Bad Blood and Broken Promises

When Serbs fired two anti-tank missiles at a United Nations convoy near the Bosnian town of Velika Kladusa last Monday, Ismail Hassain had just closed the hatch on his armored personnel carrier. The blast inflicted such massive injuries to his head that the Bangladeshi peacekeeper immediately lapsed into a deep coma. Serb forces refused permission for Hassain and four of his wounded U.N. comrades to be evacuated by helicopter, so the soldiers were forced to endure an eight-hour road trip to an American medical hospital in Zagreb. Hassain, who never awoke from his coma, died the next morning.

Minutes after the attack, the commander of the Bangladeshi battalion in * Bihac requested an air strike by NATO planes under the standard rules of engagement. Despite the fact that the U.N. Security Council would shortly condemn the assault as "a heinous act of violence," U.N. commanders in Sarajevo refused to pass the request on to NATO. As the Serbs continued to harass U.N. forces, holding peacekeepers hostage and closing down the Sarajevo airport, U.N. commanders did nothing. "The U.N. is never going to fight back," remarked one American official, in an attempt to explain the commanders' conviction that air strikes only encourage the Serbs to intensify attacks on their vulnerable troops. "They are intimidated."

That passive response illustrates the extent to which the U.N. has ceded to the Bosnian Serbs control over the largest peacekeeping mission in the post- cold war world. Their unchallenged aggression in recent weeks has brought the U.N. humanitarian mission in Bihac virtually to a standstill. Through their complex chain of backtracked commitments and broken promises, the Serbs have proved themselves masters at the game of playing one side against another. Late last week, they took the game to a new level by introducing the prospect of having Jimmy Carter engage in another round of freewheeling diplomacy.

Perhaps the most formidable weapon in the arsenal of the Bosnian Serbs is their singleness of purpose compared to the contradictions dividing the Western allies. Those fault lines were evident again last week. Only a few days after France threatened to withdraw its 4,500 peacekeepers from Bosnia, French Defense Minister Francois Leotard argued for a more aggressive stance against the Bosnian Serbs. Military chiefs will gather in the Hague this week to devise ways to strengthen the U.N. presence -- even as their subordinates continue to draft plans for an evacuation.

The French about-face, which was welcomed by the U.S. but received only a cool stare from British Defense Minister Malcolm Rifkind, reflects the schizophrenia at the core of the West's response to the Balkan war. Unable to choose between mounting a more muscular response and calling off the whole show, the allies' simultaneous pursuit of both alternatives leaves them hamstrung. On one hand they fear that a more assertive approach in Bosnia is likely to entangle them more deeply in the war. Yet admitting defeat and pulling out would not only humiliate NATO but also allow the conflict to widen.