Tango 23 Repetitor - a look into the past

4. října 2022

In September, we wrote about our meeting with UNPROFOR veterans who directly experienced the attack on their TANGO 23 - Repetitor checkpoint in 1995 and promised more information. So here is the first of them.

Our mail recently received photographs showing the site where the tragedy took place and also memories of some of the commemorations. But what actually happened at the site?

Tango 23 observation post was part of the line of observation posts between the hostile Croatia and the Republic of Serbian Krajina. The crew consisted of members of the 1st Company, 3rd Peacekeeping Battalion - CZEBATT, Czech Army. In August 1995, mortar shells fell on the post.

As the Military History Institute states, "The shrapnel caused fatal injuries to Staff Sergeant Luděk Zeman and Sergeant Petr Valeš, and minor injuries were sustained by Staff Sergeant Roman Čelanský, Sergeant Jiří Suda and Sergeant Jiří Hubáček. The Croats, who occupied the Czech post, had a doctor to attend to the wounded soldiers, but refused to release the wounded Czechs into the Serbian zone. In addition, most of the infrastructure of the base was destroyed when the fire burnt out the service and personal equipment of the observation post crew."