On 17 and 18 June, Tonogal and Lieutenant Colonel Aganović, gendarmerie commander for eastern Herzegovina, made an attempt to calm the situation by visiting villages east of the Gacko-Avtovac road to re-establish peace in the area.
The response of the NDH authorities to resistance had been to burn down the villages where this had occurred, and there were mass shootings of Serbs, which escalated the level of violence even further.