38 AMERICAN SPYLooking back, the irony of the situation is enough to make my head
spin. This unique but true spy story sheds a bright light on a much broader
issue: how presidents from both political parties ignore intelligence and
make disastrous foreign policy decisions. Decisions that adversely impact
millions of people, often for generations. Including spies like me who risk
their lives collecting and reporting this intelligence in the first place.
To be clear, the CIA does not go out and collect secrets willy-nilly.
The CIA only seeks information that directly addresses specific intelligence
“requirements” or questions, which are generated by the White House and
other key intelligence consumers in the US national security apparatus.
Why were deadly Iranian operatives in Bosnia in the first place? Not
just physically located in the heart of Europe but officially welcomed and
completely in control of the country’s minister of interior and the head of
its security service?
The first underlying reason is because the George H. W. Bush admin-
istration ignored CIA intelligence (including my own reporting) and
refused to recognize objective reality and help manage the fait accompli,
the breakup of Yugoslavia into independent states. The US government’s
unbending and Tito-esque 1991 policy of forced unity helped light the fuse
on the Balkan powder keg.
Predictably, the following year, the Bush administration flip-flopped
and reversed its original ill-fated policy. Now, the United States decided,
the Serbs were the bad guys and we would only recognize the indepen-
dent republics. These US policies not only created confusion, but they
also enabled years of bloodshed. I’m not suggesting the United States is to
blame for the civil war in Yugoslavia, but our ever-changing policies made
things worse than they needed to be.
The war in Croatia had begun to heat up in March 1991, followed
by Slovenia’s brief but violent war of secession in late June and early July
- Secretary of State James Baker visited Belgrade that summer and
urged all parties to reject the inevitable independence movements and
maintain a unified Yugoslavia. The CIA knew his effort was in vain, since
it was contrary to the will of the people. In fact, the CIA’s October 1990
National Intelligence Estimate was “stunningly prescient,” unambiguously pre-
dicting, “Yugoslavia will cease to function as a federal state within one year
and will probably dissolve within two.”^4