It's the most difficult leadership experience I have ever had. Nothing quite prepares you for this.
-- Gen. Eric Shinseki¹

Summary

• National debates fuelled by the recent U.S. military experience in Bosnia produced a series of lessons that range from force protection to civil-military implementation strategies. These lessons can and should inform U.S. military policy toward its present deployment in Kosovo.
• One of the most important lessons to emerge from the Bosnian experience is the need to refocus the training and development of senior military leaders for participation in peace operations.
• From the outset of the stability operation in Bosnia, the American military-trained almost exclusively for warfighting-was confronted with a series of non-traditional challenges. New responsibilities for senior commanders included negotiating with factional leaders and local government officials in Bosnia, managing civil-military relations, and securing a safe environment for implementation of the Dayton Peace Accords.
• In peace operations such as Kosovo, required skills include patience, the confidence to delegate authority and take risks, and the ability to engage with people outside the military, including representatives of nongovernmental and international organizations and the media. The army needs to develop a set of general principles that enhances all levels of officer education, including reference to geopolitics, cultural awareness, foreign languages, and interpersonal skills.
• Future peace operations will likely be joint, multinational, and coalition-based. One of the major observations from general officers who have served in Bosnia is that the army should place greater emphasis on assigning promising general officers to allied commands in preparation for leadership roles in future peace operations.

Introduction

Ilidza - June 20, 1998. At a ceremony to mark SFOR's extension of its mission of peace in Bosnia and Hercegovina, SFOR commanders took the opportunity to look towards the future of the mission. Courtesy: NATO Web site

Since the implementation of the Dayton Peace Accords, scholars have identified an assortment of lessons learned from the U.S. Army experience in Bosnia. The lessons have encompassed a myriad of areas, including the development of peace and stability operations, force protection, the issue of ad hoc arrangements in strategic planning and coordination², civil-military implementation strategies, and understanding the Implementation Force (IFOR) and Stabilization Force (SFOR) experiences in Bosnia³.

These areas continue to undergo scrutiny from both the U.S. Army and U.S. policymakers. Yet, an equally significant issue has escaped public debate--the requirement to train and develop senior leaders for participation in stability operations. Using interviews from a host of command participants in Bosnia, this article examines how military leaders were prepared for their leadership positions; describes the skill set needed to operate in a stability operation; and illuminates ways in which the U.S. Army can better prepare its senior leaders for peace operations.

Caught Between Doctrine and a New Reality

The U.S. Army is a doctrine-driven institution. In Bosnia, U.S. Army doctrines were largely inadequate in an environment that forced American commanders to wrestle with the political, diplomatic, and military demands of stability operations. Almost from the inception of the IFOR operation, U.S. commanders found themselves in uncharted territory. Describing this challenge, Maj. Gen. William Nash⁴ noted that this was an “inner ear problem.” Having trained for thirty years to read a battlefield, Nash observed that the general officers were now asked to read a “peace field.”⁵

SFOR Commander Gen. Eric K. Shinseki⁶ posited that he had to confront a “cultural bias.” Army doctrine-based training prepared him for warfighting and leadership at all levels, but “there wasn't a clear doctrine for stability operations. We are developing it, using the Bosnia experience, to define a doctrine for large stability operations. But it is this absence of a doctrine for a doctrine-based institution that you walk into in this environment. There you are in a kind of roll-your-own situation.”⁷ This is a revealing statement from a senior army general officer. The most striking fact, however, is that he is not alone in his opinion; other senior officers who have served in Bosnia have made similar assessments.

Gen. William Crouch⁸ noted that the Battle Command Training Program (BCTP) helped him prepare for Bosnia. But the process of peace support operations involved other significant issues. The military was on one side of the equation; multiple civilian roles were on the other. For General Crouch, the major challenge was linking the two: “I was on my own. I'd certainly never been trained for something like this.”⁹

Gen. Montgomery Meigs,¹⁰ the current SFOR commander, explained that a second tour of command provided no relief in “an environment where the results had a national impact, yet I'd had no preparation other than what I did personally and the last job I had here. I had a lot of experience as a soldier, but other than a right-seat ride and a lot of guidance from my boss, I had no specific training for this mission. I got nothing . . . for this mission. I visited a lot of folks, but the army didn't sit me down and say, ‘Listen, here is what you need to know’.”¹¹

Although the army's performance in Bosnia is generally considered an overwhelming success, senior officers interviewed for this report fervently believe that they were not prepared for the experiences they encountered in Bosnia. Were they trained? The answer is yes. The training encompassed the art of warfighting and high-intensity conflict. But after initial deployment in Bosnia, after the prospects of open warfare had faded, it became increasingly obvious that the skills acquired by the general officers-the ones that many of these senior leaders had used so effectively in the Gulf War-were not enough for what they were called upon to confront in Bosnia.

Maj. Gen. Julian H. Burns, Jr.,¹² described the environment in Bosnia as “Ph.D. warfare.”¹³ The stability operation in Bosnia required general officers to work in a multidimensional environment that constantly spanned the spectrum of conflict with a complexity of players, all with different aims and agendas, all affecting the outcome of a particular event. Within this context, the general officers knew that actions on a seemingly minor scale could, without warning, become national policy-shaping events. According to general officers who have served in both environments, this type of complexity does not exist on the modern battlefield. Bosnia holds a level of complexity and frustration that is new. Not all peace operations are the same, and Bosnia is not “peacekeeping” in the traditional sense. It is, however, the new paradigm of conflict that will confront the army in future deployments as more failed states emerge and peace enforcement and nation-building become staples of the senior military leadership diet.

Knowing that Bosnia would be different from any previous deployment, General Crouch approached a former British commander of the United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) to try to gain insight into the problems Major General Nash and the other senior leaders would confront once on the ground in Bosnia. From that conversation, General Crouch realized that Bosnia presented a different set of challenges from that for which the army's senior leadership had been prepared. Crouch's training package for senior leaders brought army experts on negotiation and conflict resolution from the Army War College to Europe to provide the 1st Armored Division's senior leadership with specific training on historical, ethnic, political, and cultural awareness issues in Bosnia. The trainers taught conflict resolution and negotiation techniques, how to use language translators, how to conduct joint military commissions, how to deal with hostile and friendly media, and how to work with civilians in the international community. In addition, the senior leaders received a self-study packet that contained both military and civilian literature on Bosnia and the Balkans.¹⁴

Crouch's experiment to overcome this educational shortfall was an attempt to create a senior leadership laboratory where general officers could be taught and exercised in all phases of peace operation skills without risk to subordinates. The laboratory was designed to put general officers deploying to Bosnia into an unfamiliar environment that they could not control while helping them learn how better to control it. Individuals were hired to role-play the different civilian and military leaders whom Nash and others would face on the ground (mayors, paramilitary and military leaders, and representatives of nongovernmental organizations [NGOs], international organizations, and the media). The American military leaders were forced to use translators in many circumstances. Negotiation and media sessions were filmed and critiqued. Crouch wanted the training to be more difficult than the actual experience, and in many instances it was. One of the brigade commanders said the environmental training he received was the most “powerful” he had ever experienced.¹⁵

Once the 1st Armored Division was on the ground in Bosnia, it began to provide feedback to Crouch. The training was adjusted on the basis of the new, first-hand information. General Nash, for example, thought that the negotiation sessions were not difficult enough and that they needed to focus more on compliance rather than just “getting to yes.” Subsequent Task Force Eagle commanders provided similar feedback. Major General Ellis found the scenarios to be outdated by the time he deployed to Bosnia because they were force-on-force oriented and did not reflect the changes that had occurred on the ground and the evolution of the mission. In 1998, the U.S. Army decided to relieve its Germany-based divisions of the Bosnia mission and shift that responsibility to divisions based in the United States.

In the spring of 1998, the 1st Cavalry Division, one of two divisions in the U.S. Army III Corps stationed at Fort Hood, Texas, was selected to replace Major General Ellis and the 1st Armored Division in Bosnia. Since training for Bosnia was not part of an established army-wide program, it had to be re-created in the United States. U.S. Forces Command delegated the training responsibility to the III Corps at Fort Hood, Texas, and the Joint Readiness Training Center (JRTC) at Fort Polk, Louisiana.

The JRTC did not try to invent an entirely new training program but rather exported the “just-in-time,” mission-focused program used by Crouch in Germany. In fact, many of the European trainers were brought to the JRTC to provide the same instruction they had given to the German-based units. However, unlike in Germany, much of the senior-level training was left up to the 1st Cavalry Division's commanding general, Major General Byrnes. In describing his self-developed training program, Byrnes explained, “I had an individual reading program. I read Bridge on the Drina, Short History of Bosnia, and Susan Woodward's Balkan Tragedy. We had the negotiation skills training and [then spent] one day on culture. We flew many of the senior leaders to Europe for on-the-ground training; that was very useful. It was too short, but it was the best we could get at the time.”¹⁶ When Byrnes realized that no training package was available, he created his own training package, including visits to the Department of State, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), the U.S. Army's Intelligence Command, Plans Directorate of the Joint Staff (J-5), and visits to the Office of the High Representative (OHR), the Organization of Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the International Police Task Force (IPTF), and the International Court Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY).

Even though the senior leader training developed by General Byrnes was based on the model created by General Crouch, the fact that he personally had to take primary responsibility for this shows a weakness in the way senior leaders are currently being trained for Bosnia. This is especially evident at the highest levels, where officers are not part of a unit deployment. For example, part of General Meigs's frustration came from the fact that he was not given a comprehensive training package for his role as the SFOR commander. General Shinseki, who had no previous experience in Bosnia, was trained in much the same “make it up as you go” manner.

The flaw in such an approach is that it assumes that senior leaders have the skills and experiences required to perform effectively in peace enforcement. It assumes that the general officers selected to serve in Bosnia were chosen because of certain qualifications, experiences, and skills. Interviews with numerous general officers, however, revealed that this was seldom the case. Of the twenty-five general officers who have served in Bosnia, only two were assigned for their prior experience. Most generals were assigned to Bosnia because their units had been selected for deployment there. Chance rather than design determined which general officers went to Bosnia. This fact was not lost on those who watched the selection process. Jock Covey,¹⁷ for example, noted that the OHR was often very curious about the selection of American general officers for assignment to Bosnia, given that so few of them had any prior experience in peace operations, let alone in Bosnia. Covey believed that had more thought been given to matching officers who had peacekeeping experience to the requirements of the operation in Bosnia, the gap between the military and civilian implementation might not have been so wide.¹⁸

An Emerging Skill Set for Senior Leaders

One of the true success stories is that in spite of the absence of an overarching plan to assign general officers to Bosnia, the effectiveness of those senior leaders on the ground validates the army's developmental process. One of the goals of this developmental process has been to focus on skills general officers need to perform in environments outside the more traditional high-intensity operations. Specifically, the developmental process endeavors to identify the skill set required by general officers in peace enforcement operations so that regardless of who is selected for such operations in the future, they will have the skills to perform just as effectively as those who have recently served in Bosnia. A list of skills needed to be effective in subsequent peace enforcement operations has evolved from the experience of general officers who have served in Bosnia.

Ironically, the most important skill needed in a peace operation remains warfighting. According to former NATO Commander Gen. George Joulwan,¹⁹ “I'd look for the best warfighter in the world. I'd look for the best guy that can fight. You ought not to think that you can develop somebody that's got this political-military experience that can't go quickly to the next step. I want a warrior. I'll train him to the mission. We have no hostile deaths in Bosnia because we have warriors who are able to understand the next step.”²⁰ The “next step” that Joulwan was referring to was combat. Time and time again, the generals in Bosnia pointed to occasions when the former warring factions would test, prod, push, and hope that the U.S. forces would misstep. In each case, the former warring factions watched America's senior military leadership counter their every move with swift deployment of forces and decisive action. These responses averted potential conflict.

Another essential quality for general officers is vision. General Crouch pointed to General Joulwan's vision of the political-military environment that made him so effective as the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe (SACEUR) and the father of the military's Bosnia policy. Vision was named time and again for linkage to a broad understanding of the international political landscape. Both Jock Covey and Amb. John Menzies pointed to Lieutenant General Carter as someone whose effectiveness was based on his ability to “understand and grasp the big picture of European politics.”²¹ The Joint Task Force Commander's Handbook for Peace Operations supports this idea: “The commander with vision and a total understanding of the big picture is more apt to be successful in peace operations than the commander who is narrowly and solely focused on warfighting.”²²

The next characteristic frequently mentioned is the courage to take risks. Many general officers pointed to General Clark as someone who was willing to “push the envelope” and take risks to move the peace process along at Dayton. Major General Nash was another officer whose ability to go beyond the expected military tasks and to perform functions consistent with nation-building activities was indicative of his courage and his willingness to take risks. General Meigs considered a willingness to take risks a fundamental part of the peace enforcement mission. Meigs explained, “If you are going to do this thing [peacekeeping], you have to be a risk-taker. You can't be too worried about your career. You have got to be willing to throw the dice if you are going to make it work.”²³

Another skill mentioned by those who served in Bosnia is the ability to interact with those outside the military. Interpersonal skills were identified as the critical difference between progress and stalemate in the peace process. Covey noted that the change in the OHR and IFOR's relationship occurred following General Crouch's arrival and his willingness to develop a personal relationship with Carl Bildt, the high representative. Consensus and team building are key ingredients of interpersonal success. General Meigs said, “You must understand the art of consensus-building in a multinational staff and among the international community, how you present yourself, [and] how to avoid the little nasty argument.” Maj. Gen. Jim Campbell, a veteran of the Somalia and Haiti peace support operations who is replacing Major General Byrnes in Multinational Division-North (MND-N or Task Force Eagle), said:

General officers deal with influential people across the spectrum of interests. Ambassadors, the special representative to the UN secretary general, congressional delegations, faction heads, allied forces, and senior leaders from our sister services compose this list. It just doesn't work to be stiff and formal and resistant to others' opinions. The best general officers I have seen in these situations were friendly, understanding, and personable. They didn't necessarily agree with everyone they encountered, but they sure treated them with respect and dignity. Staying true to the golden rule paid big dividends.²⁴

Unfortunately, stories abound in Bosnia of times when flag officers' inability to deal with civilians in the international community on a personable basis impeded the peace process and impaired the mission. Senior leaders in peace operations must understand that interpersonal relationships often constitute the difference between success and failure, between progress and stalemate, in peace operations.

Those most likely to demonstrate strong interpersonal skills are also those who have the ability to adapt to a new environment. The ability to adapt or adjust is a fundamental step on the road to success in peace support operations. Lt. Gen. Joe Kinzer, who led the UN peacekeeping operation in Haiti, observed that “the key to training for peace operations is to teach the senior leaders to be flexible, mentally agile, and able to adapt . . . to the new environment in which they find themselves.”²⁵

General officers who served in Bosnia point to confidence as a critical requirement for stability operations. Lieutenant General Carter said, “The most difficult thing for me was to have a crisis and then pick up the phone to call the head of the Serb army or prime minister and tell them what to do.”²⁶ Senior leaders in Bosnia incessantly pointed to the need to show confidence, especially in doing things they had never done before, as a vital element for success in peace operations. In an environment of uncertainty, confidence in crisis decision making may preclude events that have international and strategic consequence.

The general officers interviewed for this study listed a broad intellectual background as a key asset. Peace operations are complex, difficult, multidimensional, demanding situations that require not only physical stamina, but also mental agility and intellectual capability. General Shinseki's perception of the Bosnia operation was that it was “intellectual warfare.” In the uncertain environment of Bosnia, General Meigs believed that commanders had to spend private time learning about the historical, political, cultural, and social factors that produced the ethnic carnage in the former Yugoslavia.

Certain observers mentioned patience as one of the attributes most lacking in U.S. Army general officers. Not one of the generals listed it as a required skill, but all of the civilians did. The general officer who came closest to being described as patient was General Crouch. According to Ambassador Menzies, Crouch was deliberate: “He took his time to make decisions.” Menzies explained that Crouch was very “thoughtful,” meaning he would carefully consider the problem before reacting. Covey echoed that sentiment when he said Crouch “would listen and was willing to change.” With the multiple complexities inherent in Bosnia, Menzies explained, “You need a lot more deliberation. What you need is someone who will take time to examine the issues and take time to make decisions. You have to have much greater sensitivity. You aren't warfighting. You are building it up. You aren't destroying things. It isn't a battlefield. It is a completely different environment. You must be able to transition from one to the other.”²⁷

Another quality mentioned is the confidence to delegate authority. Menzies said, “Ego and the sense of infallibility are incredibly dangerous.”²⁸ Others cited the need for trust in a peace operation. Given the dispersion of command, general officers must trust and have faith in their subordinates. Maj. Gen. Jim Campbell said:

There is no way the general officer can be everywhere at the same time, making sure everyone is doing his job and adhering to the rules of engagement. He must have confidence in the training the men have had and he simply has to trust them to do the right thing at the right time... . You must be able to look them in the eye and tell them they did the right thing and that you are counting on them to do the right thing the next time they face that type of situation. Anything less and you will have young men making life-and-death decisions with doubts in their mind. Trust the training they have received, and then have the courage to support them even if they make a mistake.²⁹

An important set of skills involve the qualities of adherence to principle and moral steadfastness. Steady principles and core values are just as important in stability operations as in combat, if not more so. The ability to maintain fairness and evenhandedness for all parties and to prevent dehumanization of the factions involved is a basic outgrowth of principle and values.

The general officers interviewed for this report view the skills listed above as essential for successful command in peace operations. Clearly, to some extent, these qualities are needed in all general assignments. Yet the patience needed in high-intensity combat is far different from that needed in joint (multiservice), allied (NATO), combined (multicountry), interagency, and international peace operations. The secret to developing senior military leaders is to assign them to positions that develop skills within the context in which they will be needed. One way to train for such a complex environment is to assign general officers outside their comfort zone of internal army assignments. The success of such assignments is evident in Bosnia. The one common experience of those general officers who have been successful is that they have all served outside the army at the senior level.

For example, in MND-N, Major General Nash served as the special assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and gained valuable interagency experience. His diplomatic skills had been honed during two years of service in Saudi Arabia, helping the Saudis to upgrade and train their National Guard forces. Major General Meigs also had interagency experience from a key assignment on the Joint Staff and extensive European experience with over five years of continuous general officer assignments in Europe. Major General Ellis had multinational experience in Korea. Ellis also had a joint assignment in the U.S. Pacific Command. Major General Byrnes had the least preparation of any of the MND-N commanders, having served primarily in army-specific units. Not until his selection as general officer was he required by the Goldwater-Nichols Act to serve in a joint assignment outside the army. Byrnes cited his experience as the commander of the Joint Task Force responsible for drug interdiction along the Mexican border, which required extensive work within the interagency process and with international organizations, as the one that best prepared him for Bosnia.

As for the IFOR/SFOR commanders, the developmental process again proved tremendously effective. General Crouch came to IFOR with coalition and joint experience, having commanded the American Army in Korea. Coupled with his experience as the commander in chief of Land Forces Central Europe, a NATO command, this gave him a coalition perspective that served him well in IFOR. Like Major General Byrnes, General Shinseki was required as a new brigadier general to go to a joint assignment under the Goldwater-Nichols Act. His assignment was in the combined and coalition environment as the director of logistics for Armed Forces South in Verona, Italy. That assignment gave him an in-depth understanding of NATO. Before being selected to command SFOR as the army's director of operations and plans, he was responsible for the organization in the Pentagon that oversaw inter-American disaster relief and emergency response affairs.

New Needs, New Generation

Although the army has been very fortunate to have officers with varied experiences for service in Bosnia, this has often been due more to luck than design. Unlike the other military services, which seek developmental opportunities for their senior officers in joint and multinational commands in an effort to make them more competitive for promotion and more effective in such jobs, the army has been less willing to place senior leaders in allied assignments. According to General Clark, the army's assignment system prepares army general officers very well for internal army jobs. Clark, however, posited that “army general officers who have served only in army billets are not as well-qualified as Marine Corps general officers, for example, who have served around the world in a number of different types of joint and service assignments.”³⁰

The lessons from Bosnia are that future peace operations will be joint, multinational, and coalition-based. One of the overriding observations from the general officers who have served in Bosnia is that the army needs to do a much better job in assigning general officers with promotion potential to allied commands so that they can be used in future peace operations. For Lt. Gen. William Carter, part of the problem is that U.S. Army general officers lack an acute understanding of geopolitics. He notes that, unlike their British counterparts, for example, Americans do not have a history of extended colonial experience, with the concomitant tradition of studying different cultures and learning a variety of languages.³¹

Despite continuing problems, the experience in Bosnia has made a significant and beneficial impact on a new generation of military leaders. Maj. Gen. J. B. Burns, the army officer with perhaps the most Bosnian experience, noted that in the coming years, a number of general officers will have obtained valuable skills from their experience in Bosnia. Many general officers think that the lack of experience among general officers involved in peace operations will be corrected as the next generation of senior leaders make their way up the developmental ladder. Generals John Abizaid, George Casey, Mark Curran, Tony Jones, and Steve Whitcomb are examples of the next generation of army senior leaders.³² Having participated in Bosnia, this next wave of army senior leaders possesses the requisite skill set and experience with joint, allied, interagency, and peace operations to lead future stability operations. With this background, these officers will better understand how to apply military force to these operations effectively. This generational aspect of the developmental process is significant. Just as Vietnam shaped the thinking of nearly two decades of military leaders, Bosnia has the potential to shape the army well into the next century. General Meigs's statement on the matter is instructive: “I don't think officers will have the same aversion to these types of operations in the future as we had based on scar tissue from Vietnam and the associated political consequences.”³³

As this group of young general officers progresses up the ranks, they will become key players in strategic discussions at the national and international levels. Many of these officers have the potential to become the head of operations (J-5) on the Joint Staff (the position General Clark held at Dayton). In that position, they would be the prime military interface between the Joint Chiefs, the State Department, and the National Security Council. Just as General Clark influenced the Dayton Peace Accords from this position, these officers will influence how peacekeeping is employed as a tool in national strategy formation in the future.

At the next level, as regional commanders-in-chief, they will be responsible for planning, deploying, executing, and supporting peace operations throughout the world. Just as General Joulwan brilliantly implemented the military aspects of Dayton, these officers will build on their experiences in Bosnia to ensure that the application of military power in peace processes is effective and contributes to successful closure. While Vietnam soured a whole generation of officers on U.S. military involvement in civil wars, the lengthy positive deployment in Bosnia may well have a profound, positive impact on the next generation of army senior leaders.

Conclusion

The army has been very lucky in the senior leaders who have served in Bosnia. In order to make that luck permanent, the army must carefully consider steps to improve its general officer training and development process. In the short term, the “just-in-time,” mission-focused training should continue for general officers deploying to peace operations. It should be continually updated on the basis of the evolving situation on the ground. The army needs to assign responsibility for the training and not leave it up to the major command and corps. Otherwise, valuable information will be lost in the transition from one major command to another. The army's Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC), along with the BCTP, should formalize the training package and export it to the senior leaders of the units identified for deployment to peace operations. TRADOC should develop and provide a tailored training packet that includes personal study and coordination of visits for senior leaders. Modern communications, including the Internet and video teleconferencing, should be employed to save time and resources.

It is important for senior leaders to have input into the training they receive, but they should not have to train themselves-this runs counter to army doctrine. Senior leaders must have time to be adequately trained. With national strategic policy hanging in the balance on the performance of the senior leaders, they should be given the time to ensure that they and their units are adequately prepared. “Just-in-time” training will not always work unless there is the foundation upon which to build. According to General Meigs, the army faces a major challenge: “The army has a wonderful ability to adapt to a crisis, but we have to be better than that and adapt to the environment before the crisis hits, because in the twenty-first century, the crisis may be so different that you will not be able to adapt quickly enough. Just having good soldiers isn't going to cut it.”

A long-term comprehensive approach must be incorporated into doctrine and strategy if the army's senior leadership is to be able to respond to the multidimensional challenges it will face in future Bosnias. The army must continue its effort to send its general officers and younger officers with general officer potential to joint and allied command assignments. Broadening assignments to multinational headquarters will best prepare the senior leaders of tomorrow to work effectively in operations of ever-increasing complexity.

Greater emphasis must be placed on geopolitical and cultural training for the army's officer corps. Such training must begin at the officer basic course and continue at all levels of the professional military education (PME). Officers at all grades will benefit from such training because of the likelihood that they will be involved in peace operations on multiple occasions throughout their careers. The cumulative effect of such training will be especially valuable once the officer becomes a senior leader. Language training should be included in this effort. All officers should be required to become familiar with a foreign language during their careers. At every stage of the PME process, officers should be required to improve their language skills.³⁴

Most general officers interviewed for this study singled out senior service college institutions as the place where leadership training for peace operations must be conducted and the place that needs the most curriculum development. A greater emphasis on peace operations and on geopolitical and cultural awareness is needed at these institutions.

Finally, the entire training effort for peace operations must be embraced by TRADOC, just as General Crouch embraced the responsibility to train the units and senior leaders deploying from Germany to Bosnia. The army must craft these skills in its training base for captains, majors, lieutenant colonels, and colonels, schooling them in a doctrinal set of principles on how to do peace operations. The army needs to develop sets of general principles that can be taught from the officer basic course on up. The new training has to crystallize fundamentals of this skill set, and not just concentrate on conventional skills.

Clearly, there will be a need for some type of trade-off. Everything is important, but somehow the army needs to work in training for peace operations--in command and general staff college, war colleges, and in career and functional manuals. It should review its institutional base and build on this foundation without significantly reducing conventional training; and, at the same time, it must integrate new training aimed at supporting twenty-first century peace operations.³⁵

Endnotes

1. Meeting with Gen. Eric Shinseki in February 1998.

2. See Max Manwaring, “Peace and Stability Lessons from Bosnia.” Parameters, Winter 1998, 28 - 38.

3. See Larry Wentz, Lessons From Bosnia: The IFOR Experience (Washington, DC: National Defense University Press, 1998), 402-406, and Leighton Smith, “NATO's IFOR in Action-Lessons from the Bosnian Peace Support Operations,” Strategic Forum (National Defense University, Institute for National Strategic Studies), January 1999, No. 154.

4. Maj. Gen. William Nash was the first commanding general of Multi-National Division-North/Task Force Eagle in Bosnia. This division was one of three divisions that comprised the NATO Implementation Force that went into Bosnia in 1995 as part of the Dayton Peace Accords.

5. Interview with Maj. Gen. William Nash on November 13, 1998.

6. Gen. Eric Shinseki was the SFOR commander in Bosnia from 1997 to 1998.

7. Interview with Gen. Eric Shinseki on January 14, 1999.

8. Gen. William Crouch was the commanding general of all army forces in Europe during the initial deployment into Bosnia. He was later the IFOR and Stabilization Force SFOR commander.

9. Interview with Gen. William Crouch on December 10, 1998. He was referencing a negotiation session he had as the IFOR commander with one of the former warring factions.

10. Gen. Montgomery Meigs replaced Gen. Eric Shinseki as the SFOR commander in 1998.

11. Interview with Gen. Montgomery Meigs on January 22, 1999.

12. Maj. Gen. J.B. Burns was the planning officer for the initial NATO deployment into Bosnia. Later he was again assigned to be the planner for the SFOR under both Gen. William Crouch and Gen. Eric Shinseki.

13. Interview with Maj. Gen. J.B. Burns on November 3, 1998.

14. Interview with Edward McCarthy on October 28, 1998. Information provided by Lt. Col. Tom Muir.

15. Interview with Col. Greg Fontenot on November 3, 1998.

16. Interview with Maj. Gen. Kevin Byrnes on November 3, 1998.

17. Jock Covey was the chief of staff to Carl Bildt, the first high representative in Bosnia.

18. Interview with Jock Covey on November 7, 1998.

19. Gen. George Joulwan was the NATO commander responsible for the initial NATO deployment into Bosnia.

20. Interview with Gen. George Joulwan on October 1, 1998.

21. Interviews with Jock Covey (November 10, 1998) and Amb. John Menzies (November 25, 1998). John Menzies was the U.S. ambassador to Bosnia from 1995 to 1996. Both Covey and Menzies felt that Lt. Gen. William Carter was perhaps the most effective U.S. flag officer to have served in Bosnia.

22. Joint Task Force Commander's Handbook for Peace Operations (Joint Warfighting Center June 16, 1997), IV-1.

23. Interview with Gen. Montgomery Meigs on January 22, 1999.

24. Interview with Brig. Gen. James Campbell on December 7, 1998.

25. Joint Task Force Commander's Handbook for Peace Operations, IV-1.

26. Interview with Lt. Gen. William Carter on September 23, 1998.

27. Interview with Amb. John Menzies on November 25, 1998.

28. Ibid.

29. Interview with Maj. Gen. James Campbell on December 7, 1998.

30. Interview with Gen. Wesley Clark on February 9, 1999.

31. Lt. Gen. William Carter was the IFOR chief of staff under Adm. Leighton Smith, the first IFOR Commander.

32. All of these officers served at various times as deputy commanding generals in MND-N/Task Force Eagle.

33. Interview with Gen. Montgomery Meigs on January 22, 1999.

34. Ibid.

35. Interview with Gen. William Crouch on December 10, 1998.

About the Report

On June 3, 1999, the U.S. Institute of Peace hosted a panel presentation on “Strategic Leadership for Peace Operations: Military Perspectives.” The panel featured 1998-99 U.S. Army Fellow Col. Howard A. Olsen, as well as Gen. (Ret.) William C. Crouch and Lt. Gen. (Ret.) William G. Carter. The event was chaired by Institute Executive Vice President Harriet Hentges. The discussion focused on the need to improve the training and preparation of senior American military officers for peacekeeping duties overseas.

The views expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect those of the United States Institute of Peace, which does not advocate specific policies.

About the Authors

Col. Howard A. Olsen, 1998-99 U.S. Army Fellow at the U.S. Institute of Peace, is a career military officer most recently assigned to the army's chief of general officer management at the Pentagon. John Davis, Colonel Olsen's research assistant, is currently a Ph.D. candidate at Howard University and a research fellow at the Industrial College of the Armed Forces, National Defense University. This report was edited by program officer Sally Blair.