Feral Jundi

    Interesting case, just because it kind of highlights some history about Operation Storm and the work MPRI was involved with. I wouldn’t mind hitting on this in a future ‘history’ or ‘strategy’ post, because I am sure there are some very intriguing areas to explore when it comes to this operation.  It certainly sounds impressive.

    As to the case, I will not comment too much because I don’t know a lot about either side’s position.-Matt

Edit: 08/20/2010 – David Isenberg has far more to say about this, and the consensus he found is that this is a weak case. David also reported on MPRI back in the day, and interviewed the participants of Operation Storm.  So I tend to think he has this one nailed.

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U.S. Mercenaries Accused of Abetting Genocide

By ROBERT KAHN

August 18, 2010

     (CN) – A private U.S. defense contractor “trained and equipped the Croatian military for Operation Storm and designed the Operation Storm battle plan,” which killed or displaced more than 200,000 Serbs in 1995, in the largest European land offensive since World War II, the Genocide Victims of Krajina say in Chicago Federal Court. They demand billions of dollars in damages from MPRI, founded by U.S. military officers who were “downsized” at the end of the Cold War, and L-3 Communications, which bought MPRI for $40 million in 2000.”This is a class action brought by ethnic Serbs who resided in the Krajina region of Croatia up to August 1995 and who then became victims of the Croatian military assault known as Operation Storm – an aggressive, systematic military attack and bombardment on a demilitarized civilian population that had been placed under the protection of the United Nations,” the 40-page complaint begins.”Operation Storm was designed to kill or forcibly expel the ethnic Serbian residents of the Krajina region from Croatian territory, just because they were a minority religio-ethnic group. Defendant MPRI, a private military contractor subsequently acquired by Defendant L-3 Communications Inc., trained and equipped the Croatian military for Operation Storm and designed the Operation Storm battle plan. Operation Storm became the largest land offensive in Europe since World War II and resulted in the murder and inhumane treatment of thousands of ethnic Serbs, the forced displacement of approximately 200,000 ethnic Serbs from their ancestral homes in Croatian territory, and the pillaging and destruction of hundreds of millions of dollars worth of Serbian-owned property. The victims of Operation Storm and their heirs and next of kin herein claim that Defendants were complicit in genocide.” (more…)