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Abdic had been painted as a 'tycoon/warlord' by Iztbegovic and Clinton........but He was a legitmate politician in BiH.

He won the election to the Bosnian Presidency garnering many non-Muslim votes. (because he was a moderate)

In a 'mysterious' turn of events, Iztbegovic took Abdic's place. Iztebegovic tears up the Lisbon Agreement (under Zimmerman's advice) and what could have been solved without war wasn't.

Ultimately Abdic felt so strongly about Iztbegovic's destructive extremism, that he organized some 10,000 to 20,000 Soldiers to fight against Iztbegovic's xenophobia.

Of course, the fanatics in Iztbegovic's SDA over in Sarajevo did all they could to discredit Abdic. Abdic and his thousands of Muslims fighting allied with the BSA was proof positive that it was Iztbegovic who was the racist extremist.

Indeed, Clinton's White House pumped some $5 billion into Iztbegovic's regime coffers. Much of that was pumped in after 1995, the fact remains that a staggering amount of money was sent by Clinton to Iztbegovic.

My point is simply that there were moderate alternatives for Clinton's White House to support. Before Clinton's active support, the moderates were in trying to stop escalation of violence. By supporting the extremists, Clinton undermined a peaceful solution. joan has lots of data sources on Abdic and so forth

Abdic won the 1990 election (by something like 43% to 37%) but, as you said, his support stemmed mainly from non-Muslims, leaving the biggest demographic in Bosnia with their wishes unaddressed. They didn't want to be part of a Serbia-dominated Yugoslavia. Same reason why Croatia and Slovenia jumped ship.

I'm curious as to how Iztbegovic took Abdic's place. Was it some sort of a coup or through foreign recognition?

As for the Lisbon Agreement, I'm not sure a working peace was in place at all. Zimmerman reportedy told Iztbegovic that "if you don't like it don't sign." In other words, he hadn't signed in the first place. The Croats, if I'm not mistaken, had already turned the plan down when the Muslims did.

It seems to me that even if Abdic were president, you'd still have the same grievences in place.

Abdic and the presidency is a strange issue to say the least. From http://www.diacritica.com/sobaka/dossier/abdic.html:

"In the Bosnian federated system, the republic was ruled by a presidency of five members, and the one who received the largest number of votes would become its chair. Abdic outscored Izetbegovic rather handily (Abdic received 1,010,618, with a good share of support among Serbs and Croats, to Izetbegovic's 847,386, mostly among Muslims). For mysterious reasons which have never been adequately explained, Abdic abstained from taking the head of the presidency, granting it instead to Izetbegovic. Abdic in return had his lieutenant Alija Delimustafic named Interior Minister.

In the Spring of 1992, as the Serbs and Muslims entered into a tense stand-off in downtown Sarajevo, Abdic was drawn into the fray. Izetbegovic was held by the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) from May 2nd to May 3rd, in what his party rather hysterically described as a "kidnapping". In fact, a Bosnian militia was then holding a JNA general prisoner, and a local commander planned to use Alija as bait to free his colleague. During the crisis (which was broadcast on television, as Izetbegovic called in to a live news broadcast from "captivity" and spoke on the air to his deputies), Abdic arrived in Sarajevo. Later, members of the SDA accused Abdic of attempting to take advantage of Izetbegovic's absence to stage a coup d'etat. It was a rather fanciful charge, especially as Abdic had voluntarily passed over the high office which was his due, and the very nature of the crisis would lead one to think that the members of the Bosnian presidency should be close to the seat of government."

So....why did Abdic not take is place at the head if the DSA? Any idea what his version of events are?