Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
08SARAJEVO1520
2008-09-25 15:16:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Sarajevo
Cable title:  

BOSNIA - DODIK'S OPTIONS FOR BOSNIA: IT'S MY WAY

Tags:  PGOV PREL PINR KAWC KDEM BK 
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ZNY CCCCC ZZH
O 251516Z SEP 08
FM AMEMBASSY SARAJEVO
TO RUCNDT/USMISSION USUN NEW YORK IMMEDIATE 0108
RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC IMMEDIATE 8991
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC
RHEFDIA/DIA WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/JCS WASHINGTON DC
RHEHNSC/NSC WASHDC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHDC
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 SARAJEVO 001520 

SIPDIS

USUN PLEASE PASS TO EUR DAS JONES; DEPARTMENT FOR
EUR(JONES),EUR/SCE(HYLAND/FOOKS/STINCHOMB); OSD FOR BIEN;
NSC FOR HELGERSON/WILSON

E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/01/2018
TAGS: PGOV PREL PINR KAWC KDEM BK
SUBJECT: BOSNIA - DODIK'S OPTIONS FOR BOSNIA: IT'S MY WAY
OR THE HIGHWAY

REF: A. SARAJEVO 1519

B. SARAJEVO 1507

C. SARAJEVO 1459

Classified By: Ambassador English. Reason 1.4(b) and (d).

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 04 SARAJEVO 001520

SIPDIS

USUN PLEASE PASS TO EUR DAS JONES; DEPARTMENT FOR
EUR(JONES),EUR/SCE(HYLAND/FOOKS/STINCHOMB); OSD FOR BIEN;
NSC FOR HELGERSON/WILSON

E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/01/2018
TAGS: PGOV PREL PINR KAWC KDEM BK
SUBJECT: BOSNIA - DODIK'S OPTIONS FOR BOSNIA: IT'S MY WAY
OR THE HIGHWAY

REF: A. SARAJEVO 1519

B. SARAJEVO 1507

C. SARAJEVO 1459

Classified By: Ambassador English. Reason 1.4(b) and (d).


1. (C) SUMMARY: As we have reported, Republika Srpska (RS)
PM Milorad Dodik has taken a number of actions over the last
12 months to undermine the Bosnian state, his most being his
attacks on TRANSCO (Ref C) and in challenging the authorities
of state-level law enforcement and judicial authorities (Ref
A). In addition, in a series of media statements,
interviews, and op-ed pieces over the same period PM Dodik
has been laying out and expanding on his vision for an
acceptable future for Bosnia and Herzegovina -- and the RS's
place in it. His vision has generally been presented
piecemeal and in response to the issues of the moment, such
as Kosovo independence, the controversy over his remarks at a
Serb gathering in Zagreb, or Karadzic's arrest. However,
over the last several months, Dodik has increasingly framed
the issue of Bosnia's future as a choice between two
alternative paths: a) Bosnia's integration into Europe --
provided certain RS conditions are met; or, b) dissolution of
the country. Though he has publicly claimed not to want the
latter, the conditions he has attached to his support for the
former have steadily expanded (e.g., from abolishment of the
Bonn Powers, to OHR's closure, to police reform on RS terms,
to "recognition" of the RS by Federation-based politicians).
In a September 18 interview with Radio Free Europe (RFE)
Dodik expounded at length on Bosnia's present and future,
tying together a series of themes he has raised before and
introducing new ones. Most significantly, Dodik attached
another condition to his willingness to pursue a European
future within Bosnia: the return of competencies previously
transferred to the state. He has also more starkly defined
the alternative if his conditions are not met: partition. He
claimed to prefer resolving Bosnia's problems (albeit on his

terms),but he concluded that partition might be only
"rational" outcome, stating clearly that he was "not against
such an option." The Party for Democratic Action (SDA)
declaration adopted on September 20 and subsequent warnings
by SDA President Tihic about a possible future conflict in
Bosnia overshadowed Dodik's interview (Ref B). We do not
believe Dodik's interview was mere election-year rhetoric; it
provided clear insight into his strategy, the strategy to
which SDA's declaration was a response. END SUMMARY

Republika Srpska Is Everything
--------------


2. (C) A September 18 Radio Free Europe (RFE) interview with
RS PM Milorad offers interesting insights into his thinking
about Bosnia's problems and his vision for its future. To
begin with, Dodik implies that his outlook and that of his
party has evolved over the years. "We (my party and I) have
realized that Republika Srpska is the essence of everything
people want, and something they value most." Dodik explains
that this judgment has driven his rhetoric and actions since
returning to power in 2006 and will continue to do so.
"Precisely the RS, its unquestionableness, viability,
development, in peace of course. People respond more to
attacks on Republika Srpska, than, for example, to the issue
of whether a road has been constructed or not...Therefore, we
need to respond to the issue of importance to the people."
Dodik returns to this theme at the close of his interview but
uses nationalist language to make his point. "I will tell
you that I do not think about Bosnia emotionally. I do not
love it. I think about the RS very emotionally." With these
comments Dodik paints himself and his party as reflecting the
will of their Serb constituents, as any committed democrat
would, it is implied. Dodik doesn't quite portray himself as
a prisoner of 'the will of the people' as he has in the past,
but he continues to ignore his responsibility to
constructively shape the debate in Bosnia or lead his
constituents away from the traditionally destructive
political approach of the RS.

Bosnia Is Not Working
--------------


3. (SBU) Dodik paints a bleak picture of the current

SARAJEVO 00001520 002 OF 004


situation in Bosnia. He notes that "BiH is a deeply
segregated society and divided country and over the years it
has not managed to find internal reasons for additional
integration." Instead, he says, Bosnia has "only further
disintegrated." Dodik underscores that the international
community has "not managed to create a framework within which
BiH could function" despite its activism and the imposition
of "800 laws," adding that Bosnia as a country is "very hard
to sustain." Dodik also opines that thirteen years after
Dayton "the basic relation between people in BiH, between
different ethnic groups and citizens in general today is
absolutely on a lower level of communication than it was in
the past." In another passage, Dodik strives to present his
assessment of Bosnia in terms that imply he has reached these
conclusions more in sorrow than in anger. "I used to have
faith that Bosnia could build itself and become functional.
I do not have that faith any longer. I do not see any
potential for it."

There Are Two Roads Forward
--------------


4. (C) After diagnosing Bosnia's problems, Dodik lays out
what he implies are the only two possible cures for them.
The first is "to establish the functionality of joint
institutions." The second is "(the two entities) peacefully
part" (i.e., a Czechoslovakia-type velvet divorce resulting
in the entities becoming two independent countries). As he
has in the past, Dodik insists that he prefers the first
option, building a functional Bosnia, but he then defines
"functional" in a manner that makes its almost impossible to
achieve. Dodik repeats his earlier demand that the "Dayton
framework" must be maintained, reiterating that he will not
enter into discussions about resolving Bosnia's problems
unless "the RS is recognized as an unquestionable category"
(i.e., no abolition of the RS). In the past, he has also
made clear that the RS would not allow or tolerate the
transfer of any additional competencies from the entities to
the state. In his RFE interview Dodik goes further. He
demands that Bosnia "further decentralize functions whose
transfer to BiH joint institutions (i.e., the state) was
imposed by OHR." In other words, Dodik defines a functional
Bosnia as one in which many of the most critical reforms of
the last 13 years are reversed. Later in the interview, he
explains that many of these reforms have failed, but not
unsurprisingly, he ignores the RS role, including the role of
his government, in ensuring that many state institutions are
inefficient or ineffective.

Constitutional Reform Talks Are The Final Test
-------------- -


5. (C) Dodik predicts that the question of whether it is
possible to build a "functional" Bosnia -- and avoid
partition -- will likely be settled during constitutional
reform negotiations. "This (i.e., constitutional reform) is
an issue on which BiH will show whether it has a chance to
exist." Dodik anticipates that these talks will collapse,
however; in part, he suggests, because the Bosniaks are, in
the end, unreasonable and unwilling to accept the RS. As he
has in the past, Dodik criticizes Bosniak member of the
Tri-Presidency Haris Silajdzic for driving the Bosniak
agenda, but he goes much further in the RFE interview,
claiming that there are no reasonable Bosniak interlocutors
with whom he and the Serbs can work. Instead of the general
criticism of "Sarajevo politicians" Dodik has use in the
past, this time Dodik singles out the leaders of the Party of
Democratic Action (SDA),Sulejman Tihic, and the Social
Democratic Party (SDP, Zlatko Lagumdzija, by name. "Thanks
to Haris Silajdzic, the RS has awakened and realized that all
the caricaturing by Lagumdzija and Tihic, in essence boils
down to the same policy that Haris Silajdzic implements.
Their mental and other prefixes are different but their goals
are the same (i.e., the abolition of the RS)." So while
Dodik says he is willing to "sit with Bosniaks and Croats,
and agree on a functional model that will be satisfactory to
everybody," he defines his Bosniak counterparts in such a way
as to make it virtually impossible for him to reach agreement
with them and their objectives in manner that assigns them
blame for what he see as Bosnia's inevitable collapse.


SARAJEVO 00001520 003 OF 004


Partition Would Not Be A Tragedy
--------------


6. (C) Dodik states clearly that he is "not against"
partition, if it comes to that, and he is also sanguine about
the possibility Bosnia could collapse. "And, it will not be
tragic if (Bosnia) shows that it does not stand a chance. It
would be tragic if disagreements of the kind yield violence.
However, I believe reasonable men can discuss everything and
conclude that something cannot function to peacefully agree
on the way ahead." The implication of this statement and
other observations in the interview is that Dodik is one of
those "reasonable men" to whom he refers, and that violence,
if it comes, will originate from the Federation, not the RS.
Dodik has spoken of "alternative paths for the RS" in the
past, implying that the RS could or would secede under
certain circumstances, but we believe that his RFE comments
are among the clearest and strongest references to Bosnia's
dissolution Dodik has made over the last year. In several
instances, Dodik attempts to portray this stark message as
nothing more than his attempt to honestly and openly confront
issues that others chose to ignore. "Whatever I say, and I
strive to be realistic, can be misinterpreted. I believe
this country is hardly sustainable."

The RS Can Make It On Its Own, If It Has To
--------------


7. (C) Dodik is careful, as he usually is, to say that he is
"aware of the fact that we (i.e., the RS) cannot be a
separate body," but this single line is undercut by several
comments about the RS's capacity to function independently.
In fact, Dodik's pessimism about Bosnia's future is matched
by an almost unbridled optimism about the RS's potential.
"All the analyses indicate that the RS functions flawlessly
in a political, administrative, territorial, and economic
sense, that it has proven to be completely self-sustainable,"
Dodik asserts. At another point in the interview Dodik
stresses that he "believes that the (RS) can function, and
the RS has proven it." Dodik also challenges the notion that
additional reforms that come at the expense of the RS are the
best way to secure Bosnia's European future. He argues that
past experience has established that such reforms will not
work and/or they are not genuine requirements, but he
implies, simply designed to punish the RS. Here Dodik uses
former HighRep Ashdown to make his point. "Ashdown had
imposed a catalogue of laws, and achieved nothing. He has
only further divided BiH...regardless of what his intent
was." Dodik then accuses Ashdown of "using and lying (sic)
European institutions, as in the case of police reform," and
then stresses that "we have learned our lesson."

Yugoslavia And The Lessons Of History
--------------


8. (C) In a commentary that RS papers published earlier this
year, Dodik asserted that Bosniaks demanded independence from
Yugoslavia at the start of the nineties, and fought the
1992-1995 war to achieve their objective. He claimed that
Bosnian Serbs opposed the break-up of the multi-ethnic
Yugoslav state; he also suggested that Bosniak demands to
abolish the RS were reminiscent of the policies pursued by
Slobodan Milosevic prior to Yugoslavia's break-up. In his
RFE interview, Dodik elaborates on this theme, blaming the EU
for allowing "Yugoslavia to divide along the lines of ethnic
homogenization." Dodik then complains that "contrary to all
these ethnic homogenization processes, however, important
foreigners decided that Bosnia alone has to prove that it can
move forward as a society of deep ethnic divisions." The
result, 18 years later, Dodik argues is that "Bosnia is
showing that she is incapable of doing it." The implication
of Dodik's "analysis" is clear: if the international
community accepted that Yugoslavia could not function as a
multi-ethnic state, then why does it expect Bosnia to do so?

I Respect Dayton, But I Am Not Bluffing
--------------


9. (C) Throughout the RFE interview Dodik stresses his
respect for Dayton. "We in the RS do not dispute a single
authority BiH has in accordance with the Constitution...I,

SARAJEVO 00001520 004 OF 004


naturally, believe in laws and respect the Constitution and
the Dayton Agreement." However, he makes crystal clear that
he and the RS are not prepared to go beyond Dayton. "We are
not ready to be creative for things that are outside the
Dayton framework, outside our wishes." Dodik also states
matter of factly that the RS will not succumb to pressure.
"We are now aware that there is no way for the international
community to exert pressure here as it did in the past," he
says. He emphasizes this point with regard to constitutional
reform: "no international leadership, no political pressure
from the outside." To underscore his seriousness about his
bottom line (i.e., Dayton as drafted),Dodik repeats a threat
he first made during the crisis over the October (2007)
measures. "We are faced with a clear choice" and "if forced,
we have a democratic right not to work in (BiH)
institutions." Elaborating, he explains that "our people
will not withdraw from the parliament or the Council of
Ministers," but "will withdraw from the positions of chairs
of joint bodies," which will, as a result, "lose their
legitimacy." In other words, Dodik will make Bosnia
ungovernable.

Comment: More Than Just Words
--------------


10. (C) Dodik's RFE interview lays out a clear vision for
Bosnia. Though Dodik is careful to claim that he favors a
European future for the RS insider Bosnia -- a fact he would
undoubtedly point to if challenged -- he deliberately
attaches conditions to this path designed to makes the logic
of his alternative -- peaceful partition -- appear inevitable
because others will force this option upon him. Much of what
Dodik said to RFE is not new. In fact, it is a sad comment
on the state of Bosnia's political affairs that a year ago it
was almost unthinkable for an RS Prime Minister to openly
refer to the dissolution of the country as even a remote
possibility. Dodik is now presenting it as the only
"rational" solution to Bosnia's problems. Nonetheless, Dodik
did use the RFE interview to up the rhetorical ante. First,
by requiring the return of competencies previously
transferred to the state as a condition for establishing and
working with a "functional Bosnia." Second, his presentation
of partition goes beyond earlier speculation about Bosnia's
dissolution. Like the September 20 SDA declaration, which
overshadowed Dodik's interview, we do not believe that the
RFE interview were simply pre-election rhetoric. To begin
with, RFE is not the right vehicle to deliver a message to RS
voters. In addition, Dodik's arguments are carefully
constructed and build on statements and op-eds that go back
for months.
ENGLISH