Iran supporting all enemy factions in Iraq now

Washington Times:

U.S. Special Forces are intensifying their efforts to root out Iranian agents who are said to be working in Iraq to further destabilize the fractured nation, a leading U.S. analyst and a top Iraqi diplomat said.

Gen. Jack Keane, a retired four-star general who advises senior U.S. defense officials on Iraq, said Iran is so intent on pushing the United States out of the country that it is now aiding all enemy factions.

"They are assisting all of our opponents — the Shi'ite militia, the Sunni insurgents and al Qaeda," Gen. Keane, who travels regularly to Iraq, said Monday during a conference at the American Enterprise Institute.

"We do not approach it with anywhere near the degree of intensity we have to," said the former acting Army chief of staff. He did say that because of the nature of the operations and forces the Iranians are using, "we are considerably more aggressive than we have been in the past."

Iraq's ambassador to Washington, Samir Sumaidaie, confirmed to The Washington Times that U.S. operations against Iranian operatives have been stepped up but did not say whether his government was taking part.

"The American position now is that they are taking a more active role in intervening where they feel there is Iranian interference, particularly in security," the ambassador said.

The clandestine fight against Iranian agents is taking place in the midst of the more widely publicized U.S. and Iraqi troop "surge" against terrorists, insurgents and militia death squads — all of which are thought to be getting Iranian help.

Iran's notorious al Quds Force, a highly trained offshoot of the Revolutionary Guards close to Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as well as Hezbollah in Lebanon, is thought to be spearheading efforts to smuggle weapons into Iraq and train Iraqis in guerrilla warfare.

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Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies said there was a lot more to the operation than has been made public.

"It is a priority for U.S. intelligence collection," he said, and "it obviously is an effort that is more than a matter of simply chasing down operatives."

In a report released in January, the insurgent organization People's Mujahedin of Iran (PMOI) — which first described Iran's nuclear program — described in detail how the al Quds network had permeated Iraq.

According to that report, the al Quds agents often work under the cover of cultural institutes in Iraq.

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"The real problem is that if you see Iraq splinter or Iraq Shi'ite parties become dependent on Iran, then Iranian intervention in Iraq could grow much more serious," he said. Or, if the U.S. were to withdraw too soon, "you could potentially leave a power vacuum that Iran could exploit."

Iran has been at war with the US since 1979. Right now its covert war in Iraq is an attempt to be at least a hegemon. It is also paranoid about similar covert actions against Iran. Gateway Pundit has this hilarious post on the "spy squirrels" Iran claims to have captured infiltrating into Iran. We need more of these squirrels and I would be happy to volunteer a few hundred of the ones on my property.