Sunday, September 16, 2007

Iran Arming the Taliban

Robin Wright, a senior staff writer at The Washington Post, reports today that Iranian arms shipment destined for the Taliban was intercepted 6 September by NATO forces in Afghanistan.

The officials of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) has told The Post that the intercepted shipment included armor-piercing bombs known as explosively formed projectiles which have been especially deadly when used as roadside bombs against foreign troops in Iraq.

The Iranians are indeed playing a dangerous game. They are arming the Taliban to hurt the Americans. The direct involvement against the US armed forces in Iraq and now in Afghanistan, however, can only accelerate a US military attack on Iran.

Khamenei and Ahmadinejad seem to be convinced that the US will not attack Iran under any circumstances, even if they supply deadly weapons to the Iraqi militias or to the Taliban. This is a dangerous and irresponsible thinking. All political pressures in Washington to wind down the war in Iraq notwithstanding, the Iranian supply of arms to the enemies of the US in order to kill the American military personnel will bring about an armed response from the US in which Iran could only loose.

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