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Tehran insider tells of US black ops

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HD25Ak02.html

Middle East
Apr 25, 2006
Tehran insider tells of US black ops
By an Asia Times Online Special Correspondent

TEHRAN - A former Iranian ambassador and Islamic Republic insider has
provided intriguing details to Asia Times Online about US covert
operations inside Iran aimed at destabilizing the country and toppling
the
regime - or preparing for an American attack.

"The Iranian government knows and is aware of such infiltration. It
means
that the Iranian government has identified them [the covert operatives]
but
for some reason does not want to show [this]," said the former diplomat
on
condition of anonymity.

Speaking in Tehran, the ex-Foreign Ministry official said the agents
being
used by the US "were originally Iranians and not Americans" possibly
recruited in the United States or through US embassies in Dubai and
Ankara.
He also warned that such actions will engender "some reactions".

"Both sides will certainly do something," he said in a reference to
Iran's
capability to stir trouble up in neighboring Iraq and Afghanistan for
the
occupying US troops there.

Veteran US journalist Seymour Hersh wrote in a much-discussed recent
article in The New Yorker magazine that the administration of President
George W Bush has increased clandestine activities inside Iran and
intensified planning for a possible major air attack as the crisis with
Iran over its nuclear program escalates.

Hersh wrote that "teams of American combat troops have been ordered
into
Iran, under cover, to collect targeting data and to establish contact
with
anti-government ethnic-minority groups". The template seems identical
to
the period that preceded US air strikes against the Taliban regime in
Afghanistan during which a covert Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
campaign distributed millions of dollars to tribal allies.

"The Iranian accusations are true," said Richard Sale, intelligence
correspondent for United Press International, referring to charges that
the
US is using the Mujahideen-e Khalq (MEK) organization and other groups
to
carry out cross-border operations. "But it is being done on such a
small
scale - a series of pinpricks - it would seem to have no strategic
value at
all."

There has been a marked spike in unrest in Kurdistan, Khuzestan and
Balochistan, three of Iran's provinces with a high concentration of
ethnic
Kurdish, Arab and Balochi minorities respectively. With the exception
of
the immediate post-revolutionary period, when the Kurds rebelled
against
the central government and were suppressed violently, ethnic minorities
have received better treatment, more autonomy and less ethnic
discrimination than under the shah.

"The president hasn't notified the Congress that American troops are
operating inside Iran," said Sam Gardiner, a retired US Army colonel
who
specializes in war-game scenarios. "So it's a very serious question
about
the constitutional framework under which we are now conducting military
operations in Iran."

Camp Warhorse is the major US military base in the strategic Iraqi
province
of Diyala that borders Iran. Last month, Asia Times Online asked the US
official in charge of all overt and covert operations emanating from
there
whether the military and the MEK colluded on an operational level. He
denied any such knowledge.

"They have a gated community up there," came the genial reply. "Not
really
guarded - it's more gated. They bake really good bread," he added,
smiling.

But that is contrary to what Hersh was told by his sources, According
to
him, US combat troops are already inside Iran and, in the event of air
strikes, would be in position to mark critical targets with laser beams
to
ensure bombing accuracy and excite sectarian tensions between the
population and the central government. As of early winter, Hersh's
source
claims that the units were also working with minority groups in Iran,
including the Azeris in the north, the Balochis in the southeast, and
the
Kurds in the northwest.

Last week, speaking on the sidelines of a Palestinian solidarity
conference, Major-General Yehyia Rahim Safavi, the Iranian
Revolutionary
Guard Corps (IRGC) commander, sent a warning to the US and British
intelligence services he accuses of using Iraq and Kuwait to infiltrate
Iran. "I tell them that their agents can be our agents too, and they
should
not waste their money so casually."

On April 9, Iran claimed to have shot down an unmanned surveillance
plane
in the southwestern province of Khuzestan, according to a report in the
semi-official Jumhuri Eslami newspaper. US media have also reported
that
the US military has been secretly flying surveillance drones over Iran
since 2004, using radar, video, still photography and air filters to
monitor Iranian military formations and track Iran's air-defense
system.
The US denied having lost a drone.

This new mission for the combat troops is a product of Defense
Secretary
Donald Rumsfeld's long-standing interest in expanding the role of the
military in covert operations, which was made official policy in the
Pentagon's Quadrennial Defense Review, published in February. Such
activities, if conducted by CIA operatives, would need a Presidential
Finding and would have to be reported to key members of Congress.

The confirmation that the US is carrying out covert activities inside
Iran
makes more sense out of a series of suspicious events that have
occurred
along Iran's borders this year. In early January, a military airplane
belonging to Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards went down close to the
Iraqi
border. The plane was carrying 11 of the Guard's top commanders,
including
General Ahmad Kazemi, the commander of the IRGC's ground forces, and
Brigadier-General Nabiollah Shahmoradi, who was deputy commander for
intelligence.

Although a spokesman blamed bad weather and dilapidated engines for the
crash, the private intelligence company Stratfor noted that there are
several reasons to suspect foul play, not least of which was that any
aircraft carrying so many of Iran's elite military luminaries would
undergo
"thorough tests for technical issues before flight". Later, Iran's
defense
minister accused Britain and the US of bringing the plane down through
"electronic jamming".

"Given all intelligence information that we have gathered, we can say
that
agents of the United States, Britain and Israel are seeking to
destabilize
Iran through a coordinated plan," Minister of Interior Mustafa
Pour-Mohammadi said. This sentiment was echoed on websites such as
AmericanIntelligence.us, where one reader commented, "We couldn't have
made
a better hit on the IRGC's leadership if planned ... sure it was just
an
accident?"

Then, in late January, a previously unknown Sunni Muslim group called
Jundallah (Soldier of Allah) captured nine Iranian soldiers in the
remote
badlands of Sistan-Balochistan province that borders Afghanistan and
Pakistan. And in mid-February, another airplane crashed just inside
Iraq
after taking off from Azerbaijan and transiting Iranian airspace. The
Iranian Mehr news agency reported that the "passengers on board were
possibly of Israeli origin". It added that US troops have restricted
access
to the site to Iraqi Kurdish officials and that Western media were
reporting the passengers aboard as having been German.

The Iranian government has not sat idly by and just taken these
breaches of
sovereignty. Early this month, an unidentified source in the Interior
Ministry was quoted by the hardline Kayhan newspaper as saying that the
leader and 11 members of the Jundallah group had been killed by Iranian
troops. Then last Friday, Iranian missile batteries shelled Iranian
Kurdish
rebel positions inside Iraqi territory. They were targeting a militant
group called PJAK that seeks more autonomy for Iran's Kurdish
population
and has been operating out of Iraq since 1999.

The former Iranian ambassador argues that in the event that US pressure
on
Iran continues, "the end of the tunnel" for President Mahmud
Ahmadinejad's
administration is "weaponization of the [nuclear] technology ... and a
military strike".

"The Americans are pushing Iran to become a nuclear state. Iran just
wants
to be a supplier of nuclear fuel. But [with their threats] they are
pushing
it further."