Gore's Kosovo Stance Weighs On Candidacy

By Ann Scales, Globe Staff, April 23, 1999

WASHINGTON -- When the Clinton administration was contemplating launching airstrikes against Yugoslavia, Vice President Al Gore stepped forward to advocate using more rather than less force against Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic's government.

Gore's hawkishness -- an extension of his attitude toward Bosnia years earlier when he argued behind the scenes for early and forceful US intervention in that area of the Balkans -- was far more evident than even that of President Clinton and national security adviser Samuel R. "Sandy" Berger, those familiar with the conversations said.

The vice president also was among those top officials, including Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, who initially thought "a little bit of bombing would go a long way," said Ivo Daalder, a former national security aide to Clinton who informally consults with administration officials.

Gore, who is campaigning for president, perhaps has more at stake in the Kosovo crisis than Clinton, who only has to worry about the history books.

If the NATO mission is a success, analysts say, Gore can claim credit for his role. If it turns into a disaster, his campaign may be the first casualty. Gore does not want to be running for president if US ground troops -- other than a peacekeeping force -- are in the Balkans, they say.

In fact, Gore offered what remains the most definitive statement by the administration against using ground troops. At a campaign stop in New Hampshire in the opening days of the airstrikes, he said: "We are not going to put any ground troops into a combat situation. Neither are our allies."

The statement went further than the administration line, perhaps because Gore's chief foreign policy adviser, Leon S. Fuerth, had suffered a mild heart attack and was not on the trip. Clinton and other US foreign policymakers had been saying the United States has "no intentions" or "no plans" to use ground troops, leaving America and its allies wiggle room to change their position.

Gore read from the White House script the next day, saying, "There is no consideration by NATO or any of the allies for the introduction of ground troops." But the incident underscored the dilemma for Gore and the high stakes.

A protracted military struggle in Kosovo could be a drag on Gore's presidential aspirations, especially if ground troops end up being dispatched, because many analysts say history shows that voters are unlikely to reward the party that gets the country into a war.

On the other hand, analysts say Gore can't afford to distance himself from Clinton and a policy he played a role in formulating, even if NATO does resort to ground troops, because voters might view that stance with suspicion. It's a lesson then-Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey learned in 1968 when he tried to extract himself from President Lyndon B. Johnson's policy in Vietnam.

"What matters politically is not what happens now, but whether or not the policy succeeds down the road," said Anthony Lake, Clinton's former national security adviser. "So you make these decisions not based on what it may look like politically now, but the substance of these decisions, and how they play out later. And we simply can't know that yet."

Marlin Fitzwater, former press secretary to presidents Reagan and Bush, said if the NATO bombing campaign is over by the 2000 election, "win, lose or draw, I think it doesn't have much impact" on Gore. "But if it's still going on, then it does, because it forces him to take a position on how he would end it or how he would carry it out."

On one level, the Kosovo issue has given Gore a prime opportunity to display a grasp of foreign policy, as he did in his first major speech on the crisis Wednesday at Ellis Island. It also highlights the reason Clinton chose him as his running mate.

"He has played a central role in all major foreign policy in this administration from day one," said Bruce Jentleson, an informal adviser to Gore and a senior fellow at the US Institute of Peace.

"Not only is he involved, but the president does rely very heavily on his advice," Lake said.

Despite the land mines for Gore, Kosovo has raised the public's awareness of the dangers outside the US shores and the value of a president with a handle on foreign policy.

Moreover, as Gore suffers in the opinion polls for his unswerving loyalty to Clinton during last year's sex scandal and impeachment, Kosovo "turns attention from Monica, which is helpful for Gore," said historian Doris Kearns Goodwin.

Conversely, she said, Kosovo "has sped up the presidential primary process, because it has given a voice to some of his opponents," such as Senator John McCain, an Arizona Republican and former Vietnam prisoner of war who has been vocal about using ground troops if they are necessary to win the war.

On the upside, Republican presidential candidates are divided on the issue, and Gore's only Democratic challenger, former Senator Bill Bradley of New Jersey, has yet to articulate how his views on Kosovo differ from the administration's.

But most irritating for Gore and his allies are some Republicans' description of the conflict as the "Clinton-Gore war." Gore's spokesman, Chris Lehane, decried the label as injecting politics into a national security issue that should be off limits.

"Our focus is not to allow our foreign policy to be whipsawed by domestic political concerns in any way, shape or form," Lehane said.

The conflict has absorbed much of Gore's time and attention. It has become the most frequently asked question when he campaigns around the country. He gets updates from two military aides, decorated veterans of the Gulf War who travel with him. When in Washington, he participates in the daily foreign policy briefings at the White House.

He has placed calls to former presidents to explain the administration's policy, and he exchanged telephone calls with Russian Prime Minister Yevgeny M. Primakov, who turned his plane away from Washington after Gore informed him of the start of the bombing campaign.