Alexander Buha, the foreign minister of "Republika Srpska," says he hasn't seen or spoken to his family in Serbia since summer -- shortly before Serbian President Slobodan Milosevic slapped a blockade on the self-declared Bosnian Serb state in August for its stubborn refusal to accept an international peace plan. Although porous, the blockade has made a tough life tougher. Prices have jumped 30 percent, cars have virtually disappeared from the roads, and factories, robbed of their Serbian markets, are shutting down. Young professionals are starting to pack up and leave. Even medicines, which are not subject to the embargo, are scarce because of fuel shortages. And last week, Bosnian government forces launched their most successful offensive of the war, capturing wide swaths of territory and scores of abandoned weapons in the northwest in a surprise attack that sent thousands of Bosnian Serb troops and civilians fleeing.
Still, Republika Srpska's short-term pain could yet end in long-term gain. Frustrated by the costs of the war and Serbian resilience, Washington and its mediating partners increasingly are considering peace terms that are more to the liking of Bosnia's Serbs than those in the plan they rejected in August. Most significant: The international community, with Washington dragging its heels in distaste over rewarding Serbian aggression, is gravitating toward accepting the right of Bosnia's Serbs to eventually unify with neighboring Serbia.
In trying to draw the war to a close on the best possible terms, the international community is building a new diplomatic strategy around the notion that further isolating the Bosnian Serbs might succeed where threats of military reprisal have failed. Known as "Plan B" within the Clinton administration ("Plan A" languishes alongside the empty threats of punishment levied against the Bosnian Serbs in August), the strategy aims to stabilize neighboring Croatia and drive a wedge between Bosnian Serbs and Croatian Serbs. The policy puts pragmatism ahead of principle: It will turn on additional help from Milosevic and likely will entail further compromises on sanctions against Serbia -- despite Milosevic's central role in choreographing the Balkan tragedy.
Weak hand. The policy shift stems in part from American inability to unite the fractious international "contact group" -- which includes the United States, Russia, France, Britain and Germany -- behind airstrikes or other military measures to bludgeon the Serbs toward accommodation. "Have you noticed that we have any cards to play?" asks one Clinton administration official. Last week, Washington introduced a resolution in the United Nations Security Council to automatically lift the arms embargo against the Bosnian government next spring. But Moscow, Paris and London remain strongly opposed to lifting the embargo, and Washington -- wary of irrevocably splintering the group -- is unlikely to force the issue. The Clinton administration is also having trouble holding the line in insisting that the Bosnian Serbs must accept the map they rejected in August before territorial swaps and alternative constitutional arrangements can be discussed.
The next step in further isolating the Bosnian Serbs is to try to enlist Milosevic's help in resolving another rebellion, in Croatia, where local Serbs have seized control of 27 percent of the country's territory. Ending that standoff would secure Croatia's borders as well as help cut off Bosnia's Serbs from another key source of support -- Croatian Serbs in the Krajina region on the border with Bosnia. In addition to providing material help, in the past five months Serbs in Croatia have stopped more than 70 U.N. aid convoys headed into Bosnia.
Indeed one reason U.S. officials are prepared to weather the inevitable criticism over additional deals with Milosevic is that his affirmation of Croatia's borders could persuade Krajina's Serbs to settle for the substantial autonomy called for in another international peace plan being floated this week. Under this plan, dubbed "Z-4" in Washington, areas outside Krajina now under Serbian control would revert to Zagreb's authority.
If Milosevic recognizes Croatia -- or Bosnia or Macedonia, for that matter -- economic pressure will be eased on Serbia; if he helps deliver a settlement, more sanctions will be lifted. Contact group officials will meet this week in Zagreb to consider which sanctions should be put on the table. Some mostly symbolic bans have already been ended in response to Milosevic's efforts to seal Serbia's border with Bosnia. The next round, according to Clinton administration officials, would peel away bans on "nonstrategic" trade.
All this may or may not impress the Bosnian Serbs. Despite the dwindling supply lines from both Serbia and Serbs in Krajina, and a sliding standard of living, Bosnia's Serbs remain bitter but defiant -- cursing Milosevic as a "Communist turncoat" and arresting and demoting "subversives" thought to be overly loyal to Belgrade. "These people will not starve," says a foreign-aid worker. "They will adjust to having potatoes and cabbage for dinner one day, and cabbage and potatoes the next."
Bigger share. Bosnian Serb leaders still insist that no final deal is possible until the contact group plan, which earmarks 51 percent of Bosnia for a Croat-Muslim federation, is amended to give them a bigger share of Bosnia's resources and economic potential. "Our 49 percent may look like a lot," maintains Buha, "but it is nothing." They also vow never to let the Posavina corridor, a narrow supply artery in northeastern Bosnia, be shaved down to an indefensible thread.
Above all, they will continue to press for sovereignty, complete with a flag, currency, even a U.N. seat -- and the right to secede. As Momcilo Krajisnik, speaker of the Bosnian Serb assembly, puts it: "The joint Serbian state must be formed with a firm man's hand ... it should be based on Serb nationalism, with all orthodox and national traditions."
Ironically, Milosevic has emerged as the key factor in trying to restrain Bosnian Serb demands. But despite his determination to see sanctions against Serbia lifted, the staying power of his blockade is questionable. "This is very difficult," says a Serbian police commander at the Sremska Raca checkpoint in northeastern Bosnia, where 80 percent of the traffic passes into Bosnia. "Every one of us has family on the other side." Fuel tankers are now arriving in Pale, the Bosnian Serb capital, from the West. "We can't achieve anything if the Croats leave their door wide open," says retired Gen. Bo Pellnas, who leads the undersized U.N. mission charged with monitoring Serbia's border with Bosnia.
There may also be a limit to how far Milosevic can go in his efforts to resurrect Serbia's economy by cooperating with the contact group in its work in Bosnia and Croatia. Criticism of Milosevic is growing within the Yugoslav Army and among Serbs sympathetic to the nationalist cause of their brethren in other republics. "People are willing to accept Milosevic's authority," says Mihailo Markovic, an architect of the Greater Serbian ideal, and author of Milosevic's Serbian Socialist Party platform. "But not if he goes against public opinion again and again."
In a region said to have "so much history it doesn't need a future," the future looms nevertheless. And Bosnia's Serbs, consumed with the past, are still determined to dictate its terms.
