Well, if you're a regular listen to Minnesota Public Radio, you probably have a little better understanding than most of one of the most complex stories in recent years name of the war in Bosnia. The reason why we've had a chance to hear National Public Radio reporter, Tom gjelten was first hand accounts from Bosnia Tom is one of George Polk award and you overseas Press Club Lowell Thomas award for his reporting on the war of the former Yugoslavia, and he's an excellent book about the war called. Sorry Abel daily a city and its newspaper Under Siege, graduated from University, Minnesota and got his start in journalism at the Minnesota daily is back in Minnesota today. He's giving a speech this evening at Macalester College and is also been good enough to stop by our Studios today to talk about his booking to take your questions about the war. So if you've got a question for Tom gjelten was call Twin City area number is 227-6002 276 thousand or if you're calling from outside the Twin Cities. You can reach its toll free at one 800-242-2828.2276 thousand or one 800-242-2828 and we should note that to Tom speech begins at 8 tonight at the Macalester College Chapel admission is free. So you'd like to hear him and see him in person stop by Macalester College in St. Paul this evening, Thanks for coming by and welcome back to Minnesota. Thanks Gary. It's great to be here. There has been a ceasefire in Bosnia since the end of December and except for the bee hatch region has held for the most part. Is that going to become a permanent condition or will War break out again. As soon as the snow melts the wedding is that will break out again. As soon as the snow melts snow imposes a kind of a ceasefire on the war, even when there isn't one negotiated and there are a couple of other events that are coming up a couple of other sets of circumstances that could produce fighting in and of themselves one, of course is the decision by the government of Croatia.To expel or to ask the United Nations peacekeeping troops in Croatia to leave after their mandate expires at the end of March the war in Croatia member there really were two Wars and you can stop you two separate Warriors won in Croatia 1991 one in Bosnia 1992 up until now these two Wars have been separate. I mean, they haven't they haven't spilled over the war in Bosnia hasn't spilled over into Croatian vice versa. If the United Nations Forces leave Croatia at the end of March or in the spring there, it's almost certain that they will be renewed fighting in Croatia between the rebel serve courses in Croatia in the Croatian Army. The Bosnian Serb Army has said that it will come to the aid of their sir brother in Croatia. So fat set of circumstances could lead to fighting back over in Bosnia. The other thing that the other thing that adds to the instability in Bosnia right now is the moves in the direction of lifting the arms embargo, which the newPublic leadership in congress has determined to do if there's no peace settlement by May 1st. If that's to happen than UN forces in Bosnia will be pulling out and so we do have a cease-fire now, it's a more or less of a good C Spire and it's holding but with all these deadlines coming up this spring. It doesn't look good in a lot of these instances. It seems like the the little people get caught in the middle that the politicians that are in a dispute like to like to declare war on each other and then send somebody else off to get shot is that the case in Bosnia is well or are the people themselves eager to do battle with each other at various? I'm most familiar with the situation in Bosnia. And I'm most familiar with the Bosnian decide about the conflict in Bosnia the Bosnian government site. That's where I spend most of my most of my time and there are two categories of people in the in regard to that one isThose people who have been expelled from their Villages and who have lost members of their family and they have very strong and passionate feelings desires for vengeance and they are ready to fight to the end to either to go back to their home or at least to inflict some kind of punishment on the Serb Army that they hold responsible for all the suffering there lies. The other category of people are for example residents of Sarajevo of Tuzla of cities that are now under siege for whom a life has been miserable there still living in their original homes, but you know, they've been unable to move they've been without electricity decent supplies of food and water all this time. They haven't necessarily lost so much personally and don't have this overwhelming desire to fight to be of no matter what they're desperate for. Peace and they put a lot of pressure on their on their government to settle even on what seemed to beJust terms in the buzzing government is basically caught between these two groups of of citizens. Those who are determined to have a warrant to regain something in those who want peace at any price in like any government, you know faced with conflicting political demands not always easy for them to know what to do. What's the situation like in sorry able now does The Siege continued? I mean the Shaolin is mostly stopped. Correct? The shelling has stopped there is some scattered sniping for to clear around the edges of the city, you know, there's always been a kind of semantic discussion here. What does it mean to be under siege and is soluble under truly Under Siege or not, the remember the summer of 1993. I was their reporting along with the lot of other foreign correspondent send the UN spokesman decided that sorry. I was not under siege because humanitarian supplies were coming in Fairly regularly and he and he said we we don't like you using that word Under Siege now,For the people of sorry able it's they felt very definitely was a seed because they weren't for you to come and go for a city the size of Omaha to be totally encircled and cut off wood. As far as the people sorry about our are concerned with would qualify being under siege. The situation now has moderated somewhat there is in the first place supplies of water are better than this is very very important because a lot of the people that were killed in in sorry about during the last three years have been killed while standing in line to get water. They had to go out and sometimes walk up to a mile to stand in line at an outdoor. Well, look, there are plastic canisters of for water up there and Back Again water is now coming into the city on a fairly regular basis. There is a electricity is coming in people get three or four hours of electricity every other day, which is a lot better than nothing and humanitarian. Aid is coming to the city steadily every single day. In fact the airport the airLyft evade was I was suspended for a while last week because all the warehouses were so full that they didn't have anywhere to put new age coming in. So from that point of view things are obviously much better never the last it's still under siege in the sense that people are not able to just get in their car and drive out to Croatia or anywhere else. It's not an open City. One of the question a lot of questions came up reading your book. One of them having to do with life in Sarajevo. Was there a constant worry about being killed mean is that something that everybody thought about all the time?Certainly, a lot of people thought about it a lot of time because the pattern of shelling Ansari Eva was was not know it wasn't concentrated around military targets. It wasn't concentrated around the fringes of the city. It was pretty much a uniform there was not people used to tell me a story about that. There is not one square yard in the city where you could be. I feel any confidence that you're not going to be targeted for showing. In fact people live in sorry about throughout. The war always had shells falling in their immediate vicinity. So anytime you stepped outside the front door of your house you had to worry about the possibility of shell is going to fall in your head. Sometimes for 5 hours would go without a single shell falling then all the sudden put Kaboom. You know, that be a couple hundred shells falling in in in a 20 minutes or something like that. So people never quite relaxed, even though it was calm they always know we're thinking that the shelling could start at any moment.For that reason when the shelling basically stopped a year ago. I'm around people in Terryville and improved tremendously is there were a lot of problems living inside of a but the number one problem was the fear of shelling and I guess related to that. The my other question would be since the government was at war with the the Bosnian serbs. Why did the Bosnian serbs just level the city? They leveled vukovar, which was a city in Croatian of the Bosnian serbs the Croatian service back by the serve dominated Yugoslav army, they leveled the city of vukovar. But it took Millions literally millions of artillery shells to do it in the book of our was a much smaller City. It takes a lot of Shilling to level a city the size of sorry about this is a city of 300,000 people and the Serb leadership in Bosnia has over and over and over said that it wants part of sorry able to be part of their Serb Republic. They don't want the city level they want to when the war is over. They want to have their their share of it. So in that sense, it's not doesn't make sense from from tactical point of view. For them to to level a city that it seemed to people in Sarajevo and I think to a lot of us covering the war that the object of the bombardment of sorry if it was not Understandable in military terms are in strategic terms. It was really more political psychological terms always the showing was most intense around times of negotiation. It appeared that the intent of the shelling was was really to put the people of sorry Evelyn the government of Bosnia on its knees and desperate for peace and more amenable to compromise more mutable to the terms that the service where we're proposing. So I don't think it was in that sense a military operation. I guess today is Tom gjelten award-winning a national public radio reporter who has been covering the war in Bosnia. Tom has a new book out called. Sorry Abel daily a city and its newspaper Under Siege and that he's been good enough to stop by today to take your questions, Give me the phone number. Again Twin City area number is 227-6002 276 thousand if you're calling from outside the Twin Cities, you can reach its toll free. That one eight hundred to +422-828-227-6000 or one 800-242-2828. Our first collars from Saint Paul versia. Okay, I'm in regard to the people that continues working at the newspaper as well as other citizens. I'm interested in hope that's found in spite of or because of deep suffering Rock acabo Define this level of Hope as a dimension of the human spirit, and I was wondering what time had to say what his thoughts were on this topic how how big he thought his people able to renew their hoping continue at thank you. You know, there's a talking sorry about the story about resistance and the story of resistance is that is a very special phenomenon when they this term does not refer to are people grabbing their their hunting rifles and going out to the edge of the city in defending the city the way, you know, resistant spiders and other Wars have this is Ava resistance is the effort by people and so are you able to maintain their dignity and they're there their pre-war sense of themselves their identities to preserve the spirit of the city as the city meaning of a place of culture a Cosmopolitan environment of people inside of a would go to great Great Lengths to to preserve this sense of their lives from before the war in order to hold on to their hope. Hope is very much tied to memory and people inside. Work very hard to keep their memory alive of what sorry if it was like before the war. This is one of the reasons adults The Virginian The Story of a newspaper that I write about it so important because it was one of the few reminders of daily life Insatiable from the for the war also people, you know, those of us who visited sorry about a more time. We're always impressed by the links to which people went to to to dress up a story of a women were always very careful to put on makeup in to dress carefully. You would see men going out on the street to gather water or fire wouldn't they would put on there in a white shirts and ties as if they were going to work and all of this served a very important psychological purpose to sort of to keep their Spirit Alive keep your hope alive keep their memory alive. And I think that's what this color is referring to do. I sear Sarajevo described as a multi-ethnic is city of a model of Harmony in the rest except for the Bosnian Serb leadership. Argues that if this was only skin deep after all what's what's the truth a very interesting question Garian and as you know, that's one that I explore in some depth in the book because I didn't want to just take the Bosnian government's at its word when it says sorry if it was always this great place and there was no reason why people had to be organized into separate ethnic groups. This is in fact what the servant leadership argued they argued that that this was as you say only skin deep it probably was not as much a Haven of interested Harmony as it has sometimes been presented nevertheless. It was I'm convinced after spending altogether about 20 weeks there and talking to many people not just Muslims but also serves in krotz about about the city. It was their word genuine are there was a genuine tradition thereof of living Together peacefully and I think the best evidence for it was the rate of intermarriage in 1991 1 year before the year before the War Began one out of three new marriages insatiable was between people of different ethnic or national backgrounds. Now, it doesn't take much of a mathematician to calculate that if you have one third of all new marriage is a bean between members of different ethnic National groups doesn't take many generations before those ethnic or national Lions have completely disappeared into that Harmony survived the war or whenever some suggestions at the end of the book that perhaps by the time the Seas was lifted with basically that the Muslims have come to dominate sorry a bowl and we're starting to treat this herb and crawl out people kind of second-class citizens. I think that's inevitable. And sorry it was not the city that it that it once was a combination of things have happened one has been a major demographic change in Sarajevo about least a hundred thousand. These have come into the city from rural areas where people were not so accustomed to living together with people about their backgrounds. These are almost exclusively Muslims who came from all Muslim rural Villages much more traditional their Outlook. Meanwhile a lot of the most Cosmopolitan best-educated most worldly. Sorry Evans have left the city. So there's been a displacement in the start. Sorry about just demographically is not the same. Secondly anytime you have the kind of persecution that people in sorry about have experienced. They're always going to be it's always going to breed a kind of a resentment and an anger and rage against the people they hold responsible for it. So naturally there has been a movement of increasing intolerance for serves even loyal patriotic serves who remained in sorry. It was supporting the Bosnian government have been made to feel that day because they're serves are somehow partly responsible for what is half. Went to the city a third thing that has happened. Is that the Bosnian government in the morn ashless minded people the Bosnian government have concluded that there's no payoff for holding the moral High Ground in this conflict that doesn't matter that the world doesn't recognize that they are trying to create a multi-ethnic community that it doesn't necessarily win the more political support in the world. And so they simply aren't trying as hard anymore John your question for Tom Jones, please. Please listen to your report throughout this war on on national public radio in my question is in regards to the recent situation in Croatia. I have read that that the UN mandate in the protected zones had stipulated that by November of 1994 that's protected areas would be returned to civil control by the Croatian authorities and that this is not taking place in what I'm curing basically in the national International media is that they're being expel I was questioning about what did you what exactly do they mean by that and the other question I wanted to ask you was his that crying or region is a separate from Bosnia. It's very important area that has to be decided upon concerning on whether or not there was actually a so-called greater Serbia and because geographically Bosnia-Herzegovina is wedged in between here and I was curious how the International Community why the response in regards to the Crimea, which is connected to bazzi isn't as Swift and I'm intense because I think it's both areas are connected in many ways because the ethnic groups are in the same area is this is this is complicated John is referring to the crying. It's is a word that means Frontier and the crane is zone of Croatia. This is part of Croatia is the basically the Border Territory between Croatia and Bosnia and it's called The Coroner called The Border Zone because hundreds of years ago Bosnia was the start of the northern reach of the Ottoman Empire and Croatia was the southern end of the austro-hungarian Empire. So the border that what is now the border between Croatia and Bosnia was at that time the border between us Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire and the austro-hungarian Empire is brought in serves to populate that area because they were the reputation reputation for being great Fighters and they wanted people with good military skills living in that area. Now as a result that area has traditionally been a Serb populated area, even though it's now part of Croatia very briefly. What happened in 1991 when Croatia seceded from Yugoslavia the serbs living in that crying area rebelled because they didn't want to have any part of they didn't want to be a menorah tea in Croatia. They felt more comfortable in Yugoslavia is a his whole that's what has led to that situation pause news is somewhat different situation serves and lessons in krotz have been more mixed throughout Bosnia. Therefore it's not been as easy to separate one area of Bosnia is being historically they serve area Wait at the crane has been this is one of the reasons I think John asked why the International Community is not been has not put the the Bosnian serbs in the crane is served on the same same putting. This is one of the reasons why whether the crane and will become someday part of Greater, Serbia is a little bit. I doubt that in the reason is because it's connected very tenuously to to Serbia itself. If you think of the crying and and in Serbia are like the two sides of an hourglass with a very thin Connection in between the crane, it would be more like Western Serbia rather than part of a greater Serbia. He also asked why the crying area has not been returned to Croatian control the way that the peace Plan called for it to be the Peace by didn't pack call for that but it never said how it was going to happen. And the in the Croatian government should have one of the UN to go in with military force and essentially seize control of that. Are you in hand it over the crow? Government you and make clear from the very beginning was not prepared to do that that this was the goal, but it was only going to happen as a result of negotiation that negotiation never took place. I guess today is Tom gjelten. He is back from the war in Bosnia. If you've got a question for him, give us a call to 276 thousand is the Twin City area number to 276 thousand. If you're calling from outside the Twin Cities, you can reach us toll-free at one 800-242-2828 mark your question, please a little bit of war and meeting the people you've met them seeing the things you've seen has what sort of been affected that had on you personally in and what have you learned and gain from this whole experience? Well the fact that I have written a book based in my reporting experiences and sorry if it was a testament to the effect that it had on me. I mean, I've covered a lot of exotic stories. I used to be a war correspondent Central America spend a lot of time in South America was part of the team covering the Gulf War and the breakup of the Soviet Union the transition to democracy in Eastern Europe. And none of these stories had the personal effect on me that being in in Bosnia and specifically I'm sorry, but had on me never before had I felt. Inadequate in the sense that that my daily reporting just didn't didn't do it. It just didn't it's quite explain to people what the stakes in this conflict were what the issues were didn't quite communicate the horror the depth of the suffering I I felt frustrated when I used to come back here to the states and have people who had heard my reports still say that just didn't get it. They didn't understand that they'd had so many questions that they felt were unanswered. Meanwhile had felt this was the most dramatic story that I had ever covered. I have close friends and sorry if I had to interview people whose stories were so horrific that it was hard for me to to even put their stories on the air. So I felt a need that I just had to go further than what I had done and that's why I took essentially a year off to to write this book. In order to tell the story with in the kind of fullness that I thought it deserved Jimmy Carter said that we have not gotten the full story from Bosnia that in fact the serve side of the story has gotten short shrift serves have gotten something of a bum rap. Is there some truth to what he says, Well, first of all, I would point out that Jimmy Carter Jimmy Carter's intervention in Bosnia followed his interventions in North Korean and Haiti and part of Carter strategy has always been to two. Sweet talk kind of the tough guys who have been isolated by the International Community in the hopes of making them more open to compromise. I mean, he said very complimentary things for example about Raoul cedra's who is considered a tyrant in in Haiti. He had a very conciliatory things to say toward the North Korean leadership and all this has been with a very clear objective which is to bring them around to negotiation. So first of all, we have to keep it in that context. He has a track record of sort of saying nice things about people you don't hear normally hear nice things about I don't I don't necessarily think that the Surfside has gotten short shrift in this in the coverage of the war. A lot of serbs have told me quite justifiably that the vast vast majority of news reports from Bosnia. I have painted the serbs in a negative light, but that doesn't tell us anything. It doesn't that doesn't prove anything that the serbs are generally the Serb nationalists. I emphasize have generally been portrayed. In a negative way the question is whether these stories have distorted the actual situation on the ground and I think the simple and undeniable an objective truth has been that the Serb nationalist Army in Bosnia has from the beginning of War been the most aggressive side has been responsible for most of the atrocities. This is not just the this is not just the impression that the poor journalist carry the the UN special rapper tour for human rights in ex-yugoslavia. Today is muscle. Yes, he is now issued 10 reports on the human rights situation in Bosnia in each of these ten reports. He has said that the Surfside has been responsible for the vast majority of human rights violations of the UN High Commissioner for refugees has a similar Lily said that they by far the greatest proportion of let's say displacement of population and mistreatment of civilians has been in the service side. So I just think that in this particular War the Serb Army and Bar. Has does not have is clean a record has it has a worse record than the than the other parties in the conflict. I just that that's just the way it's come out and Matthews on the line from Grand Rapids with a question for, y'all can go ahead how much real solidarity is there between the Croatian and Muslim peoples in other ethnic group in Sarajevo in Bosnia. Is it is it likely that after the war if there's some sort of peace that they're going to be able to maintain peace between themselves the muslim-croat Federation which was announced in March of last year in which put an end to a year of fighting between Muslim and Crossfit militia groups in Central bars near was a really important development, but it was largely something that was Negotiated from outside and imposed on the on the warring parties. It has been a very tenuous Alliance and it's really not much more than a glorified ceasefire in places like most are in Central Bosnia. I just spent quite a bit of time there in December Muslims and courts are still barely speaking to each other. There has been very little progress in terms of Muslims returning to Villages where they were expelled by Crobot or of Court civilians returning to Villages where they had been expelled by Muslim militia groups. It's on the other hand. It's and where are the where these treatments have been made? Its it's largely because of international external pressure Germany United States have put a lot of pressure in the crawdads to be more considerate toward the Muslim the Muslims. I know that they need krotz support in order to to do better a militarily and politically so it's it's something that's kind of been imposed on them from above the only exception to this. Is in the cities, sorry able to Isla places like that where the traditions of inter-ethnic Life are deeper and more genuine in play sex. Are you able for example 7% of the population of Syria boys? Krod, there's virtually no evidence of tension between Muslims and Crofts in Sarajevo next Dollar Store Minneapolis, Cheryl. Go ahead. Please briefly last spring. Comment on something that you when you were speaking briefly about the what you called the solidarity movement in how people would strive to create a normal say during chaos. I was really struck by that and when I was there it was just her in the time when the Allied bombing of garage them and what I wanted to know was throughout the time that you were there. Did you I thought people out in the streets going to pubs really doing their best to carry on with daily life and I work with a lot of health professionals who were going to work everyday coming home every evening and whether or not that continuing getting up in the morning and acting as if was really a theme throughout the war or if I just happened to be there at a time when things were looking a little brighter. Cheryl you used it a phrase that which I really like and it really sums up what what people were trying to do and that is acting as if this is what people in Sarajevo who tried to do from the beginning is to act as if there were no war of course from time to time has been easier than other times last spring when when you were there Cheryl it was a relatively peaceful time. It's much more difficult to do that. When I work for several months last spring in the summer of the tram lines were operating its course if you can ride a tram to work it's a lot better than having to to walk her two or three miles. The biggest problem is now is that people have been acting as if there were no war in the hope that peace time would return but it's now been almost three years and that Spirit just where is down after a while. You just can't keep this up indefinitely in the face of In the face of the circumstances that that they encounter or after a while even the most indomitable. Sorry even start to give up and drift toward to spare and unfortunately, even though the objective conditions insatiable have somewhat improved their is at the same time a worsening of morale situation in salary of a way would have to report I want to get a couple of questions in here while we still have time based on the notion of 20/20 hindsight always being a always being excellent are hindsight always being 20-20 I should say. I should the International Community have recognized Bosnia in the other Former Yugoslav Republic is Independence States and wasn't that a key element in starting the actual fighting? Yeah. It was scary and I think I don't have any problem saying hindsight. That was probably a mistake. Although they're the real. Mistake was was was indecision. I mean it was okay would have been okay for the International Community to recognize these countries as independent states if they were then willing to follow through and treat them as independent states. I mean, the the main problem is been the theater me to recognize these countries is independent states, but then didn't treat them that way. I mean in Bosnia, for example, the UN admitted the Bosnian government as a member state, but then you and negotiators treated the Bosnian government is just one of three warring factions, you know, if that was the position that they were going to take throughout the course the more than then they shouldn't have recognized them in the in the beginning. They should have dealt with them from the beginning is warring factions that the main problem has been inconsistency in this applies not only to you and actions in in Bosnia to also to European to American actions government's just couldn't figure out what to do about Bosnia and Croatia. So they would do a little of this a little of this a little of this. And that kind of vacillation and indecision actually, I think encouraged the most aggressive elements on the Surfside it encouraged the Bosnian government to think that some kind of International Rescue is just around the corner. I mean you could not have laid out a series of actions by the International Community that could have made things worse than what was done for the worst of the war been avoided had the us or Europe for both the send troops military troops into Bosnia. I personally am convinced that that that has been one of the one of the biggest problems the NATO peacekeeping troops in Bosnia have been under supplied from the very beginning every you and Commander in Bosnia. I said, he doesn't have enough troops at his disposal to do what has been expected of him there needed to be a much stronger more robust International military presence in Bosnia. I in order to carry out the functions that the UN was assigned to do with it. One of them. One of the most humiliating things has been to see the way the UN troops in Bosnia have been treated because they have the responsibility theoretically of protecting the civilian population and they don't have the arms of the Personnel to do it as a result. They have more often been there is kind of hostages at themselves becoming victims of aggressive actions by all sides, you know, if the if the US had been there if they if instead of the UN peacekeeping forces if there had been a strong native Forest delivering humanitarian Aid and keeping roads open and so forth. I think that the war probably would have been settled a lot a lot sooner and I think now it's important to understand that if there is to be a peace agreement in Bosnia regardless of whether all three sides sign on there's going to have to be a beefy International military. Presence there to make sure that this agreement is implemented the way it's supposed to be implemented in R Us to think that this that we can have peace and buzzing without that is naive Dan. You get the last question for Tom Jones. Thank you. I just like to make one short, then I come to the question quickly. When is I'm look feeling a little uncomfortable how close she got to his friends? And sorry. I was also he's at emphasizing got how close he has me to Bosnian government side of the story. I think anytime journalist. Guess that the clothes that to one side. He tends to be ignored the other side. That's one that impression that I'm getting a butt that the other question I asked you a question I have is that he's been talking about it a multi-ethnic natural body and Society. Well, I have some difficulty with it. You know what the same argument that can be? Say that. Mahdad Bosnia is a multi-ethnic harmonious Society between the Muslims drugs and cross. And therefore we should nature is then hopefully help each other. Why one of the same time as you wish Lavia is nothing else, but the multi-ethnic combination of the same nationality is and the International Community decided that it was not viable country. And therefore I still recognizes and their prices destroyed it. I'll take those two questions in in in reverse order Bosnia was is discolored and pies in a lot of people have said sort of a miniature Yugoslavia. And if you were slavia could not be preserved as a multi-ethnic state. Why should we think that Bosnia should be preserved as a multi-ethnic state? I think that's one of the points of colors making it's a it's a good argument. But one thing we need to keep in mind is that the Bosnian leadership worked harder, I would argue than anyone else in Yugoslavia to keep Yugoslavia together Bosnian president all use a bigger, which actually lobbied The German government not to recognize Croatia cuz he worried that if Croatia left Yugoslavia that the whole thing would fall apart in Bosnia would be exposed to exactly what it ultimately became exposed is a bag of each and the president of Macedonia offered many compromise proposal to keep Yugoslavia together date. They really did work to keep Yugoslavia together as far as whether I'm too close to to one side. I have traveled extensively on the server side. It's much more difficult to work in the Surfside. The servant leadership has been has always acted in the more authoritarian manner. They have allowed less freedom of access to reporters not only to foreign reporters, but also to domestic reporters, you know any time you're in a in a in a in a war situation when empathizes naturally with the people who suffering when Witnesses but in all I can say is that I have been Mindful and I think other forms and listen to Wasabi have been mine. From the from the beginning that this is a complex war and no one has to sort of keep one's emotions in bounds. I've always stop short of anything like editorializing. I just have described and reported what I have seen on the ground on both sides of the conflict and I'll stand by stand by that volunteer to go to know are you going to go when you're a foreign correspondent? You you know, you're going where you go where your scent Sylvia poggioli had actually covered most of the Yugoslavian the pre-war days, once it got into a war situation to reporters we needed and I was at him in the vicinity outside somewhere reporting experience from Central America. So I should have a natural candidate for that. I think of the war widen in the spring is so many people expected to do even though I'm now assigned to the state department in based in Washington. I'll probably get drafted to some kind of Reserve mobilization Duty. 15 seconds somebody out there some aspiring foreign correspondent. What's the first thing they should do to going to get their career on track? Freelance I think the lot of foreign correspondent has started as Freelancers gone to the kind of places that nobody else wants to go to cuz their crummy dirty out of the way places, you know, if you'd been in if you'd been in Bosnia in early 1992 with no other correspondence were there you would have had a great great toe up on your competitors. Thanks. I'm sure I could come by Tom gjelten who is out with a new book call serial daily a city and its newspaper Under Siege time is going to be speaking tonight at Macalester College in St. Paul at the Macalester College Chapel the event begins at 8 tonight and I will be on hand to sign copies of his book and so on admission is free. And so it's good chance to see Tom gjelten person and hear him speak. That's tonight at 8 at Macalester College Chapel. I could thank you for tuning in over the noon hour today reminder that to mid-day is produced by Sarah Meyer help this week by Procol Pandora Carole Sylvester Engineers, Randy Johnson and Kevin Middleton. Thanks to all of you who been listening For the hour, especially those of you who called in with your questions preciate.