SARAJEVO: Less than a week after saying he was "prepared to take a hit for being wrong" over reneging on his promise to bring the boys back from Bosnia, President Clinton delivered the bad news in person Monday. But his one-day holiday stopover with the 8,500 troops enforcing the Dayton peace accords seems to be going smoothly thus far, as Clinton makes a characteristic bid to be as conciliatory as possible. To pacify Republican opposition, he brought Bob and Liddy Dole — and to keep the G.I.s happy, he brought Chelsea (who had apparently been a big hit with the troops back in '96).

If it was at all a tough sell, there were some major rewards for the President and his policy — such as the face of Sarajevo itself, bristling with new cafes and businesses just two years after it was torn apart by a siege. "These are good people and this is a good thing we're doing," Clinton said he was told by one of the troops in a Virginia unit he encountered. Making the folks back home see it the same way is a battle the White House will have to fight another day.