The botched US raid that led to the hostage crisis
Exclusive Report: How a bid to kidnap Iranian security officials sparked a diplomatic crisis

By Patrick Cockburn

Published: 03 April 2007

A failed American attempt to abduct two senior Iranian security officers on an official visit to northern Iraq was the starting pistol for a crisis that 10 weeks later led to Iranians seizing 15 British sailors and Marines.

Early on the morning of 11 January, helicopter-born US forces launched a surprise raid on a long-established Iranian liaison office in the city of Arbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. They captured five relatively junior Iranian officials whom the US accuses of being intelligence agents and still holds.

In reality the US attack had a far more ambitious objective, The Independent has learned. The aim of the raid, launched without informing the Kurdish authorities, was to seize two men at the very heart of the Iranian security establishment.

[...]

...The two senior Iranian officers the US sought to capture were Mohammed Jafari, the powerful deputy head of the Iranian National Security Council, and General Minojahar Frouzanda, the chief of intelligence of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, according to Kurdish officials.

[...]

It seemed strange at the time that the US would so openly flout the authority of the Iraqi President and the head of the KRG simply to raid an Iranian liaison office that was being upgraded to a consulate, though this had not yet happened on 11 January. US officials, who must have been privy to the White House's new anti-Iranian stance, may have thought that bruised Kurdish pride was a small price to pay if the US could grab such senior Iranian officials.

[...]

The targeted generals

* MOHAMMED JAFARI

Powerful deputy head of the Iranian National Security Council, responsible for internal security. He has accused the United States of seeking to "hold Iran responsible for insecurity in Iraq... and [US] failure in the country."

* GENERAL MINOJAHAR FROUZANDA

Chief of intelligence of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, the military unit which maintains its own intelligence service separate from the state, as well as a parallel army, navy and air force

complete article.

damned interesting, eh wot...

the revolution will not be televised...

No, I don't either.

But this is a savvy move for Tehran. They get to demonstrate how reasonable and sane they are even when provoked, even while they can claim that they were in the  right to seize the British sailors to begin with. It establishes a precedent for any future "incidents" and pre-empts (at least in theory, in the eyes of the rest of the world, including strong US allies) any future attempts by the US to use a similar incident as an excuse for war. Iran has proven that while it is not going to back down from its right to defend its territory, it is also willing to negotiate in good faith and act like a reasonable member of the international community.

Glad to hear the news.... maybe sanity may yet prevail after all. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Keith Olbermann speaks for me.

If there was to be a detainee trade for the Irbil 5, it would probably would have happened by now, or will simultaneous to the Brits actual release - Iran would  not just trust that it would happen after the fact.

A gift to the British people? Brilliant stuff. Either Iranians are chess players too, or they've been talking with the Russians. We need some deeper thinkers in the Administration, like a Zbigniew Brzezinski or somebody who can see the whole system and maintains different models for the future in his head without making a ton of false assumptions. You know, the 'Vision Thing' that Bush I also famously lacked.

Of the potential candidates for the Democratic nomination, I can see it obviously in Gore (knows important info when he sees it), Obama (makes correct predictive models based on proper methodological interpretation of evidence) and Richardson (consistently identifies critical areas and effects positive change), but sadly no one else. Biden has good policy, but I think he is still just taking the work of others and claiming it as his own (Partition).

The others are fatally flawed as either unelectable ideologues, self-promoters or lackeys. Does anyone else see the Vision Thing among other Dems?

Declaring the bottom is the only way back up..

Not to mention those who simply bought the UK MOD claim that Iran had given two different locations as if they were making things up (in fact they provided four locations, because they were showing the course that the boat had taken into their claimed waters.)

Chess is often said to have either been invented in Iran, or was further developed/refined as it was passed from India via Iran to Europe. Some of the terms in chess are indeed Persian - "check mate" but in Europe the Elephant is a Bishop, and the Vizier (Prime Minister) is a Queen. Backgamon is also quite common.