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| 2006-05-20 |
| Iran's Iraq Strategy; Tehran Could Retaliate Against Washington by Striking Next Door By Steven Simon and Ray Takeyh Sunday, May 21, 2006; B02 From the moment the first U.S. warheads detonate over an Iranian nuclear installation, the United States will be at war with the Islamic Republic Finally!. A vast tableau of American facilities around the world -- as well as the streets of U.S. cities -- could be targets for retaliation by Iran's The most likely theater of operations in the initial stages of a U.S.-Iranian conflict, however, would be next door -- in Iraq. Since the collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime, Iran has methodically built and strengthened its military, political and religious influence in Iraq Some say this. Others note that many Shia do not want to be run by Iran. Iran's Revolutionary Guard has extensively infiltrated Iraq's Ministry of the Interior and police force, both mainstays of Shiite power. The hundreds of Iranian mullahs and businessmen who have slipped across the border have a commanding presence in southern Iraq's commercial and religious sectors. Iran's sway over Shiite militias and its considerable paramilitary presence in Iraq give Tehran leverage in the ongoing nuclear stalemate with Washington, and would emerge as a key factor should armed conflict break out. U.S. forces and prestige are vulnerable in Iraq, making them particularly attractive targets. However, should Iran decide to strike in Iraq, it would have to weigh competing priorities: a desire for revenge against the Americans, and the strategic need to both avoid chaos in its Western neighbor and bolster the political role of Iraq's Shiite majority. How Iran resolves this dilemma would go a long way toward determining the outcome of a U.S.-Iranian conflict -- as well as the future of the U.S. war in Iraq. Iran's paramilitary and intelligence buildup in Iraq would put some members of the The Qods Force has a longstanding relationship with Hezbollah, which it trains and supplies in coordination with Syria through an Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps unit in central Lebanon. In the words of Iranian Maj. Gen. Yahya Rahim Safavi, the IRGC commander, "The range of [the IRGC's] duty is not limited to our land and we have extra-border missions." Iranian personnel have established safe houses throughout southern Iraq. They monitor the movement of coalition forces, tend weapons caches, facilitate cross-border travel of clerics, smuggle munitions into Iraq and recruit individuals as intelligence sources. Presumably, Tehran has recruited networks within U.S. military bases and civilian compounds that could be activated on short notice. Iran is also believed by regional intelligence agencies to have armed and trained as many as 40,000 Iraqis to prevent an unlikely rollback of Shiite control Didn't they help train and equip the, uh-hem, Mahdi Army? The one whose 'clock was cleaned' by a few battalions of Soldiers and Marines in Najaf and Baghdad?. Coalition forces have suffered the consequences of Iran's military presence. U.S. and British officials contend that the IRGC has introduced into Iraq "shaped charge designs" -- powerful bombs that channel the force of an explosion into a narrow path. (Lebanese Hezbollah also has used such bombs effectively against Israeli tanks.) According to the British, at least 10 of their soldiers in southern Iraq have been killed since May 2005 by the combination of such explosives and remote triggering devices. Marine Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, noted in a March briefing with Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld that these makeshift bombs are "traceable back to Iran." All are Acts of War U.S. troops have improved their force protection skills over the past three years and are more adroit at detecting such bombs. But it is just not possible to fully safeguard 135,000 troops, let alone the 30,000 contractors and civilians working in Iraq. If the IRGC activated its agents within U.S. forward operating bases, or used indirect fire weapons -- Katyusha rockets or heavy mortars -- Iran could kill sizable concentrations of soldiers in mess halls, sleeping quarters, headquarters tents and other key facilities. The overall level of violence in Iraq -- 75 Iran's clerical regime could complicate matters for Washington even more by pressing its Shiite allies in Iraq to demand a U.S. withdrawal Although the Islamic Republic may not be able to obtain a fatwa against the United States from Iraq's most esteemed clerics, it can still count on the backing of important segments of the Shiite community, particularly those jockeying for power within it. This support could quickly produce mobs of young men in the street protesting the occupation And they would be protesting against the Iraqi government, no?. Tehran is capable of wreaking havoc in Iraq, and it may consider such a move in response to a U.S. attack. However, as Iraq continues its descent into chaos 5-10 attacks and 25 dead daily is bad, but it is nothing even close to a civil war. The MSMs idea of "intense urban combat" is a few wild AK47 shots, Tehran must balance its desire to hurt the United States with the equally compelling objective of fostering an orderly transition to Shiite rule in Iraq. This need for balance is rooted in Iran's wartime experience during its long conflict with Hussein's Iraq. As Iran and Iraq are both Shiite-majority nations, the historic animosity between them has had less to do with religion than politics Actually, it has to do with Arabs vs. Persians, as it has been for over a millenia.. Indeed, an uneasy consensus has evolved among the Iranian leadership that the impetus for the war with Iraq, which killed hundreds of thousands of Iranians from 1980 to 1988, lay in the Sunni domination of Iraqi politics Actually, it was Saddam's idea to cleve off the Ahwaz area (Arabistan) with it's Arabs and Oil. The Sunni minority sought to justify its rule under the Baathist regime by embracing a pan-Arabist program; ultimately, this quest for glory abroad led to an assertion of hegemony in the Persian Gulf region and a devastating war with Iran. Empowerment of the more congenial Shiites in Iraq emerged as a key postwar objective of the Islamic Republic, and that empowerment depends on a modicum of political and social stability. Ironically, the Iranian clerical hard-liners, so adamant about suppressing the reform movement at home, have emerged as advocates of democratic pluralism in Iraq. The Bush administration's satisfaction with January's parliamentary elections was echoed by Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, the reactionary head of the powerful Guardian Council, when he said: "Iraq is now going through its election cycle. The election results are very good." Iran's theocrats appreciate that the surest way to advance their interests is to support an electoral process that will yield a state with strong provinces and a weak federal structure. That would keep the Shiites up, the Kurds in and the Sunnis down. How, then, will Tehran reconcile its war aims with its determination to preserve stability in Iraq? Look back to the early 1980s, when a U.S.-Iranian confrontation played itself out in hapless Lebanon. In that conflict, Iran did not subvert Lebanon's already brittle society by assassinating politicians and damaging the national infrastructure. Iran certainly could have done so, given its extensive network of clerical sympathizers, guerrillas and terrorists. Instead, Tehran opted for an incremental and deadly campaign of violence against the U.S. presence. It was at the behest of Iran that Hezbollah wrecked the U.S. Embassy in 1983, wiping out the CIA's cadre of Near East experts, and struck American barracks in Beirut in 1984, killing 241 Marines. The point of this is that if we do something to stop Iran's nukes, they can kick our ass really, REALLY bad. Any yet they do not note that the prior acts of Iran, i.e. supplying personnel and weapons against our troops, if an Act of War. In contemplating war with Iran today, the Bush administration should remember the lessons of Lebanon. The U.S. presence in Iraq -- with its |
| Posted by:Glavick Phinese7130 |
| #5 amen RS - WaPo thinks they're scaring off the American public. I think they're doing the Admin's job in preparing the public for war with Iran |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-05-20 19:28 |
| #4 Here we go again. Without the MM's doling out piles of cash, many of the terrorists would bail and much of the remainder would be reduced to throwing rocks. Terrorism costs money - for people, travel, agents, bribes, arms, UN subversion, the works. I guess the MM's are about half of the problem, with the Saudis stirring up the lion's share of the rest. You can dismantle the MM network and: reduce the militia power in Iraq dramatically, dry up the deadly modern weapons flow into Iraq, reduce stolen elections in Iraq, cut the legs from under Syria and Hezbollah, cut Paleo terr funding and arms assistance, etc, etc, by doing what should come easily and naturally: removing the threat of the MM's. Their nuke program and inability to STFU about it are, ironically, Godsends. They demand to be whacked for it and "misunderestimate" the US with a level of arrogance that is truly unique. Were it not so, had they any sense at all, any notion of what makes America tick, any perspective on just WTF happened in Afghanistan and Iraq and why, they would have stayed off the radar screen, developed their nukes on the sly and gone on bleeding us in all those other ways forever. They're idjits, thank Gawd. So is WaPo for constantly using the "fear" angle in their tripe. They think it's dispiriting and scary. For Jacksonians, it just pisses us off. |
| Posted by: random styling 2006-05-20 18:48 |
| #3 A vast tableau of American facilities around the world -- as well as the streets of U.S. cities -- could be targets for retaliation by Iran's terrorist agents and surrogates. In other words it would not be any worse then it is right now... ... only their ability to wage war and terrorists attacks would be reduced. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2006-05-20 18:30 |
| #2 Good old WaPo, trying to dictate US foreign policy by making everything sound like we're totally incapable of waging war against someone like the MMs. These jerkwads know nothing about modern warfare or the capabilities of the United States, just that "we're vulnerable". One strike against the United States forces and Iran CEASES TO EXIST, even restricting ourselves to conventional warfare. What a waste of oxygen. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2006-05-20 18:16 |
| #1 Good old WaPo, trying to dictate US foreign policy by making everything sound like we're totally incapable of waging war against someone like the MMs. These jerkwads know nothing about modern warfare or the capabilities of the United States, just that "we're vulnerable". One strike against the United States forces and Iran CEASES TO EXIST, even restricting ourselves to conventional warfare. What a waste of oxygen. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2006-05-20 18:16 |