Posted on 02/15/2007 1:04:06 PM PST by Sub-Driver
Elite Iranian Corps Enmeshed in Iraq
Feb 15 3:39 PM US/Eastern
By LEE KEATH Associated Press Writer
CAIRO, Egypt (AP) -- Iran's secretive Quds Force, accused by the United States of arming Iraqi militants with deadly bomb-making material, has built up an extensive network in the war-torn country, recruiting Iraqis and supporting not only Shiite militias but also Shiites allied with Washington.
Still unclear, however, is how closely Iran's top leadership is directing the Quds Force's operations _ and whether Iran has intended for its help to Shiite militias to be turned against U.S. forces.
Iran likely does not want a direct confrontation with American troops in Iraq but is backing militiamen to ensure Shiites win any future civil war with Iraqi Sunnis after the Americans leave, several experts said Thursday.
The Quds Force's role underlines how deeply enmeshed Iran is in its neighbor _ and how the U.S. could face resistance even from its allies in Iraq if it tries to uproot Iran's influence in the country.
The Quds (pronounced "KOHds") Force _ the name means "Jerusalem" in Farsi and Arabic _ is the most elite and covert of Iran's military branches. Over the past two decades, the corps is believed to have helped arm and train the Hezbollah guerrilla group in Lebanon, Islamic fighters in Bosnia and Afghanistan, and even Sudanese troops fighting in south Sudan.
The force is part of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, which are separate from the regular military, report directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and are tasked with protecting the Islamic government. The Quds Force, formed in the 1980s and picked from the very best of the Guards, is its special branch for operations outside Iran.
"What Quds does is very specialized, the most dangerous work, operating underground," said Mahan Abedin,
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Gee, they're going to try to wait us out.
Nobody could have foreseen that...
Stupid Media Comment Of The Day
Kill em all, box em up and ship gift wrapped in pig skin back to Iran.
I knew you could.
L
I say take em into the northern Iraq area and let Kurdish guys interrogate them. Get as much intel as possible then round up the lot of them.
We have had huge success against AQ in the last few years. Time to apply the same program.
"Still unclear, however, is how closely Iran's top leadership is directing the Quds Force's operations"
This is nonsense. Orders come from Khamenei.
kill them all...
The administration has no concrete proof who EXACTLY is making the decions but that doesn't mean that someone senior isn't. It would be like the US having Delta/Seal Team/Green Beret platoons running amok in a foreign country.
Doesn't work that way.
It's a lie, anyway. Iran doesn't care about any sectarian war. We already know they've worked with al Qaeda, both directly and through Hezbollah. We already know their Syrian puppets are aiding both Sunni Baathists and Shiite insurgents. When the Mahdi returns, all Islam is to be unified. That's the plan. The sectarian civil war is just theater for our consumption.
Iran's enemy is western civilization. Their friend is anyone who hates western civilization. Everything else is designed to complicate that simple truth.
That is from the second paragraph of the article.
The force is part of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, which are separate from the regular military, report directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and are tasked with protecting the Islamic government.
That is from the sixth paragraph. Did AP writer Lee Keath develop amnesia and then recover in mid-article?
they need to be returned to their caves/ spiderholes for a couple of generations.
the west has let them come out too far and its only due to petro dollars
we need two things
1) a return to cave policy
2) some american or someone at sony to create a hand held enrgy source thereby capping the cash spigot
Scrap that....
..... does anyone need Iran other than terrorists?
When you tell as many lies as the Associated Press, it's impossible to keep track of them all.
Kind of like it was unclear to some people that Clinton had sexual relations with "that woman".
And it especially doesn't work that way when you work for a homicidal Islamic theocracy. These dudes don't freelance.
"Gee, they're going to try to wait us out." and "Nobody could have foreseen that..."
The facts about the presence of the special Iranian units operating in Iraq is what Douglas Feith and others, operating in a specical DOD unit in 2003 and 2004 kept trying to put forth in the intelligence stream.
The permanent government at State and CIA refused to accept that assessment, characterized those making it as "political" operatives trying to "slant" the intelligence to fit the view of people like Cheney and eventually got the administration to dismantle the unit.
Now, much of what that unit tried to say about Iran (in 2003 and 2004) can no longer be denied, but how many heads at the CIA and State are going to roll for denying it for so long? None.
One of the men working with Feith has even been prosecuted for exactly that "crime". Since the CIA and State demanded the right to ignore the evidence, he tried to go around them by getting some of the facts leaked to independent outside sources. So he was prosecuted for leaking "classified" info that the CIA and State refused to honor as even worthy of being classified - that Iran was in Iraq as earlier as we were and building its own special ops infrastructure. He was prosecuting for revealing facts that the CIA and State wanted to deny.
Death to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad!
Death to Muqtada Al-Sadr!
God wills it!
Their friend is anyone who hates western civilization
that spells The Left
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