Tasks Confronting USAREUR Commanders, 1994-2000.

Abstract

Abstract : This is a study of senior Army leaders in peace operations. It focuses specifically on the three Army generals who commanded and supported operations in Bosnia from 1995 to 2000, reporting particularly on the observations, insights, and implications of large peace operations as seen through the eyes of the senior commanders. On the operational side, it traces the course of NATO-led operations in Bosnia during the years when Generals William Crouch, Eric Ric Shinseki, and Montgomery C. Monty Meigs served as commander, US Army Europe (USAREUR) and as the senior NATO commander in Bosnia. As commander, USAREUR, and commander, Implementation Force (COMIFOR) (or, later, Stabilization Force SFOR), each of the three was responsible, separately and simultaneously, for commanding US Army forces in Europe, Africa, Turkey, and Israel; for providing trained and effective US Army forces to NATO and sustaining those provided; for conducting or supporting US unilateral operations in the US European Command (EUCOM) area of responsibility (AOR); and for the (NATO) operational command of all international forces deployed to Bosnia (save, for political reasons discussed hereafter, the Russians). The period studied in this document coheres because of the dual responsibilities held by the officers at its center. There is a certain parallelism, too, in General Crouch's 1994 arrival in Heidelberg as the first post-drawdown commander, charged to stabilize USAREUR from the turmoil of its rapid reduction at the end of the Cold War, and General Meigs' 1999 return as what might be characterized as the first post-Bosnia commander required to redefine his command for the new century.