The Iranians are masters at media manipulation and psychological warfare. Just as they publicly denounce al-Qaeda in their newspapers, so too do they deny any involvement in the Iraqi insurgency. Thus, one must expect their influence wherever they say it is absent. Their battlefield method is based on one ignored since
Korea by the West. To pursue it, their proxies need no heavy weaponry, technology, or organization. Whatever they require, they either find or steal. Unfortunately, the Iranian method is an obscene metastasis of its Maoist predecessor. While the latter harnesses chaos and subjugates the population, the Iranian version generates chaos and terrorizes the population.
While Western commanders try to manage chaos, Eastern commanders take advantage of it. They do so by decentralizing control over subordinates, thereby facilitating a quicker response to local disturbances. They also do so by exploiting popular opinion. At this, the Muslim militant is unusually adept. Resorting to psychological warfare, he plays upon the noncombatants’ yearning for security. In their neighborhoods, they want some semblance of order. If they can’t get it from the occupier, they look for it elsew’’here. “Coalition commanders admit that, among the 125,000 policemen and soldiers trained so far [as of 2 February 2005], the rate of desertion is as high as 40 per cent.”
Iran knows that the U. S. Congress will only subsidize the Iraqi war for so long. American forces have been losing billions of dollars worth of equipment. The foe has repeated blown up Iraq’s only money maker—its oil pipelines. Americans believe that the Cold War bankrupted Russia. Iranians believe that the Soviet-Afghan War got the job done. That’s why they are going after high-dollar items—like vehicles and supplies. In a video aired by Arab TV on 29 October 2004, bin Laden boasted that al-Qaeda had spent $500,000 on 9/11, whereas the U. S. had forfeited $500 billion in its aftermath. All the while, more-than-adequate funding has been flowing easily to the Iraqi insurgency from “private” sources in Iran, Saudi Arabia,, and Syria.
World History
