BOSNIA: WEIGHING THE OPTIONS
Marko Attila Hoare
Bosnian Institute News
Tuesday, 13 October, 2009
As Bosnian leaders meet to discuss constitutional changes under US and
EU tutelage on a military base near Sarajevo, this analysis examines
the real options facing the country.
These days, even the most ardent Bosnian patriot or foreign friend
of Bosnia-Hercegovina finds it difficult to be optimistic about the
country’s future. In its current constitutional form, Bosnia is a state
that does not and cannot work. No conceivable solution appears very
good, while even bad solutions appear unachievable. Yet the status
quo appears worst of all. I have been defending Bosnia-Hercegovina
for seventeen years – ever since I campaigned on its behalf when
the war broke out there in 1992. In this article, however, I shall
weigh up Bosnia-Hercegovina’s different options and prospects as
cold-bloodedly as possible.
The Dayton Peace Accords of 1995 established a Bosnia-Hercegovina that
was more partitioned than united. For every year that it exists, the
constitutional arrangement for Bosnia established by Dayton brings
Bosnia another step closer to full and complete partition. Every
year, Republika Srpska further consolidates itself as a de facto
independent state; the Office of the High Representative declines in
power and authority; the international community’s will and ability
to coerce the Republika Srpska are that much weaker; the already dim
prospect of Bosniaks and Croats returning to Republika Srpska recedes
further; and the share of the Bosnian population that can remember
the unified, multinational country that existed before 1992 becomes
smaller. Despite apparent steps toward reintegration taken while
the Office of the High Representative was headed by the energetic
and determined Paddy Ashdown, subsequent high representatives have
lacked either the will or the international support to continue down
Ashdown’s path, with the result that Bosnia has further unravelled in
recent years. However monstrous the injustice that Bosnian partition
would represent, with every year that passes, the injustice is
further forgotten by the world and full partition – like death –
draws nearer. We need only look at the other injustices that have
become realities on the ground: the three-way partition of Macedonia
in 1912-13; the dispossession of the Armenian population of Anatolia;
the dispossession of the Palestinian population of present-day Israel –
these are realities on the ground. The partition of Bosnia is steadily
becoming as irreversible as the partition of Macedonia.
Consequently, the best strategy for Bosnian Serb nationalists who
want to achieve an independent Republika Srpska is simply to continue
the existing constitutional arrangement while quietly chipping away
at Bosnia from within. Ironically, however, the present arrangement
may serve the interests of the Bosnian Serb political classes at the
present time better than a full partition. A unified, homogenous Serb
nation embracing the Serb populations on both sides of the River Drina
is a myth; the dominant historical thrust of Bosnian Serb nationalism
is toward an independent Bosnian Serb state rather than toward
annexation to Serbia. Thus, for the Bosnian Serb political classes, the
existing arrangement, whereby the Republika Srpska increasingly enjoys
complete de facto independence, may be preferable to a full partition
that would threaten them with being swallowed up by Serbia. One day,
the Serb population of the Republika Srpska may cease to support
annexation to Serbia, as the Greek population of Cyprus has ceased
to support enosis with Greece. Until then – and until international
conditions are fully favourable to the disappearance of Bosnia –
Republika Srpska’s leadership might sensibly desire to stay put.
Conversely, the best hope for supporters of a unified Bosnia
may be for Milorad Dodik’s increasingly arrogant regime to
continue and escalate its present policy of rocking the boat,
inciting Serb-nationalist passion and baiting the Bosniaks and
the international community. Eventually, we may hope, Dodik might
become sufficiently stupid actually to attempt unilateral secession
prematurely, or some other such outrage that would provide Bosnia
and the world with a legitimate pretext to overturn the Dayton order
and reintegrate Republika Srpska with the rest of the country. This
is not a wholly dim prospect, as recent antics on the part of the
leaderships of both Serbia and the Republika Srpska highlight the
continued Serb-nationalist propensity to self-destructive nationalist
confrontation. Earlier this month, Dodik issued a gratuitously
offensive denial of the Tuzla massacre of 1995. This followed hot on
the heels of Serbian president Boris Tadic’s recent act of provocation
against Bosnia, when he visited the Bosnian Serb entity without
Bosnia’s permission, to open a new school named ‘Serbia’ in Pale,
the former Bosnian Serb rebel capital outside of Sarajevo.
At this point, we should be clear about what partition would
mean. Partition might be appealing for those Bosnian Serbs and Bosnian
Croats who would be able to unite with Serbia and Croatia respectively,
exchanging their citizenship of a dysfunctional state for citizenship
of states that function. But for the Bosniaks, partition would cement
their confinement to what is effectively a ghetto comprising the two
territorial enclaves around the Sarajevo-Zenica-Tuzla triangle and
Bihac respectively. The EU’s recent extension of visa-free travel to
Serbia, following on from Croatia, thereby in practice to Bosnian
Serbs and Bosnian Croats but not to Bosnia and the Bosniaks, is
evidence that this is indeed a ghetto. An ‘independent’ Bosniak entity
comprising these enclaves would be non-viable, while its embittered
and demoralised population would fall under the influence of the most
reactionary form of conservative Islamic politics. Bosniaks would be
fully justified in choosing war before accepting such a grim fate.
A territorially fairer form of partition – which one or two of my own
Bosniak correspondents have suggested to me – would envisage both
Republika Srpska and the Bosnian Croats giving up territory to the
Bosniaks in exchange for the right to secede, resulting in a separate
Bosniak entity comprising somewhat less than half of Bosnia, with
roughly a third going to the Serbs and a fifth to the Croats. This
would represent a great injustice to the Serb and Croat inhabitants
of the transferred areas, who would suddenly find themselves ethnic
minorities in a Bosniak national state. The Republika Srpska, at
least, would find such a solution unacceptable, so it would have to
be imposed unilaterally – involving, in effect, a new war and ethnic
cleansing. This is not something that twentieth-century Europe can
sanction.
Any form of outright partition, furthermore, would destabilise Bosnia’s
neighbours: Serbia, Croatia and those further afield. Serbia and
Croatia have slowly and painfully democratised over the past decade,
turning their back on aggression and expansionism. In Serbia,
in particular, the struggle between pro-European reformists and
aggressive nationalists is far from over. The acquisition of new
irredentas would mark a huge setback for this process: the newly
expanded states would be unstable as they struggled to integrate the
new populations; their party systems would be further fragmented; the
expansionist nationalists would be vindicated and revived. Serbia,
in particular, would be encouraged by such an annexation to pursue
further expansionist goals – possibly against fragile Macedonia or
even NATO-member Croatia. Ultimately, what Serbia needs to prosper
is to be kept firmly within its existing legal state borders. The
reason why Bulgaria and Romania entered the EU before Serbia is that
they were fortunate enough to have lost World War II and to have been
confined to their own borders, with no prospect of further territorial
expansion. Serbia, which came out of World War II ambiguously – neither
wholly as victor nor as vanquished – and which appeared to have some
prospects for territorial expansion in the 1990s, has paid a heavy
price. The last thing Serbia needs is to be tempted off the wagon.
The redrawing of international borders and partition of a sovereign
state would encourage those elements in the Balkans that wish to
partition Kosovo and Macedonia as well. Partitioning Bosnia outright
could open a Pandora’s box, with unforseeable consequences. Yet
as we have seen, the status quo – the Dayton system – represents
not an alternative to outright partition, but de facto partition
with the likelihood of full de jure partition at some point in the
future, when circumstances are more favourable to the Bosnian Serb
nationalists. In the meantime, the Bosniaks have the worst of both
words. Not only have they been squeezed into a ghetto and forced to
inhabit a dysfunctional state, but their energies must be expended in
permanent political conflict with Serb and Croat politicians who do
not want the state to cease being dysfunctional. The Bosnian Croats,
meanwhile, suffer as the minority party within the Bosnian Federation,
permanently squeezed by the embittered Bosniak majority. The Republika
Srpska leadership, by contrast, should feel wholly satisfied with the
existing order, which grants it all the cards except one: the right
to secede formally one day without complications. Republika Srpska’s
lack of the right to secede comprises the only strong card in the
hands of supporters of Bosnian unity, though the card is unlikely to
remain strong indefinitely.
The Western alliance should have cause to regret the rise of Republika
Srpska, which may be relied upon to undermine its interests in South
East Europe. In May, Dodik unilaterally withdrew Bosnian Serb soldiers
from Bosnia’s participation in NATO exercises in Georgia, which he then
boycotted, in a move attributed to pro-Russian sentiment. Nebojsa
Radmanovic, the Bosnian Serb member of the Bosnian presidency,
recently stated that most Bosnian Serbs oppose NATO membership,
and mooted the possibility of a referendum on NATO membership in
Republika Srpska. A de jure or de facto independent Republika Srpska
will obstruct the Balkans’ Euro-Atlantic integration and serve as a
bridgehead for Russian influence in the region.
Supporters of a unified Bosnia-Hercegovina, both inside the country
and internationally, must act now if Bosnia-Hercegovina is to be
saved. Highlighting the fact that the Dayton system is leading
inexorably toward the outright partition of Bosnia-Hercegovina,
they must campaign for an end to this system and the restoration of
a unified, functioning Bosnian state, through the reintegration of
Republika Srpska with the rest of the country. This should not involve
the entity’s outright abolition; rather, it should involve the transfer
of all meaningful power to the central government in Sarajevo, leaving
Republika Srpska a de facto administrative entity. Justification for
such a move may be found in numerous places: Dodik’s repeated calls
for Bosnia-Hercegovina’s dissolution; his continued denial of the
Srebrenica genocide, in disregard of the verdict of the internatio ts;
the Serb failure to arrest Ratko Mladic as the Dayton Accords required;
the Republika Srpska’s failure to permit the return of Bosniak and
Croat refugees. This is not a good option, but it is the least bad
of the possible options.
If they do not wish to or are unable to campaign on this platform,
Bosnia-Hercegovina’s supporters might as well give up and accept
that at some point in the future, Bosnia-Hercegovina is likely to
disappear from the map of Europe.
This article was published in Bosnian by the independent Sarajevo
weekly BH Dani, 9 October 2009, and is reproduced here from the
author’s Greater Surbiton weblog