To End a War

by Richard Holbrooke

  CHAPTER 8

  The Longest Weekend

  The historian must… constantly put himself at a point in the past at which the known factors will seem to permit different outcomes. If he speaks of Salamis, then it must be as if the Persians might still win; if he speaks of the coup d’état of Brumaire, then it must remain to be seen if Bonaparte will be ignominiously repulsed.

  —JOHAN HUIZINGA

  OUR DIPLOMATIC SHUTTLE REACHED NEW INTENSITY. With a travel schedule that changed every few hours, we moved so unpredictably across Europe that Washington often did not know where we were. Driven by the bombing and by the sense that it was now all or nothing, we felt ready to take on almost any challenge—so much so that in the midst of the Bosnia shuttle, we took on an additional, related problem: the two-year-old crisis between Greece and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, where five hundred American troops were deployed to prevent hostilities.

  It hardly dawned on us that the Labor Day holiday was starting in the United States. Our own weekend would take us to Belgrade, Bonn, Brussels, Geneva, Zagreb, Belgrade, Athens, Skopje (the capital of Macedonia), Ankara, and back for a third time to Belgrade. During those four days we would:

  arrange and announce the first high-level meeting among the three warring parties in two years;

  meet our Contact Group colleagues (and a half-dozen Central European heads of government) in Bonn;

  spend most of a night at NATO headquarters in Brussels arguing for the resumption of the bombing;

  meet representatives of the Organization of the Islamic Conference in Geneva to get Muslim support for our efforts;

  negotiate a draft agreement with Milosevic and Izetbegovic for the high-level meeting—the first such agreement that would ever hold;

  resolve the dangerous situation between Greece and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia;

  plead for the resumption of the bombing, while holding off another invitation to Jimmy Carter to step into the negotiations.

  FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 1

  NATO suspended its bombing in Bosnia at 5:00 A.M. on Friday, September 1. I had told Washington we would support a short halt so that the U.N. commander, General Bernard Janvier, could negotiate with Mladic—but only if the pause would end promptly if the Bosnian Serbs did not agree to lift the siege of Sarajevo. With considerable prescience, Hill and Pardew warned that my position could cause a serious problem: it would be hard to resume the bombing once it was stopped, they feared, because the U.N. and some Europeans would try to prevent its resumption no matter what the circumstances. As if to prove Hill and Pardew right, U.N. headquarters in Zagreb, hiding its own desire for a total bombing halt behind our highly conditional support for a brief pause, told the press that the pause was at our request, a line that prompted a strong criticism of us by New York Times columnist William Safire.

  The afternoon before the bombing halt began, we met General Janvier in his headquarters in Zagreb. Janvier, a small, unhappy-looking man, gave the impression that he wished he were somewhere else, and politely offered evasive nonresponses. He was clearly waiting for us to disappear, as had so many other negotiators in the previous three years, so that he could get on with his work. His demeanor suggested that he thought he could negotiate successfully with Mladic if only we would leave him alone.

  Milosevic received us at Dobanovci, one of the many hunting lodges Tito had maintained around the country. About thirty minutes from downtown Belgrade, it was a collection of modest buildings set among large fields and forests, on the edge of a lake, not as fancy as Tito’s more fabled retreats. We sat at a long table outside the main house, eating and drinking almost continually. Milosevic had added to his entourage Nikola Koljevic, a short, plump, and hard-drinking Shakespeare scholar who had taught English literature in Michigan. Koljevic held the title of “Vice President of Republika Srpska,” but he was not trusted by the hard mountain men of Pale, the leaders of the Bosnian Serb movement, who viewed him as a Milosevic stooge. Koljevic liked to quote the Bard selectively to support his positions, frequently making statements like “The quality of mercy is not strained” or “The fault, dear Brutus …” Trying to keep even in the Shakespeare contest, I would offer up half-remembered phrases such as “Cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war” or “There is a tide in the affairs of men.”

  The meeting at the hunting lodge rambled on for twelve hours, with a break during which we returned to our hotel for a short press conference. Milosevic had changed the venue in order to create a more relaxed atmosphere. There was heavy drinking for much of the day, which clearly affected Koljevic, but I saw no evidence—then or later—that the alcohol affected Milosevic’s judgments. The Americans drank little, and I began a policy of accepting Milosevic’s frequent offers of drinks only when we reached agreements.

  Jim Pardew later called it the day of “bonding with the godfather.” Milosevic could switch moods with astonishing speed, perhaps to keep others off balance. He could range from charm to brutality, from emotional outbursts to calm discussions of legal minutiae. When he was angry, his face wrinkled up, but he could regain control of himself instantly.

  Near the beginning of the meeting, I suggested that we take a walk, accompanied only by General Clark. As he led us through the woods and fields behind the hunting lodge, he talked with nostalgia about his trips to New York as a banker—”I want to smell that wonderful New York air again,” he said, and he seemed to be serious. He described his career as a successful Yugoslav businessman during the late Tito era, and, for the first time, he talked to us about the need for regional economic cooperation, ignoring his own central role in the destruction of Yugoslavia. When we returned to the villa, we asked him about his famous 1989 speech at Kosovo that ignited Serb extremism. He vigorously denied that this was his intent, and repeated his accusation that Ambassador Zimmermann had sought to turn international opinion against him by organizing a diplomatic boycott of the speech. But Milosevic made an interesting admission: “I was wrong not to meet with Ambassador Zimmermann for so long,” he said. “I was angry at him, but I should not have waited a year.” Chris Hill, who knew the history in detail, defended Zimmermann and reminded Milosevic that the speech had been inflammatory by any standards.

  Over the lunch table, I proposed that the three Foreign Ministers meet in a week to start the peace process. Milosevic agreed instantly, and asked only that the United States, not the full Contact Group, be in charge. He would leave all details of location and timing to us. He criticized the Russians, saying that they presumed to a far greater influence in Serbia, based on historic Slav-Serb ties, than was justified. He was scornful of Moscow’s attempts to pressure or bribe the Serbs with aid—“tons of rotten meat, and crap like that,” he said. Since the Russians were his strongest supporters within the Contact Group, this was obviously said, at least in part, to have an effect on us.

  Using a secure telephone system Clark had set up on the veranda of the lodge, I called Talbott and told him that we had a “little surprise” for Washington: all three countries had agreed to send their Foreign Ministers to Geneva in about a week for a U.S.-sponsored meeting. It would be the first meeting at such a high level in over two years. We asked him to get the British, French, Germans, and Russians on board immediately so that the meeting could be announced in four hours. Strobe was completely supportive, and said he would call us back as soon as he could.

  Four hours is normally far too little time to coordinate such a complicated matter. But Strobe and John Kornblum, working frantically, accomplished it on schedule. Calling dozens of other Washington officials and the many foreign leaders, they gained rapid agreement from London, Paris, Moscow, Bonn, and the E.U.’s Carl Bildt for the Geneva meeting. Just over two hours later, as we sat anxiously on the patio outside Belgrade, Strobe called back with a characteristic opening line: “All set, pal. Everyone is on board.” His dedicated executive assistant, Victoria Nuland, lat
er told me it was the most satisfying day she had ever spent in public service, “because we worked together as a team and everything went off like clockwork on a big issue.”

  I had told Strobe that the Geneva meeting should be chaired by Secretary of State Christopher. He had discussed this with both Christopher and Donilon before calling back. Their reply surprised me. “The Secretary wants you to run the Geneva meeting,” he said. “He has other matters to take care of. Besides, if he comes, the other Contact Group Foreign Ministers will insist on participating, and with all the grandstanding it could become hard to focus on the main event.”

  Government offers small moments like this, whose full import one realizes only later. Few Secretaries of State would have given up the chance to chair such a meeting. But it was characteristic of Warren Christopher, who firmly believed in delegating both authority and responsibility downward to key subordinates, provided they operated within established policy guidelines.

  Nick Burns made the first announcement in Washington. A few minutes later, we made a short press appearance at the Hyatt in Belgrade. Our greatest regret, I began, was that Bob, Joe, and Nelson, to whom we had dedicated our shuttle effort, could not be with us for this announcement.

  After the press conference, we returned to the villa. Milosevic’s Foreign Minister, Milan Milutinovic, was openly fearful about the Geneva meeting. Pulling me aside during one of our many breaks, Milutinovic—smooth, affable, beautifully dressed, at ease in the language and style of international diplomacy, with its elaborate circumlocutions and nonconfrontational evasions—had just become Foreign Minister, and said he could lose his job (“Even my head,” he joked weakly) if anything went wrong. Everything, he said, had to be “one hundred percent” agreed upon before we got to Geneva; once there he would have no authority or flexibility. “The Master,” he said, gesturing toward Milosevic, “will pull all the strings.”

  SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 2

  We flew to Bonn in the morning for a Contact Group meeting and an international conference on the future of Central Europe. The meeting and the conference both took place in Germany’s state guest house at Petersburg, high on a hill above the Rhine overlooking the German capital, in the same rooms in which I had first met Chancellor Kohl.*

  The Europeans. Carl Bildt was enthusiastic about the idea of the Geneva meeting, which he would co-chair. Although the selection of a Swede as the chief European negotiator, replacing Lord David Owen, carried no special meaning to most Americans, in Bildt’s native land there was high symbolism in the selection of one of their countrymen (especially a former Prime Minister) to represent the European Union only a few months after Sweden had formally ended over 150 years of determined neutrality by joining the E.U. Bildt’s selection had been the result, in large part, of our suggestions; even during our frequent arguments, a result of the pressures we faced, Bildt and I remained close friends. Tall, elegant, and witty, Bildt was to play an important role over the next two years before returning to Swedish politics. We had an unusual relationship for two diplomats—quite the reverse of the normal pattern in international diplomacy of outward cordiality masking animosity: we argued often but remained good friends, and made a productive team.

  Everyone supported the Geneva meeting, but some of the Europeans were irritated because we had acted first and informed them later. This was particularly true of Pauline Neville-Jones of Great Britain, one of the most forceful people in the Contact Group. Strong-willed and dedicated to her work, she placed enormous importance on proper procedures, and vividly expressed her unhappiness that we had arranged the Foreign Ministers meeting without getting prior approval from the Contact Group. She and her German and French counterparts also said the meeting should be held in a U.N. building, rather than at the American Mission in Geneva. However, the Russian Contact Group representative, Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, accepted an American venue immediately—on the condition that the next meeting be hosted by his government.

  Such arguments over the location and “hosting” of meetings may seem comical, but they were a constant and time-consuming subplot of the negotiations. In fact, disagreements over substance were rarely as intense as those concerning procedure and protocol. These minidramas had relatively little to do with Bosnia, but were a manifestation of the confusion within the European Union over how to forge a common foreign policy position. From a procedural point of view, Pauline Neville-Jones certainly had a point. However, as I had written Christopher ten days earlier, if we consulted the Contact Group prior to each action, it would be impossible for the negotiations to proceed, let alone succeed. Now that the United States was finally engaged in Bosnia, we could not allow internal Contact Group squabbles to deflect us.

  The Russians. That day, Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev demanded publicly that Russia be made the third co-chair of the Geneva meeting. If Moscow secured an active role in the negotiations, it could cause a serious problem, given its pro-Serb attitude. But we felt that Moscow’s primary goal was neither to run nor to wreck the negotiations. Rather, what it wanted most was to restore a sense, however symbolic, that they still mattered in the world. Strobe Talbott sometimes called this “the Rodney Dangerfield syndrome”; the Russians felt they “got no respect” anymore, and looked for ways to be seen as one of the “big boys.” We felt that, despite occasional mischief making, Moscow would be easier to deal with if we gave it a place co-equal with the E.U. and the United States as a co-chair of the Geneva meeting than if we tried to downgrade it.

  Meshing overall policy toward Russia with the search for peace in Bosnia was never simple. We spent much time calibrating and recalibrating our activities to promote both objectives simultaneously. In the end the effort succeeded, and produced, among other things, a historic arrangement that put Russian soldiers under an American commander in Bosnia.*

  Behind our efforts to include Russia in the Bosnia negotiating process lay a fundamental belief on the part of the Clinton Administration that it was essential to find the proper place for Russia in Europe’s security structure, something it had not been part of since 1914. There was a constant power struggle in Moscow between old-style officials who had served the communists—the so-called nomenklatura—and a newer, post-Soviet leadership that was just starting to emerge. The United States sought to encourage the latter. Sticking to this policy in the face of the 1993 coup attempt, the war in Chechnya, Boris Yeltsin’s uncertain health, and officially sanctioned corruption took patience and determination, particularly because of constant attacks on the policy by American conservatives, who unfairly attacked the Administration, and especially Strobe Talbott, for being “soft on Russians.”

  As we left Bonn, a remarkable but invisible drama was playing itself out over whether or not to resume the bombing. Some U.N. and NATO commanders hoped to avoid resumption no matter what the outcome of the Mladic-Janvier talks. This was particularly true of General Janvier himself and, surprisingly, Admiral Leighton Smith, the commander of NATO’s southern forces and Commander in Chief of all United States naval forces in Europe. Even though he carried out his assignment with precision and skill, Smith did not like the bombing; using the same phrase that Secretary of State James Baker had made famous four years earlier, Smith told me he did not have a “dog in this fight.”

  General Clark, on the other hand, believed the bombing should resume. This put him in a difficult position. For a three-star general to make unwelcome suggestions to men with four stars on their shoulders was not normally a wise career move, but after Mount Igman Clark was committed. As the personal representative of the Chairman of the JCS, he had the authority to make suggestions—but only suggestions—to senior officers, and report directly to General Shalikashvili. This awkward situation came to a head on Saturday afternoon, September 2, in an Embassy car on the Cologne airfield as Clark and I were about to board our plane to Brussels. As Clark explained to Smith why the bombing might have to resume, I could tell by the noises emana
ting from Clark’s cell phone that he was being scolded by a very angry, very senior American naval commander. Genuinely worried about Clark’s future, I grabbed the phone from his hands and told Smith that if Mladic did not comply with our demands on Sarajevo within the next few hours, I would insist on the resumption of the bombing. Smith, fuming at Clark, remained unconvinced.

  In my view, Smith was edging into an area of political judgments that should have been reserved for civilian leaders. But Smith saw it differently: he told me that he was “solely responsible” for the safety and well-being of his forces, and he would make his decision, under authority delegated to him by the NATO Council, based on his own judgment. In fact, he pointed out, he did not even work for the United States; as a NATO commander he took orders from Brussels.

  Clark and Smith never got along well after that telephone call. To ensure that no damage would be done to Clark’s career, Strobe, Sandy Berger, and I all talked to General Shalikashvili. When, a year later, Clark received his fourth star and became Commander in Chief of the United States Southern Command in Panama, General Shalikashvili told me that Clark’s performance in Bosnia had, in the end, been the key factor in his promotion. In 1997, Clark was chosen as Supreme Commander of NATO, succeeding General Joulwan. Ironically, the very thing that had once threatened his career, his service with the negotiating team, proved to be crucial to the assignment of a lifetime.

  Problems such as these are not uncommon between the military and civilians in the government. I disagreed with Smith on this issue, but, as the person directly responsible for the safety of the NATO forces, his position was entirely rational. One must never forget in such circumstances what is at stake: the lives of young men and women. The wrong decision could send his men to their death or capture, as had happened in Somalia less than two years earlier. On the other hand, other lives were also at stake: those of the United Nations peacekeepers, over one hundred of whom had already been killed, and countless civilians on all sides. If negotiations failed, the war would continue—and even more United Nations troops might die while American leadership in Europe continued to decline.