Bill Clinton: “In order to answer that, let's go back and see what our experience has been. First of all, the big military mission…”

“In order to answer that, let's go back and see what our experience has been. First of all, the big military mission, IFOR, really was completed within a year. In fact, it was completed in less than a year; that is the robust, large military presence we needed there--I think we had over 60,000 total allied troops there--to end the war, separate the forces, establish the separation zone between the parties. It was achieved quickly and with remarkable peace and remarkably low loss of life for all of our allied forces who were there. But then we went to the smaller force to try to support the civilian implementation of the Dayton agreement. Now, what has happened? An enormous amount of progress has been made; we don't believe the peace is self-sustaining. I think the responsible thing for me to do, since I do not believe we can meet the 18-month deadline, and no one I know now believes that, is to say to the American people what the benchmarks are. What are the benchmarks? Let's talk about that. Can they be achieved in the near-term? I believe they can. Do I think we should have a permanent presence in Bosnia? No. I don't believe this is like Germany after World War II or in the cold war or Korea after the Korean war. This is not what I'm suggesting here. But what are the benchmarks? First, let me say the final set of benchmarks must be developed by our NATO allies working with us. But let me give you just some of the things that I think we ought to be asking ourselves. Number one, are the joint institutions strong enough to be self-sustaining after the military operation? Number two, have the political parties really given up the so-called state-run media that have been instruments of hate and venom? Number three, is the civilian police large enough, well-trained enough, well-managed enough to do the job it has to do? Number four, do we have confidence that the military is under democratic rule? Those are just some of the benchmarks. I think, when we go through this, I want a full public discussion of it. But I will say again, I understand your job is try to get a deadline nailed down, but we tried it in this SFOR period, and it turned out we were wrong. I am not suggesting a permanent presence in Bosnia. I am suggesting that it's a more honest thing to do to say what our objectives are and that these objectives should be pursued, and they can be pursued at an affordable cost with fair burden-sharing with the Europeans. If that can be done, we should pursue them. Go ahead. Prosecution of War Crimes”