Yugoblunder - What Foreign Policy
What foreign policy? Ill
YUGOBLUNDER
By Patrick Glynn
For months after Secretary of StaLe Jaiiies Baker?s fateful visit to Belgrade in June 1991, observers debated whether the American secretary had inadvertently contributed to civil war in
Yugoslavia by throwing his weight behind Yugoslaviaii ?unity? at the very moment when the republics of Slove-nia and Croatia were preparing to secede. Since then the mischievous consequences of U.S. policy toward Yugoslavia have so multiplied that the fuss over Baker?s trip seems dwarfed by other disasters. In December Ger-many publicly.broke with the United States, announc-ing recognition of Slovenia and Croatia. ln January the EC followed. What began as a gruesome civil war has expanded into a crisis in U.S.-Europeaii relations, with major implications for the post-cold war balance of power. At last count thirty—nine nations—including Canada—have recognized the republics. The United States, still resisting recognition, remains isolated, its relations with Germany damaged, its influence and prestige in Europe clearly diminished.
U.S. policy-makers were quick to blame the Germans. In early January The New York Times described State ofli-cials ?below the level of James A. Baker ?3rd?—widely assumed to be Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger, the State Department?s lead man on U.S. policy toward Yugoslavia—as beginning to ?wince? at German assertiveness. But the elTect of such self exculpating statements was only to aggravate an already bad situation, increasing rancor wi th Bonn , hastening the loss of American influence in Europe.
What went wrong? U.S. handling of the Yugoslav crisis is in fact a case study in how not to conduct Ibreign pol-icy in the post-cold war world, combining lack of intel-lectual rigor and carelessness with what Senator Al Gore has ermed ?moral obtuseness? about the conflicts and issues at stake. it epitomizes the essential superficiality of the administration?s approach to foreign affairs.
Even now administration officials remain unrepen-tant. When I requested interviews for this story at time office of Eagleburger aide Kenneth Juster, public affairs directorJoseph Snyder, to whom 1 was referred, told me after two days that State officials at time ?highest levels,? including Eagleburger?s office, had determined that ?nobody in the building? would talk on the subject. The reason given was the ?murky? situation, in which offi-cials? comments would be ?overtaken by events.? (The likelier explanation was an article critical of U.S. policy
on Yugoslavia that I had written the previous week for The Wa.shington Post.)
The main factor in the Bush administration?s mis-handling of Yugoslavia was its devotion to geopolitical ?stability? at the expense of democratic values and human rights. U.S. policy toward Yugoslavia paralleled and was subordinated to U.S. policy toward the Soviet Union. In both cases the administration sought to prop up a declining Communist central government at the expense of democratically minded republics. In the USSR It was Gorbachev; in Yugoslavia it was the reform-minded Prime Minister Ante Markovic. In both cases the effort failed. But while in the Soviet instance it failed peacefully, in Yugoslavia U.S. policy may have contributed to a violent civil war. The errors were rein-forced by clientism on the part of State?s Belgrade-orientated Yugoslav hands—and possibly, in Eagle-burger?s case, by a history of personal financial dealings with firms owned by Yugoslavia?s Communist govern-ment. (See ?Lawrence of Serbia,? page 16.)
What was occurring durmg 1989 and 1990 in
Yugoslavia was an uneven shift to democracy.
In the spring of 1990 both Slovenia and
Croatia elected non-Communist govern-men ts in internationally monitored free elections. Both adopted denmocratic constitutions. Slovenia, the most prosperous and ethnically homogeneous of the six
Yugoslav republics, was also time most eager for indepen-dence. The Croatian situation was more complex, given the presence of a 12 percent Serb population and mem-ories of brutal mass murders of Serbs and other mimiori-ties under a fascist puppet regime during World War II.
But if Croatia?s human rights situation was problem-atic, human rights problems in Serbia were clear-cut amid acute. Since 1987 Serbia had been ruled by a hard-line Communist, Slobodan Milosevic, who increasingly based his appeal on fiercely nationalist themes. Under Milosevic, Serbia had perpetrated extreme abuses in the dominantly Albanian province of Kosovo—shooting and jailing protesters, torturing prisoners, firing ethnic Albanians from jobs and invading their homes. More-over, in sharp contrast to elections in Slovenia and Croatia, Serbia?s December 1990 elections were neither free nor lair. Restrictions on freedom of expression, unmonitored army voting, and a scheme whereby Ser-bian banks were ordered to print almost $2 billion in Yugoslav currency to be distributed to employees of state-owned enterprises prior to the election helped ensure victory for Milosevic and his nationalist uco-Cummunists.
By 1990 communism in Yugoslavia was ceding to nationalism, but in uneven fashion. In Slovenia and Croatia, nationalism had assumed an imperfect demo-cratic tinge, while in Serbia it remained married to hard-line Leninism. The State Deparunent?s crucial fail-ure was to miss the importance of this distinction. Even as Slovenia and Croatia edged toward democracy and the Serbian human rights record worsened, the United States strove to maintain an artificially evenhanded pol
FEBRUARY 24, 1992 THE NEW REPUBLIC
According to statements entered into time congressional record by House Banking Conmmiuee chair-man Henry Gonzalez, Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger played a role in setting up two major Yuguslav-owned companies in the United States during the 1980s ?its Bank, a wholly owned subsidiary of tIme Yugoslav bank Ljubljanska Banka, and Global Motors/Yugo of America, a subsidiary of the Yugoslav arms maker Zavodi Crvena Zastava, and importer of the Yugo automobile. According to his financial disclosure report filed under law in February 1989, Eagleburger (who was ambassador to Yugoslavia front 1977 to 1981) was paid $5,000 as a director of lBS bank front January 1, 1988, through February 24, 1989, and his directorship of Global Motors was uncompensated. But Global Motors was also a client of two consulting firms for which Eagleburger worked, Kissinger and Associates and Kent Asso-ciates, from which lie received salary, bonuses, amid severance totaling over
$1.1 million for the same period. In time case of Kent Associates, Global Motors Was one of only four clients listed by Eagleburger apparently accounting together for the $453,872 lie received.
In 1988 I.BS and its chairman were indicted for money—laundering. Although the chairman was cleared of charges, the bank was convicted, Gon-zalez said. Global Motors went bankrupt, and Eagleburger was named as a defendant in a suit stemming from time bankruptcy, according to Gonzalez.
Two questions arise. Could business connections have made Eaglebumger inclined to give a inure sympathetic hearing to Serbs? (Judy Dempsey of The Financial Times has written, for example, that Serbian leader Milosevic ?cultivated a friendship? with Eagle-burger while serving as a director of time main state-owned Vugoslav bank Beobanka.) Also, could Eagleburger be said in some sense to have had a finan-cial interest in the survival of Yugoslavia in that more such business
(heals whIm Yugoslav government-owned lirnms might be in prospect once he left government? (When these questions were outlined to Eaglebuigers office and a request for aim interview was made, he chose not to return the phone call.) At the very least, Eagle-burger?s situation as key policy-maker on Yugoslavia reveals aim importanat loophole in time present ethics laws. Ethics regulations apply only to deal-ings with firms, not (as in time Yugosla— vian case) to governments that may own those firms. In March 1989 Eagle-burger pledged to recuse himself from matters involving I.BS bank and Global Motors and their parent firms for as long as litigation was pendmg. He did not explicitly recuse himself from nmatters relating to Yugoslavia. Interestingly, Lord Carrington, time man chosen to chair time EC Peace Conference on Yugoslavia, also once worked at Kissinger Associ-ates. Under Carrington?s clmairmnan-ship, the EC pursued siumilarly even— handed policies vis-à-vis time Yugoslav republics.
P.C.
icy. ?We have never bcezz admirers of Communist ideol-ogy,? U.S. ambassador to Yugoslavia Warren Zimnrner-mann told the Serbian newspaper Borba in March 1991. ?However, we think that every people, the Yugoslav peo-ple included, have a right to the system they choose themselves and to the people they elect. We respect that right, and if they choose communism and the Commu-nists, we are prepared to deal with their leadership.?
Back home in Washington, State officials resisted efforts by. legislators to change policy. Humnan rights problems in Yugoslavia, a senior congressional aide was told by high level State Department ollicials, ?are the results of ethnic tensions…. Don?t make a big deal about them. The Serbs are trying to hold the country together… Don?t break up because the Soviet Union will use it as a model. If the Soviet Union breaks up,
Lawrence of Serbia
Moody, who also has strong Serbian sympathies, regretted that the United States hadn?t played a inure active role as a broker between the parties.
In theory, the Nickles amendment provided a new policy framework, anchored more closely to democracy and human rights. Human rights groups such as Helsinki Watch had urged just such an approach. The point was not just to penalize Serbia, which was com-mitting the grossest abuses, but to increase leverage with Croatia, where the human rights picture was still unclear. Croatia?s 1990 elections had been highly nationalistic in tone. Traveling in dominantly Serb regions of Croatia in 1990, Helsinki Watch executive director Jeri Laber says she found ?genuine fear? among Serbs of a possible resurgence of World War 11 persecution and genocide. Laber and others point out that Milosevic deliberately stirred and manipulated such fears—some argue in preparation for a coming War. Moreover, Croatia?s President Franjo Tudjman at tempted (somewhat unsuccessfully) to respond to Serb complaints in what the U.S. consul in Zagreb described in an August 1990 cable as ?sound and judi-cious? fashion. Tudjman offered the head of the minor-ity Serbian Democratic Party time vice presidency but was turned down. Eager for an international presence and
receptive to human rights monitoring, Croatia has shown a willingness to meet EC demands. Many now agree a more visible U.S. presence in Croatia and Ser-bia, backed by the threat of sanctions, might have done much both to reassure Serbs in Croatia and to deter the Serbian republic from violent intervention.
In May 1991 the Nickles sanctions were imposed, and aid was cut to the Yugoslav central government and Ser-bia. However, a mere twenty days later President Bush waived the sanctions after a phone call with Markovic, the Yugoslav ?Gorbachev.? But by now Markovic?s authority had been completely undercut by Milosevic, whose December money-printing scandal had destroyed the convertibility of the dinar and with it the Markovic economic reforms. Moreover, nine days earlier Serbia had blocked the scheduled assumption of Yugoslav?s collective presidency by Stipe Mesic, a Croat, destroying any pretense of a neutral federation.
During the winter of 1990-91, State continued to resist measures to treat the republics differently or to link U.S. aid to human rights, lit January 1991 Dole introduced legislation calling for aid to republics in both Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union, based on demo-cratic and human rights criteria. State opposed the measure. Throughout 1991—as militant Serbs in Croa-tia, stirred by Milosevic, mounted armed rebellion, eventually declaring a small independent state—Serbia resisted efforts by Slovenia and Croatia to negotiate a looser Yugoslav confederation. State advocated standing aside. in May Croatians voted overwhelmingly for inde-pemidence in a refrendum, following a similar vote by the Slovenes. in June Baker traveled to Belgrade and gave his speech emphasizing U.S. interest in the ?tern-tonal integrity? of Yugoslavia. ?I believe aker?s speech] suggested to the Serbs—to Milosevic—that we
were going to support extreme things to keep the coun-try togethet;? says Yugoslav expert Steven Burg of Bran-deis Univiversity. Even after the declarations of indepen-dence by Slovenia and Croatia, White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater condemned ?unilateral actions that pre-empt dialogue,? arguing that ?separa-tion will lead to violence,? implicitly blaming Slovenia and Croatia for the war that Serbia and the Yugoslav army were about to start.
As late as October 1991, with war raging and thou-sands of Croatian civilians fleeing their homes, State tes-tified against legislation introduced by Senator Alfonse D?Amato (another veteran of the Dole trip to Kosovo) calling for a cutoff of aid to and sanctions against Serbia.
rom the beginning of the war, Germany and Austria leaned toward recognition of Croatia and Slovenia as the best solution. The United States, following U.N. special envoy Cyrus Vance,
argued iather that recognition would only escalate the war. As hate as mid-December Eagleburger told the may-ors of the besieged Croatian towns of Dubrovnik and Osijek that recognition would only lead to expansion of the war into Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia.
instead, the German decision to recognize the two republics, coming in December and .January, brought the first enduring cease-lire. With Yugoslav army deser-tions growing, the Serbian economy flagging, and the war increasingly unpopular at home, Serbia?s Milosevic now appeared ready to talk. As is not uncommon in dealing with a dictator, pressure had worked. Time situa-tion was far from resolved, but for the first Lime in fif teen cease-fires, the Croatian countryside was mostly quiet. One only wonders now what a differential policy pursued earlier in time game migimt have done. ?If we had summoned time moral courage to act,? says Gore, ?we could have saved thousands of lives.?
in the end the Yugoslav crisis did inure than create two new states: it marked the re-emergence of Germany as a great power. It was an ironic reversal of roles. Throughout the 1980s, when tIme United States pursued tough tactics agaiimst Communist leaders, based on a commitment to democratic principles, West Germany steered a inure neutral middle path between East and West based on realpolitik. Now tIme Germans were act-ing from principle against a dictator while the United States cultivated realpolitik. it was a measure of the fun-damental difference between the Bush and the Reagan foreign policies. it was also a measure of? time declining power of the United States. One of the great lessons of the l980s was that those countries fared best jim the global power struggle that stood firmly for their princi-pies. In the 1990s, returning to Kissingerian ideas of sta-bility, the United States eschewed such a course. The result was not merely a botched opportunity amid an unnecessary loss of lives, but aim absolute loss of interna-tional power for the United States.
PATRICK GLYNN is a resident scimolar at time Ameirican Enterprise institute.
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