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US terror tactics in
Iran
By Hooman Peimani
At the
end of its military operation in April, the US military
reached a ceasefire agreement with an Iraqi-based
Iranian group, the Mujahideen-e Khalq Organization
(MKO), a group declared by the US and British members of
the "coalition of the willing" as terrorist. While the
Americans described the agreement as a step toward the
MKO's surrender, the group's backing by many members of
the US Congress and its own claim of a rapprochement
suggested a deal between the two sides.
Until
the April agreement, designating a terrorist status to
the MKO was the only common view of Tehran and the
United States. In its efforts to normalize estranged
US-Iranian ties, the Bill Clinton administration added
the MKO to its list of terrorist organizations in the
late 1990s. It also conducted an inquiry into the
group's fundraising activities in the US.
Notwithstanding these developments, the MKO, also
operating under the name of the National Council of
Resistance, has enjoyed the backing of many members of
Congress. Viewing the MKO as an acceptable alternative
to the current Iranian regime, on many occasions they
have demanded the US government's support of the group
to overthrow the Iranian regime.
While the US
seems to have changed its policy toward the MKO, the
European Union, which declared it a terrorist group last
year, insists on its stance despite the MKO-US
agreement. The official Iranian News agency, IRNA,
reported Cristina Gallach, spokeswoman for EU
foreign-policy chief Javier Solana, as stating on April
30, "For the EU, the MKO continues to be a terrorist
group. There has been no change in the decision. This
consideration continues to be the policy of the EU
regardless of what has been going on in Iraq in recent
weeks."
The MKO emerged as an underground
anti-Shah-regime group in the early 1960s. Subscribing
to Islam as its ideology, its political and economic
views drew heavily from Marxism. Its advocacy for armed
struggle resulted in bombing of government buildings and
many assassinations of mainly low-level pro-government
civilians and police and military personnel, as well as
a few US military personnel stationed in Iran in the
1960s and the 1970s. The Iranian authorities' systematic
crackdown of the group resulted in its paralysis. By the
time of the 1979 Iranian revolution, most of its cadres
had been killed, were imprisoned or lived abroad.
A few months prior to its collapse, the Shah
regime's release of political prisoners and a
significant relaxation of its authoritarian grip on
society helped the MKO revitalize itself. After the 1979
revolution, the politicization of Iranian society and a
growing dissatisfaction of Iranians with the Islamic
regime helped the MKO mushroom rapidly as an opposition
group.
In its effort to ascend to power, the MKO
sided with Iranian president Abolhassan Banisadr, who,
ironically, became critical of the Iranian regime. His
sudden removal by the late ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini
in 1981 and a subsequent government crackdown on all
major opposition groups was followed by the MKO's resort
to arms to topple the regime. Its launching a campaign
of assassination and bombing resulted in the deaths of
many pro-government civilian and military/security
personnel at different levels, including a president
(Mohammad-Ali Rajaei) and a prime minister (Ali-Akbar
Bahonar) and many high-ranking figures of the then
ruling Islamic Republic Party. However, the MKO failed
to destabilize the regime, which instituted a massive
crackdown on its members and supporters. By 1983, it
practically ceased to exist as a group inside Iran
capable of posing a serious threat to the Iranian
government.
Many MKO members, including its
leaders, fled to Western countries in the early 1980s,
only to reorganize their group in Iraq, a neighboring
country at war with Iran, which opened its doors to the
MKO rank and file. Seeking to weaken the Iranian regime
to achieve its expansionist objectives, the Saddam
Hussein regime armed the MKO and provided it with bases
from where it launched many attacks on the Iranian
military at war with Iraq. It also conducted many
assassination and bombing operations inside Iran, mainly
in neighboring provinces, during the Iran-Iraq war
(1980-88).
At the end of the war, the MKO became
an Iraq-based group with a limited number of
sympathizers among Iranians abroad and a small and
ineffective underground organization inside Iran. Its
cooperation with the Iraqi regime led to its complete
loss of popular support inside Iran as the war left
about 1.5 million Iranians dead and wounded and caused
massive destruction of its oil and other industries,
agriculture, and infrastructure estimated at about US$1
trillion. The Saddam regime used the MKO until its
collapse to pressure Tehran as well as in the
suppression of Iraqi Kurds and Shi'ites who rose after
the 1991 Gulf War, as confirmed by their respective
political groups.
Like many other Iranian
high-ranking officials, Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali
Khamenei condemned last month's agreement as a clear
case of hypocrisy in the US war on terrorism. Citing the
US government's declaration of the MKO as terrorist, he
stated on April 30, "Now, America supports them. It
shows terrorism is bad if terrorists are not America's
servants. But if terrorists become America's servants,
then they are not bad. It's a test, showing how America
ridicules fighting terrorism and democracy."
In
response to such remarks, on the same day the US State
Department's counterterrorism coordinator, Cofer Black,
rejected the characterization of the April agreement as
a cooperation pact. "The US government does not
negotiate with terrorists. The MKO's opposition to the
Iranian government does not change the fact that they
are a terrorist organization. We understand the
agreement on the ground, in the field, is a prelude to
the group's surrender. Commanders make tactical
decisions in conflict with enemy combatants."
He
added, "This is a pretty special group. They're a
foreign terrorist organization. They are not well liked
in Iraq. They could not be put with a general prisoner
population. They are following the orders of the
coalition commanders, and their situation will be
addressed in the coming days and weeks."
Despite
Black's denial, evidence suggests otherwise. In spite of
its status as a terrorist group in the United States,
the MKO operates freely in that country and holds an
office in Washington. For more than a decade, many US
politicians have backed the group. Last November, 150
members of Congress signed a petition urging the
administration of President George W Bush to remove the
MKO from its terrorist list.
The MKO
representatives abroad claim that last month's agreement
provides for their group to maintain its bases, fighters
and weapons in Iraq and to continue its operation from
Iraq to overthrow the Iranian regime. Its claim of
fighting with Iranian "infiltrators" suggests its
freedom of action in Iraq after reaching agreement. In
its April 30 statement, the group claimed two clashes
with Iran's Revolutionary Guard units allegedly crossing
into Iraq during which two MKO fighters were wounded and
three attackers were killed. No evidence has been
provided so far to that effect and the Iranian
government has denied the claim.
In the
post-Saddam era, the US government's fear of Iran's
capability to expand its influence in Iraq through
pro-Iranian Iraqi Shi'ite groups capitalizing on the
Iraq Shi'ites' politicization seems to have convinced it
of the utility of the MKO. Although it is too weak and
isolated to become an alternative to the Iranian regime,
its Iraq-based fighters could be used to dissuade Tehran
from backing the Iraqi Shi'ites. Washington's apparent
intention of using the MKO to pressure the Iranian
government demonstrates an expanding state of hostility
toward Iran in the United States that could potentially
lead to major conflicts of a political and military
nature.
Dr Hooman Peimani works as an
independent consultant with international organizations
in Geneva and does research in international
relations.
(©2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd.
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