| Hat tip to Orrin Judd. |
Leaders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) now dominate Iran's Supreme National Security Council, the country's top foreign policy-making body under the constitution. Mr. Ahmadinejad, a little-known former mayor of Tehran before his surprise election in July, is a former IRGC commander, as is new council Secretary-General Ali Larijani, who has taken the lead in negotiations about Iran's nuclear programs.
| This just makes it official and removes the pretense. |
The personnel changes "make it less and less credible that Iran is pursuing nuclear programs for peaceful uses," he said.
| But it makes it much easier politically for either Bush or Sharon to nail the Iranians, since the targets are now specifically military. |
The NCRI is the political arm of the People's Mujahadeen, a secular Iranian bloc that broke violently with the Islamic leaders of the revolution shortly after the ouster of the Shah. Branded a terrorist group by U.S. and European governments, it also has proven to be the single best intelligence source on Iran's clandestine nuclear programs, exposing in recent years massive research and testing sites inside Iran unknown to U.N. and Western monitors.
But other analysts also have reported a wave of senior appointments for Iran's military, especially from within the more ideological forces under the direct control of the ruling Islamic clerics. Houchang Hassan-Yari, a political scientist at the Royal Military College of Canada, noted in a recent analysis that current and former members of the IRGC now can be found throughout Iran's political and administrative bureaucracy, from lawmakers in parliament to mayors, university officials and even managers of some of Iran's biggest business concerns. The corps is "on the verge of being transformed from a junior player in the country's military defense to a key factor in the country's military and security doctrine -- a rise that could come at the [traditional] army's expense," he noted.