First Lady’s Christmas Wish: Support For Troops In Bosnia

Forget visions of sugarplums: While Hillary Clinton showed off the White House Christmas tree and holiday decorations Monday, she said her Christmas wish was for Americans to show their support for U.S. troops being dispatched to Bosnia.

“We are embarking on a very important and difficult challenge in leadership that the United States is performing in the world today,” she said, posing in the newly refurbished Blue Room in front of the official White House Christmas tree, a 18-1/2-foot Fraser fir. “People who take risks for peace, which is what we have seen in Northern Ireland and now in Bosnia, need to be supported.”

The first lady said that her one wish for the Christmas season was not only that the Bosnian peace flourish, but that it have the endorsement of the American people. “Particularly in this Christmas season when we will be singing carols about peace and talking about love and brotherhood, I hope every American finds in each of his or her own hearts more space for that peace and love,” she said.

She urged Americans to write letters to troops bound for Bosnia and said a special mailing address would be created promptly. She singled out soldiers’ families for particular attention, especially the soldiers’ wives.

Ironically, it was that very group that most vociferously expressed its dissatisfaction during the Clintons’ trip to American military bases in Germany last week, including one unidentified young woman carrying an infant and a “President Who Stole Christmas” sign.

The first lady said that she interpreted any negativity among the soldiers’ families overseas not as resentment, but rather “a desire for more certainty, which in any kind of military deployment may not be wholly possible.”