How to stop Serbia

SERBIA's drive to grab most of Bosnia will not be thwarted by the Security Council resolution of August 16. Although the resolution permits "all necessary measures" to assure that relief supplies get through to besieged Sarajevo, it will not change the situation on the ground, where the nascent Bosnian state is being carved out of existence. Moreover, by creating an impression that a rescue of sorts is coming, the Western sponsors of the UN resolution evidently feel that they are temporarily off the hook. The wave of concentration-camp stories has abated and Mr. Milosevic suffered no consequences.

Since the Bosnian horror is above all about history, which is a vast challenge for those who want to create ethnically homogeneous despotisms, every lessening of Western determination helps the aggressor. Indeed, there is every indication that the European conference on the disposition of Yugoslavia, scheduled for August 26-28 in London, will try to appease the Serbs in hope that accommodation will end the fighting. The consequences of such a course of action would be disastrous for the whole Balkan region and wherever new polities have emerged from multinational Communist states.

This need not be so. But instead of pursuing limited military action, without the massive use of ground troops, opponents of intervention invoke the mythical power of Serbia. Lieutenant General Barry R. McCaffrey, a representative of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, recently testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee that 60,000 to 120,000 troops would be needed to protect the flow of humanitarian aid to Sarajevo. Since less than twenty miles of poorly defended Serb-held territory separate Sarajevo from the nearest territory held by the Bosnians' Croat allies, the do-nothing claim is hardly convincing. More important, Bosnians are not asking for Western troops. Their first plea is the lifting of the arms embargo. Serbs got twothirds of Bosnia because their Moslem and Croat opponents were virtually disarmed. It is unconscionable that the Western governments make little distinction between the aggressor and his victims in the key area and perpetuate the imbalance between the combatants.

Serbia has considerable--though by no means inexhaustible--supplies of weapons, its booty from Tito's army. Most of ex-Yugoslavia's military industry, too, is located in Serbia. That is why the strategic bombing of Serbia's military installations, combined with the destruction of bridges on the Drina and Sava Rivers (at Raca, Zvornik, Bratunac, and Visegrad) that supply Serbian troops in Bosnia, should be the first military option. The sieges of Sarajevo, Gorazde, and Bihac should be relieved through targeted air raids of Serbian positions. Serbian TV stations and political quarters in occupied Banja Luka should also be targeted. Every effort should be made to cut the supply of Serbian-occupied northwestern Bosnia by ripping the thin Serbian-controlled corridor from Derventa to Podnovlje.

Procrastination has its amusing side. New canards are spread about Serbia's great prowess, the success of Communist partisans (all of them Serbs?) against the Germans, how Stalin was cowed by Tito (also a Serb?). All of this obscures the weakness of Serbia, a small regional power surrounded by enemies. The fear of Serbia is an ironic commentary on the self-satisfied mood of the West. Unless the trend is reversed, the damage will be long-lasting and paid in dividends.

COPYRIGHT 1992 National Review, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning