Warren Zimmermann
Warren Zimmermann | |
|---|---|
 Warren Zimmermann speaking at the Library of Congress in October 2002. | |
| 21st United States Ambassador to Yugoslavia | |
| In office July 11, 1988 – May 16, 1992 | |
| President | Ronald Reagan George H. W. Bush |
| Preceded by | John Douglas Scanlan |
| 7th Director of the Bureau of Refugee Programs | |
| In office June 15, 1992 – March 3, 1994 | |
| Preceded by | Princeton Lyman |
| Succeeded by | Phyllis E. Oakley |
| Personal details | |
| Born | November 16, 1934 |
| Died | February 3, 2004 (aged 69) Great Falls, Virginia, U.S. |
| Profession | Diplomat |
Warren Zimmermann (November 16, 1934 – February 3, 2004) was an American career diplomat best known as the last US ambassador to SFR Yugoslavia before its disintegration in a series of civil wars.[1][2] Zimmermann was a member of the Yale Class of 1956, and a member of Scroll and Key Society. He died of pancreatic cancer at his home in Great Falls, Virginia on February 3, 2004.[3]
Career
[edit]Warren Zimmermann served in Moscow (1973–75 and 1981–84), Paris, Caracas and Vienna, where he headed the US delegation at the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (1986–89). But it was Yugoslavia that marked him more than any other phase in his professional life, and brought him to prominence.[2]
Bosnian War
[edit]Zimmermann played an active diplomatic and geopolitical role during the initial stages of the Bosnian War.
It has been alleged, likely originally by Nikolaos Stavrou in 1994, that at a supposed meeting between Zimmermann and Bosnian Muslim leader Alija Izetbegović on 28 March 1992 Zimmerman encouraged Izetbegović to repudiate the Carrington–Cutileiro plan; however there is no evidence that such a meeting took place and substantial evidence that it did not.[4]
As the Bosnian conflict developed into a full war during spring 1992, Zimmermann supported the policy of foreign military interventionism.
According to journalist Samantha Power, the author of A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide, Zimmermann's career in Yugoslavia was marked by "frustration with the resistance of the Bush administration to intervene". His last official act before he was recalled to the United States on 16 May 1992, was to write a confidential memo called "Who Killed Yugoslavia?"[5] to the secretary of state. Each of the five sections of the memo was headed by a verse from the poem "Who Killed Cock Robin?". In Zimmermann's analysis, the nationalism of the Balkan leaders had led to the demise of the country.[6]
Zimmermann resigned from the diplomatic service in 1994 in protest at President Bill Clinton's reluctance to intervene in the Bosnian War.[citation needed] He campaigned to persuade the U.S. that it must act to end what he reportedly saw to be "Serbian aggression in the killing fields of Bosnia"[2] and was of the opinion that "NATO air strikes against the Serbs at any point during the war would have stopped the war and brought a negotiated agreement".[7]
Zimmermann went on to teach at Johns Hopkins University (1994–96) and Columbia University (1996–2000), and spoke out against human rights violations.[2]
Zimmermann wrote an account of his experiences in Yugoslavia, The Origins Of A Catastrophe (1996).[2] According to what he wrote in the book, Franjo Tuđman claimed that Bosnia should be divided between the Croats and the Serbs in the Milošević–Tuđman Karađorđevo meeting. "Tuđman admitted that he discussed these fantasies with Milošević, the Yugoslav Army leadership and the Bosnian Serbs," writes Zimmerman, "and they agreed that the only solution is to divide up Bosnia between Serbia and Croatia".[8][9]
Works
[edit]| External videos | |
|---|---|
 Presentation by Zimmermann on First Great Triumph, October 24, 2002, C-SPAN | |
| Booknotes interview with Zimmermann on First Great Triumph, January 19, 2003, C-SPAN |
Following his ambassadorship in Yugoslavia, Zimmermann authored two books: Origins of a Catastrophe: Yugoslavia and Its Destroyers — America's Last Ambassador Tells What Happened and Why,[10] published in 1996, and First Great Triumph: How Five Americans Made Their Country a World Power,[11] a work about Theodore Roosevelt, Henry Cabot Lodge, John Hay, Elihu Root, and Admiral Alfred T. Mahan, published in 2002.
Bibliography
[edit]- First Great Triumph: How Five Americans Made Their Country a World Power (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2004). ISBN 0-374-52893-4
References
[edit]- ↑ "Warren Zimmermann Dies; Envoy to Yugoslavia Was 69". The New York Times. 5 February 2004.
- 1 2 3 4 5 Hella Pick (10 February 2004). "Obituary: Warren Zimmermann". The Guardian.
- ↑ Warren Zimmerman [sic] Dies - The Washington Post Retrieved 2018-05-03.
- ↑ Cruikshanks, Alex (2026-06-01). "A Myth of a Meeting: Alija Izetbegović and Warren Zimmermann on 28 March 1992". Comparative Southeast European Studies. 74 (2): 188–213. doi:10.1515/soeu-2025-0084. ISSN 2701-8199.
- ↑ "The Last Cable". www.pbs.org.
- ↑ Power, Samantha (6 May 2003). A Problem from Hell. ISBN 9780060541644.
- ↑ "CNN - Serbian aggression is a familiar story - June 11, 1998". CNN.
- ↑ Mahmutćehajić, Rusmir (2000). The Denial of Bosnia. ISBN 0271038578.
- ↑ W. Zimmermann, Origins of a Catastrophe: Yugoslavia and Its Destroyers 1996
- ↑ Zimmermann, Warren (1999). Origins of a Catastrophe: Yugoslavia and Its Destroyers- -America's Last Ambassador Tells What Happened and Why: Warren Zimmerman: 9780812933031: Amazon.com: Books. ISBN 0812933036.
- ↑ Ross, Gale; Zimmermann, Warren (2002). First Great Triumph: How Five Americans Made Their Country a World Power. ISBN 0374179395.
External links
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| National | |
| People | |
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