Is media responsible for Iran's latest hostages?

Gabriel Schoenfeld:

SO FAR, four Iranian Americans have been detained by the Iranian government and charged with espionage. The most well-known case is that of Haleh Esfandiari of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, who was detained and later arrested after traveling to Tehran to see her 93-year-old mother late last year. The most recent case is that of Ali Shakeri, a "peace activist" from Irvine, who was arrested in mid-May.

It's not exactly clear why the Iranians have detained these American citizens, nor what they plan to do with them. But consider this: On Jan. 15, 2002, nearly five years before the detentions began, the Los Angeles Times ran a story under the headline "CIA Looks to Los Angeles for Would-Be Iranian Spies," disclosing on its front page that the CIA was recruiting Iranian Americans in Southern California, home to the largest concentration of Iranian emigres in the United States. According to the paper, the agency was "offering cash for useful information" to Iranian Americans who "have business connections [in Iran] or relatives in [a] position to provide valuable information from inside the largely impenetrable republic."

The article explained just how the agency hoped to use emigres to get at their relatives in Iran. "If family members trust each other, they'll tell you things you can't know otherwise, can't get [from satellites]. If you're really lucky, you might recruit somebody involved in the nuclear-weapons program," was how one former CIA officer explained it. The article noted that the "risks for informants are considerable" and that "spies caught by the [Islamic] Republic face severe punishment, including execution."

Is it possible that there is a connection between the leak in 2002 about the highly classified U.S. intelligence program — which the paper chose to publish despite the fact that it knew it was creating trouble for U.S. intelligence — and the recent arrests of Esfandiari and the others?

Of course, we're unlikely ever to know for sure what that connection is, and I don't mean to suggest that the recent arrests are a direct response to a five-year-old story. But I don't think it is farfetched to suspect that the leak — and the resulting suspicion of emigres coming home to visit their relatives — may have played a part in the decision to detain the four Iranian Americans.

To begin with, Iran has a significant diplomatic and intelligence presence in the United States. The same piece in The Times that revealed the CIA program to recruit Iranian emigres also reported that Iranian intelligence was active in Los Angeles, and that it, like the CIA, was paying careful attention to the emigre community. The Times story was thus nearly certain to have been seen by Iranian officials and transmitted to the Iranian foreign policy and intelligence establishment in Tehran.

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It might explain a part of the paranoia that pervades the frightened religious bigots in charge of Iran. Congress has also authorized money to support those wanting to free themselves from the repression of the religious bigots. The tension over Iran's pursuit of nukes has amped up matters. Iran also fears letting their own people leave where they might be corrupted by the truth. Their polices are a product of their fears. We need to find a way to play on those fears and not react to their paranoia.