THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, September 6, 1995 TAG: 9509060480
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: FROM WIRE REPORTS
DATELINE: SARAJEVO, BOSNIA-HERZEGOVINA LENGTH: Long : 138 lines
The bombs that NATO forces dropped on Bosnian Serb positions Tuesday and last week shook more than heavy-weapons sites and ammo dumps.
The allied air strikes have demolished two myths that have flourished since the start of the civil war in the former Yugoslavia, several experts say.
The first: that Serbian military might was too great to be safely challenged, even by the combined forces of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization led by the United States.
The second: that Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic had, in the course of the Bosnian war, become detached from the Serb rebels there. He had masterminded their insurrection in 1992 and provided them military hardware with the goal of creating a ``Greater Serbia.''
NATO launched new air attacks Tuesday meant to force the rebels to pull their big guns out of range of Sarajevo.
The airstrikes appeared to end about an hour after they started, at least around Sarajevo. But U.N. and NATO officials said they were open-ended.
``The attacks will go on until the Serbs comply with our demands,'' said U.N. spokesman Chris Gunness. ``We hope that a strong signal being sent to the Bosnian Serbs will make them realize that the international community is serious.''
However, heavy rain that began Tuesday night around Sarajevo limited the chances of new NATO attacks until the weather improved.
U.S. warplanes flying from Aviano, Italy, and from the Norfolk-based aircraft carrier Theodore Roosevelt in the Adriatic Sea, made up more than half the NATO strike force, said Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon. A Western military source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said about 80 U.S. warplanes were involved.
Tuesday's targets - similar to those attacked last week - included ammunition depots and communications facilities, Bacon said.
No NATO losses were reported, and returning pilots said they encountered scant resistance except for light anti-aircraft fire. But in an apparent gesture of defiance, Serb gunners pumped a dozen artillery shells into central Sarajevo Tuesday night, including one that exploded about 300 yards from a U.N. compound. French gunners retaliated just before midnight by hurling howitzer shells at a Serb position that the United Nations said had fired at least eight shells into the city.
The renewed bombing signaled the third phase of Operation Deliberate Force.
The operation began last Wednesday with a 51-hour bombing campaign that opened a chapter of unprecedentedly broad NATO involvement in the Bosnian conflict. It was followed by a 104-hour cease-fire intended to give the Serbs an opportunity - which they did not take - to remove an estimated 300 heavy weapons from a 12 1/2-mile ``exclusion zone'' around Sarajevo and allow free movement by U.N. forces.
The Bosnian Serb forces may not yet be ready to abandon their armed struggle after the massive pounding last week and this week by NATO's air armada. But according to a French analyst, retired air force Gen. Etienne Copel, ``NATO's assault on (the Bosnian Serb) positions was a conclusive demonstration of Western power.
``It showed that the Serbs, whether in Bosnia or Serbia itself, would not be able to long withstand a major offensive by the up-to-date forces, both ground and air, of NATO.''
Copel said there was a link between NATO's sudden display of military determination and Croatia's four-day offensive in August, which overran Serbian-held Krajina. Neither the Bosnian Serbs nor Serbia's own army tried to intervene against the Croatian attackers.
``Events in Krajina convinced NATO the Serb soldiers aren't as formidable as European and American military chiefs have assumed,'' Copel declared. ``The NATO chiefs decided to hit hard when they realized the Serbs were something of a paper tiger.''
Ever since the start of the conflict triggered by Yugoslavia's disintegration as a country in 1991, arguments in favor of Western intervention have been blunted by memories of the Serbs' legendary prowess as guerrilla fighters against the Nazi invaders in World War II. The fear was that allied troops would become trapped in a military quagmire, as the Germans were in 1941-45.
``These fears must now be seen as exaggerated,'' said British military specialist Ian Stanley. He said the decision to hit the Bosnian Serbs hard showed them that ``if they don't now submit to NATO, they must realize the degree of force directed against them will steadily increase until it reaches the point where they will face a military debacle.''
Stanley dismissed claims by officials that stepped-up air strikes were meant to punish the Serbs for their assaults on Sarajevo and other United Nations-declared safe areas in Bosnia but were not aimed at ``bombing them to the negotiating table.''
On the contrary, he contended that ``whatever the original intention, NATO's intensified bombing and threat of more has become a part of the political strategy of bringing the conflict to an end as swiftly as possible through negotiations. It was inevitable that heavy bombing, once started, would become part of the political process.''
Meanwhile, another myth evaporated when Milosevic and the Bosnian Serbs agreed to form a joint delegation for political negotiations with the Muslim-led Bosnian government and Croatia. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special envoy in the former Yugoslavia, hailed the move as a ``procedural breakthrough.''
From the West's viewpoint, the agreement ends confusion over who speaks for whom, making clear that Milosevic not only leads the Serb republic but is the puppet-master of the Bosnian Serbs as well.
For the past two years, Milosevic has claimed that his influence on the Bosnian Serbs was strictly limited, even nonexistent. At times, Western officials have acted as if they believed him. They recently have characterized him as eager to restrain the Bosnian ``wild men'' but helpless to do so.
Yet the creation of a combined Serb negotiating team, which Milosevic will head, puts ``everything out in the open,'' according to former French deputy foreign minister Jean-Francois Deniau, an expert on the Balkans.
``Milosevic will have the deciding vote (in the Serb delegation); so it will be impossible for him to pretend he is powerless to check the Bosnian Serbs if he genuinely wants to,'' he said.
Holbrooke said last week that Milosevic's cooperation in seeking the war's end means his dream of a Greater Serbia is now ``well and truly dead.''
Holbrooke planned to meet again with Milosevic today.
Peace talks are to begin in Geneva on Friday. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Aviation ordnance workers move bombs on the deck of hte carrier
Roosevelt, maneuvering in the Adriatric Sea, before the start of
Tuesday's NATO airstrikes.
Alen Imamovic, 14, stops during a walk with his neighbor's
4-month-old son, Amar Dzaka, to watch NATO jets fly over Sarajevo.
Graphic
ROOSEVELT UPDATE
Jets from the Norfolk-based carrier Roosevelt were prepared to fly
up to 100 sorties Tuesday, more than were flown on the first day of
bombing, a Defense Department official said. The sorties depended on
clear weather over targets. The aircraft carrier America is
scheduled to arrive in the Adriatic this weekend, and Navy officials
have said they hope to bring the Roosevelt carrier group back to
Norfolk on Sept. 21 as planned.
KEYWORDS: CIVIL WAR YUGOSLAVIA NATO by CNB