Ante Gotovina
At the end of 1991, realising the potential dangers of a divided army, HOS was disbanded and amalgamated with the Croatian National Guard.
The JNA withdrew from Croatia to Bosnia to enter the second phase of Milošević’s genocidal project, though before leaving, they ensured that the Rebel-Serbs of the Krajina region, the annexed one third of Croatia, who had ethnically cleansed almost 80,000 Croatians, looted and burned their homes and murdered 20,000, were equipped with military hardware.
In March 1994, the then Croatian Defence Minister requested assistance for military training from the US Pentagon. The Pentagon officially declined the request, though directed the Croatians to the Virginia based Military Professional Resource Inc (MPRI). Former US generals staff the MPRI and its main client is the US army. The Pentagon then licensed a contract, signed with the Croatian army and the US advisers set about training in ‘large-scale operations.’ US intelligence operatives, including the CIA, were widely believed to be building up their strength in Zagreb, and it was reported that UN officials had claimed the same US operatives were breaching the United Nations arms embargo.
By 1995 Milošević’s forces had butchered their way through Bosnia carving out 70% of the territory, ethnically cleansed in excess of one million Croats and Muslims, and slaughtered almost 200,000. In July, the seemingly unstoppable Serb forces massacred 7,000 Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica; before moving on to Bihać, where they bombarded hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees, trapped inside the city. The Greater Serbian dream was almost complete. All they had to do now; was enter phase 3: to ‘cleanse’ the ethnic Albanians of Kosova.
Something, however, was going to disrupt their plans – and its name was ‘Operation Storm.’
With the growing humanitarian catastrophe in Bosnia, particularly the increasingly ferocious shelling of Bihać, pressure on the US government finally compelled them to act.
The Clinton Administration realised that in order to bring stability to the region – they needed Croatia.
Evidence suggests that Milošević, aware of an imminent large-scale Croatian offensive to liberate the occupied Krajina region; gave the signal to commence the transfer of Krajina Serbs, in order to re-populate Bosnia-Hercegovina and Kosova.
On August 4th 1995, the united Croatian forces, planned and supported by one or more US agencies, and under the command of General Ante Gotovina, massed their troops around the occupied territory of Krajina. President Tudjman broadcast on Croatian radio for ‘Croatian citizens of Serbian ethnicity in the occupied territories to remain in their homes and not to fear the Croatian authorities who will respect their minority rights.’
General Gotovina’s army smashed through the Serb defences at lightening speed causing 40,000 of their troops and 400 tanks to flee to Banja Luka. Initially the Serbs, haughty with their ‘victories’ of the preceding years, responded by launching fierce artillery and rocket bombardments on Croatian towns and cities; whilst Bosnian and Croatian Serb forces united in the ferocious attack on Bihać.
It’s believed that US NATO aircraft from the air-carrier Theodore Rooselvelt destroyed the Serbs’ radar and anti-aircraft defences, and American EA-6B electronic warfare planes patrolled the air supporting the liberators by jamming the Serbs’ communications.
Within 84 hours, the Croatian forces had liberated the occupied territories, causing the cessation of the Serb onslaught on Bihać, averting a humanitarian catastrophe, and striking the ultimate blow to Milošević’s scheme.
However, what was to follow defies belief.
Subsequent to Milošević’s removal from power by the Serbian people, and the termination of his failed Greater Serbia, the UN, who had stood back and watched his forces butcher at will for almost a decade, established a tribunal in The Hague to prosecute those responsible for crimes committed during the wars in the former Yugoslavia.
As the vast majority of perpetrators were Serbs – no less than “90 percent” according to a classified CIA report leaked to the New York Times in March 1995 - in an attempt to appear even-handed, the prosecutors began to indict a number of Croatians. One of the men - was General Ante Gotovina.
The General was indicted on the vaguest of charges and it is clear to anyone who has studied the case, that the indictment was politically motivated from its inception and the allegations absurd.
The prosecutors allege that due to Operation Storm ‘thousands of Krajina Serbs were ethnically cleansed,’ despite a key Krajina Serb political leader, Milan Babic, testifying that his own leadership ordered the withdrawal of both the military and civilian population. This is confirmed in Politika’s August 23rd 1995 edition, which reproduced a copy of the actual order signed by the Krajina Serb President Mile Martić himself.
It is alleged that a number of soldiers under the General’s command committed atrocities against Serbian civilians during Operation Storm and that he took no preventative measures despite being warned by foreign observers.
Although the terrible crimes committed against the Serbian civilians can in no way be condoned; the majority of the crimes were committed during the three months following the operation, by returning Croatian civilians who’d previously been ethnically cleansed and maverick paramilitaries seeking vengeance – not by the Croatian army.
In addition, almost 300 soldiers who were under the General’s command and responsible for criminal acts were ordered by him to be tried by military court and were subsequently sentenced to prison.
Ante, who also briefed his troops prior to the operation instructing them to ‘respect the international laws of war and to keep in mind the mentality of a victorious army which must not take revenge on the defeated’; is charged with ‘personal and overall command responsibility,’ – a farcical charge which equates to a police commander being indicted if a number of his officers take it upon themselves to maltreat citizens, instead of the individual officers concerned.
There is no single fact, document or indeed any evidence whatsoever that indicates Ante ordered any atrocity.
The operation’s actual ‘chain of command’ commenced with the US agencies and Croatian government, followed by the Ministry of Defence and filtered down to the various Army Commanders on the ground, terminating with the troops. How the prosecutors can conclude that Ante had ‘overall command responsibility’ for the operation, when the facts are clear that he himself was commanded by Zagreb, which in turn was directed and supported by US agencies, who are remaining silent about their involvement, is suspicious in itself.
Two of the alleged murdered victims were subsequently found to be alive and well; yet when the prosecutor’s office was informed of this, the two names continued to remain on the indictment.
Ante Gotovina offered himself as a witness, but despite being aware of these facts, the prosecution is determined that he stands trial. The European Union, instigated by Britain who despatched MI6 operatives to catch him, (shame about your detector van!) blocked Croatia's bid for EU entry unless the Croatian government captured and extradited him to The Hague, with the additional implication that this would adversely affect the entry of other Balkan states. All despite the fact there was no evidence Ante Gotovina was in or near Croatian jurisdiction. The prosecutor, who later publicly claimed The Vatican was shielding Ante, appealed that he should hand himself in ‘if he loved his country.’ Fine words from a member of an organisation which enforced an arms embargo preventing Croatia from defending herself and then sat safely from afar as she was torn apart by a foreign tyrant; to a man who not only returned home and offered his life to defend his people, but also saved his country’s neighbour creating regional stability.
The whole affair convinced many to believe that something underhand is at work in an attempt to make Ante a ‘political scape-goat,’ and has resulted in a campaign for justice, which is growing by the day.
A smear campaign was employed, circulated by some media sources intending to discredit both the general and his associates. Full credit to Ivo Pukanic, who the British media is eager to promote as a 'Gotovina supporter', who from October 1999, was the very first to launch a series of malicious falsified attacks against Ante and other Croatian Defenders in his magazine Nacional. Pukanic conveniently forgot this episode. I didn't, which resulted in Nacional's boss launching a cowardly attack against me live on Croatian TV, in my absence, for reminding him. I then joined the long list of former Croatian Defenders to be the subject of "Nacionals' research workshop" and trademarked anonymous sources. The intended coup-de-grace coming in the guise of Soros Stooge Plamenko Cvitic's crude yet dismal failure - the main thrust of which attempted to attribute blame to me for media allegations connecting Ante to the IRA and organised crime. This time it appears, both Pukanic and Cvitic suffered a strange memory loss and had to be reminded once again that precisely these same allegations actually originated from Pukanic himself and his magazine in the late 1990's - a time before he u-turned having discovered printing support for Ante was the solution to his mounting debts.
Based essentially on Nacional's articles, and later some from the weekly Globus, some international media sources re-cycled the falsified accusations of criminality and unsubstantiated allegations of IRA connections. Ante was then demonised in reports, insinuating that he himself committed or ‘masterminded’ alleged atrocities in Operation Storm.
These same people had the audacity to call the general ‘cowardly’ for not surrendering and clearing himself of the charges. Ante’s conduct however, has been characteristically courageous.
The US government issued a $5 million dollar reward for information leading to Ante’s arrest. Maybe it would be better spent on tracing the former members of the Clinton administration; MPRI and the other US intelligence operatives and providing their airfare to The Hague?
Ante Gotovina, is an innocent man and his unjust indictment must be immediately withdrawn, his reputation re-instated, and his family be left to continue their lives in peace.
TC.
