routinely 
     denied for transfers of defense articles and defense services 
     to the former Yugoslavia.


                Amendment No. 1694 to Amendment No. 1693

  (Purpose: To propose a second-degree amendment to the first-degree 
           amendment to the substitute amendment for S. 2042)

  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will now read the second-degree 
amendment.
  The legislative clerk read as follows:

       The Senator from Kansas [Mr. Dole], for himself, Mr. 
     Lieberman, Mr. Mack, Mr. Lugar, Mr. Levin, Mr. McCain, Mr. 
     Hatch, Mr. Feingold, Mr. Dorgan, Mr. McConnell, Mr. Helms, 
     Mr. Simpson, Mr. Coverdell, Mr. DeConcini, Mr. Gorton, Mr. 
     Kempthorne, Mr. D'Amato, Mr. Pressler, Mr. Roth, Mr. Brown, 
     Mrs. Hutchison, Mr. Wallop, Mr. Bradley, Mr. Lautenberg, Mr. 
     Moynihan, Mr. Robb, Mr. Stevens, Mr. Thurmond, Mr. Packwood, 
     Mr. Reid, Mr. Jeffords, Mr. Campbell, and Mr. Murkowski, 
     proposes an amendment numbered 1694 to amendment No. 1693.

  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the reading of 
the amendment be dispensed with.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  The amendment is as follows:
       Strike all after the word ``SEC.'' and insert the 
     following:

     ``. UNITED STATES ARMS EMBARGO OF THE GOVERNMENT OF BOSNIA 
                   AND HERZEGOVINA.

       ``(a) Prohibition.--Neither the President nor any other 
     member of the Executive Branch of the United States 
     Government shall interfere with the transfer of arms to the 
     Government of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
       ``(b) Termination.--The President shall terminate the 
     United States arms embargo of the Government of Bosnia and 
     Herzegovina upon receipt from that government of a request 
     for assistance in exercising its right of self-defense under 
     Article 51 of the United Nations Charter.
       ``(c) Definition.--As used in this section, the term 
     `United States arms embargo of the Government of Bosnia and 
     Herzegovina' means the application to the Government of 
     Bosnia and Herzegovina of--
       ``(1) the policy adopted July 10, 1991, and published in 
     the Federal Register of July 19, 1991 (58 Fed. Reg. 33322) 
     under the heading `Suspension of Munitions Export Licenses to 
     Yugoslavia'; and
       ``(2) any similar policy being applied by the United States 
     Government as of the date of receipt of the request described 
     in subsection (a) pursuant to which approval is routinely 
     denied for transfers of defense articles and defense services 
     to the former Yugoslavia.
       ``(d) Nothing in this section shall be interpreted as 
     authorization for deployment of U.S. forces in the territory 
     of Bosnia and Herzegovina for any purpose, including 
     training, support or delivery of military equipment.


         Amendment No. 1694 to Amendment No. 1693, As Modified

 (Purpose: To modify the proposed second-degree amendment to the first-
       degree amendment to the substitute amendment for S. 2042)

  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Chair inquires to which amendment the 
modification is addressed.
  Mr. DOLE. The modification is to the second-degree amendment.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The clerk will read the modification.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I will explain what the modification is.
  This is a simple modification to address the concern raised by some 
that the language prohibiting the executive branch from enforcing the 
arms embargo could inadvertently allow the transfer of nuclear or other 
advanced weapons to Bosnia.
  The modification makes clear only conventional weapons appropriate to 
the self-defense of Bosnia would be allowed. That is the only purpose 
of the amendment.
  As I understand it, I have a right to make that modification.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator has that right.
  The amendment, with its modification, is as follows:

       Strike all after the word ``SEC.'' and insert the 
     following:

     ``. UNITED STATES ARMS EMBARGO OF THE GOVERNMENT OF BOSNIA 
                   AND HERZEGOVINA.

       ``(a) Prohibition.--Neither the President nor any other 
     member of the Executive Branch of the United States 
     Government shall interfere with the transfer of conventional 
     arms appropriate to the self-defense needs of the Government 
     of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
       ``(b) Termination.--The President shall terminate the 
     United States arms embargo of the Government of Bosnia and 
     Herzegovina upon receipt from that government of a request 
     for assistance in exercising its right of self-defense under 
     Article 51 of the United Nations Charter.
       ``(c) Definition.--As used in this section, the term 
     `United States arms embargo of the Government of Bosnia and 
     Herzegovina' means the application to the Government of 
     Bosnia and Herzegovina of--
       ``(1) the policy adopted July 10, 1991, and published in 
     the Federal Register of July 19, 1991 (58 Fed. Reg. 33322) 
     under the heading `Suspension of Munitions Export Licenses to 
     Yugoslavia'; and
       ``(2) any similar policy being applied by the United States 
     Government as of the date of receipt of the request described 
     in subsection (a) pursuant to which approval is routinely 
     denied for transfers of defense articles and defense services 
     to the former Yugoslavia.
       ``(d) Nothing in this section shall be interpreted as 
     authorization for deployment of U.S. forces in the territory 
     of Bosnia and Herzegovina for any purpose, including 
     training, support or delivery of military equipment.''

  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that until the 
Senate recesses for the party conferences today, that there be debate 
only on S. 2042, the Bosnia arms embargo legislation.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Is there objection? The Chair hears no 
objection. It will be so ordered.
  Mr. DOLE. That is the request of the leaders on both sides.
  Mr. President, I know with all the things that may be happening 
around the world today in South Africa--and some of our colleagues are 
there for the inauguration of President Mandela--we read about the 
tragedy in Rwanda, we look at the Mideast with some hope, there are a 
number of areas I know have the focus of the administration and the 
Congress and the President.
  But I know of no area that deserves more consideration by this body 
than Bosnia. So what we are attempting to do in a bipartisan way--we 
have more than 30 cosponsors, myself and Senator Lieberman, so it is 
bipartisan, a number of Democrats, a number of Republicans--all we are 
attempting to do with our amendment is to lift the arms embargo on 
Bosnia on a unilateral basis.
  And I might say at the outset, we prefer that it be lifted by our 
allies at the same time. But if they are not persuaded, then I think 
America should take the high moral ground so the world may know that at 
least the United States, if we do nothing else, we are not going to 
prevent people from defending themselves. That is essentially what we 
are doing now. We are telling the Bosnians, you cannot defend 
yourselves; you cannot have defensive weapons; you cannot have antitank 
weapons. They are now fighting tanks with rifles.
  I met, along with Senator Lieberman, with the Vice President of 
Bosnia, Mr. Ganic. He told us they had 8 tanks and the Serbs have over 
300. He told us they had one rifle for every 4 men. Now, it is not a 
fair fight. The Serbs have most of the weapons that the Yugoslav army 
had. And I know that some say, well, if you lift the arms embargo, you 
escalate the violence; you permit the Bosnians to inflict some pain on 
the Serbs and we would rather have it one way; we would just as soon 
have only the Serbs inflict the pain because it is less violence.
  My view is that that violates article 51 of the U.N. charter which 
provides for the right of self-defense. Bosnia is an independent 
nation. It is a member of the United Nations. They have already lost a 
half or more of their territory, some say 70 percent. We will have to 
make a decision here someday, if there is a peace accord, whether we 
should send 5,000, 10,000, 25,000 Americans to Bosnia. To do what? To 
enforce a peace agreement that favors the Serbs, because they have been 
the aggressors. The Bosnians have not been the aggressors. The Croats 
have not been the aggressors. It has been the Serbs.
  For 2 years now we have facilitated Serbian aggression and ethnic 
cleansing because we have prevented the Bosnians from defending 
themselves.
  And again I would say that the Vice President of Bosnia said that all 
we want is a limited quantity of defensive weapons, not for offensive 
purposes but for survival, survival.
  When President Clinton was candidate Clinton and campaigning across 
America he correctly said, ``In effect, we're giving a big advantage to 
the Serbians when there can't be any arms sales'' to any Balkan States. 
``We can't get involved in a quagmire,'' Governor Clinton said, ``but 
we must do what we can.''
  And I think at the outset it was my hope, and I think Senator 
Lieberman's hope, that we would strengthen the President's hand. We did 
not offer this to have any confrontation with the administration or 
with the President. But we thought we should help the President do what 
is morally right in this case and help provide the leadership. In my 
view, unless the United States is providing the leadership, nothing of 
any import is going to happen.
  So they have 8 tanks to 300, 1 gun to every 4 Bosnian soldiers. They 
are not asking for American troops. They are not asking for offensive 
weapons. They are ready to defend themselves, if only they had the 
means to protect themselves, their homes, and their families.
  We have witnessed on CNN shelling of an emergency room, the Red 
Cross, shooting children in front of their parents, killing children in 
front of their parents. It seems to me that as Americans we have a 
special history and a special understanding for the plight of the 
Bosnian people. America was once a colony, and we struggled against the 
odds for our independence. So I think we can certainly sympathize, but 
we need more than sympathy, for the Bosnians; all they want is their 
freedom and their independence.
  But they have had their fate snatched from their hands and placed in 
the hands of the U.N. Security Council. No doubt about it, I think even 
the President acknowledged and our Ambassador to the United Nations has 
acknowledged that in a sense--the international community approach has 
been one of weakness and hypocrisy. Genocide has not been halted; it 
has been managed. Aggression has not being halted; it is being 
supervised.
  The international community's policy has been a failure, and the 
American people know it. A CNN/Time magazine poll conducted last week 
indicates that only 19 percent of those polled believe United States 
policy in Bosnia has been a success, while 59 percent believe it has 
been a failure.
  The United Nations and NATO say that genocide will not be tolerated 
in U.N. ``safe havens,'' but outside those areas ethnic cleansing rages 
on. In Gorazde, one of those U.N.-declared safe havens, limited action 
was taken but only after the city was nearly destroyed and hundreds 
were killed. Now Bosnian Serbs are massing their forces in the Brcko 
area for a new offensive, but this region is not protected even in 
theory by NATO air strikes.
  Last week, two planes were hit by gunfire on the way to Sarajevo and 
Bosnian Serbs blocked a convoy bound for the beleaguered people of 
Gorazde. Nevertheless, negotiators were in Sarajevo at the end of the 
week talking peace.
  The latest news reports are more shocking. Pursuant to a deal cut by 
U.N. Special Representative Akashi, U.N. Protection Forces allowed 
Bosnian Serb tanks to have free passage through the Sarajevo exclusion 
zone, in blatant violation of the February NATO ultimatum.
  In addition to assisting Bosnian Serbs in violating the NATO 
ultimatum, the U.N. Protection Forces helped the Bosnian Serbs to 
redeploy their tanks, no doubt, so they can begin new offensives 
elsewhere--and we are picking up a big part of the UNPROFOR tab. 
Today's reports indicate that some of these tanks are now missing 
within the Sarajevo exclusion zone.
  Moreover, this morning there are reports that UNPROFOR officials are 
finally admitting that the Bosnian Serbs are still violating the NATO 
ultimatum on Gorazde, with troops and heavy equipment.
  Prime Minister Silajdzic has demanded U.N. Special Representative 
Akashi's resignation, and I think he is correct. In fact, Senator 
Lieberman and I last week had a telephone conversation with the Prime 
Minister, and again he made the case that all we want is defensive 
weapons, antitank weapons, whatever we can get to defend ourselves.
  I have also called repeatedly for Akashi's resignation. Akashi's 
approach is one of appeasement. He meets with war criminals and calls 
them friends. And when the United States refuses to send soldiers under 
U.N. command he calls us timid. Akashi should be sent packing to a post 
far away where his weakness and indecisiveness will not cost lives.
  Tragically, the international community has shown consistence--in its 
weakness and lack of principle. As innocent civilians are slaughtered 
daily, international leaders invite war criminals to Geneva to discuss 
peace. U.N. officials speak of the need for neutrality, as though they 
are referees in a sporting match. The problem is that this game is 
aggression and the referees are creating an unlevel playing field. 
Remember, the United Nations was established to protect member states 
against aggression, not to help foster it, not to choose up sides and 
not to make excuses for the aggressors as they have done in nearly 
every case, either Boutros Boutros-Ghali or his representative, Mr. 
Akashi.
  Mr. President, how do we bring an end to this multilateral madness? I 
would have preferred not to have had to offer this legislation. I would 
have preferred that the President call the congressional leadership to 
tell us of the decision to lift the U.S. embargo. But this issue has 
waited long enough. The Bosnians have waited long enough. The war has 
gone on for 25 months, and we have passed resolutions and the U.N. 
passed resolutions. There has been international hand-wringing and 
tough talk and tough rhetoric and nothing ever happens. We have had 
pilots flying over certain zones where they might have had air strikes, 
waiting for somebody in the United Nations to tell NATO it is all right 
for the pilots to take action.
  And it confuses me, I might say, and confuses most of the people in 
America. That is why those who support our policy in a recent policy 
are at about 19 percent.
  President Clinton says he wants to lift the embargo but only 
multilaterally. But do not get me wrong; the Bush administration, too, 
deserves its fair share of this policy. But the Clinton administration 
has been in charge now for more than a year. And I made the same 
statements during the Bush administration. During the Bush 
administration, we kept talking about an undivided Yugoslavia even 
after free elections in Slovenia, after free elections in Croatia, even 
after it was obvious that Milosevic was moving for this greater Serbia, 
obvious that 2 million Albanians in Kosova were probably going to be 
the next target, or maybe Macedonia or maybe somewhere else.
  So we gave them the caution light, and kept talking about not 
dividing Yugoslavia when it was obvious it was going to be divided in 
any event.
  But this administration is continuing the Bush policy of denying the 
Bosnians the ability to defend themselves. Mr. President, this bill is 
about leadership--U.S. leadership in doing what is just and what is in 
the U.S. interest. Lifting the arms embargo is in both Bosnia's 
interest and in the United States interest. But the arms embargo will 
not be lifted if America waits for a consensus to miraculously emerge 
either within the U.N. Security Council or in NATO. The United States 
must act first.
  Many of us are going to go over to Italy and Normandy in 2 or 3 
weeks. We are going to talk about a lot of things. It is going to be a 
very emotional ceremony. But what is going to be indelibly imprinted on 
our minds again is how important American leadership is.
  What would have happened in the last 50 years had America not entered 
World War II? I am not suggesting we enter into any armed conflict in 
Bosnia. But, what would have happened if we had not provided the 
leadership? Where would we be today? Would we be meeting in the U.S. 
Senate under the charge of somebody Hitler passed on?
  Only when American leadership is provided, only when the world 
understands that America is providing leadership and we are serious 
about what we intend to do, can we have cooperation, because, whether 
we like it or not, we have the burden of world leadership. We may not 
fully appreciate it. We are respected around the world, with some 
exceptions. They respect our leadership because historically America 
stood its ground. We have taken the high moral ground. What we are 
saying is, OK, we are not going to do anything in Bosnia, but we 
certainly are not going to deprive the people of a right to defend 
themselves. We would not do that if we had a street fight somewhere if 
somebody was unfairly matched. We might at least give them a right to 
defend themselves.
  That does not risk any American lives, and that does not risk any 
American capital. It just says to these poor people, children, and 
innocent women and men, who have been slaughtered, that you have a 
right to defend yourselves. Once the Serbs understand that the Bosnians 
are going to be allowed to defend themselves, then I think you will see 
some real negotiations and maybe a peaceful settlement.
  So my hope still is that we will pass this bill. I know the 
administration is opposed to it. I know some of my colleagues are 
opposed to it, unless it can be done with our allies. We are not 
France. We are not Britain. We are the United States of America. We are 
the world's leader. We ought to take that position, and we ought to do 
it proudly. And we ought to say we are going to lift the arms embargo. 
You can remove all the U.N. troops. We do not want any lives 
endangered. But we are the United States of America. We are the United 
States of America. We want to stop the slaughter. We want to give them 
at least an even chance. If the British do not like it and if the 
French do not like it, that is too bad. Because history is going to 
take a look at this era in the next 10, 15, or 20 years. And unless I 
am totally wrong, they are going to say this was a sad and tragic 
chapter in international history. And if we participate in it by just 
going along waiting for some consensus to develop, then we are going to 
be criticized for our lack of leadership.
  So, Mr. President, I think the legal arguments are clear, too. We 
have to keep in mind that the arms embargo was imposed on Yugoslavia. 
Yugoslavia no longer exists. How can we have an arms embargo in a 
country which no longer exists? This was all done before Bosnia was 
recognized and admitted into the United Nations as a member state.
  Bosnia and Herzegovina is the victim of international aggression and 
is guaranteed the right to self-defense under article 51 of the U.N. 
Charter. One of the cosponsors of this bill, the distinguished Senator 
from New York [Mr. Moynihan] is a former Ambassador to the United 
Nations and has perhaps the deepest understanding of the international 
legal questions associated with this matter. Another former U.S. 
Ambassador to the United Nations, Jeane Kirkpatrick, has also 
extensively discussed and written on this issue--and supports this 
bill. Even our current U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, 
Ambassador Albright, stated a few days ago that: ``The bottom line here 
is that this is not a legal issue, it is a political issue.''
  It is not a legal issue because the arms embargo is illegal, which 
brings me back to the leadership. The political issue is U.S. 
leadership. Is the United States going to continue to go along with and 
subsidize failed U.N. Security Council policies--including an illegal 
arms embargo?

  If we are going to do this, I may offer an amendment to cut off any 
funding. Why should we subsidize it? Why should the taxpayers subsidize 
it if only 19 percent approve of the policy? Are we going to break the 
cycle of failure which has left Bosnia in ruins and which threatens to 
drag us into the quagmire of implementing a peace settlement which 
rewards aggression?
  That is some precedent I do not think we wish to be a part of. So 
they say, OK, go ahead and take their country. Take 60 percent of it. 
Take 70 percent of it. We will send American troops to make certain 
they do not get any of it back.
  I do not really believe that is going to be an easy sell in the 
Congress of the United States or with the American people, again, when 
59 percent do not support our present policy.
  In my view, it is not in the U.S. interest to send thousands of U.S. 
troops to implement an unjust and unworkable settlement. The 
administration is now participating in a contact group which includes 
the British, French, Germans, and Russians whose main objective is to 
persuade the Bosnian Government to accept 51 percent of Bosnia, while 
allowing the Bosnian Serbs to retain 49 percent of Bosnia.
  Is that supposed to be something they would welcome? You get to keep 
51 percent. What are you complaining about?
  This is a peace-at-any-price policy. In a recent meeting, Jean 
Kirkpatrick made the point that the United States does not have a stake 
in where borders are drawn, but how they are drawn. At present, the map 
of Bosnia is a map of aggression. The negotiators' map is one of 
slightly reduced aggression.

  So you have major aggression. So, OK, you cannot have 70 percent, but 
we will give you 49 percent. So everybody wants to end the war. The 
President does. The Congress does. The people do, and particularly the 
people in Bosnia who have been pummeled, who have suffered and been 
shelled and whatever for the last 25 months.
  But how can anyone reasonably argue that this sort of resolution will 
serve U.S. interests? Are we really going to place our troops in harm's 
way to police the division of Bosnia? Are we talking now about sending 
troops?
  The only viable solution to the war in Bosnia is to lift the arms 
embargo on Bosnia. Last week, former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, 
once again made the case for lifting the embargo, in an op-ed in the 
New York Times. Lady Thatcher cites four reasons why the United States 
and Europe have important interests at stake in Bosnia and they are: 
First, the credibility of the West--and we do not have very much--NATO, 
and the United Nations; second, the message our weakness sends to other 
would-be aggressors; third, the expansion of Serbian aggression that 
would lead to a wider Balkan War; fourth, the potential for a wider war 
to create floods of refugees across Europe. Yesterday, Albert 
Wohlstetter, in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal called the present 
policy toward Bosnia, ``Genocide by Embargo.''
  In other words, we are not going to stand by and watch it. We do not 
want to call it genocide.
  So it seems to me that wherever you look, there are rather compelling 
reasons for the United States to act, not by sending ground troops, not 
even with air strikes at this point--though I would support air strikes 
if the President suggested that--but by helping the Bosnians defend 
themselves. And I ask unanimous consent that these articles be printed 
in the Record.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

              [From the Wall Street Journal, May 9, 1994]

                          Genocide by Embargo

                         (By Albert Wohlsetter)

       Since June 1991, the United States has used its own 
     diplomacy and the U.N. Security Council in a grim charade of 
     ``neutral mediation'' between a Serbian genocidal aggressor 
     and his victims. France and Britain have done likewise using 
     the Security Council and the European Community.
       They have used the brave efforts of private humanitarian 
     agencies to excuse their own failure to stop the Serbs, 
     ignoring the fact that this enormous human catastrophe is not 
     the unintended byproduct of war: It is ethnic cleansing, the 
     deliberate slaughter of innocent civilians, the destruction 
     of their private homes and public places of worship and 
     assembly, and the systematic rape of women to inspire terror 
     and flight for the strategic purpose of creating Slobodan 
     Milosevic's Greater Serbia. Western leaders have sponsored 
     the use of peacekeeping forces where there is no peace but 
     only an ongoing genocidal war.
       Such mediation, misuse of relief efforts, and peacekeeping 
     encouraged Mr. Milosevic's genocidal war and its 
     continuance. The U.S. did not bring about such horrors as 
     those in Rwanda, but the U.S. and the other democracies have 
     played a major role in bringing on the genocide in the 
     Balkans. They have much to make up for. Most obviously, they 
     have an obligation to disavow and erase the persistent 
     effects of their diplomatic moves that first deprived the 
     victims of recognition and so the right to acquire arms for 
     self-defense and, second, in a largely covert and totally 
     invalid maneuver, kept the victims from defending their 
     independence even after we and the rest of the world 
     recognized it.


                                open war

       Mr. Milosevic started his open war in Slovenia when Western 
     statesmen told Slovenian and Croatian leaders--and Mr. 
     Milosevic--they would not recognize the results of 
     an internationally monitored plebiscite they themselves had 
     asked for in Slovenia and Croatia. The results were 
     overwhelming for independence, or for at least a looser 
     federation.
       By refusing recognition, Western leaders made clear at that 
     point that they would continue to prevent Croats and Slovenes 
     from getting the means of defending their independence 
     against Mr. Milosevic's heavily armed proxies. Then, in 
     September 1991, the U.N. Security Council, at Mr. Milosevic's 
     request and with U.S. backing, put through an arms embargo to 
     keep Croatia outgunned. After that, much internal negotiation 
     within the European Community led to a scheduled European 
     recognition of Slovenia and Croatia on Jan. 10, 1992.
       On a mission to Yugoslavia shortly before that, however, 
     the representative of U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-
     Ghali simply ``told all interlocutors'' that the embargo 
     would continue to apply to all countries formed on the 
     territory of the former Yugoslavia, even after they became 
     recognized as independent nations by the international 
     community, including the EC and the U.N. This was a 
     deliberately obscure maneuver, nowhere overtly visible in the 
     labyrinth of words in U.N. Security Council Resolution 727, 
     which was passed on Jan. 8, 1992. Resolution 727, 
     nevertheless, has been taken as continuing the embargo.
       In effect, Resolution 727, coming barely two days before 
     the European Community recognized Slovenia and Croatia, was a 
     ploy to empty of any operational meaning the coming world 
     recognition of the independence of Slovenia and Croatia. 
     Besides violating Article 51 of the U.N. Charter, which 
     acknowledges that the right of individual and collective 
     self-defense is ``inherent,'' the ploy violated the Geneva 
     Convention on Genocide as well. The U.N. mediator had no 
     authority from the Security Council. And, as many experts on 
     international law have shown, the Security Council had and 
     has no authority to change the U.N. Charter.
       The U.S. should not simply declare that there is no valid 
     embargo on the sovereign nations who are the victims of 
     continuing Serbian genocide. That declaration would not (as 
     has been suggested) even remotely endanger the operation of 
     the embargo against Iraq. The embargo against Iraq applies 
     not to its victims but to the genocidal invader of Kuwait, 
     which was defeated by a U.S.-led coalition of some willing 
     NATO members and other interested countries. The embargo 
     resulted from the defeat and surrender of Iraq. It was a 
     condition of the coalition's ceasing to fire. Unlike the 
     embargo against the ex-Yugoslav republics, it is embodied in 
     the explicit language of a U.N. resolution. The credibility 
     of the U.N. as an impartial body is threatened by the 
     continuance of the embargo against former Yugoslav republics 
     under siege.
       The U.S. need not and should not condition its declaration 
     on an agreement by the U.N. Security Council (the General 
     Assembly has already called for a lifting of the embargo) or 
     even all the members of the North Atlantic Treaty 
     Organization. Russia, as a permanent member of the Security 
     Council, has said it would veto a council vote to lift the 
     embargo. So have Britain and France, who are both permanent 
     members of the Security Council and members of NATO.
       However, in lifting the embargo, the U.S. will be joined by 
     many in the General Assembly majority who, like President 
     Clinton, have long called for lifting it.
       One standard argument for continuing the embargo which has 
     been repeated mindlessly and endlessly is that ending it 
     would lengthen and widen the war. But depriving Serbia's 
     victims of the arms that would have enabled them to stop the 
     aggression has ensured the continuance of the war for nearly 
     three years, and invited the Serbs to widen it when they were 
     defeated by Slovenian guerrillas who were better prepared 
     than the Croats, and especially the Bosnians, for a Serb 
     onslaught. The Serbs widened the war to Croatia and then to 
     Bosnia and have already started further widening by their 
     operations in the Sandjak.


                           grotesque argument

       Another argument for allowing the Serbs to continue their 
     genocide with minimal opposition runs that arming the victims 
     might endanger humanitarian relief. But in spite of the 
     bravery and selflessness of the relief workers and of many of 
     the U.N. soldiers, humanitarian relief is no substitute for 
     stopping the genocidal assaults on the civilians. It is 
     grotesque to argue that the use of force to stop the Serbian 
     shelling of hospitals, marketplaces, churches, homes, etc. 
     must be abandoned because it would put at risk the convoys of 
     humanitarian aid. A convoy that brought bandages and 
     anesthetics for surgeons who are forced to amputate the legs 
     of children can hardly substitute for stopping attacks that 
     continue to blow off the legs of children.
       Nearly three years of craven meddling by the democracies 
     have led only to continuing disaster. Hopeful claims after 
     the latest near-ceasefires in Sarajevo and Gorazde that 
     ``diplomacy is working''--like the dashed hopes after each 
     broken ceasefire for three years--are deadly. But the 
     administration recently helped to broker an essential 
     alliance between the Croats and Bosnians to resist Serbian 
     aggression. Let that alliance defend itself. Lift the 
     embargo.
                                  ____


                 [From the New York Times, May 4, 1994]

                     Stop the Serbs--Now--for Good

                         (By Margaret Thatcher)

       We have been here so many times before in the Bosnian saga: 
     acts of barbarism by the Serbs, the mobilization of a shocked 
     international conscience, threats of air strikes (or actual 
     air strikes, of the most limited kind), a tactical Serbian 
     withdrawal, more talks aimed at persuading the warring 
     parties to accept a carving up of territory that rewards 
     aggression. Then the Serbs move on to yet another Bosnian 
     community, applying the same mixture of violence and 
     intimidation to secure their aim of an ethnically pure 
     Greater Serbia.
       The tragedy of Gorazde may for now at least be over. But 
     there are other towns of equal strategic interest on which 
     the Serbs are now free to concentrate their forces. Yesterday 
     the U.N. intervened to head off a Serbian attempt to expand 
     the Breko corridor in northern Bosnia, but such interventions 
     merely divert Serbian aggression. It is time to halt it--
     late, but not too late. We have the justification, the 
     interest and the means.
       A sovereign state, recognized by the world community, is 
     under attack from forces encouraged and supplied by another 
     power. This is not a civil war but a war of aggression, 
     planned and launched from outside Bosnia though using the 
     Serbian minority within it. The principle of self-defense 
     precedes and underlies the United Nations Charter. The 
     legitimate Government of Bosnia has every right to call upon 
     our assistance in defending its territory. That is ample 
     justification for helping the victims of aggression.
       And both the United States and Europe have real and 
     important strategic interests in Bosnia. Let me note four of 
     them.
       First, after all that the West, NATO and the U.N. have now 
     said, the credibility of our international stance on every 
     security issue from nuclear nonproliferation to the Middle 
     East is now at stake.
       Second, would-be aggressors are waiting to see how we deal 
     with the Serbs. Our weakness in the Balkans would have 
     dangerous and unpredictable consequences in the former Soviet 
     Union, which has Slavic nationalist forces that closely 
     parallel those of Greater Serbianism. And throughout Eastern 
     and Central Europe there are minorities that aggressive 
     mother-states might be tempted to manipulate to provoke 
     conflict, if that is allowed to pay in the case of Serbia.
       Third, Serbia's own ambitions are by no means necessarily 
     limited to Croatia and Bosnia. Kosovo is a powder keg. 
     Macedonia is fragile. Bulgaria, Hungary, Greece, Albania and 
     Turkey all have strong interests that could drag them into a 
     new Balkan war if Serbian expansion and oppression continue 
     unchecked.
       Fourth, the floods of refugees that would cross Europe--
     particularly in the event of such a wider conflict--would 
     further inflame extremist tendencies and undermine the 
     stability of Western governments.
       The West has the means--the technology and the weapons--to 
     change the balance of military advantage against the 
     aggressor in Bosnia. Since the beginning of the Serbian war 
     of aggression, which began in the summer of 1991 in Slovenia, 
     intensified in Croatia and is now consuming Bosnia, I have 
     opposed the sending of ground troops to the former 
     Yugoslavia. But I have said that humanitarian aid without a 
     military response is a misguided policy. Feeding or 
     evacuating the victims rather than helping them resist 
     aggression makes us accomplices as much as good Samaritans.
       So I have consistently called for action of two sorts: the 
     launching of air strikes against Serb forces, communication 
     centers and ammunition dumps; and the lifting of the arms 
     embargo and Bosnia and Croatia so that the Muslims and Croats 
     can defend themselves on more equal terms against the Serbs, 
     who inherited the massive armaments of the Yugoslavian Army.
       If such a policy had been pursued when I first proposed it 
     on this page in the summer of 1991, at a time when Sarajevo 
     and Gorazde were under serious assault, thousands of people 
     would now be alive and in all probability the Milosevic 
     regime in Belgrade would have fallen. Because this approach 
     was not adopted, we now find ourselves in a far more complex 
     and dangerous situation: trying to defend almost indefensible 
     safe havens; maintaining a facade of neutrality when all our 
     decisions are based on the knowledge that the Serbs are the 
     threat, and with a large contingent of U.N. personnel whom 
     the Serbs may choose to use as hostages.
       The new joint effort by Russia and the West to persuade the 
     Serbs to settle for 49 percent of Bosnian territory (down 
     from the 72 percent they have now occupied) is hardly less 
     rife with dangers. The Serbs will almost certainly not 
     withdraw, and once the guns are quiet the Russians may not 
     wish them to do so--nor may the West be prepared to revive 
     the threat of bombing to force them. Even if they were to 
     withdraw, their 49 percent of Bosnia would still represent a 
     reward for aggression. And in either event, the ensuing peace 
     would be an unjust and fragile one requiring a large 
     contingent of Western (including U.S.) ground troops to 
     enforce it on the victims. If hostilities resume, as is all 
     too likely, these troops would become the target for attack.
       So the formula of air strikes and lifting the arms of 
     embargo is still the right one to apply. NATO already has the 
     mandate from the U.N. Security Council not just to defend 
     U.N. personnel but to deter attacks on the safe havens. This 
     mandate gives full authority for the requisite launching of 
     repeated large-scale air strikes against Serb military 
     targets wherever these may prove effective. It is a matter 
     for consideration whether strikes should go into Serbia 
     itself.
       Air strikes are effective, as long as they are not on a 
     small scale, hedged with political hesitations and 
     qualifications. They can inflict severe and ultimately 
     unsustainable damage. But they have to be part of a clear 
     strategy to shift the advantage against the aggressor. The 
     Serbs must know that they will be carried out with swiftness 
     and determination. Nor may Russian objections be allowed to 
     stand in their way. If the Russians are prepared to support 
     such action, all well and good. But NATO cannot have its 
     policies entirely shaped by Russian sensibilities.
       Lifting the arms embargo, as Senators Bob Dole and Joseph 
     Biden have courageously proposed (the Senate is to take up 
     the resolution tomorrow), is also crucial. That embargo was 
     imposed before Bosnia and Croatia were internationally 
     recognized, and its legal standing is at least questionable. 
     The U.S., Britian and France--or if necessary, the U.S. 
     acting alone--should formally state that they do not intend 
     to continue with it.
       Such statements might also be supported by a resolution of 
     the U.N. General Assembly. The confederation between Bosnia 
     and Croatia, so skillfully brokered by the United States, now 
     means that supplies of arms will be used against the common 
     aggressor, not against each other, and that they can easily 
     be shipped in through Croatia. A well-armed Muslim-Croation 
     alliance would confront the Serbs with a quite new and 
     unwelcome challenge. It might even prompt the Serbs to 
     settle.
       I do not claim that this approach is without dangers. It 
     would require diplomatic and military skills of a high order. 
     It is unlikely to bring immediate peace--through it might. 
     Some disruption of the aid effort is inevitable. But what the 
     people of Bosnia now need is a permanent peace that allows 
     them to return to their homes and live without fear. What the 
     West needs is to restore its reputation and secure its 
     interests. This is the only way those aims can be realized.
  Mr. DOLE. Mr. President, I would like to take a few moments to review 
the other arguments made by some who question lifting the arms embargo 
and to respond to them.
  First, lifting the embargo would stop the delivery of humanitarian 
assistance. Albert Wohlstetter described this argument as grotesque. In 
my view Margaret Thatcher said it best, ``Feeding or evacuating the 
victims rather than helping them resist aggression makes us accomplices 
as much as good samaritans.'' If the Bosnians are armed, they have 
enough manpower to deliver their own convoys of food. Moreover, as the 
recent GAO report on the effectiveness of U.N. operations in Bosnia 
discovered, the United Nations has had only limited success in 
delivering humanitarian aid because it has not been consistently 
assertive.
  Second, we cannot do it. There are all of these technical problems 
associated with arming the Bosnians. Some say it will not be easy to 
deliver arms or that the Bosnians will need training. It seems to me 
that these same arguments were made before we decided to arm the Afghan 
resistance.
  I remember a lot of debate we had in here on the Afghan resistance or 
to provide arms to the Salvadorans. In any event, the Bosnians are 
better trained overall than the Afghans were. While logistics may be 
difficult, they are not impossible, since the Bosnians and Croatians 
managed to bring in some arms themselves. The bottom line is that the 
Bosnians have not asked us to solve these problems. They have not asked 
us to do that.

  If the embargo is lifted, other friendly countries will also have the 
opportunity to assist the Bosnians, not just the United States, if we 
so choose.
  The third reason is French and British opposition. The participation 
of the British and French in the U.N. Protection Forces is the main 
reason the British and French object to lifting the embargo. Well, the 
answer is simple: Take out the troops. Take out the U.N. protection 
forces. And until all troops have been evacuated, threaten the Bosnian 
Serbs with NATO airstrikes if any troops are taken hostage or harmed, 
and then be prepared to follow through. We do not want anybody hurt. We 
just want the Bosnians to exercise the right for self-defense.
  The final, most ridiculous argument is that if we lift this embargo, 
it will undermine all the other U.N. embargoes. We have stated--and 
apparently the administration does not disagree--that the arms embargo 
against Bosnia is illegal and cannot be compared to the legal ones 
against Iraq and Libya. We need to remember that Iraq, like Serbia, is 
an aggressor state, while Bosnia is the victim of aggression. This is a 
major, major difference. We are imposing an embargo on somebody who is 
being subjugated--or whatever the term may be--by the aggressors, the 
Serbs.
  So, Mr. President, it seems to me that all these questions--and there 
may be others, and there may be some that should be addressed, and we 
are going to have a rather lengthy debate on this very important 
issue--I think the real question, again, comes back to leadership. Are 
we prepared as a country, as the world leader--which no question about 
it is the United States--to exert the leadership necessary to end this 
illegal and immoral embargo in Bosnia and allow the Bosnians to defend 
their homes and families?
  Whether or not it is too late or too difficult is not a decision for 
us or the international community to make. I have a feeling it is not 
too late. I have a feeling there are going to be a lot more atrocities 
committed and many other things are going to happen in that part of the 
world, in Bosnia, maybe in Kosova, maybe Macedonia, or somewhere else. 
I think this is a decision the Bosnians ought to make. We should not 
make up their minds and say, ``Oh, it is too late,'' or too this, or 
not enough, or whatever.
  Again, I will go back to the conversation we had with Prime Minister 
Silajdzic, when we were told--and this startled me; I did not know 
this--they had one rifle for every four men, and eight tanks in 300. It 
seems to me that the moral position is fairly clear.
  I have to say, finally, it is their country and their independence 
and their future, and all they want us to do is to give them their 
right to defend themselves. I do not see that as anything that should 
require a great deal of debate. I mean, just because we might somehow 
offend the sensibilities of the French and British--who can take out 
their troops--or we can persuade them to lift the arms embargo, too. In 
my view, if this legislation passed, it would so strengthen the 
President's hand, that he would be in a very strong position to go to 
the British and French and say: Wait a minute, let us see if we cannot 
do something here, the right thing.
  I will say, in conclusion, as I said in at the outset several weeks 
ago: It was our hope that this was going to support the President; not 
in any way undermine him, but strengthen his hand. And based on former 
decisions and personal discussions with the President, I think he 
agrees with us.
  I hope this legislation will pass, and if it passes, that it will be 
with strong bipartisan support and for the right reasons.
  Mr. PELL addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Rhode Island [Mr. Pell] 
is recognized.
  Mr. PELL. Mr. President, last Friday, the Senate began debate on a 
bill that directs the President to lift the United States arms embargo 
against Bosnia and Herzegovina. As we continue this debate today, I 
would like to review for my colleagues the points made in opposition to 
the Dole-Lieberman bill.
  In January, the Senate voted to adopt a sense-of-the-Senate amendment 
to the State Department authorization bill calling on the President to 
lift the United States arms embargo against Bosnia. I was one of a few 
Members who voted against that provision, and I continue to hold to 
that position today.
  As I said last Friday, I, in fact, found many of the arguments in 
favor of lifting the arms embargo to be quite compelling. Clearly, the 
people of Bosnia are suffering greatly, and Bosnian Government forces 
are outgunned by the Bosnian Serb aggressors, as we saw most recently 
in Gorazde. Although the NATO ultimatum of April 22 appears to have 
relieved the Serb bombing of Gorazde, regrettably, in other parts of 
Bosnia, the reckless violence against civilians continues.
  As my esteemed colleague Lee Hamilton and I wrote in a piece in last 
Thursday's New York Times, lifting the embargo appears to be a way of 
showing support and sympathy for the beleaguered government and people 
of Bosnia. It seems like an easy, cost-free solution.
  It may make us feel better, but I believe it is bad policy that could 
yield disastrous results. I ask unanimous consent that at the end of my 
remarks, the piece from the Times be printed in the Record.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. PELL. Now, however, I would like to touch upon several of the 
reasons why I believe unilaterally lifting the embargo is a bad idea.
  First, it would put the United States in the position of abrogating a 
United Nations Security Council Resolution, and in essence, breaking 
international law. Second, it could begin a process of unilateral 
United States involvement in the Bosnia conflict--or as some Senators 
have put it--start us down the slippery slope to greater engagement in 
the crisis. Third, unilaterally lifting the arms embargo could actually 
leave the Bosnian Government forces vulnerable to further Serbian 
obstruction of humanitarian assistance and brutal attack. Fourth, 
lifting the embargo at this time could upset the delicate peace process 
underway.
  Many of my colleagues have made the point that the international 
community may be contributing to the problem by denying the Bosnian 
Government the right to defend itself. We have heard many times that we 
owe it to the people of Bosnia to ``level the playing field.'' Some of 
my colleagues have made powerful arguments to that affect. I believe, 
however, that if steps are to be taken, the United Nations, not the 
United States going it alone, should take them. The embargo is in place 
as a result of a binding U.N. Security Council resolution and can only 
be abrogated by a subsequent U.N. Security Council action. A unilateral 
lifting of the arms embargo would set a dangerous precedent. Other 
countries could choose to ignore Security Council resolutions that we 
consider important--such as the embargo against Iraq and sanctions 
against Libya.

  There have been recent reports that the international consensus on 
the embargo against Iraq may be at risk. Apparently, Turkey, France, 
Russia, China, and perhaps others are ready to support a lifting of the 
embargo on Iraqi oil sales. Some countries or companies may even be 
contemplating deals that violate the current sanctions regime. If the 
Senate were to signal its approval of a unilateral abrogation of a U.N. 
embargo, we would be giving a green light to those who may be looking 
for an excuse to violate the embargo against Iraq. In the long run, I 
would argue that containing the threat posed by Saddam Hussein is a 
higher United States priority than supplying arms to Bosnia. If the 
United States lifts the embargo on Bosnia--a step which by no means 
guarantees success--we would assuredly undermine international resolve 
on Iraq. In my opinion, taking a gamble on Bosnia is not worth 
destroying the coalition, the consensus we have worked so hard to 
build, on Iraq.
  As many said in the previous discussion, U.S. integrity is on the 
line. I agree wholeheartedly. If the United States were to break the 
embargo on its own, we would destroy our credibility as a trustworthy 
leader in international affairs. A unilateral lifting of the arms 
embargo would undoubtedly strain our relations with Britain, France, 
Russia, and other countries with troops on the ground in Bosnia--and 
would undermine our trustworthiness in other international negotiations 
completely unrelated to the Bosnian tragedy.
  I find myself in agreement with the sentiments expressed by other 
Senators 2 weeks ago that a unilateral lifting of the arms embargo 
could be perceived as the beginning of a United States decision to go 
alone in Bosnia. It is naive to think we can unilaterally lift the arms 
embargo, and then walk away. We instead would assume responsibility for 
Bosnia not only in terms of our moral obligation, but in practical 
terms as well. Delivering weapons to Bosnia would likely require 
sending in United States personnel. Granted, this legislation states 
that nothing should be construed as authorizing the deployment of 
United States forces to Bosnia and Herzegovina for any purpose. But I 
want to emphasize that this would be a U.S. decision to dismantle the 
embargo. It would not be a U.N. decision, nor a NATO decision, nor a 
decision made with the support of other countries with a stake in the 
conflict. I therefore do not see how we can lift the embargo on our own 
without sending in the personnel to carry out the policy.
  Lifting the embargo without international support would increase 
American responsibility for the outcome of the conflict. If we take 
unilateral action, we will assume the lead international role in 
Bosnia. If we were to take the initiative and supply arms on our own, 
our allies, who I admit, have not always been the most cooperative, 
could step back even further and say, ``It may be our continent, but 
it's your job now to see this through; it's America's problem to 
solve.''
  Before we take any step that could lead to greater U.S. action--and I 
argue that unilaterally lifting the arms embargo would do just that--we 
need to answer some serious questions. A year ago this month, I wrote 
an op-ed piece in which I stated:

       Terrible human-rights abuses--torture, rape and slaughter--
     run rampant in Bosnia. But as horrible as the situation is 
     there, other parts of the world--Kashmir, Cambodia, Nagorno-
     Karabakh, Sudan, and Liberia--are also experiencing reckless 
     violence and grave abuses that breed instability.

  Sadly, in the year that has passed since I wrote those words, the 
carnage in Bosnia has continued, and more countries have been added to 
my list--Rwanda, Haiti, Yemen.
  A year ago, I asked: ``Why should we intervene in Bosnia? Why is 
Bosnia different from other places of conflict in the world? What are 
American interests in Bosnia?'' Regrettably, we are no closer to having 
answers to those questions today than we were a year ago. Without those 
answers, I cannot support any action that would launch us headlong into 
a military quagmire.
  I am concerned too, about the negative impact that lifting the arms 
embargo could have on the Bosnian people. I know that the Bosnian 
Government has asked that the arms embargo be lifted, and it may appear 
rather presumptuous for us to tell the Bosnian Government that we know 
what is best for it. But if the United States were to lift the embargo 
on our own, our allies with troops on the ground would very likely pull 
out of portions of Bosnia, leaving the Moslem enclaves even more 
vulnerable to Bosnian Serb attacks and the obstruction of the delivery 
of humanitarian relief supplies.
  There would likely be a lagtime too--anywhere from 6 weeks to 6 
months by many estimates--for weapons to be delivered to Bosnia. During 
that lagtime, the Serbs will undoubtedly move swiftly to crush Bosnian 
Government forces. Moreover, the United States will receive the brunt 
of the blame when hundreds, if not thousands, of Bosnians die from lack 
of basic supplies.
  Finally, a unilateral lifting of the embargo could endanger progress 
on the international negotiations underway and jeopardize the gains 
made to date through diplomacy. If we were to lift the arms embargo, 
all parties to the negotiations would lose incentive to reach a 
negotiated settlement. In characteristic fashion, the Bosnian Serbs 
would likely rush to grab even more land before arms could be delivered 
to the Bosnians; the Bosnian Government may take the lifting of the 
arms embargo as a signal that the United States intends to intervene, 
and may lose interest in a negotiated settlement; Croatia, currently in 
a fragile alliance with Bosnia, would either prevent the transit of the 
arms across its territory or insist upon its own cut, potentially 
upsetting the delicate negotiations occurring between Serbia and 
Croatia over the status of the U.N. protected areas in Croatia.
  Admittedly, the diplomatic process in the Balkans has not been 
perfect. There continue to be setbacks, but there also have been some 
important accomplishments, including the breaking of the siege of 
Sarajevo and the signing of a peace agreement between Moslems and 
Croats in Bosnia. If we build upon these and other accomplishments, we 
have the hope of a comprehensive peace. I, for one, believe it unwise 
to upset the sensitive negotiation process now underway.
  I acknowledged earlier that I see merit in some of the arguments of 
the bill's proponents. This is a difficult problem that cuts across 
partisan lines and that slices to the heart of issues related to U.S. 
influence and power abroad. We are, as public servants, called upon to 
exercise our best judgment on this very difficult issue. My conscience 
tells me that unilaterally lifting the arms embargo is the wrong thing 
to do, and I therefore must oppose this bill.

                               Exhibit 1

                 [From the New York Times, May 5, 1994]

                            Don't Arm Bosnia

                (By Claiborne Pell and Lee H. Hamilton)

       Washington.--When the Bosnian Serbs unleashed their fierce 
     attacks on Gorazde last month, sentiment grew for the United 
     States to lift the embargo that is keeping arms from reaching 
     the Bosnian Muslims. The Senate is to take up that debate 
     today.
       Bosnia has suffered much in this vicious war. Lifting the 
     embargo would be a way of showing support and sympathy for 
     its beleaguered Government and people. It seems like an easy, 
     cost-free solution. But it is a bad idea. Lifting the embargo 
     will neither level the playing field, as proponents argue, 
     nor help the Bosnian cause.
       While President Clinton says he wants to lift the embargo, 
     he has also repeatedly said that he will not do so 
     unilaterally. No permanent member of the United Nations 
     Security Council supports lifting the embargo. Yet some 
     members of Congress now advocate unilateral action.
       What would happen if the U.S. acted alone to lift the arms 
     embargo? First, it would Americanize the war, signaling that 
     the U.S. was entering on the side of the Bosnian Muslims. We 
     would become responsible for Bosnia's fate.
       Second, unilateral action would encourage others to violate 
     sanctions elsewhere, in particular the embargoes on Iraq and 
     Libya. To Bosnia's detriment, it would encourage other 
     countries to violate trade and financial sanctions against 
     Serbia.
       Third, to lift the embargo now would send exactly the wrong 
     signal at a fragile and pivotal moment in the peace talks.
       For the Muslims, it would hold out the unrealistic prospect 
     of better weapons, U.S. intervention--even victory. The 
     Bosnian Government would lose interest in a negotiated 
     settlement. The Serbs, understanding that the Muslims might 
     get more arms, would move swiftly to crush Bosnian Government 
     forces. Both sides would be tempted to intensify a war that 
     neither can win. Peace elsewhere in the Balkans would be 
     undermined.
       That's not all. The U.N. Protection Force in Bosnia would 
     come under fire. Those with troops on the ground, including 
     Britain, France and Canada, would come under heavy domestic 
     pressure to withdraw. If the U.N. forces left, the 
     humanitarian mission in Bosnia--on which two out of three 
     Bosnians depend--would be at risk, and the U.S. would be 
     blamed.
       NATO, meanwhile, is working closely with the United States 
     on a strategy of force and diplomacy for a peace settlement 
     in Bosnia. If we lifted the embargo unilaterally, that 
     strategy would fall apart, opening a serious rift in the 
     alliance. And relations with Russia would suffer, since 
     Moscow would find itself under great pressure to provide arms 
     to the Serbs.
       Lifting the embargo is not as easy as it sounds. Who would 
     provide the weapons, and how would they be delivered to the 
     landlocked Bosnian forces? And who would train the Bosnians?
       The legal basis for lifting the embargo is shaky, too. 
     Proponents selectively cite the U.N. Charter, saying it 
     guarantees the right of ``individual or collective self-
     defense.'' But it also says this right cannot negate Security 
     Council action to maintain or restore international peace and 
     security.
       Despite setbacks, we now have our best opportunity in three 
     years to try to end this war. Diplomacy is working: since 
     February there has been an end to the sieges of Sarajevo and 
     Tuzla, a peace agreement between Muslims and Croats in 
     Bosnia, a formal ceasefire between the Croatian Government 
     and Serbs in Croatia, a dramatic overall reduction in 
     fighting throughout Bosnia and an end to the shelling of 
     Gorazde. Talks on a comprehensive peace are at a delicate 
     stage. Only those talks can end the fighting.
       The U.S. does not want to become a party to this war. We do 
     not have vital national interests; what we do have are 
     pressing humanitarian and political interests in ending the 
     fighting. A negotiated settlement is precisely what the 
     Administration, NATO, the European Union and the U.N. are 
     trying to pursue. Our frustration with the peace process 
     should not compel us to choose a course that would prolong, 
     intensify and widen the war.
  Mr. McCAIN. Mr. President, last week I had intended to speak and vote 
in support of the legislation offered by Senators Dole and Lieberman to 
end the arms embargo against the Government of Bosnia. However, as we 
all know, debate was postponed until today. The parliamentary situation 
is a little confused at the moment, but as I understand it, the Senate 
will be asked to consider not only the Dole-Lieberman bill, but 
subsequent legislation offered by the distinguished majority leader. 
The details of the majority leader's legislation are unclear at 
present, but they may include authorization for the President to use 
American air power to enforce the United Nations exclusion zones in 
Bosnia.
  I have in the recent past called for the opportunity to vote on such 
authorization. So, if we are to do so, I am pleased to begin that 
debate now. And I am pleased that the Senate can vote on the arms 
embargo question and the use of force question separately. I would not 
have liked the fate of the former to depend on the fate of the latter, 
for I think one course is just and the other foolish.
  As my colleagues know, I support lifting the arms embargo and oppose 
using American force in Bosnia. The Dole-Lieberman legislation requires 
the President to lift the embargo, but does not authorize the use of 
force. The last draft of the majority leader's resolution which I saw 
does not compel the President to lift the embargo, it only urges him to 
promptly consider such action.
  Mr. President, I want to commend Senators Dole and Lieberman for 
sponsoring this bill. Lifting the arms embargo against the Bosnians--
multilaterally if possible, unilaterally if necessary--is the only 
action which the United States and the United Nations can take that 
might help the Bosnians achieve a more equitable settlement of this 
terrible conflict without deploying massive numbers of ground troops to 
roll back Serb territorial gains.
  Better armed and better able to defend themselves, the Bosnians might 
be able to present a more credible, long-term threat to Serb conquests, 
and by so doing convince the Serbs to re-think their refusal to 
relinquish any substantial portion of their gains or risk those gains 
in a more protracted war.
  Besides addressing the sound argument that territory is not conquered 
or held by air forces, but by infantries, this amendment has the 
additional attraction of being just. I think we all believe that the 
cause of the Bosnians is just. And if we do not believe our own 
interests are sufficiently at risk to warrant the intervention of 
United States ground forces and the sacrifice of American lives to 
defend the Bosnians--and I do not believe they are--then to impede the 
rights of Bosnians to defend themselves is a gross injustice.
  As others have observed, the United Nations embargo was imposed in 
July 1991 against Yugoslavia. At that time, Bosnia was part of 
Yugoslavia. Today, Bosnia is an independent nation, and recognized as 
such by the United States and the United Nations. As an independent 
state and member of the United Nations, Bosnia has an inherent right to 
self-defense.
  Bosnian independence has rendered the arms embargo outdated. It is 
without legal standing, and, in fact, violates the sovereign rights of 
a United Nations member state that is under attack by forces supported 
by a neighboring state.
  Article 2 of the charter states:

       The inherent right to self-defense is a pre-eminent right 
     of international law, and may not be abridged by actions of 
     the Security Council.

  Article 51 of the charter states:

       Nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent 
     right of individual or collective self-defense if an armed 
     attack occurs against a member of the United Nations, until 
     the Security Council has taken measures necessary to maintain 
     international peace and security.

  Mr. President, it is clear, in my view, that the Security Council has 
not taken ``measures necessary to maintain international peace and 
security.'' As I have already implied, to do so would require the 
deployment of sufficient numbers of ground troops to defeat the Serb 
aggressors on the battlefield. Understandably, the United Nations has 
no intention of making that kind of commitment.
  Opponents of the Dole-Lieberman resolution argue that were the United 
States to unilaterally violate the arms embargo, other countries would 
be emboldened to violate other U.N. embargoes--specifically, the very 
necessary embargo currently imposed on Iraq. The differences between 
these two situations are so obvious that I am a little surprised that 
such a false comparison is even raised.
  Bosnia is a victim state whose sovereignty has been attacked by an 
externally supported aggressor. Iraq, is an aggressor state that 
violated the territorial integrity of a neighbor, and would do so again 
if given half a chance. Thus, the embargo imposed against Iraq has 
sound standing in international law. The embargo against Bosnia is 
unlawful.
  Should any nation use the lifting of the arms embargo against Bosnia 
as an excuse to violate the embargo against Iraq--and France has been 
identified as a possible violator of the Iraqi embargo under this 
circumstance--then they would be in violation of international law, and 
should be held accountable for their transgression.
  I would like to believe, Mr. President, that American diplomacy still 
possesses enough force and credibility that we could prevent a close 
ally from taking such an unlawful action--an action that would so 
clearly be in neither the national interest of France or any other 
nation with regard for international peace and security.
  Mr. President, I have also heard the argument that if the United 
States and the United Nations want to economize the violence in Bosnia, 
and bring the war to its quickest possible conclusion then we should 
not lift this embargo. If the embargo remains in effect, then the 
Bosnian Government will have little choice but to accept the very 
unfair terms that the Serbs will impose on them to settle the conflict 
now.
  Mr. President, such a forced settlement may hold for awhile. But the 
ancient enmities will not die. The aspirations of the Bosnian people to 
restore to their children a viable sovereignty will not long be 
suppressed. Nationalism for good or for ill is a durable--a very 
durable--yearning. War would return to Bosnia.
  By supporting the Bosnians inherent right to self-defense, I cannot 
predict that the Bosnian Government will prevail in this war. I cannot 
predict that the Bosnians will even recover significant amounts of 
territory from the Serbs to make an eventual settlement of the conflict 
more equitable. But they have the right to try. They have the right to 
try. And the United States should do nothing to interfere with that 
right unless we take it upon ourselves to defend with force the 
national interests of Bosnians. And that, Mr. President, is something I 
sincerely hope we will not do.
  We have already done just that to a small extent, and I believe it 
was a mistake.
  When the United States commits its prestige and the lives of our 
young to resolving a conflict militarily then we must be prepared to 
see the thing through to the end. If you start from the premise--and I 
have heard no voice in Congress in opposition to this premise--that the 
United States will not deploy ground forces in Bosnia, then you 
identify to the enemy the circumstances under which the United States 
can be defeated. You have indicated the conditionality, the half 
heartedness of our commitment. And you have told the Serbs: we may bomb 
you, but if you can withstand that, Bosnia is yours.
  The feckless pinprick air strikes of a few weeks ago surely indicated 
to the Serbs that they could probably withstand the limit of our 
commitment to Bosnia. No one, no one in this Chamber, no one in this 
administration, no one in the U.S. Armed Forces can tell me with any 
degree of confidence that air strikes alone will determine the outcome 
of this war.
  Mr. President, the American people and their elected representatives 
have already made the most important decision governing United States 
involvement in Bosnia. As a nation, we have decided--correctly, in my 
view--that the tragedy in Bosnia--as terrible as it is, as unjust as it 
is, as despicably brutal as it is--the tragedy in Bosnia does not 
directly affect the vital national security interests of the United 
States. We made that decision, Mr. President, when we decided, as a 
nation, not to send American infantry into that conflict.
  Some of the proponents of using American air power in Bosnia have 
argued that the Bosnian civil war does threaten our vital national 
security interests to the extent that it has the potential to spread 
throughout the Balkans, and even to provoke open hostilities between 
two NATO allies--Greece and Turkey. I happen to believe that we can 
contain that conflict. But, for the sake of argument, let me concede 
that the war in Bosnia directly affects our vital national interests.
  If the Government of the United States feels our national interests 
are gravely at risk in that conflict then let's do the honest thing, 
let's do the militarily sound thing, let's do the courageous thing. Let 
us say to Bosnian Serbs and to Serbia: You have threatened the vital 
interests of the most powerful nation on Earth. The United States 
intends to defend those interests by all means necessary, and you can 
expect the invasion of Bosnia--and Serbia, if necessary--by American 
ground forces supported with all available air and sea power.
  If our vital interests are at risk, then we would be grossly 
negligent if we did not take all actions necessary to secure those 
interests.
  Mr. President, bombing tents and trucks may not dissuade the Serbs. 
Bombing bridges, fuel supply lines and ammo depots may not dissuade the 
Serbs. We do not even know with any degree of confidence that bombing 
Belgrade will dissuade the Serbs. What do we do then, Mr. President, 
when our interests remain at risk? We must either sacrifice those 
interests and withdraw in abject defeat. Or we must bring the full 
power of the United States down upon the enemy and slug it out from 
town to town, from hill to hill, from battle to battle until we defeat 
the enemy utterly and secure the interests of this great Nation.
  So. Mr. President, let us authorize the President to use all means 
necessary to protect the interests of the country we are sworn to 
defend. Let us tell the President: Mr. President, you have identified a 
grave threat to our security, now use the force necessary to defeat 
that threat decisively. Use American ground troops to defeat the 
Serbian aggressors who have challenged our security.
  But the fact is, Mr. President, that neither Congress nor the 
President intends to deploy ground troops in Bosnia. Why? Because we 
cannot make a plausible argument to the American people that our 
security is so gravely threatened in Bosnia that it requires the 
sacrifice of our sons and daughters to defend. As I said a few minutes 
ago, America has already ruled on the question of whether our vital 
interests are at stake in Bosnia. We have determined that they are not. 
We made that determination when we decided as a nation that we would 
not use ground forces to settle the conflict.
  So let us not dissemble any longer about how the war in Bosnia 
threatens the security of the United States or NATO. It does not, and 
we all know it. What the President has decided, and what Congress may 
now authorize, is that by incremental escalation--starting with the 
most minimal use of force imaginable--we can intimidate or bluff the 
Serbs into ceasing their aggression.
  We threatened air strikes to protect the safe zone around Sarajevo. 
Serb forces then redeployed to Gorazde where they brought that 
unfortunate city under siege. We then initiated two air strikes to 
protect U.N. peacekeepers in Gorazde. We destroyed a tent, a truck, and 
two armored personnel carriers. The Serbs intensified their barrage 
against Gorazde, and for good measure began shelling the city of 
Tuzla--another declared safe area.
  We have now extended the threat of more destructive air strikes to 
Gorazde, and all the U.N. declared safe areas. The Serbs continued 
shelling for a period, while United Nation officials in Bosnia refused 
NATO permission to launch air strikes. The Serbs have not resumed 
shelling Gorazde for a while now, but they are in violation of the 
ultimatum by keeping armed militia and artillery within the exclusion 
zone. They have also intensified fighting in Brcko (Birchko), where we 
are now contemplating establishing another safe area. They have fought 
two pitched battles with U.N. peacekeepers. They have continued 
shelling areas near Tuzla. And the United Nations has granted 
permission for several Serb tanks to transit through the Sarajevo 
exclusion zone on their way, presumably, to shell some other Muslim-
held area.
  Mr. President, if it weren't for the terrible cost in lives, U.N. and 
NATO actions would turn this tragedy into low comedy. All the while, 
the United States and NATO, to say nothing of the United Nations, are 
bleeding credibility. Yet, by threatening widespread air strikes, we 
expect the Serbs to refrain from the further use of force, and for the 
Moslems to believe that we can convince the Serbs to agree to a more 
equitable peace settlement.
  I have my doubts, Mr. President, I have my doubts.
  I hear quite often now, that we expect Serb acquiescence in our 
demands because they fear NATO's resolve to launch a campaign of 
strategic bombing. Some of my colleagues may not appreciate what 
strategic bombing, in its broadest definition, entails. In short, 
unrestrained strategic bombing requires that we fill the skies with our 
bombers and lay waste to a country. In past conflicts, we called it 
carpet bombing.
  Mr. President, no one seriously believes that the President of the 
United States is contemplating such an action. The civilian casualties 
which such a campaign would unavoidably incur would be devastating. 
Hospitals, schools, friendly forces, Moslems, Croats and Serbs, men, 
women, and children would perish. Strategic bombing is the most 
cataclysmic event in modern warfare with the exception of a nuclear 
detonation.
  What I believe the proponents of air strikes mean when they refer to 
strategic bombing is really widespread tactical bombing--attacking 
again and again as many of the enemy's bridges, or ammunition depots, 
or supply lines as possible. We have that capability, of course. But 
such strikes will surely incur heavy civilian casualties as well.
  I must also point out that a committed foe--and I have no reason to 
believe that the Serbs are not committed--can and will resist such a 
campaign. In Vietnam, we bombed the Than Hoa bridge over a hundred 
times and we never broke North Vietnam's will to fight. We unleashed 
the awesome destructive power of B-52's on Hanoi, a devastation I 
personally witnessed, and still the Vietnamese did not lose their will 
to fight.
  We have sufficient cause to fear that the Serbs will endure whatever 
air strikes NATO undertakes and fight on, especially, if the Serbs know 
that at the end of air strikes, all of Bosnia is theirs for the taking. 
We have cause to fear this, Mr. President, because the Serbs know in 
advance the limits of our commitment. They know that we will not send 
ground troops to force a resolution of the conflict. They know that 
there are certainly limits to the escalation of any bombing campaign we 
are prepared to undertake.
  Neither will the air strikes we are contemplating be, as I have heard 
them described, a piece of cake. Under the best of conditions, to fly 
into a combat zone, find a legitimate target, strike it without doing 
collateral damage, while all the while evading surface-to-air missiles 
is terribly exacting, immensely dangerous, and as frightening an 
experience as human beings can be expected to endure.
  The tactical problems posed by the chronic poor weather and the very 
difficult, mountainous terrain in Bosnia greatly increase the risks of 
missed targets, collateral damage, and the loss of allied pilots. We 
saw a pretty good indication of the problem and its costs during the 
air strikes in Gorazde. Low cloud cover requires us to fly in low, well 
within range of Serb SA7's. We will lose planes, Mr. President; 
possibly quite a few planes. Artillery, tanks, even field command 
centers will be hard to find and easy to move. Harder targets, like 
bridges and ammo dumps will be defended by surface-to-air missiles.
  We must also consider the welfare of the U.N. peacekeepers currently 
deployed in Bosnia before we launch these air strikes. Will we withdraw 
them in advance of the strikes or will we leave them in place, hostages 
to the terrible fortunes of war?
  Mr. President, I will close by reiterating a sentiment I have 
expressed before: I hope every subsequent development in Bosnia proves 
me wrong. I hope the Serbs feel they have consumed enough of Bosnia 
that the capture of additional territory is not worth risking their 
lives and equipment in anticipated NATO air strikes. I hope U.S. 
actions precipitate a just and lasting settlement to this terrible 
conflict. I hope the entire world is impressed by the courage and 
wisdom of American leaders.
  I may be wrong, Mr. President. But on a question of such importance 
to my country, I must use all of my experience to guide my judgment. I 
must use all of the lessons I have learned in a lifetime about when and 
how our Nation should go to war. And all of my experience tells me that 
this is not the place, and this is not the time for the United States 
to intervene militarily in the defense of another people's sovereignty.
  For very sound reasons I fear greatly that will not be proved wrong, 
Mr. President. I fear that the United States is about to embark on an 
undefined military adventure where the limits to our force have been 
clearly revealed to the enemy in advance of its use; where out of 
concern for our prestige we will be drawn deeper and deeper into war or 
compelled to sacrifice that prestige and many lives to a cause we were 
not prepared to win; where the aggrieved party has been prevented by us 
from fighting in their own defense; where television and the best of 
intentions have made us squander that most valuable of diplomatic 
tools--credibility; where American foreign policy is crippled for the 
duration of this administration.
  If I am wrong, Mr. President, I will gladly admit to the error. But 
even if I am wrong, I would still counsel against the use of force by 
similar means and under similar circumstances. Let us not draw the 
wrong lesson from what would be nothing more than extraordinary good 
luck and engage in such recklessness elsewhere. This is grim, dangerous 
business we are about to authorize. It has not been well planned, and 
it may not end well, and, irrespective of its outcome, it was not--I 
repeat, not--undertaken in the best interests of this country.
  Mr. President, I strongly support Senator Dole and Senator 
Lieberman's legislation. I strongly feel that we must allow these 
people to defend themselves. As the Vice President of Bosnia said in my 
office 3 weeks ago, ``We are dying. At least let us die fighting.'' If 
we do not lift this embargo with or without--hopefully with--the 
agreement of the United Nations, we will have a blot on the history of 
this Nation which will take a long time to erase because we failed to 
allow a decent and honorable people to defend themselves.
  I would like to make an additional comment, Mr. President, about the 
impact that has not been discussed on the floor of this situation in 
Bosnia. Throughout the Moslem world today, Moslems are wondering and 
asking the question: Would the United States and the United Nations be 
so loath to lift this embargo if these people were not Moslems?
  A couple of weeks ago, there were large-scale demonstrations in 
Ankara, Istanbul. Islamic fundamentalism, which is a great threat to 
peace and freedom throughout the world, is using the cause of the 
Moslems in Bosnia as a way to inflame and, indeed, enrage the passions 
of Moslem peoples throughout the world.
  Mr. President, it is an unjust charge that the United States of 
America and the United Nations is discriminating against Moslem 
peoples. But believe me, it is real and it can have far-reaching 
consequences as well.
  Mr. President, I have confidence that this body will vote 
overwhelmingly in favor of lifting the embargo. There is no other just 
course. Now I hope that that action will embolden this administration 
to go to the United Nations, seek the lifting of the embargo and use 
the position of leadership in the world to see that that happens so 
that we are not faced with a distasteful likelihood of violating a 
United Nations resolution.
  At the same time, we should make it very clear that if other nations 
do not choose to follow our leadership, then we, as the most powerful 
nation in the world, which has stood for the rights of man for over 200 
years, will exercise in a unilateral fashion what we know is right and 
just.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. THURMOND addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from South Carolina [Mr. 
Thurmond].
  Mr. THURMOND. Mr. President, I wish to congratulate the able Senator 
from Arizona for his fine interest in this subject and the sound 
position he has taken in regard to it.
  Mr. President, I supported the Dole amendment to lift the Bosnian 
arms embargo when it first came before the Senate a few weeks ago. 
Nothing has happened since then to change my mind. If anything, the 
situation in Bosnia demands more than ever that we end the embargo on 
the Bosnian Moslems.
  Many of my colleagues have already argued eloquently in favor of the 
current bill offered by Senators Dole and Lieberman. It enjoys broad 
support, and has 32 cosponsors. I will not take the Senate's time to 
repeat all the arguments. But I would like to make two points that I 
feel have not been adequately considered during this debate.
  First, opponents of this legislation seem to be equating a decision 
to lift the embargo with a commitment to arm and train Bosnian 
Government forces. I believe this view is a mistake. In fact, I believe 
this confusion may be the reason some Senators oppose it, in particular 
those who do not want to see the United States dragged deeper into the 
Bosnian quagmire.
  I do not want to see the United States more deeply involved either. 
But lifting the embargo does not necessarily involve us more deeply. It 
does not obligate America to undertake the immense logistical 
challenges of providing heavy weapons to the Bosnian Moslems. It does 
not require us to incur the political risks of sending in U.S. 
trainers, thereby becoming active participants in the war, and putting 
American lives in jeopardy.
  What the bill does achieve is to stake out an indisputable moral 
position. America is not obligated to intervene militarily on the side 
of the Bosnians, or remedy their lack of tanks and artillery. But if we 
are not going to defend the Bosnians or protect their noncombatants 
from indiscriminate slaughter, it is immoral for us to deny them access 
to the means to defend themselves.
  Passing this amendment by Senator Dole and Senator Lieberman simply 
means that the United States will no longer use its military or naval 
units to enforce the embargo. It will allow the Bosnians on their own 
to acquire the arms they are seeking--primarily light infantry weapons, 
antitank weapons, and mortars--to defend their villages, and engage the 
Serbs more effectively at longer ranges.
  My second point is this. In addition to the moral principle involved, 
S. 2042 embodies an important legal principle. Its passage will 
reaffirm the traditional American principle that every state has the 
right to defend itself. The inherent right of self-defense is a 
fundamental right, enshrined in the U.N. Charter itself. It may not be 
overturned or abrogated by subsequent acts or resolutions of any 
international body, especially the United Nations. If the United 
Nations wants to regain a measure of its lost credibility and moral 
authority, it must act in accord with its own charter.
  In effect, this bill would correct a serious legal error by 
committing the United States to the position that U.N. Resolution 713 
imposing the embargo was misapplied. The newly independent states that 
emerged from the breakup of Yugoslavia--states whose sovereignty we 
recognized--should not have been subjected to an embargo in the first 
place.
  Mr. President, I am under no illusions that this step or any other 
will bring about a lasting peace settlement. The West has tried to 
broker a negotiated peace without success, and some Senators argue that 
lifting the embargo will only prolong the agony. But everything else we 
have tried to end the aggression of the Serbs has failed. Now the 
situation has deteriorated to the point that a new factor is needed to 
change the military dynamics in this largely one-sided war. Now that we 
have been drawn into the Bosnian conflict, we have some degree of 
responsibility. We will pay a penalty for doing nothing, although none 
of the options open to us are attractive.
  Mr. President, even if lifting the embargo does not achieve peace, I 
do not feel we can continue a policy that forces the Bosnian Moslems to 
remain defenseless against Serbian tanks and heavy artillery, with no 
means to protect their old and helpless, their women and children. Our 
current policy has proven to be neither practical nor moral. We have to 
try something else, and I believe that S. 2042 is a proper and 
necessary step in that direction.
  I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, as I yield the floor, I wish to congratulate Senator 
Dole and Senator Lieberman for sponsoring this amendment. They are on 
the right track, and I hope we can pass their resolution.
  Mr. President, I yield the floor.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN addressed the Chair.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Connecticut [Mr. 
Lieberman].
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair, and I thank my distinguished 
colleague from South Carolina for his support of this amendment and for 
his words of praise at the end of his statement.


                         Privilege of the floor

  Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent at the outset that Debra 
Shelton, a congressional fellow on my staff, have access to the Senate 
floor during consideration of S. 2042.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, I am honored to join with the Senator from Kansas in 
introducing S. 2042, the aim of which, as has been stated, is to lift 
the arms embargo on Bosnia. I am pleased, also, that Senator Dole and I 
have 31 other cosponsors from both parties. This is genuinely a 
bipartisan expression of not just opinion, but a call for action and 
leadership on this vexing problem of what we can do to fulfill our 
strategic interests and moral responsibilities in the conflict in 
Bosnia.
  I want to say, Mr. President, in terms of the bipartisanship of this 
effort, that the Senator from Kansas and I did not begin working on 
this matter during the Democratic administration of President Clinton. 
We worked side by side during the Republican administration of 
President Bush where the Senator from Kansas was equally as direct and 
outspoken and, in that case, opposed to a policy that was being pursued 
by the then Republican administration. So this is truly a bipartisan 
effort, and as the Senator from Kansas said, it is an effort that we 
have conceived to do at least two things procedurally apart from what 
it does substantively.
  The first is to create a common ground on this complicated question 
of our policy in Bosnia. There are those of us who favor the limited 
use of allied air power to even the battle and to bring the parties to 
the peace table more quickly. There are many other colleagues who do 
not support the use of air power in Bosnia. But as the Senator from 
Kansas and I discussed the conflict in Bosnia with our colleagues, we 
felt that there was a common, bipartisan ground on the baseline 
question of lifting the arms embargo to allow the Bosnians to defend 
themselves--not to send American soldiers to Bosnia. As the Senator 
from Arizona indicated earlier, nobody that I have heard in the 
Congress has suggested that sending United States troops to Bosnia is a 
good idea. Certainly this Senator does not feel that way.
  Even though there is some opposition to this bill calling for the 
United States to lift the arms embargo multilaterally if possible, but 
unilaterally if necessary, our hope was, and still is, that there is a 
common ground on which a lot of us can come together and fulfill our 
national interests and the moral imperative in this conflict.
  The second procedural goal of this bill, as Senator Dole has 
indicated, is that the passage of this measure would strengthen the 
hand of President Clinton in dealing with the conflict in Bosnia and in 
working with our allies in NATO in dealing with the conflict.
  Mr. President, it was just a little more than a year ago that the 
Clinton administration adopted a two-part policy regarding Bosnia, the 
so-called ``lift and strike policy''--lift the arms embargo to give the 
Bosnians the weapons with which they could defend themselves, and, 
along with our allies, to strike from the air at minimal risk to 
American personnel to hit aggressive Serbian targets. All of this was 
aimed at bringing the parties to the peace table because without this 
lift and strike policy the Serbs--who in this Senator's opinion are the 
aggressors and who have carried out genocidal acts--are free to 
continue not just to roam but to carry out acts of aggression without 
fear of consequence.
  This bill follows on the heels of the administration's successful 
convincing of our allies in the aftermath of the Serbian attack on 
civilians in Sarajevo in February of this year to use air power 
selectively. This effort helped bring peace to Sarajevo which has been 
torn by war throughout so many of the preceding months, and led to 
another ultimatum concerning Gorazde. After the very limited use of air 
strikes, we saw significant--although not total--adherence by the Serbs 
to the exclusion zones.
  So now we have the strike policy. I accept the point that the Senator 
from Arizona has made that conflicts are not won with air power alone; 
that it is necessary to create some power on the ground, but not by 
sending in U.S. soldiers. Soldiers are already there; they are Bosnian-
Moslem soldiers. But they do not have the arms to fight with. Give them 
those arms by lifting this arms embargo.
  This Senator certainly sees this amendment as supporting the policy 
of lift and strike that the President of the United States adopted more 
than a year ago and giving him the leverage of a measure passed by the 
Senate of the United States to take with him to negotiate with our 
allies in NATO and others in the United Nations, hopefully, to convince 
them to lift the arms embargo multilaterally.
  Mr. President, this measure that we are debating today is similar to 
an amendment that Senator Dole and I and many others cosponsored to the 
bankruptcy bill that was before the Senate more than 2 weeks ago. Many 
Senators came to the floor that day and voiced their support for our 
proposal. Others, of course, came and expressed concerns, reservations, 
and opposition. But I thought that the debate which took place that day 
was an important one, and was characterized by an honest desire of all 
parties to bring the slaughter and the conflict in Bosnia to an end.
  I fully expect the exchange of views that we have here today on this 
bill will be similarly direct and constructive as they certainly have 
been so far as I have listened to the debate this morning. It is 
appropriate that the Senate of the United States should be considering 
these critical matters.
  Mr. President, it is obvious that we are at a difficult time, an 
unclear and unsettling time, in world events. The cold war is over. We 
have achieved an extraordinary victory in the victory of freedom over 
tyranny, of capitalism over communism, of free economies over state-
controlled economies. Yet, the world that we find today is 
characterized, in many ways by greater instability. The cold war 
position of two great powers, the United States and the Soviet Union, 
each with an enormous nuclear capacity against one another, imposed an 
order of sorts to global affairs. It was easier to choose sides. In 
regional conflicts throughout the world, the forces of freedom tended 
to be arrayed against the forces of tyranny and communism. Most 
regional conflicts had a side that expressed our values and required us 
to act to protect our national interests. Behind those conflicts, 
however, was always the looming fear of a nuclear confrontation between 
the two great powers.
  All that is essentially gone. In the conflicts that occur in the 
world today and that are brought not only to us but to our constituents 
through the power of the electronic media, we must determine where 
American policy should attempt to work its will, and where, if 
anywhere, we should join force with that policy to protect America's 
strategic interests and to uphold our principles; to be true to our 
moral traditions which have always distinguished this country.
  These decisions are not easy. I understand that in this case they are 
not easy for many Members of this Chamber. In the opinion of this 
Senator, the conflict in Bosnia is one in which the United States has 
strategic and moral interests; strategic interests in part because of 
our historic connection to Europe: not just because this country was 
settled by Europeans, but because we have seen in this century how 
conflict in Europe has drawn us twice into world war.
  We also have a strategic interest in the conflict in Bosnia because 
it will set a standard for the resolution of those many other ethnic 
and national conflicts that have been unleashed by the dissolution of 
the Soviet Union.
  Further, I believe we have humanitarian and moral interests as once 
again we have watched genocidal acts carried out against a people 
simply because of their religion--in this case, because they are 
Moslem.
  Are these interests that we have-- strategic and moral--enough to 
justify sending American soldiers to fight in Bosnia? My answer is no. 
Is it enough of an interest for us to be involved in the policy of lift 
and strike that the administration articulated more than a year ago? My 
answer is yes. That is why I am cosponsoring this amendment with the 
Senator from Kansas [Mr. Dole].
  There is a strong moral argument here, because in lifting the arms 
embargo we will be restoring to the sovereign and legitimate government 
of Bosnia and Herzegovina the right to defend its people, its 
territory, and, in fact, its very existence. What right can be more 
basic to a state than the right to defend its own continued existence? 
This embargo denies the Bosnians that fundamental right.
  The argument here is both moral and legal. The moral argument is, in 
my view, the more powerful argument. The moral argument says that when 
a people want to fight to protect their families, their homes, their 
country, it is immoral to deny them the means by which they can do 
that.
  It is a moral argument to lift this embargo because the Bosnians are 
the victims. They have been the victims of aggression. They have been 
the victims of genocidal acts. It is wrong for us to stand by and turn 
a deaf ear and a closed eye to the fervent and direct appeals of duly 
elected leaders of Bosnia to us, to this Government, to this Congress, 
to this Senate, to so many of us individually, ``Please, send us the 
weapons with which we can defend ourselves.''
  Mr. President, there is also a legal argument. I think to explore 
that legal argument we have to go back to the beginnings of this 
process.
  The U.N. Security Council adopted Resolution No. 713 on September 25, 
1991.
  This resolution imposed an arms embargo on Yugoslavia. What is 
interesting, as we look back at the history here, is that this 
resolution was passed at the request of the then government of 
Yugoslavia, centered in Belgrade and dominated by the Serbs. The 
resolution was part of an overall policy expressed by the United 
Nations, in which the United Nations adopted a series of goals that 
were aimed at avoiding war and conflict in the former Yugoslavia.
  The reality is, of course, that that United Nations policy failed. 
And in the 2\1/2\ years since that original resolution was adopted, a 
bloody, savage war has ensued. I think it is important to remember that 
the premise of the arms embargo was to keep arms from flowing into the 
former Yugoslavia, as part of an overall policy to avoid war there; 
this policy failed. Thus, the political premise of the arms embargo, 
let alone the legal premises, no longer exist.
  To continue with the legal argument, we must note that at the time of 
the 1991 resolution, Bosnia had not yet received independent statehood; 
it was a part of Yugoslavia.
  On January 4, 1992, the Secretary General of the United Nations 
submitted a report to the Security Council arguing that the arms 
embargo against Yugoslavia should continue in force and would continue 
to apply to all areas of Yugoslavia, notwithstanding any decisions 
which were pending at that time on the question of the recognition of 
the independence of certain republics that had been part of Yugoslavia.
  On January 8, 4 days later, the Security Council adopted Resolution 
No. 727, which referenced the Secretary General's report that I have 
just mentioned, and determined that the arms embargo should apply as 
the report suggested. At that time, it is important to point out from a 
legal perspective, Bosnia still had not achieved statehood and remained 
a constituent entity of Yugoslavia. Thus, when adopted on January 8, 
1992, this resolution did apply to Bosnia since it was not an 
independent state and was not entitled, therefore, to a right of self-
defense.
  From February 29 to March 1, 1992, Bosnia held a historic referendum 
on the question of whether it should become an independent state, and, 
of course, the people voted that they did want to establish themselves 
as an independent state. In fact, Bosnia was recognized just a little 
bit more than a month later, on April 7, 1992, by the Government of the 
United States, and became a member of the United Nations on May 22, 
1992.
  Since Bosnia became a member of the United Nations, there have been 
no Security Council resolutions which impose the arms embargo on Bosnia 
itself. Subsequent resolutions refer to previous acts as a matter of 
course, but it seems to me that the mere reference to the earlier 
resolutions which were passed before Bosnia became a state are not 
relevant to the situation that exists today not only on the ground but 
in international law.
  When Bosnia became an independent state and a United Nations member 
in 1992, it became entitled to the right of self defense, which is 
enshrined in the U.N. Charter. In that sense, I believe that the 
embargo against the former Yugoslavia ceased to be valid when Bosnia 
became an independent state with membership in the United Nations, with 
the right to self defense under the U.N. Charter. This is a right which 
I believe supersedes the previous resolution, Resolution No. 713, of 
the Security Council.
  Mr. President, the United States is a nation of laws. That is one of 
the characteristics that distinguishes us. The world is not a world of 
laws, but we try, to the extent we can, to express and respect 
principles of law in our international deliberations. I believe that in 
that context there is no legal basis for the arms embargo on Bosnia. It 
is, in that sense, irrelevant and invalid.
  So to terminate the embrgo, as this measure before the Senate does 
today, is essentially stepping away from an act which is invalid. It is 
a return to the basic legal right of a nation to defend itself. In that 
sense, I think by ending the arms embargo, we are returning to a 
consistency between principles of international law, America's respect 
for those principles of law, and the facts, both legal and political, 
as they exist in the former Yugoslavia.
  I have already spoken about the moral argument. I need not repeat 
that, although it is very important, except to say this: It does seem 
to me that insofar as we continue this embargo on arms to Bosnia--not 
only failing to send arms, but preventing arms from being delivered, in 
spite of the Serbian aggression and genocidal acts which the people of 
Bosnia have been the targets and victims of--the United States is not 
maintaining a policy of neutrality. The United States is, in effect, 
choosing sides in this conflict, because we are effectively saying to 
the Serbs, who are the aggressors, that you can continue to use your 
weapons, your tanks, your artillery, which, as I will explain in a 
moment, they have special access to, against the people of Bosnia, 
while we refuse to allow the victims of their aggression the means to 
defend themselves.
  The Senator from Kansas referred to some of the numbers that Vice 
President Ganic and Prime Minister Silajdzic gave to both him and me 
regarding the tanks that are on the ground between the two sides.
  Let me quote some statistics from the International Institute for 
Strategic Studies [IISS], Military Balance for 1993-94, on the weapons 
strength of both sides. They report that the Bosnian Serb army has 330 
tanks. The Bosnians told us it was around 300 now. The Serbs have 400 
armored personnel carriers, 800 artillery pieces, and over 400 
antiaircraft guns that are usable in a direct fire role. The Bosnian 
Moslem army, on the other hand, can field only 20 tanks. Prime Minister 
Silajdzic recently told us there were only 8 left. So that is 8 Bosnian 
tanks against 300 Serbian tanks. There are 30 armored personnel 
carriers for the Moslems against 400 armored personnel carriers for the 
Serbs. There are 30 artillery pieces against 800 artillery pieces for 
the Serbs; and 400 antiaircraft guns that the Serbs have and I do not 
see that the Moslems have any. Of the 180,000 Bosnian troops available, 
only 60,000 are in organized units, with the remainder constituting a 
reserve to fill losses. Most of these reserves have no weapons at all 
or they have only small, light-arms or hunting rifles. This was the 
tragic imbalance of the conflict around Gorazde as we were hearing. 
Serbian tank, were moving into the city and all the Moslems in the city 
in this ``safe haven'' were lightly armed against the tanks. More than 
one of the Bosnians who has come here has expressed to us how much he 
hoped that someday the Bosnian Moslems would have the kind of antitank 
weapons that we have supplied in other conflicts that would allow them 
to make this a fair fight.
  The few arms which are available to the Bosnians are supported by a 
very uncertain home-made ammunition supply system. Most of the former 
Yugoslavia's arms industry in Bosnia, that is the part of the arms 
industry of the former Yugoslavia, which was considerable, was 
concentrated in areas which have either fallen under Serb control, such 
as Banja Luka, or have been destroyed or deprived of sufficient raw 
materials and power supply to operate.
  Bosnian troops must collect their spent cartridges to have them 
refilled at makeshift ammunition factories. In contrast, factories in 
Serbia have been immune from attack and are producing arms and 
ammunition at a feverish pace. Then they are delivered across an 
international border to Serbs engaged against the Bosnian Government.
  The Bosnian people are doing their best to defend themselves and 
their country with the meager resources they have. But it is wrong to 
perpetuate this unfair fight. We must stop denying the Bosnians the 
right to defend themselves. We must lift the arms embargo. I listened 
very carefully 2 weeks ago when the distinguished chairman of the Armed 
Services Committee, my colleague Senator Nunn, spoke on this issue. 
While he expressed many concerns about our strategy in Bosnia--many 
which I share--he spoke clearly and eloquently on this point when he 
said:

       I think this embargo on arms to those who are the victims 
     is a policy that is not only counter-productive politically 
     and militarily. I think it prolongs the conflict, and I 
     believe it is an immoral policy, preventing us from helping 
     those who are there ready to help themselves.

  My colleague described the post-Vietnam policy developed by President 
Richard Nixon where the United States made clear its willingness to arm 
those who were the victims of aggression so that they could help 
themselves. He went on to say:

       In this case, what the United Nations has done, with good 
     intention but I think with disastrous results, is just the 
     opposite. We have denied arms to those who are increasingly 
     the victims of this conflict.

  Mr. President, there are serious concerns about where we are going in 
Bosnia. We have ample cause for concern about what our inability to end 
the aggression in Bosnia says about the future role of NATO, the United 
Nations, and the United States in Europe and in the world community.
  Margaret Thatcher, the former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, 
addressed these concerns in an article which appeared in the New York 
Times on May 4. She wrote:

       Lifting the arms embargo * * * is also crucial. That 
     embargo was imposed before Bosnia and Croatia were 
     internationally recognized, and its legal standing is at 
     least questionable. The U.S., Britain, and France--or if 
     necessary, the U.S. acting alone--should formally state that 
     they do not intend to continue with it. * * * A well-armed 
     Muslim-Croatian alliance would confront the Serbs with a 
     quite new and unwelcome challenge. It might even prompt the 
     Serbs to settle.

  Mrs. Thatcher concludes--

       I do not claim that this approach is without dangers. * * * 
     It is unlikely to bring immediate peace--though it might. 
     Some disruption of the aid effort is inevitable. But what the 
     people of Bosnia now need is a permanent peace that allows 
     them to return to their homes and live without fear.

  I could not agree more. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that 
this article be printed as part of the Record following my remarks.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  (See exhibit 1.)
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, I do not want to see Bosnian men, 
women, and children die at the hands of naked aggression because they 
don't have the weapons to defend themselves. This debate today and the 
decision each of us makes when we vote on this issue are critical to 
the way we defend American leadership in the world community.
  I hope we have not come to a point where we are unwilling to assert 
the simple, strong, moral leadership necessary to arm the victims of 
aggression to fight for themselves. That, in my opinion, is the least 
we should do.

                               Exhibit 1

                [From the Washington Post, May 4, 1994]

                     Stop the Serbs--Now--for Good

                         (By Margaret Thatcher)

       We have been here so many times before in the Bosnian saga: 
     acts of barbarism by the Serbs, the mobilization of a shocked 
     international conscience, threats of air strikes (or actual 
     air strikes, of the most limited kind), a tactical Serbian 
     withdrawal, more talks aimed at persuading the warring 
     parties to accept a carving up of territory that rewards 
     aggression. Then the Serbs move on to yet another Bosnian 
     community, applying the same mixture of violence and 
     intimidation to secure their aim of an ethnically pure 
     Greater Serbia.
       The tragedy of Gorazde may for now at least be over. But 
     there are other towns of equal strategic interest on which 
     the Serbs are now free to concentrate their forces. Yesterday 
     the U.N. intervened to head off a Serbian attempt to expand 
     the Brcko corridor in northern Bosnia, but such interventions 
     merely divert Serbian aggression. It is time to halt it--
     late, but not too late. We have the justification, the 
     interest and the means.
       A sovereign state, recognized by the world community, is 
     under attack from forces encouraged and supplied by another 
     power. This is not a civil war but a war of aggression, 
     planned and launched from outside Bosnia though using the 
     Serbian minority within it. The principle of self-defense 
     precedes and underlies the United Nations Charter. The 
     legitimate Government of Bosnia has every right to call upon 
     our assistance in defending its territory. That is ample 
     justification for helping the victims of aggression.
       And both the United States and Europe have real and 
     important strategic interests in Bosnia. Let me note four of 
     them.
       First, after all that the West, NATO and the U.N. have now 
     said, the credibility of our international stance on every 
     security issue from nuclear nonproliferation to the Middle 
     East is now at stake.
       Second, would-be aggressors are waiting to see how we deal 
     with the Serbs. Our weakness in the Balkans would have 
     dangerous and unpredictable consequences in the former Soviet 
     Union, which has Slavic nationalist forces that closely 
     parallel those of Greater Serbianism. And throughout Eastern 
     and Central Europe there are minorities that aggressive 
     mother-states might be tempted to manipulate to provoke 
     conflict, if that is allowed to pay in the case of Serbia.
       Third, Serbia's own ambitions are by no means necessarily 
     limited to Croatia and Bosnia. Kosovo is a powder keg. 
     Macedonia is fragile. Bulgaria, Hungary, Greece, Albania and 
     Turkey all have strong interests that could drag them into a 
     new Balkan war if Serbian expansion and oppression continue 
     unchecked.
       Fourth, the floods of refugees that would cross Europe--
     particularly in the event of such a wider conflict--would 
     further inflame extremist tendencies and undermine the 
     stability of Western governments.
       The West has the means--the technology and the weapons--to 
     change the balance of military advantage against the 
     aggressor in Bosnia. Since the beginning of the Serbian war 
     of aggression, which began in the summer of 1991 in Slovenia, 
     intensified in Croatia and is now consuming Bosnia, I have 
     opposed the sending of ground troops to the former 
     Yugoslavia. But I have said that humanitarian aid without a 
     military response is a misguided policy. Feeding or 
     evacuating the victims rather than helping them resist 
     aggression makes us accomplices as much as good Samaritans.
       So I have consistently called for action of two sorts: the 
     launching of air strikes against Serb forces, communications 
     centers and ammunition dumps; and the lifting of the arms 
     embargo on Bosnia and Croatia so that the Muslims and Croats 
     can defend themselves on more equal terms against the Serbs, 
     who inherited the massive armaments of the Yugoslavian Army.
       If such a policy had been pursued when I first proposed it 
     on this page in the summer of 1991, at a time when Sarajevo 
     and Gorazde were under serious assault, thousands of people 
     would now be alive and in all probability the Milosevic 
     regime in Belgrade would have fallen. Because this approach 
     was not adopted, we now find ourselves in a far more complex 
     and dangerous situation: trying to defend almost indefensible 
     safe havens; maintaining a facade of neutrality when all our 
     decisions are based on the knowledge that the Serbs are the 
     threat, and with a large contingent of U.N. personnel whom 
     the Serbs may choose to use as hostages.
       The new joint effort by Russia and the West to persuade the 
     Serbs to settle for 49 percent of Bosnian territory (down 
     from the 72 percent they have now occupied) is hardly less 
     rife with dangers. The Serbs will almost certainly not 
     withdraw, and once the guns are quiet the Russians may not 
     wish them to do so--nor may the West be prepared to revive 
     the threat of bombing to force them. Even if they were to 
     withdraw, their 49 percent of Bosnia would still represent a 
     reward for aggression. And in either event, the ensuing peace 
     would be an unjust and fragile one requiring a large 
     contingent of Western (including U.S.) ground troops to 
     enforce it on the victims. If hostilities resume, as is all 
     too likely, these troops would become the target for attack.
       So the formula of air strikes and lifting the arms embargo 
     is still the right one to apply. NATO already has the mandate 
     from the U.N. Security Council not just to defend U.N. 
     personnel but to deter attacks on the safe havens. This 
     mandate gives full authority for the requisite launching of 
     repeated large-scale air strikes against Serb military 
     targets wherever these may prove effective. It is a matter 
     for consideration whether strikes should go into Serbia 
     itself.
       Air strikes are effective, as long as they are not on a 
     small scale, hedged with political hesitations and 
     qualifications. They can inflict severe and ultimately 
     unsustainable damage. But they have to be part of a clear 
     strategy to shift the advantage against the aggressor. The 
     Serbs must know that they will be carried out with swiftness 
     and determination. Nor may Russian objections be allowed to 
     stand in their way. If the Russians are prepared to support 
     such action, all well and good. But NATO cannot have its 
     policies entirely shaped by Russian sensibilities.
       Lifting the arms embargo, as Senators Bob Dole and Joseph 
     Biden have courageously proposed (the Senate is to take up 
     the resolution tomorrow), is also crucial. That embargo was 
     imposed before Bosnia and Croatia were internationally 
     recognized, and its legal standing is at least questionable. 
     The U.S., Britain and France--or if necessary, the U.S. 
     acting alone--should formally state that they do not intend 
     to continue with it.
       Such statements might also be supported by a resolution of 
     the U.S. General Assembly. The confederation between Bosnia 
     and Croatia, so skillfully brokered by the United States, now 
     means that supplies of arms will be used against the common 
     aggressor, not against each other, and that they can easily 
     be shipped in through Croatia. A well-armed Muslim-Croatian 
     alliance would confront the Serbs with a quite new and 
     unwelcome challenge. It might even prompt the Serbs to 
     settle.
       I do not claim that this approach is without dangers. It 
     would require diplomatic and military skills of a high order. 
     It is unlikely to bring immediate peace--though it might. 
     Some disruption of the aid effort is inevitable. But what the 
     people of Bosnia now need is a permanent peace that allows 
     them to return to their homes and live without fear. What the 
     West needs is to restore its reputation and secure its 
     interests, This is the only way those aims can be realized.

  Mr. LIEBERMAN. Mr. President, may I inquire of the Chair if there is 
a time that is part of the unanimous-consent agreement.
  The PRESIDENT pro tempore. There is an order, and under the order the 
Senate will recess at the hour of 12 o'clock noon until 2:30 p.m.
  Mr. LIEBERMAN. I yield the floor. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. SIMPSON. Mr. President, I rise to voice my support for the Dole-
Lieberman measure to lift the arms embargo against Bosnia, of which I 
am a cosponsor, and my opposition to diminishing the full force of its 
language.
  Mr. President, we continue to have before us in Bosnia a grievous and 
tragic situation. For the past couple of years, we have repeatedly seen 
temporary resurgences of hope dashed by returns to brutality and 
slaughter.
  All of us who would criticize the handling of this crisis must 
acknowledge that the situation there does not admit of easy solutions. 
The mistakes made were not made in the course of passing up options of 
obvious preference. There are none.
  When we review the policy choices that have been available to us, we 
see that they all pose their dangers, and risks of failure. There is of 
course the negotiating track. Cyrus Vance and Lord Owen shouldered that 
burden in good faith, but there was no question but that negotiations 
were doomed to be fruitless to the extent that the military situation 
rarely encouraged all of the warring parties to agree to a fair 
settlement.
  At one extreme was the option of declaring the Serbs to be the 
aggressors, and either unilaterally or with such allies as would follow 
us, shedding the mantle of peace-broker and becoming full participants 
in the conflict. I think my colleagues would agree with me that the 
American people would not have been willing to become so fully engaged.
  At the other extreme was the option of simply turning away and 
abandoning Bosnia to its fate. There are some who would advocate 
precisely that, but most of us would have found this to be morally 
intolerable.
  Faced with unacceptable options at both ends of the spectrum, we have 
tried to steer a middle course. We have tried to retain a perception of 
our neutrality that will allow us to deliver relief unmolested. And we 
have applied military force on occasion, chiefly through the air, to 
address specific violations of cease fires and U.N. safe havens.
  This policy has not produced peace, except on a local and sporadic 
basis. We have found that threats of air strikes may deter a specific 
assault in one place, but that too often we merely see a displacement 
of the aggression into another region.
  We should not be surprised by this. We have made bold references to 
the international will and the international conscience, and crowed 
loudly about what we will not tolerate. But our actions, in the form of 
our reliance on military half-measures, show that our will is lacking, 
a fact that is not lost on Serb militia, who make their calculations 
accordingly.
  We should not pretend that lifting the arms embargo against Bosnia is 
a substitute for a properly coordinated international policy. But at 
the very least we would by this action permit the people of Bosnia to 
be less completely at the mercy of our failure to develop a solution. 
If the West had determined how it was to save Bosnia, I would not be 
here arguing for a lifting of the arms embargo. It would not be 
necessary. But if we will not defend Bosnia, then Bosnians must be 
permitted to do so.
  The facts are stark. The international community dithers, 
deliberates, and dawdles. The Bosnian Serbs have enjoyed access to 
equipment that once was the property of the Yugoslav Federal Army. We 
have been resolute only in denying arms to those who have too often 
been the victims of military aggression. I do not excuse the atrocities 
that have been committed by Croats and Muslims any more than those 
committed by Serbs--but there is no doubt that many of the latter were 
made possible because the victims were too often defenseless.
  I understand and appreciate the sentiment that we should not take so 
bold a step without the approval of our European allies. I would say to 
my colleagues that in this matter we have allowed our actions to be too 
much guided by a rigorous insistence on multinational agreement. It has 
become a prescription for doing nothing. The Western nations, with all 
their power and might, have shown themselves less willing to enforce 
their will than the Serbs, simply because the Serbs, unlike the West, 
have been able to effectively translate desire into action. This is the 
danger of multilateral processes. It is why Congresses do not command 
Armed Forces. It is hard to get several independent voices to sing from 
the same songsheet.
  So I am not overly troubled if we do not allow other nations to veto 
this action. We are not sending Americans to fight in Bosnia if we pass 
this measure. We are merely permitting Bosnians to defend themselves. 
Surely we ought to be able to accomplish this without again retreating 
to the passivity that has thus far characterized our behavior.

                          ____________________