Iranian-Made Arms Seized in Afghanistan, Pace Says !!!!!!!!!

[Daanyeer]

Source: Bloomberg.com
April 17, 2007 Author: Tony Capaccio


April 17 (Bloomberg) -- Iranian-made arms bound for the Taliban were intercepted by coalition forces in Afghanistan within the past month, General Peter Pace, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said today.

U.S. and coalition forces seized mortars and explosives in Kandahar, a city in southeast Afghanistan near Pakistan, Pace told reporters at a breakfast meeting in Washington. He said it's not known if the Iranian government was involved in the transfer.

It ``is not as clear in Afghanistan, which Iranian entity is responsible, but we have intercepted weapons headed for the Taliban that were made in Iran,'' Pace said.

His remarks are the first to disclose that Iranian weapons are showing up in Afghanistan, where Taliban fighters have increased attacks in an effort to destabilize the government of President Hamid Karzai. The U.S. since last year has accused Iran of supplying weapons and technology to Shiite insurgents in Iraq.

Assuming Pace's remarks are accurate and the arms transfers are sanctioned by the Iranian government, the disclosure ``is highly significant'' because it indicates that Iran is becoming ``more aggressive'' in it attempts to inflict damage on U.S. troops in the region, said Ken Katzman, a terrorism analyst with the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service of the Library of Congress.

Iran, for example, doesn't have ``a natural alliance'' with the largely Sunni Taliban, Katzman said.

`Do Not Know'

Pace said ``we do not know with the same clarity we know in Iraq who is delivering those weapons and who was involved.''

``We should continue to be aggressive inside Iraq and aggressive inside Afghanistan in attacking any element that's attacking U.S. and coalition forces,'' he said.

Pace did not tie the Iranian government directly to the arms shipments to either country. While the U.S. has captured in Iraq Iranian Quds soldiers who are under the control of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps that protects the religious leadership, the Pentagon isn't sure how high the authority goes, he said.

``We know there are munitions that were made in Iran that are in Iraq and Afghanistan,'' Pace said. ``We know that the Quds works for the IRGC. That's what we know. We surmise from that one of two things -- either the leadership of the country knows what their armed forces are doing or they don't know. In either case, that's a problem.''

While the U.S. will aggressively pursue Iranian networks in Iraq and Afghanistan, ``there's a lot more diplomacy between the U.S. and Iran and all the nations that can still be brought to bear to change Iran's attitude,'' Pace said. ``Military force is your last tool. There are still many international tools available to address Iranian interference.''

[*jr]

The Unknown:
"As we know,
There are known knowns.
There are things we know we know.
We also know
There are known unknowns.
That is to say
We know there are some things
We do not know.
But there are also unknown unknowns,
The ones we don't know
We don't know."

Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld

—Feb. 12, 2002, Department of Defense news briefing