The investigators have recommended that three Croatian generals be indicted, and a U.S. official said last week that the indictments could come within a few weeks. The indictments would be the first of Croatian army officers for actions in the Balkan wars of 1991 to 1995, which first pitted an independence-seeking Croatia against rebel Serbs and Serbia proper, and then moved to Bosnia. Any indictment of Croatian army generals could prove politically troublesome for the Clinton administration, which has a delicate relationship with Croatia, a U.S. ally with a poor human rights record in preserving the peace in Bosnia. The August 1995 Croatian offensive, which drove some 100,000 Serbs from a large swath of Croatia over four days, was carried out with the tacit blessing of the United States by a Croatian army that had been schooled in part by a group of retired U.S. military officers.
Questions remain about the full extent of U.S. involvement.
In the course of the three-year investigation into the assault, the United States has failed to provide critical evidence requested by the tribunal, according to tribunal documents and officials, adding to suspicion among some there that Washington is uneasy about the investigation. Two senior Canadian military officers, for example, who were in Croatia during the offensive, testified that the assault, which saw some 3,000 shells rain down on the city of Knin over 48 hours, was indiscriminate and targeted civilians. The Pentagon, however, has argued through U.S. lawyers at the tribunal that the shelling was a legitimate military activity, according to tribunal documents and officials. And U.S. officials have repeatedly maintained that they have provided full cooperation with the tribunal. A spokesman for the Croatian Ministry of Defense denied that any war crimes or other illegal acts were committed during the offensive, which the Croatians dubbed Operation Storm.