Iranian Assasination Plot in the US.

[Juana]

I'm a little at a loss why a Mexican cartel would be willing to cooperate with the Iranians for an assassination of a Saudi, come to think of it. Is there something I'm missing here?

The truth, maybe??? In my bones I think the U.S. has been just itching for a reason to invade Iran, and why would it surprise anyone if they finally had to fabricate that reason?

That was my way of saying I found it fishy. And, yeah, that's kind of what I'm thinking.

[Cain]

I'm a little at a loss why a Mexican cartel would be willing to cooperate with the Iranians for an assassination of a Saudi, come to think of it. Is there something I'm missing here?

Mexican cartels are only in it for the money.  If they were supplying arms for the hit, that could explain their involvement.  To be honest, the Mexican groups would be the first people I would attempt to contact as well. They can move people and drugs across borders fairly easily, so they should be able to move weapons as well.

Since Iran has no embassy in the US, and so no diplomatic pouch to smuggle them in with, another method for obtaining weapons would be needed.

Hezbollah also has links with some drug cartels further south.  Of course, the media always over-exaggerate the links between Iran and Hezbollah anyway (amazingly, Hezbollah is not purely an extension of the Iranian state's will - not least because the "Iranian state" as a unitary actor is a laughable fiction), but it could be some calls were put into the Bekaa Valley and some questions about groups and people to contact were asked.

[Cain]

I'd like to know more about this bank transfer, as well.  I'm a little more familiar with Iranian banking operations, having spent a (very tedious) evening browsing such documents from Wikileaks, and would be more inclined to believe it if certain names were involved.

[Juana]

I'm a little at a loss why a Mexican cartel would be willing to cooperate with the Iranians for an assassination of a Saudi, come to think of it. Is there something I'm missing here?

Mexican cartels are only in it for the money.  If they were supplying arms for the hit, that could explain their involvement.  To be honest, the Mexican groups would be the first people I would attempt to contact as well. They can move people and drugs across borders fairly easily, so they should be able to move weapons as well.

Since Iran has no embassy in the US, and so no diplomatic pouch to smuggle them in with, another method for obtaining weapons would be needed.

Hezbollah also has links with some drug cartels further south.  Of course, the media always over-exaggerate the links between Iran and Hezbollah anyway (amazingly, Hezbollah is not purely an extension of the Iranian state's will - not least because the "Iranian state" as a unitary actor is a laughable fiction), but it could be some calls were put into the Bekaa Valley and some questions about groups and people to contact were asked.

Ah yeah, that makes sense. I was perusing an article on it just now, which was saying they were looking to borrow some muscle for it.
^{_{No idea what quality Human Events is, but I need to run to class so D: it'll do for now.}}

[Cain]

Human Events are terrible quality.  They syndicate Coulter and Pat Buchanan, among others.  The "outside muscle" angle sounds even less likely than the "multiple bombings" angle.  You do not bring in outsiders on a sensitive job.  You do not complicate the plot.  You kill the fucker you came for, and that's it.  You don't go off and bomb 4 different embassies on two different continents, to show off or whatever.  You don't tell random Mexican cartel members what you intend to do.

[I_Kicked_Kennedy]

Couple questions for those smarter than me:

1) Why are they releasing this to the news today? I believe the plot actually happened, and this isn't a total fabrication, but I also believe there have been a dozen or so of these in the last couple years (at least), but there was some sort of political motivations behind releasing the info now. Do you think the military contractors are doing it so the budget superdupercommittee doesn't cut their budget?

2) Is anyone else more concerned by the fact that drug cartels are now conspiring with major governments? (Besides, you know... the biggest one...) That's the part that's scaring the hell out of me. These drug cartels are gearing up for an actual, shit's goin' down WAR. Am I over thinking this?

Gee, if only there was some simple way to take the revenue stream away from these drug cartels...

[Prince Glittersnatch III]

"Gearing up"?

Circa 2010 15,273 people had died in the Drug War. In comparison the US has only lost about 5,000 troops in Iraq. This has been an actual shits goin down war for awhile now.

[I_Kicked_Kennedy]

Good point.

[Juana]

Human Events are terrible quality.  They syndicate Coulter and Pat Buchanan, among others.  The "outside muscle" angle sounds even less likely than the "multiple bombings" angle.  You do not bring in outsiders on a sensitive job.  You do not complicate the plot.  You kill the fucker you came for, and that's it.  You don't go off and bomb 4 different embassies on two different continents, to show off or whatever.  You don't tell random Mexican cartel members what you intend to do.

Yeah, I had never heard of them and was skimming the article before I ran off. Good to know it's shit. And ew.

[Cain]

Couple questions for those smarter than me:

1) Why are they releasing this to the news today? I believe the plot actually happened, and this isn't a total fabrication, but I also believe there have been a dozen or so of these in the last couple years (at least), but there was some sort of political motivations behind releasing the info now. Do you think the military contractors are doing it so the budget superdupercommittee doesn't cut their budget?

2) Is anyone else more concerned by the fact that drug cartels are now conspiring with major governments? (Besides, you know... the biggest one...) That's the part that's scaring the hell out of me. These drug cartels are gearing up for an actual, shit's goin' down WAR. Am I over thinking this?

Gee, if only there was some simple way to take the revenue stream away from these drug cartels...

I don't think mercs are worried about a budget cut.  If there is one thing that is guaranteed, it is that mercenaries will be paid.  Obama has virtually doubled US dependency on them in foreign conflict zones.

*shrug*  One of the worst Mexican gangs, the Zetas, were former police and special forces.  Besides, lets remember, this wasn't an actual Cartel member they were talking to, it was a covert US DEA officer.  The cartels are already fighting an actual war against the Mexican government, and are winning, without much in the way of government assistance.

[Cain]

Here's a good question, however, that is always worth asking.

Why now?

The US has had the same Saudi Arabian ambsassador in Washington since 2006.  What has changed so significantly that killing him is considered a necessity?  He does seem to be a critical node in US-Saudi intelligence sharing on terrorism...but lets be honest, any idiot could do that.  What's the expected outcome here, the payoff for Iran?  As a rule, nations don't just engage in assassination plots for the hell of it, they do it because either they want to prevent something happening, they want to send a message (which requires the assassination to be linked to a wider context) or because they will benefit from the replacement for the person who is being removed (in intelligence tradecraft, if you had a mole in an enemy service, it was terribly easy to manage their rise to positions of influence, simply by expelling or otherwise compromising the other spies in the network and getting your guy promoted.  Assassination tends to work best in similar circumstances).

I'm not even going to speculate that Iran has a mole in the top of the Saudi Arabian foreign ministry because, aside from being a great plot for a novel, we'd never know if that was true or nor anyway.

So what could Iran want to prevent from happening?  Well...it could be that US or Saudi intelligence were planning something Iran-directed.  Maybe the US was going to transfer yet more high-tech arms to the Kingdom - precision bombs, something like that - which would really ruin Iran's day should a Middle East war break out.  Of course, such an arms deal was actually agreed, about a year ago now.

Another possibility is the Gulf Cooperation Group agitation over what is going on in Syria.  The Syrian regime is, of course, close to Tehran.  After the success of Qatari-backed, Al-Qaeda linked militants in Libya, Tehran no doubt surmises the GCG are riding high on success, and planning to export the Sunni counterrevolution to Damascus next.  However, the GCG wont act without at least some kind of NATO backing, I am fairly confident of that.  Therefore, lobbying the US for involvement beyond sanctions would be necessary - another bombing campaign, while the Arab dictatorships took care of the dirty work on the ground.  Tehran would then lose access to an ally very strategically placed in the heart of the Arab world - a real blow.  It would also probably have a knock-on effect on Hezbollah's ability to fight Israel - a vulnerability that Bibi would be keen to exploit, given his own internal woes.

[Cain]

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2011/10/would-iran-really-want-to-blow-up-the-saudi-ambassador-to-the-us/246505/

Worth reading

The Iranian leadership, for all their twisted human rights abuses and policies that often serve the regime at the cost of actual Iranians, are not idiots. Though they use terrorism as a foreign policy tool, the attacks in Iraq and Lebanon and elsewhere have clearly been driven by just that -- a cool-headed pragmatic desire to further Iranian foreign policy interests. Unifying the U.S. and Saudi Arabia at a time when they are drifting apart with a plot that would galvanize American publics and policymakers to support Saudi Arabia, and all without actually doing much strategic damage to either country, would be monumentally stupid. They've made serious, ideology-driven mistakes before -- as government often do -- but this plot comes so far out of left field that it should raise more questions than accusations.

If they would go through all the trouble to organize a bombing attack on U.S. soil -- no easy thing to do -- why target someone so low-level? For that matter, why launch an attack on U.S. soil at all, something Iran has never done in the tumultuous decade since September 11? Why now, as opposed to, for example, during the height of the Iraq war? Why incur the wrath of the U.S. now, so soon after releasing the U.S. hikers detained in Tehran? (Their release was a modest and long overdue concession, but one that suggests the path of Iranian diplomacy.)

And why get involved with Mexican drug cartels? Is that really someplace where Iran has good contacts these days? As Ken Gude of the Center for American Progress asked, "Wiring money into US? Talking about plot on phone? Does that sound like an intel service to you?"

[The Rev]

Yeah, something really stinks about this entire thing.

Cain, instead of taking direct action, wouldn't it be far more likely that Tehran would sponsor a terrorist group for this sort of thing? I just can't accept that they would benefit from any direct action against U.S. soil, when the U.S. has quantifiable history of readily invading ME countries.

[Cain]

Would you trust a terrorist group to do this right?  Apart from Hezbollah, which would give the whole thing away anyway. 

Peter Lee, the Asia Times correspondent, has his doubts about this story as well:

Since everybody else is tiptoeing around the issue, I might as well put my hoof in:

The "Iranian bomb plot" smells like BS.

The idea that the Iranian regime or Quds Force decided to pull this off should be fourth or fifth down the list of plausible explanations, if not lower.

It looks more like a black flag operation by Israel or Saudi Arabia.

The fact that the US decided to take the allegation and run with it should itself be a matter of interest and investigation.

After all, just as Iran is trying once again to break out of its diplomatic isolation by refloating the Teheran Research Reactor nuclear fuel swap, the State Department comes up with a new load of manure to dump on the situation.

Makes me think, the Obama administration decided to give the Jose Padilla treatment to this ridiculous scheme in order to reclaim leadership of the anti-Iran jihad, which threatened to run off under the incitement of Saudi Arabia and Israel, both of whom now regard the US as a dubious ally who no longer deserves either a leadership role or even a veto in skullduggery involving Teheran.

[The Rev]

Good point I suppose.

I remember in the 70's, we were always told people in Russia and China didn't know what was going on in the world because the state run media only told the people what the state wanted them to hear.

Thanks for the info from the Asian Times.