Delegations Arrive in Dayton

There were over 30 ceasefires and agreements in Bosnia prior to the Dayton Peace Accords. All of them collapsed. By the time negotiations began at the Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, the Bosnian war had become the worst in Europe since 1945. After 18 weeks of whirlwind shuttle diplomacy, Dayton would be host to nine delegations.

Delegation placement

We placed the American, Bosnian, Croat, and combined Serbian-Bosnian Serb delegations in the four nondescript visiting officer’s quarters that faced each other around a drab rectangular parking lot. The Europens occupied a fifth building of the quad, but only thirty feet away. To emphasize Europe’s co-chairmanship of the conference, we gave Carl Bildt a VIP suite directly above mine in the American building. The Bosnians were to our left, the Croatians to the right, and the Serbians and Bosnian Serbs directly opposite us. The ground-floor windows of my rooms looked straight into those of Milosevic across the parking lot, about sixty yards away, thus allowing us to see if he was in his suite. The buildings were adequate but hardly elegant. Our rooms were small, sound carried through the thin walls, and the corridor was only about six feet wide. During a preview tour of the facilities for journalists before the talks began, someone compared them to college dormitories.

Dozens of workmen swarmed over the site in preparation. Balkan delegations, the U.S., and Europeans each had its own building with Presidential suites. Hope Conference Center, a two hundred-room hotel which we filled completely with administrative and security personnel. With a large area for private walks, private rooms, and tennis courts, the final result was near our dreams for Site X. With a lovely meandering walkway complete with lighting so that delegates could walk this peaceful path from their quarters to the meeting rooms.

Our team arrived in Dayton on October 31 in time to greet the Balkan delegations:

• Milosevic arrived, proclaiming his confidence that a peace agreement would emerge from Dayton.
• On an American military plane came Izetbegovic calling for “peace with justice”.
• Tudjman landed, proud and haughty. He made no statement.

(Excerpts from Richard Holbrooke’s book “To End a War”)