Sunday, February 11, 2007

'Anonymous sources' show 'evidence' of 'Iranian' IEDs

Feb 11, 2007

Well, after yesterday's atrocious Gordon/NYT piece, somebody in the "coalition" forces seem to have laid it out their "evidence", and it sounds pretty weak, and of course very anonymous. From Reuters:

U.S.-led forces in Iraq presented on Sunday what officials said was "a growing body" of evidence of Iranian weapons being used to kill their soldiers, as U.S. anger at Tehran's alleged involvement in the war rises.

A senior defence official from the U.S.-led Multinational Force in Baghdad told a briefing that 170 coalition forces had been killed by Iranian-made roadside bombs known as explosively formed penetrators (EFPs) that he said were smuggled into Iraq.

I see nothing in this that directly links to Iran:

Officials showed journalists fragments of what they said were Iranian-manufactured weapons, including one part of an EFP -- which is strong enough to penetrate the armour of an Abrams tank -- and tail fins from 81 mm and 60 mm mortar bombs.

Hmm...old mortar shells, eh? how about THESE?
HERE WE HAVE EVIDENCE?????:

"The weapons had characteristics unique to being manfactured in Iran ... Iran is the only country in the region that produces these weapons," the senior defence official said in Baghdad, briefing reporters on condition of anonymity.

The officials said they were showing the evidence now out of concern about the "vast increase" in sophisticated weapons used by Iraqi militants against U.S. forces in 2006....

"We assess these activities are coming from the highest levels of the Iranian government," said one of the officials, a senior defence analyst, referring to the training and funding of Iraqi militant groups.

Tehran denies the charge and blames American soldiers for the violence and for inflaming tensions between Shi'ites and once-dominant Sunni Arabs.

"We are a friend of Iraq. We have common culture and history, and Iraq's stability, security and integrity, means Iran's stability, security and integrity," Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told a rally in Tehran on Sunday marking the 28th anniversary of the 1979 Islamic revolution.

...
SURROGATES

The officials also said Iran had several surrogate groups operating in Iraq using the EFPs, among them rogue elements of radical Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi Army, to whom Iran was supplying weapons and guerrilla warfare training.

The Pentagon calls the Mehdi Army the biggest threat to peace in Iraq. Al Sadr, who is a key political ally of the Iraqi prime minister, denies any involvement in attacks to troops.

Juan Cole today repeats his cricisms and expands somewhat; to suggest that the Shiites and particularly Iranians are the cause of much of the violence against the US is ridiculous.

This claim is one hundred percent wrong. Because 25 percent of US troops were not killed fighting Shiites in those three months. Day after day, the casualty reports specify al-Anbar Province or Diyala or Salahuddin or Babil, or Baghdad districts such as al-Dura, Ghaziliyah, Amiriyah, etc.--and the enemy fighting is clearly Sunni Arab guerrillas. And, Iran is not giving high tech weapons to Baathists and Salafi Shiite-killers. ....
So the unnamed sources at the Pentagon are reduced to implying that Iran is giving sophisticated bombs to its sworn enemies and the very groups that are killing its Shiite Iraqi allies every day. Get real!

Very clever of "them" to continue to cloak it in secrecy, and avoid any questioning, have this little "dog and pony" show over in Baghdad, with selected reporters, I would imagine. Now there are two days worth of stories going around the world, without serious rebuttal. Makes me see red. Main stream media are prepared to blare it out on the Sunday talk shows, I'm sure, with the usual array of ignorant but never hesitant pundits.

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