In 2014, the Dutch Ministry of Defense prepared plans to send a battalion of heavily armed standby soldiers to Eastern Ukraine, where the wreckage of the downed Malaysian passenger plane MH17 had landed.
The soldiers were to secure the crash site, which was controlled with Russian support by Ukrainian rebels. The primary goal of the mission was to 'bring home' the 283 victims who died. Among the passengers on the flight from Amsterdam to Singapore were nearly two hundred Dutch nationals.
Australia, where several dozen occupants originated, also made preparations immediately after the disaster on June 17, 2014, to send a troop force of about one thousand soldiers. According to Dutch sources, the then-government of Ukraine was aware of these military preparations.
The news of the preparations for a Dutch military operation was made public this week by both a former and the current commander of the Dutch Airmobile Brigade, the most readily deployable part of the Dutch armed forces. This is the first time the Ministry of Defense has publicized the mission. Besides repatriating victims, the Netherlands also intended to possibly secure evidence for the investigation. According to the two Dutch generals, the operation would be carried out in consultation with the government of Ukraine.
Preparations for the operation began on the day of the attack, Sunday, July 17, when the MH17 was shot down at an altitude of over seven kilometers by a Russian BUK missile. The urgency to 'intervene quickly' was partly fueled in the Netherlands by the fact that the rebels controlling eastern Ukraine initially refused to cooperate with Dutch authorities.
Already on the second and third days after the attack, reporters extensively reported that Ukrainian rebels were looting belongings of deceased passengers and that bodies were being 'dumped in train cars.'
Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte immediately announced after the attack that the very first Dutch priority was the return of the victims, followed by the investigation and prosecution of the perpetrators, and that relatives should receive justice. It is known that Prime Minister Rutte had personal contact with Russian President Putin at the time, but the content of that phone call has not yet been disclosed.
Dutch soldiers who were then training in Portugal were ordered on Wednesday, July 20, to return immediately, with an unspecified foreign mission in mind. It is formally unknown whether Russian authorities were aware of the Dutch and Australian military preparations, but given the scale and multi-day nature, this seems likely.
What is certain is that Ukrainian rebels nevertheless announced on Thursday, July 21, that they would hand over the bodies, after which preparations for a military expedition in the Netherlands and Australia were halted. A few days later, only Dutch forensic experts and Military Police were sent to the crash site. Forensic evidence was immediately collected as well, which could possibly be used next week in the criminal trial against four suspects in the attack.
One of those four suspects is Igor Girkin, a former senior officer of the Russian military intelligence service GRU, who at the time functioned as the defense minister of the Donetsk republic declared by the rebels. The charges will only be made public next week in the Dutch court. It is not yet known whether Dutch officials at the time consulted with Girkin about the transport of the bodies to the Netherlands.