Obama's response to Iran
Preet Bharara, U.S. attorney from Manhattan, speaks to reporters in Washington about the alleged Iranian assassination plot. Behind him is FBI Director Robert S. Mueller. (Oct. 11, 2011). Credit: AP
If this were a movie about a Mexican drug cartel carrying out a Middle East terror plot you could call it "The Iranian Insanity." But the story of a foiled plot to assassinate Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States by bombing a Washington restaurant appears all too real.
If the alleged plan for a brazen terrorist attack on American soil was orchestrated by top Iranian government officials, then it's an intolerable breach of U.S. sovereignty and a reckless escalation of Iran's clandestine battle with the West. The nation's response must be strong and sure, starting with sanctions imposed yesterday against an Iranian airline officials said carried operatives across the Middle East. Still, talk of U.S. military retaliation is premature.
That option is always on the table. But President Barack Obama must determine whether the conspiracy's leaders are top Iranian officials, religious leaders or a rogue faction within the Qods Force, a shadowy arm of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard. That's necessary to craft a response calibrated for the maximum impact the situation demands.
Manssor Arbabsiar, a U.S. citizen with an Iranian passport, is accused of working with the Qods Force to pay Mexican drug dealers $1.5 million to assassinate ambassador Adel al-Jubeir. With the help of an informant, the FBI says it infiltrated the conspiracy, prevented the attack and arrested Arbabsiar.
The Qods Force, whose mission is to train and support terrorists and insurgents outside Iran, has been linked to assassinations, kidnappings, bombings and supplying Iraqi insurgents with sophisticated explosive devices used against coalition forces. After Arbabsiar was arrested Sept. 29 at JFK Airport, officials monitored his phone calls with alleged co-conspirator Gholam Shakuri, whose cousin is said to be their Qods Force contact.
But the bomb plot seems sloppy and amateurish, while the Qods Force is not. Employing untested proxies, putting agents on U.S. soil and using U.S. banks is not the way the organization is known to operate.
There is enough bad blood between Iran and Saudi Arabia to motivate such an attack. The two countries are bitter rivals for influence in the Middle East. But Obama has to make it clear the United States will not be anyone's battlefield.
