Deconstructing Markale II
November 12, 2013
Written by: Andy Wilcoxson
At 11:10 AM on 28 August 1995 a 120 mm mortar shell landed near the Markale Market in Sarajevo. The explosion killed 38 people and
wounded another 75. The Bosnian-Serbs were blamed for the attack, although they
denied responsibility, and NATO air strikes were launched against Bosnian-Serb
targets.
The
Muslims allege that the Serbs shelled the Markale
Market in order to terrorize the civilian population. The Serbs allege that the
Muslims shelled the Market themselves in order to give NATO a pretext to launch
its bombing campaign.
The
UN Protection Force was dispatched to investigate the incident and they,
together with the local police, initially concluded that the fatal round came
in at a bearing of 170 degrees. However, in their final report they concluded
“beyond reasonable doubt” that the mortar round was “fired from Bosnian Serb
territory … from the Lukavica area at a range of between
3,000 and 5,000 meters … the bearing of this round was most likely from 220-240
degrees.”[1]
Two
separate trial chambers at the ICTY also concluded “beyond reasonable doubt”
that the shell was fired from Bosnian Serb territory – but not from Lukavica.
According
to the Dragomir Milosevic judgment, “The mortar shell
that struck the street in the vicinity of the Markale
Market was fired from the territory under the control of the SRK [Sarajevo-Romanija Corps of the Bosnian Serb Army] and it was fired
by members of the SRK ... the Trial Chamber is persuaded by the evidence of the
BiH police, the UNMOs and the first UNPROFOR
investigation, which concluded that the direction of fire was 170 degrees, that
is, Mount Trebevic, which was SRK-held territory.”[2]
The
Perisic trial chamber came to the same conclusion:
“The Trial Chamber finds beyond a reasonable doubt that on 28 August 1995
shortly after 11:00 hours, a 120mm mortar shell hit the entrance of the City
Market on Mula-Mustafe Baseskije
street killing 38 persons and injuring 75 persons. The
Trial Chamber also finds that the mortar shell was fired from the VRS-held
territory on the slopes of Mt. Trebevic.”[3]
The
judges were persuaded by the evidence of the prosecution’s mortar expert,
quartermaster sergeant Richard Higgs of England. Higgs identified four possible
firing positions along the 170 degree bearing where the mortar could have been
fired from: 900, 1600, 2400, and 3000 meters from the market depending on the
propulsion charge used to fire the mortar. He concluded that 2400 meters was
the most likely firing position.[4]
Anyone
capable of reading a map can see that Lukavica and
Mt. Trebevic are in two completely different
directions. Lukavica is to the west and Mt. Trebevic is to the south of the Markale
Market. UNPROFOR’s investigation concluded “beyond a reasonable doubt” that the
shell was fired from Lukavica, but two ICTY trial
chambers have found “beyond a reasonable doubt” that it was fired from Mt. Trebevic.
The
only thing you can conclude beyond a reasonable doubt is that the ICTY’s
findings and UNPROFOR’s investigation can’t both be right. Either UNPROFOR is
wrong, the ICTY is wrong, or both of them are wrong.
Mapping
the ICTY and UNPROFOR’s Claims
This map shows the frontlines around Sarajevo, the firing positions alleged by
the ICTY and UNPROFOR, the location of the UN Observation post, the findings
from QMS Higgs report and a circle with a 1,050 meter radius centered on the Markale Market. In order to understand the rest of the
article, I would urge the reader to take a minute and get acquainted with the
map.
ICTY
& UNPROFOR: Getting the Location of the Front Lines Wrong
In
order to determine whether the shell was fired from the Serbian or the Muslim
side of the confrontation line it is important to know the location of the
front lines.
Even
though the ICTY and UNPROFOR don’t agree on the direction that the shell came
from they both agree that the confrontation line was 1,050 meters away from the
Markale Market.[5]
In
reality, the front lines were much farther away than the ICTY or UNPROFOR say
they were. The Serb lines were about 1,700 meters away in the direction of Lukavica and about 1,900 meters away in the direction of
Mt. Trebevic.
Moving
the confrontation lines closer to the market than they actually were reduces
the area from which the Muslims could have fired the shell and increases the
area from which the Serbs could have fired it. Manipulating the location of the
confrontation lines makes it appear more likely that the Serbs fired the shell
and less likely that the Muslims did.
The
blue circle on the map has a radius of 1,050 meters and is centered on the
impact crater. As you can see the circle comes nowhere close to the front
lines.
Hear
No Evil
A
lot has been made of the fact that one of the UN Military Observers assigned to
the UN Observation Post didn’t hear any outgoing mortar fire.
According
to the Dragomir Milosevic judgment, “The UNMOs Lt.
Com. Thomas Knustad and Maj. Paul Conway were posted
at OP-1 and they heard an impact and explosion after which they observed smoke
coming from the area of Markale, about 2,000 metres from where they were. Lt. Com. Knustad
was confident that the round, which resulted in the explosion that he heard and
observed from his post, was not fired from within his area of responsibility.
Lt. Com. Knustad estimated that the maximum distance
at which a 120 mm mortar shell can be heard is at least four to five kilometres. He therefore excluded the possibility that the
shell was fired from within ABiH-held territory
because he would have heard it.”[6]
It
is highly interesting that the trial chamber only heard testimony from Knustad, but not Conway. It is especially interesting
because Conway was at the observation post and Knustad
wasn’t when the incident occurred.
According
to the Perisic judgment, “At about 9:00 hours on 28
August 1995, UNMOs Thom Knustad from Norway and Paul
Conway from Ireland assumed their duties at OP-1. It was a bright, sunny
morning and Knustad was sitting outside the house
while Conway was at the observation post. At about 11:00 hours, Knustad saw a smokestack coming up from what he instantly
identified as the Markale area and then heard the
impact about five to six seconds later. Knustad
joined Conway at the observation post, where they recorded the incident in the
log book kept there and Conway immediately reported the incident to the UNMO
headquarters at the PTT building.”[7]
Incredibly,
nobody bothered put Paul Conway, the UNMO who was actually on duty at the
Observation Post at that exact moment, on the witness stand until 2012 when
Radovan Karadzic called him to testify as a defense witness.
Once
Conway took the stand it was obvious why the Prosecutor hadn’t called him to
testify. He said that he wasn’t sure if the explosions he heard were the sound
of mortars impacting the Markale Market or if they
were the sound of outgoing mortar fire.
Conway
testified that he heard the sound of “muffled explosions.”[8] In response to questioning from the
Prosecutor he said, “I was always confused as had I heard outgoing or incoming.
So I can't say that I only heard impact. I don't -- to be honest, I don't know
what the explosions I heard were coming from.”[9]
The
prosecutor put it to Conway that “the sound of 120-millimetre mortar firing is
not - to use your word – ‘muffled’ if fired from a reasonably close distance to
the listener” and he agreed saying, “I would expect it to make a very
distinctive ‘vrmph’ and ‘trmph’
and you'd know that a heavy explosion had occurred.”[10]
The
Prosecution’s Mortar Expert
As
previously mentioned, the Prosecution enlisted a British mortar expert named
Richard Higgs to determine the possible firing positions for the mortar that
hit the Markale Market.
According
to his report, “At an angle of [descent] approximately 70 degrees the different
possible charges give ranges in the following areas;
“Charge
1 = 900m
“Charge 2 = 1600m
“Charge 3 = 2400m
“Charge 4 = 3000m
“When
you take into account where these plot on a map, the fact that the UN observers
did not hear the round being fired and the shallow crater the following
assumptions can be made. At a range of only 900m would put the firing position
inside the confrontation line and in direct line of sight and ear shot with the
UN observation post which would only have been approximately only 1km away. At
this distance they would have heard the round being fired.
“At
a range of 1600m places the firing point is in the area of the confrontation
line but still in easy ear shot of the UN observers. At a range of 2400m puts
the firing position in the hills which is out of ear shot of the UN observers
due to the lay of the land i.e. they would not have heard the round being fired
due to the hills and valleys. This area is also one that is marked next to a
gun position on the confrontation positional map.”[11]
Higgs
further elaborated on his findings in court. He said, “If the round had been
fired from 900 metres, this puts that location very
close to an urban area where there would be lots of people who could have heard
the firing, and there was no report that anyone heard that firing. Then when
you come back to 1600 metres it places it right
between the confrontation lines, which would be totally tactically sound (sic)
for the position of a mortar and again very close in direct line of hearing
from the UN observer, so you should have heard it. And then when you back to
the area of 2400, you are now coming back to the more ideal position where a
mortar would want to be, on the higher ground. It is far enough away from the
confrontation line for tactical reasons for survivability. Plus, because it is
up there in the hills, steep hills, it is shrouded from the UN observer by
these hills, and so therefore, of course, that would reduce the chance of any
sound being heard when fired.”[12]
The
Prosecutor asked Higgs to explain why he eliminated the 1,600 meter firing
position, and Higgs replied, “That position there would put this particular
mortar either right on the front line or even in between the two front lines.
For such a valuable asset, to place it in such a vulnerable position would not
make tactical sense. The 120-millimetre mortar is a large piece of ordnance.
Its ammunition is heavy. Ideally it is resupplied by a vehicle or many, many
people; and to place it in that location just would not be sensical.”[13]
Higgs
said that it was his firm conviction that the mortar had been fired from a
distance of 2,400 meters, and when the Prosecutor asked him if the mortar crew
could see the marketplace from 2,400 meters he said, “From that area, you
cannot see the market itself because it is hidden by the taller buildings all
around it. But you can identify the taller buildings very easily. For instance the
cathedral is not far from that location and the other taller buildings. So you
could use those as reference points to assist you, but you cannot see the
marketplace itself.”[14]
There
are a number of problems with Higgs’ evidence. The first problem is the fact
that claims that the UNMOs at the observation post hadn’t heard any outgoing
fire, when we know that UNMO Conway did hear something but he isn’t sure what
he heard. But to be fair, Higgs testified before Conway did and so he couldn’t
have possibly known what the UNMOs heard, even though he may have thought that
he did based on the information provided to him by the prosecutor.
The
next problem is that Higgs eliminates the 900 meter firing position as a
possibility because he says nobody reported having heard a mortar being fired.
If somebody did hear that, they likely would have reported it to the police in
Sarajevo, and if the Muslims had done the shelling themselves to blame the
Serbs and provoke a NATO intervention, would they have passed along those
reports to Higgs or the ICTY? Probably not.
Moreover,
the sound of mortars being fired was commonplace in Sarajevo during the war. A
person in the city who heard the sound of mortar fire would probably have
assumed that it was being fired at the Serbs and they wouldn’t have paid any
mind to it. They wouldn’t necessarily have connected the sound with the attack
on the Markale Market and reported it.
Another
problem with Higgs’ evidence is that he eliminates the 1,600 meter firing
position because he thinks it is right on top of the confrontation lines.
Unlike the trial chamber itself, and unlike UNPROFOR, at least Higgs knows
where the confrontation lines are at. Higgs’ problem was that he didn’t know
where the market was at as evidenced by this map from his report.
The reason why Higgs thinks that 1,600 meters is right on top of the
confrontation line is clear from the map in his report. His map makes it
obvious that he started measuring from the wrong place. His map puts the
location where the mortar impacted about 240 meters away from where it actually
did. He put the crater closer to the confrontation line so that when he
measured 1,600 meters he found himself right on top of the confrontation line
instead of being more than 200 meters inside of Muslim territory like you would
if you measured from the real impact site.
And
to compound that error he miscalculated magnetic declination when he plotted
the 170 degree line on the map. According to NOAA, the magnetic declination in
Sarajevo was 2.22 degrees east on 28 August 1995, but Higgs has the line drawn
as if magnetic declination were 3.25 degrees west and so the line he drew not
only starts from the wrong location, but the bearing of his “170 degree” line
is off by more than 5 degrees.
According
to Higgs, a Serbian mortar crew at 2,400 meters would have seen buildings in
the city that would help them target the market, but he says the terrain would
have blocked the sound of the outgoing mortar fire from reaching the UN
Observation Post, and he notes in his report that there is a Serbian gun
position on the map at about 2,400 meters distance from the market.
Contrary
to what Higgs claims, there is perfect line of sight between the Serbian gun
position at 2,400 meters and the UN Observation Post. There are no buildings
and no terrain that would block or muffle the sound of outgoing mortar fire
from reaching the Observation Post. The sound would have been clear as a bell.
This diagram is an elevation profile showing the terrain between the
Observation Post on the left and the 2,400 meter Serb gun position on the
right.
At 3,000 meters there is no line of sight to the Observation post, but there is
also no line of sight to the city. A mortar crew at 3,000 meters wouldn’t have
been able to see the city in order to target the market. At 3,000 meters there
is no line of sight to the Observation post, but there is also no line of sight
to the city. A mortar crew at 3,000 meters wouldn’t have been able to see the
city in order to target the market. The diagram below is an elevation profile
showing the line of sight from each of the potential firing positions to the
market.
When
Higgs dismissed the 900 meter firing position in his report he said, “At a
range of only 900m would put the firing position inside the confrontation line
and in direct line of sight and ear shot with the UN observation post which
would only have been approximately only 1km away. At this distance they would
have heard the round being fired.”
As
you can tell from the map, the observation post was half way up the hill. It
was northeast of the 900 meter firing position and southeast of the 2400 meter
firing position. The distance from the Observation Post to the 2400 meter
firing position is practically the same as it is to the 900 meter firing. Higgs
cannot credibly argue that outgoing mortar fire would have been audible to the
Observation Post at 900 meters from the market, but not at 2400 meters.
The
1,600 meter firing position, which Higgs dismissed because he started measuring
from the wrong place, would have put the mortar crew in Sarajevo’s Bostarici neighborhood, which was held by the Muslims.
From
Bostarici a mortar crew would have had a good view of
the city, and unlike the forested slopes of Mt. Trebevic,
there are buildings in Bostarici that could deflect
and muffle the sound. In fact, there is even a hill in the eastern part of Bostarici that would have prevented the observation post
from having line of sight into certain parts of the neighborhood.
As
Higgs noted in his testimony, “The 120-millimetre mortar is a large piece of
ordnance. Its ammunition is heavy. Ideally it is resupplied by a vehicle or
many, many people.” As one can see from Google’s satellite imagery, there
aren’t a lot of roads on the top of Mt. Trebevic, but
there are paved roads in Bostarici.
It
is important to be fair to QMS Higgs. His report does say, “It must be
remembered that I only have the evidence of others to go by and must make my judgements based on the facts in front of me.” The
inaccuracies in his report may be attributable to bad information he received
from the Prosecution.
ABiH Use of Mortars in
Sarajevo
It
is noteworthy that the ABiH and the VRS both had 120
millimeter mortars in their arsenal and that the ABiH
troops in Sarajevo were very skilled at firing their mortars and moving them
quickly.
Major
Roy Thomas was the senior UNMO in Sarajevo from 14 October 1993 until the 14th
of July, 1994. Major Thomas has 35 years of military experience with the
Canadian Armed Forces. And prior to his arrival in Sarajevo, he had
participated in five UN peacekeeping or military observer tours.
Major
Thomas testified for the Prosecution in the Radovan Karadzic trial, and during
his cross-examination, Maj. Thomas explained that “Some of the Bosnian [Muslim]
tactics proved to be superior, and one of them, I think, deserves some look by
military analysts, not necessarily in this court, is how they managed to use
the mortars and get them moved so quickly and avoid any semblance of
counter-battery fire on your [the Bosnian-Serbs’] part.”[15]
Major
Thomas told the court, “I'll tell you the most novel use of transport was a
mortar that was put in an unused railway car near the PTT building, was pushed
out by people on foot. It fired and then was pushed back before the Serb
artillery reacted.”[16]
The
ABiH mortar crews were also skilled at concealing
their activities from the UNMOs. Maj. Thomas told the court that UNMOs in Sarajevo
“spent a lot of time trying to catch them moving mortars into the hospital
grounds and then firing and then moving, but we were never able to pick them up
doing it. But we know they did it.”[17]
Maj.
Thomas wasn’t the only UN official to testify about the ABiH’s
use of mortars in Sarajevo either. A senior French military official who had
been deployed with the UN in Sarajevo also testified for the prosecution under
the pseudonym of KDZ-185.
Witness
KDZ-185 told the court: “I underline that the mortar units, especially with the
Bosnians, had this characteristic, that they would move them very often. They
had no fixed position, which accounts for the fact that unlike the Serb
artillery positions, we had not ascertained what the permanent locations were
of the Bosnian mortar units because such did not exist. They would move them
frequently so as to avoid being located and have a counter-battery fire fired
on them.”[18]
It
wasn’t just UN Personnel who saw the ABiH moving
their mortars around the city either. Martin Bell was a journalist who covered
the war for the BBC, and he testified in the Karadzic trial that he saw them
firing from mortars mounted on vehicles. Karadzic asked him: “Do you recall
that there were mortars mounted on vehicles, and they moved around the city and
opened fire from various locations?” And Bell responded, “Yes, Dr. Karadzic, I
saw that for myself.”[19]
In
light of the fact that the Bosnian-Muslims were adept at moving their mortars
quickly and firing them without being detected by the UN it is not beyond the
realm of possibility that a Bosnian-Muslim mortar crew could have opened fire
on the market from a location in Bostarici, out of
sight of the UN Observation Post, and gotten away without being detected.
Bostarici, Caco, and the 10th Mountain Brigade
During
the first part of the war, Bostarici was controlled
by the 10th Mountain Brigade commanded by a notorious Muslim warlord
named Musan Topalovic --
better known as “Caco” (pronounced ZA-tso).[20]
David
Harland was the head of UN civil affairs in Bosnia during the war. According to
his testimony at the ICTY Caco was “a dangerous man”
he said that “his whole unit was engaged in violence” and that “Caco, of course, had not only been killing Serbs; he had
been killing Muslims as well. And I think, in fact, the action which led to his
own death was a last spasm of violence in which he had killed a number of
Muslims.”[21]
General
Vahid Karavelic of the ABiH testified in the Delic trial
that they were afraid that outlaw units like Caco’s
10th Mountain Brigade would “attack us from the back.”[22] Indeed, the 10th
Mountain Brigade would ambush other units of the ABiH
and steal their equipment.[23]
In
late 1993 the Bosnian authorities killed Caco,
disbanded the 10th Mountain Brigade, and put Bostarici
under the control of the 115th Brigade, but Caco’s
men remained.
When
Caco was killed the New York Times reported that
“senior police officials said killing Mr. Topalovic
and arresting Mr. Delalic, the other gang leader,
would only dent the power of the gangs.
“’We
got the big Caco,’ a senior officer said, using the
dead gang leader's nickname. ‘But there are lot of little Cacos
waiting to take his place, and as long as we are in this situation, the
criminals will always be on top.’”[24]
Regardless
of their behavior, Caco’s men were seen as valuable
fighters by the Bosnian Government. The Bosnian-Muslim authorities were even
willing to look the other way when Caco attacked
their own police.
According
to one report in the New York Times, “A militia group led by a 29-year-old
former nightclub singer known as Caco attacked three
police stations, seizing 30 officers and taking them off to dig trenches at the
front-line positions held by Caco's men on Trebevic mountain ... ‘This is being handled very gently
because these guys are very good on the front line,’ said Ejup
Ganic, a vice president, referring to Caco's men. His view, as well as being expedient, reflected
a widely held opinion: that militia leaders like Caco,
even if they behave like renegades, have permitted the city to resist the
Serbs.”[25]
When
the Bosnian-Muslims killed Caco, the New York Times
reported that “The crimes that Mr. Topalovic and his
followers are said to have committed made the Government's failure to take
action sooner all the more striking. Mr. Alispahic,
the Interior Minister, said the gang leader's activities included seizing
people from their homes and killing them; seizing women at gunpoint to be
raped; kidnapping wealthy people in Sarajevo and holding them for ransom
payments of as much as 100,000 German marks, about $60,000; blackmail of other
well-to-do people, also for large sums, and grabbing men off the streets and
forcing them to dig trenches at the front.” The report also noted that “Mr. Topalovic broke into a funeral home used for many of the
victims of the siege and robbed its owner of 400,000 marks, about $240,000.”[26]
Just
because Caco was killed it didn’t mean that his men
disappeared. After he was killed, the Agence France Presse wire service reported that “a number of Caco supporters were still believed to be hold up in houses
close to his former command post.”[27]
According
to press reports, Caco had some 2,800 men under his
command.[28]
In 1996 thousands of his men turned out for his funeral. Agence
France Presse reported that “In a remarkable show of
solidarity, thousands of men, many of them former comrades in arms, flooded the
narrow streets of the old Turkish district of Sarajevo to pay their last
respects to Caco on Saturday.
“Caco's body was passed from hand to hand in traditional
fashion all the way from the mosque to the Kovaci
cemetery, a distance of one kilometer.”[29]
The
Kovaci cemetery where Caco
is buried, otherwise known as “Martyrs’ Memorial Cemetery,” is the
Bosnian-Muslim equivalent of the Arlington National Cemetery. It is the
cemetery where they bury their most honored veterans.
The
fact that Caco was killed in the autumn of 1993,
doesn’t mean that some of his men weren’t still lingering around Bostarici in the summer of 1995 when the Markale Market was hit. The fact that they were still
around for his funeral in 1996 is a good indicator that they were there in 1995
too.
This
was a depraved group of criminals and thugs who raped, robbed, kidnapped, and
murdered Serbs and Muslims alike. One cannot lightly dismiss the possibility
that they may have been the ones who shelled the Markale
Market especially when the heading that the shell came from points to an area
where they were known to be active.
As
the ballistics show, the Bosnian-Muslims had the means and the opportunity to
shell the Markale Market, and they had a motive.
The
motive was to incite international outrage against the Serbs, who would be seen
as responsible. The logical assumption when a shell is fired into Sarajevo is
that it must be the Serbs surrounding the city who did it. By shelling the Markale Market, the Muslims could exploit the carnage to
motivate NATO retaliation against the Serbs.
If
the Bosnian-Government wanted “dirty work” to be done, then Caco’s
men would have been the logical people to turn to. They were immoral and
unscrupulous cut-throats who could have easily been bribed to do anything.
In
spite of the ICTY and UNPROFOR’s findings, there is ample room for reasonable
doubt to make a definitive conclusion about who fired that shell.
[1]
D. Milosevic Exhibit P00357
[2]
D. Milosevic judgment, paras 724, 719
[3]
M. Perisic Judgment, para. 467
[4]
Ibid.
[5]
D. Milosevic Ex. P00357, Pg. 21; M. Perisic Judgment para 448; D. Milosevic Judgment para 693
[6]
D. Milosevic Judgment para 690
[7]
M. Perisic Judgment para 443
[8]
R. Karadzic Exhibit D2329
[9]
R. Karadzic Transcript, 17 October 2012; pg. 29013
[10]
Ibid., pg. 29011
[11]
R. Higgs Expert Report; D. Milosevic Exhibit P588.
[12]
D. Milosevic Transcript, 24 April 2007; pg. 5026-5027
[13]
Ibid., Pg. 5028
[14]
Ibid., Pg. 5029
[15]
R. Karadzic Transcript, 15 September 2010, pg. 6831
[16]
Ibid., Ibid., pg. 6841
[17]
Ibid., Ibid., pg. 6842
[18]
R. Karadzic Transcript, 29 June 2010, pg. 4283
[19]
R. Karadzic Transcript, 15 December 2010, pg. 9872
[20]
Testimony of Asim Dzambasovic,
Testimony of Asim Dzambasovic, R. Karadzic Transcript, 22 June 2011, pg. 15224
[21]
D. Milosevic Transcript, 16 January 2007, p. 445-446
[22]
R. Delic Transcript, 26 March 2008, pg. 7884
[23]
R. Delic Exhibit 00392e
[24]
The New York Times, "New Horror for Sarajevo: Muslims Killing Muslims", October 31, 1993
[25]
The New York Times, "Renegades Help Bosnia By Helping Themselves", July 5, 1993
[26]
The New York Times, "New Horror for Sarajevo: Muslims Killing Muslims", October 31, 1993
[27]
Agence France Presse, "Serbs shell Sarajevo district controlled by renegade brigade", October 28, 1993
[28]
Press Association, "Sarajevo Streets Ruled By Rogue Commander," June 3, 1993
[29]
Agence France Presse, "Sarajevo re-buries a war legend," November 02, 1996
Presse, November 02, 1996 02:18 GMT
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