Hard line with Iran puts U.S. in a bind

WASHINGTON — Lest you cling to the impression that the Bush administration is looking for ways out of Iraq, instead of digging ourselves deeper in, take a look at recent headlines.

“U.S. Is Weighing Terrorist Labels for Iran Guards, A More Assertive Turn,” trumpets The New York Times. “Iranian Unit to Be Labeled Terrorist; U.S. Moving Against Revolutionary Guard,” headlines The Washington Post. Unquestionably the big story of the day was that the administration had deliberately taken one more step toward making Iran into even more of an enemy by applying the “terrorist” designation to what is effectively a national army.

Until now, the word “terrorist” has been largely restricted to small groups, to ever-evolving cells, and to individuals who use violent force of horrible means against often innocent people. To sow “terror” is precisely NOT to have the ranks of a regular army behind you.

Now the Bush administration, not for a moment allowing its dismal approval ratings to daunt it, has chosen to move against Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps, or Pasdaran, which was formed by the Ayatollah Khomeini as his special SS-style unit in the ’80s war with Iraq. Its fighters now are believed to number approximately 125,000 and, as in other dictatorships such as Castro’s, control huge sectors of the economy.

Adding problems

Why now? One might think we are having enough problems in Iraq not to add more. By designating the Guards as “terrorists,” this administration is taking one more step toward indirectly fighting Iran’s nuclear threat. (Many of the front companies working with the nuclear technology are owned and run by the Guards.) Meanwhile, President Bush has also said publicly that he looks upon this new act, as well as others, as ways to further divide Iran’s population, which is deeply split between old-line, turbaned Shiite conservatives and increasingly restive young progressives.

There is far more danger here than a simple “change of designation” by the State Department, which also has on its “terrorists list” groups such as the international al-Qaida, the Lebanese Hezbollah, the Palestinian Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The idea of our best analysts who work in these areas has always been to set up situations to decimate, weaken and destroy the will of terrorist groups until they eventually disappear. This has happened historically in many places, as with the Mau Mau in Kenya, the Dhofar rebellion in Oman and the communist insurgency in Malaysia.

But with Iran, we are doing exactly the opposite. We are placing a more traditional army on that famous list and thus providing it with new stature when we should instead be denying it. Nor have we paused to think that the majority Shiites in Iran are directly related — familially, politically, spiritually — to the 60 percent of Iraq that is Shiite. Why should we be so surprised that one would help, support and fight for the other, especially in the face of big, violent foreigners like us?

Joseph Cirincione, the nuclear proliferation expert at the Center for American Progress, warned in The Washington Post last week that these new acts could tie the ending of Iran’s nuclear program to the ending of its support for allies in Hezbollah and Hamas — and that that kind of “grand bargain” was simply too complicated to be within reach. In fact, a “deal” will become even harder if, as appears, this new attitude toward the Revolutionary Guards is really only the administration’s prelude to some kind of military action against Iranian nuclear facilities.

Geneva Accords

This is the first time that the United States has added the armed forces of any sovereign government to its list of terrorist organizations. Think about that. Before, the word “terrorist” always meant “non-state actor.” This change could mean — WILL mean, if this gang stays in the White House — that we could soon be calling any army on the face of the Earth that irks us by the name of terrorist. That would, of course, even further threaten the Geneva Accords and other civilized institutions as well.

Once again, President Bush doesn’t get it. In addressing the Iranian people directly during his news conference last week, Bush said: “My message to the Iranian people is, ‘You can do better than this current government.’ You don’t have to be isolated.”

Bush actually thinks he is peeling off the progressive, younger elements from the Iranian theocratic regime, when he is actually driving them into the same corner where ethnicity, religion and history overcome all.

Universal Press Syndicate