{"id":973,"date":"2019-07-18T14:17:21","date_gmt":"2019-07-18T13:17:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.balkan-conflicts-research.com\/archive\/?page_id=973"},"modified":"2019-07-18T14:17:21","modified_gmt":"2019-07-18T13:17:21","slug":"1997-us-senate-report-on-bosnian-war","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.balkan-conflicts-research.com\/archive\/1997-us-senate-report-on-bosnian-war\/","title":{"rendered":"1997 US Senate Report on Bosnian War"},"content":{"rendered":"

January 16, 1997\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 <\/span>Extended Bosnia Mission Endangers U.S. Troops<\/p>\n

\u00a0 <\/span>Clinton-Approved Iranian Arms Transfers Help Turn Bosnia into Militant Islamic Base\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>“‘There is no question that the policy of getting arms into Bosnia was of great\u00a0assistance in allowing the Iranians to dig in and create good relations with the\u00a0Bosnian government,’ a senior CIA officer told Congress in a classified deposition.<\/p>\n

‘And it is a thing we will live to regret because when they blow up some Americans, as\u00a0they no doubt will before this . . . thing is over, it will be in part because the\u00a0Iranians were able to have the time and contacts to establish themselves well in\u00a0Bosnia.'” [“Iran Gave Bosnia Leader $500,000, CIA Alleges: Classified Report Says\u00a0Izetbegovic Has Been ‘Co-Opted,’ Contradicting U.S. Public Assertion of Rift,” Los\u00a0Angeles Times, 12\/31\/96. Ellipses in original. Alija Izetbegovic is the Muslim\u00a0president of Bosnia.]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>“‘If you read President Izetbegovic’s writings, as I have, there is no doubt that\u00a0he is an Islamic fundamentalist,’ said a senior Western diplomat with long experience\u00a0in the region. ‘He is a very nice fundamentalist, but he is still a fundamentalist.\u00a0This has not changed. His goal is to establish a Muslim state in Bosnia, and the Serbs\u00a0and Croats understand this better than the rest of us.'” [“Bosnian Leader Hails Islam\u00a0at Election Rallies,” New York Times, 9\/2\/96]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Introduction and Summary\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>In late 1995, President Bill Clinton dispatched some 20,000 U.S. troops to\u00a0Bosnia-Hercegovina as part of a NATO-led “implementation force” (IFOR) to ensure that\u00a0the warring Muslim, Serbian, and Croatian factions complied with provisions of the\u00a0Dayton peace plan. [NOTE: This paper assumes the reader is acquainted with the basic\u00a0facts of the Bosnian war leading to the IFOR deployment. For background, see RPC’s\u00a0“Clinton Administration Ready to Send U.S. Troops to Bosnia, “9\/28\/95,” and\u00a0Legislative Notice No. 60, “Senate to Consider Several Resolutions on Bosnia,”\u00a012\/12\/95] Through statements by Administration spokesmen, notably Defense Secretary\u00a0Perry and Joint Chiefs Chairman General Shalikashvili, the president firmly assured\u00a0Congress and the American people that U.S. personnel would be out of Bosnia at the end\u00a0of one year. Predictably, as soon as the November 1996 election was safely behind him,\u00a0President Clinton announced that approximately 8,500 U.S. troops would be remaining\u00a0for another 18 months as part of a restructured and scaled down contingent, the\u00a0“stabilization force” (SFOR), officially established on December 20, 1996.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>SFOR begins its mission in Bosnia under a serious cloud both as to the nature of\u00a0its mission and the dangers it will face. While IFOR had successfully accomplished its\u00a0basic military task — separating the factions’ armed forces — there has been very\u00a0little progress toward other stated goals of the Dayton agreement, including political\u00a0and economic reintegration of Bosnia, return of refugees to their homes, and\u00a0apprehension and prosecution of accused war criminals. It is far from certain that the\u00a0cease-fire that has held through the past year will continue for much longer, in light\u00a0of such unresolved issues as the status of the cities of Brcko (claimed by Muslims but\u00a0held by the Serbs) and Mostar (divided between nominal Muslim and Croat allies, bothof which are currently being armed by the Clinton Administration). Moreover, at a\u00a0strength approximately one-third that of its predecessor, SFOR may not be in as strong\u00a0a position to deter attacks by one or another of the Bosnian factions or to avoid\u00a0attempts to involve it in renewed fighting: “IFOR forces, despite having suffered few\u00a0casualties, have been vulnerable to attacks from all of the contending sides over the\u00a0year of the Dayton mandate. As a second mandate [i.e., SFOR] evolves, presumably\u00a0maintaining a smaller force on the ground, the deterrent effect which has existed maywell become less compelling and vulnerabilities of the troops will increase.”<\/p>\n

[“Military Security in Bosnia-Herzegovina: Present and Future,” Bulletin of theAtlantic Council of the United States, 12\/18\/96]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Iranian Connection\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Perhaps most threatening to the SFOR mission — and more importantly, to thesafety of the American personnel serving in Bosnia — is the unwillingness of theClinton Administration to come clean with the Congress and with the American people\u00a0about its complicity in the delivery of weapons from Iran to the Muslim government in\u00a0Sarajevo. That policy, personally approved by Bill Clinton in April 1994 at the urging\u00a0of CIA Director-designate (and then-NSC chief) Anthony Lake and the U.S. ambassador to\u00a0Croatia Peter Galbraith, has, according to the Los Angeles Times (citing classified\u00a0intelligence community sources), “played a central role in the dramatic increase in\u00a0Iranian influence in Bosnia.” Further, according to the Times, in September 1996\u00a0National Security Agency analysts contradicted Clinton Administration claims of\u00a0declining Iranian influence, insisting instead that “Iranian Revolutionary Guard\u00a0personnel remain active throughout Bosnia.” Likewise, “CIA analysts noted that the\u00a0Iranian presence was expanding last fall,” with some ostensible cultural andhumanitarian activities “known to be fronts” for the Revolutionary Guard and Iran’s\u00a0intelligence service, known as VEVAK, the Islamic revolutionary successor to theShah’s SAVAK. [LAT, 12\/31\/96] At a time when there is evidence of increased\u00a0willingness by pro-Iranian Islamic militants to target American assets abroad — as\u00a0illustrated by the June 1996 car-bombing at the Khobar Towers in Dhahran, Saudi\u00a0Arabia, that killed 19 American airmen, in which the Iranian government or pro-Iranian\u00a0terrorist organizations are suspected [“U.S. Focuses Bomb Probe on Iran, Saudi\u00a0Dissident,” Chicago Tribune, 11\/4\/96] — it is irresponsible in the extreme for the\u00a0Clinton Administration to gloss over the extent to which its policies have putAmerican personnel in an increasingly vulnerable position while performing an\u00a0increasingly questionable mission.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Three Key Issues for Examination\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>This paper will examine the Clinton policy of giving the green light to Iranianarms shipments to the Bosnian Muslims, with serious implications for the safety of\u00a0U.S. troops deployed there. (In addition, RPC will release a general analysis of the\u00a0SFOR mission and the Clinton Administration’s request for supplemental appropriations\u00a0to fund it in the near future.) Specifically, the balance of this paper will examine\u00a0in detail the three issues summarized below:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>1. The Clinton Green Light to Iranian Arms Shipments (page 3): In April 1994,\u00a0President Clinton gave the government of Croatia what has been described byCongressional committees as a “green light” for shipments of weapons from Iran and\u00a0other Muslim countries to the Muslim-led government of Bosnia. The policy was approved\u00a0at the urging of NSC chief Anthony Lake and the U.S. ambassador to Croatia Peter\u00a0Galbraith. The CIA and the Departments of State and Defense were kept in the dark\u00a0until after the decision was made.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>2. The Militant Islamic Network (page 5): Along with the weapons, Iranian\u00a0Revolutionary Guards and VEVAK intelligence operatives entered Bosnia in large\u00a0numbers, along with thousands of mujahedin (“holy warriors”) from across the Muslim\u00a0world. Also engaged in the effort were several other Muslim countries (including\u00a0Brunei, Malaysia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Turkey) and a number of radical\u00a0Muslim organizations. For example, the role of one Sudan-based “humanitarian\u00a0organization,” called the Third World Relief Agency, has been well-documented. The\u00a0Clinton Administration’s “hands-on” involvement with the Islamic network’s arms\u00a0pipeline included inspections of missiles from Iran by U.S. government officials.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>3. The Radical Islamic Character of the Sarajevo Regime (page 8): Underlying theClinton Administration’s misguided green light policy is a complete misreading of its\u00a0main beneficiary, the Bosnian Muslim government of Alija Izetbegovic. Rather than\u00a0being the tolerant, multiethnic democratic government it pretends to be, there is\u00a0clear evidence that the ruling circle of Izetbegovic’s party, the Party of Democratic\u00a0Action (SDA), has long been guided by the principles of radical Islam. This Islamist\u00a0orientation is illustrated by profiles of three important officials, including\u00a0President Izetbegovic himself; the progressive Islamization of the Bosnian army,\u00a0including creation of native Bosnian mujahedin units; credible claims that major\u00a0atrocities against civilians in Sarajevo were staged for propaganda purposes by\u00a0operatives of the Izetbegovic government; and suppression of enemies, both non-Muslimand Muslim.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Clinton Green Light to Iranian Arms Shipments\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Both the Senate Intelligence Committee and the House Select Subcommittee to\u00a0Investigate the United States Role in Iranian Arms Transfers to Croatia and Bosnia\u00a0issued reports late last year. (The Senate report, dated November 1996, is\u00a0unclassified. The House report is classified, with the exception of the final section\u00a0of conclusions, which was released on October 8, 1996; a declassified version of the\u00a0full report is expected to be released soon.) The reports, consistent with numerous\u00a0press accounts, confirm that on April 27, 1994, President Clinton directed Ambassador\u00a0Galbraith to inform the government of Croatia that he had “no instructions” regarding\u00a0Croatia’s decision whether or not to permit weapons, primarily from Iran, to betransshipped to Bosnia through Croatia. (The purpose was to facilitate the acquisitionof arms by the Muslim-led government in Sarajevo despite the arms embargo imposed on\u00a0Yugoslavia by the U.N. Security Council.) Clinton Administration officials took that\u00a0course despite their awareness of the source of the weapons and despite the fact that\u00a0the Croats (who were themselves divided on whether to permit arms deliveries to theMuslims) would take anything short of a U.S. statement that they should not facilitatethe flow of Iranian arms to Bosnia as a “green light.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The green light policy was decided upon and implemented with unusual secrecy, with\u00a0the CIA and the Departments of State and Defense only informed after the fact. [“U.S.Had Options to Let Bosnia Get Arms, Avoid Iran,” Los Angeles Times, 7\/14\/96] Among the\u00a0key conclusions of the House Subcommittee were the following (taken from the\u00a0unclassified section released on October 8):\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>“The President and the American people were poorly served by the Administration\u00a0officials who rushed the green light decision without due deliberation, full\u00a0information and an adequate consideration of the consequences.” (page 202)\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>“The Administration’s efforts to keep even senior US officials from seeing its’fingerprints’ on the green light policy led to confusion and disarray within thegovernment.” (page 203)\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>“The Administration repeatedly deceived the American people about its Iranian\u00a0green light policy.” (page 204)\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Clinton, Lake, and Galbraith Responsible\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>While the final go-ahead for the green light was given by President Clinton — who\u00a0is ultimately accountable for the results of his decision — two ClintonAdministration officials bear particular responsibility: Ambassador Galbraith and\u00a0then-NSC Director Anthony Lake, against both of whom the House of Representatives has\u00a0referred criminal charges to the Justice Department. Mr. Lake, who personally\u00a0presented the proposal to Bill Clinton for approval, “played a central role in\u00a0preventing the responsible congressional committees from knowing about the\u00a0Administration’s fateful decision to acquiesce in radical Islamic Iran’s effort to\u00a0penetrate the European continent through arms shipments and military cooperation with\u00a0the Bosnian government.” [“‘In Lake We Trust’? Confirmation Make-Over ExacerbatesSenate Concerns About D.C.I.-Designate’s Candor, Reliability,” Center for SecurityPolicy, Washington, D.C., 1\/8\/97] His responsibility for the operation is certain tobe a major hurdle in his effort to be confirmed as CIA Director: “The fact that Lake\u00a0was one of the authors of the duplicitous policy in Bosnia, which is very\u00a0controversial and which has probably helped strengthen the hand of the Iranians,\u00a0doesn’t play well,” stated Senate Intelligence Chairman Richard Shelby. [“Lake to be\u00a0asked about donation,” Washington Times, 1\/2\/97]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>For his part, Ambassador Galbraith was the key person both in conceiving the\u00a0policy and in serving as the link between the Clinton Administration and the Croatian\u00a0government; he also met with Imam Sevko Omerbasic, the top Muslim cleric in Croatia,”who the CIA says was an intermediary for Iran.” [“Fingerprints: Arms to Bosnia, thereal story,” The New Republic, 10\/28\/96; see also LAT 12\/23\/96] As the HouseSubcommittee concluded (page 206): “There is evidence that Ambassador Galbraith may\u00a0have engaged in activities that could be characterized as unauthorized covert action.”<\/p>\n

The Senate Committee (pages 19 and 20 of the report) was unable to agree on the\u00a0specific legal issue of whether Galbraith’s actions constituted a “covert action”\u00a0within the definition of section 503(e) of the National Security Act of 1947 (50\u00a0U.S.C. Sec. 413(e)), as amended, defined as “an activity or activities . . . to\u00a0influence political, economic, or military conditions abroad, where it is intended\u00a0that the role of the United States Government will not be apparent or acknowledged\u00a0publicly.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Militant Islamic Network\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The House Subcommittee report also concluded (page 2): “The Administration’s\u00a0Iranian green light policy gave Iran an unprecedented foothold in Europe and has\u00a0recklessly endangered American lives and US strategic interests.” Further —\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>” . . . The Iranian presence and influence [in Bosnia] jumped radically in the\u00a0months following the green light. Iranian elements infiltrated the Bosnian government\u00a0and established close ties with the current leadership in Bosnia and the next\u00a0generation of leaders. Iranian Revolutionary Guards accompanied Iranian weapons into\u00a0Bosnia and soon were integrated in the Bosnian military structure from top to bottomas well as operating in independent units throughout Bosnia. The Iranian intelligenceservice [VEVAK] ran wild through the area developing intelligence networks, setting up\u00a0terrorist support systems, recruiting terrorist ‘sleeper’ agents and agents of\u00a0influence, and insinuating itself with the Bosnian political leadership to a\u00a0remarkable degree. The Iranians effectively annexed large portions of the Bosnian\u00a0security apparatus [known as the Agency for Information and Documentation (AID)] to\u00a0act as their intelligence and terrorist surrogates. This extended to the point of\u00a0jointly planning terrorist activities. The Iranian embassy became the largest in\u00a0Bosnia and its officers were given unparalleled privileges and access at every levelof the Bosnian government.” (page 201)\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Not Just the Iranians\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>To understand how the Clinton green light would lead to this degree of Iranian\u00a0influence, it is necessary to remember that the policy was adopted in the context of\u00a0extensive and growing radical Islamic activity in Bosnia. That is, the Iranians and\u00a0other Muslim militants had long been active in Bosnia; the American green light was an\u00a0important political signal to both Sarajevo and the militants that the United States\u00a0was unable or unwilling to present an obstacle to those activities — and, to a\u00a0certain extent, was willing to cooperate with them. In short, the Clinton\u00a0Administration’s policy of facilitating the delivery of arms to the Bosnian Muslims\u00a0made it the de facto partner of an ongoing international network of governments and\u00a0organizations pursuing their own agenda in Bosnia: the promotion of Islamic revolution\u00a0in Europe. That network involves not only Iran but Brunei, Malaysia, Pakistan, SaudiArabia, Sudan (a key ally of Iran), and Turkey, together with front groups supposedly\u00a0pursuing humanitarian and cultural activities.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>For example, one such group about which details have come to light is the Third\u00a0World Relief Agency (TWRA), a Sudan-based, phoney humanitarian organization which has\u00a0been a major link in the arms pipeline to Bosnia. [“How Bosnia’s Muslims Dodged Arms\u00a0Embargo: Relief Agency Brokered Aid From Nations, Radical Groups,” Washington Post,\u00a09\/22\/96; see also “Saudis Funded Weapons For Bosnia, Official Says: $300 Million\u00a0Program Had U.S. ‘Stealth Cooperation’,” Washington Post, 2\/2\/96] TWRA is believed to\u00a0be connected with such fixtures of the Islamic terror network as Sheik Omar AbdelRahman (the convicted mastermind behind the 1993 World Trade Center bombing) and Osama\u00a0Binladen, a wealthy Saudi emigre believed to bankroll numerous militant groups. [WP,\u00a09\/22\/96] (Sheik Rahman, a native of Egypt, is currently in prison in the United\u00a0States; letter bombs addressed to targets in Washington and London, apparently from\u00a0Alexandria, Egypt, are believed connected with his case. Binladen was a resident in\u00a0Khartoum, Sudan, until last year; he is now believed to be in Afghanistan, “where he\u00a0has issued statements calling for attacks on U.S. forces in the Persian Gulf.” [WP,\u00a09\/22\/96])\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Clinton Administration’s “Hands-On” Help\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The extent to which Clinton Administration officials, notably Ambassador\u00a0Galbraith, knowingly or negligently, cooperated with the efforts of such front\u00a0organizations is unclear. For example, according to one intelligence account seen by\u00a0an unnamed U.S. official in the Balkans, “Galbraith ‘talked with representatives of\u00a0Muslim countries on payment for arms that would be sent to Bosnia,’ . . . [T]he dollar\u00a0amount mentioned in the report was $500 million-$800 million. The U.S. official said\u00a0he also saw subsequent ‘operational reports’ in 1995 on almost weekly arms shipments\u00a0of automatic weapons, rocket-propelled grenade launchers, anti-armor rockets and TOWmissiles.” [TNR, 10\/28\/96] The United States played a disturbingly “hands-on” role,with, according to the Senate report (page 19), U.S. government personnel twiceconducting inspections in Croatia of missiles en route to Bosnia. Further —\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>“The U.S. decision to send personnel to Croatia to inspect rockets bound forBosnia is . . . subject to varying interpretations. It may have been simply astraightforward effort to determine whether chemical weapons were being shipped into\u00a0Bosnia. It was certainly, at least in part, an opportunity to examine a rocket in\u00a0which the United States had some interest. But it may also have been designed to\u00a0ensure that Croatia would not shut down the pipeline.” (page 21)\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The account in The New Republic points sharply to the latter explanation: “Enraged\u00a0at Iran’s apparent attempt to slip super weapons past Croat monitors, the Croatian\u00a0defense minister nonetheless sent the missiles on to Bosnia ‘just as Peter [i.e.,Ambassador Galbraith] told us to do,’ sources familiar with the episode said.” [TNR,\u00a010\/28\/96] In short, the Clinton Administration’s connection with the various playersthat made up the arms network seems to have been direct and intimate.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Mujahedin Threat\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>In addition to (and working closely with) the Iranian Revolutionary Guards andVEVAK intelligence are members of numerous radical groups known for their anti-Western\u00a0orientation, along with thousands of volunteer mujahedin (“holy warriors”) from across\u00a0the Islamic world. >From the beginning of the NATO-led deployment, the Clinton\u00a0Administration has given insufficient weight to military concerns regarding themujahedin presence in Bosnia as well as the danger they pose to American personnel.<\/p>\n

Many of the fighters are concentrated in the so-called “green triangle” (the color\u00a0green symbolizes Islam) centered on the town of Zenica in the American IFOR\/SFOR zone\u00a0but are also found throughout the country.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Clinton Administration has been willing to accept Sarajevo’s transparently\u00a0false assurances of the departure of the foreign fighters based on the contention that\u00a0they have married Bosnian women and have acquired Bosnian citizenship — and thus are\u00a0no longer “foreign”! — or, having left overt military units to join “humanitarian,”\u00a0“cultural,” or “charitable” organizations, are no longer “fighters.” [See “Foreign\u00a0Muslims Fighting in Bosnia Considered ‘Threat’ to U.S. Troops,” Washington Post,\u00a011\/30\/95; “Outsiders Bring Islamic Fervor To the Balkans,” New York Times, 9\/23\/96;\u00a0“Islamic Alien Fighters Settle in Bosnia,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 9\/23\/96;\u00a0“Mujahideen rule Bosnian villages: Threaten NATO forces, non-Muslims,” Washington\u00a0Times, 9\/23\/96; and Yossef Bodansky, Offensive in the Balkans (November 1995) and SomeCall It Peace (August 1996), International Media Corporation, Ltd., London. Bodansky,an analyst with the House Republican Task Force on Terrorism and UnconventionalWarfare, is an internationally recognized authority on Islamic terrorism.]<\/p>\n

The methods\u00a0employed to qualify for Bosnian citizenship are themselves problematic: “Islamic\u00a0militants from Iran and other foreign countries are employing techniques such as\u00a0forced marriages, kidnappings and the occupation of apartments and houses to remain in\u00a0Bosnia in violation of the Dayton peace accord and may be a threat to U.S. forces.”[“Mujaheddin Remaining in Bosnia: Islamic Militants Strongarm Civilians, Defy Dayton\u00a0Plan,” Washington Post, 7\/8\/96]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The threat presented by the mujahedin to IFOR (and now, to SFOR) — contingent\u00a0only upon the precise time their commanders in Tehran or Sarajevo should choose to\u00a0activate them — has been evident from the beginning of the NATO-led deployment. For\u00a0example, in February 1996 NATO forces raided a terrorist training camp near the town\u00a0of Fojnica, taking into custody 11 men (8 Bosnian citizens — two of whom may have been naturalized foreign mujahedin — and three Iranian instructors); also seized were\u00a0explosives “built into small children’s plastic toys, including a car, a helicopter\u00a0and an ice cream cone,” plus other weapons such as handguns, sniper rifles, grenadelaunchers, etc. The Sarajevo government denounced the raid, claiming the facility was\u00a0an “intelligence service school”; the detainees were released promptly after NATO\u00a0turned them over to local authorities. [“NATO Captures Terrorist Training Camp, Claims\u00a0Iranian Involvement,” Associated Press, 2\/16\/96; “Bosnian government denies camp was\u00a0for terrorists,” Reuters, 2\/16\/96; Bodansky Some Call It Peace, page 56] In May 1996,a previously unknown group called “Bosnian Islamic Jihad” (jihad means “holy war”)\u00a0threatened attacks on NATO troops by suicide bombers, similar to those that hadrecently been launched in Israel. [“Jihad Threat in Bosnia Alarms NATO,” The European,\u00a05\/9\/96]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Stepping-Stone to Europe\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The intended targets of the mujahedin network in Bosnia are not limited to that\u00a0country but extend to Western Europe. For example, in August 1995, the conservative\u00a0Paris daily Le Figaro reported that French security services believe that “Islamic\u00a0fundamentalists from Algeria have set up a security network across Europe with\u00a0fighters trained in Afghan guerrilla camps and [in] southern France while some have\u00a0been tested in Bosnia.” [(London) Daily Telegraph, 8\/17\/95] Also, in April 1996,Belgian security arrested a number of Islamic militants, including two native\u00a0Bosnians, smuggling weapons to Algerian guerrillas active in France. [Intelligence\u00a0Newsletter, Paris, 5\/9\/96 (No. 287)] Finally, also in April 1996, a meeting of\u00a0radicals aligned with HizbAllah (“Party of God”), a pro-Iran group based in Lebanon,\u00a0set plans for stepping up attacks on U.S. assets on all continents; among those\u00a0participating was an Egyptian, Ayman al-Zawahiri, who “runs the Islamist terrorist\u00a0operations in Bosnia-Herzegovina from a special headquarters in Sofia, Bulgaria. His\u00a0forces are already deployed throughout Bosnia, ready to attack US and other I-FOR\u00a0(NATO Implementation Force) targets.” [“State-Sponsored Terrorism and The Rise of the\u00a0HizbAllah International,” Defense and Foreign Affairs and Strategic Policy, London,\u00a08\/31\/96] Finally, in December 1996, French and Belgian security arrested several\u00a0would-be terrorists trained at Iranian-run camps in Bosnia. [“Terrorism: The Bosnian\u00a0Connection,” (Paris) L’Express, 12\/26\/96]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Radical Islamic Character of the Sarajevo Regime\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Underlying the Clinton Administration’s misguided policy toward Iranian influence\u00a0in Bosnia is a fundamental misreading of the true nature of the Muslim regime that\u00a0benefitted from the Iran\/Bosnia arms policy: “The most dubious of all Bosniac [i.e.,\u00a0Bosnian Muslim] claims pertains to the self-serving commercial that the government\u00a0hopes to eventually establish a multiethnic liberal democratic society. Such ideals\u00a0may appeal to a few members of Bosnia’s ruling circle as well as to a generally\u00a0secular populace, but President Izetbegovic and his cabal appear to harbor much\u00a0different private intentions and goals.” [“Selling the Bosnia Myth to America: Buyer\u00a0Beware,” Lieutenant Colonel John E. Sray, USA, U.S. Army Foreign Military Studies\u00a0Office, Fort Leavenworth, KS, October 1995]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The evidence that the leadership of the ruling Party of Democratic Action (SDA),\u00a0and consequently, the Sarajevo-based government, has long been motivated by the\u00a0principles of radical Islam is inescapable. The following three profiles are\u00a0instructive:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Alija Izetbegovic: Alija Izetbegovic, current Bosnian president and head of theSDA, in 1970 authored the radical “Islamic Declaration,” which calls for “the Islamic\u00a0movement” to start to take power as soon as it can overturn “the existing non-Muslim\u00a0government . . . [and] build up a new Islamic one,” to destroy non-Islamic\u00a0\u00a0(“There can be neither peace nor coexistence between the Islamic religion\u00a0and non-Islamic social institutions”), and to create an international federation of\u00a0Islamic states. [The Islamic Declaration: A Programme for the Islamization of Muslimsand the Muslim Peoples, Sarajevo, in English, 1990] Izetbegovic’s radical pro-Iran\u00a0associations go back decades: “At the center of the Iranian system in Europe is\u00a0Bosnia-Hercegovina’s President, Alija Izetbegovic, . . . who is committed to the\u00a0establishment of an Islamic Republic in Bosnia-Hercegovina.” [“Iran’s European\u00a0Springboard?”, House Republican Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare,\u00a09\/1\/92] The Task Force report further describes Izetbegovic’s contacts with Iran and\u00a0Libya in 1991, before the Bosnian war began; he is also noted as a “fundamentalist\u00a0Muslim” and a member of the “Fedayeen of Islam” organization, an Iran-based radical\u00a0group dating to the 1930s and which by the late 1960s had recognized the leadership of\u00a0the Ayatollah Khomeini (then in exile from the Shah). Following Khomeini’s accession\u00a0to power in 1979, Izetbegovic stepped-up his efforts to establish Islamic power in\u00a0Bosnia and was jailed by the communists in 1983. Today, he is open and unapologetic\u00a0about his links to Iran: “Perhaps the most telling detail of the [SDA’s September 1,\u00a01996] campaign rally . . . was the presence of the Iranian Ambassador and his Bosnian\u00a0and Iranian bodyguards, who sat in the shadow of the huge birchwood platform. . . . As\u00a0the only foreign diplomat [present], indeed the only foreigner traveling in the\u00a0President’s [i.e., Izetbegovic’s] heavily guarded motorcade of bulky four-wheel drive\u00a0jeeps, he lent a silent Islamic imprimatur to the event, one that many American and\u00a0European supporters of the Bosnian Government are trying hard to ignore or dismiss.”\u00a0[NYT, 9\/2\/96]<\/p>\n

During the summer 1996 election campaign, the Iranians delivered to him,in two suitcases, $500,000 in cash; Izetbegovic “is now ‘literally on their [i.e., theIranians’] payroll,’ according to a classified report based on the CIA’s analysis ofthe issue.” [LAT, 12\/31\/96. See also “Iran Contributed $500,000 to Bosnian President’s\u00a0Election Effort, U.S. Says,” New York Times, 1\/1\/97, and Washington Times, 1\/2\/97]<\/p>\n

Adil Zulfikarpasic, a Muslim co-founder of the SDA, broke with Izetbegovic in late\u00a01990 due to the increasingly overt fundamentalist and pro-Iranian direction of the\u00a0party. [See Milovan Djilas, Bosnjak: Adil Zulfikarpasic, Zurich, 1994]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Hassan (or Hasan) Cengic: Until recently, deputy defense minister (and now\u00a0cosmetically reassigned to a potentially even more dangerous job in refugee\u00a0resettlement at the behest of the Clinton Administration), Cengic, a member of a\u00a0powerful clan headed by his father, Halid Cengic, is an Islamic cleric who has\u00a0traveled frequently to Tehran and is deeply involved in the arms pipeline. [“Bosnian\u00a0Officials Involved in Arms Trade Tied to Radical States,” Washington Post, 9\/22\/96]\u00a0Cengic was identified by Austrian police as a member of TWRA’s supervisory board, “a\u00a0fact confirmed by its Sudanese director, Elfatih Hassanein, in a 1994 interview with\u00a0Gazi Husrev Beg, an Islamic affairs magazine. Cengic later became the key Bosnian\u00a0official involved in setting up a weapons pipeline from Iran. . . . Cengic . . . is a\u00a0longtime associate of Izetbegovic’s. He was one of the co-defendants in Izetbegovic’s\u00a01983 trial for fomenting Muslim nationalism in what was then Yugoslavia. Cengic wasgiven a 10-year prison term, most of which he did not serve. In trial testimony Cengicwas said to have been traveling to Iran since 1983. Cengic lived in Tehran and\u00a0Istanbul during much of the war, arranging for weapons to be smuggled into Bosnia.”\u00a0[WP, 9\/22\/96] According to a Bosnian Croat radio profile: “Hasan’s father, Halid\u00a0Cengic . . . is the main logistic expert in the Muslim army. All petrodollar donations\u00a0from the Islamic world and the procurement of arms and military technology for Muslim\u00a0units went through him. He made so much money out of this business that he is one of\u00a0the richest Muslims today. Halid Cengic and his two sons, of whom Hasan has been morein the public spotlight, also control the Islamic wing of the intelligence agency AID\u00a0[Agency for Information and Documentation]. Well informed sources in Sarajevo claim\u00a0that only Hasan addresses Izetbegovic with ‘ti’ [second person singular, used as an\u00a0informal form of address] while all the others address him as ‘Mr. President,'” a sign\u00a0of his extraordinary degree of intimacy with the president. [BBC Summary of WorldBroadcasts, 10\/28\/96, “Radio elaborates on Iranian connection of Bosnian deputy\u00a0defense minister,” from Croat Radio Herceg-Bosna, Mostar, in Serbo-Croatian, 10\/25\/96,\u00a0bracketed text in original] In late 1996, at the insistence of the Clinton\u00a0Administration, Hassan Cengic was reassigned to refugee affairs. However, in his new\u00a0capacity he may present an even greater hazard to NATO forces in Bosnia, in light of\u00a0past incidents such as the one that took place near the village of Celic in November\u00a01996. At that time, in what NATO officers called part of a pattern of “military\u00a0operations in disguise,” American and Russian IFOR troops were caught between Muslims\u00a0and Serbs as the Muslims, some of them armed, attempted to encroach on the cease-fire\u00a0line established by Dayton; commented a NATO spokesman: “We believe this to be a\u00a0deliberate, orchestrated and provocative move to circumvent established procedures forthe return of refugees.” [“Gunfire Erupts as Muslims Return Home,” Washington Post,\u00a011\/13\/96]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Dzemal Merdan: “The office of Brig. Gen. Dzemal Merdan is an ornate affair,equipped with an elaborately carved wooden gazebo ringed with red velvet couches and\u00a0slippers for his guests. A sheepskin prayer mat lies in the corner, pointing toward\u00a0Mecca. The most striking thing in the chamber is a large flag. It is not the flag of\u00a0Bosnia, but of Iran. Pinned with a button of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Iran’s\u00a0late Islamic leader, the flag occupies pride of place in Merdan’s digs — displayed in\u00a0the middle of the gazebo for every visitor to see. Next to it hangs another pennant,\u00a0that of the Democratic Action Party, the increasingly nationalist Islamic organization\u00a0of President Alija Izetbegovic that dominates Bosnia’s Muslim region. . . . Merdan’sposition highlights the American dilemma. As head of the office of training and\u00a0development of the Bosnian army, he is a key liaison figure in the U.S. [arm andtrain] program. . . . But Merdan, Western sources say, also has another job — asliaison with foreign Islamic fighters here since 1992 and promoter of the Islamic\u00a0faith among Bosnia’s recruits. Sources identified Merdan as being instrumental in the\u00a0creation of a brigade of Bosnian soldiers, called the 7th Muslim Brigade, that is\u00a0heavily influenced by Islam and trained by fighters from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.<\/p>\n

He has also launched a program, these sources say, to build mosques on military\u00a0training grounds to teach Islam to Bosnian recruits. In addition, he helped establish\u00a0training camps in Bosnia where Revolutionary Guards carried out their work.” [“Arming\u00a0the Bosnians: U.S. Program Would Aid Force Increasingly Linked to Iran,” Washington\u00a0Post, 1\/26\/96, emphasis added] General Merdan is a close associate of both Izetbegovic\u00a0and Cengic; the central region around Zenica, which was “completely militarized in thefirst two years of the war” under the control of Merdan’s mujahedin, is “under totalcontrol of the Cengic family.” [“Who Rules Bosnia and Which Way,” (Sarajevo) SlobodnaBosna, 11\/17\/96, FBIS translation; Slobodna Bosna is one of the few publications in\u00a0Muslim-held areas that dares to criticize the policies and personal corruption of the\u00a0ruling SDA clique.] Merdan’s mujahedin were accused by their erstwhile Croat allies of\u00a0massacring more than 100 Croats near Zenica in late 1993. [“Bosnian Croats vow to\u00a0probe war crimes by Moslems,” Agence France Presse, 5\/12\/95]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Islamization of the Bosnian Army\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>In cooperation with the foreign Islamic presence, the Izetbegovic regime hasrevamped its security and military apparatus to reflect its Islamic revolutionary\u00a0outlook, including the creation of mujahedin units throughout the army; some members\u00a0of these units have assumed the guise of a shaheed (a “martyr,” the Arabic term\u00a0commonly used to describe suicide bombers), marked by their white garb, representing a\u00a0shroud. While these units include foreign fighters naturalized in Bosnia, most of the\u00a0personnel are now Bosnian Muslims trained and indoctrinated by Iranian and other\u00a0foreign militants — which also makes it easier for the Clinton Administration to\u00a0minimize the mujahedin threat, because few of them are “foreigners.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Prior to 1996, there were three principal mujahedin units in the Bosnian army, the\u00a0first two of which are headquartered in the American IFOR\/SFOR zone: (1) the 7th\u00a0Muslim Liberation Brigade of the 3rd Corps, headquartered in Zenica; (2) the 9th\u00a0Muslim Liberation Brigade of the 2nd Corps, headquartered in Travnik (the 2nd Corps is\u00a0based in Tuzla); and (3) the 4th Muslim Liberation Brigade of the 4th Corps,\u00a0headquartered in Konjic (in the French zone). [Bodansky, Some Call It Peace, page 40]<\/p>\n

Particularly ominous, many members of these units have donned the guise of martyrs,\u00a0indicating their willingness to sacrifice themselves in the cause of Islam. Commenting\u00a0on an appearance of soldiers from the 7th Liberation Brigade, in Zenica in December\u00a01995, Bodansky writes: “Many of the fighters . . . were dressed in white coveralls\u00a0over their uniforms. Officially, these were ‘white winter camouflage,’ but the green\u00a0headbands [bearing Koranic verses] these warriors were wearing left no doubt that\u00a0these were actually Shaheeds’ shrouds.” [Some Call It Peace, page 12] The same\u00a0demonstration was staged before the admiring Iranian ambassador and President\u00a0Izetbegovic in September 1996, when white winter garb could only be symbolic, not\u00a0functional. [NYT, 9\/2\/96] By June 1996, ten more mujahedin brigades had beenestablished, along with numerous smaller “special units” dedicated to covert and\u00a0terrorist operations; while foreigners are present in all of these units, most of the\u00a0soldiers are now native Bosnian Muslims. [Some Call It Peace, pages 42-46]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>In addition to these units, there exists another group known as the Handzar(“dagger” or “scimitar”) Division, described by Bodansky as a “praetorian guard” for\u00a0President Izetbegovic. “Up to 6000-strong, the Handzar division glories in a fascist\u00a0culture. They see themselves as the heirs of the SS Handzar division, formed by\u00a0Bosnian Muslims in 1943 to fight for the Nazis. Their spiritual model was Mohammed\u00a0Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem who sided with Hitler. According to UN\u00a0officers, surprisingly few of those in charge of the Handzars . . . seem to speak good\u00a0Serbo-Croatian. ‘Many of them are Albanian, whether from Kosovo [the Serb provincewhere Albanians are the majority] or from Albania itself.’ They are trained and led byveterans from Afghanistan and Pakistan, say UN sources.” [“Albanians and Afghans fight\u00a0for the heirs to Bosnia’s SS past,” (London) Daily Telegraph, 12\/29\/93, bracketed text\u00a0in original]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Self-Inflicted Atrocities\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Almost since the beginning of the Bosnian war in the spring of 1992, there have\u00a0been persistent reports — readily found in the European media but little reported in\u00a0the United States — that civilian deaths in Muslim-held Sarajevo attributed to the\u00a0Bosnian Serb Army were in some cases actually inflicted by operatives of the\u00a0Izetbegovic regime in an (ultimately successful) effort to secure American\u00a0intervention on Sarajevo’s behalf. These allegations include instances of sniping at\u00a0civilians as well as three major explosions, attributed to Serbian mortar fire, that\u00a0claimed the lives of dozens of people and, in each case, resulted in the international\u00a0community’s taking measures against the Muslims’ Serb enemies. (The three explosions\u00a0were: (1) the May 27, 1992, “breadline massacre,” which was reported to have killed 16\u00a0people and which resulted in economic sanctions on the Bosnian Serbs and rump\u00a0Yugoslavia; (2) the February 5, 1994, Markale “market massacre,” killing 68 and\u00a0resulting in selective NATO air strikes and an ultimatum to the Serbs to withdraw\u00a0their heavy weapons from the area near Sarajevo; and (3) the August 28, 1995 “second\u00a0market massacre,” killing 37 and resulting in large-scale NATO air strikes, eventually\u00a0leading to the Dayton agreement and the deployment of IFOR.) When she was asked aboutsuch allegations (with respect to the February 1994 explosion) then-U.N. Ambassador\u00a0and current Secretary of State-designate Madeleine Albright, in a stunning non\u00a0sequitur, said: “It’s very hard to believe any country would do this to their own\u00a0people, and therefore, although we do not exactly know what the facts are, it wouldseem to us that the Serbs are the ones that probably have a great deal of\u00a0responsibility.” [“Senior official admits to secret U.N. report on Sarajevo massacre,”Deutsch Presse-Agentur, 6\/6\/96, emphasis added]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The fact that such a contention is difficult to believe does not mean it is not\u00a0true. Not only did the incidents lead to the result desired by Sarajevo (Western\u00a0action against the Bosnian Serbs), their staging by the Muslims would be entirely in\u00a0keeping with the moral outlook of Islamic radicalism, which has long accepted the\u00a0deaths of innocent (including Muslim) bystanders killed in terrorist actions.<\/p>\n

According to a noted analyst: “The dictum that the end justifies the means is adopted\u00a0by all fundamentalist organizations in their strategies for achieving political power\u00a0and imposing on society their own view of Islam. What is important in every action is\u00a0its niy’yah, its motive. No means need be spared in the service of Islam as long as\u00a0one takes action with a pure niy’yah.” [Amir Taheri, Holy Terror, Bethesda, MD, 1987]<\/p>\n

With the evidence that the Sarajevo leadership does in fact have a fundamentalist\u00a0outlook, it is unwarranted to dismiss cavalierly the possibility of Muslim\u00a0responsibility. Among some of the reports:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Sniping: “French peacekeeping troops in the United Nations unit trying to curtail\u00a0Bosnian Serb sniping at civilians in Sarajevo have concluded that until mid-June some\u00a0gunfire also came from Government soldiers deliberately shooting at their own\u00a0civilians. After what it called a ‘definitive’ investigation, a French marine unit\u00a0that patrols against snipers said it traced sniper fire to a building normally\u00a0occupied by Bosnian [i.e., Muslim] soldiers and other security forces. A senior French\u00a0officer said, ‘We find it almost impossible to believe, but we are sure that it is\u00a0true.'” [“Investigation Concludes Bosnian Government Snipers Shot at Civilians,” New\u00a0York Times, 8\/1\/95]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The 1992 “Breadline Massacre”: “United Nations officials and senior Western\u00a0military officers believe some of the worst killings in Sarajevo, including the\u00a0massacre of at least 16 people in a bread queue, were carried out by the city’s mainly\u00a0Muslim defenders — not Serb besiegers — as a propaganda ploy to win world sympathy\u00a0and military intervention. . . . Classified reports to the UN force commander, General\u00a0Satish Nambiar, concluded . . . that Bosnian forces loyal to President Alija\u00a0Izetbegovic may have detonated a bomb. ‘We believe it was a command-detonated\u00a0explosion, probably in a can,’ a UN official said then. ‘The large impact which is\u00a0there now is not necessarily similar or anywhere near as large as we came to expect\u00a0with a mortar round landing on a paved surface.” [“Muslims ‘slaughter their own\u00a0people’,” (London) The Independent, 8\/22\/92] “Our people tell us there were a number\u00a0of things that didn’t fit. The street had been blocked off just before the incident.\u00a0Once the crowd was let in and had lined up, the media appeared but kept their\u00a0distance. The attack took place, and the media were immediately on the scene.” [Major\u00a0General Lewis MacKenzie, Peacekeeper: The Road to Sarajevo, Vancouver, BC, 1993, pages\u00a0193-4; Gen. MacKenzie, a Canadian, had been commander of the U.N. peacekeeping force\u00a0in Sarajevo.]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The 1994 Markale “Market Massacre”: “French television reported last night that\u00a0the United Nations investigation into the market-place bombing in Sarajevo two weeks\u00a0ago had established beyond doubt that the mortar shell that killed 68 people was fired\u00a0from inside Bosnian [Muslim] lines.” [“UN tracks source of fatal shell,” (London) The\u00a0Times, 2\/19\/94] “For the first time, a senior U.N. official has admitted the existence\u00a0of a secret U.N. report that blames the Bosnian Moslems for the February 1994 massacre\u00a0of Moslems at a Sarajevo market. . . . After studying the crater left by the mortar\u00a0shell and the distribution of shrapnel, the report concluded that the shell was fired\u00a0from behind Moslem lines.” The report, however, was kept secret; the context of thewire story implies that U.S. Ambasador Albright may have been involved in its\u00a0suppression. [DPA, 6\/6\/96] For a fuller discussion of the conflicting claims, see\u00a0“Anatomy of a massacre,” Foreign Policy, 12\/22\/94, by David Binder; Binder, a veteran\u00a0New York Times reporter in Yugoslavia, had access to the suppressed report. Bodansky\u00a0categorically states that the bomb “was actually a special charge designed and built\u00a0with help from HizbAllah [“Party of God,” a Beirut-based pro-Iranian terror group]\u00a0experts and then most likely dropped from a nearby rooftop onto the crowd of shoppers.\u00a0Video cameras at the ready recorded this expertly-staged spectacle of gore, while\u00a0dozens of corpses of Bosnian Muslim troops killed in action (exchanged the day beforein a ‘body swap’ with the Serbs) were paraded in front of cameras to raise thecasualty counts.” [Offensive in the Balkans, page 62]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The 1995 “Second Market Massacre”: “British ammunition experts serving with the\u00a0United Nations in Sarajevo have challenged key ‘evidence’ of the Serbian atrocity that\u00a0triggered the devastating Nato bombing campaign which turned the tide of the Bosnian\u00a0war.” The Britons’ analysis was confirmed by French analysts but their findings were\u00a0“dismissed” by “a senior American officer” at U.N. headquarters in Sarajevo. [“Serbs\u00a0‘not guilty’ of massacre: Experts warned US that mortar was Bosnian,” (London) TheTimes, 10\/1\/95] A “crucial U.N. report [stating Serb responsibility for] the market\u00a0massacre is a classified secret, but four specialists — a Russian, a Canadian and twoAmericans — have raised serious doubts about its conclusion, suggesting instead that\u00a0the mortar was fired not by the Serbs but by Bosnian government forces.” A Canadian\u00a0officer “added that he and fellow Canadian officers in Bosnia were ‘convinced that the\u00a0Muslim government dropped both the February 5, 1994, and the August 28, 1995, mortar\u00a0shells on the Sarajevo markets.'” An unidentified U.S. official “contends that the\u00a0available evidence suggests either ‘the shell was fired at a very low trajectory,\u00a0which means a range of a few hundred yards — therefore under [Sarajevo] government\u00a0control,’ or ‘a mortar shell converted into a bomb was dropped from a nearby roof into\u00a0the crowd.'” [“Bosnia’s bombers,” The Nation, 10\/2\/95]. At least some high-ranking\u00a0French and perhaps other Western officials believed the Muslims responsible; after\u00a0having received that account from government ministers and two generals, French\u00a0magazine editor Jean Daniel put the question directly to Prime Minister Edouard\u00a0Balladur: “‘They [i.e., the Muslims] have committed this carnage on their own people?’\u00a0I exclaimed in consternation. ‘Yes,’ confirmed the Prime Minister without hesitation,\u00a0‘but at least they have forced NATO to intervene.'” [“No more lies about Bosnia,” LeNouvel Observateur, 8\/31\/95, translated in Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture,\u00a0January 1997]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Suppression of Enemies\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>As might be expected, one manifestation of the radical Islamic orientation of the\u00a0Izetbegovic government is increasing curtailment of the freedoms of the remaining\u00a0non-Muslims (Croats and Serbs) in the Muslim-held zone. While there are similar\u00a0pressures on minorities in the Serb- and Croat-held parts of Bosnia, in the Muslim\u00a0zone they have a distinct Islamic flavor. For example, during the 1996-1997 Christmas\u00a0and New Year holiday season, Muslim militants attempted to intimidate not only Muslims\u00a0but Christians from engaging in what had become common holiday practices, such asgift-giving, putting up Christmas or New Year’s trees, and playing the local SantaClaus figure, Grandfather Frost (Deda Mraz). [“The Holiday, All Wrapped Up; Bosnian\u00a0Muslims Take Sides Over Santa,” Washington Post, 12\/26\/96] In general:\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>“Even in Sarajevo itself, always portrayed as the most prominent multi-national\u00a0community in Bosnia, pressure, both psychological and real, is impelling non-Bosniaks\u00a0[i.e., non-Muslims] to leave. Some measures are indirect, such as attempts to ban thesale of pork and the growing predominance of [Bosniak] street names. Other measuresare deliberate efforts to apply pressure. Examples include various means to make\u00a0non-Bosniaks leave the city. Similar pressures, often with more violent expression and\u00a0occasionally with overt official participation, are being used throughout Bosnia.”\u00a0[“Bosnia’s Security and U.S. Policy in the Next Phase: A Policy Paper, International\u00a0Research and Exchanges Board, November 1996]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>In addition, President Izetbegovic’s party, the SDA, has launched\u00a0politically-motivated attacks on moderate Muslims both within the SDA and in rival\u00a0parties. For example, in the summer of 1996 former Prime Minister Haris Silajdzic, (a\u00a0Muslim, and son of the former imam at the main Sarajevo mosque) was set upon and\u00a0beaten by SDA militants. Silajdzic claimed Izetbegovic himself was behind the attacks.\u00a0[NYT, 9\/2\/96] Irfan Mustafic, a Muslim who co-founded the SDA, is a member of the\u00a0Bosnian parliament and was president of the SDA’s executive council in Srebrenica when\u00a0it fell to Bosnian Serb forces; he was taken prisoner but later released. Because of\u00a0several policy disagreements with Izetbegovic and his close associates, Mustafic wasshot and seriously wounded in Srebrenica by Izetbegovic loyalists. [(Sarajevo)Slobodna Bosna, 7\/14\/96] Finally, one incident sums up both the ruthlessness of theSarajevo establishment in dealing with their enemies as well as their internationalradical links:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>“A special Bosnian army unit headed by Bakir Izetbegovic, the Bosnian president’s\u00a0son, murdered a Bosnian general found shot to death in Belgium last week, a Croatian\u00a0newspaper reported . . . citing well-informed sources. The Vjesnik newspaper,\u00a0controlled by the government, said the assassination of Yusuf Prazina was carried out\u00a0by five members of a commando unit called ‘Delta’ and headed by Ismet Bajramovic also\u00a0known as Celo. The paper said that three members of the Syrian-backed Palestinian\u00a0movement Saika had Prazina under surveillance for three weeks before one of them,\u00a0acting as an arms dealer, lured him into a trap in a car park along the main highway\u00a0between Liege in eastern Belgium and the German border town of Aachen. Prazina, 30,\u00a0nicknamed Yuka, went missing early last month. He was found Saturday with two bullet\u00a0holes to the head. ‘The necessary logistical means to carry out the operation were\u00a0provided by Bakir Izetbegovic, son of Alija Izetbegovic, who left Sarajevo more than\u00a0six months ago,’ Vjesnik said. It added that Bakir Izetbegovic ‘often travels between\u00a0Brussels, Paris, Frankfurt, Baghdad, Tehran and Ankara, by using Iraqi and Pakistani\u00a0passports,’ and was in Belgium at the time of the assassination. Hasan Cengic, head of\u00a0logistics for the army in Bosnia-Hercegovina, was ‘personally involved in theassassination of Yuka Prazina,’ the paper said.” [Agence France Presse, 1\/5\/94]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>Conclusion\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>The Clinton Administration’s blunder in giving the green light to the Iranian arms\u00a0pipeline was based, among other errors, on a gross misreading of the true nature and\u00a0goals of the Izetbegovic regime in Sarajevo. It calls to mind the similar mistake of\u00a0the Carter Administration, which in 1979 began lavish aid to the new Sandinista\u00a0government in Nicaragua in the hopes that (if the United States were friendly enough)\u00a0the nine comandantes would turn out to be democrats, not communists, despite abundant\u00a0evidence to the contrary. By the time the Reagan Administration finally cut off the\u00a0dollar spigot in 1981, the comandantes — or the “nine little Castros,” as they were\u00a0known locally — had fully entrenched themselves in power.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0 <\/span>To state that the Clinton Administration erred in facilitating the penetration of\u00a0the Iranians and other radical elements into Europe would be a breathtaking\u00a0understatement. A thorough reexamination of U.S. policy and goals in the region is\u00a0essential. In particular, addressing the immediate threat to U.S. troops in Bosnia,\u00a0exacerbated by the extention of the IFOR\/SFOR mission, should be a major priority of\u00a0the 105th Congress.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

January 16, 1997\u00a0 \u00a0 Extended Bosnia Mission Endangers U.S. Troops \u00a0 Clinton-Approved Iranian Arms Transfers Help Turn Bosnia into Militant Islamic Base\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 “‘There is no question that the policy of getting arms into Bosnia was of great\u00a0assistance in allowing the Iranians to dig in and create good relations with the\u00a0Bosnian government,’ a senior … <\/p>\n

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