that America remain the foremost economic power in thernworld. Thus the war in the Balkans evolved from a Yugoslavrndisaster and a European inconvenience into a major test ofrn”U.S. leadership.” This was made possible by a bogus consensusrnwhich passed for Europe’s Balkan policy. This consensus,rnamplified in the media, limited the scope for meaningful debate.rn”Europe” was thus unable to resist the new thrust ofrnBosnian policy coming from Washington.rnWhile Europe resorted to the lowest common denominatorrnin lieu of coherent policy, a violently anti-Serb, agenda-drivenrnform of Realpolitik dominated America’s Bosnian policy. Insteadrnof the neo-Wilsonian “moralist” approach—howeverrnmisguided—egotistic unilateralism had grown rampant inrnWashington. Globalist phraseology should not mislead us.rnThe intent is no longer to achieve a consensus; it is to force othersrnto acquiesce to the American position. Just as Germanyrnsought to paint its Maastricht Diktat on Croatia’s recognitionrnin December 1991 as an expression of the “European consensus,”rnafter 1993 Washington’s faits accomplis—^The Hague Tribunalrnincluded—were straightfacedly labeled by the administrationrn”the will of the international community.”rnJust as the EU has lived with the consequences of its acquiescencernto Herr Genscher’s fist-banging in Maastricht, NATOrnhas felt the brunt of the new American agenda in foreign policy.rnMost NATO partners were resentful but helpless when thernUnited States resorted to covert action—with the support ofrnTurkey and Germany—to smuggle arms into Groatia andrnBosnia in violation of U.N. resolutions. America’s refusal tornsupport pre-1994 attempts to end the war (the EU Lisbon formularnin 1992, the Vance-Owen and Owen-Stoltenberg plans inrn1993), and its unilateral actions to directly aid the Muslim andrnCroat cause have frustrated the Europeans, but they were helpless.rnThe rest is history. Predictably, catching “war criminals” inrnBosnia has now become another American obsession, a mediafedrncrusade that may yet make a durable peace impossible.rnThe American-led operation was initially presented as a limitedrneffort to implement the Dayton peace accord by creating arn”zone of separation” between the factions and enforcing arncease-fire. But a full-fledged political campaign is under way inrnWashington to turn IFOR into an international gendarmerie,rnobliged to assist the Hague Tribunal in apprehending accusedrnwar criminals.rnAt the root of the problem is a deeply flawed model of thernnew Balkan order, designed in Washington and Bonn, whichrnseeks to satisfy the aspirations of virtually all ethnic groups inrnformer Yugoslavia—except those “eight million Serbs.” This isrna disastrous strategy for all concerned. Even if forced into submissionrnnow, the Serb nation shall have no stake in the ensuingrnorder of things. This will cause imbalance and strife for years,rnor decades. It will entangle the United States in a Balkan quagmire,rnand guarantee a new war as soon as Clinton’s and Albright’srnsuccessors lose interest in underwriting the ill-gottenrngains of America’s new Balkan clients.rnThe little-known details of the way The Hague Tribunal operatesrngo beyond the issues of legality and politics; theyrnconstitute a moral debacle of the highest order. Here are somernof the facts. First, in October 1992, the U.N. Security Councilrnpassed Resolution 780, establishing a five-member commissionrnof experts to investigate war crimes and other violations of internationalrnlaw in the former Yugoslavia. DePaul University lawrnprofessor Mammoud Cherif Bassiouni was chosen to serve onrnthe commission and to serve as its “rapporteur,” to gather andrnanalyze the evidence of war crimes. Bassiouni subsequently becamernthe chairman of the commission, and its work providedrnthe initial impetus to the advocates of The Hague Tribunal.rnThe “War Crimes Project” at DePaul was the first data base tornthe Tribunal’s prosecutor.rnProfessor Bassiouni is a devout Muslim. He has never soughtrnto conceal his core values and prejudices in his books and articles,rnwhich include the following: The Palestinians’ Right ofrnSelf-Determination, Introduction to Islam, The Islamic Criminalrnjustice System, Jewish-Arab Relations, Criminal Procedure (IslamicrnLaw), and The Palestinian Intifada: A Record of Israeli Repression.rnObviously, entrusting Professor Bassiouni with collecting evidencernin a conflict between Muslims and non-Muslims wasrntantamount to putting Count Dracula in charge of a bloodrnbank. It was a gesture of contempt for the Serbs and appeasementrnof oil-rich friends. As expected, he had consistently refusedrnto accept evidence of Croat and Muslim crimes againstrnthe Serbs, while his staff have not hesitated to include thirdhandrnhearsay and anonymous submissions from Muslim andrnCroat sources.rnBassiouni initiated and legitimized a selective approach tornevidence gathering which has become habitual at The Hague,rnand which prompted David Binder of the New York Times to declarernthe entire War Crimes Tribunal unfair:rnIndependent Serbian efforts to collect war crimes datarnand not only data involving Serbs, but other nationalitiesrnhas been ignored. A large volume of data has been simplyrnbrushed aside…. I think it is a farce frankly, and it’srnmade more of a farce by their naming political leaders asrnpotential war criminals…. If you’re going to start listingrnpotential war criminals, you might add [German] ChancellorrnKohl and, then Foreign Minister, Hans DietrichrnGenscher, to the list of potential war criminals for whatrnthey did in pushing the recognition of Slovenia andrnGroatia, and thereby, spreading and deepening the conflictrnin the Balkans.rnBassiouni’s “Final Report” unambiguously blamed the Serbsrnfor aggression, premeditated ethnic cleansing, mass rapes, andrnall the rest. It was widely circulated in five languages under thernU.N. cover. The outside worid perceived it as an official U.N.rndocument based on facts. It was an exercise in disinformationrnworthy of Goebbels. Few copies of the 3,000 page Annex wererncirculated, with primary evidence on which the findings werernbased. This Annex simply listed thousands of anti-Serb submissions,rnwithout attempting to evaluate their veracity.rnBassiouni’s magnum opus would have been laughed out of anyrnreal court, in the United States or anywhere else in the Westernrnworld—just as he himself would have been disqualified fromrnserving on an American jury in any dispute involving a Muslimrnand a non-Muslim.rnSecond, he who pays the piper calls the tune. As Brecht putrnit, “You want justice, but do you want to pay for it, hm? Whenrnyou go to a butcher you know you have to pay, but you peoplerngo to a judge as if you were off to a funeral supper.”rnIn the first months of its existence. The Hague Tribunal receivedrn93.4 percent of its funding from two Islamic countries,rnPakistan and Malaysia. Mirahile dictu: both have been given thern18/CHRONICLESrnrnrn