NATO a toothless tiger

The impending fall of Bihac into the hands of the rebel Serbs could not be more humiliating for the United Nations and NATO. The Serbs could have easily captured the whole town on Monday and it is not immediately clear why they have chosen to wait.

The whole situation has demonstrated the UN's failure to protect Bosnia Herzegovina, a member state. It has also pinpointed the fruitlessness of NATO's presence in the troubled state of now defunct Yugoslavia.

After more than two years of inaction -- except for some showcase air attacks against the Serbs -- NATO has to face the ugly reality of its impotence and start seeking ways to save face.

Ironically, the 16-member alliance has shown the Serbs that it is now no more than an aging toothless tiger. The air strikes against empty Serb tanks and an airfield, which sometimes involved dozens of modern jet fighters, were either too late, too little, or too ineffective. In the end, they failed to deter the Serbs from expanding their grip or holding UN troops hostage.

Anyway, there are only 20,000 UN troops in Bosnia. They are lightly armed and not in any position to resist attacks from the Serbs. They will even face difficulties finding an escape route in case they suddenly have to encounter hostile aggressors.

The UN itself understands that its current inertia has roots in its "primary sin" of denying the Bosnian government the right of self defense. The UN Security Council cannot escape from the results of its thoughtless and tragic decision to impose an arms embargo against Bosnia, the victim of aggression, two years ago.

In the beginning, the western governments seemed very reluctant to help the Bosnians, at least they did not react as quickly or as strongly as when Slovenia and Croatia freed themselves from the sinking communist nation of Yugoslavia.

The West still owes the world an explanation about that reluctance. Moslem observers have concluded that the West would have acted differently if the Bosnians had adhered to a different creed.

It is not very clear yet what steps NATO will take to try to save Bihac. As many military experts have said, the only effective way to teach the Serbs a lesson and to improve the tarnished images of NATO and the UN is to send in ground troops.

But who wants to die for the Bosnians? Washington long ago announced it could not commit its own troops to Bosnia because President Bill Clinton would not be likely get the go ahead from Congress for that. And its European allies have apologetically announced opposition to the idea of sending troops there.

Even the Moslem countries, which have accused the West of treating the Bosnia problem in a half-hearted manner, have not done anything themselves, except to condemn the situation.

Now if NATO resumes its chronic fence sitting and sits back to watch the continuing letting of Bosnian blood, it will demonstrate nothing but a lack of moral fiber, which belies the excessive trumpeting of human rights by its member nations.

The failure of the UN and NATO in Bihac will surely motivate the Serbs, who now constitute the only effective and aggressive military power there, to move against the under-armed government troops to annex other UN-declared safety zones. The only safety Bihac offers anyone now is that for the Serbs, courtesy of the ineffectiveness of NATO and the UN.

No matter how hardened the world has become to human tragedy in its various trouble spots, NATO's passive witnessing of the Serbs bleeding Bosnians into surrender, not only in Bihac, but also in other strategic places, would surely be something difficult to forget or forgive.