By Jon R. Anderson, Stars and Stripes European edition, Sunday, September 8, 2002
Pvt. Antonio Hollie, front, and Spec. Michael Sabol guard the front gate of the Army's headquarters at Heidelberg, Germany.
Bomb-plot suspect Astrid Eyzaguirre worked at this military liquor store at the Army shopping center in Heidelberg.
HEIDELBERG, Germany — Anxiety was running high among U.S. soldiers and their families in Heidelberg on Saturday amid revelations that a terrorist plot may have been narrowly thwarted in recent days.
And while the plot itself was enough to get everyone’s attention in this picturesque tourist city in southeast Germany, it is the news that an American, working for one of the local post exchange stores, is among the suspects that is leaving most people shocked.
Responding to a U.S. tip, German authorities arrested Osman Petmezci, 25, and his fiancée, American Astrid Eyzaguirre, 23, in the Heidelberg suburb of Walldorf on Thursday on charges that they were preparing to blow up U.S. facilities on the first anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks. Heidelberg is home to about 16,000 soldiers, family members and Army civilians and is the headquarters of U.S. Army Europe.
Jon R. Anderson / S&S
Pvt. Antonio Hollie, front, and Spec. Michael Sabol guard the front gate of the Army's headquarters at Heidelberg, Germany.
Authorities said Saturday that the couple appear to have no link to the al-Qaida terror organization.
“That one of our own was involved, that’s the scary part,” said Army spouse Vanessa Stokes-Tabb while shopping in the same center where Eyzaquirre worked. “How can you screen Americans for something like this? It’s very scary.”
Jon R. Anderson / S&S
Bomb-plot suspect Astrid Eyzaguirre worked at this military liquor store at the Army shopping center in Heidelberg.
While Eyzaquirre worked at the Class Six liquor store at the shopping center, her ID card would have given her access to virtually all of Heidelberg’s military installations, including the Army’s headquarters compound known as Campbell Barracks.
Police found 287 pounds of chemicals, five pipe bombs that could have been used to detonate the chemicals, and a picture of Osama bin Laden in the couple’s apartment, German officials say.
The weekly magazine Der Spiegel reported Saturday that Eyzaguirre had expressed admiration for bin Laden to a friend, and that she had warned the friend to stay away from the post shopping facilities in the coming days. The friend reported the warning to U.S. military police.
While the overall threat condition remains stable, security was tightened slightly throughout Heidelberg with additional guards posted at several locations and a beefed-up presence by German police.
“Obviously, this is something that causes us to pay a lot of attention,” said Col. Carl Kropf, spokesman for Gen. Montgomery Meigs, commander of the Army’s approximately 62,000 troops in Europe.
Addressing concerns that more plotters still may be lurking, Kropf said, “That’s why we have force protection in place — to serve as a deterrent and to be the eyes and ears of the command.”
Kropf encouraged soldiers and family members to report “anything out of the ordinary.”
“We just want people to remain vigilant,” he said.
Sgt. Aye Ba, the sergeant in charge of the platoon of troops manning posts at Heidelberg’s shopping center Saturday afternoon, said that’s exactly what his soldiers are doing.
“Nobody is going to get past us,” he said.
While military shoppers continued to flow into the small fenced-in compound throughout the day, Ba said there has been a palpable level of anxiety in the air.
“People are shocked,” he said. “We all are. It’s unbelievable that one of the people plotting something like this could have worked right here.”
The shopping center was the scene Friday of another mysterious arrest.
Two ethnic Albanian men, one of them another Army and Air Force Exchange Service employee who has worked as a barber here for seven years, were hauled away by German police after U.S. Criminal Investigation Command agents arrested them Friday afternoon.
U.S. officials have remained tight-lipped about the case, referring all questions to German authorities. While German police say the two sets of arrests are not related, they have so far not released any details on why the two ethnic Albanian men were apprehended.
“They say it’s not connected, but I don’t believe it,” said one soldier who witnessed the arrest. “They evacuated the whole building in a big hurry. They were worried something was going to happen.”
Neighbors in Walldorf, a town of 14,000 that houses a large American military community, described Petmezci and Eyzaguirre as “pretty friendly.” But one man recalled that Petmezci openly discussed his hatred of Jews.
Despite Petmezci’s Islamic beliefs, Jürgen Meyer said they’d drunk beer together watching soccer — and that in the context he didn’t take the talk seriously.
“I thought it was all nonsense,” Meyer said.
Jessica Rosarius, who lives on the same floor as the couple, said she saw Eyzaguirre standing in the hall outside her third-floor apartment shortly after noon on the day of the arrests.
“I asked her if she locked herself out and she said, ‘Long story,’” Rosarius said.
As she left the building, Rosarius said she saw several police vans and a police dog unit, but did not see authorities remove anything from the apartment.
Though both Rosarius and Eyzaguirre are German-Americans, roughly the same age, living in the same building and working on base in civilian jobs, Rosarius said their interaction was confined to casual greetings and that neither had visited the other’s apartment.
Nor, Rosarius said, did she ever pick up any anti-American sentiment from Petmezci.
Despite any concerns that more attackers still may be plotting, many refused to allow their anxiety to stop them from getting out on a beautiful Saturday afternoon.
“I’m relieved they caught them, but if I let something like this disrupt my life, then the bad guys are winning,” said Sgt. Keith Mattison, with the 501st Military Intelligence Battalion, based in Wiesbaden.
Across town, the news didn’t stop the annual German-American Volksmarch either.
Several military families participating in the community hike, however, said their guard is up.
“We’re very concerned,” said the wife of a USAREUR officer, “especially because we live in off-post housing.”
“I think everyone is worried,” said a medical officer who works at the nearby Army hospital. “As a soldier, you kind of expect danger, but as a father, there’s certainly concern.”
Bill Henry, a Patch High School football coach who had brought his team from Stuttgart for a scrimmage with Heidelberg High, said his students “were just shocked.”
“We were just worried it would cancel our game,” said one of the players while eating Popeye’s chicken at the shopping center.
Sean Martin, civilian employee with the Army’s Child and Youth Services, said he hopes the incident leads to a review of AAFES’ hiring policies and, perhaps, better background checks.
“It’s a tough issue,” he said, “I’m just not sure how you can control something like that.”
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
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