storm - Hrvatski memorijalno-dokumentacijski centar Domovinskog ...

y infl uential Croatian politicians, e.g., in the books by Hrvoje Šarinić, Chief of Staff of
the President of the Republic of Croatia, and Mate Granić, Minister of Foreign Aff airs. 5
At the other end, Milisav Sekulić and Marko Vrcelj of the Serbian Krajina Army
(SVK) authored books on Storm. 6 Major General Sekulić, Head of the SVK Training
and Education Division, produced a valuable but also a questionable contribution. A
signifi cant part of the book Knin Fell in Belgrade is really based on documents partly
captured by Croatian forces during the operation. However, some of the claims are not
documented; they derive from the author’s family education (primary socialization)
and abound in biases, blanket assessments and deliberate insinuations. In a nutshell, a
signifi cant part of the book is extremely incorrect. Th e author seeks to challenge the fact
that the SVK was militarily defeated and, of course, accuses the political and military
leadership of treason, introduces NATO (which was not involved) into the story - briefl y,
resorts to everything in order to dispute his own account on earlier pages, i.e., the poor
and ineffi cient political system which had produced an analogous military force.
Th e operations of the ARBiH 5 th Corps are described by Bejdo Felić’s monograph
which lacks a scientifi c approach and omits certain signifi cant facts regarding Storm and
Bosniac-Croatian relations in the Bihać region. 7
Th is book is based on my unfi nished manuscript which was commissioned by Mr.
Jozo Radoš, then Minister of Defence of the Republic of Croatia. Th e documents to
which I refer were then in the Archives of the HV General Staff ; today, to my knowledge,
they are mainly in the MORH Central Military Archives. In late 2006 I again applied
for access to the same documents to the cabinet of the Minister of Defence. I have never
received any answer.
A major problem in the analysis of the operations of the Croatian forces was the lack
of part of documents related to the actual engagement. Part of these is certainly missing,
and another part was apparently never written. Some units certainly never recorded
daily operational reports, and others kept no war diary. Because of this some aspects and
parts of specifi c operations will forever remain an unknown. Th us, one of the questions
open to speculation is the claim of one HV unit that it was the fi rst to reach the suburbs
of Slunj where for “well-known reasons it waited” for units of the 14 th Slunj Home Guard
Regiment to enter their town fi rst. 8 Only time will show how much this can be set right
by interviewing the participants. Another very frequently fl awed type of documents
are combat action analyses by the units involved aft er the operation. Th e units were
mainly focused on themselves and on their role, and it is diffi cult to establish what was
happening with their ‘neighbours’ and analyze their contribution along specifi c lines of
action. Some of the units produced analyses of no historic value, and others, apparently,
none at all. Unfortunately, the latter include two of the fi ve guards brigades which were
5 Hrvoje Šarinić, «Svi moji tajni pregovori sa Slobodanom Miloševićem, 1993-95/98» (All My Secret Negotiations
with Slobodan Milošević, 1993-95/98). Globus, International, Zagreb, 1999; Mate Granić, «Vanjski
poslovi: Iza kulisa politike” (Foreign Aff airs: Behind the Scenes of Politics). Algoritam, Zagreb, 2005.
6 Milisav Sekulić, «Knin je pao u Beogradu» (Knin Fell in Belgrade), Nidda Verlag, Bad Vilbel, 2000; Marko
Vrcelj, „Rat za Srpsku Krajinu 1991-1995“ (Th e War for Serbian Krajina, 1991-1995); Srpsko kulturno
društvo “Zora”, Belgrade, 2002.
7 Brigadier Bejdo Felić, «Peti korpus 1992-1995.» (Th e 5 th Corps 1992-1995); Ljiljan, Sarajevo, 2002.
8 Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Croatia (MORH), GSHV Archives: ZP Karlovac, IZpM Karlovac-
Ogulin; Cl. 81/95-01/01, Reg. No. 1078-IZM-1/95-29 of 6 August 1995. Report.
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