It is simply childish to attach blame to the Dutch troops. They were hopelessly ill-equpped for their task, their mandate was constricting and they were protecting a "safe haven" which had armed itself to the teeth in the preceding years under the noses of various UN troops who had preceded them.

Also they could not have foreseen the fate awaiting the men and youths among the prisoners. It was customary for all factions in the conflict to separate out males of fighting age when releasing other prisoners. Whoever gave the order to murder the male prisoners captured at Srebrenica (and it certainly was not General Radislav Krstic who is now serving a ridiculously long sentence for the fact that some of his troops were put on to the task outside his control), it was an act of sheer insanity as well as a criminal outrage.

The blame belongs overwhelmingly with those who gave the orders and those who carried out the orders. And perhaps some blame should be attached to those who stirred up the mood for vengeance by destroying scores of surrounding Serb villages and their civilian populations.

Blaming the Dutch would just be adding to the game of finding scapegoats.