I-ran So Far

There are several stories in the news of late that all wrap around Iran’s escalating nuclear weapons threat. I’ve already hammered the risks about our possible responses to their closing the threat to Strait of Hormuz (if the Western allies escalate their economic sanctions and boycott Iranian oil) in my Risk of Confrontation December 31^st blog. Iran’s now also demanding that U.S. naval force vacate the Persian Gulf entirely. Many Americans are at least mildly amused at the U.S. waterborne rescue of two separate sets of Iranian sailors in recent weeks in that same Gulf that Iran wishes us to leave: the rescue of thirteen Iranian seamen from Iranian fishing vessel taken over by Somali pirates and the Coast Guard’s response to a sinking Iranian vessel, resulting in saving six sailors.

But there are other stories coming out of Iran that aren’t so amusing. First, an ethnically Persian-American, a former U.S. Marine, 28-year-old Amir Hekmati (who served as a military translator), was arrested and charged with espionage while visiting his grandmothers in Iran, then convicted and sentenced to death. Hekmati was born in Arizona and graduated from high school in Michigan. “Iran says he is a CIA spy who tried to incriminate Iran in terrorist activity; the Obama administration flatly rejects the accusations… It is the first time Iran has handed down a sentence of capital punishment to a U.S. citizen since the Islamic Revolution 33 years ago.” Washington Post, January 10^th. Undoubted, there is a political bargain in the works.

The next bit of news from this Islamic Republic speaks very specifically to the increasing likelihood that Iran is hell-bent on having nukes as opposed to the peaceful generation of power that they always claim. Power generation doesn’t require the same high level of uranium enrichment that would be needed to create a viable nuclear weapon, so when it was revealed that Iran was upgrading its enrichment program to accommodate this higher level required for warheads, shockwaves went through the international community. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, responded as expected: “‘[T]here is no plausible justification’ for [Iran’s] decision to increase enrichment to 20 percent, which ‘brings Iran a significant step closer to having the capability to produce weapons-grade highly enriched uranium.’” The Post.

But even Russia, which has an enriched uranium exchange program with Iran and has generally backed the Iranian position against the protests of the United States and Israel, has expressed its concerns over the news: “A statement from the Russian foreign ministry said that Moscow has ‘with regret and worry received the news of the start of work on enriching uranium at the Iranian plant.’” The Telegraph (UK), January 11^th. Israel, of course, was shocked and horrified that the very nation that has denied the Holocaust and threatened to push Israel into the sea has upgraded its nuclear enrichment program.

Which brings me to the third leg of this blog, exactly what we think Israel, through its legendary Mossad (their CIA, but a tad more “hands on”), is doing about Iran’s nuclear efforts, short of sending in a fighter-bomber strike force for a surgical removal of the nuclear threat (if they really even know where all the facilities are). Americans and Israelis have fondly inserted computer worms and viruses into the computers generating the programming necessary to run and control their refinement centrifuges as well as other essential steps in their operations. But there is a greater and very physical (probable Mossad) attack, with guns and bombs focused on the Iranian scientists who actually are implementing the nuclear threat.

“The script, by now, is familiar enough. An assassin riding a motorcycle weaves through Tehran's morning traffic towards his target, almost invariably a Peugeot 405, the vehicle of choice for officials on Iran's nuclear programme… Leaning out a hand, the motorcyclist attaches a magnetic explosive device – sometimes called a ‘sticky bomb’ -- to the door nearest the man he is trying to kill and then speeds off. Seconds later, the bomb is detonated by remote-control. It is so sophisticated that only the target is killed. Those sitting next to him, or in front or behind him, escape with just cuts and bruises.

“[The January 11] target was Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, killed in his vehicle in front of a university campus in east Tehran. A chemist by training, he was a deputy director at Iran’s main uranium enrichment plant at Natanz, a role given to him because of his expertise in gas separation technology, a technique vital to the enrichment process.

“He was the fifth Iranian nuclear scientist to be targeted in the past two years and the fourth to die. The only survivor was the biggest prize of all. In November 2010, Fereydoun Abbasi, now the head of Iran's atomic energy organisation was well trained enough to recognise what the clicking sound on the door of his car meant. He and his wife leapt clear just in time. That same day, on the other side of the Iranian capital, Majid Shahriari, one of Mr Abbasi’s colleagues, was less fortunate as he fell victim to another motorcycle assassin.” The Telegraph.

“Iranian officials immediately blamed both Israel and the United States for the latest death, which came less than two months after a suspicious explosion at an Iranian missile base that killed a top general and 16 other people. While American officials deny a role in lethal activities, the United States is believed to engage in other covert efforts against the Iranian nuclear program… ‘The United States had absolutely nothing to do with this,’ said Tommy Vietor, a spokesman for the National Security Council. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton appeared to expand the denial beyond Wednesday’s killing, ‘categorically’ denying ‘any United States involvement in any kind of act of violence inside Iran.’… The Israeli military spokesman, Brig. Gen. Yoav Mordechai, writing on Facebook about the attack, said, ‘I don’t know who took revenge on the Iranian scientist, but I am definitely not shedding a tear,” Israeli news media reported.” New York Times, January 11^th. Yeah, well…

Iran is clearly a rogue nation, a Shiite republic trying desperately to impress the antagonistic Sunni world that by baiting Israel and the West (particularly the United States) that it should assume the top leadership position in the Islamic universe. The complexity in a strong Israeli or American military response – well beyond the elements set out in my Risk of Confrontation blog – is that the vast majority of Iranians, particularly their middle class, are extremely pro-American and resent their theocratic regime as much as we do. Undoubtedly, Iranian functionaries have made damned sure that some of their facilities are located in regions where there would be lots of civilian “collateral” casualties, human shields who don’t even understand their own risks.

I’m Peter Dekom, and in a situation with no clearly wonderful solutions, these escalating tensions appear only to accelerate.