*On July 10, 1995, Karremans, the Dutch commander of U.N. forces at Srebrenica, requested air support from the senior Unprofor officer, the French general Bertrand Janvier. These repeated requests were denied. When on July 11 Karremans desperately asked for NATO air strikes to relieve his position, Janvier declined to send the request forward, unbelievably, on the grounds that Karremans had used the wrong request form. The massacres occurred five days later.
†One doubts whether this justifies the actions of those Dutch soldiers who forced Muslim families out of the U.N. compound at one of the “safe areas” and then surrendered their U.N. helmets to the Serbs who used them to dupe Muslims who had fled to the hills into coming forward to their destruction. The real shame, however, lies with the political leaders who put these soldiers in such a position.