yugoslavias implosion

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ChApter 2
police and the paramilitary units it had created. They were responsible
for the gravest crimes committed during the war.
By the third month of the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina, Republika
Srpska had realized its territorial ambitions, which mirrored the
program Moljević had set out in 1941. The Belgrade regime had succeeded
in brutally wresting control of 30 percent of Croatia and 75
percent of Bosnia-Herzegovina and establishing these areas as “Serb
ethnic territories.” The ethnic divisions effected by the ypa at the
outbreak of hostilities in order to keep the ethnic groups apart were
then effectively (and unintentionally) cemented by the international
community, which stationed peacekeeping troops along the borders
of the new territories. In achieving these goals, Serbs committed
major crimes, including genocide in Bosnia. Milošević came under
international pressure following the first disclosures of mass crimes
and ethnic cleansing in Bosnia.
The Muslims had been unprepared for war. Izetbegović had
believed naively that his neutral stance would prevent it. According
to Aleksandar Vasiljević, the kos had two of its men at the very top of
the Muslim party. 300 In March 1991, the Party of Democratic Action
(sda, Stranka demokratske akcije), a Bosnian Muslim group, organized
its first paramilitary force, the Patriotic League, led by Hasan
Čengić, but the Bosnian Army was not formed until May 14, 1992.
The arms embargo on Yugoslavia imposed in September 1991 by a un
Security Council resolution, forced Bosnia-Herzegovina to smuggle
in weapons, mostly from Iran. As the Bosnian Army grew, it was
joined by Muslim refugees in increasing numbers until it eventually
outnumbered its Serbian counterpart. Toward the end of the war,
the Bosnian Army became ever stronger due to the high morale of its
members.
The genocide against Muslims in Srebrenica in July 1995 marked
the turning point of the war. After four years of terror against
300 NIN, June 12, 1992