Edition: U.S. / Global

CONFLICT IN THE BALKANS; Senator Who Saw War Up Close Doesn't Want to See Another

Published: May 5, 1993

Senator John S. McCain of Arizona is a conservative Republican and a war hero, a medal-spangled Navy pilot in Vietnam, the son and grandson of admirals in a family whose fighting lineage extends to George Washington's Continental Army. If politicians were thoroughbreds and bloodlines dictated performance, Mr. McCain might be the Secretariat of Senate militarists.

But anyone who wagered that Mr. McCain would favor United States intervention in Bosnia's war would lose his shirt. As President Clinton and lawmakers ponder the prospect of air strikes to counter Serbian aggression or the despatch of thousands of American troops to enforce a cease-fire, Mr. McCain has been sounding the Senate's most persistent and most urgent alarms on the question of involvement in a European war. Far Too Many Ifs

"We need to be honest about one central fact: We have no way to predict the size, length and casualties of a peacemaking effort," he told the Senate on April 21.

"If we find ourselves involved in a conflict in which American casualties mount, in which there is no end in sight, in which we take sides in a foreign civil war, in which American fighting men and women have great difficulty distinguishing between friend and foe, then I suggest that American support for military involvement would rapidly evaporate."

For now, Mr. McCain says, he prefers leaving the dirtiest work of peacemaking to those whom the war threatens most -- Europeans.

"I think it's time to hold their coats instead of them holding ours," he said in an interview.

Other senators have counseled against the use of United States force in Bosnia. But Mr. McCain's views draw special attention because of who he is: the Senator from Vietnam, who spent five and a half years in a prison camp after being blown out of the sky on a bombing run over Hanoi. It's Not Vietnam, He Says

Now, when he warns against what he calls the "tar baby" of Bosnia, the temptation is overwhelming to conclude that he is reliving the frustration of Vietnam.

Mr. McCain insists, a little wearily, that it isn't so. He says the 23 combat missions, the mid-air ejection that left him with two broken legs and a broken arm, the beatings by North Vietnamese guards, the solitary confinement, the efforts at resistance -- heroic, by some accounts -- are a closed chapter in his life.

"I never talk about Vietnam," he said last week during a talk in his Capitol Hill office. "I never relate stories about it. When I walked away from that place, it was over."

As for Bosnia, he said, there are better analogies.

"I think you can draw a parallel to the military challenge in Bosnia with what the Russians faced in Afghanistan," he said. "Even with ground forces and with overwhelming air superiority, they were unable to defeat a motivated, very capable enemy."

He nevertheless admits to seeing a fair likeness between Washington's initial response to Bosnia and its drift into Vietnam in the 1960's. Both began with a clamor to punish an enemy with air strikes; both may entail what he contends could be an open-ended commitment of troops and aircraft. The Admirals Before Him

"Right now," he said, "we seem to be flailing around, looking for a way to do this on the cheap. And there is no way to do this on the cheap."

How much of this caution is a reaction to Mr. McCain's Vietnam years, how much is passed on from ancestral fighting men and how much is a matter of intellect is speculation. But a background like Mr. McCain's cannot be ignored or forgotten.

His grandfather was in charge of all Pacific Ocean aircraft carriers during World War II; his father became commander of all United States forces in the Pacific during the Vietnam War.

There was never much doubt that John 3d would follow in their steps. And so, after an unimpressive stint at the United States Naval Academy, Ensign McCain began flying fighter jets off carrier decks. Eventually, the job took him to the aircraft carrier Forrestal and to Vietnam. 'Crown Prince' Is Downed

In October 1967, on his twenty-third bombing run, Mr. McCain's jet was struck by an antiaircraft missile over Hanoi. He bailed out into a lake and was taken, both legs and one arm broken, to a P.O.W. camp. Not until two months after the the war's end, in March 1973, was he released; by that time, at 37, he weighed about 100 pounds and his hair had turned white.

"I met him just before Christmas of '67," said Bud Day, a Florida lawyer who was an Air Force pilot and had been shot down and imprisoned the previous August. "He was in just horrible condition -- filthy, rotten dirty, hurting terribly. I'm amazed to this day he ever lived through it."

Mr. McCain's imprisonment was especially rigorous because Hanoi regarded him as special: the "crown prince," son of the Pacific commander who was directing the war against them. Mr. McCain was beaten because of his refusal to cooperate, and he spent long stretches in solitary confinement.

"Here's a guy who grew up in a very famous naval family, whose entire life growing up consisted of people going out of their way to be nice to him because of his last name," said Torie Clarke, who was his press secretary before joining the Bush Administration in 1989.

"And he gets shot down, and within a few days he reached a point in life where his last name not only didn't help him -- it actually hurt him. Suddenly he has to fend for himself, and do what's right, and learn to count on friends.

"You can argue that it was one of the best things that ever happened to him." A Political Takeoff

Today Mr. McCain is hobbled by a bad shoulder and arthritis in his legs, and he has had to switch to his left hand when writing. But the infirmities did not prevent him from regaining his flying status in the late 1970's and resuming his Navy career, with posts in Florida and Washington.

After failing his flight physical in 1981, he quit the Navy, moved to Arizona and immediately won a Congressional seat vacated by the House minority leader at the time, John Rhodes. Five years later, he swept into Barry Goldwater's Senate seat and a spot on the Armed Services Committee.

In Congress, Mr. McCain has supported most Republican military ventures, from Afghanistan to Iraq. But he has not shied from the role of dove. In 1988, he opposed President Reagan's decision to send warships to escort Kuwaiti oil tankers through Persian Gulf minefields.

In 1983, while in the House, he ignored intense White House pressure and called for American troops to quit Lebanon, saying their peacekeeping mission there was futile and ill-planned.

Weeks later a terrorist proved him right, driving an explosives-laden truck into a Marine compound and killing 241 troops. 'Should' vs. 'Can'

Mr. McCain professes to feel sympathy for President Clinton, a man who never served in the military and who, Mr. McCain says, faces a no-win decision on Bosnia.

"When you're sitting there at the dedication of the Holocaust museum, and Elie Weisel correctly points out that this tragedy is ensuing and we're doing nothing, that brings enormous pressure to bear," he said. "The question is what is viable. We cannot confuse a desire to do good with viable military options."

Would he have reached the same decision 25 years ago?

"I'd like to say yes," he replied. "But I'm afraid I had not had some of the experiences and reading and study. And I might have leaned toward another solution."

Photo: Senator John S. McCain of Arizona walking back to the Senate yesterday after giving an update on the events in Bosnia to a group of high school students from Phoenix who were visiting the Capitol. (Jose R. Lopez/The New York Times)