Iran May Be Helping Iraqis Build Bombs
Pastor Dale Morgan
Apr 11, 3:19 PM EDT
*Iran May Be Helping Iraqis Build Bombs*
By QASSIM ABDUL-ZAHRA
Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD (AP) -- Iranian intelligence operatives have been training Iraqi
fighters inside Iran on how to use and assemble deadly roadside bombs
known as EFPs, the U.S. military spokesman said Wednesday.
Commanders of a splinter group inside the Shiite Mahdi Army militia have
told The Associated Press that there are as many as 4,000 members of
their organization that were trained in Iran and that they have
stockpiles of EFPs, a weapon that causes great uneasiness among U.S.
forces here because they penetrate heavily armored vehicles.
U.S. military spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell would not say how
many militia fighters had been trained in Iran but said that questioning
of fighters captured as recently as this month confirmed many had been
in Iranian training camps.
"We know that they are being in fact manufactured and smuggled into this
country, and we know that training does go on in Iran for people to
learn how to assemble them and how to employ them. We know that training
has gone on as recently as this past month from detainees debriefs,"
Caldwell said at a weekly briefing.
EFP stands for explosively formed penetrator, deadly roadside bombs that
hurl a fist-size lump of molten copper capable of piercing armor.
In January, U.S. officials said at least 170 U.S. soldiers had been
killed by EFPs.
Caldwell also said the U.S. military had evidence that Iranian
intelligence agents were active in Iraq in funding, training and arming
Shiite militia fighters.
"We also know that training still is being conducted in Iran for
insurgent elements from Iraq. We know that as recent as last week from
debriefing personnel," he said.
"The do receive training on how to assemble and employ EFPs," Caldwell
said, adding that fighters also were trained in how to carry out complex
attacks that used explosives followed by assaults with rocket-propelled
grenades and small arms.
"There has been training on specialized weapons that are used here in
Iraq. And then we do know they receive also training on general tactics
in terms of how to take and employ and work what we call a more complex
kind of attack where we see multiple types of engagements being used
from an explosion to small arms fire to being done in multiple places,"
he said.
The general would not say specifically which arm of the Iranian
government was doing the training but called the trainers "surrogates"
of Iran's intelligence agency.
Caldwell opened the briefing by showing photographs of what he said were
Iranian-made mortar rounds, RPG rounds and rockets that were found in Iraq.
The U.S. military also announced two more soldier deaths: One soldier
was killed and two were wounded by a roadside bomb Wednesday in an
eastern section of the capital, and another soldier died a day earlier
in an attack in southern Baghdad. One soldier was wounded in that incident.
At least 3,287 members of the U.S. military have died since the
beginning of the war in 2003, according to an AP count. The figure
includes seven military civilians.
Also Wednesday, Iraqi Cabinet ministers allied to radical cleric Muqtada
al-Sadr threatened to quit the government to protest the prime
minister's lack of support for a timetable for U.S. withdrawal.
Such a pullout by the very bloc that put Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki
in office could collapse his already perilously weak government. The
threat comes two months into a U.S. effort to pacify Baghdad in order to
give al-Maliki's government room to function.
Meanwhile, bodies lay scattered across two central Baghdad neighborhoods
after a raging battle left 20 suspected insurgents and four Iraqi
soldiers dead, and 16 U.S. soldiers wounded, witnesses and officials said.
The fighting Tuesday in Fadhil and Sheik Omar, two Sunni enclaves, was
the most intense since a massive push to pacify the capital began two
months ago.
Al-Sadr's political committee issued a statement a day after al-Maliki
rejected an immediate U.S. troop withdrawal.
"We see no need for a withdrawal timetable. We are working as fast as we
can," al-Maliki said on his four-day trip to Japan, where he signed loan
agreements for redevelopment projects in Iraq.
"To demand the departure of the troops is a democratic right and a right
we respect. What governs the departure at the end of the day is how
confident we are in the handover process," he said, adding that
"achievements on the ground" would dictate how long American troops remain.
Al-Maliki spoke a day after tens of thousands of Iraqis took to the
streets of two Shiite holy cities, on al-Sadr's orders, to protest the
U.S. presence in their country. The rally marked the fourth anniversary
of the fall of Baghdad at the hands of American forces.
"The Sadrist movement strongly rejects the statements of Prime Minister
Nouri al-Maliki, in which he stood by the continued presence of
occupation forces despite the will of the Iraqi people," said the
statement, a copy of which was obtained by the AP. "The Sadrist movement
is studying the option of withdrawing from the Iraqi government - a
government that has not fulfilled its promises to the people," it said.
"We are serious about withdrawing," it added.
It would not be the first time the Sadrists, who hold six seats in the
Cabinet, left al-Maliki's government.
Al-Sadr's ministers and 30 legislators boycotted the government and
parliament for nearly two months to protest a November meeting between
al-Maliki and President Bush in Jordan.
The statement expressed anger over the Baghdad security plan launched
Feb. 14, calling it "unfair." Iraqi and U.S. troops have been targeting
members of al-Sadr's Mahdi Army militia, which has been blamed for
sectarian killings.
Later in the day, the head of al-Sadr's bloc in parliament, Nassar
al-Rubaie, said U.S. troops had taken over al-Sadr's office in the city
of Diwaniyah, the scene of weekend clashes between U.S. and Iraqi troops
and al-Sadr's militiamen.
"We say that this matter is very dangerous and we put the blame on the
Iraqi government for the American destruction of the country," he said.
"We have thought before that sovereignty in Iraq is incomplete, but now
we say that sovereignty doesn't exist in Iraq," al-Rubaie said.
Caldwell said he has no information about the alleged takeover of the
office.
Iraqi soldiers held a security cordon around Fadhil, and residents hid
frightened in their homes, a witness told the AP by telephone, on
condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety.
The Muslim Scholars Association, a Sunni group, issued a statement
quoting witnesses as saying Tuesday's battle began after Iraqi troops
entered a mosque and executed two young men in front of other
worshippers. Ground forces used tear gas on civilians, it said.
"The association condemns this horrible crime carried out by occupiers
and the government," the statement said.
But the witness in Fadhil said the two men were executed in an outdoor
vegetable market, not in the mosque. The Iraqi military was not
immediately available to comment on the claim.
The U.S. military said the battle began after American and Iraqi troops
came under fire around 7 a.m. during a routine search operation.
Helicopter gunships then swooped in, engaging insurgents with machine
gun fire, the military said.
Some Arab TV stations reported a U.S. helicopter was shot down in the
fight, and showed video of a charred piece of mechanical wreckage that
was impossible to identify. Caldwell said four helicopters sustained
minor damage but were able to return to base. He confirmed that one
Apache gunship had dropped a missile pod as it left the area.
Caldwell said 13 of the 16 wounded Americans had returned to duty and
that 20 suspected insurgents were killed and 30 wounded, he said.
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Associated Press writers Lauren Frayer and Hamid Ahmed contributed to
this report.