CIA activities in Iran

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Main article: CIA activities in the Near East, North Africa, South and Southwest Asia

Contents 1 Iran 1952 2 Iran 1953 3 Iran 1957 4 Iran 1975 5 Iran 1978 6 Iran 1979 7 Iran 1980 8 Iran 1983 9 Iran 1984 10 Iran 2000 11 Iran 2003 12 Iran 2005 12.1 Intelligence analysis 13 Iran 2006 14 Iran 2007 14.1 General guerilla actions in Iran by ethnic minorities 14.2 Baluchi guerillas in Iran 14.3 MEK support 15 References

[edit] Iran 1952

Britain, resentful of the nationalization of Iran’s oil industry, came up with the idea for the coup in 1952 and pressed the U.S. to mount a joint operation to remove the democratically elected government of Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh^[1] and install the Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi to rule Iran autocratically. Partially due to fear of a Communist overthrow due to increasing influence of the Communist Tudeh party, and partly to gain control of a larger share of Iranian oil supplies, the US agreed. Brigadier General Norman Schwarzkopf, Sr. and CIA guru Kermit Roosevelt, Jr. were ordered to begin a covert operation to overthrow Mossadegh. A complex plot, codenamed Operation Ajax, was conceived and executed from the US Embassy in Tehran. Full details of the operation were released fifty years later, in 2003. Britain, who previously had controlled all of the Iranian oil industry, lost its monopoly and allowed U.S. oil companies to compete in Iran.

[edit] Iran 1953

Main article: 1953 Iranian coup d'état

The United States and the West backed the Shah's regime. Although it did much to develop the country economically, the Shah's government also repressed political dissent.

[edit] Iran 1957

CIA and MOSSAD help form and train SAVAK, the internal security apparatus of the Shah. CIA provides SAVAK with lists of Communists who the Savak would either imprison or execute. ^[2][3]

[edit] Iran 1975

The CIA worked with the Mossad and SAVAK to covertly support uprisings of Iraqi Kurds in 1975 to destabilize Pre-Saddam Iraq.^[3][4]

[edit] Iran 1978

From August 1978 through beginning of 1979, CIA had no HUMINT on Iran.^[5]

[edit] Iran 1979

The Shah of Iran Mohammad Reza Pahlavi flees Iran for the U.S. on 16 January 1979. The CIA is caught unaware.^[5] Because the Shah had neutralized or assassinated all of his moderate political opposition, when the Shah was finally overthrown in 1979, it was by extreme Islamic fundamentalists. Former CIA director Admiral Stansfield Turner had poor intelligence of the Islamist revolution of 1979 in Iran as, "It was a big gap in CIA coverage." Consequently the CIA engaged in numerous covert operations in an attempt to maintain control.^[3][2]

[edit] Iran 1980

Larry Everest, a correspondent for the Revolutionary Worker, writing in Z magazine reported that in June 1980, students in Iran revealed a 1980 memorandum from U.S. National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski to Secretary of State Cyrus Vance recommending the "destabilization" of the Iranian government by using Iran's neighbors.^[6] Similar claims regarding the role of the CIA in destabilizing the Shah comes from the economist F. William Engdahl^[7] and others, such as Robert Dreyfuss^[3] suggest that the CIA wanted to use the Iranian Islamists to destroy the communist forces inside Iran, support the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan (which the Shah refused to do) and to spread Islamic fundamentalism inside the Soviet Union. This support of fundamentalists eventually led to the Chechen insurgency, according to a review of Engdahl's book in an Iranian journal.^[8]

Engdahl asserts in his book that Khomeini's coup was engineered

• By Britain to get a better oil contract renewal and
• By "the senior ranks of the U.S. liberal establishment"

According to Engdahl, these two resourceful parties were able to direct the CIA in this task while keeping "President Carter largely ignorant of the policy and its ultimate objectives".

The U.S. has denied that it gave Iraq a "green light" for its September 22, 1980 invasion of Iran. Five months before Iraq's invasion, on April 14, 1980, Zbigniew Brzezinski, signaled the U.S.'s willingness to work with Iraq: "We see no fundamental incompatibility of interests between the United States and Iraq... we do not feel that American-Iraqi relations need to be frozen in antagonisms." According to Iran's president at the time, Abolhassan Banisadr, Brzezinski met directly with Saddam Hussein in Jordan two months before the Iraqi assault. Bani-Sadr wrote, "Brzezinski had assured Saddam Hussein that the United States would not oppose the separation of Khuzestan [in southwest Iran] from Iran."^[6]

Author Kenneth R. Timmermann and former Iranian President Abolhassan Banisadr argue separately that Brzezinski met with Saddam Hussein in July 1980 in Amman, Jordan, to discuss joint efforts to oppose Iran. According to Hussein biographer Said Aburish however, at the Amman meeting Saddam Hussein met with three CIA agents, not Brzezinski personally^[9].

Author George Crile claimed the CIA actively supported Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war in order to bleed both parties.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Iran 1983

The Soviet KGB defector, Vasili Mitrokhin stated in his book, ^[10] that the CIA continued to provide lists of Iranian Communists that the Islamic revolutionary government utilized to arrest, torture and execute Iranian communists.

[edit] Iran 1984

Beginning in August 1984, a small group within the US government, in the Iran-Contra affair, arranged for the indirect transfer of arms to Iran, as a means of circumventing the Boland Amendments that were intended, in part, to prevent the expenditure of US funds to support the Nicaraguan Contras. Since the arms-for-hostages deal struck by the Reagan Administration channeled money for to the Contras, the legal interpretation of the time was that the CIA, as an organization, could not participate in Iran-Contra.

The relationships, first to avoid the Boland Amendment restriction, but also for operational security, did not directly give or sell U.S. weapons to Iran. Instead, the Reagan Administration authorized Israel to sell munitions to Iran, using contracted Iranian arms broker Manucher Ghorbanifar.^[11] The proceeds from the sales, less the 41% markup charged by Ghorbanifar and originally at a price not acceptable to Iran, went directly to the Contras. Those proceeds were not interpreted as U.S. funds. The Administration resupplied Israel, which was not illegal, with munitions that replaced those transferred to Iran.

While Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) William Casey was deeply involved in Iran-Contra, Casey, a World War II Office of Strategic Services (OSS) clandestine operations officer, ran the Iran operation with people outside the CIA, such as White House/National Security Council employees such as John Poindexter and Oliver North, as well as retired special operations personnel such as John K. Singlaub and Richard Secord

[edit] Iran 2000

In a speech on March 17, 2000 before the American Iranian Council on the relaxation of U.S. sanctions against Iran, Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said: "In 1953, the United States played a significant role in orchestrating the overthrow of Iran's popular prime minister, Mohammed Mossadegh. The Eisenhower administration believed its actions were justified for strategic reasons, but the coup was clearly a setback for Iran's political development and it is easy to see now why many Iranians continue to resent this intervention by America in their internal affairs."^[12]

[edit] Iran 2003

Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage gives testimony on US policy and Iran.^{[13][clarify]} This testimony will support the U.S. designation of portions of the Iranian government as terrorist organizations. In response, in 2007, Iran will designate the CIA as a terrorist organization.

[edit] Iran 2005

[edit] Intelligence analysis

Iran was described as a problem area in Porter Goss' early 2005 report to the Senate Intelligence Committee.^[14] "In early February, the spokesman of Iran's Supreme Council for National Security publicly announced that Iran would never scrap its nuclear program. This came in the midst of negotiations with EU-3 members (Britain, Germany and France) seeking objective guarantees from Tehran that it will not use nuclear technology for nuclear weapons.

"Previous comments by Iranian officials, including Iran's Supreme Leader and its Foreign Minister, indicated that Iran would not give up its ability to enrich uranium. Certainly they can use it to produce fuel for power reactors. We are more concerned about the dual-use nature of the technology that could also be used to achieve a nuclear weapon.

"In parallel, Iran continues its pursuit of long-range ballistic missiles, such as an improved version of its 1,300 km range Shahab-3 medium-range ballistic missile (MRBM), to add to the hundreds of short-range SCUD missiles it already has.

"Even since 9/11, Tehran continues to support terrorist groups in the region, such as Hizballah, and could encourage increased attacks in Israel and the Palestinian Territories to derail progress toward peace. Iran reportedly is supporting some anti-Coalition activities in Iraq and seeking to influence the future character of the Iraqi state. Iran continues to retain in secret important members of Al-Qai'ida-the Management Council--causing further uncertainty about Iran's commitment to bring them to justice.

"Conservatives are likely to consolidate their power in Iran's June 2005 presidential elections, further marginalizing the reform movement last year."

[edit] Iran 2006

Seymour Hersh reported that Party for a Free Life in Kurdistan (PEJAK) was a US proxy. Hersh said he was told, in November 2006, was a government consultant with close ties to the Pentagon civilian leadership of secret US support for PEJAK for operations inside Iran, stating that the group had been given “a list of targets inside Iran of interest to the U.S.”.^[15]

[edit] Iran 2007

Various sources cite "support" for guerillas operating in Iran, with US government avoiding financial support that would require a Presidential finding or Congressional oversight. There are unconfirmed reports of US troops operating there.^{[citation needed]}

In a nonbinding resolution of the Iranian parliament, the United States Army and the CIA has been labeled a terrorist organization by the Iranian parliament, partly for its activities in the "War on Terror such as its treatment of suspected Muslim militants in prisons. The resolution appeared to be in response to the U.S. designation of the Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps and Ministry of Defense as terrorist organizations.^[16]

[edit] General guerilla actions in Iran by ethnic minorities

"America is secretly funding militant ethnic separatist groups in Iran in an attempt to pile pressure on the Islamic regime to give up its nuclear programme. In a move that reflects Washington's growing concern with the failure of diplomatic initiatives, CIA officials are understood to be helping opposition militias among the numerous ethnic minority groups clustered in Iran's border regions.

"The operations are controversial because they involve dealing with movements that resort to terrorist methods in pursuit of their grievances against the Iranian regime. Such incidents have been carried out by the Kurds in the west, the Azeris in the north-west, the Ahwazi Arabs in the south-west, and the Baluchis in the south-east. Non-Persians make up nearly 40 per cent of Iran's 69 million population, with around 16 million Azeris, seven million Kurds, five million Ahwazis and one million Baluchis. Most Baluchis live over the border in Pakistan.

"Teheran has long claimed to detect the hand of both America and Britain in attacks by guerrilla groups on its internal security forces. Last Monday, Iran publicly hanged a man, Nasrollah Shanbe Zehi, for his involvement in a bomb attack that killed 11 Revolutionary Guards in the city of Zahedan in Sistan-Baluchistan. ^[17]

...Iranian forces also claimed to have killed 17 rebels described as "mercenary elements" in clashes near the Turkish border, which is a stronghold of the Pejak, a Kurdish militant party linked to Turkey's outlawed PKK Kurdistan Workers' Party.

"John Pike, the head of the Global Security think tank in Washington, said: "The activities of the ethnic groups have hotted up over the last two years and it would be a scandal if that was not at least in part the result of CIA activity."

"Such a policy is fraught with risk, however. Many of the groups share little common cause with Washington other than their opposition to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose regime they accuse of stepping up repression of minority rights and culture. The Baluchistan-based Jundallah (Brigade of God)(TYYT group, which last year kidnapped and killed eight Iranian soldiers, is a volatile Sunni organisation that many fear could easily turn against Washington after taking its money.

"A row has also broken out in Washington over whether to "unleash" the military wing of the Mujahedeen-e Khalq (MEK), an Iraq-based Iranian opposition group with a long and bloody history of armed opposition to the Iranian regime. The group is currently listed by the US state department as a terrorist organization, but Mr Pike said: "A faction in the Defence Department wants to unleash them. They could never overthrow the current Iranian regime but they might cause a lot of damage."^[17]

An Asia Times report states the U.S. has military units operating inside Iran.^[18]

[edit] Baluchi guerillas in Iran

According to ABC news, citing U.S. and Pakistani intelligence sources, U.S. officials have been encouraging and advising a Pakistani Balochi militant group named Jundullah that is responsible for a series of deadly guerrilla raids inside Iran, reported ABC News online. The Jundullah militants "stage attacks across the border into Iran on Iranian military officers, Iranian intelligence officers, kidnapping them, executing them on camera," This militant group is led by a leader, Abd el Malik Regi, sometimes known as "Regi." The U.S. provides no direct funding to the group, which would require an official presidential order or "presidential finding" as well as congressional oversight. A CIA spokesperson said "the account of alleged CIA action is false".^[19]

According to the Christian Science Monitor, Jundallah, or "God's Brigade," composed of predominantly Sunni Muslim Baluchis which inhabits Pakistan's gas-rich province of Baluchestan, as well as neighboring regions in Iran and Afghanistan.^[20]

Regi was also claimed by Iran to be associated with al Qaida which the group denies. Hossein Ali Shahriari, the representative from Zahedan in Parliament, said the attack had been carried out by “insurgents and smugglers who are led by the world imperialism,” a common reference to the United States and Britain.^[21]

[edit] MEK support

The PBS documentary series "Frontline," reported, in October 2007, CIA supports Anti-Iranian organizations such as the People's Mujahedin of Iran (also known as the MEK or MKO) which has been involved in terrorist activities within Iran. Iran has demanded that the US stop supporting the MEK in exchange for stopping it's support of Shiite's in Iraq.^[22] The show quoted Vali Nasr, author of The Shia Revival as saying the Iranians had hoped that the fall of Saddam would destroy the MEK, which is generally unpopular in Iraq...the MEK operated in Iraq as an arm of Iraqi intelligence against Iranian operatives in Iraq, against Shi'ites and against the Kurds. And, in fact, one of the major pressures on the United States to round up the MEK and put them in a camp did not come from Iran; it came from [Iraqi President] Jalal Talabani.... And I think at a third level the Iranians look at the MEK issue as a test of U.S. goodwill...."

Richard Armitage disagreed that MEK was being supported. "Richard Armitage, U.S. deputy secretary of state, 2001-05, said... "I've heard through some interviews that in some of the discussions leading up to the invasion that Ryan Crocker had said to the Iranians that the MEK would be treated as part of Saddam's army, the implication being [it would be] on a target list, which wasn't exactly what happened after the war.

"I don't know about that specifically, but we had discussed the MEK more pointedly after the invasion. And there were some in the administration who wanted to use the Mujahideen-e Khalq as a pressure point against Iran, and I can remember the national security adviser, Dr. [Condoleezza] Rice, being very specific about it, saying no, a terrorist group is a terrorist group.

"That was exactly the point of view of the State Department as well. We wanted the U.S. military to disarm the MEK and contain them. ... And eventually we did disarm the major weapons [from] the MEK. Then we ... engaged in a broad effort to try to resettle these people, but we were very unsuccessful in getting them settled in foreign lands...."

[edit] References

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