The Final Move Beyond Iraq: The Final Solution While the World Sleeps (13 page)

I
RAN
R
ISES

With Tehran’s encouragement, resistance from the Shiites in Iraq was growing daily. U.S. and British patrols in principally Shiite cities were greeted with chants and barrages of rocks thrown from rooftops.

Initially, the Shiites in Iraq assumed the role of peacemaker. They seemed to be willing to support the United States during the invasion, certain that when the dust settled, the United States would back a Shiite-majority government. As sure as the Iraqis were that this would happen, Tehran was equally sure that an American-friendly, democratic Iraq would not be in their best interest. Ayatollah Baqir al-Hakim, the leader of the Iranian-sponsored Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), intensified his call for a Baghdad regime much like that in Iran. Al-Hakim was certain that the future of Iraq lay in an Islamic theocracy, not a Western-style democracy. In early May 2004, al-Hakim took his well-practiced, middle-of-the-road, democracy-for-Iraq rhetoric to al Najaf. Of course he knew, as did Iran, that a democratic election in a Shiite-majority Iraq meant control of the government for that faction. He preached security for Iraq with the inference that it could only be achieved by the groups that were armed and funded by Iran.

Unbeknownst to many, this also included Al Qaeda radicals ready and willing to enter the terrorist-driven battle against the United States. Just how far was Iran willing to go to achieve its aims in Iraq? Tehran was willing to provide a safe haven for Osama bin Laden and his cronies. In fact, it was widely reported that Al Qaeda personnel, including bin Laden (who is a Sunni Muslim), were entertained by Iranian government officials. Cooperation between the Sunnis and Shiites, as well as a base in Iran, would provide bin Laden with a launching pad for future attacks against other U.S.-friendly Arab regimes such as his own home country, Saudi Arabia. And it would allow Iran to more rapidly take on the role of “Terror Central.” This was not surprising, since Iran had been instrumental in providing safe and undocumented passage for the hijackers responsible for the 9/11 attacks.

The knots in the noose of terror encircling Iraq were being formed with residual Al Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran as well as Syrian Hezbollah with ties to Al Qaeda in Syria and Lebanon. How long would it be before the various factions began to pull on the rope, strangling coalition troops and forcing the United States to abandon its commitment to stay the course in Iraq?

Iran, leery as it was of a Western influence, was equally wary of one of Iraq’s most respected ayatollahs, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. They feared that his more lax form of Islam practiced around al Najaf would not look favorably on Iran’s overtures. Iran began to accelerate the only plan that it knew with any certainty might work—terror attacks against American troops. Tehran was certain that a sustained flood of terror would demoralize the U.S. military and the American people and therefore influence the Bush administration to bow to pressure from Congress to withdraw the troops as quickly as possible.

The go-ahead to launch terror attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq further emboldened Osama bin Laden to call his troops together to plan new attacks, not only against the government in Riyadh but against the British, Israelis, tourists, and politicians. In fact, anyone who was pro-West would become an open target for bin Laden’s troops. At the top of his list were the same nations that topped Tehran’s list of Islamic traitors—Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, and other Arab states with Western leanings.

Bin Laden’s first targets were compounds that housed Western interests in Riyadh. In the early morning hours of May 12, 2003, five vehicles eased their way through the city. Three of the vehicles were packed with explosives; the other two carried assault teams. As the sun peeked over the edge of the city, massive blasts rocked three Western compounds, killing twenty-six people, nine of them Americans, and wounding more than one hundred sixty people. These explosions were followed days later with similar blasts in Casablanca that claimed the lives of thirty-three civilians and injured more than a hundred. According to a
Washington Post
report, Iran was complicit at least in the Riyadh bombings:

Prominent Al Qaeda member Ayman al-Zawahiri joined the call for vicious, worldwide attacks against Americans and Jews. In a harangue delivered in May 2003, he ranted:

The powers-that-be in Iran were convinced that America had a twofold plan for the Middle East: regime change where necessary and democratization of other Arab states. Tehran had learned by studying American involvement in other regions that the Americans were good at quick response but had a very poor track record when it came to defending prolonged occupations; perfect examples could be found in Vietnam and in Lebanon. Given these two options, and fearing American incursion, the Iranians came up with a third plan: rather than be dominated by the United States, Iran would dominate. How would they achieve their plan? As the world would soon see, it would pick up the pace on Iran’s nuclear program and succeed through nuclear blackmail.

Tehran believed that Iran—not Iraq—had always been the ultimate goal of an American invasion. A foothold in that country would place American troops in two countries surrounding Iran’s borders: Iraq and Afghanistan. An invasion of Iran seemed to be the next logical step in what was seen as a U.S. bid for regional domination. U.S. efforts, or so Tehran believed, were focused only on preserving the Zionists that had usurped land from the Palestinians, and in order to do that, Iranian influence had to be curbed. Therefore, in the minds of the mullahs in control, the only answer was a U.S. invasion of Iran and an end to Khomeini’s Islamic revolution. In June 2003, a power play designed to showcase Iran’s presence in the Persian Gulf unfolded. The Iranian Coast Guard stopped two boats carrying four U.S. soldiers and five civilians. The occupants of the two boats were blindfolded and interrogated by the Iranians before being released, according to U.S. Central Command.
¹⁴

Just a few days before the incident in the Persian Gulf, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had subtly warned Iraq’s neighbors against interference in that nation’s liberation. Said Rumsfeld in a
Wall Street Journal
article: “Assistance from Iraq’s neighbors will be welcomed. Conversely, interference in Iraq by its neighbors or their proxies—including those whose objective is to remake Iraq in Iran’s image—will not be accepted or permitted.” Rumsfeld went on to say that the transition to democracy would “take time” and that the “ultimate political outcome must be decided by the Iraqi people.” The end result in Iraq should not be made to “replicate any other system [of governance].”
¹⁵
All the political pundits had to figure out now was how to keep the Shiite majority from controlling Iraq and linking arms with Iran.

O
PEN
-E
NDED
O
CCUPATION

America was now firmly entrenched in Iraq, but the unanswered question was, “For how long, and toward what end result?” Protests, not only from factions in Iraq but also from the entire Muslim world, were increasing. Terrorist organizations seemed capable of humiliating and/or killing American troops at will. Rather than reinforcing the Bush administration’s war on terror, the terrorists in Iraq were sucking the life and the will to win out of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Coalition troops were faced with an increasingly bold guerrilla war fought by jihadists.

The Iraqi resistance movement was compared to the Palestinian resistance against the Israelis. It was also heralded as an infusion of new life into the Lebanese and Palestinian intifada against the Jews. With all eyes on Iraq, both Iran and Syria could take advantage of the opportunity to build forces in Lebanon and in Gaza, Israel’s closest neighbors.

However, just as the Madrid Peace Conference following the first Gulf War ran through Jerusalem, so a resolution to this war would as well. The first entity to benefit from the defeat of Saddam Hussein was the Palestinian Authority. In fact, the two coalition leaders, George W. Bush and Tony Blair, agreed even before the outbreak of hostilities on the link between the war on Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Indeed, the entire European political establishment tied the defeat of Saddam Hussein to a renewed peace process between Israel and the Palestinians.

In an address to Parliament before the war began, Blair started the campaign to link the Palestinian question to the war in Iraq. He reassured his listeners that peace between the Jews and the Palestinians was of paramount importance. It was the beginning of a push for what was to become known as the Road Map for Peace that would be unveiled in June 2003.

Following a meeting at Camp David between the president and Mr. Blair, President Bush stated:

Blair responded by noting a date for the public debut of the Road Map:

The Road Map plan included sponsorship by the UN, the EU, and Russia—none of which supported the war with Iraq. According to sources in Jerusalem, Israel accepted the Road Map in principle but had a number of reservations. This could well have been a sign that Israel learned a valuable lesson post-Madrid. It learned that it cannot afford to make unilateral concessions. Israel recognized that a new Middle East could not evolve in response to a UN Security Council resolution or to a well-executed public relations campaign by the EU, even if Arafat and the various factions could be successfully lured to the bargaining table.

For the moment, at least, Israel was satisfied with being relegated to the background, comfortable with helping Washington without public recognition. It must have created quite a shock wave in the Knesset when their staunch political ally, George W. Bush, announced the Road Map with its steps to a two-state solution. The entities resident in the Palestinian Authority met the news with their usual response: a suicide bomber detonated a backpack of explosives inside an Israeli pub, killing three and wounding twenty. And still, Israel was pressured to turn a blind eye on the daily threats of terrorism by Hamas, Fatah, Hezbollah, and a plethora of terror organizations in deference to the new peace process, the Road Map. Knesset member Uzi Landau wrote:

While the Quartet (the UN, EU, Russia, and the United States) was pushing the Road Map, Iran’s President Khatami was looking for a few good friends in Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen, all states known to fund and harbor terrorists. In Syria, Khatami deliberated on how the two countries could resist what they saw as the U.S. intentions to occupy the region without antagonizing Washington. Of particular interest was American support for Israel and how to pursue terror activities against that country without retaliation by the United States. Despite these concerns, Hezbollah continued its dogged pursuit of Israeli civilians with rocket fire into Northern Israel.