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

80Chapter 3Dutch intelligence and security services andthe war in Bosnia1. IntroductionQuestion to General Couzy: ‘What was your general view of the role that theDutch intelligence community could play in the deployment and later stationing ofDutch troops in Bosnia?’Answer by General Couzy: ‘What I actually thought was: zero. Yes!’. 378Western intelligence and security services encountered many problems when the war in the Balkansbroke out. There were many teething troubles of a psychological, structural, technical and politicalnature. All the services sought mainly independently for solutions in order to cope with these problems,and attempted to build up a system as quickly as possible that would be able to supply the variousnational capitals with rapid and reliable intelligence. Various considerations and circumstances wereinvolved. For example, the American intelligence community had no need to take into account theinterests of American troops on the ground in Bosnia: only those of the US Air Force and the USNavy. The main function of intelligence in Washington DC appeared to be a source of information forthe political and military policymakers. The priorities at first sight appeared to be different in TheHague, London, Paris, Ottawa, Oslo, Stockholm and Copenhagen. However, this was not the case. Thepriorities for the US intelligence community were very similar, but involved no ground forces. Forceprotection from surface-to-air assets extended beyond the coastal area, and served to support airliftefforts and enforcement of the No-Fly Zone deep inside the country. The dimension of the problemwas different, but the function was fundamentally the same, and completely natural for any nation: toprotect the military assets inserted into harm’s way. As well as the function described above,intelligence in those capitals served mainly for the protection of the countries’ own ground forces, airforce and navy. The question that is now in the spotlight is how the gathering and dissemination ofintelligence was organized in the Netherlands.This chapter examines the Netherlands intelligence and security services in greater detail. Thepolitical willingness to send troops to Bosnia, both in Parliament and in the government, was greaterafter pictures had been shown on television of the camps in northwest Bosnia. In the debates on thedeployment there was nonetheless a lack of clear statements on intelligence support for the deployedtroops. Neither could anything be read on the subject in the parliamentary motions that wereadopted. 379 It can be deduced from this that parliamentarians and the government had no interest in therelationship between peacekeeping and intelligence. The question arises as to whether this politicalinterest in intelligence was indeed zero, especially on a ministerial and parliamentary level, and if sowhat the underlying reason was. One possibility is that the services failed to press their demands on thepoliticians sufficiently firmly; another is that they did not present themselves effectively enough.Even if the interest had been stronger, the question remains as to whether the services werewell enough prepared for Dutch participation in the Bosnia mission. The question arises as to what wasthe information position of the foreign intelligence service (Inlichtingendienst Buitenland, IDB), thenational security service (Binnenlandse Veiligheidsdienst, BVD) and the military intelligence service (MilitaireInlichtingendienst, MID, hereafter MIS). The IDB hardly played any role in the conflict in Bosnia; this378 Interview with H. Couzy, 04/10/01.379 See Chapter 13 of Part I of the Srebrenica r eport.