14 August 2007

It was New Zealand’s first deployment of combat troops since the Vietnam War.

A 250-strong rifle company deployed to the war zones of Bosnia, and although it was attached to a British Regiment it took with it an impressive (at the time) assortment of kit – 25 armoured personnel carriers, Unimog trucks, land rovers, field kitchens and containers of equipment.

Even before the first major contingent deployed, a number of NZDF officers had served as United Nations observers in Bosnia throughout the difficult and dangerous early 1990s.

When the first Company readied itself for the combat zone there were street parades, and stories about the tenuous peace agreement in the war ravaged country were seldom off television screens throughout the world.

A total of three reinforced rifle companies deployed, and after the last of these returned home the NZDF continued to maintain a presence to help encourage stability, the rule of law and good governance, and growth.

Now, New Zealand’s 15-year long commitment to the troubled Balkan state has ended. The New Zealand flag was lowered on June 29 at a ceremony in Sarajevo, officially ending the Kiwi involvement in the international peace-keeping effort in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The Commanding Officer of 3 LFG, Colonel Dave Gawn was a young major when he deployed as OC of the New Zealand Company which was based at Santici, alongside Belgian and Dutch transport contingents.

A peace agreement had been signed between the Bosnian Croats and the Bosnian Muslims, and was the precursor to the Kiwi troops deploying and landing at Split on the Dalmatian coast and then moving to the Lashva Valley.

“The extent of the tragedy that we walked into was almost incomprehensible,” he recalls.

“The tension was palpable, particularly between the Bosniaks (Muslims) and the Croats. They were still facing each other off across trenches around the town of Vitez, which was the Croat pocket in the Muslim area, fighting to survive. In places those trenches were only 20 metres apart.”

Looking back, he says, he and his troops were “pretty naive” about what they were facing. “As an Army we hadn’t had any experience in this sort of warfare since (our involvement in) Rhodesia. Our biggest issue was developing a modus operandi to fulfil the mission assigned to us by the British. Basically, it was “go out and further the peace”. We didn’t have much real idea of what was required. Our doctrine and our thinking and pretty much everything else about us as an Army are far more mature now.”

“Most of the Army’s mission-critical equipment was still of the Vietnam era but as young soldiers we weren’t that concerned. It was the best equipment that we had and was sufficient and adequate to do what we were being asked to do.”

Until the peace accord was signed the conflict in the Lashva valley involved Muslims trying to squeeze out a pocket of Croats to provide a more secure and homogenous zone. “The Croats in turn were trying to squeeze out that pocket of Muslims in Stari Vitez, which was a canker in their midst, and the scene of some very heavy, vicious and desperate fighting, each side literally struggling for survival.”

“We were thrown into that environment. I remember arriving in Santici (our operational base) and looking at my officers and thinking, ‘what the hell are we doing here, and, more importantly, what the hell is it that we have to do?’ I was very fortunate because General John McColl (who was the Deputy Commander in Iraq until recently) and Sir Michael Rose arrived on our doorstep and they provided me with my mission. And a good military mission it was: They said - ‘We want you to go out there and further the peace.’That was it no how, no why, nothing else just ‘Go out and further the peace’.

“That was immediately followed by a question from them - ‘How do you propose to do it?’ This is on about day two of arrival. As I said, we were really green my career had been based around training to fight insurgents in the bush and the situation we found ourselves in was a reflection of the preparedness of the New Zealand Army at the time for those sorts of combat/high-end peacekeeping operations.”

But despite the lack of experience in similar situations, the Kiwi approach worked.

The troops were armed, but rather than use firepower to decide issues, they put their best effort into unravelling the complexities that motivated each group – no easy task in a land mass that has experienced centuries of conflict.

As they are doing in Afghanistan and Timor Leste today, the New Zealanders identified who the key personalities were, and the pressure and influence points. Local “leaders” were often not the most savoury of characters – one, Dario Kordic is serving a 25-year prison sentence for war crimes involving a massacre – but communicating with them was necessary in order to make progress.

The local children, however, were another matter. Colonel Gawn: “Children are children – it doesn’t matter which side of the factional line they are on. They are the future, they are innocent, and we cared as much about their safety and well being as their own parents. In our patch the actions of the parents (through the indiscriminate use of mines particularly) were killing and maiming seven to nine kids per week on both sides.

“We talked to the children because we knew they would talk to and influence their parents. If you are able to work with them, then you can build relationships through them by re-building schools, school visits, school books and for us, mine awareness education programmes and cultural programmes. It was a programme of hope built around normalising the lives of kids by getting them back into the schools in the first instance. That line of operation, in particular, was more successful than any others, and I would argue it is relevant in any theatre in the world today. Naturally the security environment has to be sufficiently stable for it to gain traction.”

“We explored different areas and played to our strengths as New Zealand soldiers, enhanced those initiatives that seemed to strike a chord with the locals and treaded very lightly with those that did not. Key amongst these was our ability to harness the nature of soft power at the tactical level, in particular the Maori cultural side of Ngati Tumatuenga proved to be a very powerful force that creates leverage and access into communities that is the envy of other nations.”

Colonel Gawn has maintained a personal watching brief on Bosnia, sparked by his own original involvement, and that of his troops over the years.

“It takes generations for a country to get over the trauma of war, particularly when it is tearing itself apart as Bosnia did, neighbour upon neighbour; religious, cultural and ethnic genocide. There is a long way to go before this country can really take its next step forward. The issues to be resolved will take generations. Justice matters, hence the war crime tribunals were a real key to resolving the Bosnia situation.

“Peace is a state of mind. You have got to have something to live for and that is what we as peacekeepers tried to do.”

Background

The decision to withdraw New Zealand personnel from Bosnia-Herzegovina was made in consultation with the British forces to which they were attached, and the European Unionled Stabilisation Force (EUFOR) which controls the international deployment.

It followed the United Kingdom’s announcement that the bulk of its forces would be pulling out of Bosnia. The European Union is also reducing its military presence from 6000 to 2000 this year.

Defence Minister Phil Goff said New Zealand had relied on the larger United Kingdom force to support its deployment in areas such as logistics. It made sense to withdraw New Zealand personnel in conjunction with the British wind-down.

“The role of EUFOR has evolved to the point where its forces are presently limited to reassuring the Bosnian population rather than deterring armed forces. The focus of peace support operations has now shifted to political and civil institution building. As a result the requirement for a military presence is reducing.”

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