For two days last week, the Croatian city of Knin was drenched in a fiery rain of artillery shells, mortars and bombs. The self-styled capital of Krajina, the stronghold of nearly 200,000 rebel Serbs who seceded from Croatia in 1991, found itself the focus of a massive assault by the forces of Croatian President Franjo Tudjman. Within the first half-hour of the offensive, more than 200 shells fell on Knin. By Saturday panic had descended as well. As Croatian tanks began rolling through the streets, Knin's Serb leaders placed a last-minute call to the U.N., requesting the evacuation of 32,000 civilians. Then the leaders themselves joined the long line of cars, trucks and buses streaming in the direction of northern Bosnia. Around noon, an enormous Croatian flag, whose red-and-white checkerboards have long served for Serbs as a hated symbol of Croatian rule, was hoisted above Knin's 10th century citadel, once used as a coronation site for medieval kings.
And then Knin appeared to give itself over to one of war's more oddly languorous moments. The streets were deserted, apart from scattered corpses and rescue vehicles scavenging about like small birds. Abandoned by the losers, as yet unoccupied by the winners, the city seemed lost in its pause, as if reflecting on the raw brutality with which the victors had smitten the vanquished. "Almost the only people remaining," said Major Alan Balfour, a U.N. spokesman, "were the dead and dying."
In the Balkans, there is now a whole new war to die in. Four years after a humiliating defeat, the Croats are on the move with a well-trained, well-equipped force of more than 100,000. That is the largest army to fight in Europe in 50 years. There is a risk that the battle for Krajina will spin out of control and engulf the Balkans in a wider war, one that could conceivably draw the republics of the former Yugoslavia, as well as their European and American allies, even further into the conflict. At the same time, however, there is a chance--admittedly a remote chance--that if the Croatian offensive succeeds, a balance of power will be achieved and four years of Balkan butchery will come to an end. In any case the Balkans have entered a new phase, one in which the fighting and the killing may for a time be more intense than they have been since 1992.
For weeks Tudjman's generals had been massing troops around Krajina, threatening to retake the breakaway province unless the Serbs agreed to rejoin Croatia. Then three weeks ago the Bosnian Serbs began attacking Bihac, a pocket bordering Krajina and controlled by the Muslim-dominated Bosnian government. The Croats helped the Bosnian Muslims and took two towns in Bosnia controlled by the Serbs. Following that action, the Croats seemed to gear up for a full-scale offensive. There was a brief moment of hope when the U.S. ambassador to Croatia, Peter Galbraith, announced concessions by the Serbs. The U.S. had been trying to broker a peaceful settlement. But the moment passed; at 5 a.m. on Friday, the shells began falling on Knin.