passing on the link.
just read at the brutality of these people & their self-agg*****zement for such brutal acts.
dushi
Medals of absurdity for Srebrenica
Over a decade after the Srebrenica massacre, Dutch soldiers are awarded medals for an “impossible” mission that saw some 8,000 people slaughtered before a helpless UN force.
The United Nations Protection Force (UNPROFOR) (Wikipedia)
Wikipedia
Commentary by Anes Alic for ISN Security Watch (08/12/06)
In what is likely a first in military history, soldiers have been awarded medals of bravery without having fired a single shot, having been undeniably humiliated by a clearly less powerful aggressor, and failing, totally and completely to accomplish the mission at hand.
That is exactly what happened to the 800 Dutch soldiers, former members of the UN Protection Forces (UNPROFOR), charged with securing the safety of tens of thousands of civilians in demilitarized town of Srebrenica, during the war in Bosnia in 1992-1995.
While Bosniak (Bosnian Muslim) officials and survivors of the Srebrenica massacre were protesting the awarding of the medals of bravery as scandalous earlier this week, the Dutch government said the troops deserved recognition for their behavior under difficult circumstances.
Speaking at the military camp in Assen, Dutch Defense Minister Henk Kamp said the soldiers had been unjustly accused allowing the Srebrenica massacre to unfold in front of them. He said, in an oft repeated justification, that the soldiers had been sent to the eastern Bosnian town on an impossible mission, without enough weaponry, without enough intelligence and with a limited mandate.
Nearly 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were executed by Serb forces who overran the Srebrenica enclave between 11-15 July 1995.
Some 450 Dutch soldiers from a rapid response unit were mandated to safeguard Srebrenica in 1993, after the town of an estimated 30,000 civilians, mostly refugees from nearby towns and villages, was demilitarized and came under UN protection.
French UNPROFOR General Philippe Morillon arrived in Srebrenica that same year, promising before international media that the town would become a UN protected “safe area.”
Later, the Dutch military complained that they had taken on the mission when no one else would, that they were out armed and out numbered, and that they had requested that they be able to take military actions against the Serb forces. Though this is indeed true, there are some shameful facts about the Dutch role in the Srebrenica tragedy.
On 11 July 1995, Bosnian Serb forces surrounded the Dutch soldiers in their camp, taking captive those who were stationed on the nearby hills, disarming them and tying them to trees. Then, the Dutch soldiers watched while Bosnian Serb fighters separated the men and boys from the women and girls who were seeking shelter in the UN camp at nearby Potocari.
While the women and children were placed on trucks and deported to territory under the control of the Bosnian government, the men and some boys were placed on trucks and driven to nearby schools, factories and houses, where they were slaughtered.
The Bosnian Serb soldiers used UN uniforms and vehicles to capture Bosniak men hiding out in mountains. Those who surrendered were never seen again.
Addressing media in The Netherlands, some Dutch soldiers who served in Srebrenica described the atmosphere in the Dutch camp as “defeated, frustrated and powerless.”
Defeated, frustrated and powerless - certainly. But brave, certainly not. And medals or no, and mandate or no, the international actors here cannot deny their share of responsibility for what happened in Srebrenica.
Of course, the Bosnian Serb political and military forces perpetrated a heinous crime, the worst massacre in Europe since World War II. But the question here is to what extent should interventionist forces bringing promises of safety bear responsibility for their own failure - a failure that led to the death of some 8,000 people.
To military experts it is clear just how much time it required Bosnian Serb political and military structures to plan an operation that including the mobilization of tens of thousands of army, police and paramilitary forces to systematically shell Srebrenica and the surrounding area; to plan ambushes at every possible juncture to ensure that no one escaped; to disarm and capture UN soldiers; and, perhaps, most significantly, to make sure that NATO would not retaliate.
The extent to which the Bosnian Serb forces planned the Srebrenica operation was also illustrated by the fact that trucks had also been organized for the transportation of those captured; firing squads had been set up; and backhoe machinery for digging the hundreds of mass graves and bulldozers for covering them were brought in. It was a massive and very well thought out operation that should have not have defied Western intelligence and international preparedness.
Bosnian authorities also share some of the responsibility for the Srebrenica tragedy. Since the town had been demilitarized, Bosnian authorities withdrew most army personnel to territory under Bosnian army control. They also failed to send the troops to Srebrenica to help with safe passage for those men who had escaped to the woods, where they wandered for weeks and were eventually captured or surrendered and were executed.
However, the greatest share of moral responsibility for Srebrenica falls on the shoulders of the UN administration, which failed to fulfill its mandate.
Number books and articles on the subject, many of them citing witnesses to the events, recount how the people of Srebrenica could not have been saved because of the complexity of UN operations and the layers of bureaucracy that could not be cut through in time to avert the massacre. They repeat how the UN lacked a serious mandate to act against the Bosnian Serbs, and how the tragedy happened during a time of summer holidays, when many high-level decision-makers could not be reached.
A Bosnian journalist, who was 17 and an interpreter for UN officials in Srebrenica at the time, recounted how he was ordered by his superiors to leave the UN camp and join the other Bosniaks slated for execution.
With the help of one UN official, he managed to send a fax to NATO headquarters in Brussels in an attempt to have the ordered rescinded. The request was denied because he sent the fax to the wrong office and the official who should have signed it was on vacation.
It was only after he managed to have a friend in New York forge the signature of the necessary official that he was allowed to stay in the UN camp. Another interpreter also managed to stay in UN camp, but failed to secure the same deal for his brother and father, whom he walked to the gate and never saw again.
It is still unclear why the Dutch government has chosen to honor its soldiers with medals of bravery more than 11 years after the massacre. It is possible that by honoring the soldiers, the authorities hope to strengthen their position in the face of a lawsuit against the government.
In June 2004, the survivors of the Srebrenica massacre handed Dutch authorities a proposal for an out-of-court settlement of EUR2 billion (US$2.6 billion), warning that no response would mean taking the case to court.
Last year, a district court in The Hague opened hearings in a compensation case against the Dutch government.
But the awarding of medals of bravery to the Dutch soldiers seems rather absurd - not only to Bosnians, but also to the Dutch - given the fact that the entire Dutch government resigned in 2002 due its role in the Srebrenica massacre after a report blamed the country’s political and military leaders for sending their peacekeepers an “impossible” mission there.