While UNPROFOR helped protect the humanitarian aid efforts designed to bring medicine and food to the people of Sarajevo and other besieged cities, critics accused the UN of not doing anything to stop the war. Bosnians were especially critical. When Bosnia's president asked for UN protection following Bosnia's declaration of independence, he believed that the UN would protect Bosnia from reprisals from the Bosnian Serbs and Croats. However, Izetbegovic overestimated the role that the UN was willing to play in the conflict. The UN typically does not take sides in a conflict. A traditional UN peacekeeping operation is designed to enforce a peace already established. For example, UN peace-keeping forces were sent to Croatia only after the cease-fire agreement was signed, and their role was strictly to enforce that peace. When UNPROFOR established itself in Bosnia, it was operating on the same neutrality mandate...