In selecting To End a War as one of the eleven Best Books of the Year, The New York Times wrote:
“Diplomacy is the grungiest job…. But it must be satisfying because this enthralling book is also a heartfelt call to America to use its power when societies break down and to become a steady global force resisting human rights abuses everywhere. It is filled with anecdotes and sharp pictures of the wily Balkan leaders Holbrooke had to deal with, as well as with shrewd and seldom flattering analyses of the personalities and motivations of timid American and NATO military commanders…. His re-creation of battles over principle and tactics with Western generals and State Department and White House officials are dramatic, and his description of a rudderless administration during the early days of his efforts is astonishingly candid, and convincing. His combativeness may offend the pinstripe set, but it is wonderfully refreshing on the page. It is a very rare book on diplomacy that makes you feel you were in the midst of it, and excited to be there.”
—The New York Times Book Review
More praise for To End a War
“One of the most important and readable diplomatic memoirs of recent times…. His account should restore some respect to the much maligned art of diplomacy.”
—The Washington Post
“A compelling account of a life-and-death negotiation—the personal dynamics, the theatrical gestures, the unexpected snags, the leaks…. A classic exercise in lockup, great-power diplomacy. To End a War is a riveting book.”
—Time
“Engaging, witty, and dramatic…. Holbrooke paints a picture of an administration so inattentive and rudderless that it was often unclear what policy, if any, it had adopted “
—The New York Times Book Review
“Holbrooke is brilliant, forceful, determined, focused…. In his intuitive feel for the realities of power diplomacy and his strategic vision, he is the heir to Henry Kissinger in American diplomacy.”
—New York Post
“Of all the many excellent books that have been written on Bosnia, To End a War may turn out to be the most important. Holbrooke has written a superb book, one that is clear and honest. Bosnia needed a Holbrooke; perhaps more importantly, so did Washington, if it was to redeem its besmirched honor.”
—MICHAEL ELLIOTT, Newsweek
“Easily the best book of recent years on how to carry off a diplomatic negotiation…. We can only hope that the White House, Congress and the public are listening, and that generations of Americans will read Holbrooke’s book.”
—The Philadelphia Inquirer
“A first-rate piece of diplomatic history…. Holbrooke portrays the inner circle of the Clinton administration at work … and makes as powerful a case for the use of tactical force as is ever likely to appear in print.”
—The New York Times
“A natural writer, Holbrooke uses poetic license to dramatize events into an absorbing read. We have him bluffing, shouting at, or cursing Balkan politicians, negotiating deals of great consequence on the fly, stitching things together as he goes along.”
—The Boston Globe
“A roller-coaster ride, from the driver’s seat…. The going is rambunctious and fascinating.”
—Foreign Affairs
“A bravura performance, fascinating, informative and powerfully argued.”
—The New Republic
“Peppered with amusing anecdotes and shrewd insights…. Richard Holbrooke is the Quentin Tarantino of diplomacy.”
—The Economist
“To End a War should be read by anyone who still believes that the relationship between the United States military and its political overseers is healthy.”
—THOMAS E. RICKS, The Washington Monthly
“The first detailed insider account of foreign policy battles in the Clinton presidency. An unsettling, prophetic book.”
—JIM HOAGLAND, The Washington Post
“Riveting and forthright…. Holbrooke’s memoir is both highly literate and informed, as well as notably readable. It is steeped in the tradition of diplomatic memoirs by eminent diplomat/authors such as Henry Kissinger and Harold Nicolson.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred)
“Holbrooke on Bosnia is legendary.”
—The Christian Science Monitor
“One of the most important memoirs written about a post-cold war crisis…. Historians, diplomats and foreign policy experts will surely read To End a War in an attempt to understand the intricacies of how American actions were decisive in bringing an end to the worst tragedy to occur on European soil since World War II. Holbrooke gives riveting accounts of the meetings between members of the Principal’s Committee who, with President Clinton, made life-and-death decisions over NATO bombing and the timing of peace negotiations. The author also takes the reader on a tour de force of intense negotiations between the infamous figures who share responsibility for the demise of the Balkans. Like other memoirs written about historic negotiations, To End a War will take on greater importance as leaders try to ‘learn from history.’ To End a War is a vital starting point to understanding the success and failures of building peace.”
—The Georgetown Public Policy Review
“Absorbing…. What mattered [to Holbrooke] was the exercise of American leadership in setting the post-cold war global pace, in keeping the peace in Europe, and in strengthening a Western alliance badly strained by what was otherwise regarded as a second-tier regional problem…. Holbrooke has been
hailed for prodigies of imperial shrewdness, manipulation, and overall orchestration. Yet his willingness to second-guess some of his own tactics along the way adds to the credibility of his account.”
—STEPHEN S. ROSENFELD, World Policy Journal
“The Dayton Agreement provided much-needed relief from the horrible war that preceded it, and it is largely to the credit of Richard Holbrooke that there is any agreement at all. He has now given us, in To End a War, his memoir of this crucially important negotiation, the crowning achievement (so far) of an impressive diplomatic career. The book makes compelling reading.”
—PAUL WOLFOWITZ, The National Interest
“To End a War is a good book, well written and very readable…. It is invaluable to have such a substantial contribution to the public record, written by a principal player so soon after the event.”
—PAULINE NEVILLE-JONES, Prospect
“To End a War goes a long way toward revealing a much more human and thoughtful figure behind the brash, pushy image. Though Holbrooke was presented in the media as a sort of diplomatic Lone Ranger, one of the constant themes of this book is the teamwork on which he always depended. The point is made in a dramatic and tragic way in his opening chapter, in which he describes how three of his closest colleagues lost their lives when their armored vehicle rolled off a mountain track on the outskirts of Sarajevo…. This is one of several genuinely moving moments in To End a War.”
—NOEL MALCOLM, Los Angeles Times Book Review
“A graphic and insightful account of one of the most difficult problems the United States has faced since the end of World War II.”
—WARREN CHRISTOPHER
“This brilliant and remarkable book is both an absorbing firsthand narrative of the Balkan conflict and an invaluable contribution to the history of our time. This is more than a book about Bosnia. There will be more Bosnias in our future, and To End a War offers basic guidance about the uses of American power in a dangerous world.”
—ARTHUR SC
HLESINGER, JR.
“What Richard Holbrooke has given us in this impressive diplomatic memoir is a vivid and well-written account of the heroic efforts put forth by the author himself and the small team he headed to spare the troubled Balkan region further bloodshed and horror, and to bring the endangered peoples of Bosnia hope, security, and normalcy of life”
—GEORGE F. KENNAN
“Whether one agrees with him or not on Bosnia, Richard Holbrooke’s book is must reading.”
—HENRY KISSINGER
1999 Modern Library Paperback Edition
Copyright © 1998 by Richard Holbrooke
Maps copyright © 1998 by David Lindroth Inc.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American
Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by
Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by
Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Modern Library and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Originally published in hardcover by Random House, Inc., in 1998.
Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following for permission
to reprint previously published material:
Éditions Bernard Grasset: Excerpt from Le Lys et la Cendre
by Bernard-Henri Lévy (Paris: Éditions Bernard Grasset, 1996). Reprinted
by permission of Éditions Bernard Grasset.
Harcourt Brace & Company and Faber and Faber Limited: Excerpt from
‘The Hollow Men” from Collected Poems 1909–1962 by T. S. Eliot. Copyright © 1936 by T. S. Eliot.
Copyright © 1964, 1963 by T. S. Eliot.
Rights outside of the United States are controlled by Faber and Faber Limited.
Reprinted by permission of Harcourt Brace & Company and Faber
and Faber Limited.
Random House, Inc.: Fifty-one lines from “New Year’s Day” by W. H. Auden.
Copyright © 1941, 1969 by W. H. Auden. Four lines from “Danse Macabre”
by W. H. Auden. Copyright © 1940, 1968 by W. H. Auden. Both poems are
published in Collected Poems (New York: Random House, Inc., 1945).
Reprinted by permission of Random House, Inc.
Photo of Joseph Kruzel (p. vii): Scott Davis/U.S. Army Visual
Information Center
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Holbrooke, Richard C.
To end a war / Richard Holbrooke.
p. cm.
Originally published: New York : Random House, ©1998.
Ebook ISBN: 9780307765437
1. Holbrooke, Richard C. 2. Yugoslav War, 1991–1995—Diplomatic history.
3. Yugoslav War, 1991–1995—Peace. 4. Yugoslav War, 1991–1995—Bosnia
and Hercegovina. 5. Yugoslav War, 1991–1995—Personal narratives,
American. 6. Bosnia and Hercegovina—History—1992– I. Title.
DR1313.7.D58H65 1999
949.703—dc21 98–55520
Modern Library website address: www.modernlibrary.com
v3.1_r2
No words men write can stop the war
Or measure up to the relief
Of its immeasurable grief….
May an Accord be reached, and may
This aide-mémoire on what they say,
Be the dispatch that I intend;
Although addressed to a Whitehall,
Be under Flying Seal to all
Who wish to read it anywhere,
And, if they open it, En Clair.
—W. H. AUDEN, New Year Letter
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Note to the Reader
Prologue
1. The Most Dangerous Road in Europe
BOOK I: BOSNIA AT WAR2. “The Greatest Collective Failure …”
3. A Personal Prelude
4. Bonn to Washington
5. From Decline to Disaster
BOOK II: THE SHUTTLE6. Pale’s Challenge
7. Bombing and Breakthrough
8. The Longest Weekend
9. Geneva
10. The Siege of Sarajevo Ends
11. The Western Offensive
12. Drama in New York
13. Cease-fire
14. Choosing Dayton, Getting Ready
15. Decisions with Consequences
BOOK III: DAYTON16. Going in Circles
17. “Peace in a Week”
18. Showdown
BOOK IV: IMPLEMENTATION19. Slow Start
20. Disaster and Progress
21. America, Europe, and Bosnia
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Cast of Characters
Notes
Bibliography
Other Books by this Author
About the Author
List of Maps
The Former Yugoslavia
The Western Offensive
Areas of Control After Cease-fire
Key Territorial Issues at Dayton
Reunifying Sarajevo Under Dayton
Note to the Reader
BETWEEN 1991 AND 1995, CLOSE TO three hundred thousand people were killed in the former Yugoslavia. The international response to this catastrophe was at best uncertain and at worst appalling. While both the United States and the European Union initially viewed the Balkan wars as a European problem, the Europeans chose not to take a strong stand, restricting themselves to dispatching U.N. “peacekeepers” to a country where there was no peace to keep, and withholding from them the means and the authority to stop the fighting. Finally, in late 1995, in the face of growing atrocities and new Bosnian Serb threats, the United States decided to launch a last, all-out negotiating effort. This is the story of how, belatedly and reluctantly, the United States came to intervene and how that intervention brought the war in Bosnia to an end.
In the last two years, many people have asked me what the negotiations were really like. This cannot be answered with a dry account of positions taken and agreements reached. The fourteen weeks that form the core of this story were filled with conflict, confusion, and tragedy before their ultimate success. The negotiations were simultaneously cerebral and physical, abstract and personal, something like a combination of chess and mountain climbing. This was not a theoretical game between nation-states, but a dangerous and unpredictable process.
This account of the Bosnia negotiations is written from the perspective of the negotiating team, but to broaden it I have interviewed many of my former colleagues and associates, as well as other experts on the region, who offered their own recollections of important events. Physical descriptions, anecdotes, and the personal background of participants are integral to the story; in diplomacy, as in architecture, details matter. Many events happened far from the negotiating team, in Washington, in the Balkans, in the United Nations, and in the major European capitals. I have included most of them, but, by necessity, they are discussed in less detail. Of special importance were the parallel negotiations with Moscow, conducted primarily by Secretary of Defense William Perry and Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott, which resulted in the unprecedented deployment of Russian troops to Bosnia under American command as part of a NATO-led peacekeeping force.
Government service is always a collective effort; we were only part of a much larger team headed by President Clinton, Vice President Gore, and Secretary of State Warren Christopher, without whose support we would have failed. A list of acknowledgments can be found at the end of this book, but it is not long enough to credit everyone who made the shuttle and Dayton possible. The opinions and views expressed
in this book are nonetheless solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Department of State or the United States Government.
Today, public service has lost much of the aura that it had when John F. Kennedy asked us what we could do for our country. To hear that phrase before it became a cliché was electrifying and led many in my generation to enter public service. For me it was the Foreign Service, which I joined right after graduating from college. Less than a year later I found myself in Saigon. It seems like yesterday, but this was almost thirty-six years ago. I do not wish to suggest that in some distant “golden age” all was altruism and that today idealism is dead. Such easy myths may satisfy, but they are not true; every era has both heroes and scandals. But in an age when the media pays more attention to personalities than to issues, Americans may conclude that public service is either just another job, or a game played for personal advancement.
The public sector contains countless men and women who, whether liberal or conservative, still believe in hard work, high ethical standards, and patriotism. This book is dedicated to three of them. As this story demonstrates, public service can make a difference. If this book helps inspire a few young Americans to enter the government or other forms of public service, it will have achieved one of its goals.
My own government experiences over the last thirty-five years have led me to conclude that most accounts of major historical events, including memoirs, do not convey how the process felt at the time to those participating in it. This derives, in part, from the historian’s need to compress immensely complicated and often contradictory events into a coherent narrative whose outcome the reader (unlike the participants at the time) already knows. Other, more subtle factors are also at work: the natural tendency of memoirists to present themselves in a favorable light; a faulty memory or incomplete knowledge; and the distorting effect of perfect hindsight. A memoir sits at the dangerous intersection of policy, ambition, and history, where it is tempting to focus on instances of good judgment, and to blur or forget times when one made a mistake.
To End a War Page 1
