Henk Kamp awards Dutch soldiers who failed to protect civilians in Bosnia, what do you think?

No medals are deserved. Both the Dutch government and the Dutch soldiers committed a gross act of cowardice.

Who cares if they did not have permission from the UN? Can you imagine US troops standing idly by under similar circumstances?

Sometime you have to tell the UN where to stick it and go out and do the right thing.

I believe that it is correct to reward these soldiers. Soldiers, please remember, only follow orders and this is exactly what these professional men did. Being in the middle of the conflict, the soldiers probably knew a lot more than anyone about the consequences that their withdrawal would bring to the area, and I am sure that many of them still feel in some way guilty for what happened. A soldiers professionalism and bravery in a war zone should never be forgotten. The soldiers in question were part of a multi-national peace-keeping force in an area destroyed by civil conflict and genocide. The men put their life on the line to carry out there role of protecting civilians and could only do so much as was permitted by the UN security council.

You simply cannot blame the Dutch Soldiers for what happened, they were mere pawns in theatre. You can however blame the UN Security Council for its inaction and bureaucracy.

If you put your life on the line, went through hell, maybe even got injured or seen a comrade killed as part of a peace keeping mission in a foreign country, even if it was not a popular war...would you not like some kind of acknowledgement for it?

Not disrespect to dutch soldiers, but if those had been United States Marines guarding those people i dont think they would have abandond them, despite UN orders. A good Marine or Army leader would have done the Right thing and protected those people

around 6 million people whatever race have been killed world wide in secret wars since the cia was put together odviously mi5/6 and mosad and all those other groups have been involved but this is the reality ,this from the mouth of a ex cia employee who was working in the top levels and put together alot of the strategies for this.oh and by the way when i say secret wars that means they were in plain view yet not classed as wars ,yet in reality these thousand sof events were at that level .click on this link http://video.google.co.uk/videoplay?docid=78604845... be informed why this has happend throughout history and it will affect all us who are safe and secure at the minute or stay a zombie ,either way the info has been put in front of you.laters

OK, on the face of it this looks very wrong.

But remember, it was the UN who prevented the soldiers from intervening. This was not a decision they took themselves, or even one taken by the Dutch government.

I read an interview with the Dutch commander some time ago, and the guy has been terribly affected by the horrors of what happened, as have his troops.

He wanted to intervene and was ordered not to. He says now he wishes he had just gone ahead and ignored orders.

But hindsight is a wonderful thing................

It was not the fault of the Dutch soldiers about the events in Bosnia. They were tragically under UN orders to not fire and abandon the Muslim refugees. Had they been left to their own judgment they probably would have fired on the Serbs.