Bosnia after Dayton - Anthony Lake, Asst. to the President for National Security Affairs - Transcript

US Department of State Dispatch, June 24, 1996

As President Clinton made clear in committing our troops to IFOR, the point of this extraordinary international effort is straightforward: to give the people of Bosnia the breathing room they need to begin to rebuild their lives and their land, and to give peace a chance to take on a life and logic of its own.

President Clinton has made equally clear what the point is not: It is not to take on responsibilities that are not our own and create in Bosnia an unsustainable dependency instead of giving its people a chance to act independently. The United States is not in the business of building other nations--but we can help nations build themselves and give them time to make a start of it.

That's why the next step in the Dayton process--Bosnia-wide elections--is so important. Only after elections are held will the constitution fully take effect; only after elections are held can the structures of a unified Bosnian state be created; only after elections are held will Bosnia have a parliament, a presidency, and a constitutional court that represent the interests of all the people of Bosnia, including the hundreds of thousands of refugees and millions of displaced persons; only after elections are held will government agencies be up and running and able to pursue foreign trade and oversee customs and immigration; only after elections are held can the promise of Dayton be shaped into a political reality.

A few hours ago in Florence, Bob Frowick, the head of the OSCE mission in Bosnia, recommended that the OSCE certify that conditions will be suitable for holding free and fair elections in Bosnia on September 14--as called for in the Dayton Agreement. The Clinton Administration strongly supports that recommendation, and we hope and expect the OSCE will endorse it soon.

Some people who share our goals in Bosnia disagree. They would postpone elections beyond the Dayton deadline because the parties have, as of this moment, failed to meet all the necessary conditions. Let me tell you why we believe they are wrong.

If you took a snapshot of Bosnia, would it show that conditions for fair elections exist right now? The answer is no. But that's the wrong picture to look at. Our focus should be on whether those conditions will exist by September 14. And if you switch from still frames to moving pictures and pan three months down the road, very different images of Bosnia begin to unfold. They would show people taking small, steady steps every day to put in place the mechanisms for free and fair elections--just as they have for the past six months by opening up new media outlets so more voices can be heard, by forming new political parties representing different points of view, by setting up local election committees to oversee voter registration. I believe those are the images we will see more and more often between now and election day. Here's why:

The very fact of setting an election date is a forcing event. It will concentrate the minds of the parties on the progress they must still make--and that they committed to in Dayton--to expand freedom of movement and association, open the news media to opposition candidates and viewpoints, give refugees and displaced persons the ability to vote and run for office in their original places of residence, and make sure that war criminals have no part in the electoral process. We will hold them to those commitments. And 3,200 international supervisors and monitors will make sure the elections themselves run smoothly and openly.