Just seven days later, Clinton administration spokesmen are telling a different story. Admitting that NATO bombing has not destroyed either the will or the capacity of the Yugoslav military, U.S. General Wesley Clark now argues that air strikes will not be enough. Cynics argue that Clinton fears to provide us with an honest, up-front accounting of the probable costs of military intervention, for such an accounting might undermine public support for his policies. More charitable observers conclude that Clinton's problem is ignorance. Never a foreign policy expert, Clinton knows little about the region where he has deployed our military twice in the past five years.
Ignorance comes at a high price.
Our fruitless air strikes have been expensive too. Of course, the price of the bombs we drop represents only the tip of the iceberg of our total military costs. Robert McNamara recently wrote a book about his experiences as secretary of defense during the Vietnam War. All Rights Reserved.