THE BOMBING CAMPAIGN against Radko Mladic’s Bosnian Serb army alone has not solved the Balkan crisis. But NATO air strikes have dramatically altered the situation in the Balkans to the point where a peaceful settlement stands its best chance to take root since the start of the conflict four years ago. More important, the success of this mea- sured but effective use of military might may help the world’s most powerful nation get over the pervasive fear that every foreign policy tangle is a Mission Im- possible. That would be a welcome step forward, be- cause a timid superpower poses a greater danger to the present world order than ten Setbias.
When the foreign ministers of Bosnia, Croatia, and Serbia met in Geneva on September 8 to begin talking about a settlement of the conflict, they stood on the rubble of four years of conventional wisdom that American and NATO military action in the Balkans could have no useful effect. Indeed, just this past month, Gen. Charles G. Boyd (recently retired as Deputy Commander in Chief of the U.S. European Command) declared in the pages of Foreign Affairs that any course of action other than acquiescing to the territorial demands of the Serbs Was foolhardy. American and NATO military power could accomplish little.
