An Organised and Comprehensive Effort

General Mosh

13. From 26 May 1995 through 19 June 1995, Bosnian Serb Forces under the command and control of General Ratko MLADIC seized and held over two hundred UN military observers and UN peacekeepers as hostages, following air strikes by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization ("NATO") against Bosnian Serb Forces in BiH, in order to deter further air strikes in those areas where the hostages were being held. Some of the hostages were assaulted and otherwise maltreated during their captivity.

14. On 8 March 1995, Radovan KARADZIC, as the Supreme Commander of the VRS, issued Operational Directive 07, which directed the VRS to eliminate the Muslim enclaves of Srebrenica and Zepa, in furtherance of the "strategic objectives" of 12 May 1992. On 2 July 1995, Bosnian Serb Forces under the command and control of General Ratko MLADIC attacked the Srebrenica enclave. This attack on the enclave continued until 11 July 1995, when General Ratko MLADIC and the Bosnian Serb Forces entered Srebrenica. Subsequently, those Bosnian Serb Forces terrorised Bosnian Muslims, who were forcibly transferred to areas outside the enclave and many of whom fled in a huge column through the woods towards Tuzla. The majority of this group consisted of unarmed military personnel and civilians.

15. Between 12 July and about 20 July 1995, thousands of Bosnian Muslim men were captured by, or surrendered to, Bosnian Serb Forces under the command and control of General Ratko MLADIC. Over 7,000 Bosnian Muslim prisoners captured in the area around Srebrenica were summarily executed from 13 July to 19 July 1995. Killings continued thereafter. From about 1 August 1995 through about 1 November 1995, VRS units under the command and control of General Ratko MLADIC participated in an organised and comprehensive effort to conceal the killings and executions of the Bosnian Muslims of Srebrenica by reburying, in isolated locations, bodies exhumed from mass graves.

(International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia)

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Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina
28 June 2001
1830 Local Time

It was past dinnertime, and Dina’s baby was getting fussy. She bounced and whispered to him as she ambled down the street, keeping a close eye for street vendors or more nefarious individuals. Tuzla was, mostly, a safe city, but safe and safe for her could sometimes be two very different things. She didn’t usually like to stay out much into the evening, especially not just her and the child. But sometimes, like tonight, Dina didn’t have a choice. It was be out or be hungry. She’d been hungry enough in her twenty-three years.

A warm summer breeze wafted down the street, bringing with it the mouth-watering scents of the nearby market. The breeze ruffled through her hair, blowing a few stray strands in front of her face and momentarily obstructing her vision. Solely by habit, she stopped to run her sleeve across her face, her son sensing her slight distress and nuzzling closer into her shoulder. Now a soft thumping noise filled the air, getting louder by the moment, and she looked up just in time to see three big, dark-colored helicopters swoop through the air above the city. The summer breeze turned into a summer gust, and she stepped several steps to the side of the street before they were gone.

In Tuzla, it wasn’t uncommon to see military helicopters or other signs that peace was barely old enough to go to primary school. It was quite a bit more uncommon for the helicopters to swoop so low over the city, and Dina let her mind wander for a few seconds as she regained her path and continued towards the market. But then those smells filled her nostrils again, and having barely considered the destination of those strange helicopters, or indeed the men inside of them, Dina was hurrying for dinner.
 

General Mosh

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Ladies and gentlemen, a narrative timeline set in the former Yugoslavia. The PoD will occur over the next few posts (well, it's already occurred, I just mean make itself apparent), and then after that I've got some wild ideas brewing for how the story might escalate further.

I hope you guys enjoy the read! And please, feel free to leave a comment even if it's not groundbreakingly substantial. Reader feedback is a helpful inspiration.
 
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General Mosh

Somewhere above Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina
28 June 2001
1835 Local Time

“Adjusting course 15 degrees northeast towards the operating area. We’re going silent until necessary.” The other teams signaled their assent before doing the same. Wind buffeted the aircraft briefly before they finished the course correction, and Sam gripped at the sides of his seat. He had never been a huge fan of flying, and doing it on a real operation seemed to suck even more than doing it during routine training. He’d only been in Bosnia a week, and the assignment to SFOR had come as a surprise to these men, who had expected a deployment closer to the Middle East, or maybe even the opportunity to spend July 4th in the states.

They hadn’t been given much time to train for this mission, the opportunity was apparently time sensitive, and diplomatically flammable. Sam chided himself for the understatement. Before setting off, the Colonel who had briefed the teams had reminded all of them that this region had once been called the powder keg of Europe, and that not much had occurred to dissuade anyone of that sentiment. Their job was to toss a lit match in the keg and make sure it didn’t go off. It wasn’t a particularly comforting metaphor, but sometimes it was important to be reminded just how high the stakes were. This was Mogadishu in the center of Europe, and that was still a fresh memory.

The helicopter bumped again as they flew low over a particularly tall copse of trees. That was supposed to help the three Black Hawks avoid the attention of Serbian radar, but Sam wasn’t sure how much it would help. It seemed as though the brass expected the Serbian military to be, if not compliant, then at least purposely ignorant. A task force of aircraft loaded with an assortment of anti-Serb capabilities was enjoying a holding pattern somewhere over Bosnia just in case the Serbs didn’t get the message. That was some comfort, anyways.

Sam wiped his goggles with the edge of his glove and tried not to hold onto the seat any tighter as they crossed into Serbia proper.

Belgrade, Serbia
28 June 2001
1850 Local Time

A cold draft worked its way into the cold, grey cell as a guard opened the door, ushering two more into the room. The man sitting inside looked up with some dismay. He’d been sure his time was coming, but hopeful, after the day’s news, that it wouldn’t be tonight. He’d been wrong. The man stood uncertainly, holding his arms out in front of him. One of the guards stepped off to the side as the other clasped his wrists in cuffs, then both of them stood next to him, each with a stiff hold on an arm. They marched him out of the cell and into the slightly warmer hallway, where another trio of guards waited with the one holding the door. As one, all six of them marched down the hallway, the man who was once President of Serbia centered between all of them.

The man endeavored to keep his head held high, always aware of appearances. His characteristic hairline and swept-back grey hair announced his presence to everyone watching from the sides, but the grey-white stubble on his chin and the lines around his eyes suggested a wariness that he would have liked to have kept hidden. The guards weren’t rough with him, but they were firm, and they made sure the man didn’t miss a step as they approached a stairway near the end of the hall. Two went ahead of them, two behind, and the two guards escorting the man took each step of the stairs in lock with their captive.

Despite himself, the man was almost proud of the young Serbians whose faces showed less emotion than a guard outside London’s royal palace or America’s Arlington. The six, no doubt, had been handpicked by the men in charge of the prison, the men apparently loyal to Serbia’s current Prime Minister. The man briefly wondered how the nation would receive his extradition, before turning his thoughts to his fate at the destination they intended for him. Genocide. He scoffed. What did America’s puppet Europeans know about the necessities of war? The Bosniaks had brought events on themselves.

They only climbed three or four flights of stairs before coming to a brief stop before a thick metal door. One of his guards stepped forward, banging loudly on the door twice before a fourth pair of guards opened it from the outside. Fresh air rushed into the building and the man blinked as he was taken out into the natural light. A plain military helicopter sat on the roof outside, crewed by a pilot and a pair of soldiers just as emotionless as the prison guards who had brought him outside. A third military man, this one appearing to have some authority, stood to the side, smoking idly as the guards marched the man towards the helicopter. He didn’t protest as he was led to the side door and told to step in, or when his feet and hands were secured to the frame of the seat. The third military man finished his cigarette, tossing it into an ash bin before sauntering over to the helicopter. He checked his watch, then stepped in and took a seat across from the former President. The doors were slammed, and the helicopter spun up slowly as the prison guards watched from across the roof. Slobodan Milosevic stared out the window as the helicopter began its ascent.

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington D.C.
28 June 2001
1250 Local Time

“Milosevic is out of Belgrade.” Nervous applause breezed through the room - even with lives in the offing the nation’s top political and military brass couldn’t avoid a self-congratulatory display. Captain Miller didn’t join in. He wasn’t – quite – the lowest-ranking member in the room, but he was close enough to still feel nervous at the sheer array of power and personality on display. Top Presidential aides, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State, and all manner of uniformed gentlemen from the Pentagon sat around a central table, surrounded by screens, aides, and mountains of paper. It could be overwhelming, which is why Captain Miller leaned into his job so hard and bent himself back over the computer monitor in a corner of the room.

Ever since the Yugoslavian Constitutional Court had made their ruling at what was very early in the morning DC time, the powers-that-be in Washington had been nervous about the night’s planned festivities. Milosevic’s extradition was a vital cog in the planned operation, and the American and European ambassadors particularly had spent a long day wading through the minefield of Serbian politics. Thankfully, the Serbian Prime Minister was of a “now let them enforce it” disposition, and now the former Serbian President was on his way to a long, all expenses paid stay at the Hague. It was almost enough to celebrate all by itself. Almost. But there was a second part.

Captain Miller wasn’t privy to the particular diplomatic intrigues it had taken to line up the second opportunity, and although he was sure they were fascinating, he didn’t particularly care. His job was to be worried about the military component of the operation. A fuzzy video feed on one of his monitors showed two helicopters sweeping low through the air ahead of the third, deliberately doing their best to stick to the rural countryside between their base and their destination. A second, less fuzzy feed showed on another monitor, focused on a low-slung block of apartments, non-descript in their appearance. They could have been built in any Eastern European city, and probably didn’t look much different from the way they had under unified Yugoslavia. Their appearance, he supposed, was the point.

The streets surrounding the apartment were reasonably quiet, empty except for some civilians walking home from work and what looked to be a couple drunks leaned up against the side of a late 80s style vehicle. There were no sentries, as far as Miller could see, and the park next to the apartment block was similarly sparsely populated. They couldn’t see inside the apartment, but as far as the outside looked it was a normal Thursday night in Belgrade. He nodded to the Colonel overseeing the operation on this side of the Atlantic. Everything still looked pretty good.

Miller was engrossed enough in his own surveillance not to notice the brief commotion at the door at the front of the room, but he had enough situational awareness – and perhaps the self-preservation – to stand at attention when his eyes caught everyone else doing the same thing. The President entered the room.
 

General Mosh

Belgrade, Serbia
28 June 2001
1910 Local Time

The landscape started get a lot more urban the closer they got to the center of Serbian governance. Sam had never spent a lot of time in Europe, but a more practiced eye might have identified the low slung row housing and apartment blocks as not being out of place in any large European city. The streets were busy but not packed, and Sam noticed an increasing number of people staring up at the darkening sky and the helicopters plowing through it. They were flying a little higher now, radar didn’t matter as much when the Serbians could just look out their windows and confirm the incursion for themselves, but Sam could still make out individual faces on the city’s sidewalks and staring off of balconies.

“We’re getting close”. The Lieutenant leading their team confirmed what Sam and doubtlessly the others already knew. The helicopters banked hard over the river now (was that the Danube or the Sava?) before sweeping low over another set of apartment blocks and then beginning to slow. One of the helicopters broke off to take a holding pattern. Sam checked his sights one last time, and then made some last-minute adjustments to the straps on his helmet. His Black Hawk pulled up sharply over a non-descript apartment building, hovering 30 feet from the roof. The operative next to him rappelled down first, then Sam. He was on the roof in seconds. The Lieutenant came down not long after him.

It still wasn’t dark enough outside to make the use of IR any benefit, so Sam activated the small light on the barrel of his weapon before switching the safety off, talking care not to put his finger on the trigger. He swung it around the roof, carefully checking the corners for movement or dark shapes that looked out of place. The other members of his team did the same thing, before each signaled to their Lieutenant that the roof was clear. He spoke into the radio.

“Gold is in position.” Then the door swung open.

Washington D.C.
28 June 2001
1310 Local Time

The President was conferring quietly with his Secretaries when the three helicopters came into view on Captain Miller’s satellite feed. He signaled to the Colonel, who got someone’s else’s attention, who whispered in the President’s ear. The room was dead silent, and the mute satellite feed the center of everyone’s attention. One of the helicopters peeled off and out of frame, while the other two made for the building to the north, one making directly for the roof and another for the park beyond it. Dark-clad men rappelled from the helicopter over the roof, and seconds later similar men were doing the same at the park.

As designed, the plan was simple. Gold team would land on the roof, proceeding directly down the central stairway (via a roof access door) to the target apartment. Silver team would land in the park, proceeding directly to the ground floor of the target building to prevent ground escape and support Gold as needed. Copper remained in the sky, watchful, to be deployed if absolutely necessary. Once the target was secured, Gold would escort him to the roof, where Gold’s helicopter would hover near the parapet and receive its team and their prisoner. Then Silver would proceed to the roof and do the same thing.

Even the best laid plans didn’t survive contact with the enemy, though. Miller remembered Mogadishu just as vividly as everyone else in this room. The idea was to avoid another black hawk down incident in the middle of the volatile Balkan peninsula. But this target, the President had decreed, was worth it. Miller suspected the President would take full advantage of the good will at home if he brought the target to the Hague the same night Milosevic was transferred. And so he should, Miller thought. He was proud he hadn’t voted for the other guy.

The radio crackled to life. “Gold is in position”.

There was some commotion on the apartment roof. A series of flashes illuminated the scene, and Miller thought he saw someone stumbling back into the door on the roof. One of Gold’s members followed directly after him, then the rest. Silver looked to be moving faster too, leapfrogging from cover to cover across the park, and then stacking on the apartment’s main door. Miller watched as one of Silver’s members kicked it open. A garbled transmission came across the radio. “Gold…en…contact. We...assistance.” Copper’s helicopter angled towards the building.

Belgrade, Serbia
28 June 2001
1913 Local Time

Sam panted hard as he half-ran, half-jumped down the stairs. He stepped over the broken corpse at the bottom of the flight, rounding the corner and clearing the next before yelling back up the stairs that it was clear. The rest of his team followed. Someone slapped his shoulder and Sam made his way down the next set of flights, clearing again. One of Gold’s members placed a metal chock in every stair door they passed on the way down, hopefully blocking it long enough for them to have the opportunity to grab the target. Sam was certain everybody had heard the brief staccato burst of gunfire from the roof, which had probably been some guard curious about the noise the helicopters made. That was a dumb mistake the entire team should have been ready for.

They cleared yet another flight of stairs before coming to another door which led to a hallway beyond. Sam and the rest of the team stacked up on it. Sam tried the handle. It was unlocked. He opened the door slightly, then slammed it with his foot. It shot open, and someone tossed a pair of concussion grenades down the hallway. The door was closing again when those went off, and Sam slammed it again, this time propping it open while the rest of the team funneled around him. A scream down the hallway was punctuated by shouting and the tinkle of broken glass. Sam crept down the hallway with the rest of the team, keeping his weapon raised.

They crept past the first two doors without incident, quickly clearing the apartments and finding nothing but terrified civilians and barking dogs. The third door was slightly agar, and Sam threw a concussion grenade inside before kicking open the door. The apartment was bare of people or furniture. The fourth door was the target apartment. Before they could even approach it a sharp burst of gunfire cut low through the hallway, sending splinters of the door flying and the team jumping for cover. One of them went down with a muffled scream, clutching his leg. The others returned fire, reducing the door further to splinters. Angry shouts responded from inside.

Sam methodically fired into the blown-open doorway, aiming to keep down the heads of everyone inside as one of the other operatives inched forward across the hallway, grabbing their wounded man and pulling him back towards the stairway. Then Sam stopped firing. The acrid stench of sulfur mixed with the bitter taste of wood dust and the bloody tang of iron. The hallway fell silent except for a muffled whimper inside that sounded barely human, and the heavy breathing of the men in the hallway. It was getting dark now. They moved forward. Yet another set of concussion grenades was used to clear the room, and Sam was the first in.

He almost missed the man to his right who came out of the bathroom swinging an AK like a club, knocking Sam backwards into a closet. The man started to level his rifle before his face disappeared in a spray of red mist, hit by the trained gunfire of the men who had entered the apartment directly behind Sam. They pushed past Sam as he extricated himself from the closet and followed behind. They went right, into the living room. Sam pushed left, towards the kitchen, and then slowed when something in the pantry behind it caught his eye. The edge of a boot, maybe, just visible around the frame. Sam signaled to the men still behind him, and then moved forward. “Drop it! Odustati!” It was the only Serbian word he remembered from the briefing.

For a wonder, the man inside the pantry obeyed, slowly moving into the kitchen with his hands above his head. He was a little overweight, with the beginnings of a double chin and dirty stubble on his face. He wore a stained white t-shirt and fatigues for pants, his grey hair was cut short and he had on a goofy looking hat that wouldn’t have been out of place on an American retiree. He didn’t have a weapon, and he didn’t look to have a lot of fight left in him either. “Come here”. The man did as he was told, and Sam pulled a set of zip ties from his belt, turning the man around and securing his hands. Then he turned him over to the Sergeant. “I think this is him sir.”

“Yeah. Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
 
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