With former Serbian dictator Slobodan Milosevic finally under arrest, the time is right for a wider look at the Balkans. George W. Bush should seize the moment to deal expeditiously with the many outstanding Balkan problems he inherited from the Clinton Administration. The 1995 Dayton agreement, which ended the Bosnia war, is effectively dead. Montenegro, encouraged to seek independence as a way to undermine Milosevic, may now attempt to do just that, which in turn could touch off another ethnic war. The Kosovo problem remains unresolved. Most troubling, another war has started in Macedonia.

The explosive potential of Macedonia should not be underestimated. It is arguably the most fragile country in Europe, as Bush's father recognized in the last days of his presidency. He warned Milosevic that the United States would intervene militarily against Serbia "in the event of a conflict caused by Serbian action" in Kosovo. His real concern was that a Kosovo conflict could spill into Macedonia, involving Greece and Turkey. At the time, Albanians in Kosovo had set up a parallel government, as well as education and health systems, in response to Milosevic's repression. A similar attempt by the Albanians in western Macedonia was crushed by the Slav Macedonian majority. But the dream was that there they would unite with Albania in a Greater Albania.

Macedonia's instability involved more than its ethnic mix (two-thirds Slav Macedonian, one-third Albanian). None of Macedonia's neighbors wanted it to exist. Bulgaria claimed that Macedonians were ethnic Bulgarians; Serbia insisted they were "southern Serbs"; Greece argued long and loudly that they had stolen the name of an ancient Greek state. All could be drawn into a war if the Macedonian state were to collapse.

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