Is it war with Iran yet?
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article2953462.eceThe 'proxy war': UK troops are sent to Iranian border
British soldiers return to action as tensions between US and Iran grow
Published: 12 September 2007
British forces have been sent from Basra to the volatile border with Iran amid warnings from the senior US commander in Iraq that Tehran is fomenting a "proxy war".
In signs of a fast-developing confrontation, the Iranians have threatened military action in response to attacks launched from Iraqi territory while the Pentagon has announced the building of a US base and fortified checkpoints at the frontier.
The UK operation, in which up to 350 troops are involved, has come at the request of the Americans, who say that elements close to the Iranian regime have stepped up supplies of weapons to Shia militias in recent weeks in preparation for attacks inside Iraq.
The deployment came within a week of British forces leaving Basra Palace, their last remaining base inside Basra city, and withdrawing to the airport for a widely expected final departure from Iraq. Brigadier James Bashall, commander of 1 Mechanised Brigade, based at Basra said: "We have been asked to help at the Iranian border to stop the flow of weapons and I am willing to do so. We know the points of entry and I am sure we can do what needs to be done. The US forces are, as we know, engaged in the 'surge' and the border is of particular concern to them."
The mission will include the King's Royal Hussars battle group, 250 of whom were told at the weekend that they would be returning to the UK as part of a drawdown of forces in Iraq.
The operation is regarded as a high-risk strategy which could lead to clashes with Iranian-backed Shia militias or even Iranian forces and also leaves open the possibility of Iranian retaliation in the form of attacks against British forces at the Basra air base or inciting violence to draw them back into Basra city. Relations between the two countries are already fraught after the Iranian Revolutionary Guards seized a British naval party in the Gulf earlier this year.
http://www.upi.com/International_Security/Energy/Analysis/2007/09/10/analysis_iran_moves_to_ditch_us_dollar/6990 /
By DEREK SANDS
UPI Correspondent
WASHINGTON, Sept. 10 (UPI) -- Faced with U.S. economic sanctions and a weak dollar, Tehran is demanding foreign energy companies do business in yen and euros, despite increasingly desperate need for investment.
In a deal announced last week, Japan’s Nippon Oil agreed to buy oil from Iran using yen instead of the traditional U.S. dollars. The agreement comes after years of Iranian efforts to shift its petroleum exports away from dollars and toward yen and euros.
With refineries in need of investment and vast natural gas deposits in need of foreign companies for development, Iran is trying every avenue to extricate itself from U.S. sanctions.
“In general, a key motivation is the U.S. informal sanctions pressure that the Treasury, and Undersecretary Levey in particular, put on banks not to do financial transactions with Iran. And increasingly designating banks with ties to certain Iranian entities as unable to perform the U-turn transactions for dollar-denominated transactions,” according to David Kirsch, the manager for market intelligence at the international energy consultancy PFC Energy.
U.S. Treasury Undersecretary for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence Stuart Levey has been in charge of coordinating U.S. sanctions against Iran since 2004. In recent months the U.S. Treasury has increased pressure on foreign banks not to deal with Iran, including so-called U-turn transactions, which “allow U.S. banks to process payments involving Iran that begin and end with a non-Iranian foreign bank,” according to the U.S. Treasury.
Shifting to euros and yen allows Iran some relief.
“Overall it does lower some of their exposure to this successful yet informal pressure from the U.S.,” Kirsch said.
Iran has the world’s second-largest reserves of crude oil, is the world’s fourth-largest exporter of oil, at 2.5 million barrels per day, and depends on export revenue for almost half of its government revenue, estimated at about $46.9 billion in 2006. Japan is Iran’s largest customer for oil.
Iran’s turn to the yen or euro may help in some ways, but U.S. sanctions are still a danger.
http://www.freemarketnews.com/WorldNews.asp?nid=48779Sen Lieberman Wants Invasion Inside Iran
Tuesday, September 11, 2007 - FreeMarketNews.com
Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman, who is among the Senate's fiercest hawks, blamed Iran for the deaths of "hundreds of American troops," and claimed the US has evidence that Iran is training insurgents outside Tehran before sending them to Iraq. He asked whether the US should expand its invasion into Iran. "Is it time to give you authority, in pursuit of your mission in Iraq, to pursue those Iranian Quds Force operations in Iranian territory, in order to protect Americas troops in Iraq," Lieberman (I-CT) asked at a hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of US troops in Iraq, demurred, but did not shoot down the idea of an expansion into Iran. -Raw Story
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