Then There’s The Iran Bit
Lara Logan at CBS on the Iran-Taliban connection:
U.S. military officials have told CBS News that Iran is sending money and weapons onto the Afghan battlefield. But U.S. commanders are not allowed to comment publicly and it’s unclear to them what the U.S. strategy is for dealing with Iran’s increasingly deadly involvement.
The deadliest form of roadside bomb on the Iraqi battlefield - explosively formed penetrators (EFPs) - is now being found in Afghanistan.
Lethal armor piercing bombs that can slice through U.S. humvees are also an Iranian specialty.
More worrying still: U.S. intelligence believes Iran is supplying surface to air missiles to the Taliban - the very same weapon the U.S. supplied to the Afghan resistance to bring down the Russians.
“We are losing this war every day,” said Bruce Reidel, with Brookings.
Reidel led the Obama Administration’s strategy review of Afghanistan and Pakistan earlier this year. But he’s also worried about Iran.
“It’s clear that U.S.-Iranian relations now are going to go into an increasingly difficult period,” Reidel said. “If I was sitting in Teheran, I’d be looking for the place where you could hurt the Americans the most and that’s Obama’s war right next door in Afghanistan.”
Remember that Chicagoland speech in The Untouchables? “He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue.” Not exactly the community-organizing Chicago way, I know …
Anyway, another nuance overlooked in the complex AfPakInd picture painted by the AP’s Reid today. It isn’t just a war about al-Qaeda, or the Taliban, or Pakistan or India. It’s a war about Iran, too. A lot like Iraq that way.
Topics: Afghanistan, Iran, Obama
Posted by Jules Crittenden at 11:14 pm on Thursday, October 8, 2009
2 Responses to “Then There’s The Iran Bit”
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October 9th, 2009 at 2:01 am
“It’s a war about Iran, too.”
Do you think this Administration has ever actually looked at a friggin’ map?
October 9th, 2009 at 2:23 pm
But surely the next mellifluous “engagement in dialogue” will make it all better.