Page 2 of 2 THE ROVING
EYE 'War
on terror' is now war on
Iran By Pepe Escobar
special operations. It is the Quds
Force that trained Iraq's Badr Brigades, the
paramilitary arm of the Supreme Islamic Iraqi
Council, the party of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim allied
with the US. The Badr are firmly ensconced at the
Iraqi Ministry of Interior - and it is they who
have spawned death squads and accelerated ethnic
cleansing in Baghdad. Instead of accusing Iran
without any evidence, Washington should take a
good look at what its Iraqi
allies are up to.
The
Quds Force has four main bases in Tehran, aside
from bases in Mashhad, Qom and Tabriz and a
semi-secret base in eastern Lebanon. These bases
would in all certainty be hit in the event of an
American - or Israeli - strike. It is the IRGC
that supplied Hezbollah with the rockets and
anti-tank missiles that caused havoc during the
Israeli invasion of southern Lebanon in the summer
of 2006.
In bed with
business After the Iran-Iraq war, the IRGC
quickly diversified from the battlefield into real
estate development. The man who actually gave the
go-ahead was then-president Hashemi Rafsanjani,
the wily, indestructible pragmatist who is today
the actual number two of the regime, behind only
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The
business-minded IRGC thrived during the 1990s.
Today it controls more than 100 large companies
involved in telecoms, road and dam construction,
luxury hotels, the auto industry (the Mazda
assembly line in Iran) and, crucially, oil and gas
exploitation at the giant South Pars field.
The IRGC power play is visible in upscale
north Tehran in a cluster of high-security
buildings occupied by the revolutionary
bonyads (foundations). That's also where
the IRGC elite enjoys itself in restaurants like
the Talaie, with its water fountains and tearoom.
The foundations - many directed by IRGC people -
don't pay taxes and their budget is under direct
supervision of the Supreme Leader. So the IRGC in
fact controls an array of both public and private
companies, financed by their own network linked to
the Iranian Central Bank. They also have extensive
connections in the black market - one reason why
US sanctions may not bite as much as the Americans
believe.
President Mahmud Ahmadinejad is
an ex-pasdaran himself - thus also a
"terrorist" according to Bush administration
logic. The same applies to no fewer than
two-thirds of the members of the Majlis
(parliament). Most of the leadership at the
Ministry of Interior is also ex-pasdaran.
Five IRGC generals are already under United
Nations sanctions, as they are responsible for
Iran's nuclear and missile program.
The
bassijis - essentially a gigantic militia -
are the IRGC at street level. They number about
100,000, but in theory could instantly draw on as
many as 20 million people - hence they are known
in Iran as "the army of 20 million". The bete
noire of the bassijis include students
(especially those attracted by the West) and
Western-minded women and girls bent on showing off
their stylish hairdos, fancy makeup and curves
under their chadors. The bassijis'
main bases virtually surround Tehran; they are
capable of blockading the whole city in less than
half an hour.
We'll bomb you to bits
During the years of reformist president
Mohammad Khatami (1997-2005), the Supreme Leader
cleverly manipulated the IRGC for political ends,
thus preparing for the arrival to power of
Ahmadinejad and his IRGC buddies. Dejected
reformists in Tehran swear the IRGC now controls
everything: power, wealth and weapons.
The
IRGC is accused of being involved in all sorts of
rackets, from oil smuggling with Iraq to opium
trafficking with Afghanistan. Hard evidence is
extremely difficult to come by. Investigative
reporting in Iran inevitably lands practitioners
in jail. What is certain is that the IRGC is
flush: US$12 billion in contracts in 2006 alone,
including a mega-pipeline and the Tehran metro. A
few Iranian ministerial officials, when pressed,
admit strictly off the record that the IRGC is in
fact a huge industrial-military complex - not
exactly like that of the US but rather similar to
that of the former Soviet Union - ghostly and as
Kafkaesque.
Even well-positioned Iranians
cannot clearly distinguish who is manipulating
whom in the wide net involving the Supreme Leader,
the IRGC, the fervent bassiji masses and
business and national security interests. By
branding the IRGC as terrorist, Washington has in
fact declared war on the Iranian power elite.
One can imagine what would happen if any
developing country branded the US
industrial-military complex as "terrorists" - and
any number of countries would have plenty of
reasons to do so. By stretching its "war on
terror" logic to actually naming names, the Bush
administration has boxed itself into no other
option than regime change in Iran.
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