Bosnia 10 Years Later Is a Broken Country

For Western democracies, Bosnia was the first test of the “new world order.” By working together, Europe and the United States not only would heal the wounds of war but also transform the country’s crumbling socialist infrastructure into a modern capitalist state suitable for inclusion in the European Union.

The Dayton accords, signed in December 1995, appeared to provide all the tools necessary to complete the job. Protected by a NATO-led military force, the United Nations high commissioner for refugees would return displaced people to their homes. The U.N. mission would reform local police forces, while the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe supervised honest elections. Executive authority was given to an Office of the High Representative, which would implement the peace plan agreed upon by all donor nations.

Ten years after the war started, the guns in Bosnia are silent but the promise of peace has not been redeemed. Though more than $6 billion has been invested in the country, Bosnia-Herzegovina remains the poorest country in Europe. One family in eight in the country’s Muslim-Croat Federation earns enough for a reasonable standard of living. The situation is worse in the Bosnian Serb entity, Republika Srpska, where one in 25 families lives above the poverty line. Half the population is unemployed, and those who do have jobs earn an average of $115 a month, about half of what it takes to feed a family of four.

One measure of the country’s desperation is the lines of young people applying for visas outside foreign consulates. One diplomat estimates that 20,000 educated young people are waiting for immigration approval. Under international supervision, Bosnia-Herzegovina’s future has become so bleak that a recent census found that the country’s population has dropped 10% over the last decade.

Officially, the country’s gross domestic product is estimated to be $4.6 billion. This translates into a per capita income of slightly under $1,200. But nearly all the economic activity comes from foreign aid or employment with international development agencies. Were foreign assistance excluded, Bosnia would have recorded economic growth of minus 2% last year.

The Office of the High Representative has the authority to administer the country by fiat, but it rarely takes unilateral action, preferring to work in concert with elected officials. Unfortunately, most of Bosnia’s leaders are the same politicians who supported the war and continue to profit from political chaos. Nearly all of Bosnia’s cantons are fiefdoms in which politicians, backed by criminal gangs, corrupt judges and lethargic police, have frustrated refugee resettlement, prevented banking reforms and largely halted privatization.

“Balkan mafias won’t be eradicated until you have the rule of law, trust of the government, an independent judiciary and uncorrupt officials,” says Louise Shelley, director of the Transnational Crime and Corruption Center at American University. “The mafia in Bosnia is not like the Corleone family. It’s the banks, the government and all the layers of society that benefit from corruption.”

Bosnia is not alone when it comes to crime. Montenegro has no extradition treaties with the West, making it a valuable transport hub for contraband. According to the Brussels-based International Crisis Group, crime is so rampant in Albania that most of the population is “demoralized and apathetic toward the very concept of democracy.”

What makes Bosnia different is that its corruption is based on institutionalized xenophobia. Rubble still covers more than 50% of Mostar because Croat-controlled West Mostar refuses to form a unified government with Muslim-Slav Bosniaks in the eastern part of the city. Despite constant pressure from the U.N., it took three years to integrate the police and fire departments. Croats still refuse to put their trash in a dump containing Muslim garbage. Last year, the World Bank almost recalled a $12-million grant to rebuild the water system installed by the Austrians in 1873 after Croats threatened not to drink from pipes that also carried water to Muslim households.

Two years ago, in an effort to reduce ethnic tension, the Office of the High Representative ordered that all ethnically offensive words in school textbooks be blacked out. Marked for elimination were the words “grand Serbian aggressors” that appeared beneath the picture of an amputee. But instead of using black markers, many teachers in West Mostar’s elementary schools highlighted the words in yellow.

“Herzegovina could be prosperous if it were fully integrated into Bosnia,” says Rubina Khan, U.N. civil affairs coordinator for the Mostar region. “But politicians prefer this netherworld existence because they profit from an economy based on black-market liquor, cigarettes and stolen Mercedes sedans.”

How long should the U.S. maintain a military presence in Bosnia?

Last summer, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld hinted that perhaps it was time for NATO’s European members to assume more of the responsibility for peacekeeping. The Sept. 11 attack and the subsequent search for European allies in the war on terrorism postponed serious debate on the question. But given a new list of priorities that now includes homeland defense, the issue undoubtedly will be raised again by those in the Pentagon who believe that the NATO-led force easily could survive the departure of the 2,500 U.S. soldiers stationed outside the city of Tuzla.

Some policy analysts in Washington think the force, as it’s currently constituted, has outlived its usefulness and should be replaced with something similar to Italy’s Carabinieri or Spain’s Guardia Civil, national police forces under joint civilian and military control. Certainly, it no longer intimidates the rent-a-mobs that Bosnia’s nationalists use to express displeasure.

Even when prepared, the stabilization force often refuses to act. In Herzegovina, 30 armored vehicles belonging to NATO’s Quick Reaction Force were standing by last spring when a team of U.S. auditors raided a Bosnian bank suspected of criminal connections. But when a mob of angry skinheads appeared and the Americans radioed for rescue, the Spanish and Italian commanders in charge of the convoy refused to intervene, explaining that restrictive rules of engagement imposed by their governments superseded any order from NATO’s local commander.

Bosnia may be a problem for Europe, but a strong argument can be made for continued U.S. engagement. Many of the moujahedeen invited to Bosnia a decade ago moved to Albania after the Dayton accords to help train the Kosovo Liberation Army.

Today, some of these same men continue to fight alongside Albanian rebels in Macedonia. Some Western intelligence analysts believe that a decade of conflict in Bosnia, Kosovo, southern Serbia and Macedonia may have produced a core of 10,000 Albanian Muslims with significant military experience. If they are correct, the U.S. may discover that Bosnia’s recalcitrant Croats and Serbs are the least of their problems.