The US Readies The Next Move On Iran After Hossein Khomeini's 'Regime Change' Invite.

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WASHINGTON - An APS source here says the Washington visit of Hossein Khomeini, the grandson of the late Imam Khomeini, was a turning point in the US pressure campaign against the theocracy in Iran. The visit coincided with the discovery of traces of weapons-grade enriched uranium at the Kalay-e company in Tehran, marking the second time this year that such enriched uranium has been found in Iran nuclear programme. With the nuclear issue having become one more bone of contention between the reformist and hardline theologians in Tehran, the source adds, the stage is being set by the US and its allies for calibrated moves towards regime change in Iran.

The source says neocons guiding post-9/11 policy in the US are very methodical in their moves for regime change - the aftermath of which would be "far better planned than in the case of Iraq". It was after a meeting with neocons that Hossein Khomeini, a religious figure based in Qom, told reporters in Washington he was urging the US to help the Iranians get rid of the Tehran theocrats. During a visit to Baghdad in the summer, Khomeini described the theocracy as "the worst dictatorship in history".

Opinion polls have repeatedly shown that most of the Iranian people have a favourable opinion of the US, in contrast with the rest of the Greater Middle East. The Bush administration does not want to jeopardise this reservoir of goodwill through military action that might rapidly turn the population against America. Rather, it will back dissent among the public, will guide key figures inside and outside Iran, and then will provide covert support for change from within Iran - where public opinion has turned against the theocrats, be they reformists or hardliners, for failing to deliver economic well-being and concentrating instead on social strictures.

Sustained but relatively low-key pressure has been applied since the ouster of Saddam's Baathist regime in Baghdad in April 2003. The pressure - this time the US is co-ordinating with the EU - has been on the nuclear question. According to the source, the Bush team believes the symbolism of Khomeini's visit to the US and his utterances will have a deep impact among those in Iran who revere the late Imam.

Speaking on Sept. 27 to the American Enterprise Institute, a neocon hub, Khomeini attacked the Tehran "dictatorship" and said although he had no knowledge that Iran was trying to develop nuclear weapons, "I wouldn't put anything (past) them". He stated: "Today, Iranian people again want democracy, they want freedom. Furthermore they have experienced everything, they have experienced theocracy in Iran and they have come to understand that religion and government cannot be one and the same".

Khomeini said: "The best way is for the US to help the movement for democracy in Iran. They should look at this issue very seriously and not as dispassionately as they have been, waiting for something to happen and then get involved... Mr. Bush should act like Churchill when he gathered around him the British population to fight against Hitler".

Asked if he thought the exiled son of Iran's late Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi should return to Iran, Khomeini replied: "Anyone who has the power to lead Iranians into freedom should be there, no matter who".

The source believes the timing of Khomeini's visit and his strong remarks indicate a serious turn in the power struggle between the reformists and hardliners of the theocracy over Iran's future course. The absence of any criticism of Hossein Khomeini - officials in Tehran said he was free to speak his mind like any other Iranian - is indicative of the delicacy of the situation from the hardliners' perspective, in view of the aura attached to the Khomeini surname. The idea that theologians must move away from power and focus on a realm above politics - which never died out even during the late Imam's rule - is beginning to gather strength among Shiite theologians both in Iran and in Iraq. Senior Ayatullahs in the holy city of Qom are openly advocating a withdrawal from politics, which they believe has tarnished the image of the Shiite theological community in view of the corrupt behaviour of the hardliners.

Similar viewpoints are being aired by Shiite theologians in Najaf and Karbala in Iraq, the heartland of Shiism, where Khomeini is a frequent visitor. Most are advocating democratic government respectful of Islamic values, rather than a government of theocrats based on the Iranian model. On Sept. 19, Ibrahim Jaafari, leader of the Islamist Daawa Party and the first Iraqi Governing Council (IGC) member to hold its rotating presidency in August, addressed the second annual Iraqi-American Conference in Detroit and made the case for a pluralistic, tolerant Iraq in which all citizens -Muslim and non-Muslim, men and women - would have full rights of citizenship.

The Washington source anticipates that the nuclear issue could become the political battleground where the hardliners, the reformists and theologians advocating an end to Velayat-e-Faqih (rule of the jurisprudent, the system put in place by the late Imam Khomeini) may fight the definitive battle to impose their standpoint. The signals indicate that the battle has already begun.

Ayatullah Ahmad Jannati, a traditionalist hardliner who heads the Guardians' Council and a member of the Assembly of Constitutional Experts, is advocating that Iran pull out of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) - as North Korea did - and refuse to sign the Additional Protocol for unscheduled inspections of Iranian nuclear sites. Hossein Shariatmadari, a close aide to Supreme Leader Ayat. Ali Khamenei, warned that the growing US pressure is part of a "plan, similar to the US plan against Iraq, seeking the fall of the Islamic establishment in Iran". International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors were to return to Iran on Oct. 2 to clarify ambiguities surrounding its enrichment programme before an Oct. 31 deadline set by the UN agency. Shariatmadari stated that the US would not end pressure on Iran even if it signs the Additional Protocol.

However, Mohsen Mirdamadi, a close Khatami ally who heads the National Security and Foreign Policy Committee in the Majlis (parliament), warned in remarks published on Sept. 26 in the reformist daily Yas-e-Nou that procrastination on the nuclear issue was harming the country and forging an international consensus against Iran. A leader of the Islamic Iran Participation Front, Iran's largest reformist political party, Mirdamadi said: "Our behaviour has effectively brought Europe and the US, which have had different positions, closer together. We are gradually creating an unprecedented global consensus against ourselves".

Khatami's government is in favour of signing the Additional Protocol. Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi last week told the UN General Assembly: "Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program nor does it intend to embark on one. Thus we have nothing to hide and, in principle, have no problem with the additional protocol". Khatami's position is more true to that of the late Imam Khomeini who stopped a nuclear programme initiated by the Shah. By contrast the position of the hardliners who advocate a nuclear Iran is similar to that of the Shah, who had ambitions for Iran to become the fifth biggest power in the world.

In the months ahead, there will be tough issues for Tehran to deal with because few believe that Iran does not have a weaponisation programme. The trickling out of information on Iran's nuclear capabilities has already generated an indirect threat from Israel. On Sept. 25, Israeli Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Moshe Yaalon was quoted as telling Middle East Newsline: "The fact that a country like Iran, an enemy [of Israel] and which is particularly irresponsible, has equipped itself with non-conventional weapons is worrisome. The combination in this case of a non-conventional regime with non-conventional weapons is a concern. At the moment there is continuing international diplomatic activity to deal with this threat, and it would be good if it succeeds. But if that is not the case we would consider our options".

Revitalising Iran-Syria Alliance: On Sept. 29 Syrian Vice President Abdel Halim Khaddam flew to Tehran on an unscheduled visit and met with the Iranian leaders. An APS source in Beirut later said Khaddam and Tehran agreed on a two-pronged strategy to "retrieve Iraq" from the US: Syria will forcefully project Arab nationalism in backing "Arab resistance" against the American-led foreign occupation, and Iran will forecefully project its Islamic militancy through Hizbollah operations in Iraq.