Operation Vrbas '92

Operation Vrbas '92
Part of the Bosnian War
Jajce Travnik Bugojno N. Travnik Prozor Vitez Banja Luka Jajce and nearby towns on the map of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Date June 1992 – 29 October 1992 Location Jajce, Bosnia and Herzegovina Result Bosnian Serb victory Exodus of non-Serb civilians from Jajce Widespread destruction of Jajce's cultural heritage
Belligerents
Republika Srpska	Bosnia and Herzegovina Herzeg-Bosnia
Commanders and leaders
Momir Talić Stanislav Galić Dragan Marčetić	Tihomir Blaškić Stjepan Blažević Midhat Karadžić
Strength
7,000–8,000 troops	3,400–5,500 troops
Casualties and losses
Unknown	103 killed 492 wounded 5 missing
30,000–40,000 refugees

Bosnian Serb victory

Operation Vrbas '92 (Serbian: Операција Врбас '92) was a military offensive undertaken by the Army of Republika Srpska (Vojska Republike Srpske – VRS) in June–October 1992, during the Bosnian War. The goal of the operation was the destruction of a salient around the central Bosnian town of Jajce, which was held by the Croatian Defence Council (Hrvatsko vijeće obrane – HVO) and the Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Armija Republike Bosne i Hercegovine – ARBiH). The intensity of fighting varied considerably and involved several major VRS offensive efforts interspersed by relative lulls in fighting. Jajce fell to the VRS on 29 October 1992, and the town's capture was followed by the destruction of all its mosques and Roman Catholic churches.

The fighting improved the safety of VRS lines of communication south of the Bosnian Serb capital of Banja Luka, and displaced between 30,000 and 40,000 people, in what foreign observers called "the largest and most wretched single exodus" of the Bosnian War. The ARBiH and HVO in Jajce were not only outnumbered and outgunned, but their units were also plagued by inadequate staff work, compounded by lack of coordination between separate command and control structures maintained by the two forces throughout the battle. The defence of Jajce also suffered from worsening Croat–Bosniak relations and skirmishes between the ARBiH and the HVO along the resupply route to Jajce. Ultimately, the outcome of the battle itself fueled greater Bosniak–Croat animosities, which eventually led to the Croat–Bosniak War. The VRS saw the cracking of the ARBiH–HVO alliance as a very significant outcome of the operation.

As the Yugoslav People's Army (Jugoslovenska narodna armija – JNA) withdrew from Croatia following the acceptance and start of implementation of the Vance plan, its 55,000 officers and soldiers born in Bosnia and Herzegovina were transferred to a new Bosnian Serb army, which was later renamed the Army of Republika Srpska (Vojska Republike Srpske – VRS). This reorganisation followed the declaration of the Serbian Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina on 9 January 1992, ahead of the 29 February – 1 March 1992 referendum on the independence of Bosnia and Herzegovina. This declaration would later be cited by the Bosnian Serbs as a pretext for the Bosnian War. On 4 April, JNA artillery began shelling Sarajevo. At the same time, the JNA and the Bosnian Serb forces clashed with the HVO at the Kupres Plateau, capturing Kupres by 7 April.

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