[Yugoslavia Memory of a disaster] Arms embargo: 20 years later, the same mistake?
(BRUSSELS2) Europeans do not seem to have learned the lessons of the past. And they find themselves today in Syria in the same trap in which they found themselves trapped in the former Yugoslavia. Chance of the dates, we are now 20 years away from the anniversary date of the siege of Srebrenica (March 11, 1993, General Morillon went to the enclave). The slow culmination of a drama already written two years ago.
In the absence of military intervention, which everyone always finds a good reason to oppose, the European community and the international community have in effect imposed an embargo " general and complete "on all deliveries" arms and military equipment to Yugoslavia “, therefore targeting “all parties” to the conflict.
Suicidal measure
This measure, desired by the Europeans (under the Dutch presidency) and the United States (under the presidency of G. Bush Sr.) from July 1991, validated by a Security Council resolution (proposed by France), was to prove totally suicidal for Bosnians and Croats. Those who then have few forces and armaments compared to the central power of Belgrade and the Serbs, endowed with a well-stocked arsenal, supplied by the Soviets. The Croatian Minister of Defense at the time, Gojko Susak criticizes, in an interview with Le Monde, the European attitude which he considers unfair: “ Only Croatia feels the consequences of the embargo on arms supplies to Yugoslavia. and he asks for anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons, assuring that Zagreb is only looking for defensive weapons, in no way offensive. " We have a duty to arm the population, to resist, to avoid a bloodbath he explains... Arguments that can be found today in Syria.
Circumvention of the embargo
In the 1990s, several of the countries behind the embargo seemed determined to circumvent it, more or less unofficially. Germany, the United Kingdom, the United States, in particular, are arming Croats and Bosnians. The Germans supply MBB-made anti-tank rocket launchers, the Italians Italian smooth-bore rifles, the Hungarians AK 47s, American Stinger surface-to-air missiles destined for Afghanistan change course in Cyprus, etc. The arrival of Bill Clinton at the White House in 1993 marks a change of momentum across the Atlantic. American support for the reconstruction of Croatian forces becomes an open secret. In 1994, the Americans officially withdrew from the embargo control system set up jointly by the WEU and NATO (which caused a tragedy within the Alliance). And in 1995, Congress voted to unilaterally lift the arms embargo on the Bosnian army. It will take the president's veto to prevent the measure from going into effect.
These deliveries as well as the sending of trainers led to successive offensives. The Croats begin the reconquest of the ground lost in Krajina in January 1993; reconquest completed in August 1995. In October 1994, the Bosnian 5th Corps began a major offensive in the Bihac security area. In July 1995, it was the Croatian offensive in Bosnia, pursued in a concerted manner by the Croat-Muslim forces in September 1995 in western and central Bosnia. A ceasefire is signed in October. And the Dayton negotiations opened in November 1995. It was not until June 1996 that the arms embargo was lifted after a final disarmament agreement between all the parties involved in the conflict.
A lesson...
The usefulness of the embargo has never really been assessed nor has it been the subject of European introspection. And for good reason ! Its result was nil on the aggravation of the conflict. And it will only have led to delaying its outcome by one or two years and causing thousands of additional victims. In fact, if a political solution like the Dayton Accords was able to come about, and put an end to the conflict, it is partly thanks to the efforts of negotiation. But it is mainly thanks to/because of the violation of the embargo. The Serbian forces felt the wind of cannonball and the sound of defeat. The successive losses on the ground have led them to negotiate where they were not ready to do so a few years earlier... The paradox is there: the violation of international law has led to respect for its spirit.
