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| Iran |
| Tehran putting its spies in Iraq |
| 2003-09-29 |
| Iran has dispatched hundreds of agents posing as pilgrims and traders to Iraq to foment unrest in the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala, and the lawless frontier areas. Don’t have to check the suprise meter on this one. Tehran’s hard-line regime has also allowed extremist fighters from Ansar al-Islam, a terror faction with close links to al Qaeda, to cross back into Iraq from its territory to join the anti-American resistance. The Pentagon believes that Iran is building a bridgehead of activists inside Iraq, ready to destabilize the country if that serves its future interests. It does and they are. "They are provoking sectarian divisions, inciting people against the Americans and trying to foment conflict and anarchy," said Abdulaziz al-Kubaisi, a former Iraqi major who was jailed by Saddam Hussein and is now a senior official in the Iraqi National Congress. "The last thing that certain elements in the regime want is to see a stable democratic and pluralistic Iraq next door, so they are trying to export trouble here," said a leading official in another Iraqi party. Although Iran’s president is a Time tested and mullah approved. The National Council of Resistance in Iran (NCRI), an opposition group, claims that some translators working for the U.S. forces are reporting back to Tehran. It also says that its informants within the regime have supplied details of senior Iranian intelligence commanders who are operating inside Iraq. "The Iranian agents have melted into the population and are just waiting until the moment is right," said one NCRI official. L. Paul Bremer, the American head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, has already accused Iran of "meddling" in Iraq’s internal affairs and backing some attacks on American forces. On Friday, he confirmed that several hundred members of Ansar, which set up a Taliban-style ministate in Kurdish-controlled territory in 2001, had re-entered Iraq. "They are a very dangerous group," he said in Washington. "The flow of terrorists into Iraq is the biggest obstacle to the reconstruction of the country." Mr. Bremer said that U.S. forces are holding 248 non-Iraqi fighters captured in Iraq. Most came from Syria, but the second-largest group was Iranians. Tap, nope. At the start of the war to topple Saddam, Kurdish militia and U.S. Special Forces had crushed Ansar’s 750-strong force of Arabs, Pakistanis, Chechens and Kurds. About 250 Ansar fighters were killed and another 100 captured, but Iran’s military turned a blind eye as the rest escaped across the mountainous border. As predicted here. Most have returned to the violent flash points west and north of Baghdad, according to U.S. military officials, Kurdish political leaders and former mukhabarat officers. Ansar adheres to the same extremist Sunni Muslim interpretation of Islam as al Qaeda. Although Iran follows the alternative Shiite version of Islam, its hard-line military rulers have allowed Ansar to regroup and return to Iraq because they share its anti-American cause. The old "enemy of my enemy" policy. Iran has also taken advantage of its largely unpoliced border with Iraq — a 210-mile stretch of which was turned over Friday to an American-trained police force by the U.S. Army — to deploy agents who are building networks of spies and sympathizers. One Iraqi of ethnic Iranian origin, who returned to Najaf after 23 years in Iran and who has contacts with Tehran’s intelligence services, told the Sunday Telegraph that he has seen many Iranian agents mingling with visitors to the city of golden-domed mosques and shrines. Najaf, an ancient seat of Shi’ite learning, is fertile ground for the Iranian agents. Last week, many of the visiting pilgrims were speaking Farsi (Persian). The real pilgrims provide cover for the agents. Long-banned pictures of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979, are once again on sale in the markets of the town where he spent part of his early exile before moving to Paris. The returning Iraqi exile said that several agents from the political wing of the Revolutionary Guards had been deployed to Najaf, some operating within the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). "They are gathering information on the Americans and establishing their contacts with anti-U.S. groups," he said. Iran denies interference or sending agents to Iraq, saying that it has already recognized the Governing Council. "They ain’t our agents, they’re, somebody else’s!" The Iranian opposition, however, says that the Quds force of the regime’s Revolutionary Guards, which specializes in foreign operations, commands the loyalty of key commanders within the Badr Brigade, the Iranian-trained militia army of the SCIRI. Yup. |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #4 Maybe nobody (most of the world) has noticed, but Iran has been and is now at war with the west. They are on a fast track to developing nuclear weapons and are sure to use them as soon as they do. One of the Mullahs in that country has already said that if Iran hit Israel with a nuclear weapon it would happen so fast that Israel would not be able to respond in kind. There are two problems with this Mullahs argument. For one, what does he think the response to Iran would be from the United States, a strong allay of Israel? Secondly, Israel just moved ships and subs into the Persian Gulf. Though they haven't said that they were carrying nuclear missles and even deny they have them you can bet your sweet ass they do and their reason for going there was to be able to launch missles at Iran in the event Iran does attack Israel. It was also intended to send a clear message to Iran to think twice before attacking. |
| Posted by: Mandy 2003-12-22 3:24:30 AM |
| #3 that'll go great with the folks back home.. |
| Posted by: Dcreeper 2003-9-29 9:28:26 PM |
| #2 Build a series of gallows just inside the Iraq/Iran border. Whenever you catch one of these toads, hang him and leave the body there until it falls apart. It won't take long for either the leaders in Iran or the idiotarians they ship to Iraq to get the message. Having them on the border like that provides a much more direct message that interference with the internal affairs of Iraq will not be tolerated, and what you see is what you can expect if you try. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2003-9-29 2:23:54 PM |
| #1 The returning Iraqi exile said that several agents from the political wing of the Revolutionary Guards had been deployed to Najaf, some operating within the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), one of the five political parties represented in the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council. "They are gathering information on the Americans and establishing their contacts with anti-U.S. groups," he said. These scumbags need to be rooted out and exposed, and Iran given a clear warning to put the brakes on their games or else. |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2003-9-29 10:52:15 AM |