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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| No atomic ayatollahs: Need to destabilize IranÂ’s govÂ’t is no secret |
| 2007-05-30 |
“There are but two powers in the world, the sword and the mind. In the long run, the sword is always beaten by the mind.” - Napoleon Bonaparte According to a news account supposedly based on a leak from inside the government, President Bush recently signed off on a classified intelligence finding, authorizing the CIA to undertake nonlethal covert action to destabilize Iran’s nearly out-of-control government. If true, it’s about time. Diplomatic pleading hasn’t deterred the maniacal mullahs in their aspirations to make Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei into an atomic ayatollah. The covert action is also supposed to stem Iran’s support for Iraqi insurgents. Tehran’s likely assistance to the Taliban in Afghanistan should be added to the list. But a covert bid to pressure or topple Iran’s regime faces at least two problems. First, it’s not a secret anymore. So long as the leaker remains nameless, we can’t know the motive for sure - though the goal was likely to kill the project altogether. Second, it’s probably too little, too late. Such a program likely lacks the means needed to get Iran to throttle back on nukes or its support of insurgents. That’s more likely going to require economic sanctions that truly hurt, or a military strike. Sanctions are tough to get. Some reports indicate Europe has actually increased investment in Iran since the nuclear crisis. The mullahs should know the military option is still active. Last week’s unannounced exercises of two aircraft carrier strike groups in the Persian Gulf should send a clear signal. But an armed attack risks strengthening the regime. Many, perhaps most, Iranians are deeply alienated from their rulers now, but a surge of patriotism could ease those rifts. Unfortunately, a blown covert action runs that risk, too. Indeed, the CIA played a key role in putting the shah into power in 1953. Any sign that it’s meddling again could be poisonous. But even the loss of secrecy doesn’t mean the program can’t go ahead. A well-executed operation could upset things for the mullahs, increasing social pressure from below and shaking the senior clerics into backing off on their nefarious games. The regime is increasingly paranoid. The mullahs are now holding at least four Americans on trumped-up charges of every cleric’s worst nightmare: counter-revolution. The leak claims the covert-action program would include propaganda, disinformation and economic attacks - efforts to weaken Iran’s currency and manipulate financial transactions. It’s not hard to envision at least some tactics: We might look at getting Iran’s key oil suppliers, like the United Arab Emirates and India, to cut back. Buy up and flood the international market with rials, devaluing the currency and worsening Iran’s economy. The nuclear program could be slowed by devising ways to sell defective parts to the Iranian front companies buying off the black market. The regime’s fundamentalist legitimacy is also vulnerable. Why not use the foreign media to expose corruption (moral or financial) among the ruling elite? Iran is only slightly more than half Persian. Could ethnic minorities like the Azeris (24 percent) and Kurds (7 percent), already unhappy with their second-class status, be empowered to do something about it? A bolder, riskier approach would be to start aiding armed anti-government elements to operate in Iran. Unfortunately, it’s a double-edged sword: An ugly backlash might await perceived sympathizers - complicit or not. If U.S. interference is exposed, the blowback could be another anti-U.S. regime. Plus none of the anti-regime groups are ones you’d want to see running Iran. A covert program is unlikely to bring the Iranian regime to its knees. But it could throw Tehran off balance just enough to distract it from nukes and foreign adventurism, making such an operation well worth the good ol’ company - er, college - try. Peter Brookes, a Heritage Foundation senior fellow, served in military and national intelligence. Talk back at peterbrookes@heritage.org. This column first ran in the New York Post. |
| Posted by:Delphi |
| #2 Faster with the destabilization please. We owe these mulletheads for 1979 and for their meddling in Iraq and Lebanon. |
| Posted by: Angavirt Borgia5635 2007-05-30 17:19 |
| #1 Iranians alienated? I won't believe that until they start lynching a mullah or two weekly after the Friday sermons. Napoleon didn't mention that in the long run we are all dead. What most of us are pursuing during our short lives is some kind of a short run. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2007-05-30 13:37 |