Fabricated Evidence, Round Two? (Truthdig)

[marmar]

Fabricated Evidence, Round Two?

Posted on Mar 13, 2007
Reese Erlich and Muhammad Sahimi

In recent weeks the Bush administration has launched a propaganda blitz accusing Iran of helping Shiite militias murder American soldiers in Iraq. On Feb. 11, U.S. military officials in Baghdad presented an elaborate display of rocket-propelled grenades, mortar rounds and components for explosives that they said were responsible for the deaths of 170 GIs over the past three years. They claimed that such weapons were made available to the insurgents with the approval of the highest authorities in Iran. These accusations are eerily similar to the administration’s claims in 2002-2003 that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and that his regime had connections with al-Qaida.

Upon close inspection, however, the United States’ claims seem dubious at best. American officials have stated that Iran provides key components for explosively formed penetrators (EFPs) that can blow up armored Humvees. Such devices require precision machining that cannot be done in Iraq, according to U.S. officials. However, EFPs were, in fact, first developed by the Irish Republican Army in its fight against Britain. They were also used by the German Red Army in 1989 to murder the German banker Alfred Herrhausen. The Pentagon has been producing EFPs since 1977. They are commercially available for mineral mining, and have been used for years by guerrilla groups in the Middle East.

These supposed precision parts can be manufactured in many Iraqi machine shops. There are a large number of unsecured caches of munitions spread throughout Iraq. All one needs are small-diameter iron pipes, a fuse and a metallic bowl. The use of EFPs in Iraq is also not new. They have been used almost from the beginning of the insurgency.

The mortars that are known to be produced by Iran have four horizontal ribs below the lettering, while those shown by the U.S. military in Baghdad have three ribs above the lettering. The Iranian type does not usually have dates, but those shown by the U.S. do have them, and Iraq has produced them since at least the 1991 Persian Gulf War. Moreover, the U.S. military has not explained why rocket-propelled grenades that were supposedly manufactured in Iran were dated American style (for example, 5/31/2006) and not in the style used in Iran and Europe (31-5-2006). It is also known that explosives manufactured for domestic use in Iran use the Iranian, not the Christian, calendar. ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20070313_fabricated_evidence_round_two/

[mtnHov]

1. thanx for the article. Cheney scares the piss out of me.

There's no telling what this cornered wild animal will pull on his last throws as tyrant.