To End a War by Richard Holbrooke and The Rohde Affair: An Analysis

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October 3, 2020
In the early 1990s, America faced a type of aggression in Bosnia, which, if left unchecked, would lead to the destruction and downfall of Europe. Richard Holbrooke himself – author of the book To End a War, and Assistant Secretary of State for European and Canadian Affairs and Chief Negotiator of the Dayton Peace Accords during that time – explained that this wave of aggression consisted of “thugs, automobile mechanics, and farmers and school teachers who had taken up weapons and were just slaughtering their neighbours based on some form of race hatred.”
In Holbrooke’s To End a War, he details the story of how American diplomacy and swift military power, as well as presidential leadership, ended the Bosnian War between the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the proto-states Republika Srpska and Herzeg-Bosnia.
Specifically, in his book, there is a passage where Holbrooke puts a pause on the Dayton Peace Talks between former President of Croatia Tudjman, former President of Bosnia and Herzegovina Izetbegovic, and former President of Serbia Milosevic. This pause by the chief negotiator between the presidents was due to the capture and detention of a journalist of the Christian Science Monitor, David Rohde.
The Rohde Affair
The tensions were already high when Tudjman, Izetbegovic, and Milosevic discussed during the first few days of the Dayton Peace Talks the possibilities of arriving at an arrangement and a permanent ceasefire that would put an end to the Bosnian War of the 1990s.
Since day 1 of the Dayton Peace Talks, Tudjman already openly displayed his dislike of Izetbegovic and Milosevic, and there was no timidity about him when he openly vaunted his leverage over Sarajevo, a critical foothold for peace during those trying times. Discussions were heated, furious, and multi-faceted. There were talks of a multi-ethnic statement, of ceding land, and of military pacts and concords. Events were as you would expect them to be when the heads of state of three countries came together to discuss peace.
These tensions were even further aggravated when Holbrooke learned of the capture of Rohde by Bosnian Serb police, and his detention in Republika Srpska, one of the proto-states that was a main belligerent during the War. Despite Rohde being a private citizen, and despite knowingly travelling into Bosnian Serb territory without papers or permission or even the knowledge of his editors, as well as the significant risks involved in this excursion, Holbrooke considered him a situation that could not be ignored.
Holbrooke approached Milosevic and told him that while discussions would continue, no agreement would be produced until and unless Rohde was found unharmed and returned. Milosevic was baffled at the extent this negotiator would go “just for a single journalist.”
The next day, Holbrooke received word that Rohde was alive and well in a northwest Bosnian Serb town of Bijeljina on charges of illegally entering Bosnian Serb territory and falsifying his ID papers. An officer from the Embassy in Sarajevo, Walter Andrusyzyn, travelled through a brutal snowstorm and forced his way into...