this just in;
http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/story/0,,2149593,00.html
Iranian guards are terrorists, US to declare
Move aimed at increasing pressure on Tehran over its nuclear programme
Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Thursday August 16, 2007
The Guardian
>>The Bush administration is preparing to ramp up its confrontation
with Iran by declaring part or all of the country's Revolutionary
Guard a "global terrorist" organisation and targeting its extensive
financial interests.
The move is extremely provocative, given that the 125,000-strong
Revolutionary Guard Corps is an integral part of the state rather
than a group outside the law. It has its own navy, air force, and
ground troops, as well as specialist wings.<<
now, this is tricky. on the one hand, BushCo has long stressed that
terrorists are not part of national constructs nor representative of
the muslim world. the whole justification for, say, holding a bunch
of folks against their will and outside the various national and
international legal protections otherwise afforded them, is that they
are "enemy combatants." on the other hand, a case can be made that
the nation of iran supports and funds various extra-national groups
that engage in acts of terrorism. (i cite--or rather fail to cite--an
obscure lawsuit that i've mentioned before and you'll just have to
look it up because i'm too damn lazy, wherein the family of an
american slain by crazy people sued the government of iran for
supporting terrorist groups and used as evidence the damn iranian
national budget, which the family argued showed line items funding
said terrorists.) BushCo also claims to have evidence of munitions
bearing incriminating serial numbers that were used in insurgent
attacks inside iraq.
where this all breaks down is that the argument hinges on proof of
iranian revolutionary guard member(s) operating outside national
boundaries with the express intent of committing or facilitating
terrorist acts. at least that's where i take it. i think the usa
would demand nothing less if another nation declared the green berets
a terrorist organization and froze their assets. and i highly doubt
that pakistan's isi or israel's mossad would hold up under the same
scrutiny.
x
