[Congressional Record Volume 146, Number 12 (Thursday, February 10, 2000)]
[Senate]
[Pages S591-S594]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                   THE SITUATION IN BOSNIA AND KOSOVO

  Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I rise today to address my colleagues on 
both sides of the aisle with regard to the deepening and very grave 
concerns I have in my heart about the situation in both Bosnia and 
Kosovo. I, as many colleagues, travel with some regularity to that 
region of the world, the Balkans. Just 3 weeks ago, I completed my most 
recent trip. I had the distinct privilege of being accompanied on that 
trip by the Supreme Allied Commander of Europe, General Clark, 
Commander in Chief of NATO Forces, in my travels through Kosovo, and 
then later the next day with his deputy, Admiral Abbott, as I went into 
Bosnia.
  I have been to this region many times, although I am not suggesting I 
am any more of an expert than my colleagues. I first went in 1990 with 
then-leader Robert Dole. We went to Pristina, in Kosovo. I remember our 
delegation of Senators queried Senator Dole: Why here? Bob Dole 
instinctively knew that Kosovo could become a battleground. I remember 
Stephen Ambrose, the historian, was alleged to have quoted Eisenhower 
when Eisenhower was asked, 10 years after D-day: General, tell us about 
the next war. And Ike very wisely did not opine, except to say: That 
war could come as a surprise and may well come from a direction that 
none of us could anticipate.
  In our visit to Kosovo, I and that tried and tested and courageous 
Bob Dole, a soldier of World War II, were confronted with a totally 
unpredicted situation while in Pristina. Thousands and thousands of 
people heard about Members of the U.S. Congress coming to this remote 
region, and they converged on the hotel. There was panic in the streets 
and a great deal of disorder. People were being trampled in the crowds, 
and Senator Dole had to make a wise decision, and a quick one, that we 
had to exit because we could be responsible for injuries to people, 
people who wanted to come to see us, people who wanted to tell us about 
the hardships that were then being inflicted by Milosevic. Indeed, we 
made a hasty retreat.
  But as we went back to our plane, we passed that historic piece of 
ground, whose origin goes way back, in my recollection, to the 1300s, 
that field of battle which actually the persons who preceded the 
governing structure today lost. They lost the war, yet they still 
consider that hallowed ground. But I remember as we passed that 
battlefield, Bob Dole said: Tragedy and fighting will visit this land 
someday.
  And that it did. Our Nation's men and women of the Armed Forces, 
primarily the Air Force, fought a courageous battle: 78 days of combat, 
tens of thousands of missions together with other nations--seven other 
nations were flying missions with our Air Force--and eventually the 
major nations of the world came to an understanding as to how that 
fighting should stop. It was causing tremendous damage, but there was 
no other recourse by which we could get the attention of Milosevic.
  There are those who say today, in hindsight, perhaps we should not 
have done this, perhaps we should not have blown up that bridge. When I 
visited Pristina several weeks ago, someone said: We haven't got power 
because the power lines were blown out. It was a tough war, and our 
military commanders made tough decisions; 19 nations got together to 
make those decisions--a historic first combat by NATO. They made it 
work. Now they have basically stopped any major fighting and we are 
down to incidents --fortunately few incidents, but nevertheless 
dangerous ones.
  When I looked into the faces of the young men and women of our Armed 
Forces, and indeed other armed forces, and actually walked the streets 
with a patrol, it was clear they were performing duties for which they 
were never trained in their military careers. Historically, our troops 
have not in any great measure performed the type of mission they are 
doing in that region. But they are doing it and doing it very well. 
They are accepting the risks of getting caught in the crossfire that 
still erupts as a consequence of the cultural differences, the ethnic 
hatreds. Indeed, much of the fighting today in Kosovo is Albanian upon 
Albanian. It is retribution against fellow Albanians because they at 
one time or another did something to further the Serb interest.

  Our troops are there. When you ask those in charge, whether it is the 
NATO commanders, the U.N. representative, the E.U. representative, or 
anyone else, no one can give you any time estimate within which our 
forces can be withdrawn. The infrastructure that was to move in behind 
in Kosovo, the commitments that were made by a number of nations to 
provide police, to provide money to pay salaries for the judicial 
element, to help rebuild the power lines--it is not flowing. It is 
caught up in bureaucracies, international bureaucracies. It is all but 
stagnant--all but stagnant.
  I met with the commander of all troops, a very competent professional 
German officer. I met Ambassador Kouchner, who has been designated to 
pull together the various elements to make this work. We were in a room 
in the military headquarters. There was no running water. The water 
pipes were shut off, partially due to freezing and partially due to 
lack of power. The light bulbs flickered. Ambassador Kouchner pointed 
out we do not have enough power to keep the homes warm. There was a 
certain feeling we won the war but we could lose the peace, because the 
war goes on amongst the bureaucracies, no matter what the good 
intentions may be to bring forth and reestablish in that war-torn 
region of Serbia--Kosovo is a part of Serbia--the

[[Page S592]]

infrastructure needed to bring back just a modicum of a normal life.
  Foremost in my heart is my deep concern for the men and women of the 
armed services undertaking missions for which they were not trained. 
Missions which take them away not only from their families, but take 
them away from other potential deployments of our U.S. military, a 
military that is stretched far too thin already.
  These men and women of our military need to have some definitization 
of how much longer we are going to keep significant numbers deployed to 
Kosovo. That timing is directly tied to the ability and the willingness 
of other nations and organizations to come in and consolidate the 
military gains, reestablish an infrastructure--be it judicial, be it 
police, be it rebuilding, be it a form of government, be it elections--
so that the troops can return--ours and others--to their assignments 
and their bases elsewhere.
  A similar situation still exists in Bosnia after these many years. 
However, let me draw a distinction. After the fighting stopped in 
Bosnia, the military decided they would locate the troops in heavily 
protected compounds. They would go out on daily patrols to prevent the 
eruption of further fighting. So far, that has worked.
  Clearly, without any question, the military operations in Bosnia and 
Kosovo are a great credit to the men and women who fought them, the men 
and women who planned them, and the men and women who are still there 
today. That job was done and done well.
  In Kosovo, they decided not to concentrate the military, either the 
U.S. military, or the other militaries. Rather, they were dispersed in 
the various regions. The U.S. region is the same as the one controlled 
by the British and the French. They dispersed them right out into the 
small communities so that men and women of the U.S. Armed Forces, four 
and five of them at a time, are living in some war-torn house or in a 
small churchyard where I saw them. Some are just guarding churches 
because of the incredible desire to destroy churches. That is a whole 
chapter of this tragedy which someone has to examine. The Albanian 
forces practically destroyed every church the Serbian people ever used.
  Quite different is the military deployment in Kosovo from that in 
Bosnia, but both have worked. Both were carefully planned, both have a 
credible measure of success.
  In Bosnia, the Dayton accords laid the blueprint. One can argue we 
should have done this and we should have done that in Dayton. Yes, we 
knew it could have been better, but we had to get an agreement, and we 
got the best we could at that time.
  One of my concerns is we should go back--not reconvene everybody who 
was at Dayton--but go back and examine what was right and what proved 
not to be successful at Dayton and correct it.
  The fighting has stopped, and the military provides a security 
blanket within which the various factions can begin to reestablish that 
country. Some progress is being made, but by any timetable, that 
progress is way behind the expectations, given the fighting has been 
over for several years. It is way behind, again, because of the 
difficulty of the bureaucracies working to bring in adequate police, 
and not just the police who perform duties on the streets, but in the 
case of Bosnia, we need an international police force to investigate 
and fight the rampant crime.
  Beneath the security blanket provided by the men and women of the 
Armed Forces, organized crime is rampant. It has been said the only 
thing really organized in Bosnia is organized crime. The various ethnic 
factions get along very well in the criminal underworld. They have 
charted their ground.
  Yes, things are slowly improving in Bosnia but ever so slowly. There 
we have independent entities. The U.N. has one area of responsibility, 
primarily the police; the E.U. another area of responsibility; the OSCE 
responsibility with regards to elections. However, they each report to 
different capitals.

  I had the Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations in my office 
yesterday. He is in charge of peacekeeping all over the world. He made 
clear how the four basic entities in charge of bringing about the 
restoration of Bosnia all have different reporting channels. There is 
no central authority that works today for the greater betterment of 
that region.
  What has happened? You still cannot get a definitive date from 
anybody as to when the American troops and other troops can be 
withdrawn.
  I say it is time the Congress of the United States should step up. We 
are a coequal branch of our Government. This body has time and time 
been called upon to vote for funds, for resolutions, and other 
legislative initiatives with regard to the Balkan situation. Now it is 
time for us to take a look at the constant flow of the American 
taxpayers' money and say: Is America going to keep its spigot flowing 
when, at the same time, other nations are not meeting their financial 
commitments or obligations?
  If I can digress for a moment, I have studied this situation, I have 
talked with innumerable people, I have traveled to this region. The 
Balkan situation is the most difficult problem and a matrix of 
diversified responsibility and commitment I have ever tried to get my 
arms around. As soon as I feel I have one body of fact on which I can 
rely and reach a decision, another person will come along and say: No, 
it's different than that.
  I have tried in this set of remarks to outline how I understand the 
situation to be in Bosnia and Kosovo. But I rise today to say to the 
Senate that it is my intention, when the piece of legislation we 
anticipate will be coming through soon, the supplemental--the 
supplemental has $2 billion--can I repeat that?--$2 billion associated 
with our obligations, military and otherwise, in just Kosovo. I think 
it is time we stated our intention as the Congress of the United States 
to allow the first part of those funds to flow--I will refine the 
language eventually--but to have a stopping point when we take a pause 
and we say to our President respectfully: Mr. President, no further 
funds of the $2 billion will flow until you can come back and give us 
some type of assurance, certification, or otherwise, that the other 
nations are living up to their commitments. That should get the 
attention of the other nations. I say most respectfully, that should 
give our President some leverage to deal with these other nations.

  I am not alone on this. I have talked to a number of colleagues. As I 
say, my language is not refined at this point. I welcome suggestions. I 
welcome those who can contribute facts where I may be in error with 
regard to some of the statements I make today. In good conscience, I 
tried to check out everything. But, as I say, getting your arms around 
this problem is not easy. Getting the body of facts is difficult. 
Indeed, others have worked as hard as I have.
  Collectively, let us bring together our judgments as to how best and 
by what mechanism we can assert our responsibility under the 
Constitution--as the coequal branch, as those who control the purse 
strings of the U.S. Government--to string this purse of $2 billion such 
that our President can expend what has to be expended in the next 90 
days, following adoption by the Congress, but that there comes a time 
when accountability steps in.
  Our President has to explain to the Congress what he has done, what 
remains to be done, and hopefully some prospects of when these 
situations in both Bosnia and Kosovo can be brought to a state of 
affairs where the infrastructure allows the significant withdrawal of 
our troops and, indeed, troops of other nations.
  It may well be that the United States--we took a major role in the 
war in Kosovo, a major role in the war in Bosnia--could turn over such 
balance of troop responsibilities as may remain in, say, a year, 18 
months, to the Europeans. They are quite anxious, under NATO, to 
establish their own organization militarily to do certain things in the 
event NATO, for one reason or another, decides not to do them. This 
might be their first challenge.
  I see on the floor the distinguished leader of our NATO group in the 
Senate, the Senator from Delaware. We just met with the British Foreign 
Secretary on this very question. This might be an opportunity to test 
that new military structure. I have concerns about that and how it 
might have long-term effects on the weakening of

[[Page S593]]

NATO, but for the moment I give those who propose it the benefit of the 
doubt. It has not been completely refined yet, this concept, nor 
implemented. So that is another question for another day.
  The reason for my addressing the Senate today is my deep concern for 
the welfare of the men and women of the Armed Forces of the United 
States who are going through a winter far more severe than anything we 
have experienced here, certainly in the area of the Nation's Capital. 
And every day they could be subject to someone looking down a gun 
barrel, perhaps not firing in anger at them or the troops of other 
nations but firing in anger at someone else because of the persistent 
ethnic hatred that remains.
  I say most respectfully, we have a duty in this institution to assert 
ourselves as to the timetable committed to by other nations with regard 
to their support in both Bosnia and Kosovo which, up to this point, has 
not been met. We should do everything within our power, and working 
with our President, to see that that is done.
  Mr. President, simply put, the United Nations, the European Union, 
and the OSCE are not doing the job they committed to do--in a timely 
manner--in Bosnia or Kosovo. The successful NATO-led military 
operations in Bosnia and Kosovo were undertaken--at personal risk to 
our troops, and those of other nations, and with billions of dollars in 
cost to the American taxpayer--with the express understanding here in 
America that the UN and others would promptly move in behind and 
consolidate the gains. Now, as a result of little consolidation, U.S. 
troops--and troops from over 30 other nations--remain in Bosnia over 
four years after the end of that war, and are facing indefinite 
deployments to both Bosnia and Kosovo.
  Personal bravery and international bonds of commitment won the wars 
in the Balkans; but, will the slow pace of follow-on actions result in 
a loss of peace?
  During a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on February 2, when 
NATO commander General Clark was the witness, I first signaled my 
intention to take legislative action, in connection with the upcoming 
Kosovo Supplemental to be proposed by President Clinton, to revitalize 
the near stagnant situations in both Bosnia and Kosovo. I addressed 
this subject again this past Tuesday, during the Committee's annual 
hearing with the Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint 
Chiefs on the budget request.
  I am considering a variety of options, including tying U.S. military 
funding for these operations to demonstrable progress by the UN, the 
EU, and the OSCE in fulfilling their commitments to rebuild the civil 
society in Bosnia and Kosovo; or requiring the withdrawal of U.S. 
troops by a time certain--perhaps in 18 months--and leaving the 
military occupation in Bosnia and Kosovo to European leadership. In the 
coming days, I intend to continue to consult with my colleagues in the 
Senate, and others in the Administration and outside of government, on 
this initiative. From my initial discussion with my colleagues I have 
to say, support is growing for my concept.
  Congress has a co-equal responsibility with the Administration, and 
we now must exercise leadership, hopefully with concurrence by the 
Administration. This situation just cannot continue. Other nations and 
organizations will have to follow through on their commitments, the 
parties in the region will have to start cooperating with international 
authorities and taking on more responsibility for the fate of their 
region and their people.
  The U.S. military will not stay there forever. The United States has 
far too many commitments around the world, our military is stretched 
too thin as it is; we cannot have a decades-long military deployment to 
the Balkans.
  We, together with other nations, went into Bosnia and Kosovo with the 
best of intentions--to stop the slaughter of tens of thousands of 
innocent people, to restore peace and stability to the region, and to 
help the people of the Balkans rebuild lives shattered by war and 
ethnic cleansing. But what has the coalition achieved? Our military 
forces have done their job. We have stopped the fighting, but precious 
little other progress has taken place. As one official said to me in 
Bosnia, ``We have stopped the fighting, but the war goes on.'' Four 
years after the Dayton Accords ended the war in Bosnia, little progress 
has been made in rebuilding that country. The economy is stagnant, 
police forces are inadequate and ineffective even to deal with routine 
criminal activity--much less the growing problems of organized crime, 
the judicial system is far from ready, only crime and corruption are 
growing. In fact, I was told by a senior UN official in Bosnia that the 
only truly organized, multi-ethnic institution in Bosnia is organized 
crime. Regrettably, a similar situation is rapidly developing in 
Kosovo.

  At this point, I would like to mention a positive event that has 
occurred in the region, the recent elections in Croatia. However, at 
this point, it remains to be seen if those elections will translate 
into similar positive events in Bosnia and Kosovo.
  Since the timing of the departure of U.S. and allied troops from both 
Bosnia and Kosovo is directly linked to the progress--or lack of 
progress--that the UN and others make in achieving their goals, I am 
gravely concerned with the current situation. Clearly, the military has 
fulfilled its mission--namely, to provide a secure situation in Bosnia 
and Kosovo. In sharp contrast, the UN, the EU, the OSCE and others are 
not living up--in a timely manner--to the commitments they made to 
consolidate the gains made by the military.
  Even though I have had a long association with the situation in the 
Balkans--having traveled regularly to the region since first visiting 
Kosovo in September 1990 with then-Senate Majority Leaders Bob Dole and 
others, and being the first U.S. Senator to go to Sarajevo during the 
war, in September 1992--I was, quite frankly, distressed by what I saw 
during my last visit in January.
  Let me be clear--our troops, along with the troops from over 30 other 
nations that have joined the NATO-led operations in Bosnia and Kosovo, 
performed magnificently in their military missions. They are, today, 
conducting a wide variety of assignments, and doing an outstanding job. 
The U.S. troops I met in Bosnia and Kosovo are among the finest I have 
encountered in my 30-plus years of public service in working with 
military organizations throughout the world. They are well-trained, 
motivated and enthusiastic about what they are doing to help the people 
of Bosnia and Kosovo. Simply put--they have achieved their mission. To 
the extent possible, given the continued ethnic animosities, the 
military has stopped the large-scale fighting and has created a safe 
and secure environment, from a military perspective, in both Bosnia and 
Kosovo. However, unacceptable, dangerous levels of criminal activity 
continue, and put our troops at constant risk.
  So, why are our troops still in Bosnia over four years after they 
were first deployed? Why is there no end in sight in Kosovo? The reason 
is that the United Nations, the EU and other international 
organizations charged with the responsibility of rebuilding the 
civilian structures in Bosnia and Kosovo are simply not doing their 
job. This situation has to change.
  Yesterday, I had the opportunity to communicate this message directly 
to Bernard Miyet, the Under Secretary General for Peacekeeping 
Operations at the United Nations. We had a lengthy discussion regarding 
Bosnia and Kosovo and I conveyed to him my extreme concern with the 
situation there, in particular the slow pace with which the United 
Nations, European Union and other international organizations are 
fulfilling their promised assistance to the region.
  Foreign donors must deliver, immediately, on their promises of 
international police so that NATO soldiers can get out of the business 
of policing. Our troops are not trained to perform these tasks, and it 
should not be part of their mission. The United States has made a major 
contribution of 450 police for Kosovo and is about to increase its 
commitment. Others, particularly the Europeans, have to do their share 
by providing the necessary police forces.

  Secretary Cohen delivered that message to our European allies this 
past weekend, at the annual Wehrkunde Conference. According to 
Secretary Cohen,

       To date there has been a clear failure by participating 
     nations to provide the UN with

[[Page S594]]

     sufficient numbers of police for public security duties in 
     Kosovo, with a significant disparity in the amount of support 
     provided by different Alliance members. Indeed, the number of 
     police deployed is roughly half of what was planned. As a 
     result, KFOR soldiers, who are trained to fight wars, are 
     working as policemen, a job for which they have not been 
     trained and should not be asked to perform indefinitely.

  I agree.
  We must be mindful of the fact that the United Nations and other 
international organizations can only succeed if the nations comprising 
these organizations contribute the needed resources.
  In Kosovo, the UN needs the money to do the job. Only a small portion 
of the money pledged at last November's donors conference for Kosovo's 
budget has actually been delivered. This is the money that pays the 
salaries for teachers, judges, and street sweepers--the people who make 
Kosovo work and whose loyalty the United Nations Mission in Kosovo 
(UNMIK) needs if it is to succeed. The Europeans and others have to 
carry their weight and deliver on their commitments.
  I am particularly concerned with the performance thus far of the 
European Union. The EU has taken on the primary responsibility for the 
reconstruction of Kosovo. This is a job to which the EU committed--in 
recognition of the fact that the United States bore the lion's share of 
the cost of the war. Unfortunately, it is not quite working out as 
planned.
  Last fall, the EU committed almost $500 million for reconstruction. 
Recently, the European Parliament reduced that commitment to less than 
$200 million, questioning Kosovo's ``absorption capacity.'' It now 
appears that there is a serious chance that even this reduced EU 
commitment will not arrive in time to make a difference.
  I would like to quote from the excellent statement made by the 
Ranking Member of the Armed Services Committee, Senator Levin, during 
last week's Committee hearing with General Clark:

       It is vitally important for the international community and 
     particularly the nations of Europe to provide the funding and 
     the civilian police that are so necessary if these missions 
     (in Bosnia and Kosovo) are to be successful . . . The 
     European Union can talk about a goal of greater Euoprean 
     military strength--a stronger European pillar within NATO. 
     But the first test is whether it will meet the 
     responsibilities they have already accepted of providing $36 
     million and civilian police for Kosovo. On my scorecard, they 
     are flunking the test.

  The distinguished Ranking Member and I agree.
  And again, during last Tuesday's hearing, Senator Levin reiterated 
and strengthen his message from last week by saying, ``There is a 
requirement (in Kosovo) for 6,000 civilian police, but less than 2,000 
have been provided. We have provided our share but others have failed, 
and that failure endangers our troops and the success of our mission. 
Civil implementation of the cease fire is in real jeopardy and will 
fail unless a sufficient number of international civil police are put 
on the ground promptly by the Europeans. The European Union can talk 
all it wants to about its plans to provide a militarily strong European 
pillar within NATO under the European Security and Defense Identity. 
But that is just rhetoric. The reality is their failure to meet their 
current commitments in Kosovo.''
  Since NATO troops were first deployed to Bosnia in December of 1995, 
the United States has spent almost $10 billion dollars to support our 
military commitment of troops to that nation. We have spent an 
additional $5 billion in Kosovo for the air campaign and the deployment 
of U.S. KFOR troops. The annual price-tag for these military 
commitments is $1.5 billion for Bosnia and $2 billion projected for 
Kosovo. This is an obligation for the American taxpayer.

  In addition to these significant sums of money, I am concerned about 
the safety and welfare of the men and women of our Armed Forces, and 
the Armed Forces of the other nations, who every day patrol the towns 
and villages of Bosnia and Kosovo, subjecting themselves to substantial 
personal risk while performing duties traditionally not performed by 
military personnel.
  As I said earlier, our troops have performed their mission--they have 
created a safe and secure environment, as I previously indicated. But 
the UN and other elements of the international community have not 
filled in behind our troops to perform their mission. The results is 
that our troops are forced to fill the vacuum, preforming missions for 
which they were not trained--acting as mayors, policemen, arbiters of 
disputes, large and small. I was told of U.S. troops who were guarding 
two old Serb women who did not want to leave their home, which happened 
to be in an Albanian village. I saw three U.S. soldiers guarding a Serb 
church in an Albanian section of Kosovo. We must ask ourselves, are 
these jobs our troops should be performing today, tomorrow or for an 
indefinite period, as is now projected? These are commendable, 
humanitarian objectives which should be assumed by entities other than 
the Armed Forces.
  In Kosovo--as is the case in Bosnia--there is a level of hatred--
personal, ethnic and religious--that is simply beyond our 
comprehension. When I was in Kosovo in January, I was told that most of 
the violence in Kosovo is now Albanian on Albanian violence. I find 
this troubling. The United States and our NATO allies went into this 
region for the purpose of stopping and reversing the ethnic cleansing 
of Albanians by Serbs. But what has been a consequence of our 
involvement? While hundreds of thousands of Albanians have returned to 
their homes, tens of thousands of Serbs have been driven from Kosovo--
the result of attacks by returning Albanians. Now that the Serb 
population of Kosovo--such as it is--has been isolated in small pockets 
of the province, we are seeing growing violence by Albanians against 
fellow Albanians, simply for their past or present association with 
Serbs. In the town of Vitina, I was shown a store, owned by an 
Albanian, which had been bombed 2 days before our arrival. Why? The 
Albanian shopkeeper had purchased property from a Serb--he was a 
``collaborator'' in the minds of hardline Albanians.
  Is it realistic for us to think that these people can ever live 
together peacefully? Or are we wasting our time and money--and 
needlessly risking the lives of our people--trying to achieve the goal 
of a multiethnic society for Bosnia and Kosovo?
  I believe that we have reached that point in time when it is the 
responsibility of the Congress to take action--to reexamine the goals, 
their achievability, and what appears to be our open-ended involvement 
in Bosnia and Kosovo for an undetermined period of time.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER: The Senator from Delaware.
  (The remarks of Mr. Roth pertaining to the submission of S. Con. Res. 
81 are located in today's Record under ``Submission of Concurrent and 
Senate Resolutions.)
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from New York.

                          ____________________