| 1992 Yugoslav campaign in Bosnia | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of the Bosnian War | |||||||||
 | |||||||||
| |||||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||||
 SFR Yugoslavia (until 27 April 1992) Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (from 27 April 1992) Republika Srpska |
 Bosnia and Herzegovina Herzeg-Bosnia Croatia | ||||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||||
|
Slobodan Milošević Željko Ražnatović Vojislav Šešelj Radovan Karadžić Ratko Mladić |
Alija Izetbegović Sefer Halilović Murat Šabanović Mate Boban Milivoj Petković | ||||||||
| Units involved | |||||||||
| Strength | |||||||||
.svg){kind=small} JNA 100,000 troops VRS 40,000 (from 12 May to 19 May) |
 TOBiH 70,000 troops HVO 20,000 HV 15,000 | ||||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||||
| Unknown | Heavy | ||||||||
The 1992 Yugoslav campaign in Bosnia was a series of engagements between the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) and the Territorial Defence Force of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (TO BiH) and then the Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ARBiH) during the Bosnian war. The campaign effectively started on 3 April and ended 19 May.
The war was part of the breakup of Yugoslavia. Following the Slovenian and Croatian secessions from the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1991, the multi-ethnic Socialist Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina – which was inhabited by mainly Muslim Bosniaks (44%), Orthodox Serbs (32.5%) and Catholic Croats (17%) – passed a referendum for independence on 29 February 1992. Political representatives of the Bosnian Serbs boycotted the referendum, and rejected its outcome. Anticipating the outcome of the referendum, the Assembly of the Serb People in Bosnia and Herzegovina adopted the Constitution of the Serbian Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina on 28 February 1992. Following Bosnia and Herzegovina's declaration of independence (which gained international recognition) and following the withdrawal of Alija Izetbegović from the previously signed Cutileiro Plan (which proposed a division of Bosnia into ethnic cantons), the Bosnian Serbs, led by Radovan Karadžić and supported by the government of Slobodan Milošević and the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA), mobilised their forces inside Bosnia and Herzegovina in order to secure ethnic Serb territory. The war soon spread across the country, accompanied by ethnic cleansing.
The first clashes took place in Kupres between the Bosnian Croat Territorial Defence Force supported by the Croatian Army troops on one side and the Yugoslav People's Army. There were battles for Zvornik, Višegrad, Foča, Doboj, Prijedor and many more cities later. The JNA officially withdrew from Bosnia and Herzegovina in May 1992. In January 1992, a Bosnian Serb self-proclaimed statelet was declared. Later renamed Republika Srpska, it developed its own military as the JNA withdrew and handed over its weapons, equipment and 55,000 troops to the newly created Bosnian Serb army.[42][44] On 20 May 1992 the JNA was formally dissolved, the remnants of which reformed into the military of the newly founded Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
- ^ Balkan Battlegrounds: A Military History of the Yugoslav Conflict. Central Intelligence Agency, Office of Russian and European Analysis. 2002. p. 160. ISBN 978-0-16-066472-4.