But the time has come to look seriously at introducing ground forces. Doing so may qualify as the least bad option currently available. There are many lessons to be learned from Kosovo. Waiting to use military force can increase the scale of the humanitarian disaster and narrow the strategic options. Air power by itself is rarely enough.
Advanced technology is no panacea.
But the most important lesson might be to understand that ruling out the introduction of ground forces never made sense. Doing so only made it more likely that Milosevic would attack with impunity and shrug off air assaults. In trying to reassure the American people about what this intervention would not cost, the Clinton administration undermined its own attempt to coerce Milosevic. Now the president also has to consider the task of persuading the American people to accept ground forces after telling them it would never come to this. Once again, we see that foreign policy on the cheap has a way of turning expensive.