Rat holes U2 is paradise—a halfway house between the hippie ideal and the Boy Scouts.

Which is why Naomi's no-nonsense air of entitlement rubs some of these people the wrong way. Adam's fiancee is graceful and full of style, but she occasionally seems to think employee is another name for servant. One spoiled crew member whispered to me that Naomi was the person on the tour most likely to have a flight case dropped on her head.

Naomi returns to our company, stretches languidly across the back of Adam's chair, and pouts that the chef, who refused to cook, would not stand aside and let her at the stove. She is upset and she is going to bed. She kisses Adam good night, kisses Christy good night, waves to every­one else, and then walks straight into the glass door with a shuddering crash. Everyone jumps up, but Naomi just reels back, laughs, and tries again, this time passing through the open side and back into the hotel.

"That'll straighten her out," says the gallant Adam.

Words From the Front

Tension runs high over bono and bosnia/ paying off the city inspectors/ why we weigh our tickets/ the pursuit of nancy wilson by concert security/ a dispatch arrives from the battle zone

once everyone's assembled in Rome the campaign that dares not speak its name—Bono's plan to invade Bosnia—is fill­ing the Principles with tension. It's not doing wonders for my digestion, either. The first thing Bono wanted to know when we got to Rome was if I was still committed to going with him to Sarajevo. I said sure, but good luck making it happen. I got the impression he was disappointed that I didn't leap up shouting, "You bet! Let's go!" He suspects that people are deliberately dragging their feet to prevent it from happening. "Well, I'm going," Bono said sharply. "I hope Paul's been working on it!"

I don't know how hard Paul's been working on it. I do know what his attitude is: "I think it's foolhardy. I think it's vain. I don't like it at any level. It's dangerous and uninsurable and seems to contradict something I thought we had all thought through. We came to the conclusion that the duty of the artist is to illustrate contradictions and point a finger at things that are wrong and terrible without the responsibility of having to resolve them. U2's effort to discuss any humanitarian issue have sometimes been accompanied by a false instinct that U2 is also obliged to resolve that issue. Going to Sarajevo seems to me to fall into that category. I think it would endanger the people we go with, endanger the tour, and endanger the band. I think it's grandstanding."

I approach Dennis Sheehan in the hotel corridor and say, "Tell me as soon as you know if Yugoslavia is on for Thursday. I've got a couple of things I've got to change before I go—my plane ticket and my will."

[295]

Dennis looks at me with the blank face of a soldier playing dumb and says, "Yugoslavia? Why are you going to Yugoslavia, Bill?"

"If U2 goes I go, Dennis."

Dennis's expression turns cold and he says, "Oh, yeah? I haven't heard about it. As far as I'm concerned it will interfere with other plans. Like the rest of our lives! If people talk about this Bono will be forced to do it, to fulfill everyone's expectations. And it will accomplish nothing except to draw all those people into one place where they will be easy targets. There's not even any power to play! Bono's an extremist and he has done some extreme things, but Sarajevo isn't Central America, Sarajevo isn't Ethiopia. As far as I'm concerned this should not happen and it will not happen unless so many people talk about it that Bono feels he has to do it. So don't talk about it!"

By the next day the unspoken tension is leaking out all over. One of the Zoo TV cameramen says he just ran into a friend, a newsman who usually covers the troubles in Belfast newly returned from Sarajevo, who says he was scared shitless the whole time: it's horrible, don't go. This news sweeps through the hotel, along with reminders of one of the stories Bill Carter told us in Verona—of how he was sitting talking to a friend not long ago and suddenly the friend fell over dead from a sniper's bullet.

Nonetheless, under Bono's orders Regine Moylett is maintaining contact with Bill Carter, who's now back in Sarajevo, and it seems that some progress is being made in trying to secure several seats on a U.N. or Red Cross transport plane to carry us in. There is a notion that it might be possible for U2 to fly in early in the morning, get to Sarajevo, play, and fly out that night. But aside from the fact that it is proving to be very hard to get seats on the relief flights, everyone the Principles talk to makes it clear that once you get into Bosnia you have to be prepared for the possiblity that you might not get out. When the airport comes under attack all flights are canceled. Or there could be a major evacua­tion of wounded, in which case the healthy get bumped. I write a letter for my wife to give to my kids in case we get stuck there and can't get out, trying to explain what happened to Daddy.

Leaks are springing up too. MTV's Tom Freston stops me in the hall and asks if I'm going to Bosnia. He says Bono has promised MTV footage. "It would be an amazing gesture," he says. Then with a big

[296]

smile he adds, "You tell me what it's like, Bill! I'll be back in New-York;"

This is becoming like a political convention—all of the arguments and intrigues are taking place in the corridors and corners of this hotel. Regine follows Bono down the hallway, trying to give the latest reasons he shouldn't go while Bono does his best to ignore her: "I spoke to Bill Carter. He says a thousand shells fell on Sarajevo yesterday and any­thing that gathers people together in a large group is dangerous. We can put information about Sarajevo on the Zoo TV screens, we can give Bill Carter editing facilities in Dublin so he can get his film footage out to the world. There are many, many things the band can do that will be more useful than going there and entertaining two hundred people."

Regine continues chasing Bono, throwing out bribes and petitions, while he tries to get away: "The U.N. probably won't let you in, and if you do get in you probably won't get out for at least a week. . . ."

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