February 05, 2007	Monday	Muharram 16, 1428

WASHINGTON: President George W. Bush’s heightened rhetoric against Iran’s alleged role in Iraq violence is aimed at ratcheting up pressure over Tehran’s political activities more widely, Stephen Hadley, a top White House advisor, confirmed.

Calling Iran “a disruptive factor in the region,” Hadley, Bush’s national security adviser, said the US president’s tough remarks recently were not only aimed at Iran’s alleged interference in Iraq.

In an interview on Jan 30 Bush warned on National Public Radio that “if Iran escalates its military action in Iraq to the detriment of our troops and/or innocent Iraqi people, we will respond firmly.” The White House also last month revealed that Bush had authorised the killing or capture of Iranian agents threatening US soldiers in their activities in Iraq in the second half of 2006.

The US has claimed to have strong proof that Iran is providing the arms and explosive devices to Shia militias that have caused so many casualties in Iraq, including US military casualties.

While Bush has stopped short of branding Iran a “major factor” in Iraq’s instability, as part of his new controversial strategy to boost troop levels in Iraq he has vowed to use all the means necessary to protect US forces from Iranian actions there.

The frequent mention of Iran has been a marked shift in the White House’s message on how it is conducting the Iraq war.

But analysts say this is deliberate. Lawrence Korb, an expert at the Centre for American Progress, summed up the change in rhetoric, “This is not about Iraq, it’s about Iran.” Hadley said Bush wanted to increase pressure on the Islamic Republic’s support of the radical Palestinian group Hamas, its efforts “to destabilise” the Lebanese government, and its alleged programme to develop nuclear weapons.

He made clear the US rhetoric reflects concern about Shia-dominated Iran’s region-wide activities among other Arab countries.

“There’s a suggestion almost that the concern of Sunni nations for Iran’s activities comes out of their assessments of what’s happening in Iraq. But, of course, if you talk to any of those leaders, their concerns about Iran go much beyond an Iranian role in Iraq,” Hadley said.

“They are concerned about what Iran is doing to destabilise the democratically elected (Fuad) Siniora government in Lebanon. They’re concerned about Iranian training and support for Hamas that is making it difficult for (Palestinian) President (Mahmud) Abbas to move forward with (Israeli) Prime Minister (Ehud) Olmert to try and find a way forward to a peace.

“And of course, there’s concern in the region about a nuclear-armed Iran because if the current Iran can cause this much disruption, the concern is with a nuclear Iran.” A Western diplomat posted in Tehran said there was an impression that Arab nations in the region were pushing the US to confront Tehran because the Arab leaders themselves did not dare do so.

The change in Washington’s tone has led to some suspicion that the White House is exaggerating Iran’s role in the Iraq violence, a view underscored by the Bush administration’s twice putting off planned conferences in which the government intended to provide proof of its allegations.

Asked whether Bush had willingly overstated Iran’s role in Iraq, Anthony Cordesman, of the Centre for Strategic International Studies, pointed out that the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), portions of which were released on Friday, presented “a notably more balanced picture of this threat.” The NIE said that while Iran was not the principal cause behind the violence in its western neighbour, “Iranian lethal support for select groups of Iraqi Shia militants clearly intensifies the conflict in Iraq.” It added that the involvement of Iran and Syria “is not likely to be a major driver of violence or the prospects for stability because of the self-sustaining character of Iraq’s internal sectarian dynamics.” Iran insists Washington should show proof of its alleged scheming. In not responding, some suspect the Bush administration is only looking for a scapegoat for its problems in Iraq.

That suspicion is paralleled by the fears among opposition Democratic Party politicians in Washington who hear an echo of the strident White House tone that preceded the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, when faulty intelligence had served to justify the war.Some experts believe that the radical Iranians are supporting their Iraqi counterparts just to annoy the Americans.

But Dennis Ross, a counsellor at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said in testimony to US senators in January that Iran and Syria “have little interest in an Iraq that begins to unravel.” Ross, a former top US diplomat, pointed to the risk of a flood of refugees, the spilling of instability and terrorism into the region, and heightened rivalry with Saudi Arabia.—AFP