Waging Modern War: Bosnia, Kosovo, and the Future of Combat

Waging Modern War: Bosnia, Kosovo, and the Future of Combat Wesley K. Clark Date: 06 August, 2002   —   $7.20   —   Book product page Rating:

"Waging Modern War: Bosnia, Kosovo, and the Future of Combat", by Wesley K. Clark, is a warts-and-all memoir of Clark’s involvement in the Balkan Crisis from 1995 to 2000. It covers his work with Richard Holbrooke on getting the Dayton accords signed, the peacekeeping efforts in Bosnia, and the NATO war in Kosovo and Serbia all the way through the controversial standoff with the Russians at Pristina Airfield.

I picked up this book after hearing General Hugh Shelton’s criticism of Clark. The book fully documents the tension between Clark, Shelton, and Secretary of Defense Cohen. I’m not going to make any judgments as to whether the criticisms are justified, but I will say that Clark feels most of the problems were brought on by the fact that Cohen and Shelton didn’t fully understand the implications of his dual role as SACEUR and CINCEUR. As CINCEUR, Clark was in the US military chain of command under Shelton. As SACEUR, Clark was not in the US military chain of command and he had NATO responsibilities that sometimes conflicted with US military strategy and doctrine.

It’s a very interesting read by a man who campaigned for President of the United States and is being considered as Vice President. As the book was written before Clark decided to become a politician, it gave me a great deal of insight into his personality and belief system, unsullied by campaign propaganda. It’s also a well written and interesting account of a war that was, at the time, mostly ignored in the United States.

One of the most interesting parts of the book, in my opinion, is the Preface to the Paperback Edition where just before the recent Afghan war, Clark is talking to a senior member of the administration who tells him, “We read your book – no one is going to tell us where we can or can’t bomb.”

Clark continues, “This represented an unfortunate misreading of the lessons of the Kosovo campaign. Whereas in the popular view, the allies hindered the bombing, the actual truth is virtually the opposite: allied target approvals made the overall impact of the strikes far greater than if the United States had acted unilaterally. The real lesson of Kosovo is this: to achieve strategic success at a minimal cost, a structured alliance whose actions are guided by consensus and underwritten by international law is likely to be far more effective and efficient in the long run.”

He goes on to explain that three years after the NATO war in Kosovo, there is no fighting in the Balkans. “What caused this outcome was not just the weapons of war. In fact, one might say the weapons were but a relatively small factor in the ultimate outcome. Rather, there were forces far more powerful than bombs and bullets at work. These were the wholehearted political commitment of European nations, the thrust of international law, and the binding structure of NATO.

As the book attests, the NATO bombing campaign had little real effect on Serbian military forces inside Kosovo, but nonetheless, a strategic victory was achieved because the moral force of the citizens of 19 democratic nations was behind each bomb. Contrast that to the recent Iraq campaign, where the US military quickly won a tactical victory but has yet to gain the strategic aim of a democratic Iraq, and you can see why Clark has a better grasp on foreign policy than our current President.