Yes Nadine, I have looked at your reports and I also read a lot of other reports in multiple languages. I have learned to never trust any news source, no matter who. Instead, I contrast the news from sources with known biases and figure out the most likely case for myself. And this is the crux of the problems with your sources; they are very one sided.
Take for example the issue of British troops who were inside Iran's waters. Oh BTW, don't try to obscure the issue by saying may be they were inside international waters. The river they were captured at has no international waters. Half of it is Iraq's the other half is Iran's. Anyway, back to the issue. If you had fallowed the bigger picture in the news around the Persian Gulf, you'd have known that only a few days before UAE escalated its provocation of Iran by seizing a few Iranian fishing boats and holding 25 Iranians in custody for illegally entering its waters (unlike the river where the Brits were arrested in, there is international waters between Iran and UAE). The Iranian response came 3 days later not from the foreign ministry or even the navy, but from the Revolutionary Guards. Surprisingly, they stated that UAE was right in arresting the fishermen and anyone who enters another's territory without permission should be kept for answers. When I read that, I knew they were up to something, but I was not sure what. Soon enough, though, I got my answer. The British boats inside Iranian waters were captured by the Revolutionary Guards. In a panic ridden move, UAE only asked the Iranian fishermen to pay a small fine and leave. When they claimed to have no money, the judge told them not to worry about it because a good Samaritan has paid their fines for them and they should get on their boats and leave right away. After their release, the British were released as well. Now if you really want to dig in deeper into all these connections and how it ties to the Brits, you need to fallow up on the news between UAE and Iran over some disputed islands.
With regards to the foreign fighters entering Iraq via Iran, I have a few things to say:
(1) Yesterday I was watching CSPAN broadcast of Senate's Arms Committee. They asked both Rummy and Acting CIA Director point blank if Iran is controlling the boarders to prevent AQ fighters entrance into Iraq. Both answered that Iran supports terrorism through its support of Hezbollah against Israel. Talk about avoiding the question!!! Neither one confirmed that Iran is too lax on Iraqi boarders.
(2) The boarder is identical on both sides of the line. If you think it can be secured, then why doesn't US do it?
(3) There are over 2 million Afghan refugees in Iran. Afghans speak a dialect of Persian that is fairly close to the one spoken by majority of Iranians. So an Afghan crossing Iran is no more suspicious than a Mexican crossing I.A.
(4) Why are you upset about this? Is this not what Neocons claimed they wanted; an opportunity to fight off their enemies inside Iraq? You should in fact encourage Iran to provide good transportation for anyone wishing to fight off US in Iraq, if you really believe in the fly-paper strategy.
Now let's move on to Sadr and Iran's desire for a messed up Iraq. There is some truth to what you say, but it is really a lot more complex than the picture you paint and is not even close to what you think. There are factions within Iran who support Sadr and there are factions who are against him. However, Iran is not interested in seeing Iraq disintegrate. This is purely for selfish reasons. Should Iraq actually split into 3 (or 5) independent or even mostly autonomous regions, Iran risks chaos along its own boarders with the ethnic groups who are closely tied with their cousins in Iraq. This is most critical in Kurdistan, but can be true for other parts as well. For this same reason, Israel has a vested interest in seeing an independent Kurdistan. Israel is also very interested in seeing Iran put in its place by US. So I wouldn't be surprised to find out Israel has been encouraging some factions in Iran to do something to provoke US invasion. Politics makes for very strange bedfellows (and enemies).
BTW, who are these people who are accusing Iran as a big factor in the uprisings in Iraq? Would that be the same people who promised Iraq would be a cakewalk and are now proven wrong? Here is a little quote from a Guardian article that as you wanted, reports the claims of US and its appointed Iraqi government guardian.co.uk note that despite the article's title, the Iraqi government does not confirm captured fighters' ties with Iran.
"The invitation was something of a surprise but it perhaps is an acknowledgment that Iran realizes that things could get out hand in the south. It is not in their interests for there to be chaos. Many many Iraqi Shia are against what Moqtada al-Sadr are doing, and the sensible elements of the Iranian government know that. We believe we can develop better relations if we are honest with one another."
But one Iraqi diplomat, a former member of the Iraqi opposition who took part in the postwar planning, said: "You know we didn't misread the reaction of the Shia in postwar Iraq, as many analysts have suggested; our big failing was to misread the reaction from our neighbours. They really don't want to give us a chance."
Sounds like Iran is the escape goat of those who misled America and is actually helping with the Sadr problem. BTW, Did you know that Sistani is actually an Iranian citizen? And that Khoi, the most pro-US ayatollah who nonetheless had an office in Iran and US is now trying to capture Sadr for his murder was also Iranian? And that SCIRI which lived in Iran for 10 years before the invasion and by all accounts has close friendship with Iran is now one of the most (US) trusted factions in Iraq? So here you have all these people with ties to Iran who are actually helping to keep things calm in Iraq, and you go on choosing a native Iraqi who has never set foot in Iran as the Iranian stooge. It is not a very convincing picture.
Sun Tzu |
