Send the Serbs a Cold Message : If they won’t accept Bosnia’s division, freeze them out over the long term

The warring Serbs, Croats and Muslims of Bosnia-Herzegovina received an ultimatum two weeks ago yesterday from Britain, France, Germany, Russia and the United States: Accept the internal division of your country--49% to the Serbs, 51% to the Muslims and Croats--or face the consequences. The Muslim-Croat federation has accepted the division. According to reports on Tuesday, the Bosnian Serbs, by attaching conditions, in effect were all but rejecting it.

In the past, the Serbs have successfully called various Western bluffs. This time, the Serbs may believe themselves better able than ever to risk a bluff: Deference to Russia, they may well reason, will surely impede the other four powers from imposing the terms of the ultimatum by military force.

But military force may not be needed to make this latest gamble a losing one for the Serbs. In “How to Defeat Serbia,” David Gompert writes in the current Foreign Affairs: “The best alternative is to conduct a cold war against Serbia--one of indefinite duration but certain outcome--while in the meantime using NATO’s military power more effectively to ensure that relief reaches Bosnia’s innocent victims.” Serbia is neither Kuwait (short hot war ending in victory) nor Vietnam (long hot war ending in defeat) but a mini-Soviet Union (long Cold War ending in victory).

On this reasoning, the coalition, if indeed the Serbs do defy the ultimatum, should postpone indefinitely a final territorial solution and extend indefinitely the total isolation of Serbia and the rebel Serbian entities of Bosnia. “A patient cold war against Serbia would not require that sanctions be airtight, provided they are durable,” Gompert writes, pointing to “the slow death of the economies of the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, leading to the revolutions of 1989-91.”

This may well be the solution that, for the Europeans as well as the Americans, best matches risk to national interest. But it would require the abandonment of the failed posture of evenhandedness. Having accepted the ultimatum, Bosnia should be welcomed into the world community. If they reject the ultimatum, the Serbs of Serbia and the Serbian rebel states of Bosnia should go into a cold-war deep freeze--for as long as it takes.