[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 111 (Tuesday, July 11, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S9708-S9709]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                         THE FALL OF SREBRENICA

  Mr. BIDEN. Mr. President, I rise tonight to deplore the fall of the 
Bosnian City of Srebrenica.
  Almost 2 years ago, when Srebrenica was under siege in the despicable 
policy of ethnic cleansing, instigated by President Milosevic of Serbia 
and executed by General Silajdzic and the leader of the Bosnian Serbs, 
Mr. Karadzic, I met with Mr. Milosevic to attempt to get into 
Srebrenica. I was unable to do that and went on up to Tuzla where 
hundreds, eventually thousands, of Bosnian Serbs and Croats were 
fleeing for their lives with all of their possessions on their back and 
their families in tow.
  I met in Tuzla with a man and a woman in their early forties who told 
me they had to make a very difficult decision as they fled over the 
mountains into Tuzla from Srebrenica, because they could not get back 
in. And I was wondering what that terrible decision was they were about 
to tell me. They pointed out they had left to die on the mountain top 
in the snow the man's elderly mother who was 81. They had to choose 
between taking their kids or the mother-in-law, or the wife, who could 
make it, or no one making it.
  The Bosnian Serb aggression and Serbian aggression--I know I sound 
like a broken record, I have been speaking about this for 2 years--
seems to cause very little concern in this country and the world.
  Mr. President, I think it is time for an immediate and fundamental 
change in our policy in the former Yugoslavia. Mr. President, the news 
this morning that the Bosnian Serbs have overrun, finally, Srebrenica, 
one of the United Nations' so-called safe areas, puts the final nail in 
the coffin of a bankrupt policy in the former Yugoslavia, begun by the 
Bush administration and continued with only minor adjustments by the 
Clinton administration.
  Given the feckless performance of the United Nations in Bosnia, it is 
no surprise that the Bosnian Serbs continue to violate several United 
Nations resolutions, and do it with impunity, and then thumb their nose 
at the entire world and the peacekeeping force there.
  In Srebrenica, the United Nations first disarmed the Bosnian 
Government military. I want to remind everybody of that. The Bosnian 
Government military was in Srebrenica, as in other safe areas, fighting 
the onslaught of Serbs with heavy artillery. The solution put forward 
by the United Nations, after having imposed an embargo on the 

[[Page S 9709]]
Bosnian Government, was to go in and take the weapons from the Bosnian 
Serbs, the Bosnian military in Srebrenica, in return for a guarantee of 
protection for six safe areas. That was the deal.
  It was supposed to be putting the city and the surrounding areas 
under the protection of the United Nations. Then the United Nations, of 
course, did not live up to its half of the bargain. Its blue-helmeted 
peacekeepers were kept lightly armed and, as a consequence, unable to 
withstand a Bosnian Serb onslaught. NATO air strikes were called for by 
the Dutch blue hats. The United Nations concluded that this was not a 
good time to do that. NATO air strikes were eventually called in too 
late to have any effect. The safe area of Srebrenica proved to be safe 
only for Serbian aggressors.
  Srebrenica was filled with thousands of Moslem refugees from 
elsewhere in eastern Bosnia, the victims of the vile Serbian practice 
that they refer to as ethnic cleansing, the very people the United 
Nations pledged to protect in return for them giving up what few 
weapons they had. The United Nations defaulted on its honor. It has 
disgraced itself. And these pathetic souls, already once driven from 
their ancestral homes, are now reportedly fleeing Srebrenica to an 
uncertain fate in undetermined locations, and I expect many will meet 
the fate of that family I visited in Tuzla a year and a half ago.
  Could the United Nations have saved Srebrenica? Of course it could 
have, if it only allowed NATO to do its job promptly and fully. Perhaps 
the most frustrating and maddening aspect of the entire catastrophe is 
the fact that the Bosnian Serbs were able to defy NATO, which has been 
hobbled by being tied to the timorous U.N. civilian command, led by Mr. 
Akashi.
  Mr. President, we must immediately change the course of our policy in 
the former Yugoslavia. First of all, as I and others have been saying 
in this Chamber for more than 2 years, we must lift the illegal and 
immoral arms embargo on the Government of Bosnia and Herzegovina. A 
resolution to that effect, which I am cosponsoring, will be introduced 
next week. I am confident that it will pass with a comfortable 
majority.
  Mr. President, the fall of Srebrenica has given the lie to pundits in 
the United States--but especially in Western Europe--who have 
ceaselessly issued dire warnings that if the United States would 
unilaterally lift the arms embargo, the Bosnian Serbs would then 
overrun the eastern enclaves.
  Well, Mr. President, apparently, someone forgot to explain this 
causal relationship to the Serbs. I suppose the apostles of appeasement 
will now say that if we lift the embargo, the Bosnian Serbs will 
overrun the remaining two enclaves, or maybe Sarajevo, or maybe Western 
Europe. After all, Mr. President, we have been led to believe that we 
are facing a juggernaut. That is nonsense. We are talking about a 
third-rate, poorly motivated, middle-aged force that has to dragoon its 
reserves from the cafes of Belgrade to fight.
  In reality, of course, this tiresome rhetoric has been a smokescreen 
for doing nothing, for sitting back and watching this vile ethnic 
cleansing, mass rapes, cowardly sniping at children, and other military 
tactics at which the Bosnian Serbs excel. ``How regrettable,'' the 
appeasers say publicly. ``But as long as these quarrelsome south Slavs 
contain their feuding to Bosnia,'' they add, ``then it is nothing to 
get too exercised about.''
  Well, Mr. President, it is something to get exercised about. The 
geostrategic reality of the 21st century is that the primary danger to 
peace will most likely come from regional ethnic crises. We must not 
allow cold-blooded aggressors like Karadzic and Milosevic to get away 
with their terrorism. Europe, unfortunately, has other potential 
Karadzics and Milosevics.
  After we lift the arms embargo on Bosnia and Herzegovina, we should 
immediately put into place a program to train Bosnian Government 
troops, probably in Croatia.
  We should make clear that we are not neutral parties in this 
conflict, we are on the side of the aggrieved party, the Bosnian 
Government.
  This does not require a single American troop to set foot in Bosnia 
and Herzegovina. I have been told time and again that these folks 
cannot defend themselves. Well, of course they cannot defend 
themselves, they have no weapons.
  We should make it clear, Mr. President, that we are no longer signing 
on to this incredible policy that has been promoted in Europe.
  We should call an emergency session of the North Atlantic Council and 
tell our allies that NATO must immediately remove itself from the U.N. 
chain of command in the former Yugoslavia. The conflict there already 
constitutes a clear and present danger to the European members of the 
alliance. NATO does not need the blessing of the United Nations to 
protect its members' vital interests.
  Furthermore, we should restate to our NATO allies who have 
peacekeeping troops in Bosnia and Croatia that we will stand by 
President Clinton's commitment to extricate them, but only if the 
entire operation is under the command of the Supreme Allied Commander 
in Europe, a United States general, and only if the operation is fully 
conducted under NATO rules of engagement.
  We should give immediate public warning to the Bosnian Serbs and 
their patrons in Belgrade that any further locking-on of radar to 
American planes flying over Bosnia will be cause for total destruction 
of the Bosnian Serb radar facilities, which is fully, totally within 
our capacity to do. Serbia should be given fair warning that if it 
tries to intervene, it, too, will receive immediate and 
disproportionate attacks on Serbia proper.
  There is no reason why our British, French, Dutch, and other NATO 
allies should object to this policy. If, however, Mr. President, they 
do not wish to follow our lead, then we should remind them that four 
years ago they wanted to handle this southern European problem 
themselves. And we should say, ``Well, good luck, it is now your 
problem, handle it.''
  I do not think for a minute, Mr. President, they will take on that 
responsibility. It is about time this President and this administration 
understands that we either should do it our way or get out.
  Mr. President, nothing good can come out of this latest fiasco in 
Bosnia. The United Nations has been definitively discredited. NATO has 
been defied. As usual, defenseless and blameless Bosnian Moslems have 
been brutalized.
  This madness must stop, Mr. President. We must change our policy 
immediately. Tomorrow is not soon enough.
  I yield the floor.
  Mr. THOMPSON. Mr. President, I want to join in the comments of my 
distinguished colleague from Delaware. I could not agree with him more 
concerning the events of recent hours, and as far as our policies are 
concerned concerning those events in that part of the country.
  What concerns me most about all of this is the credibility of the 
United States of America. I am beginning to wonder if we have any 
credibility in any part of the world anymore.
  Following the disastrous U.N. lead, and to a certain extent the NATO 
lead there, not getting them to go along with sound policies and 
lifting the arms embargo with their cooperation, one sad tale after 
another, we have gone down a road of totally participating in the 
discrediting of the United Nations, of NATO, and our own country.
  I think that the first step toward rectifying that certainly is not 
putting our own troops in there, but letting the people defend 
themselves, which is all they say they want to do, lifting that arms 
embargo, stepping back and saying, ``It is your problem. You solve it. 
You take care of it.''
  That is what they deserve to do. We cannot afford to stand by, 
through our policies, and let this murderous activity go on, and say to 
the world that we, the strongest power in the world, supposedly are 
going to countenance that sort of thing and not use the many resources, 
short of troops on the ground, that we have, to do something about such 
terrible activities.

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