The present article deals with the phenomenon of willful destruction of cultural heritage during armed conflicts: more particularly, the article focuses on the Balkan region, a zone that many conflicts ravaged along the centuries, and more specifically, during the Balkan wars, using two iconic cases of destruction of cultural heritage during the above-mentioned conflict: on one hand, the destruction of the Vijecnica in Sarajevo; on the other, the shelling of Dubrovnik, a case that gave rise to the prosecution and judgments of Pavle Strugar and Miodrag Jokic, among others, by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY). Using official reports, journalistic accounts, and documents from the ICTY and the Global Heritage Fund, the article assesses how even though there is no shortage of instruments (international tribunals) and policies (both local, national and international) to prevent cultural destruction during war times, in the case of the Balkans, these fall short of reaching their objective, and lack of funding and other motives block effective restoration of the damaged cultural heritage. Also, there is no effective law enforcement and punishment for these crimes, denying thus a deterring effect for the perpetrators. All these problems are further enhanced due to the lack of consensus and research on the criminal categorization of the destruction of cultural property during wartimes.