The Bosnian Intervention

by Cliopatria

I don’t want to jinx it, but this report about Bosnia looks like excellent news. The problems they have remaining are real, and as we can see in other parts of the world, ethnic tensions can flare quickly. But so far so good.

A couple of questions on this:
1) This looks like an example of effective international intervention. What has made it successful?
2) Should this begin a reevaluation of Bill Clinton’s foreign policy?

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Oscar Chamberlain - 8/3/2006

John

The length of time is a consideration. I was never happy with the one year promise when the troops went in. Clinton was lying when he said it. Congressmen and Senators lied when they said they believed it.

However, if my memory serves--I am open to correction, after we were there three years, the situation had greatly improved--though it was still difficult in many ways.

Six months ago, I would have said that for all the problems that the situation was better in Iraq now than before the invasion. With the exception of the Kurdish region, I'm not sure if that remains true.

John H. Lederer - 8/2/2006

I'll correct myself. So far as Bosnia is concerned US troops went in in late 1995 and largely left in 2004 (EU troops replacing them).

In Kosovo we apparently went in in 1999 and are still there.

John H. Lederer - 8/2/2006

haven't we had forces in the Balkans for just almost 10 years now? Was it 1996?

Robert KC Johnson - 8/2/2006

Last term, I taught my US since 1950 class, so we had a class on Clinton's foreign policy. I pointed to Bosnia and especially Kosovo to make a case it was a success. (I should say that a friend of mine, John Schindler, is coming out with a book calling into question the thesis, on the grounds that the Bosnian government increasingly came under the control of Islamist forces.)

Anyway, my answer to (2) would still be yes.

My answer to (1) would be, at the very least, the use of overwhelming force--the single biggest mistake of Bush in Iraq: occupations can't succeed unless security is immediately re-established, and once this opportunity is lost, it's never regained. Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld, in their desire to avoid everything Clinton did, decided to ignore this critical lesson--and we're all paying for it.