Douglas Farah: "London and the Possible Bosnia Connection"

By Andrew Cochran

Doug Farah asked me to post the following:

There is one intriguing detail in the emerging picture of the London bombings that are almost entirely overlooked: The possibility that the high-level explosives came from the Balkans. For several months, Western intelligence officials in Bosnia have been warning their counterparts that high-level plastic explosives have gone missing and were possibly in terrorist hands. One official told me a few months ago that if there were an attack in Europe, it would be very likely the materiel would have been obtained in Bosnia. The big question now is why no one paid attention to the warnings. There remains a small, dedicated group gatherin intelligence on these types of operation, but their work is given a low priority and the entire intelligence-gathering structure, providing what little reliable information available on radical Islamic movements and leaders in Bosnia, is slated to disappear at the end of the year. This is an incredibly short-sighted move by international donors who no longer want to pay relative pocket change, only a few million dollars a year, to keep the operation going.

While Western forces continue to scale back their activities in the Balkans and slash their intelligence-gathering capabilities there in the mistaken belief that things are returning to normal, radical Islamists are steadily preparing for renewed activity and are already engaged in acts of violence. The gun that killed Dutch film maker Theo Van Gough came from the Bosnia. The huge, unsecured stockpiles of weapons and explosives make obtaining these items easy. And there are still militant Islamists in positions of power. The foremost is Hasan Cengic, now in the Bosnia parliament, was a former deputy defense minister in charge of arming Bosnian Muslims during the Bosnian war. He set up, with the help of a very reluctant U.S. intelligence community, a weapons pipeline that ran primarily through Iran. He was also a director of the Third World Relief Agency, (TWRA), the fake Islamic charity that funneled hundreds of millions of dollars to radical Islamists during that conflict. Much of the money remains unaccounted for. TWRA officially went out of business in 1996, but more than $300 million in assets were not accounted for. It is interesting to note that Viktor Bout, happily flying for the U.S. military and KBR in Iraq and Afghanistan, dealt with Cengic often and provided him with at least one aircraft during the Bosnia war.

It is often forgotten that Bosnia played an extemely significant role in the formation of al Qaeda, and that the infrastructure established during that war were never erradicated. Al Qaeda and other Salafist groups used Bosnia as a training ground, a financial center, a weapons storage site and a money laundering center. Bosnia is still an active center for all of those activities. We ignore the obvious signs of danger at our own expense. Maybe the supply of high-grade explosives from the region will finally focus the necessary attention on Bosnia as an unfinished enterprise.

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