Cheney Military rift re claims Iran arming Taliban

Cheney and others in the administration are bound and determined that they will continue to build up a public perception that Iran is public enemy number one for the US and must be pre-emptively attacked. Many in the military are probably not all that happy with such a plan.

U.S.-IRAN: New Arms Claim Reveals Cheney-Military Rift
Analysis by Gareth Porter*

WASHINGTON, Jun 20 (IPS) - In a development that underlines the tensions between the anti-Iran agenda of the George W. Bush administration and the preoccupation of its military command in Afghanistan with militant Sunni activism, a State Department official publicly accused Iran for the first time of arming the Taliban forces last week, but the U.S. commander of NATO forces in Afghanistan rejected that charge for the second time in less than two weeks.

Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns declared in Paris Jun. 12 that Iran was "transferring arms to the Taliban in Afghanistan", putting it in the context of a larger alleged Iranian role of funding "extremists" in the Palestinian territories, Lebanon and Iraq. The following day he asserted that there was "irrefutable evidence" of such Iranian arms supply to the Taliban.

The use of the phrase "irrefutable evidence" suggested that the Burns statement was scripted by the office of Vice President Dick Cheney. The same phrase had been used by Cheney himself on Sep. 20, 2002, in referring to the administration's accusation that Saddam Hussein had a programme to enrich uranium as the basis for a nuclear weapon.

But the NATO commander in Afghanistan, Gen. Dan McNeill, pointed to other possible explanations, particularly the link between drug smuggling and weapons smuggling between Iran and Afghanistan.

Gen. McNeill repeated in an interview with U.S. News and World Report last week a previous statement to Reuters that he did not agree with the charge. McNeill minimised the scope of the arms coming from Iran, saying: "What we've found so far hasn't been militarily significant on the battlefield."

He speculated that the arms could have come from black market dealers, drug traffickers, or al Qaeda backers and could have been sold by low-level Iranian military personnel.

McNeill's remarks underlined the U.S. command's knowledge of the link between the heroin trade and trafficking in arms between southeastern Iran and southern Afghanistan. The main entry point for opium and heroin smuggling between Afghanistan and Iran runs through the Iranian province of Sistan-Baluchistan to the capital of Zahedan. The two convoys of arms which were intercepted by NATO forces last spring had evidently come through that Iranian province.

According to a report by Robert Tait of The Guardian Feb. 17, Sistan-Baluchistan province has also been the setting for frequent violent incidents involving militant Sunni groups and drug traffickers. Tait reported that more than 3,000 Iranian security personnel had been killed in armed clashes with drug traffickers since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

McNeill further appeared to suggest in the interview with U.S. News that not all the arms coming from the Iranian side of the border were necessarily Iranian-made. Munitions in one convoy, he said, "were without a whole lot of doubt in my mind Iranian made," implying that the origins of the arms was not clear in other cases.

McNeill's rejection of Burns' accusation reflected the views of Afghanistan's Defence Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak, who told Associated Press on Jun. 14 that it was "difficult" to link the arms traffic to the Iranian government. Wardak said the arms "might be from al-Qaida, from the drug mafia or from other sources."

The clash between key civilian officials and the command in Afghanistan over the explanation for the arms entering Afghanistan from Iran followed a series of news stories in late May and early June quoting an anonymous administration official as claiming proof of a change in Iranian policy to one of military support for the Taliban. These anonymous statements of certainty about such a policy shift, for which no intelligence has ever been claimed, pointed to Cheney's office as the orchestrator of the campaign.

Given the very small scale of the arms in question, Cheney's interest in the issue appears to have much less to do with Afghanistan than his aim of ensuring that President Bush goes along with the neoconservative desire to attack Iran before the end of his term.

The U.S. military command in Afghanistan, on the other hand, sees the external threat in Afghanistan coming from Pakistan rather than from Iran. U.S. commanders there are very concerned about the increase in Taliban attacks launched from Pakistan's North Waziristan and South Waziristan following Pakistani Prime Minister Pervez Musharraf's truce with Islamic separatists in those border provinces last year.

McNeill told a press conference Jun. 5 that there can be no "long-term stability" in Afghanistan "if there are sanctuaries just out of reach for both the alliance and the Afghan national security forces that harbor insurgents."

Apparently reflecting Cheney's dominant influence on policy, the Bush administration has continued to defend the Musharraf government's policy of compromise with the Pakistani Islamists and has said nothing publicly about the rise in Taliban attacks launched from Pakistan or the massive arms flow from Pakistan to Taliban forces.

U.S. military officials in Afghanistan could be expected to be sceptical about an anti-Iran propaganda line aimed at making it more difficult for Bush to resist neoconservative pressures for a war against Iran. An attack on Iran could only make the task of coping with the threat from the Taliban more difficult.

Burns, who served in senior positions in the Bill Clinton administration, is part of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's team, which is resisting Cheney's pressures for preparations for an attack on Iran. But the Burns statements came during a visit to France that was aimed at ensuring the French government would support tougher sanctions against Iran in the United Nations Security Council if Iran did not suspend enrichment of uranium within a week or two.

So Rice apparently agreed to the new accusation against Iran in order to strengthen the U.S. argument for tougher sanctions -- an administration policy with which she and Burns have both been identified since late 2005.

Meanwhile, despite the public statement by Burns indicting Iran, both the State Department and Defence Department appear to have adopted a more ambiguous position on the issue. In the daily press briefing by State Department on Jun. 13, spokesman Sean McCormack did not claim that Iran has actually changed its policy toward the Taliban, much less support the "irrefutable evidence" language used by Burns.

"At this point we can't make that assessment," McCormack said in regard to a change in Iranian policy. Asked by reporters to explain the categorical language used by Burns, McCormack offered the rather awkward explanation that Burns was merely expressing the "concerns and suspicions" that everyone in the administration had about Iran's intentions. That remark effectively undercut the use of the headline-grabbing language by Burns, but was buried in media coverage of Burns' remarks.

Secretary of Defence Robert Gates, who was then on his way to a NATO meeting on Afghanistan, did not repeat a previous dismissal of the charge of Iran's arming the Taliban, but also failed to endorse the language used by Burns.

"I would say, given the quantities [of arms] that we're seeing, it is difficult to believe that it's associated with smuggling or the drug business, or that it's taking place without the knowledge of the Iranian government," Gates said.

However, Gates, who had denied on Jun. 4 that there was any evidence linking the arms trade to Iran, made the significant admission that he had seen no new intelligence supporting such speculation.

*Gareth Porter is an historian and national security policy analyst. His latest book, "Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam", was published in June 2005. (END/2007)

Afghan Defence Minister denies US claims that Iran providing arms to Taliban

At least this shows a certain degree of independence from the US. No doubt the US will not be pleased. Iran's support is for Shiite radical groups such as Hezbollah in Lebanon. Iran is opposed to Sunni radical groups such as Al Qaeda. Weirdly enough Khameni claims that US together with Al Qaeda is responsible for the recent mosque bombing in Iraq. Afghanistan does not show that much interest or enthusiasm for the US actions of whipping up a war fever against Iran at the expense of good Afghan Iranian relations.



Afghan minister dismisses U.S. claims By SLOBODAN LEKIC, Associated Press Writer
Thu Jun 14, 5:38 AM ET



BRUSSELS, Belgium - Afghanistan's defense minister on Thursday dismissed claims by a top U.S. State Department official that there was "irrefutable evidence" that the Iranian government was providing arms to Taliban rebels.


"Actually, throughout, we have had good relations with Iran and we believe that the security and stability of Afghanistan are also in the interests of Iran," Abdul Rahim Wardak told The Associated Press.

On Wednesday, U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns said in Paris that Tehran was directly supplying weapons to the Taliban. He told CNN there was "irrefutable evidence" that arms shipments were coming from Iran's government.

The State Department later appeared to step back from Burns' assertion, but stressed that the United States has proof that weapons from Iran were reaching Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.

Tehran has denied the accusations. Wardak, who is attending a NATO defense ministers' meeting in Brussels, also played down suggestions that Iranian authorities were sending arms shipments to the Taliban.

"There has been evidence of weapons, but it is difficult to link it to Iran," Wardak said. "It is possible that (they) might be from al-Qaida, from the drug mafia or from other sources."

Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who is attending the Brussels meeting, also mentioned the alleged weapons transfers from Iran.

"The irony is the Afghan government and the Iranian government have pretty good relationships," Gates told reporters. Gates, who was in Afghanistan last week, said Afghan President Hamid Karzai talked to him about the good relationship the two countries have.

Gates speculated that Tehran may be "trying to play both sides of the street, hedge their bets, or what their motives are other than causing trouble for us."

In a wide-ranging interview with The Associated Press, Wardak said he would appeal to the defense ministers of NATO and allied countries to provide greater assistance in the training of Afghan security forces.

He said the establishment of an effective Afghan air force was a top priority because air support would enable the army to conduct independent operations without having to rely so heavily on the international forces.

It currently operates a handful of Czech-built L-39 jet trainers, together with some old Soviet Mi-17 helicopters and Antonov An-26 twin-engine transports.

"We have all agreed that the only sustainable way to secure Afghanistan is to enable the Afghans themselves to defend the country as they have done for thousands of years. Based on that I would like to have further acceleration of the Afghan national security forces both in numbers and capabilities," Wardak said