(Des Moines, IA) Republican presidential candidate Gary Bauer on Friday said U.S. troops should not go into combat in Serbia.
“If troops on the ground are needed and this is such a severe problem, then European nations ought to provide the troops,” Bauer told reporters during a news conference in Des Moines.
Bauer said the United States is already providing 70 percent of the aircraft and munitiions used in the NATO bombing campaign.
“You have major countries in Europe — France, Germany, Great Britian, Italy, etcetera — if this is a matter of supreme importance to European security, then they ought to bear the brunt of any kind of combat forces on the ground,” Bauer said.
Like many other Republican presidential hopefuls, Bauer said President Clinton has gotten the U.S. into the conflict without explaining the objectives or a strategy for winning.
“The President has not demonstrated that he’s got a way to solve a crisis or conflict that literally has been raging since 1350…Whether it’s been the Albanians with the upper hand or the Serbs with the upperhand, they have treated each other with an incredible amount of inhumanity. That’s a terrible thing. It offends our conscience, but how in the world are American boys flying over Kosovo dropping bombsgoing to stop something that’s been going on for over 600 years?” Bauer said.
Bauer was a domestic policy advisor to President Reagan and has taken a leave of adsence from his job as president of the Family PolicyCouncil.