U.S. May Pay Steep Price for Bosnian Peace : Balkans: Commitment could include 25,000 American troops and a share of $5-billion international aid package.

If U.S. diplomats succeed in negotiating peace in Bosnia-Herzegovina, officials said Friday, it will be a triumph with a potentially enormous price tag: as many as 25,000 American peacekeeping troops, billions of dollars in economic aid and a commitment to arm the new and vulnerable Bosnian state.

A peace agreement is far from complete, but Clinton Administration officials are already planning the effort that would be needed to make it stick--and worrying whether Congress and the public would prove willing to shoulder the burden.

After foreign ministers meeting in Geneva announced progress toward a peace agreement among the warring factions in Bosnia, the White House reaffirmed a previous U.S. commitment to provide as much of half of a North Atlantic Treaty Organization peacekeeping force that could total 50,000 troops.

“Our thinking continues to point toward an international peacekeeping force . . . which would move into Bosnia very quickly to establish control on the ground--and it would have very tough rules of engagement to ensure that this agreement doesn’t unravel before the ink is dry,” said Alexander Vershbow, the National Security Council’s chief Bosnia expert.

Vershbow said that once a peace agreement was concluded, European troops already in Bosnia probably would form an instant nucleus for the peacekeeping force and that U.S. troops would join them in “more likely weeks than months.”

At the same time, the Administration plans to lead an international drive to provide economic aid for Bosnia that could run as high as $5 billion over four years, with European and Arab contributions as well as U.S. money.

And the United States would undertake a commitment to maintain Bosnia’s defenses against its potentially hostile neighbors, in much the same way that the United States has kept Israel strong for almost 50 years.

“One of the most destabilizing factors is that, at least at the outset, the two entities will have separate armies,” a senior official said, referring to the Bosnian Serb republic and the Muslim-Croat federation that would make up the two segments of the new Bosnia. “Until that changes--and that may not occur for some time--we will ensure there is a balance so they will not go to war for some time. We will ensure, along with others, that the Bosnians are sufficiently armed to defend themselves. And that means we will fairly quickly lift the arms embargo on Bosnia.”

The official predicted spirited debate in Congress over the size, mission and command of the peacekeeping force. “We know it will be contentious,” he said. “But to be a leader, you have to be willing to contribute in a significant way.”

The initial reaction from Congress was cautiously positive. Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.), who has been a strong critic of President Clinton’s Bosnia policy, declined to comment, but a senior Republican aide in the Senate called Friday’s accord “a step in the right direction.”

Over the longer run, though, the new U.S. engagement in Bosnia could be a major test of the nation’s willingness to bear the costs of playing a leadership role in the post-Cold War world.

“Today’s agreement demonstrates that when the world confronts intractable problems, American leadership is absolutely essential,” Secretary of State Warren Christopher said. But he added that it will be impossible to exercise such leadership in the future if Congress cuts his State Department budget.

The record of the last five years, since the collapse of the Soviet Union, is mixed. Congress supported the 1991 Persian Gulf War, but only after the George Bush Administration secured funding from wealthy Arab states to pay for it. Congress largely opposed U.S. intervention in Haiti, but Clinton sent U.S. troops anyway. In Somalia, Congress and the public forced a hasty withdrawal of U.S. troops after 18 soldiers were killed in an ambush in the capital, Mogadishu, in 1993.

Some of the risks in Bosnia appear to be similar. “It is a high-wire act,” warned Helmut Sonnenfeldt, a former State Department official in the Richard Nixon and Gerald R. Ford administrations. “It could all come crashing down. It is possibly a prescription for a quagmire, particularly if we get involved in policing an agreement and get stuck there with forces on the ground in an ambiguous situation. . . . It is a prescription, at least, for a very substantial American involvement, and conceivably a military involvement, with no clear end strategy.”

Officials said that no U.S. troops will be deployed in Bosnia until a peace agreement and a cease-fire are solidly in place. But they acknowledged that rogue military units among any of Bosnia’s three ethnic groups, or even individuals dissatisfied with the outcome of the war, could pose a danger to peacekeepers even if a truce was holding.

“There is no guarantee of a harmonious multiethnic Bosnia in the future,” a White House official said. “There will be risks. We don’t think all the elements of the Bosnian Serb army, including [its commander, Gen. Ratko] Mladic, are going to be enthusiastic.

“NATO military force will be needed to enforce the cease-fire, separate the forces and keep them honest on the ground,” he said. “Having a strong presence on the ground quickly is important. The key is to show resolve at the outset so it doesn’t lead to skirmishing and petty attacks that CNN would magnify,” leading to a political backlash in the United States.

Officials said that NATO and U.S. strategists still have not finished hammering out plans for the peace-enforcement mission. Washington still is negotiating with major allies such as Britain and France.

One senior official said that the earlier estimate of 50,000 troops might turn out to be high. “The map is likely to be simpler, so that could require somewhat fewer troops,” he said. “But it may not be much different, because [Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. John M.] Shalikashvili believes you’re better off putting in plenty of forces.”

In addition to combat troops, the United States is expected to supply most of the intelligence, logistics support and specialists in such areas as military police and civil affairs forces.

Most of the American ground troops are expected to come from the U.S. 1st Armored Division in Germany, which is equipped with Apache attack helicopters, M1-A1 tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles. The military also has earmarked several thousand troops stationed in Italy.

The Pentagon has deployed about 5,250 U.S. military personnel from all four services to participate in a massive training exercise in Germany this week and next. Although officials insisted publicly that the exercise is not directly related to a possible peace-enforcement mission, some officers acknowledged that the training provided in this week’s maneuvers could be applied in Bosnia.

Times staff writer Art Pine contributed to this report.