U.S. escalating covert operations against Iran: report
Sun Jun 29, 2008

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. congressional leaders agreed late last year to President George W. Bush's funding request for a major escalation of covert operations against Iran aimed at destabilizing its leadership, according to a report in The New Yorker magazine published online on Sunday.

(In other words, they're funding Terrorism inside the country ...)

The article by reporter Seymour Hersh, from the magazine's July 7 and 14 issue, centers on a highly classified Presidential Finding signed by Bush which by U.S. law must be made known to Democratic and Republican House and Senate leaders and ranking members of the intelligence committees.

"The Finding was focused on undermining Iran's nuclear ambitions and trying to undermine the government through regime change," the article cited a person familiar with its contents as saying, and involved "working with opposition groups and passing money."

(But since Iran has no such "nuclear ambitions", this is solely about Regime Change. Is The Shah, Chapter II, just around the corner? These people must not study their own histories ...)

Hersh has written previously about possible administration plans to go to war to stop Tehran from obtaining nuclear weapons, including an April 2006 article in the New Yorker that suggested regime change in Iran, whether by diplomatic or military means, was Bush's ultimate goal.

(Yes, since Iran is not trying to obtain nuclear weapons, and this unfounded allegation - LIE - is simply the same BS these Extremists pulled on their own citizens before starting the disastrous war in Iraq.)

Funding for the covert escalation, for which Bush requested up to $400 million, was approved by congressional leaders, according to the article, citing current and former military, intelligence and congressional sources.

Clandestine operations against Iran are not new. U.S. Special Operations Forces have been conducting crossborder operations from southern Iraq since last year, the article said.

(They've actually been conducting these for several years.)

These have included seizing members of Al Quds, the commando arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and taking them to Iraq for interrogation, and the pursuit of "high-value targets" in Bush's war on terrorism, who may be captured or killed, according to the article.

(As well as the targeting of Government personnel, and the funding of terrorist groups within the country.)

The U.S. ambassador in Iraq, Ryan Crocker, told CNN's "Late Edition" he had not read the article, but denied the allegations of cross-border operations.

(They are not "allegations" ...)

"I'll tell you flatly that U.S. forces are not operating across the Iraqi border into Iran, in the south or anywhere else," he said in an interview from Baghdad on Sunday.

The scale and the scope of the operations in Iran, which include the Central Intelligence Agency, have now been significantly expanded, the New Yorker article said, citing current and former officials.

Many of these activities are not specified in the new finding, and some congressional leaders have had serious questions about their nature, it said.

Among groups inside Iran benefiting from U.S. support is the Jundallah, also known as the Iranian People's Resistance Movement, according to former CIA officer Robert Baer. Council on Foreign Relations analyst Vali Nasr described it to Hersh as a vicious organization suspected of links to al Qaeda.

('Al Qaeda', of course, being nothing more than a Front for the nastier parts of the American and Israeli intelligence services.)

The article said U.S. support for the dissident groups could prompt a violent crackdown by Iran, which could give the Bush administration a reason to intervene.

None of the Democratic leaders in Congress would comment on the finding, the article said. The White House, which has repeatedly denied preparing for military action against Iran, and the CIA also declined comment.

(But everyone knows better than that ...)

The United States is leading international efforts to rein in Iran's suspected effort to develop nuclear weapons, although Washington concedes Iran has the right to develop nuclear power for civilian uses.

(No, they are attempting to again feign a justification for an illegal war they see as an inevitability. The weak-kneed press has completely discredited itself by incessantly repeating this LIE.)

(Additional reporting by Paul Eckert in Washington; writing by Chris Michaud; editing by Eric Beech and David Wiessler)

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