Arrested Iranians tied to group arming Iraqis--US

[sabra]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L1487138.htm

Arrested Iranians tied to group arming Iraqis--US

BAGHDAD, Jan 14 (Reuters) -Five Iranians arrested by U.S. forces in northern Iraq are connected to an Iranian Revolutionary Guard group that provides weapons to Iraqi insurgents, the U.S. military said on Sunday.

The five were arrested on Thursday in a U.S. raid on an Iranian government office in the Iraqi city of Arbil -- the second such operation in a month.

"Preliminary results revealed the five detainees are connected to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard - Qods Force (IRGC-QF), an organisation known for providing funds, weapons, improvised explosive device technology and training to extremist groups attempting to destabilise the Government of Iraq and attack Coalition forces," the U.S. military said in a statement.

"The Multi-National Force, in keeping with U.S. policy, will continue to disrupt logistical support to extremists that originate from outside Iraq," it said.

[K8-EEE]

1. They're "connected with" them?

Oh brother...

[IndianaGreen]

12. American ignorance of the Middle East are the basis for our failed policies

as this article in the Sunday's Guardian illustrates:

After the surge ... what next?

President Bush, under fire for sending 20,000 extra troops into Iraq, is now ready to target Iran for the chaos in Baghdad and beyond

Peter Beaumont in London, Paul Harris in New York, and Robert Tait in Tehran
Sunday January 14, 2007
The Observer

For what America sees as 'evidence' of Iranian meddling, including the presence of numbers of Iranian officials, in Iraq, is not quite so obvious viewed from the perspective of Iraq's Shia political parties, many of whose senior figures lived for two decades and more in exile in Iran, and look to its powerful Shia neighbour as both a friend and a religious and political exemplar in the midst of crisis. Iraq's most senior Shia cleric was born in Iran - although he rejects the role of the clerics in the Iranian state. Many of the returning 'Iranians', as Iraqis who stayed under Saddam have dubbed the returning exiles, speak Farsi as comfortably as Arabic and when they want a break from the violence they holiday in villas in Iran.

Seen from this point of view, many Shias would argue, it is the Americans who are meddling, not their Iranian 'brothers'.

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,1989912,00.html

[magellan]

2. "Connected with" as in they're all Iranian

Otherwise propaganda and bullshit.

[tularetom]

3. WTF is wrong with Iraqis being armed?

If I lived there the last thing I would want is to be unarmed. In fact the last thing I'd want to be here in Amurka is unarmed. Besides, what about all those studies that say crime goes down when the citizens are armed.

[ellisonz]

9. Every Iraqi household is allowed one AK-47 or similiar weapon.

But IED materials, c'mon.

[ronnie624]

11. The article

does not mention anyone in possession of IED materials.

Anyway, according to an article in the Washington Post last October, the British military has found no evidence of Iran providing weapons to Iraqi "insurgents".

[ellisonz]

14. All the article says is "weapons."

I would take a broad interpretation of the term based on the usage...



The British are patrolling in the South out of Basra in wheeled vehicles...

Erbil is in the north where the mountains, and that is pretty rugged terrain.

If you're moving things by donkey/horse or jeep/truck which route do you think provides more cover? And the further consideration is that there are alot fewer US grunts in Iraqi Kuridistan.

[Eugene]

15. The alleged weapons are parts and know-how for armor piercing bombs.

Various press outlets are disclosing the charge in bits and pieces.
The U.S. asserts that someone, Iran being the prime suspect, is
providing armor piercing explosively formed penetrators (EFP's)
in kit form and showing militias how to use them.

The official story: Coalition targets Iranian influence in Northern Iraq - MNF Iraq
Additional info: After the surge ... what next? - The Observer

[catnhatnh]

4. Well-If they are "arrested"....

...What is the charge? Have they been given a phone call? Do they have an attorney? When will they be arraigned? What will be the cost of bail? OH, IT'S ALL LIES AND BULLSHIT, RIGHT???

[BayCityProgressive]

5. First of all

Iraq is occupied. They have a right be armed. Secondly, this is bullshit. Thirdly, get ready for another war.

[Webster Green]

6. Bullshit!

Why the hell would anyone believe any statement made by the US Government or the US Military?

[Eugene]

7. The U.S. claims these Iranians had documents laying out their terror network.

It's far-fetched and the U.S. officials has not yet shared the evidence
they claim to have found, but here it is from today's The Observer:

After the surge ... what next?

-snip-

Last week, US troops in helicopters launched a raid on an Iranian facility in Kurdistan
-claiming afterwards that they had arrested a high-ranking Revolutionary Guard officer
among six Iranians seized and found maps of neighbourhoods in Baghdad in which Sunnis
'could be' evicted. US officials also claimed they had found proof there of Iranian
involvement in last summer's conflict in Lebanon. None of this 'evidence' has yet been
produced for public scrutiny.

-snip-

Full article: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/world/story/0,,1989912,00.html

What intelligence officer with half a brain would leave ultrasensitive
documents lying around, especially some that don't relate to the mission
at hand? This whole affair doesn't pass the smell test, sorry.

[Roland99]

20. $20 the docs match Ledeen's handwriting

;)

[HuffleClaw]

8. BULLSHIT

their lies and persecution/harrassment of innocents are criminal. enough!

[IndianaGreen]

10. America lies all the time, and this is just another lie in a sea of lies.

The point is that this raid has been condemned by the Kurdish authorities that invited the Iranians. and by the Russians and Iranians.

[junior college]

13. I'm confused

Is the US going to bomb Iran or is it going to be Israel? Wait and see, I guess.

[maddezmom]

16. I think they'll be released eventually, this raid seems to have been timed

perfectly with *'s speech and condi's visit to the ME. How long did they hold the other 4 before releasing them?

[annabanana]

17. And they will PROVE it in a open court, right??

What? No?
Nuts to them.

[Ian David]

18. Is it a "slam-dunk"? n/t

[Roland99]

19. Known? Known how? And by whom? The British found NO evidence just a few months ago>>>>>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/03/AR2006100301577_pf.html

A few hundred British troops living out of nothing more than their cut-down Land Rovers and light armored vehicles have taken to the desert in the start of what British officers said would be months of patrols aimed at finding the illicit weapons trafficking from Iran, or any sign of it.

...

"I suspect there's nothing out there," the commander, Lt. Col. David Labouchere, said last month, speaking at an overnight camp near the border. "And I intend to prove it."

Other senior British military leaders spoke as explicitly in interviews over the previous two months. Britain, whose forces have had responsibility for security in southeastern Iraq since the war began, has found nothing to support the Americans' contention that Iran is providing weapons and training in Iraq, several senior military officials said.

"I have not myself seen any evidence -- and I don't think any evidence exists -- of government-supported or instigated" armed support on Iran's part in Iraq, British Defense Secretary Des Browne said in an interview in Baghdad in late August.

[leftchick]

21. pure BS but

will our congress critters fall for this again? Why am I so afraid they already are? :scared: