Throughout the Bosnian war, there has been unhappiness in Paris and London about US motives and – despite the need for public unity now – that has not gone away.There is also the nagging question of the Russians. It is vital to both the alliance and Moscow that the new force integrates in some shape or form a Russian element. But Russia has no desire to serve under Nato; and Nato is pledged to maintain sole control of the military aspects of Bosnia, an apparently unsquareable circle. Today, Mr Perry will try to keep the Russian relationship on track at a meeting in Geneva with Pavel Grachev, Russian Defence Minister. Russia is threatening to boycott joint exercises later this month in the US, and continues to make its unhappiness known over Nato plans to expand its membership.

Keeping Moscow onside over Bosnia is vital for the longer-term aim of rebuilding European security with Nato at its heart.So Bosnia presents the alliance with the biggest political challenges it has ever faced. Yet the events of the last few weeks – massive air strikes, a renewed US diplomatic commitment to Bosnia and preparations for the new force – have come about partly because America was so concerned that if Nato did not act then the risks were greater. Nato had to show itself to be vital, or at least relevant, or risk fading away.Nato has always been part of a triangular relationship, with the Europeans, Americans and Russians at each apex Keeping that triangle stable is getting harder and harder. Six years after the reunification of Germany, five years after Iraq invaded Kuwait, four years after the end of the Soviet Union, three years after the beginning of the Balkan conflict, two years after Nato decided to enlarge and one year after its aircraft began strikes in Bosnia, the alliance is still peering into the darkness to see where it is going The plunge that it is now making is a leap of faith..

AT 5pm on Wednesday, 31 May, Cedric Brown heaved a huge sigh of relief The most humiliating afternoon of his life was finally over. For five hours, the small shareholders in British Gas had bombarded him with complaints, brickbats and plain insults. A 40-stone pig labelled “Cedric” had been paraded outside the meeting. Brown himself was accused of self- serving greed, compared with Attila the Hun and at one point told to go and gas himself.

But when the dust settled, both his job as chief executive and his pounds 475,000 pay packet were intact. Thanks to the votes of the big institutional shareholders – pension funds and insurance companies – Brown and the rest of the British Gas board left the podium bloody but unbowed, and confident that the nightmare was over.
Four months later, however, the company is facing a much greater threat than the raspberries of 4,500 angry private shareholders. The furore then was about a single salary payment that could not make a flea-bite’s difference to a company the size of British Gas. The worry now is about events that threaten to wipe billions of pounds from the company’s revenues.Institutions which then backed Brown and his chairman, Sir Richard Giordano, are beginning to wonder whether their loyalty was misplaced The doubts have already hit the share price The shares on that infamous afternoon were trading at 305p. They are now worth just 258.5p after a 6.5p fall on Friday – their lowest this year. Shareholders have seen pounds 2bn wiped from the value of their portfolios since the AGM. The shares are now worth little more than before the stock market crash of 1987.