Sunday, May 25, 2003 U.S. considers
plan to destabilize Iran Senior Bush administration officials will meet Tuesday at the White House to discuss the evolving strategy toward the Islamic republic, with Pentagon officials pressing hard for public and private actions that they believe could lead to the toppling of the government through a popular uprising, officials said. The State Department, which had encouraged some form of engagement with the Iranians, appears inclined to accept such a policy, especially if Iran does not take any visible steps to deal with the suspected al-Qaida operatives before Tuesday, officials said. But State Department officials are concerned that the level of popular discontent there is much lower than Pentagon officials believe, leading to the possibility that U.S. efforts could ultimately discredit reformers in Iran. In any case, the Saudi Arabia bombings have ended the tentative signs of engagement between Iran and the United States that had emerged during the wars against Afghanistan and Iraq. U.S. and Iranian officials had met periodically to discuss issues of mutual concern, including search-and-rescue missions and the tracking down of al-Qaida operatives. But, after the suicide bombings at three residential compounds in Riyadh, the Bush administration canceled the next planned meeting. "We're headed down the same path of the last 20 years," one State Department official said. "An inflexible, unimaginative policy of just say no." U.S. officials have also been deeply concerned about Iran's nuclear weapons program, which has the support of both elected reformers and conservative clerics. The Bush administration has pressed the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, to issue a critical report on Iran's nuclear activities next month. Officials have sought to convince Russia and China -- two suppliers of Iran's nuclear power program -- that Iran is determined to possess nuclear weapons, a campaign that a U.S. official said is winning support. But a major factor in the new stance toward Iran consists of what have been described as "very troubling intercepts" before and after the Riyadh attacks, which killed 34 people, including nine suicide bombers. The intercepts suggested that al-Qaida operatives in Iran were involved in the planning of the bombings. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld last week accused Iran of harboring al-Qaida members. "There's no question but that there have been and are today senior al-Qaida leaders in Iran, and they are busy," Rumsfeld said. Iranian officials, however, have vehemently denied that they have granted al-Qaida leaders safe haven. Until the Saudi bombings, some officials said, Iran had been relatively cooperative on al-Qaida. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Iran has turned over al-Qaida officials to Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan. In talks, U.S. officials had repeatedly warned Iranian officials that if any al-Qaida operatives in Iran are implicated in attacks against Americans, it would have serious consequences for relations between the two countries. Those talks, however, were held with representatives of Iran's foreign ministry. Other parts of the Iranian government are controlled not by elected reformers but by conservative mullahs. A senior administration official who is skeptical of the Pentagon's arguments said most of the al-Qaida members -- fewer than a dozen -- appear to be located in an isolated area of northeastern Iran, near the border with Afghanistan. He described the area as a drug-smuggling terrorist haven that is tolerated by key members of the Revolutionary Guards in part because they skim money off some of the activities there. It is not clear how much control the central Iranian government has over this area, he said. "I don't think the elected government knows much about it," he said. "Why should you punish the rest of Iran," he asked, just because the government cannot act in this area? Original Link: http://www.charleston.net/stories/052503/ter_25iran.shtml |
