St. Petersburg Times February 28, 2007
Gray weapons market clouds Iran role
By Susan Taylor Martin
Iran makes no secret of the fact that it manufactures weapons for export, including mortar bombs of the general type found in Iraq.
Customers from around the world can log on to the Web site of the government-owned Defense Industries Organization and view a wide array of Iranian-made munitions. If they decide to order, they apparently can pay by credit card, as a VISA logo suggests.
The site - which promises "best quality and fast service" - is an example of the vigor with which Iran has moved into a global arms market long dominated by the United States and Western Europe. It also shows that some Iranian-made weapons probably have been used to kill Americans in Iraq, although they could have come through third countries without the direct knowledge of Iran's leadership.
"Nigeria is as crooked as the day is long, so if Nigeria bought arms from Iran no telling where they are going to show up," says John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org "And if Iran is supplying arms to Hezbollah, no telling where those are going to show up, either."
In a series of media briefings this month, the U.S. military has displayed mortars, rocket-propelled grenades and a particularly lethal type of roadside bomb alleged to have been made in Iran. The military has acknowledged there is no direct evidence the Iranian leadership is responsible, and the Bush administration denies it is building a case for attacking Iran as it did with Iraq in 2003.
But skepticism abounds about the origin of the weapons, with critics wondering why those alleged to have been made in Iran had markings in English, not Farsi. And Monday, the New York Times printed a letter from an Iranian diplomat who said dates on some of the weapons shown - including a warhead marked 5-31-2006 - prove the U.S. claims are "preposterous."
"The dates are in the American date format - month first, day second - whereas the rest of the world does not use this format," wrote M.A. Mohammadi, press secretary for Iran's U.N. mission. Iran and most other countries put the day first, followed by month and year.
Judging from photos on the Web site of Defense Industries Organization, which makes weapons for sale as well as for the country's own defense, Iran does use English lettering - such as HE for "high explosives" - on at least some weapons in accord with international standards. However, none of the weapons shown on the company's site appear to be dated.
There are also visible differences between 81mm mortar shells known to be made by Iran and those displayed Feb. 11 by the U.S. military at a Baghdad briefing. The Iranian mortar shell has four horizontal ribs below the lettering and no date; the one shown in Baghdad has three ribs above the lettering and the date 3-2006.
Indeed, as skeptics have pointed out, the mortar shell displayed in Baghdad looks more like a shell that was made in Iraq - not Iran - around the time of the 1991 Persian Gulf War. After the most recent war began in 2003, coalition troops found caches of munitions throughout Iraq but failed to secure many of them. Tons of weapons fell into insurgent hands.
Anthony Cordesman, a military expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says Iraq at one time would have been able to manufacture many of the types of weapons now being seized by U.S. forces.
"Truth is, these aren't so sophisticated to say DIO has to make them," said Cordesman, referring to the Tehran-based Defense Industries Organization. "Any really good machine shop with automated metal lathes and normal tools could make them.
"The problem is that in a lot of Iraq, very little is working and things it would have been very capable of doing several years ago would be much more difficult today."
Iran began developing its weapons industry during its 1980-88 war with Iraq, when the United States and other Western countries supported Saddam Hussein's secular regime and slapped an arms embargo on Iran's Islamic government.
"They got really tight with countries like China and North Korea to make sure they had a domestic arms industry that would to the fullest extent possible make them an independent player," Pike said. "They're quite energetic and they're open for business."
Although the Web site of Defense Industries Organization bars registration by computer users in the United States, Israel, Iraq and a few other countries, it is accessible to potential buyers in several of Iraq's neighbors including Saudi Arabia. The Saudis, whose own domestic weapons industry is small, are thought to be funding and arming Sunni insurgents in Iraq, just as Iran is alleged to be supporting Shiite insurgents.
While Iranian-made arms may be flowing into Iraq through other countries, there's little doubt Iranian arms are also coming from Iran itself, Pike said.
Iranians "have a bigger stake in the outcome in Iraq than anybody does, and the notion they are just going to sit by and let the Americans take care of it while they watch on TV is just not going to happen. I assume that every major segment of Iranian society has engaged on Iraq, and that means men of violence in Iran are integrating with violent men in Iraq."
© Copyright 2007, St. Petersburg Times
