It was over before it started

"It's rising, it just hasn't started," photojournalist Zlajo, on duty at the Krajina Press Center, told me over the phone, two or three minutes before five in the morning. On August 1995, 5, at exactly 2:XNUMX a.m., the first volleys of shells fell in Knin, causing a power outage and thus interrupting the speech of Croatian President Franjo Tuđman, who announced that the military-police operation "Storm" had begun and called on the Serbs to remain in their houses.

The previous evening, we all knew that the attack would begin the next day, it was only a matter of time, because Croatia refused the "capitulation" of the Republika Srpska Krajina (RSK) at the negotiations in Geneva. On the morning of August 5, Knin was conquered by Croatian forces descending from Dinara.

KNIN HAS FALLEN IN BELGRADE

How it happened, many people have asked countless times, and a retired colonel wrote the book "Knin fell in Belgrade". Wrong title, missing conjunction "and". Because Knin did not fall only in Belgrade, it fell in Knin, in Pale and most importantly in Karađorđevo, because Tuđman's officials came there to negotiate secretly with Slobodan Milošević and his confidants. Thus, there was no salvation for RSK - solutions and plans were agreed in advance. As far as Republika Srpska (RS) is concerned, its then leader Radovan Karadžić made a big deal with the Croats and reached agreements, and the RSK thus became a target for bribery and a prelude to the future Dayton partition of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The prelude to all this was certainly the fall of the "Kupreška vrata" in November 1994, which the Army of the Republika Srpska (VRS) practically did not even defend, and which opened a further path for the Croatian Army (HV) towards the interior of Bosnia and Herzegovina, because it is strategically important area. At the same time, the HV from the direction of Livna begins an unhindered breakthrough on the snow-bound Dinar, engineering builds roads through the dead-ends, tanks and cannons are brought out. During that time, the Serbian Army of the Krajina (SVK) rests, lulled into a truce; a general mobilization is carried out, which, however, quickly collapses, because there was no one to work in the economy.

When the HV strengthened itself on the top of Dinara, and then in the spring descended on the Dalmatian side of the mountain and occupied strategic elevations, the road to Knin was open to them, the artillery had it in the palm of their hand. In the Main Headquarters of the SVK, they "come to their senses" only then, but it was already too late. Until then, the direction towards Lake Peručka and Dinara was held by an incomplete light infantry brigade, which was commanded by a reserve officer. HV attacks and provocations on Serbian positions were daily, and the SVK command retaliated with "harsh statements" and protests to Unprofor. How much the Croats cared about Unprofor, the fact that they once "hit" with missiles the commander of the peacekeeping mission for the "South" sector, who went with his colleagues to inspect the situation, speaks volumes.

By the time the SVK remembered to send stronger forces there, it was too late: the HV could have thrown stones at them, because they were in such a position. At the same time, the Croats are making progress in conquering the Svilaja mountain, southwest of Knin, which practically found the city semi-surrounded.

DECEPTIVE VIDOVDAN PARADE

May 1, 1995 comes, the fall of Western Slavonia. There is chaos and disunity in RSK, especially among politicians, and some of them, as well as richer people, are slowly sending their families to Serbia, preparing to leave themselves as soon as the moment comes. The VRS does not fire a bullet, let alone a grenade, to help the "brotherly" SVK in Western Slavonia, even the non-commissioned officer who single-handedly shot down a Croatian MiG-21 had problems because of it.

After the fall of Western Slavonia, an indiscriminate hunt for conscripts began across Serbia. It was enough that they were born in Croatia to be forcibly taken to the RSK. It is difficult to make a warrior out of a man so mobilized by force, who has no motivation whatsoever. They are taken to the Plitivite Lakes and the military training ground near Slunj, for supposed training, but in fact they were prepared for the "Vidovdan Parade", which was supposed to raise the morale of the people by deception. Officers led by General Mile Mrkšić and Colonel Milorad Stupar, who was the commander of the parade, were also sent from Belgrade. That meeting, which was attended by the entire leadership of the RSK and its army, also showed that there was some kind of agreement between Milosevic and Tuđman, because the Croats could have "covered" that meeting with artillery or targeted the meeting with airplanes, but they didn't. RSK was the narrowest at that place - only 14 kilometers.

The Vidovdan parade was a prelude to the imminent collapse of the RSK. HV units are advancing through Livanjsko polje towards Bosanski Grahovo on one side and over Šator mountain towards Glamoč on the other side. The second Krajina VRS corps, which in reality was the size of one brigade, torn apart from Bihać to Glamoč, is powerless. At the same time, instead of defending the western part of the RS, the VRS command sends a large number of units to Srebrenica, apparently for political reasons.

And the SVK commits an even greater stupidity: it engages the best forces in the attack on Bihać and Cazinska Krajina in operation "Spider", which was a thorn in the side of the international community and gave Croatia the "green light" for "Storm".

PATRIARCH PAVLE IN KNIN

Part of the militia from SUP Knin (which also included Benkovac and Obrovac), as well as the military police of the North Dalmatian Corps, went to the RS to fight at Štor and defend Grahovo, which was practically a suicide mission. Why did they do that? Well, Grahovo is strategically important for Northern Dalmatia because the only road to Banja Luka and Serbia leads through it. Immediately before the fall, RSK president Milan Martić came to Grahovo and told the population, giving them false hope, that the positions would be restored and that area would be defended. Martić says this at a time when Croatian units could practically walk into Grahovo, which they did on July 28. That was the last nail in the "coffin" for Knin. A day later, Glamoč was also conquered. The next day, July 29, Martic appears on RSK television and declares that he spoke with Milosevic and Karadzic, with whom he agreed on a "unique performance in the defense of Serbian lands." Only the naive militiaman Martić could believe the gambler Karadžić, who was playing his poker game all the time.

By conquering Grahov, the HV acquired all the conditions to come over the mountain, through Brezovec and the "Red Land", to reach Knin itself, which it did, and the small forces of the SVK barely offered it any serious resistance.

At the same time, SVK engineering works hard to widen and fill the macadam "rural" road that leads from Serbs to Martin Brod on the banks of the Una and further to Drvar. The bridge over the Una is being repaired and strengthened, apparently with the intention that tanks and heavy vehicles can cross into the RS.

Patriarch Pavle arrived in Knin on July 30 and said: "It is not easy for our enemies either." And if they knew what they were doing, they would be ready to stop the bloodshed, to discuss in a peaceful, dignified and human way the issues that were between people and that will always exist".

The commander of the Main Staff of the VRS Ratko Mladić was also at the meeting, but he did not speak. He went to the House of the JNA to say goodbye to the journalists and tell them what he was up to. With platitudes typical of JNA officers such as "Grahovo will be liberated soon", he told the journalists: "And say hello to the politicians". That said everything.

LEFT AROUND

The first three days of August pass in anticipation. The news from the front is increasingly devastating for the Serbian side, general mobilization is underway, but "third recruits" or those who have not fought until then are being sent to Dinar. Pompously formed on the "Vidovdan Parade", the Corps of Special Units of the SVK passes through Knin to the front on the Dinara to give the impression that that part of the front will be defended. But on the morning of August 4, everything fell apart like a house of cards. The soldiers mobilized by force retreated practically without firing a shot. Only a part of the Krajina militia and the Military Police remained to defend themselves as much as possible. The withdrawal of Stupar's "corps" leaves the Knin police and the fighters of the Vrlica light and mechanized 75th brigade of the SVK in the lurch.

A few days before the "Storm", Mrkšić changed the commander of the Dalmatian Corps and replaced him with Colonel Slobodan Kovačević, who had arrived from Belgrade, and who, even if he wanted to, could not familiarize himself with the situation.

Stupar and Kovačević later, upon their arrival in Belgrade, were rewarded: the former became the head of the Infantry Directorate, and the latter of the Directorate of Armored and Mechanized Units of the VJ. Both of them were, of course, promoted to generals, because it is, I guess, a custom in all armies - to receive promotions after heavy defeats. Not unless… unless they received an order to defeat and successfully carried it out.

When the HV broke through the "Red Land" (one of the most notorious training grounds among the JNA soldiers) on August 4, the chaos began.

And what happened in the main headquarters of the SVK? This is the author's personal story.

IT HAS STARTED

After the first volley of grenades and VBR rockets that morning after 5 o'clock, I sent the parents who took refuge in the bathroom in the middle of the apartment to the basement of the building, which was like the palm of the hand exposed to the "Red Earth" and a potential target. I hear a loud explosion nearby and through the window, lying on the floor, I see that a building in the neighborhood (known as S-13, the tallest in Knin, seven floors) has been hit. There was not a single military facility anywhere in the vicinity or in that direction. Apparently the aim was to cause panic. Out of all the volleys, only three rockets fell on that densely populated part of the city - one on that multi-story building, the other two on private houses nearby.

I send my parents to the basement with the advice that when the HV has a break in shelling (they also have to go "to brunch" and to "cool their pipes" a bit), head towards the village ten kilometers deep and collect the necessary things and documents. Everything was clear to them, they left on foot.

Under the shelling, I make my way to the Press Center 500-600 meters away and the Krajina news agency "Iskra", whose editor I was. There, everyone is gathered in a room on the ground floor, an old building, with thick walls, right next to the military command building, whose yard has already been hit. The army has its own lines and aggregate, so the connections work. We report to the newsrooms of which we were correspondents (Danko Perić Radio Belgrade, Milorad Bošnjak "Večernji novosti", Petar B. Popović "Ekspres politiki", Srđan Radulović "Borbi", Milan Četnik "Politici", me Tanjug) about the number of rockets and grenades that were fired at Knin in the first hour, and the women we dictate to ask anxiously: "How are you?". The editors, of course, didn't think to ask that. A fellow Chetnik is invited from RTV Politika to be a live guest on their program. He said what they didn't like, so they didn't call him anymore.

DECISION O "TEMPORARY" DISPLACEMENT

A strange situation in the hall of the House of JNA. During the day, various Unproforces come, there they meet with SVK officers. In the command of the SVK, one senses that chaos has broken out. From the building, they take out a black bag in which the dead are packed with the body of the lieutenant colonel of the air force who, as a duty officer in the RV and Air Defense Command, killed himself that morning, allegedly because he read what was written in the envelope with the order in case of an attack.

Chaos lasts the whole day, high-ranking officers appear who claim that the lines are firmly held, and journalists see with the naked eye how the battles are being fought on the "Red Earth", within a rifle range of Knin. News is coming that the Croatian army and police from Mali Alan have stormed the approaches to Gračac, which the "assumption planners" in SVK did not foresee. If the Croats had wanted to, they would have cut off that only escape route, through the Serbs and Martin Brod. During that time, the Drniška front towards Šibenik held well, the 75th Motorized Brigade did not lose positions.

Late in the afternoon, it was certain that columns of refugees from Serbian villages started from the direction of Drniš along the street through the center of Knin. They caused anxiety and panic among the others, complete chaos ensued. That mass of people was impossible to stop. Late in the afternoon, the assistant commander for morale, colonel Kosta Novaković, calls three journalists, among them the author of this text, to inform us that the "Supreme Defense Council of the RSK" made a decision on the temporary relocation of the population from the peripheral areas of Dalmatia.

That morning, by the way, the building of the Krajina radio and television station was hit, which, it turned out, did not have a power generator, so the radio and television remained silent, which caused additional panic among the population. Around 17:XNUMX, the radio was activated, which could only be heard in a narrow area of ​​the city. The Croats took advantage of this, not in Knin, but in Kordun and Bania, where they waged a subversive information war.

We send evacuation reports, we all understand that everything has gone to hell, the columns are getting denser and more massive, with civilians there are already soldiers in them. The front is apparently slowly disintegrating, and in the evening activities can also be seen in the neighboring headquarters building - they are also moving to a "reserve position". Military telephone lines are also disconnected.

A FANTASMAGORICAL DAWN

Four journalists were left to fend for themselves, and none of them have a car. In that hopelessness, we see the then secretary of the Government of the RSK and the president of "Veritas", Sava Štrpac, stuffing the archive into his trunk. We help him, he accepts us in the car and we go - first to the "reserve position" in Padjeni (12 km from Knin). There is no one there. Then in Donji Lapac, the reserve position of the Government. No one there either. Then we go to Serbia, where we find the morning and what the late poet Nebojša Devetak described as a "phantasmagorical dawn".

Tanks and mopeds, self-propelled tractors and motor cultivators, various types of tractors and heavy haulers, horse-drawn carriages attached to luxury "Mercedes", boys of 13 who matured overnight behind the wheels of "jugić" or " tamić", crowds of old women in black crammed into tractor and truck trailers in the merciless August sun. A drunken reservist sitting on a tank "armed" with two buckets of wine shouts: "Serb brothers, victory is ours", thinking he is marching towards Zadar.

The military police of the RS on Oštrelje disarms everyone from the column, as if those people care to continue fighting after losing everything they had. From Oštrelje, from the command of the Second Krajina Corps of the VRS, I am sending the news that Croatian forces have entered Knin - this news has not been announced by Tanjug until today.

Leave us alone.

PSYCHOLOGY: M. Dodik, Patriarch Porfiria, A. Vučić, A. Brnabić

This year's commemoration of the anniversary of "Storm" was again organized by the government in Busija, a refugee settlement near Batajnica, where Šešelj, as the president of the municipality of Zemun, sold plots to refugees for 1997 marks each in 3.000.

Krajišniks from Busi, mostly from Dalmatia and Kordun, have had enough of everything - they remember them once a year.

The President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, ordered the entire Government to come this time, many ministers stopped their vacations (some were vacationing in Croatia). A "people's happening" took place according to the recipe of SNS - mercenary bots were brought in, as well as people employed in public enterprises.

According to the "commander-in-chief", 30.000 people came. No one can explain how so many stood on the plateau in front of the church in Busije.

Be that as it may, a lot of people were brought - yes, the author of this article personally saw it, because thanks to the "civil servant" in the current position of deputy mayor, Goran Vesić, the bus service from Batajnica to Busije and Ugrinovci was canceled. From the train station in Batajnica to the church in Busije, 6,5 kilometers, on the way back, to the center of Batajnica, 7,5 kilometers - and this is where you can see all the misery of those organized "support gatherings", because many of those brought did not leave their buses. It was necessary to walk several kilometers, and they hated it. Why would they bother in the August sun when they had already received their daily wage or completed their work assignment. They really don't care about "Oluja", and about the refugees, Vučić, the indispensable Dodik... They were just asking when the buses will go back. The name of the SNS municipal board and the number were written on each bus, so that people would know.

From Batajnica to Busi, there have never been more policemen. "If this much had been sent to Knin in August 1995, it would never have fallen," one Krajisnik was angry. By the way, the residents of Busi practically boycotted that meeting, they stayed in their houses and yards, they had enough of everything. With that, they sent a clear message - leave us alone, us and our pain.

photo: Rade Prelić / Tanjug

photo: aleksandar kelić