NEWS ANALYSIS : Political Risks Attached to Bosnia Intervention : Policy: Bush’s election defeat after Gulf War victory showed that even a military triumph can lose its luster.

When Ross Perot gibed last week that “a little war” in Bosnia could turn into a political boon for President Clinton, the White House called the idea of connecting politics to war “outrageous.”

But both the experience of past chief executives and Clinton’s own present circumstance suggest that domestic politics and military ventures abroad are inextricably linked. As a consequence, the road to military triumph often turns into a political minefield.

Just ask George Bush, who was turned out of office 21 months after leading the United States to victory in the Persian Gulf.

“In this business, sometimes even when you win, you lose,” said UC Davis scholar Larry Berman, who pointed out that Bush’s military triumph could not overcome the domestic policy failings that dragged him down to defeat. It is a fate that could well befall Clinton, Bosnia or no Bosnia.

There is nothing insidious about Commander in Chief Clinton making political calculations as he ponders his moves in Bosnia. Unless he can generate public support for U.S. involvement there, or anywhere else, such a commitment is bound to be short-lived.

A glance at polls, which show a majority of Americans opposed to military action, makes clear what a formidable challenge he faces. Clearly aware of the polling trends, senior lawmakers said Sunday that Clinton must do a lot more explaining if he expects Congress to approve military action against Bosnian Serbs.

“Ordinary members of Congress are really frustrated,” said Rep. Lee H. Hamilton (D-Ind.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “They want to hear the goals, the objectives and the costs articulated.”

Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.), joining Hamilton on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” added that the American people “need to hear from the President of the United States why this is in our national interest, what the plan is, the fact that others are going to cooperate with us.”

Events in the Balkans are so twisted, and American interests so uncertain, that even conservative Southern politicians--usually a hawkish breed--seem inclined to sit this one out.

“What’s at stake in Bosnia does not threaten our national interest,” Republican Rep. Harold Rogers of Kentucky told a GOP leadership meeting in Louisville last week. “We don’t have the blood, not to mention the money, to spread ourselves into every ethnic conflict in the world.”

Those who support some sort of U.S. military intervention also are cautious about the United States moving without international backing. Democratic Sen. Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, chairman of a Senate foreign aid panel, condemns the passiveness of European nations in the face of the havoc in the Balkans.

“It is genocide, and they are ignoring it,” he said on CNN’s “Newsmaker Sunday.” But as distressed as he is, Leahy conceded, “It is almost an impossible situation for the U.S. to go it alone.”

On the House side, Speaker Thomas S. Foley (D-Wash.) took a similar tack. “I am sure he (Clinton) isn’t going to come to Congress (to seek backing) without U.N. authority and without cooperation with the allies being worked out,” Foley said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

If Clinton can get the United Nations and the allies on board, Foley added, “there is a better than good chance that Congress will approve it.”

But most politicians think the key job that the President faces is to win over hearts and minds at home.

Although Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) favors some sort of action in Bosnia and claims that Americans have “the will for it,” he conceded on CNN on Sunday: “We’re not there yet. We haven’t prepared the American people.”

“I’m very concerned because it isn’t clear to me what our objectives are,” said influential conservative Paul Weyrich, a onetime hard-line Cold Warrior. “And I don’t want to see any kind of military intervention unless it’s very clear what we’re trying to do and how we can win.”

Of course, a President has considerable opportunity to alter public opinion simply by acting on the tendency of people to support him in a crisis. While opinion was divided during the buildup to the Persian Gulf War, dissent all but vanished once Bush launched the Desert Storm attack that freed Kuwait.

What is harder to measure is how long support can last, particularly if what most people anticipate to be a brief venture turns into a prolonged ordeal. That is what happened in Korea and Vietnam, two limited Cold War conflicts that helped to defeat Democratic candidates for President in 1952 and again in 1968.

In Clinton’s case, the difficulties he faces in mustering backing for whatever he does in Bosnia are multiplied by the current perception that his Administration is in disarray on domestic policy. His economic program has been faltering, and his national health reform package, which could make or break his presidency, is certain to face intense controversy.

Under the circumstances, what is pushing Clinton even to consider military involvement?

Part of the reason, admirers believe, is humanitarian concern in the face of the horrors perpetrated by the Bosnian Serb forces. Beyond that, in this situation as in domestic matters, Clinton is, to a degree, a prisoner of his own campaign rhetoric.

Last summer, candidate Clinton criticized incumbent Commander in Chief Bush for opposing the lifting of the arms embargo that prevents Bosnian Muslims from getting weapons to defend themselves. He also said that air strikes to punish interference with humanitarian aid should at least be considered.

More generally, Clinton sought to present himself during the campaign as someone who would be a more creative chief executive than Bush, not only on domestic issues but also in dealing with problems abroad.

And he tried to sell himself as a “different kind of Democrat” who would not follow in the footsteps of most of his party’s post-Vietnam leadership by shrinking from involvement overseas.

As he tries to resolve these problems, Clinton may be able to benefit from the tactics employed by one of his political heroes, Franklin D. Roosevelt, who as President had to struggle against a tide of isolationist sentiment opposing aid to Britain in the dark days after the fall of France and before Pearl Harbor.

“As commander in chief, I have no right to think of politics,” Roosevelt said in rebuking an isolationist senator in his own party who argued that too much help to Britain could cost Democrats votes in the 1940 election. But despite his public nonpolitical stance, candidate Roosevelt, seeking a controversial third term, played politics furiously behind the scenes.

One major coup: He schemed successfully to get his Republican challenger, Wendell L. Willkie, to promise a truce of sorts on a highly controversial boost for the British--giving them 50 old U.S. destroyers in return for bases in their Western Hemisphere possessions.

Roosevelt won the election and then led the United States down the road to war and victory. But he had one thing going for him that Clinton doesn’t: Adolf Hitler.

The threat of Nazi aggression made it easier for Roosevelt to convince Americans that their self-interest was at stake in the 1940s’ Battle of Britain than for Clinton to make that case in this year’s battle for Bosnia.

Times staff writer Norman Kempster contributed to this story.