C. Wiebes - Intelligence en de oorlog in Bosnië 1992-1995. De rol van de inlichtingen- en veiligheidsdiensten - Engels

108It is important to note that the British and the Danes each in their own way appeared to be ableto partially alleviate these same shortcomings for their units. Brantz proposed the formulation of anaction plan to minimize the perceived difficulties in the short term. 491 In a response, the Commanderin-Chiefstated that all that needed to be established was why the promise of intelligence support to theDutchbat commander made by the Head of the MIS could not be kept; this was information that theDutchbat commander had to have. There was to be consultation on the action plan with theMIS/Army’s Intelligence and Security Department. 492Dutchbat therefore provisionally received no optimum intelligence support from The Hague,but neither had it set up any intelligence-gathering structure of its own. The intelligence staff officerwas not a key officer. In fact, Dutchbats I and II were not even allowed by its commander to take anintelligence staff officer with them. It is true that there was an intelligence officer with the transportbattalion, but he was located in Simin Han with the Alpha Company, not in Srebrenica. In September1994, no official intelligence officer was present in Simin Han either; only later was a soldier assigned tothis specific work. At the Netherlands Support Command in Lukavac there was likewise no officer withthe function of gathering intelligence. 493 However, one officer there was given responsibility for MilitarySecurity.The debriefing reports of this Military Security section in Lukavac showed that in the periodJuly-November 1994 there was no good collaboration with Dutchbat (‘useless’ was the pronouncementmade by the section itself). There were numerous problems. The information on the order of battle ofthe warring factions and other intelligence went in the first instance to Dutchbat in Srebrenica, whowere supposed to provide feedback to Support Command in Lukavac. The officer responsible forMilitary Security did report to Dutchbat in Srebrenica, but discovered that his reports were not beingincorporated in Dutchbat’s daily Situation Reports (Sitreps) further along the UN line. Instead of theinformation received, the Dutchbat Sitreps simply stated ‘Nothing To Report’. The reports wereapparently of no interest to Dutchbat. At a certain point, Commander P. Everts of Dutchbat II evenwanted to abolish this post in Lukavac, but The Hague nipped this plan in the bud. The last straw forthe officer in Lukavac was when he phoned the compound in Potocari and a soldier intheOperationsroom (the command post) asked him who he was. Subsequently, this military securityman started up his own network.In contrast, Lukavac’s collaboration with the Dutch company in Sapna and with the TransportBattalion worked well. Everything the convoy commanders encountered that might be of interest froman intelligence point of view was passed on to the intelligence officer in Lukavac, who forwarded it tohis opposite number in Sector North East (SNE). Incidentally, this Scandinavian officer regularlywarned him that the VRS listened in on UNPROFOR’s communication traffic, and for this reasonadvised him not to include everything in situation reports. 494 The warning was probably intended as asignal: not long afterwards the MIS/Army discovered that a Scandinavian intelligence service wasmonitoring the traffic between various units of the Dutch Signals battalion in Bosnia. Two Dutchsoldiers were overheard making extremely denigrating remarks about their commander. 4955. Intelligence gathering in the enclave under Dutchbats I, II, IIIIn Dutchbat I, intelligence was gathered by the team for civil-military relations (in military terms: the S-5) under the leadership of Major A. Derksen. This team arranged the liaison with the ABiH and VRS,compiled a great deal of information, and made a ‘mugshot album’. The team had no example to followin terms of how it was supposed to operate and interpreted its task in its own commando-like way.491 MoD, Archive CSKL, No. 379, Brantz to BLS, No. CRST/374, 06/06/94.492 MoD, Archive CSKL, No. 380, the Royal Netherlands Army Crisis Staff ‘Morning Briefing , No. CRST/497, 22/06/94.493 MoD, Archive CSKL, Royal Netherlands Army Crisis Staff ‘Morning Briefing , No. 378, G-2 Cap. Hagenaars to HINL, No. CBST/941, 15/09/94.494 MoD, Archive 101 MI S/ Cie , Van Jawad to Hakort, Debriefing report 101 MI S/Cie, 23/12/95.495 Interview with H. Bosch, 10/10/01.