Iran - will it be a war too far for Washington?

06/18/03: (AFI) With commendable stupidity usually only reserved for the most powerful and isolated from reality, President Bush has managed to go some way towards repeating the catastrophic mistakes of Lyndon Johnson and ensnare the United States in an increasingly unpopular and probably un-winnable foreign military involvement. Just two months after the sudden collapse of organized Iraqi resistance to the Allied invasion, US troops are back in a Vietnam-scenario with the ambushing of military convoy's, the regular use of grenades and rocket launchers against isolated American targets and indeed suicide bombers. 

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It has always been a truism that if you cannot avoid wars, then at least learn the lessons of previous conflicts. This however the United States has signally failed to do. Not content with the ultimate failures of the campaigns in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, of Somalia, and indeed even Afghanistan, to achieve the stated aims and the supposed improvement in the state of the inhabitants of those nations, the United States has blindly embarked on a dangerous and unsound course of action.

US forces are already launching operations suspiciously similar to the 'search-and-destroy' tactics of forty years ago and with a similar response from an increasingly hostile civilian population.  

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CIA expends millions of dollars undermining the Mullahs

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Using a marked degree of devious propaganda about the imminent threat of weapons of mass destruction and largely in the dark about the true allegiance and likely response of the majority of Iraqi's, the United States has now succeeded in alienating much of both the developed and third world, and indeed signalled to both Russia and China that Washington's new found military belligerence and diplomatic toughness are a profound threat to their influence and future powerbase. Not content with expending much of America's wealth and the lives of its young service personnel in largely fruitless campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq, Washington is now clearly preparing the ground for an attack on Iran.

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The CIA have been in contact with senior Iranian military personnel for several years and are believed to have developed a number of highly valuable operations to undermine Iran's defences. However and crucially, they have so far failed in similar attempts with the Islamic Republican Guards or Pasdaran. Aware of the US Intelligence agencies success with 'turning' large numbers of key Iraqi commanders, the Iranian Government has quietly contemplated a mass purge of the possibly 'infected' Army High Command and senior Field Commanders. This would of course still suit the Pentagon as it would severely disrupt Iranian war planning, the command structure and the likely performance of its combat units in battle.

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The course that the Mullahs have apparently decided upon is to ensure a higher degree of integration between Pasdaran and Regular Army formations in conflict situations and to increase both the penetration of the army by the internal security branch of the Intelligence Service, SAVAMA and vastly increase the numbers of trusted Pasdaran Officers positioned at Brigade and Divisional-level headquarters to watch for any signs of treachery by Regular Officers, much in the manner of Soviet Commissars or Political Officers. 

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Iran will not be a simple re-run of Iraq

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The Iranian Government has moved hundreds, if not thousands of trusted Islamic Officers and Pasdaran fighters into the Shia area's of Iraq in order to create a massive subversive campaign in the event of a US attack on their country. However, Washington has more than paid back this action in kind. CIA Officers and dissident Iranian agents have expended millions of dollars in recent weeks to foment trouble throughout Iran and indeed have had some success in Tehran and a number of other cities. In a re-run of the classic CIA-SIS campaign that successfully overthrew the regime of Prime Minister Musadeqq in 1953 and which resulted in the return of the Shah, American intelligence operations have been focused mainly on the protesting students, the police and those troops used for internal security.

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While not expecting the Tehran regime to be toppled easily or quickly, the CIA operations are the beginning of a determined effort to subvert the armed forces of Iran and significantly undermine the ability of the Government in Tehran to resist increasing diplomatic pressure to disarm or to organize successfully to resist a US military invasion perhaps as early as 2004.

However, judging by the failure to complete the victories won on the battlefield in both Afghanistan and Iraq, the portents for the coming War with Iran are ominous. Both Afghanistan and Iraq now have developing major insurgencies which the US forces are showing few signs of coming to terms with and without doubt Iran will be a much harder nut to crack. The drain on US resources and lives will almost certainly be that much greater. Any one of these campaigns may indeed be winnable, two are a serious problem, however three may well prove to be just one war too far, even for the world's only superpower! 

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Richard M. Bennett

Books by Richard M Bennett include
FIGHTING FORCES (Barron's-New York 2001), ESPIONAGE (Virgin-London 2002), ELITE FORCES (Virgin-London Feb 2003) CONSPIRACIES (Virgin-London Sept 2003), TOP SECRET (NEW In preparation), ESPIONAGE (Paperback edition August 2003), ELITE FORCES (Paperback edition - In preparation for 2004) 

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Richard Bennett Media.  rbmedia@supanet.com