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

123capacity of the UN, but as described in Chapter 1 of this study, this was something that the UN did notpossess. Voorhoeve had previously declared this to Parliament as well: the UN had no intelligenceservice of its own and was therefore unaware of the VRS strategy. 579This demonstrated that the Minister had not fully fathomed the process behind gatheringintelligence. Dropping special units behind enemy lines is one method of gathering intelligence, but, ofcourse, not the only one. Perhaps the Ministry of Defence and the Netherlands Army should havefocused on utilizing the possibility of gathering Sigint from the enclave as effectively as possible. Itwould have been possible to operate an Electronic Warfare Unit from Tuzla in support of their ownbattalion. This unit could have concentrated on intercepting VHF communication traffic, and wouldhave been effective within an area of over 50 kilometres around the deployment position. This optionwas even proposed by the MIS/Army, but Couzy rejected it. In a UN context, no intelligence tasksneeded to be executed. 580Such an arrangement would have strongly improved the negotiating position of The Hague inthe international intelligence community. Furthermore, the remark that within the framework ofUNPROFOR the Netherlands had no spies among the Serbs was a strange starting point to adopt. Forthe sake of Force Protection, the Minister should perhaps have encouraged the MIS/CO or theCommander-in-Chief of the Royal Netherlands Army through his MIS/Army to take such a step.Force Protection in particular implies that special attention be paid to counterintelligence (subversion,espionage and terrorism). 581 If this had succeeded, then The Hague would no longer have been arequesting party on the national and international stage, and would also have received more intelligencein return on a quid pro quo basis.The question then remains as to how the ministers and the senior Ministry of Defence officialsactually did receive their intelligence. The MIS/CO reported directly and through special briefings tothe Ministers Ter Beek and Voorhoeve, the senior ministry officials and military officers. Thesebriefings, by the MIS/CO’s only Balkans analyst, took place in the meetings of the Defence CrisisManagement Centre (DCBC). They were carried out on behalf of the CDS responsible for policyguidance and evaluation of crisis management operations. The Centre was founded during the GulfWar. The branches of the Armed Forces contributed the necessary officers and NCOs, but until the582autumn of 1994 they still did not have the requisite qualities.At the time there was an MIS cell at the Defence Crisis Management Centre, (DCBC) but thedepartment’s senior officials took hardly any interest in it. The Balkans analyst himself considered theinformation given in the briefings to be ‘pearls cast before swine’. MIS/Air Force staff, who sometimesattended briefings at the Centre, confirmed this. The team at the MIS cell was not a strong one: onlythe MIS/CO analyst had sufficient calibre but he only carried out the political-strategic part. Thisinfluenced the Head of the MIS, Kok, in backing a proposal to disband the cell. It was later decided,under Knapp, to re-establish a similar MIS cell, but that was after the fall of Srebrenica. Better qualifiedpeople were then assigned. 583On weekdays, the MIS cell arranged briefings and intelligence summaries. According to someMIS officials, the briefings by the MIS/CO were occasionally too pro-Serbian in tone. However, theysaw this mainly as an attempt to offer a counterweight to the pro-Bosnian attitude of the seniorMinistry of Defence officials. According to many MIS personnel, there was a constant ‘good guys, badguys’ mentality in the air, with no room for subtle distinctions. The MIS/CO analyst discovered thisduring briefings for the DCBC, where occasionally there was an element of a selective perception ofthe events in Bosnia. This analyst was to receive a ‘reprimand’ from Voorhoeve in June 1998. He was579 ‘Voorhoeve wist van aanvoer Serviërs naar Srebrenica’ (‘Voorhoeve knew of supply of Serbs to Srebrenica’), De Volkskrant, 11/07/96.580 Interview with H. Bosch, 10/10/01. See especially : Chapter 5 of this study.581 Drs. R. Theunens, ‘Intelligence en vredesoperaties’ (‘Intelligence and peace operations’), Militaire Spectator, Vol . 170 (2001) 11 , p. 600.582 MoD , Archive DCBC, Cabinet 15, File 1, 2212, Notes ‘Improving effectiveness and efficiency’, 19/10/94.583 Confidential interviews (25 ) , ( 26 ) and ( 31).