<p>Clinton is under mounting pressure to stop the killing, but
there is no easy or politically popular way to do it
</p>
<p>By BRUCE W. NELAN--With reporting by J.F.O. McAllister and Jay
Peterzell/Washington, with other bureaus
</p>
<p> Tears filled the eyes of the men and women who stood in
the wintry spring wind at last week's dedication of the U.S.
Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, remembering the mass
murder of a half-century ago. Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel, a
survivor of the German death camps, turned from the audience to
address Bill Clinton, who was sitting behind him. "Mr.
President," he said, "I have been in the former Yugoslavia last
fall. I cannot sleep since what I have seen. We must do
something to stop the bloodshed." Wiesel almost pleaded:
"Something, anything, must be done."
</p>
<p> Standing brazenly among the honored guests, personifying
the very tragedy Wie sel condemned, was Croatian President
Franjo Tudjman. His Croat brethren had just begun a vicious
onslaught of "ethnic cleansing" in western Bosnia, burning
villages and villagers in one of the cruelest campaigns of the
war. "Whole valleys of people have been massacred here," a
British peacekeeper on the scene reported. "It's horrendous."
</p>
<p> After a sobering tour of Bosnia's battlefields, Senator
Joe Biden came back to Washington last month and declared, "The
U.S. must lead the West in a decisive response to Serbian
aggression, beginning with air attacks on Serbian artillery."
Senators Bob Dole and George Mitchell agreed, as did 47
Congressmen and 12 State Department officials who took the
unusual step of petitioning Secretary of State Warren
Christopher to back the use of military force against the Serbs.
Ambassador to the U.N. Madeleine Albright sent a memorandum
directly to the President in which she advocated air strikes.
</p>
<p> The war in Bosnia is closing in on Bill Clinton. A growing
number of Americans feel the same moral imperative to act that
Wiesel expressed. Would that it were so simple. All week Clinton
wrestled with the conflicting advice offered by his
foreign-policy makers, themselves divided between the go-slow
counsel of Christopher and Joint Chiefs Chairman Colin Powell
and the more robust preferences of Defense Secretary Les Aspin
and National Security Adviser Anthony Lake. When the President
was asked at his news conference on Friday how he evaluated the
options, his body language spoke volumes. He rolled his eyes,
taking a deep breath and a long pause before saying he was
"reluctant" to talk about them in public. But yes, he conceded,
tougher steps were being considered.
</p>
<p> Clinton pledged to announce his choices within a few days.
While he wants above all to be a domestic President, he is eager
to appear resolute and make a difference in Bosnia if he can.
He does not want to put undue pressure on Boris Yeltsin to
cooperate with the West or to endanger French and British troops
on peacekeeping duty. Even so, he is casting about for more
forceful actions that might end the war, or produce a
cease-fire, or guarantee sanctuary somewhere for Bosnian
Muslims.
</p>
<p> All the new options, Clinton acknowledged, "have pluses
and minuses," and "all have supporters and opponents in
Congress." That is a large part of the President's problem. He
is getting plenty of advice, but it is not consistent. He is
being pulled and tugged in several directions at once in a field--foreign affairs--for which he does not have his own
fingertip instinctiveness. He is being asked to lead where his
allies in Europe are reluctant to follow.
</p>
<p> Clinton feels the strength of the moral argument for
action echoing around Washington but is unwilling to start
something without knowing how he will end it. He would like to
halt the Serbian aggressors in their tracks, but he wants to
take steps that provide clear, achievable objectives and that
will encourage rather than cut off a political process leading
eventually to a negotiated solution to the tribal wars. If he
chooses to bomb the Serbs, he wants to be convinced that bombs
will in due course push them into some mutually acceptable
agreement.
</p>
<p> Above all, Clinton does not want to make an open-ended
commitment of U.S. blood and treasure. Most of the Congress is
not behind intervention, partly because no one is sure what
might work. "Given the resources you're willing to devote to the
problem," says Lee Hamilton, chairman of the House Foreign
Affairs Committee, "I think you have to lower your expectations
about what you can accomplish." Members of Congress returned to
Washington after the Easter recess with no feeling that their
constituents were clamoring for the use of armed force. National
opinion polls show that only about a quarter to a third of
Americans favor military intervention.
</p>
<p> After the Holocaust ceremony, the President said he
accepted Wiesel's plea as a challenge to the West "to take
further initiatives in Bosnia." In answer to questions at his
press conference, he said he was convinced "the U.S. should
lead" in trying to solve "clearly the most difficult
foreign-policy problem we face." But he was not prepared to act
unilaterally if the NATO allies, Russia and the U.N. Security
Council did not support his proposals. "I do not think we should
act alone," he said, "nor do I think we will have to."
</p>
<p> Will anything work? The first Administration initiative--a package of modest diplomatic measures announced on Feb. 10--is universally seen as a bust. Not only have negotiations on
Bosnia failed but Serbian aggression has become even more
brutal and more successful.
</p>
<p> Aside from a handful of diplomatic gestures, such as
opening an embassy in Sarajevo, the two new initiatives being
urged on Clinton most strongly by official and unofficial
advisers are to lift the embargo on arms shipments to Bosnia and
to use air power against Serbian guns and supply routes. British
diplomats say one of the others is a proposal from London for
a military land, sea and air blockade that would completely seal
off Serbia from contact with the rest of the world. Still
another is the possibility of establishing and protecting "safe
havens" for Muslims in the remnants of Bosnia.
</p>
<p> Bombing Serbian gun positions or supply lines delivers a
satisfying sense of muscularity, but some Pentagon officials
argue that it would have little impact on ending the war. The
problems are many: collateral damage, danger to U.S. pilots,
highly mobile targets, retaliation against U.N. forces.
</p>
<p> Lifting the arms embargo on Bosnia is an attractive option
because it has a low risk of drawing the U.S. into a ground war,
turning the responsibility for self-preservation over to the
Bosnian Muslims. Unless Washington delivers the weapons, an end
to the embargo could bring in suppliers, such as Iran, that the
U.S. would not welcome in the Balkans, and would probably bring
Russian weapons surging into Serbia as well.
</p>
<p> One way or another, though, Clinton says, he will do more.
In deciding how to step up the pressure, he must contend with
three major problems. First, he will have to sell his plan to
Britain, France and Canada, all of which oppose military
intervention because they have troops on the ground who could
be endangered, and to Russia, which has rediscovered its
nationalistic ties of brotherhood with the Orthodox, Slavic
Serbs. Second, all the peacekeepers convoying humanitarian aid
in the former Yugoslavia will have to be withdrawn, beefed up
or safe-guarded against retaliation. And third, he must define
the goal he intends to achieve.
</p>
<p> The truth is that Washington has never arrived at a firm
concept of what kind of Yugoslavia it wants to see emerge from
the wreckage of war. In the past, the Administration has been
willing to agree to anything the Serbs, Muslims and Croats might
all be pushed into accepting. That now looks like a hopeless
effort, and Clinton will have to do better before he announces--and wins support for--the next chapter in his Bosnian
policy. "The strong options depend on only one person," said a
State Department official. The President does not need any more
briefings or position papers. It is now a matter of his
