Bosnia options

I think of myself not as an optimist or pessimist, but as a realist, albeit an occasionally imaginative (hopefully not delusionary) one.  What does that mean in Bosnia and Herzegovina today?

I am finding wide agreement among the internationals on at least one thing:  the President of Republika Srpska, Milorad Dodik, should be taken seriously when he advocates maximum autonomy for his Serb entity, with a view to gaining independence.  Where they differ is on the remedy:  some think none is needed, since the day when independence is possible will never arrive, while others think it necessary to react, one way or the other, to his threats.

Ignoring Dodik is certainly one option.  Those who advocate doing so think it was a mistake for the European Union’s High Representative, Catherine Ashton, to cut a deal with Dodik to postpone his proposed referendum on the role of the international community in enforcing the Dayton agreements and on the Bosnian judicial system.  They think it would also have been a mistake for the international community to annul the referendum law, which was the intention before Ashton cut her deal.  The EU and US might have done better, some would argue, just to ignore the referendum, thus minimizing its political significance.

Another option would be to challenge Dodik when he crosses well-defined red lines. One clear red line is independence for RS, or anything that leads irreversibly in that direction.  Neither Europe nor the U.S.–not even Serbia–would allow a referendum on independence, and the other High Representative (Valentin Inzko, who represents not only the U.S. and EU but also the Russians, Turks and other members of the international community) was poised to cancel Dodik’s proposed referendum on grounds that it would have led irreversibly in the direction of independence.  Had Ashton not acted, Inzko would have.

What else can be done?

Some argue in favor of an early Bosnian application for EU membership. This they say would put Bosnia into a process that will require it to have a more functional central government and reduce the temptation of the EU to do what Ashton did, i.e. deal directly with Republika Srpska. It will also reduce the significance of Dodik’s independence talk and force him to deal with the central government, which will be responsible for most of the reforms EU membership requires.

It can also be argued that the right response to Dodik’s campaign for maximum autonomy for the RS is maximum effort in the Federation (the other 51% of Bosnia) to become more functional and effective. This would set up a competition between the two halves of the country and accelerate progress to towards the EU, as well as convergence between the two administrations, which will have to meet the same EU requirements.  Given the current difficulty of forming a government–Bosnia has been unable to do so since elections eight months ago–this to some is an appealing way of turning the current situation to advantage.

Another possibility is a referendum in all of Bosnia on whether its population wants a government that can fulfill the requirements of EU membership. This would answer the question many people pose:  do Bosnians want to live in the same state?  Dodik has made a lot of political hay among Serbs with his referendum proposals.  But there is no reason why the fate of Bosnia should be decided exclusively in the RS, with only one quarter the country’s population voting.  A referendum in the whole country would likely pass handily and end Dodik’s referendum bravado.

Some would like to see a new Dayton conference. While in the past the people who advocated this were mainly those who wanted to partition Bosnia along ethnic lines, today some of those who would like to hold it together believe that a new grand bargain is necessary.  Dayton has become in Dodik’s hands an instrument for maximizing RS autonomy.  Some of those who would prefer a stronger central government think that they could get more of what they want from a renegotiated agreement.

If Dodik goes ahead with his referendum at some point, the country’s majority could react in several ways. What if a million Bosnians walked into the RS and sat down in polling places?  What if the constitutional court intervened?  What if the EU and U.S. pulled their ambassadors and levied sanctions against Dodik and his close advisors?

And finally:  there is the war option. Let me be clear about this:  I am not advocating it, just posing it as one among a number of other possibilities.  Among those who fought for a single Bosnia in the 1992-95 war, there are at least some who took their guns home with them and would be prepared to fight again if the unity of the country were threatened.

The only scenario for this I can realistically imagine is a lightening quick Muslim lunge for Brcko, the linchpin of the two parts of RS that lies only a short distance from Federation territory.  Once split, the western portion of RS (where Banja Luka lies) would fall quickly.  Eastern Bosnia, where the terrain is difficult and the population heavily Serb since the war, would likely require negotiation.

It is admittedly difficult to imagine this last option in a Sarajevo bathed in sunshine and teeming with Bosnians eating ice cream and drinking the many different types of coffee that remain as a symbol of the country’s one-time role as a crossroads of civilizations.  Who would want to give up a job in one of the five (yes, count them:  district, municipal, cantonal, entity and central) governments headquartered here for a bug-challenged tromp through the mountains and across the Posavina corridor?

The answer is someone feeling threatened by ethnic nationalist rhetoric and other reminders of a war that took about 100,000 lives and close to four years of depradations of the civilian population.  Or maybe someone in the Muslim community feeling as emboldened as Milorad Dodik, as he plunks for maximum autonomy, challenging and manipulating the Americans and Europeans into partitioning Bosnia.

I know too well that America has many problems that come before Bosnia in the current hierarchy of priorities.  But let’s be clear:  a radicalized Islamic state in central Bosnia would be no more welcome today than 15 years ago.  There are lots of options.  Bosnians and Europeans should tend to the problem before the Americans feel they need to.