Finding the path to lasting peace in Bosnia

US Department of State Dispatch, May, 1997

Thank you, General Shali. I am deeply honored to receive the Intrepid Freedom Award. I am not sure what I have done that qualifies for the adjective "intrepid," unless it was throwing out the first pitch of the baseball season, but I am very grateful just the same.

I want to join with our other speakers in welcoming the members of our five armed services who are here, in congratulating those who will be honored as "Military Personnel of the Year," and in saluting our friends from Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, and Brazil.

I am also pleased to add my voice to those paying tribute to Zachary and Elizabeth Fisher for their work on behalf of America's armed forces. Mr. and Mrs. Fisher, you are the greatest, and all of America is in your debt.

I know it is customary at this event to speak primarily about Fleet Week and about this marvelous piece of history--the Intrepid--which has been turned into a living museum. But I have asked for and have been granted permission to discuss not so much the history that has shaped us but the history we are now striving to shape, and to focus not so much on the past exploits of our armed forces but on a region--the Balkans--in which those forces are even now rendering extraordinary service.

Two weeks short of 50 years ago, another Secretary of State, this one truly "intrepid," announced a plan for the reconstruction of postwar Europe, a plan that Winston Churchill called "the most unsordid act in history."

The Marshall Plan was inspired by the vision of a peaceful, democratic, and united Europe. It was grounded in the lesson, seared in the minds of that generation, that American security and prosperity could not be assured if Europe were weak, unstable, or divided.

The descent of the Iron Curtain across the European stage prevented the full realization of Marshall's vision. But the resolve demonstrated by the American commitment to lead united the west, produced the greatest military alliance in history, and fired an economic recovery that halted communist inroads in Europe.

Today, we have the opportunity Secretary Marshall's generation was denied--to build a Europe without walls, wholly at peace, and fully free. This vision is at the heart of the Founding Act of the new partnership between NATO and Russia that President Clinton will join in signing in Paris next Tuesday. It is embodied in our plan to invite a number of Central Europe's new democracies to join NATO, which we will do in Madrid the first week of July. It is central to the Partnership for Peace. And it is reflected in our joint efforts to restore political stability in Albania, to encourage a permanent reduction of tensions in the Aegean, and to nurture democratic transitions from Skopje to Yerevan.

But if we are to succeed and make our vision a reality, we must also complete our mission and fully implement the Dayton Accords for peace in Bosnia.

Like the Marshall Plan, Dayton is a call to cooperative action--in this case, to bring together a nation and mend a region shattered by the worst violence in Europe since Hitler's final days. And like the earlier initiative, it depends on the military and civilians working together, on support from other democracies, and on the willingness of those eligible for assistance to do all they can on their own behalf.

Dayton is also based, as was the Marshall Plan, on a clear-eyed view of U.S. interests. Fulfillment of these accords would produce a stable, undivided Bosnia that would cease to be a source of instability in southern Europe. We must never forget that there is no natural geographical or political endpoint to violence in this region. Fulfillment of Dayton would ease the nightmare that inter-ethnic fighting could again spread across southern Europe, affecting NATO allies, redividing the continent, and creating a crisis that America could not ignore and that U.S. forces could not contain without grave risk.

So the promise of Dayton is that when our forces depart Bosnia, they will be able to do so without the fear that renewed violence threatening U.S. interests might one day require them to return.

The fulfillment of Dayton would also serve America's interest in a unified Europe by making possible the full integration of Bosnia into European institutions, including the Partnership for Peace. It would contribute to regional prosperity in which our own economy has a stake and sustain momentum toward the democratic values that we cherish. It would make Americans safer by helping to prevent the area in and around Bosnia from serving as a base for transnational crime and by dampening the revival of the Balkan route for smuggling drugs. It would contribute to our security by creating a further bar to meddling by Iran. And it would serve our interest in the rule of law by establishing a precedent-setting model for resolving ethnic differences on the basis of justice and respect for human rights.

To suggest, as some have, that America has no stake in the future of Bosnia is to propose that America abdicate its leadership role in Europe. As Secretary of State--and I know I speak for President Clinton, Secretary Cohen, and General Shall--let me affirm: America will never abdicate that role. To do so would shake the faith of allies, betray our responsibilities, and ignore the lessons--learned at priceless cost in blood and treasure--of this century.