Anyone who wants to know why “Europe” doesn’t work very well when the United States refuses to call the shots can consult the last chapter of David Owen’s Balkan Odyssey (Harcourt Brace, 389 pages, $ 25), a personal account of the ups and downs of European diplomacy in Bosnia from 1992 to 1995. To avoid future catastrophes like the genocidal Balkan war, Lord Owen writes, it will be necessary, among other things, to “link the European Council of heads of government with the Council Secretariat which serves the EU Foreign Affairs Council and the WEU” by creating a new post called the ” European Council’s Secretary-General,” who would be appointed by the European Council of heads of government but would not be answerable to the FAC or the EP. “The key to making this an effective reform,” of course, “would be for the existing SG of the Foreign Affairs Council Secretariat and the existing Secretary-General of the WEU to be charged by their respective bodies with working under the authority of the Secretary-General of the European Council of heads of government and the Presidency of the European Union for those matters, and only those matters, which are before the European Council at any one time.”

Or you could just have the United States bomb the hell out of them and send an assistant secretary of state to draw up the peace terms.