The message in the Iranian regime's missiles
Fox News, July 16, 2008
Last week the ayatollahs’
capacity to stow death and destruction beyond Iran’s borders
was on full display, when a barrage of Shahab missiles was
test fired. Also last week, the French energy company,
Total, pulled out of a huge investment in Iran's gas sector,
citing "political risks."
Meanwhile, back in Iran, the gallows were busy. On July 10,
Khalij Fars news agency reported four men were publicly
hanged in the southern city of Borazjan. On Sunday, two men
were hanged in the central city of Isfahan. A day before,
Iran’s Supreme Court upheld the death sentence for three
Kurdish political activists.
The common thread here is that Tehran faces mounting
political and social dissent, aggravated by factional
infighting, at home, and growing international isolation
abroad. Belligerence looks to Tehran like a way out of this
impasse.
Dismissing the missile test as a mere bluster is very
dangerous. Much has been made of the unimpressive technology
and Tehran's failed attempt at doctoring images of the
launch. That analysis misses the point that Tehran’s missile
capability still poses a grave threat to the region, because
the intent behind it is belligerent.
Moreover, Iran's missile program has made advances in recent
years, particularly since the ascendance of the Islamic
Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) to the pantheon of power
and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's presidency in 2005. After the main
Iranian opposition, the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK)[PMOI]
exposed Tehran's nuclear site at Lavizan in 2003, the regime
transferred much of its nuclear work to secret tunnels. As I
reported in my book, The Iran Threat: President Ahmadinejad
and Coming Nuclear Crisis, the secrecy of Iran’s missile
production is now based upon so much of the program being
underground. North Korea has been Iran's primary
collaborator in building and expanding this underground
infrastructure, providing experts and blueprints.
In September 2005, MEK [PMOI] provided more details about
Iran’s missile operations in the secret tunnels associated
with the Parchin Military Complex, a site 19 miles southeast
of Tehran. A few weeks later the group was able to provide
new information about the massive size and operations of the
regime's tunnel complexes.
Accessible only by military roads, the largest tunnel
complex is beneath the mountains of the Khojir region, just
east of Tehran. This is where Movahed Industries, housed in
the largest tunnel in the Khojir complex, builds the main
body, does the final assembly, and warehouses the final
product. This tunnel is about 1,000 meters long and 12
meters wide. Inside are six forklike, 500 meter extensions
which extends from deep inside the central area of Khojir to
the Bar Jamali Mountain.
The eyewitness accounts of the Iranian opposition sources
inside Iran describe this tunnel as an underground city,
complete with its own firefighting system, steam boilers for
an independent heating system, air conditioning, water
pumps, and a water-resistant electrical system.
Security measures include codenames for the industries that
work on various aspects of the program. For example, Nori
Industries, which builds the warhead and is the most
secretive part of the program, is known as "8500."
The Khojir complex also contains dozens of other
well-equipped tunnels that vary in length from 150 to 300
meters and contain more industries and warehouses in which
missiles are kept. Among these is Bakeri Industries Group,
whose five facilities in the Khojir complex produce
surface-to-surface missiles, including the Iran-designed
Fateh A-110, Nazeat, and Zolqadr. Fateh was among the
missiles the Iranian regime fired last week.
Indeed, in an interview with the French daily Le Monde on
February 25, 2005, Iran’s then nuclear negotiator Hassan
Rowhani, acknowledged that reports about Iran building
tunnels to hide its nuclear technology "could be true."
So with much of the ayatollahs’ missile program tucked away
in massive underground tunnels, the level of its missile
technology cannot really be judged from the video clips of
last week’s launch. But one thing the world can be certain
of is the nefarious intent of a regime whose IRGC commanders
boast they have their fingers on thousands of missile
triggers, aimed at 32 U.S. targets in the Middle East, and
will plunge the region into "raging fire". Bluster? Maybe,
but can the free world afford to take that chance?
The mullahs are building nuclear bombs and the missiles to
carry them. Nuclear capability will make them a powerhouse
in the region, and will bolster the morale of the hated
IRGC, the key means to their repressive regime's staying
power.
Although the ayatollahs’ missile-rattling can hardly
disguise their growing political weakness, if they are not
stopped, we are looking at a nuclear-armed state-sponsor of
terrorism with an aggressive agenda that extends beyond
neighboring Iraq. Washington needs to recognize this fact,
with finality.
A day before the ayatollahs’ launch, the US Treasury
Department slapped new sanctions on Tehran and pursuant to
Executive Order 13382, designated four individuals and four
entities for their roles in Iran’s missile and nuclear
program. As Stuart Levey, under Secretary of Treasury for
Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, correctly pointed out,
"Iran's nuclear and missile firms hide behind an array of
agents that transact business on their behalf."
A growing number of members of Congress from both sides of
the aisle believe that sanctions should be coupled with
political pressure aimed at heightening the internal
discontent, and weakening the regime. They maintain that
Washington should remove all restrictions from the Iranian
opposition groups, allowing them to play their real and
indigenous role as a potent political force and dedicated to
democratic change in Iran.
Alireza Jafarzadeh is a FOX News Channel Foreign Affairs
Analyst and the author of "The
Iran Threat: President Ahmadinejad and the Coming Nuclear
Crisis" (Palgrave Macmillan, 2007).
Jafarzadeh has revealed Iran's terrorist network in Iraq and
its terror training camps since 2003. He first disclosed the
existence of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility and the
Arak heavy water facility in August 2002.
