Sow War and Reap Terror
This article, in the Asia Times, by K Gajendra Singh, former Indian ambassador to Turkey examines the tangled connections between Islamic extremist groups, Afghan mujahideen and the US, who supported them during the Bosnian war. He looks at the historical links between Turkey and Bosnia and argues that the appalling bombings in Turkey may have their origin with the thousands of fighters who were given a base in Europe.
Sow War and Reap Terror: "During 1992-95, the Pentagon helped with the movement of thousands of mujahideen and other Islamic elements from Central Asia, even some Turks, into Europe to fight alongside Bosnian Muslims against the Serbs.
'It was very important in the rise of mujahideen forces and in the emergence of current cross-border Islamic terrorist groups who think nothing of moving from state to state in the search of outlets for their jihadi mission. In moving to Bosnia, Islamic fighters were transported from the caves of Afghanistan and the Middle East into Europe; from an outdated battleground of the Cold War to the major world conflict of the day; from being yesterday's men to fighting alongside the West's favored side in the clash of the Balkans. If Western intervention in Afghanistan created the mujahideen, Western intervention in Bosnia appears to have globalized it.'
This is a quotation from a Dutch government report after investigations, prepared by Professor C Wiebes of Amsterdam University, into the Srebrenica massacre of July 1995, entitled 'Intelligence and the War in Bosnia', published in April 2002.
It details the secret alliance between the Pentagon and radical Islamic groups from the Middle East and their efforts to assist Bosnia's Muslims. By 1993, a vast amount of weapons were being smuggling through Croatia to the Muslims, organized by 'clandestine agencies' of the US, Turkey and Iran, in association with a range of Islamic groups that included the Afghan Mujahideen and the pro-Iranian Hezbollah. Arms bought by Iran and Turkey with the financial backing of Saudi Arabia were airlifted from the Middle East to Bosnia - airlifts with which, Wiebes points out, the US was 'very closely involved'. "
:: | 12:29 pm |Save This Page | |
|
0 Comments:
This is an archived story. See current posts here!