storm - Hrvatski memorijalno-dokumentacijski centar Domovinskog ...

material, the reminiscences of General Krešimir Ćosić regarding negotiations with
American political and military offi cials in the United States, resulting in Operation
Zima ’94 (Winter ’94) by Croatian armed forces and the resolution of the fi rst Bihać
crisis. Th is is followed by 44 documents, largely of Serbian provenance, on events in the
Bihać area - between 27 October 1994 and 3 August 1995 - showing that Bihać was an
extremely important objective in the Serbian plans, which could not easily be achieved
because of the tough resistance of the ARBiH 5 th Corps. Moreover, the documents show
that Serbian strategists did not shrink from any means in their attempt to take Bihać.
Th ey even carried out a covert operation involving the use of biological agents for food
poisoning, to be smuggled into Bihać and intended to cause large scale poisoning of the
5 th Corps troops and knocking them out of action.
Th e third thematic section presents the plans of the rebel Serbs for the evacuation of
the population from the occupied territory of Croatia. Th e 22 documents, demonstrating
that evacuation plans in the case of an HV attack such as Storm had existed already in
1993, include the “Decision of the RSK Supreme Defence Council on the Evacuation of
the Population from the Municipalities of Benkovac, Obrovac, Drniš, Gračac and Knin
towards Srb and Lapac” adopted in the aft ernoon on 4 August 1995 in Knin.
At the end, the Appendices present the contents of the so-called Plan Z-4, which
the rebel Serbs refused even to consider, and reminiscences of the representatives of
the international community involved in the attempt to implement the plan. Th eir
statements on how the leaders of the Serbs in Croatia refused to accept the off ered Plan
as a negotiating platform clearly confi rm that any attempt to peacefully reintegrate the
occupied areas into the constitutional and legal system of the Republic of Croatia would
have been futile because of the narrow-mindedness of the Serbian leaders.
Th e documents in Appendices are the direct and well-argumented answer to
questions such as why, unfortunately, there was no alternative to the military option,
why the Croatian leadership could no longer defer Storm, and who was responsible
for the exodus of Croatian citizens, ethnic Serbs, on the eve of Storm and during the
operation. Th e dramatic condition of Bihać defences, the collapse of which would have
reinforced almost decisively the position of Serbian forces and their refusal of all peace
initiatives - whether promoted by the Government of the Republic of Croatia or by
the international community - and even of the “Plan Z-4” which granted the Serbs in
Croatia an extraordinarily broad autonomy, and the continuous endeavours, ever since
1991, of the Serbs from Croatia and Bosnia&Herzegovina to create a single Serbian
state in the occupied territory of the Republic of Croatia and Bosnia&Herzegovina,
which had entered, on the eve of Storm, the fi nal stage by the adoption of their common
Constitution, clearly demonstrate how unconvincing are the claims that Croatia had
been hasty in resorting to a military solution and that more time should have been
foreseen for negotiations.
In view of the experience acquired throughout the process of negotiation on the
peaceful reintegration of occupied territory into the constitutional and legal system of
the Republic of Croatia, it would indeed be very diffi cult to explain in a reasoned way the
assumption that the rebel Serbs - if they had succeeded in taking Bihać and strategically
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