The U.S. is determined to be the dominant power in the Balkans. This thinking is best reflected in an extraordinary 46-page Pentagon document excerpted by the New York Times on March 8, 1992. The document, leaked by Pentagon officials, asserts the need for complete U.S. world domination in both political and military terms and threatens other countries that even aspire to a greater role. The public threats seem to be aimed at the European powers and Japan. Why else would the document be released with no disavowal by the Pentagon?
This Pentagon policy document states: "Our first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival. ... First, the U.S. must show the leadership necessary to establish and protect a new order that holds the promise of convincing potential competitors that they need not aspire to a greater role or pursue a more aggressive posture to protect their legitimate interests.
"We must account sufficiently for the interests of the advanced industrial nations to discourage them from seeking to overturn the established political and economic order. Finally, we must maintain the mechanism for deterring potential competitors from even aspiring to a larger regional or global role."
The document goes on to specifically address Europe. "It is of fundamental importance to preserve NATO as the primary instrument of Western defense and security.... We must seek to prevent the emergence of European-only security arrangements which would undermine NATO."
No senior U.S. official has ever denounced or renounced this document. When President George Bush was asked directly about the document, he said that while he hadn’t read the report, "We are the leaders and we must continue to lead."
Just how little U.S. involvement has to do with "aiding poor Bosnia" is best seen in an opinion piece in the Nov. 29, 1992, New York Times by retired Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Michael J. Dugan entitled "Operation Balkan Storm: Here’s a Plan."
Dugan is best remembered for an unusually candid interview before the Gulf War where he laid out very precise plans for the destruction of Iraq. He was relieved of his command for being too frank in describing the Pentagon’s war plans at a time when the U.S. was claiming to the UN that it wanted to impose sanctions on Iraq to pursue a diplomatic solution. However, four months later the war unfolded almost exactly as Dugan had described.
"A win in the Balkans would establish U.S. leadership in the post-Cold War world in a way that Operation Desert Storm never could," Dugan crowed. He laid out a scenario of coalition building, if possible, with Britain, France and Italy on an ad-hoc basis since the UN Security Council is deadlocked on the use of force by NATO. He described arming the pro-U.S. Bosnian forces such as those around Izetbegovic and use of "unconventional" operations in Bosnia to suspend UN humanitarian operations. Then, he said, massive air power should be used against Serbs in Bosnia and Serbia. This Air Force general likes to brag about U.S. death technology. Dugan suggested using aircraft carriers, U.S. F-15s, F-16s, F-18s and F-111s, Jstars and Tomahawk missiles to destroy Serbia’s electricity grid, refineries, storage facilities and communications. "But the U.S. costs in blood and treasure would be modest compared with that of Bosnian trauma."
Whether it was the original U.S. legislation of November 1990, or the recognition of an independent Bosnia under a right-wing U.S.-backed government rather than the compromise government acceptable to all sides in March 1992, or the U.S.-brokered Croatian-Muslim Federation of March 1994—U.S. intervention at each stage in the growing conflict in the Balkans has fanned the flames of war.
Whether it is the early 1993 Vance-Owen plan to cantonize Bosnia into tiny enclaves or the Vance-Stoltenberg Plan of late 1993 for a three-way partition of Bosnia—each proposal is an assertion of U.S. determination to dominate the region and keep its imperialist rivals off guard.
Despite the many grim warnings of difficult terrain and low cloud cover, the Clinton administration has offered to send 25,000 troops as a "peacekeeping" force if a U.S. plan presented in late August 1995 is imposed on the people of the region. Massive use of air power began in September 1995. Once committed, more and more troops will be required in a war that can quickly escalate. There is a heated debate today in ruling military, corporate and government circles. But it is not about how to negotiate peace. It is about how to insure U.S. domination of a strategic region.
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