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A Serb nationalist political leader in Bosnia and
Herzegovina, with the support of a longtime hardline Bosnian Croat,
is escalating separatist rhetoric, heightening concerns that his
threatened actions to reject state institutions could renew violent
conflict and unravel a long-touted U.S. diplomatic achievement, the
1995 Dayton Peace Agreement (DPA). Yet, the United States and its
European Union and NATO allies thus far have only issued tepid
statements in response, with no deterrent effect.
Milorad Dodik, Bosnian Serb member of Bosnia and
Herzegovina’s tripartite Presidency, announced on Oct. 14 that he
would initiate actions to dismantle state institutions, which he
incorrectly asserts were simply imposed by the international High
Representative. He has specifically cited the unified armed forces,
police and intelligence agencies, state tax administration, state
court, and numerous other bodies.
Since his rise to power in 2006 in the Bosnian
Serb entity, Republika Srpska (RS), Dodik has characterized these
institutions as the result of “legal violence” against the RS, which
constitutes just under half of BiH. While the High Representative
was instrumental in developing momentum for new state institutions,
most were established through inter-entity agreement with the
marginally larger Federation of BiH, and later voted upon in BiH’s
state Parliamentary Assembly (including with votes from Dodik’s
party). Action by one of those entities’ parliaments to revoke those
decisions would thus be illegal and unconstitutional.
Further upping the ante, Dodik said that if NATO
“intervened” in the RS against his actions, he would call upon his
“friends” (implying Serbia and Russia) to assist. The phrasing
implied that NATO didn’t have the right to be in the RS (and the
rest of BiH), an authority that Dayton clearly outlines. Later in
the day, he stated that, to deal with the (unified) BiH armed
forces, he would surround barracks in the fashion that the Slovene
Territorial Defense forces did with the Yugoslav People’s Army in
1991 – forcing them to withdraw unarmed. However, he mistakenly gave
the date as 1992 – the year the war in BiH was initiated.
Hard-Line Symbolism
The day he issued his threat to withdraw from the
state, which he has long called for dissolving, was significant. It
was the 30th anniversary of his predecessor Radovan Karadžić’s
speech in the assembly of the Socialist Republic of BiH, in which he
warned the country’s Bosniaks (then called Muslims) of potential
extinction should they proceed with seeking independence from a
disintegrating Yugoslavia – known as “the highway to hell” speech.
Karadžić is now serving a life sentence in a British prison for
genocide and a host of other war crimes, as a result of a trial by
an international tribunal. Dodik named a school after him in Pale,
Karadžić’s wartime “capital” near Sarajevo, and has brought
convicted war criminals who completed their sentences onto his staff
as advisors.
Dodik also has rejected the authority and
appointment of the new international High Representative, German
politician Christian Schmidt – a stance he shares with Russia. At
the end of his tenure, the previous High Representative, Austrian
diplomat Valentin Inzko, imposed changes to the BiH criminal code to
make genocide denial and glorification of war criminals illegal, a
move that itself was prompted by the intensifying rhetoric of hate
in recent years. As a reaction, the RS government, led by Dodik’s
SNSD party, has rammed a law through the entity parliament that
declares all High Representative actions null and void in the RS, in
clear violation of the Dayton agreement, and makes it illegal to
“disparage” the RS.
The anti-nationalist Croat member of the BiH
Presidency, Željko Komšić, has stated that if international actors
do not defend BiH territorial integrity and sovereignty, state
institutions will. The RS is conducting police exercises today on
Jahorina, a mountain immediately above Sarajevo (and from which the
city was besieged during the war) and in the area of an RS town,
Mrkonjić Grad. Komšić immediately – and correctly — called the
exercises a “provocation.”
The potential for miscalculation is high. Any
confrontation between RS and forces from the state or Federation
would almost certainly be violent, even if not intended to lead to
hostilities. Given the continuous inflammatory rhetoric is aimed at
radicalizing populations, a random violent incident could be used as
the “proof” needed that a formal armed response is warranted. This
may well be the intent of the continuing escalation.
NATO and EU Security Responsibility
This never needed to happen. The first annex (1A)
in the Dayton agreement gave NATO the responsibility to maintain a
“safe and secure environment” throughout BiH; this Implementation
Force (IFOR) initially comprised over 54,000 troops, one-third of
whom were American. IFOR was succeeded by the Stabilization Force
(SFOR) after President Bill Clinton admitted in December 1997 that a
presence would need to be maintained without a scheduled exit date;
he initially had promised that troops would depart in a year.
That same month, the Peace Implementation Council
(PIC), the ad hoc international consortium established to oversee
Dayton and to whom the civilian High Representative reports,
articulated that the High Representative, with powers as “final
authority in theater” to enforce the DPA as stipulated in Annex 10,
included the power to impose laws, annul laws, and remove officials
for violating the accord. Dodik (now) rejects all that followed. He
campaigned in 2006 on a platform that included a referendum that he
never specifically defined but suggested repeatedly would advance RS
independence. At the time, it was the most divisive election since
the war.
It’s been all downhill from there. Dodik claims he
wants to return to the “original Dayton,” which would amount to
completing the gutting of the connective tissue built since the war
with the aim of making the state functional – including the State
Court (for war crimes and organized crime/corruption), the Armed
Forces, state police, and a host of other state bodies, including –
in the midst of a pandemic that hit BiH hard – the State Agency for
Medical Equipment and Drugs. But he also has long argued for – and
worked toward – independence. His prior challenges have been
appeased since 2006, each time leaving him stronger – and U.S. and
EU credibility weaker.
Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić claimed last
Thursday that he was told by friends in the EU (an allusion to the
autocratic leaders of Hungary and Slovenia) that the RS was in
danger of abolition (a legal impossibility). He has since claimed he
only wants agreement among BiH’s three constituent peoples
(Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats, though of course that leaves out all
others). But Serbian government ministers openly advocate a “Serbian
World” unifying Serbs throughout the region, which Vučić only last
month grudgingly stated he had not personally advocated.
The EU, backed by NATO, took on SFOR’s mission and
legal obligation in December 2004 as a showpiece for its Common
Security and Defense Policy. The force was radically drawn down from
its strength of about 7,000 to just over 2,000 in early 2007,
allegedly because of an improved political situation in BiH, but
really in order to shore up a deteriorating situation in Afghanistan
— Dutch and British forces needed to redeploy there.
Hostages-in-Waiting
The force in Bosnia has shrunk further since. For
over a decade, EUFOR has been below operational requirements. It is
now roughly 700 troops – incapable of defending their base at Butmir
and the nearby Sarajevo airport simultaneously, let alone their
Liaison and Observation Teams (LOTs) dispersed throughout BiH. These
non-combat units are effectively hostages-in-waiting. Three Deputy
Supreme Allied Commanders in Europe (DSACEURs) in a row assessed
that to fulfill Dayton’s deterrent mandate properly, they needed a
brigade-strength force, approximately 5,000 troops. BiH is now
experiencing a deterrence failure that has been evident for over a
decade. While a smaller contingent is necessary now – particularly
in Brčko – to address the immediate challenge, the deterrent has
long been recognized to be in deficit.
Politically, BiH has been on this downward
trajectory for more than 15 years, and such a serious secessionist
challenge has been in the offing for a more than a decade. Dodik has
long subjected state institutions to assault. And he has been
accommodated by an international community led by the European
Union. The U.S. government has at least sanctioned Dodik for his
anti-Dayton activity; the EU has not imposed such penalties– even
now with this blatant assault on the Dayton constitutional order and
potentially on peace itself. Since Oct. 14, all the EU and the
United States have done is to issue boilerplate statements, without
mentioning their own deterrent responsibility.
The rationale for this weak stance seems to be a
continued fixation on electoral and “limited constitutional change”
– ostensibly to improve the electoral process and respect several
court judgments, including five European Court of Human Rights
rulings. But in reality, as previously explained on these pages most
recently by one of the plaintiffs, Azra Zornić, the international
effort essentially caves to joint blackmail by Dodik and his
longtime ally, Bosnian Croat nationalist party leader Dragan Čović.
The two are threatening to impede Bosnia’s general elections in
October 2022 unless Čović gets the changes he has long sought:
assurance that only he (or someone he designates) can possibly be
elected to the Croat seat on the BiH Presidency.
U.S. Special Envoy Matt Palmer and U.S. Ambassador
Eric Nelson have pressed this election-focused agenda hard, together
with the EU and the U.K. This dangerous policy itself drives the
country towards further ethnic and ethno-territorial division, and
ultimate disintegration. But being wedded to the hope of achieving
this goal also prevents the United States and the EU from forcefully
pushing back against the threats emanating from Dodik (Čović‘s
ally), which would previously have constituted absolute red lines.
U.N. Security Council Mandate Renewal Next
Month
What’s worse, the very mandate for EUFOR and
NATO’s Headquarters in Sarajevo is on the proverbial chopping block
next month at the United Nations Security Council, at an annual
session to consider renewal. The potential for a Russian veto of the
mission has long been feared. After the 2014 Russian invasion of
Crimea and eastern Ukraine that ignited a war that continues to this
day, Russia kicked its spoiler role in the Western Balkans into gear
with aggressive disruption, though making its point thus far by
abstaining rather than vetoing EUFOR’s continuation. But in recent
months, Russia and China (China is not on the PIC) have tried
jointly to delegitimize High Representative Schmidt, arguing that he
was not approved by the Security Council. That gambit failed 13-2.
But next month, when EUFOR (and NATO HQ Sarajevo) come up for
renewal of their Chapter 7 peace enforcement mandate, Moscow and
Beijing could choose to step up their disruption.
Preparation for that eventuality is long overdue.
But at best, there seems to remain a blithe assumption that NATO
could just take on the mission with minimal change. This attitude
was evident prior to Dodik’s escalation. EUFOR was preserved for
years by British-led resistance to its closure, but there are EU and
NATO members, such as France, who might be happy to let the Russians
and Chinese take the rap for a mission they have wanted to end, if
nothing else, to end the liability the mission confers (the
obligation to ensure a safe and secure environment). Given the
direct threat to peace now, such a stance is downright foolhardy.
France holds the pen on the U.N. Security Council Resolution on
EUFOR (and NATO HQ) next month.
Reinforcement of the current force with actual
troops is essential, in the immediate term. A contingent in Brčko,
where the RS and Federation meet and which sits on a vital
communications line from the RS capital Banja Luka to Bijeljina and
Belgrade, would constitute a strong deterrent to Dodik or any other
RS leader seeking independence. It also would break Dodik’s back
politically, damaging his credibility as he also is struggling
against increasingly vocal public dissatisfaction over the RS
entity’s deepening debt.
A NATO-EUFOR joint exercise with the BiH Armed
Forces, Brzi Odgovor (“Rapid Response”), that ended just two weeks
ago would have been the logical time to have reinforced the
deterrent to higher credibility, including deploying in Brčko. The
international community could have noted that Annex 1A of the Dayton
Peace Agreement ensuring a “safe and secure environment” had no
expiration date and that NATO would enforce it until it was replaced
by a post-Dayton constitutional order with popular legitimacy, not
just built around ethnic leaders who thrive on maintaining division
and leveraging fear. That opportunity was squandered.
German Green MEP Urges Reinforcements
The EU believes its credibility rests in what it
is, but for people in BiH and the Balkans, it is a deep-pockets
donor and desirable address, not a potent political actor. However,
several members of the European Parliament recognized this in
statements yesterday, calling for strong EU-U.S. joint action
against Dodik, including sanctions, with German Green MEP, Viola von
Cramon, urging that EUFOR be reinforced. The United States maintains
credibility, though recently dented, because of what it did in 1995,
1999, and can still do – project power.
So restoring deterrence and therefore popular
confidence in peace requires direct American action through NATO,
with a U.S. on-the-ground contribution in Brčko. This would pre-empt
any potential Russian-Chinese veto by making it moot, demonstrating
forcefully that the United States and the rest of NATO intend to
enforce Annex 1A indefinitely. It would also sever the accelerating
negative feedback loop of fear and polarization that keeps Dodik and
the rest of BiH’s political class in business. This would create
space for integrative and progressive alternatives to get traction,
something that regular citizens throughout the country (including in
the RS) clearly want, as recent protests and demonstrations attest.
There has never been such a clear and present
danger to Bosnia and Herzegovina’s peace and cohesion since the
Dayton Peace Agreement was forged 26 years ago next month,
propelling America’s post-Cold War influence to its apex over the
decade to follow. Dodik’s challenge not only must be met, but
provides an opportune moment for a long-overdue course correction
(undergirded by a long-needed security assessment) to a failing –
and potentially dangerous — transatlantic policy in BiH and the
wider Balkans.
Legislatures usually have to press executive
branches out of inertial policy postures. During the war in Bosnia,
the U.S. Congress consistently pressed the Bush and Clinton
administrations for a more forceful, forward-leaning policy. One of
those voices was then-Senator Joe Biden.
Now is the time to end Bosnia’s accelerating
crisis. As their European Parliament counterparts did yesterday,
U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee members need to press for such
a shift on Oct. 28, when Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for
Europe and Eurasia Gabriel Escobar testifies in a hearing before a
panel subcommittee.
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