Recipe for recruiting terrorist allies. Rename them.

[k hanly <khanly@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Well first you disarm them. Then you rename them. Then you arm them again.

Cheers, Ken Hanly

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/ITeamInsider.html#Iran

The Iran Debate
Pentagon Eyes Massive Covert Attack on Iran




May 29- The Pentagon is advocating a massive covert action program to
overthrow Iran's ruling ayatollahs as the only way to stop the country's
nuclear weapons ambitions, senior State Department and Pentagon officials
told ABCNEWS.



The proposal, which would include covert sponsorship of a group currently
deemed terrorist by the U.S. government, is not new, and has not won favor
with enough top officials to be acted upon.

But sources say it is a viable option that is getting a new look as the
administration ramps up its rhetoric against Iran, and it is likely to be
one of the top items on the agenda as high-level U.S. policymakers meet
today to discuss how to deal with the Islamic republic.

The Pentagon's proposal includes using all available points of pressure on
the Iranian regime, including backing armed Iranian dissidents and employing
the services of the Mujahedeen e Khalq, a group currently branded as
terrorist by the United States.

The MEK, which had been primarily supported by Iraq and was responsible for
numerous attacks inside Iran, agreed after the Iraq war to a truce with U.S.
forces.

The Pentagon specifically set aside a proposal to reconstitute the MEK under
a different banner and promote their armed incursions into Iran, much as the
MEK had been doing under Saddam. As the State Department insisted, and the
White House concurred, the MEK has been disarmed but their forces are still
in place and their weapons are in storage.

The State Department argument was that MEK is on the terrorist list and any
failure to disarm it would be an act of hypocrisy, which was the same line
taken by the Iranians in confidential meetings that have been ongoing in
Geneva, until the United States recently cut them off.


The office of Doug Feith, undersecretary for policy at the Department of
Defense, argued that the MEK has not targeted Americans since the 1970s,
which is true, and was only put on the terrorist list by the Clinton
administration as a gesture to improve relations with Iran.

The Pentagon argues that the MEK is disciplined, well-trained, and an
effective lever against the ayatollahs, and could be renamed and placed
under American clandestine guidance.

For the moment, this proposal is blocked, but will be revisited as part of
the greater proposal to institute massive covert action against the
ayatollahs.

This covert action program, which has not been approved or even recommended
by the so-called deputies committee of Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Armitage,
National Security Council Deputy Steven Hadley and the deputy to the
director of Central Intelligence, would include intelligence collaboration
with Iranian dissidents, as well as lethal aid (i.e., guns and other
military assistance to anti-Iranian government elements, both inside and
outside Iran).

The objective of the Pentagon proposal to destabilize the Iranian government
is based on the belief that the religious hard-liners are opposed by the
majority of the Iranian population and any pressure would make them crack -
a view that some analysts find dubious.

The debate over Iran comes after Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on
Tuesday warned Iran against meddling in Iraq, and presidential spokesman Ari
Fleischer described the Islamic republic's efforts to root al Qaeda leaders
out of country as insufficient.

New accusations also surfaced this week from an Iranian opposition group,
the National Council of Resistance of Iran, that the government has built a
uranium-enrichment plant for bomb materials, echoing existing charges from
the United States.

Whether the Pentagon proposal gets to the point of a covert action program
is partly dependent on Iranian responses to U.S. demands, such as turning
over high-ranking al Qaeda lieutenant Saif Al-Adel and closing down the
alleged nuclear weapons program.

The State Department favors diplomatic and political pressure, utilizing the
International Atomic Energy Agency as one pressure point on the nuclear
program.

Whether or not that al Qaeda leaders will be handed over, as the United
States formally requested last week, depends on politics within Iran.

There is an apparent debate under way in Iran between more hard-line
elements led by Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamanei, and moderates
led by Iranian President Mohammad Khatami.

Khatami seems to argue that cooperation with the United States on al Qaeda
is necessary, and that Al-Adel should be turned over. The hard-liners
apparently are using the issue of protection of senior al Qaeda as a tool
against the pragmatists who wish to improve relations with the United
States.

Some senior American intelligence sources are optimistic that the issue can
be resolved in the United States' favor soon.

But the nuclear issue remains, and U.S. officials are apparently divided on
how imminent the threat is.

The Pentagon, and Vice President Dick Cheney, are said to believe that Iran
may have all the means necessary to build a nuclear bomb without further
foreign assistance, although CIA intelligence sources say their assessments
are at variance with these assumptions.

The intelligence agency apparently believes that Iran is trying to build a
bomb, but that it still needs help for parts of the program.