[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 103 (Thursday, June 22, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1311]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                          THE CRISIS IN BOSNIA

                                 ______


                        HON. GERALD B.H. SOLOMON

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, June 22, 1995

  Mr. SOLOMON. Mr. Speaker. I commend to the attention of Members a 
thoughtful statement concerning the crisis in Bosnia that was delivered 
on May 29, 1995 at the North Atlantic Assembly by our good friend and 
colleague, Representative Doug Bereuter:
                North Atlantic Assembly Debate on Bosnia
       Thank You, Mr. President. The events which have led this 
     Assembly to undertake today's special debate on Bosnia are 
     both compelling and tragic. At the outset, I know I can speak 
     for the Congress and the American people in one regard and 
     that is to convey our grave concern for the safety of all 
     personnel serving for the UN in Bosnia. On this America's 
     Memorial Day our thoughts and prayers are now especially for 
     those troops who have been detained as hostages or who are 
     under imminent threat by the Bosnian Serbs. We especially 
     convey our condolences to the families and the French 
     government for the French soldiers who were so recently 
     killed in the line of duty.
       There is very little consensus on the situation in Bosnia 
     but strong views in America as in your own countries.
       The Clinton Administration supports the view that UNPROFOR 
     should remain in Bosnia. Present circumstances may dictate 
     that UNPROFOR will have to leave, but America's view is that 
     every effort must be made to keep the UN there--but I stress 
     under acceptable conditions.
       We must all recognize that there has always been a tension 
     and a contradiction between the tough mandates adopted at the 
     UN Security Council in New York and the hard realities on the 
     ground in Bosnia. The current crisis dictates that we have to 
     decide once and for all whether UNPROFOR is a peacekeeping 
     force or a peace making force, i.e., an enforcer. As we 
     tragically learned in Somalia it cannot be both.
       We must work together within the UN framework to firm-up 
     the UNPROFOR mandate and eliminate its ambiguities to the 
     extent possible. We must examine the increasingly cumbersome 
     and dangerous relationship between NATO and the UN in Bosnia; 
     it is disastrously slow and obviously, in my personal view, 
     Mr. Akashi is not the right man for is position. 
     Specifically, we must allow military commanders on the ground 
     more decision-making discretion, especially concerning the 
     disposition, safety and well-being of peacekeeping troops. I 
     have confidence in General Rupert Smith and his key 
     multinational officers.
       Many countries represented here today have troops serving 
     honorably in Bosnia. I want to reassure those colleagues here 
     that we in the U.S. Congress, despite criticism you may have 
     heard from time to time from individual Members, both 
     prominent and obscure--despite that criticims, the Congress 
     and informed Americans remain very appreciative and sensitive 
     to the extremely difficult but very necessary role these 
     UNPROFOR troops have assumed in Bosnia. France and Britain, 
     in particular, have played a central role in this operation 
     and their troops have suffered accordingly.
       As our NATO allies, you have our support and solidarity and 
     will continue to have it as your troops try to conduct their 
     difficult mission in Bosnia.
       America is fully engaged as your ally in NATO in the 
     advanced contingency planning to withdraw UNPROFOR from 
     Bosnia if this proves necessary. If NATO needs to assist the 
     UN in withdrawing from Bosnia, I would urge that NATO goes in 
     with overwhelming force and that the operation is executed 
     swiftly. We are committed by our President to provide 
     approximately half of the personal for such an operation.
       Certainly we must recognize that UNPROFOR cannot stay in 
     Bosnia forever. The force has already been there for three 
     years. It may be that the parties in Bosnia no longer want 
     UNPROFOR to stay or that they will continue to try to 
     manipulate UNPROFOR for their own interests. In November, if 
     UNPROFOR has not already been withdrawn, and if the parties 
     have not agreed on the outline of a peace settlement, we 
     should then consider not renewing the current mandate as it 
     expires. In approaching that decision, however, we also must 
     recognize that the prospect of the withdrawal of UNPROFOR may 
     influence the warring sides in Bosnia to come to a negotiated 
     settlement. Or withdrawing UNPROFOR may only be the prelude 
     to a total bloodbath that will be appalling to the civilized 
     world. Which will it be? There have never been any single or 
     easy solutions to the conflict in Bosnia. There are none in 
     the current crisis either.
       The American Government strongly believes that despite the 
     stark conditions in Bosnia we must keep the negotiating track 
     open. The work of the Contract Group should continue. 
     Together as allies we must keep striving to find a negotiated 
     solution to the conflict acceptable to all sides. Hopeless as 
     that seems, we cannot give up, but neither should we delay 
     remedies to the current dangers faced by UNPROFOR and 
     civilians while we seek a negotiated settlement.
       In conclusion, I would say that the present turn of events 
     in Bosnia makes it plain that our policies and the means 
     provided to conduct them are not bringing the conflict in 
     Bosnia closer to an end. It seems plain that either we alter 
     our objectives and strategy, or we must escalate UNPROFOR's 
     resources and their use.
       Our policymakers, myself included, do understand that the 
     Bosnian ethnic conflict or civil war is probably not an 
     isolated situation. The aftermath of the age of Communism and 
     the end of the Cold War has left Europe and other continents 
     with hundreds of situations of potential ethnic conflict or 
     severe civil strife, many of them with the potential of being 
     as serious as Bosnia. How
      then do we send the right signal to those elsewhere in 
     Europe, the parts of the former Soviet Union and Africa 
     that the West can and will take measures necessary to 
     ensure that there is not a violent spiralling or ethnicly 
     driven violence in or around Europe?
       I do not have an answer for this question, but I would like 
     to close with an observation by Robert Tucker, a 
     distinguished American professor of diplomacy, 
     ``Interdependence itself is not constitutive of order. . . . 
     Interdependence creates the need for greater order because it 
     is as much a source of conflict as consensus.''
       Some may therefore submit that the UN and the international 
     community has been couching its strategy for the Bosnian 
     conflict in a desire to control and limit the violence. While 
     that strategy may have worked to some degree within Bosnia, 
     it does not address the question of avoiding further conflict 
     driven by ethnic hatreds elsewhere. And in the long run, such 
     a strategy concedes the game to the party that is willing to 
     be the worst thug on the block.
       Quite understandably a great many people in my country, and 
     in yours as well, believe that it is the parties in the 
     Yugoslavian conflict themselves who ultimately will decide 
     whether to live or die with one another, in other words they 
     have concluded that we cannot force peace in Bosnia among 
     people whose deep hatred sets them to kill each other. In the 
     end, the most the international community may be able to say 
     about Bosnia is that we tried, albeit haltingly, 
     inadequately, and timidly. But humanity demands that the 
     effort be made.
       The American delegation supports the resolution.
       

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