Charles R. Smith
Thursday, June 2, 2005

Story Continues Below

  U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld recently stated that operatives belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps are currently infiltrating Iraq.

There are mountains of evidence to support Rumsfeld's claims. In September 2003, Iraqi security forces arrested a dozen Iranian agents in Baghdad, allegedly as they were planning bomb attacks.

According to the U.S. Defense Department, in August 2004, 30 Iranians were captured fighting for anti-U.S. cleric Moqtada Al-Sadr. In addition, U.S. and Iraqi forces guarding the Iranian border seized two truckloads of weapons reportedly destined for Sadr's Mahdi militia.

Iranian Activities in Iraq

"We are drowning in information about Iranian activities in Iraq," stated Michael Ledeen of the American Enterprise Institute. Ledeen, a resident scholar and author, is also a leading Middle East policy analyst at the public policy institute.

"After the battles of Fallujah and Hilla, we found names of Iranian contacts, locations of safe houses, telephone numbers, and photographs that document Iranian activities. That information led directly to the current campaigns against the terrorists," noted Ledeen.

According to a recent article published in Jane's Defence Weekly, Iraq's General Security Directorate (GSD) chief Mohammed Abdullah Al-Shahwani accused Iran's embassy in Baghdad of masterminding an assassination campaign in which 18 of his agents were killed.

Al-Shahwani claimed that raids on three Iranian safe houses in Baghdad uncovered a large cache of documents that linked Tehran to the campaign and to recruiting operatives from within the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq. Al-Shahwani claimed that the documents showed that Iran had funneled $45 million to terrorists inside Iraq as part of an overall destabilization plan.

Treachery Backed by Friends

"Welcome to the treachery championships of Iranian, Iraqi and Syrian – with Chinese, French and Russian interests lurking beneath – 'politics' which America has now frontally engaged," stated Scott Newark, a Canadian security analyst.

"The Iranian Shia regime is concerned about an Iraqi Shia regime that might not be under its control although they're glad to see the Iraqi Baathists gone except that they helped fight and fund the enemies of the Great Satan," said Newark.

"Meanwhile in Damascus, Assad the Lesser is hearing American footsteps but is equally antsy about Islamic forces that think Allah rather the Assad family should be in charge," noted Newark.

"If anything might produce results that actually benefit the folks living in these countries as opposed to those ruling them – a remarkable concept called democracy – it's the American and hopefully Allied presence that provides it. Don't expect Newsweek or the N.Y. Times or Al-Jazeera to report it, but it's that 'light on the hill' specter of hope that has always been America's best feature that may just win the day in the end," said Newark.

"I suspect that most Iranians and Syrians hope that America hangs in there long enough for them to wrest control of their countries like Iraqis have done to have a future free from the need for U.S. troops and the dictators that enslave them," concluded Newark.

New Iranian Missile

Iran has also recently engaged in an aggressive missile, biological, chemical and nuclear weapons development program. The program includes extensive support from Beijing.

In January 2005, the Bush administration sanctioned several Chinese companies for supplying advanced weaponry to Iran. The State Department issued a notice, which stated in part that the Chinese firms would not be allowed to purchase sensitive U.S. technology including space systems, satellite technology and high-speed computer systems.

Three of the sanctioned Chinese firms are well known to many defense analysts as the same companies that participated in the Clinton-era Chinagate scandal. The sanctions list includes China Aero-Technology Import Export Corporation (CATIC), China North Industries (NORINCO) and China Great Wall Industry.

The sanctions are a direct U.S. response to Chinese army firms selling advanced ballistic and cruise missile guidance systems to Iran.

Iran has demonstrated its newly acquired Chinese technology with several test flights of the upgraded Shahab-3 long-range ballistic missile. The Iranian Shahab-3 was developed by Tehran with the direct assistance of North Korea. The missile is an improved version of North Korea's No Dong system.

The upgraded Shahab-3 has been flight-tested four times by the Iranian missile forces between July and October 2004. The U.S. Air Force Defense Support Program (DSP) missile-warning satellite and the USAF Cobra Ball surveillance aircraft monitored the flight tests.

The improved Shahab-3 missile flew at ranges of 930 to 1,240 miles and demonstrated accuracy never seen before by the No-Dong class of missile. The improved Shahab-3 is nearly 60 feet long and reportedly carries 15 percent more propellant than the standard North Korean design.

The Shahab-3 sports a newly designed warhead system using Chinese nose cone and re-entry vehicle designs. The improved Shahab-3 now has a bulbous nose cone system and the flight tests indicated that the simulated warhead carried advanced navigation avionics and re-entry control systems for improved accuracy.

The new Iranian warhead design is considered nuclear capable, enabling the Shahab-3 missile to carry atomic bombs that can fuse during re-entry and air-burst at accurate altitudes above their intended targets.

Charles Smith will be on:

The George Putnam Show on Friday, 6/3/05, at 1 p.m. Pacific time (4 p.m. Eastern time) on KCAA 1050 AM in Southern California; WPYT 560 AM in Pittsburgh; WLTH 1370 AM in Gary, Ind., and Chicago; and CRN Radio Network, WWW.CRNI.NET.

Editor's note:
New book offers details of bin Laden's nuclear plans – Click Here Now
Is liberalism a mental disorder? Michael Savage thinks so – Click Here for more!
The Stunning Truth About Hillary in Ed Klein`s New Book!