Jerusalem Post, 2003.08.24
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| Pâ•qidꞋ Yi•rᵊmᵊyâhꞋ u |
Teheran's hawks, notably Supreme Guide Ali Khamenei, have enlisted a two-star Iranian general to devise a plan to provoke conflict with the US and Israel as an excuse for suppressing democracy at home.
Iran is preparing for an unequal battle in which Iran's "readiness to sustain large numbers of casualties" and simply never concede defeat no matter what losses are sustained (a la Usama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein) is expected to win them an eventual victory against the disproportionately mightier military powers of the US or Israel. Iran estimates the American capacity for sustaining losses at a maximum of 20 weeks of fighting and 5,000 Americans killed. If they can weather those thresholds they believe the American or world public will order American soldiers home, thereby defeating "the great Satan" of "the infidels" and winning the war.
Iran's plan is based on creating innumerable small and independent units capable of fighting guerrilla warfare over a wide geographical area – patterned after the Muslims of Gaza, the West Bank, Afghanistan and Iraq.
In the war with Iraq, Iran suffered almost 2,000,000 casualties, including 750,000 killed. Showing the influence of North Korean military doctrines, the Iranians are willing to suffer these kinds of losses in order to kill only 5,000 Americans and maintain fighting for a little more than 20 weeks. Iran's former Foreign Minister welcomes a direct clash with the US to cause "an earthquake" in the Middle East and throughout the Muslim world. "In a recent paper, partly leaked in Teheren, [the former Foreign Minister] said that, if attacked, Iran would open 'a second, a third, a fourth and a fifth front." Attacking Israel is the simplest, and probably the most effective, way to trigger the conflagration they desire.
"The Iranian-controlled branch of the [Khiz'b-Allah (party of Allah, corrupted to "Hizbullah")] in Lebanon would immediately open a new front againt Israel, using thousands of medium-range Fajr IV missiles it has received from Teheran. Various Palestinian militant groups no heavily dependent on Iranian finance, including Hamas and Islamic Jihad, would move onto the offensive against Israel."
"The whole strategy is based on the assumption that once Iran has developed its own nuclear deterrent it would be immune to any US attack…"
"The next 18 months to two years will be the most dangerous in the history of our revolution," former president Hashemi Rafsanjani said in a recent sermon in Teheran. "Once we have passed through that danger zone we shall be in a position that will discourage attacks [by the US]."
"Some commentators take those remarks to mean Iran is confident of having a nuclear deterrent before 2005."
"In 1980 the Khomeinist regime was saved from a popular revolt because of Saddam Hussein's invasion of Iran. Khomeini's successors hope [the] story will repeat itself with a US attack producing a patriotic reflex that would stifle [the present] democratic aspirations." On the other hand, a military attack by the US could also accelerate the downfall of the Iranian mullahs who are presently very unpopular with the Iranian public whereas a diplomatic compromise with the Iranian government might very well save the mullahs regime. (Excerpts from Amir Taheri in The Jerusalem Post, 2003.08.22, p. A9)
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