Iran's Rigged Election & Terrorists America Tolerates

On Friday, Iran will stage their "rigged" election. With religious leaders banning many true reformers from participation, once again Islamic cleric, Akban Hashemi Rafsanjani is very likely to again be elected President in Iran. There is a tremendous yearning from the Iranian public, especially the young, for an end to strict Islamic control of their lives, yet without truly legitimate and free elections in Iran, no substantial change in Iranian-U.S. policy is expected. Today Rafsanjani gave an interview to CNN that sounded faintly like supporting a "detente" with the U.S., yet Mr. Rafsanjani is certainly not trust worthy or a moderate by any stretch. His offer rings hollow.

In December, this very same cleric, Rafsanjani in an address given in a Mosque called on all Muslim states to use nuclear weapons to annihilate Israel. And it looked likely that either the U.S. or Isreal would soon act militarily to bomb Iran's nuclear research sites. In fact, former UNSCOM arms inspector, Scott Ritter claimed that Bush had already signed off on a plan to use the U.S. military for a series of aerial bombing attacks on Iranian nuclear research sites set for June. But then in a recent White House visit, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, brought a top Israeli military officer who shared new Israeli intelligence information that Iran has dug their nuclear research program sites into extremely deep fortified bunkers that the 500 uranium tipped smart bomb "bunker busters" that the U.S. sold Israel would not be able to penetrate these fortified bunkers, and such an attack on Iran would not take out the research sites. Israel had been practicing for these bombing missions using Turkish airspace in an agreement reached with the U.S. and Turkey. But the "bunker busters" the U.S. sold to Israel are as advanced as the U.S. has in their arsenial, and since they will not penetrate, the military option by the U.S. , or by proxy state Israel was simply out of the question.

This has forced the U.S. to two options. One is to very reluctantly accept some sort of diplomacy path with Iran. But Rafsanjani is a twofaced political and religious leader. He talked slightly concilitory in the CNN interview today. But in December urged the nuclear annilation of Israel as a form of duty by Muslim states. And Rafsanjani is one of the strongest supporters of the late Ayatollah Khomeini's revolution as well as the American hostage taking crisis. If Rafsanjani can cause either the U.S. or Israel harm or destruction, then that would be his first choice. Rafsanjani may sometimes talk more moderately than a radical leader such North Korea's Kim Jong Il, but is every bit as much of an antiU.S. enemy bent on her destruction. Even if the U.S. would free billions in Iranian assets frozen by the U.S. after the hostage taking crisis, it would not soften the conflict between the two nations. These assets are only likely to be freed after a substantially reform minded government should gain control in Iran.

It is well known that much of the young people of Iran favor a big change of their hardline government. Yet without truly free elections, the U.S. now has a strange relationship with the MEK terrorist organization as a terrible second choice to reforming Iran's govenment. In 2003, U.S. forces bombed MEK bases in Iraq, that have been used to stage terrorist attacks across the border inside Iran. And publicly, the U.S. State Department classifies the MEK as a terrorist group. But just like Rafsanjani, the Bush Administration is also playing coy between public comments and actual policy. The Bush Administration signed a little known cease fire document with the MEK, and the CIA has been using the MEK information on the Iranian nuclear program as it's main intelligence source. And some such as Richard Perle have almost leaned to financial or other support to this terrorist organization by the U.S. In fact Perle even spoke at a fundraising charity event sponsored by an MEK front organization, with Perle sharing keynote address duty with MEK head, Maryam Rajavi who addressed the event with a video address from Paris.

The MEK is a strange bedfellow for the U.S. to have as a quasi-ally. The MEK(Mujahedin-e Khalq) is a an organization that combines marxism with Islam. And this revolutionary organization is hardly any prodemocracy organization by any stretch of the imagination. They would simply trade the authoritarian control of the clergy dominated Iranian government for an authoritarian marxist government with less of an Islamic religious control element. The MEK seeks to undermine the nuclear ambitions of the Iranian government because with nuclear arms, the current Iranian government is very strong. And the U.S. finds itself supporting the MEK as a sort of ally, because of the mutual opposition to both the current Iranian government and to nuclear plans by Iran. Just like North Korea, a weak nation can stand up to the U.S. with nuclear weapons. Both Iran and the U.S. know this fact. Nuclear arms are antiIraq-style invasion insurance by a weak nation. So because of the Bush doctrine in Iraq, many states no doubt desire nuclear arms as antiU.S. invasion insurance. If MEK helps to undermine Iran's intentions along this line of thought, then the Bush Administration finds them at least temporarily useful.

There are other opposition organizations to the current Iranian government, the National Liberation Army Of Iran, the People's Mujahedin Of Iran, and the Nationial Council Of Resistance Of Iran. However, the MEK is the strongest of the organized efforts to oust the Iranian government. And it is highly likely that the recent terrorist bombing in Iran was by elements of the MEK organization. And the White House seemed to be silent on this act of terror, a possible sign of silent support for any efforts of this organization to oust the current Iranian government. This Bush White House is not strongly anticommunist like previous Administration's such as the Reagan Administration. In fact, the Secretary of the Iraqi Communist Party, an economist was actually brought in to the Governing Council in Iraq as a junior member by the Bush Administration. Most Americans do not know this fact.

This was a major departure from the Reagan Administration's anticommunist hardline. After the 1979 Afghanistan invasion by the Soviet Union, Reagan usedthe CIA to sponsor mujahedin terrorist fighters to help to oust the Soviets. In fact, with the cooperation of Saudi Arabia, Osama Bin Laden was recruited to set up terrorist training camps in remote areas of Afghanistan to train fighters to battle the Soviets. This eventually brought the Taliban to power, and the Al Qaeda camps were a favorite son that helped bestow a defeat on the Soviets and brought thisc strongly Islamic government power in Aghanistan. And in fact, many of the insurgent leaders in Iraq are former leaders or top fighters formerly funded by the Reagan era U.S. CIA efforts or part of the anti Soviet mujahedin Afghanistan fighters. In fact, even the warfare of the Chechen fighters is influenced directly from CIA training. The terrible attack on a school in which teachers and students were killed was directly from CIA training of mujahedin fighters in Afghanistan who were trained to slit teachers throats as a form of terrorism. This is why the insurgents in Iraq are so difficult to defeat, they are excellent students of the worst CIA skills in murder and mayhem.

The U.S. created the problem with Osama bin Laden during the Afghanistan War and learned nothing. Now the Bush Administration is finding itself in an increasingly cozy relationship with another group of terrorists, the MEK. The American CIA is largely responsible for many of the problems with terrorism today. And the Iranians use leaders such as Zarqawi in a similar manner as a proxy warrior for their efforts in Iraq to battle the Americans. This is why the evil of terrorism does not go away. The CIA thought terrorist efforts in Nicaragua and in Afghanistan were a new "safe" form of proxy combat compared to the stalemate in the 1950's Korean War or the defeat in Viernam. Instead this evil is now hard to eradicate. The U.S. and other governments who claim to oppose terrorism often actually use terrorists as proxy warriors. To paraphrase a classic Pogo quote: I've seen the enemy and he is us.