Ahmadinejad: No Iranian weapons supply to Taliban

Posted: 14-08-2007 , 12:00 GMT

AhmadinejadIranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Tuesday rejected US and British claims that Iranian weapons are being supplied to Taliban members fighting the Afghan government and international forces. "I doubt seriously if there is any truth in it," Ahmadinejad said at a press conference with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in Kabul on his first visit to the country since taking office.

"With all our force, we support the political process in Afghanistan," he said, according to AFP. "For us, a secure and stable Afghanistan is the best," Ahmadinejad said.

Both British and US officials have charged that Iranian-made weapons were aiding the Taliban. US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said earlier this year there were so many weapons of Iranian origin coming into Afghanistan that it was hard to believe "it's taking place without the knowledge of the Iranian government."

Karzai has also downplayed the claims, saying they have not been proven.
http://www.albawaba.com/en/countries/Iran/215993

Whoa. Bit of a misuse of the tool, if one asks me. Qods Force I could see, but the whole IRGC?

"The spectacle of this great nation which does not know its own mind is as humiliating as it is dangerous." ~ Walter Lippmann

U.S. Weighing Terrorist Label for Iran Guards

NYT
By HELENE COOPER
Published: August 15, 2007

According to European diplomats, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has warned of the move in recent conversations with European counterparts, saying that a delay in efforts to win approval from the United Nations Security Council for further economic sanctions on Iran was leaving the administration with little choice but unilateral action.

Senior administration officials said current plans called for the declaration to be made this month, but cautioned that it could be put off, and that the effort could still be set aside if the Security Council moved more quickly to impose broad sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program.

...The immediate legal consequence of the guard’s designation as a terrorist organization would be to make it unlawful for anyone subject to United States jurisdiction to knowingly provide material support or resources to the guard, according to the State Department. Any United States financial institution that becomes aware that it possesses, or has control over, funds of a foreign terrorist organization would have to turn them over to the Treasury Department.

Because Iran has done little business with the United States in more than two decades, the larger point of the designation would be to heighten the political and psychological pressure on Iran, administration officials said, by using the designation to persuade foreign governments and financial institutions to cut ties with Iranian businesses and individuals.

The decision would have little impact on American military activities in Iraq, where coalition forces already pursue fighters, advisers and financiers who support antigovernment forces, according to a senior Defense Department official. “We are going to go after any forces that are engaged in activities that are disruptive to the stability and security of Iraq,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the subject was pending administration policy.

What the wimps need to do is take this apart. Instead of being scared, they need to compel Bush to "prove" that the IRGC is a so-called "terrorist organization", and they need to point out the consequences of being wrong about it, such as starting an unwinnable war with Iran. But I doubt that the wimps in the Democratic Party will do this; and so we will get closer to the war with Iran, more killing, more mayhem, more chaos, all to stampede people toward what the Bush & Co. group wants. I call it ruining our country.

US feels heat as Iranian leader visits Afghanistan

Karzai, meantime, figured out how to end the doormat treatment?

I watched a CNN interview with Democratic Senator Dick Durbin yesterday, In the midst of a discussion about imported toys(BTW China said it made the magnetic ones to Mattel's specifications)which he focussed on Republican cutbacks on staff used to check health and safety issues, he was asked about his reaction to the Bush/Iran move and immediately switched gears into super patriot.

He had,he said, been shown the Iranian weapons by the military hewhen he was recently there and any pressure on Iran was good.

US news outlets seem also to have stepped up their "imbedding with the troups" maneuvers, as you can see on surge reports.

No wonder Maliki's and Karzai's meetings with Mr A seem so disconnected with US policy.

_{"George Washington did not cross the Delaware for Capitalism," Shmuley Boteach}

Put the entire Chinese army on terrorist list next time their leader threatens Taiwan; that'l show'm

Ineffectual, not tough

Leader
Thursday August 16, 2007
The Guardian

The proposal, flagged up by US State Department officials yesterday, to put Iran's revolutionary guard on a list of foreign terrorist organisations which includes al-Qaida, Hizbullah and Hamas is a confrontational one which could go down well in Washington. There is a temporary confluence of interests between the hawks and doves within the Bush administration, in their conflicted debate on Iran. The doves - secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and defence secretary Robert Gates - favour muscular sanctions but oppose a military strike, while the hawks, led by vice-president Dick Cheney, are convinced that only military action will end Tehran's nuclear dreams.

Both sides could use this proposal to advance their cause. It allows the doves to argue that more robust sanctions will lessen the need for military action, while the hawks can view this as a useful precursor to a strike by stylising the revolutionary guard as a combatant in the "war on terror". There have even been rumours of a US airstrike on bases used by the Quds wing of the guard, accused of providing explosives to Shia militias.
But where is the logic of this measure if the policy is to persuade Tehran to stop enriching uranium? Iran will only negotiate away its enrichment programme if it is convinced that Washington is not seeking regime change. The revolutionary guard differs from al-Qaida, Hamas, or Hizbullah in one important respect: it is not only a state body, but forms the largest part of Iran's military.

If the US declares an arm of the Iranian state a terrorist organisation (and under the Bush doctrine, those who harbour terrorists are as guilty of terrorism as the terrorists themselves) what chance does Washington have of prising influential Iranian opinion away from the belief that the bomb is the best insurance policy against outside attack? Tougher sanctions could persuade saner voices like the supreme leader Ali Khamenei and Ali Larijani, secretary of the national security council, to conclude that diplomatic pressure represents a clear danger to the system and that maintaining Iran's theocracy is more important than the bomb, or the capacity to make one. But as Iran has done little business with the US in the last two decades, the terrorist designation would not be a tough sanction, but a psychological and ultimately ineffectual one. It would be folly to believe it would have any effect on the deteriorating security situation in Iraq. As the central government in Baghdad weakens, the influence of Iran on Shia militias does not necessarily grow. The Quds force is only one player out of many in a conflict that is descending into a civil war on the scale of the one that tore Lebanon apart.

They won't need to go to Congress to bomb terrorists i.e., Iran

Give me control over a nation's currency,
and I care not who makes its laws.
Mayer Amschel Rothschild
(1743 - 1812)

Ray Takeyh | August 28

Financial Times - President George W. Bush’s plan to designate Iran’s Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organisation is yet another example of Washington’s incoherent Iran policy. On the surface, the Revolutionary Guards are ideal candidates for sanctions, as they are in control of Iran’s expanding nuclear infrastructure and are busy training Shia militias in Iraq. However, at a time when the administration professes a desire for a negotiated settlement with Tehran, coercing a pillar of the theocratic regime erodes the possibility of a diplomatic resolution.

The 125,000-strong Revolutionary Guards were created in the early 1980s and continue to be commanded by reactionary ideologues who are committed to the values and outlook of the clerical hardliners. Throughout the 1990s, the Guards pressed for suppression of the reform movement.

In recent years, the Guards have steadily intruded into economic activities, establishing their own companies with privileged access to contracts in industries such as telecommunications and imported consumer goods. Through this network, the Guards have enhanced their patronage power, allowing them to cultivate their constituents. More ominously, under the auspices of the Revolutionary Guards an entire array of organisations such as the Defence Industries Organisation, university laboratories and a plethora of companies have provided an impetus for Iran ’s expanding nuclear efforts.

"The spectacle of this great nation which does not know its own mind is as humiliating as it is dangerous." ~ Walter Lippmann