Study calls Iran 'biggest beneficiary' of US war on terror

Study calls Iran 'biggest beneficiary' of US war on terror

Another analysis blames weak US approach to Iran on poor intellgence.
By Arthur Bright | csmonitor.com

Two new reports criticize the US's handling of Iran, just as the West gauges Iran's response to a proposal meant to rein in Tehran's nuclear ambitions. One report says the US war on terror has strengthened Tehran, the other slams America's poor intelligence on Iran.

The first report, released Wednesday by the non-government Royal Institute of International Affairs (also known as Chatham House) in Britain, says that Iran, despite being a part of US President Bush's "axis of evil," has been the "chief beneficiary of the war on terror in the Middle East."

The United States, with Coalition support, has eliminated two of Iran's regional rival governments - the Taliban in Afghanistan in November 2001 and Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq in April 2003 - but has failed to replace either with coherent and stable political structures. The outbreak of conflict on two fronts in June - July 2006 between Israel and the Palestinians in Gaza, and Israel and Hizbullah in Lebanon has added to the regional dimensions of this instability.

Consequently, Iran has moved to fill the regional void with an apparent ease that has disturbed both regional players and the United States and its European allies. Iran is one of the most significant and powerful states in the region and its influence spreads well beyond its critical location at the nexus of the Middle East, Turkey, the Caucasus, Central Asia and South Asia.


Of particular note is Iran's influence in Iraq. Chatham House argues that "the great problem facing the US is that Iran has superseded it as the most influential power in Iraq," due in part to Tehran's tremendous sway with influential militant cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), one of the country's dominant Shia parties.

This influence has a variety of forms but all can be turned against the US presence in Iraq with relative ease, and almost certainly would heighten US casualties to the point where a continued presence might not be tenable. Sources in Iraq are already warning that the major cities (including Basra and Baghdad) have witnessed a rise in the activities of Iranian paramilitary units and the recent bout of violence and instability in Basra is now considered to be a small display of what would happen if Iran itself was targeted.

The BBC reports that one author of the report puts the blame for Iran's ascension on the United States and its execution of the war on terror.

One of the authors of the Chatham House report, Dr Ali Ansari of the University of St Andrews, told BBC Radio Five Live: "We've seen really since 9/11 that the chief beneficiary of America's global war on terror in the Middle East has been the very country that it considers to be a major part or a founding member of the axis of evil.

"And that basically tells us that there's an enormous incoherence in American approach to the Middle East. They simply haven't managed to work out a strategy and a policy that will work and will achieve results."

Another author of the report echoed those statements, reports UPI.

Nadim Shehadi, associate fellow on Chatham House's Middle East Program and one of the report's authors, said: "While the U.S. has been playing poker in the region, Iran has been playing chess. Iran is playing a longer, cleverer game and has been far more successful at winning hearts and minds."

John Rapley, a senior lecturer in the Department of Government at the University of the West Indies at Mona, Jamaica, writes in a Jamaica Gleaner commentary that because of Iran's newfound strength and American struggles in the Middle East, President Bush "may have no choice but to negotiate with the Iranians on terms he doesn't like."

However, members of the US House Intelligence Committee argued in their own report released Wednesday that America's weak position with Iran stems from poor intelligence from the CIA and other agencies. The Washington Post writes that the report "fully backs the White House position that the Islamic republic is moving forward with a nuclear weapons program and that it poses a significant danger to the United States. But it chides the intelligence community for not providing enough direct evidence to support that assertion."

"American intelligence agencies do not know nearly enough about Iran's nuclear weapons program" to help policymakers at a critical time, the report's authors say. Information "regarding potential Iranian chemical weapons and biological weapons programs is neither voluminous nor conclusive," and little evidence has been gathered to tie Iran to al-Qaeda and to the recent fighting between Israel and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, they say.

The report relies exclusively on publicly available documents. Its authors did not interview intelligence officials. Still, it warns the intelligence community to avoid the mistakes made regarding weapons of mass destruction before the Iraq war, noting that Iran could easily be engaged in "a denial and deception campaign to exaggerate progress on its nuclear program as Saddam Hussein apparently did concerning his WMD programs."

The Post notes that the report was authored primarily by Frederick Fleitz, a former CIA officer who had been a special assistant to former State Department official and current ambassador to the United Nations John R. Bolton, who has espoused a hard line against Iran. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has since pushed a policy of supporting Europe's direct negotiations with Iran.

In an editorial published today, The New York Times criticized the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R) of Michigan, for the report, calling it bullying of American intelligence agencies and fearmongering for GOP political gain.

It's hard to imagine that Mr. Hoekstra believes there is someone left in this country who does not already know that [Iran is a strategic threat to the US]. But the report obviously has different aims. It is partly a campaign document, a product of the Republican strategy of scaring Americans into allowing the G.O.P. to retain control of Congress this fall. It fits with the fearmongering we've heard lately - like President Bush's attempt the other day to link the Iraq war to the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

But even more worrisome, the report seems intended to signal the intelligence community that the Republican leadership wants scarier assessments that would justify a more confrontational approach to Tehran. It was not the work of any intelligence agency, or the full intelligence panel, or even the subcommittee that ostensibly drafted it. The Washington Post reported that it was written primarily by a former C.I.A. official known for his view that the assessments on Iran are not sufficiently dire.

While the report contains no new information, it does dish up dire-sounding innuendo, mostly to leave the impression that Iran is developing nuclear weapons a lot faster than intelligence agencies have the guts to admit. It also tosses in a few conspiracy theories, like the unsupported assertion that Iran engineered the warfare between Israel and Hezbollah. And it complains that America's spy agencies are too cautious, that they "shy away from provocative conclusions."

Dan Riehl of the conservative NewsBusters blog counters that the Times is belittling the threat Iran poses in favor of an anti-GOP critique.

[The Times states] that Iran is our enemy, has lied to the world about their on going nuclear endeavors ... and our intelligence is murky, at best. And the Times answer to that? Be Not afraid!

Interesting that to the Times a lying, terrorist-supporting enemy nation with a hidden nuclear program isn't really such a big deal. It's those dangerous democratically elected Republicans America has to fear.

However, Larry C. Johnson of The Huffington Post argues that Republicans, particularly Vice President Dick Cheney, his former aide "Scooter" Libby, and White House advisor Karl Rove, were responsible for undermining CIA efforts to monitor Iran's nuclear activity by outing CIA operative Valerie Plame in an act of political retribution against her husband, Joseph C. Wilson.

So, the Republicans want to whine about inadequate intelligence on Iran's nuclear program while holding fund raisers for Scooter Libby, one of the men implicated in the leak of Valerie's classified identity? Excuse me? The leak did more than ruin Val's ability to continue working as an undercover CIA officer. The leak destroyed a U.S. intelligence program to collect information about Iran's efforts to get nuclear weapons material.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0825/dailyUpdate.html