White House Insists Nothing Improper was Done
WASHINGTON (AP) — Republicans are aiming at an elusive issue in protesting President Clinton's tacit OK to 1994 Iranian arms smuggling to the Bosnians, since the embargo those shipments evaded was one they opposed. That leaves Republicans the argument that Clinton was duplicitous and misleading when he let it be known, without telling, that the United States would do nothing to bar the shipments through Croatia to the outgunned Bosnian Muslims, who were being driven into retreat by the Serbs.
In addition, GOP leaders contend the result was an Iranian foothold in Bosnia. They also have suggested it may have been a covert operation, which Congress should by law have known at the time. All of which the administration denies.
"There was absolutely nothing improper done," Clinton replied, and said he wasn't concerned about Republican calls for congressional investigations. They'd have to be narrowly focused, since Congress forbade U.S. enforcement against breaches of the United Nations arms embargo by third countries, a ban effective in November 1994.
Dole Calls Actions Duplicitous
Sen. Bob Dole, who will be the Republican nominee against Clinton, called his course duplicitous: telling Congress one thing while covertly doing another. The Republican position, shared by a substantial bloc of Democrats, had been that the United States should help arm the Bosnians so they could better defend themselves against Serb forces equipped with weapons of the old Yugoslav army.
"While he was fighting lifting the arms embargo he looked the other way while Iran sold arms ... and never told the Congress, which he had an obligation to do," Dole said.
Dole, the GOP majority leader, plans to confer this week with the chairmen of four Senate committees he has asked to investigate the affair. There's also talk of House investigations.
House Speaker Newt Gingrich said the president's credibility was at issue. Gingrich asked how congressional Republicans were supposed to believe Clinton next time.
But Secretary of State Warren Christopher said the administration always opposed the U.N. embargo and wanted it lifted. The dispute with Congress was over Clinton's refusal to do so unilaterally, in part on grounds that to do so would undermine other international sanctions imposed by the United Nations and supported by the United States.
Clinton vetoed a bill to lift the arms embargo eight months ago. He said at the time that allies with peacekeeping forces then in Bosnia had said they would withdraw their troops if the United States acted unilaterally on arms for the Bosnians. The bill had passed by veto-proof margins, but there never was an override attempt because of the U.S.-sponsored negotiations and peace settlement now in effect in what was Yugoslavia.
That's the accord under which Clinton sent American troops, now numbering more than 18,000, to join a NATO force of 60,000 enforcing the pact. He sent them late last year, and said they would be withdrawn before the end of 1996.
Republicans grudgingly accepted the mission. Dole said he was supporting the troops, not the Clinton policy. He and other GOP leaders carefully drew that distinction on what had appeared a high-risk operation most Americans opposed.
Polls Show Growing Support for Mission
In a public opinion poll conducted at the time the first Americans were sent to Bosnia, only 36 percent said they supported Clinton's use of U.S. troops there. But the mission so far has gone relatively smoothly, and attitudes seem to have turned. A poll sponsored by Tufts University indicated 60 percent support the mission now.Another survey, this one by the Pew Research Center, showed waning public concern about the operation. According to that poll, 18 percent were following the situation closely, half as many as two months ago. That could change abruptly, of course, were a crisis to erupt. And what now seems relatively routine could become a central campaign issue. The narrow argument about arms shipments isn't going to reach that level.
Whatever that did to let the Iranians into the region, the administration is withholding nearly $100 million in U.S. military aid until all foreign forces, save the NATO peacekeepers, have been expelled. It also has said that an Iranian offer of economic aid to Bosnia cannot be accepted under the peace accord.
Berserkistan is a world news service of Michael Linder Productions, Inc.
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