GOP Tempers Bid to Block U.S. Deployment to Bosnia

House Republicans held some of their fire Friday on a bill to prohibit President Clinton from sending U.S. troops to Bosnia-Herzegovina without Congress’ approval, after top Administration officials warned that the measure might sabotage the peace talks in Dayton, Ohio.

Although the measure ultimately passed, 243 to 171, the victory margin was far smaller than sponsors had mustered for previous no-troops-to-Bosnia resolutions--and conspicuously short of the two-thirds majority that would be needed to override a presidential veto.

Congressional strategists said the shift reflected a fear by top GOP leaders that, if the bill passed overwhelmingly on Friday, Republicans might get blamed for any breakdown in the Dayton talks.

State Department spokesman Nicholas Burns charged in a late-night press conference that congressional passage of the legislation by the House was a direct attempt to scuttle the Dayton talks.

“I can think of no other reason for the House to take the action it did except to make a statement about these talks. This is unwarranted, it is intrusive, it is naive,” Burns said.

The late-evening action on Capitol Hill came after Secretary of State Warren Christopher arrived at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base just outside Dayton after flying back from Japan to help guide the negotiations, which U.S. officials say are entering their final phase.

Christopher arrived in Dayton in late afternoon and met with Bosnian President Alija Izetbegovic and Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic, as well as U.S. mediators.

Meanwhile, in the Croatian capital, Zagreb, President Franjo Tudjman for the first time publicly raised the possibility that Croats and Serbs might exchange territory to give Serbs access to the Adriatic Sea if the three warring factions reach an accord.

Although the negotiations still are far from over, U.S. officials have been hinting that the three factions are close to a final settlement and may have an accord as early as Sunday. Tudjman left for Croatia on Thursday but is expected to return to Dayton this weekend.

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Clinton has pledged that if a peace accord is signed, he will send up to 25,000 U.S. troops as part of a 60,000-member NATO-led international “implementation force” assigned to help carry out the pact. The factions have said they will not sign if the United States backs out.

Administration officials say once the representatives of the three factions initial an accord, that will set off a series of meetings among the allies, leading to a formal signing of the peace agreement in Paris within two weeks and deployment of North Atlantic Treaty Organization troops after that.

Clinton has pledged to seek a formal “expression of approval” from Congress before sending U.S. troops to Bosnia.

Officials say Clinton could deploy U.S. troops without Congress’ approval, although he would be unlikely to do so if Congress disapproved by a hefty majority.

Despite its enactment in the House, the bill, sponsored by Rep. Joel Hefley (R-Colo.), is expected to languish in Congress. The Senate has no companion legislation ready for consideration, and strategists there say it is unlikely that such a bill would be passed by a veto-proof majority anyway.

Times staff writer Norman Kempster in Dayton contributed to this report.