President Bush has authorized the CIA to run a destabilization campaign against the Iranian regime, according to ABC News. Disclosure of the plan makes it impossible to carry out effectively and knocks a negotiating weapon out of the hands of U.S. diplomats.
The mullahs who run Iran, and who have been making war against the United States for 28 years, will use the disclosure to discredit any dissident action, from simple publication of criticism to uprisings by groups completely independent of the CIA’s work.
Haleh Esfandiari of the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington and consultant Kian Tajbakhsh are being held incommunicado in Tehran, a familiar Iranian cruelty. Iran’s accusations that Esfandiari has been working against the regime are simply not credible in view of the untruths they allege about her past - in fact, she has been a leader in trying to arrange dialogue between U.S. and Iranian institutions. Tajbakhsh has been working for George Soros, an implacable foe of the Bush administration. U.S. and Iranian ambassadors to Iraq are to meet next week. Actions during a negotiation can convey messages. Iran sends messages by hostage-taking. It can be useful to get a reputation for irrationality like the holding of a well-disposed figure. By its actions, Iran is saying to the United States, “We have nothing to fear from you. See what we can get away with.”
The United States knows about nonverbal messages. Why else is the U.S. Navy exercising two aircraft carrier battle groups in the Persian Gulf?
Covert actions in progress during a negotiation would be a very useful message, especially financial disruptions said to have been part of the CIA plan. Bounced checks or missed deliveries of nuclear equipment, unexpected and uncommented on by U.S. negotiators, would say to Tehran, “We can hurt you in ways you haven’t thought of.”
Now Iran can blame any economic glitch anywhere on the CIA, and too many people will believe it regardless of the truth.
