Second front: American troops at eagle Base in Bosnia were the target of a plot by Muslims linked to Mujaheddin in the Balkans, many of whom were recruited by a Bin Laden lieutenant
BOSNIAN PLOT: Balkan zealots planned suicide attacks
Edin Hamzic and Nick Fielding
ON THE order from their commanding officer, the soldiers of El Mudzahid, the holy warriors, climbed out of their trenches around the village of Vozuca in central Bosnia.
"About 300 of them got up and started running towards the Serb line, screaming 'Allahu akbar'," recalled one intelligence officer who witnessed the attack during the Bosnian war of 1992-95. "It was unbelievable. You could see them get shot and get up and run again . . . like animals. The Serbs withdrew."
A mercenary group, some of El Mudzahid had trained in the camps of Osama Bin Laden and were veterans of the Afghan war against the Russians. Drawn from the Arabian peninsula and northern Africa, they were in Bosnia to fight the holy war against the Serbs and Croats. The reward for some at the end of the war was Bosnian citizenship.
Last week, however, their fanaticism resurfaced, again allegedly inspired by Bin Laden. Five men were arrested for plotting suicide attacks, using light aircraft and helicopters, on Nato-ledstabilisation force bases in Bosnia. They had targeted Eagle Base, where most of the 3,000 US troops are located.
On the mobile phone of one conspirator investigators found the number of a key Bin Laden lieutenant, Abu Zubaydah, who was seen with the terrorist leader on a video released after the September 11 attacks.
Zubaydah co-ordinated the recruitment of mujaheddin from Afghanistan for the Bosnian war and set up training camps. Within months of the start of the war, hundreds of fanatical Muslims were fighting on the front line.
The men gained a reputation for unreliability. "They would not take commands from regular units. They would pick and choose their battles and, if they met serious resistance, they would retreat and go back to their barracks," said one former Bosnian officer.
With financial backing from Bin Laden, Iran and Saudi Arabia, they were, however, better armed than the regulars and had more ammunition.
Civilians were rarely allowed into their base, a disused hangar near Zenica with its own mosque. Vladimir Populovski, an armourer with the Bosnian army's 3rd Corps and one of the few non-Muslims to deal with the mujaheddin, recalls their unit parades. "The parades would start with a prayer, and it sounded scary even though I was on the same side. Then they would chant 'For whom? For Allah!' and my blood would freeze," he said.
By late 1993, El Mudzahid had been incorporated into the Bosnian army's command structure and became more disciplined. The men's fanatical beliefs and unerring trust in their commanders meant they were prepared to carry out any action.
They even had their own manual, Instructions to the Muslim Fighter, written by two prominent Bosnian Muslim clerics. "Subordination to one's superior is obligatory in every situation," it states.
Fearlessness was inspired by fatalism: "Muslim fighters must understand that their creator determined long ago the place, time and manner of their death."
Commanders, it states, should be prepared to "liquidate prisoners of war". One former Bosnian intelligence officer said: "In battle they were fearless and they rarely took any prisoners - and if they did, they executed them."
In operations near Teslic in central Bosnia, they placed the heads of three Serbian soldiers on poles on the front line. Villagers suffered a similar fate, with the soldiers proudly displaying the heads of victims piled in ammunition boxes. The mujaheddin also allegedly performed crude circumcisions on Serbian policemen they captured.
The unit's wartime activities have now come under scrutiny from the international war crimes tribunal in the Hague, for involvement in the execution of captured Croatian soldiers and civilians.
Earlier this year Nato moved against the remnants of the Arab volunteers. The search was prompted by US intelligence reports that up to 18 suspected terrorists were operating in Bosnia.
Several north Africans and Egyptians were seized. Earlier this month police arrested Bensayah Belkacem on charges of having contacts with one of Bin Laden's senior associates. Nato officials believe the key cell has been broken, but at least six are still thought to be on the loose.
