A high-ranking U.S. military officer Sunday described new details that Iran is meddling in Iraq, by training Iraqi operatives to direct militants in their homeland. The Los Angeles Times wrote on March 10, 2008.
On Sunday in Baghdad, Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, a spokesman for American forces in Iraq, fleshed out some of the details of those allegations. He said U.S. troops recently discovered a cache of weapons south of Baghdad with markings indicating they had been made recently in Iran. He added that Tehran had been recruiting Iraqis for training in Iran, citing statements by Iraqi detainees.
“Groups and elements” including Iranians and militants attached to Lebanon’s Hezbollah militia are training Iraqis in Iran to act as recruiters and trainers in Iraq, Smith said.
“They’re being trained as trainers to set up the teams inside Iraq,” he said on the sidelines of the news conference.
He said the U.S. gleaned the information from Iraqi detainees who had undergone such training late last year. And more details would be given in the coming weeks.
“All told the same story,” Smith said of the detainees. “Handlers trained by Hezbollah inside Iran came back here purposefully to support anti-coalition and anti-security elements.”
The LA Times continued U.S. officials, without disclosing numbers, have told reporters of a slight uptick recently in reports of rocket and sophisticated roadside bomb attacks that they attribute to Iranian-backed militiamen.
Last week, after a visit to Baghdad by Ahmadinejad, U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno and Navy Adm. William J. Fallon accused his government of destabilizing Iraq.
Gen. Odierno, speaking at the Pentagon, had called Iran the greatest long-term threat to Iraq and accused it of trying to keep the Baghdad government weak for its own benefit.
Commander of Central Command, Admiral William Fallon told the Senate Armed Services Committee that there was evidence that Iran continued to train and equip militants in Iraq.
