Thirty years after the Balkans peace deal, a different US...

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Academic rigour, journalistic flair Thirty years after the Balkans peace deal, a different US leadership is fumbling the war in Ukraine Published: December 2, 2025 6.31pm GMT Stefan Wolff, University of Birmingham, Argyro Kartsonaki, Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy, University of Hamburg

Authors

Stefan Wolff
Professor of International Security, University of Birmingham
Argyro Kartsonaki
Senior Researcher, Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy, University of Hamburg

Disclosure statement

Stefan Wolff is a past recipient of grant funding from the Natural Environment Research Council of the UK, the United States Institute of Peace, the Economic and Social Research Council of the UK, the British Academy, the NATO Science for Peace Programme, the EU Framework Programmes 6 and 7 and Horizon 2020, as well as the EU's Jean Monnet Programme. He is a Trustee and Honorary Treasurer of the Political Studies Association of the UK and a Senior Research Fellow at the Foreign Policy Centre in London.

Argyro Kartsonaki has received funding from the German Federal Foreign Office and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). She is past recipient of grants from the United States Institute of Peace and from the Economic and Social Research Council (UK). She is a part of the Centre for OSCE Research at IFSH, co-editor of OSCE Insights, and consults the OSCE as a member of the OSCE Expert Network.

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DOI

https://doi.org/10.64628/AB.n5q33ysmc

Seated (left to right): President of Serbia Slobodan Milosevic, President of Croatia Franjo Tudjman, President of Bosnia Herzegovina Alija Izetbegovic; standing (left to right): Spanish Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez, US President Bill Clinton, French President Jacques Chirac, German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, UK Prime Minister John Major and Russian Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin

The Dayton accords, signed in December 1995, ended three years of bitter conflict in the Balkans. https://theconversation.com/thirty-years-after-the-balkans-peace-deal-a-different-us-leadership-is-fumbling-the-war-in-ukraine-270024 https://theconversation.com/thirty-years-after-the-balkans-peace-deal-a-different-us-leadership-is-fumbling-the-war-in-ukraine-270024 Link copied Share article

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Thirty years ago, on December 14 1995, the presidents of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia signed the Dayton agreement. The treaty ended three years of bloodshed in what was, at the time, the largest war in Europe since 1945.

This distinction is now held by the Russian war against Ukraine. The conflict which began in February 2022 has already lasted longer than the one in Bosnia-Herzegovina and has reportedly led to the death and displacement of millions of people.

The war in Bosnia-Herzegovina happened at a very different time than the war against Ukraine and a very different setting. It was at the end of the cold war, in a fracturing multinational state amid rising nationalism. It started as a civil war rather than an external invasion and it was fought throughout the country’s territory.

Yet despite their differences, there are several eerie parallels between both wars. These are lessons worth considering for how the war against Ukraine might end.

Both wars have a very strong ethnic element, and they both happened in a shifting geopolitical environment. Both wars have had high levels of internationalisation. They were not only fought between the belligerent parties, but indirectly between their supporting allies through the military equipment and support they provided.

The negotiation process that led to the agreement that ended the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina did not just involve the belligerent parties. It also involved “parent” states – Serbia and Croatia – which signed on their behalf. Similarly, but in some ways worse, it seems that any agreement on Ukraine will involve first and foremost the US and Russia. Ukraine and Europe appear set to be excluded.

The war in Bosnia-Herzegovina ended as a result of heavy-handed, US-led mediation at an air force base in Dayton, Ohio. The Dayton mediation effort succeeded after multiple earlier European-led efforts had failed and a UN peacekeeping operation was unable to protect civilians, even in so-called safe areas.

The Dayton accords, as the agreement became known, provided an operational framework that, with all its faults, has managed to keep the country away from violent conflict for 30 years. It has not, however, provided a framework for a functioning state.

The rigid power-sharing structures agreed in Dayton have created frequent political paralysis. Dayton requires key decisions – such as the elections law or on the financing of institutions – to be taken by an international high representative who still holds ultimate authority over Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Nor did the Dayton accords instil much loyalty to the new state. Especially among its Serb population, the desire for breaking away from Bosnia-Herzegovina remains strong. This was clearly evident from the results in the latest presidential elections in the Serbian part of the country on November 23. The candidate who campaigned on a platform for secession won the vote.

What has largely contributed in keeping Bosnia-Herzegovina together is a range of EU actions and funds aiming at maintaining stability. This includes the presence of a UN-mandated European Union peacekeeping force: Eufor Althea.

The clear European commitment to stability in Bosnia-Herzegovina and the western Balkans more broadly is commendable in its endurance. But it is also an indictment of local politicians for failing to establish a self-sustaining peace based on the Dayton accords.

Comparisons with Ukraine

There are a number of lessons that Dayton can offer to efforts to end the war against Ukraine. The first relates to the process of negotiations. In the run-up to the talks, US president Bill Clinton dispatched his national security advisor, Anthony Lake, to Europe to consult extensively with allies.

Volodymr Zelensky, DOnald Trump and their aides in talks in the White House, October 2025.

Unlike at Dayton, US leadership of peace efforts has yet to stop the killing in Ukraine. EPA/Aaron Schwartz/pool

US leadership in Nato and the clear signal sent to the Bosnian Serbs with operations Deadeye and Deliberate Force, bombing missions which brought the Serbs to the table for negotiations. These were then brought to a successful conclusion by Richard Holbrooke, one of the most gifted diplomats of his generation.

The ceremonial signature event in Paris, three weeks after its initialling in Dayton, gave the agreement additional weight. The three presidents of the warring factions signed under the watchful eyes of the presidents of the US, France and the Council of the EU, as well as the prime ministers of the UK and Russia and the German chancellor.

The sheer extent of the Dayton accords – an agreement with 12 annexes – speaks volumes of the attention to detail. Not all of the original provisions have worked out in the way their drafters may have intended.

But, if nothing else, the military provisions in annex 1A and the subsequent UN-authorised peacekeeping operations, led initially by Nato and then by the EU, provided a robust set of security arrangements. These have been key in deterring any of the parties from defecting from the Dayton accords and contributed to the prevention of renewed large-scale violence in Bosnia.

Most of what made the Dayton accords adoptable, and at least minimally functional, is currently absent from the process to achieve peace in Ukraine.

First, Russia in 2025 is not Serbia in 1995. Where Serbia was already worn out by years of international sanctions, Russia has found ways to minimise their impact.

This is mainly due to the support of allies like China, Iran and North Korea as well as the reluctance by the US president, Donald Trump, to get tough on his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin. Serbia did not have resources, population or strategic depth comparable to what Russia can throw into its war against Ukraine.

Second, western assistance to the wartime Bosnian-Croat alliance was a fraction of what would be necessary to enable Ukraine to achieve a similarly advantageous negotiation position. At this stage, it is not even clear whether US and European support will continue at a level to enable Ukraine to avoid an outright military defeat.

While Ukraine’s defeat on the battlefield is not on the cards immediately, it is a less distant prospect now, given the country’s domestic turmoil, the capriciousness of US engagement under Trump and the weakness of Europe.

The final lesson from Dayton to consider might therefore be that even an imperfect agreement may be preferable to an unending, and likely unwinnable, war.