Iran’s Interests in America

Ahmadinejad has weakened to a point that he is now reinforcing his ties with Latin America.

Latin America rarely emerges as an important issue in U.S. presidential debates, but all indications show that this time it will, for reasons that have rarely been discussed until recently: the Iranian connection.

Republican candidate Mitt Romney and Republican leaders in Congress are increasing their attacks against President Barack Obama, alleging that he is not doing enough to deter what they believe is an Iranian offense to use Latin America as a platform to launch terror attacks against the United States.

The issue is receiving increased attention in Washington. On Feb. 2, Iran launched its own Spanish-language television station in Latin America. Meanwhile, following President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s fifth visit to Venezuela, Nicaragua, Ecuador and Cuba in the last five years, the House of Representatives’ Committee on Foreign Affairs held a hearing on “Iran’s Agenda in the Western Hemisphere.”

These hearings took place hours after James Clapper, the U.S. director of national intelligence, declared that Iranian officials are “willing to conduct an attack in the United States.” Clapper didn’t explicitly suggest that the attacks would arise from Latin America, but congressional Republicans have.

The president of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Republican Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Miami, opened the hearings with a speech arguing that Iran’s relationship with Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba and Ecuador “[poses] an immediate threat by giving Iran… a platform in the region to carry out attacks against the United States, our interests, and allies.” In November’s Republican debate, Romney warned that Hezbollah presents a “very significant, imminent threat” to the U.S., citing a Washington report from last year about a conspiracy by Iranian special forces to kill the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. and the 2007 plan of an Iranian diplomat in Mexico who aspired to launch a cyber-attack against the U.S. Ros-Lehtinen added, “The fact that the military arm of a state-sponsor of terrorism has its operatives within multiple countries in our hemisphere is certainly cause for alarm.”

In his testimony before the committee, Jose Azel, researcher with the University of Miami, warned of a catastrophic scenario in which Iran could install nuclear weapons in Venezuela, just as the former Soviet Union, during the 1962 missile crisis, began to build nuclear bases in Cuba pointed toward American territory. Other experts that testified in the hearings said that Venezuela is helping Iran to elude international economic sanctions due to its nuclear program and giving refuge to terrorist groups like Hezbollah, which they say is expanding its networks in the region.

Analysts remember that, according to the Argentinean justice system, Hezbollah, with Iran’s assistance, was responsible for lethal terrorist attacks against the Israeli embassy and a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, in 1992 and 1994.

Romney has already attacked Obama for not being tough enough on Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez for his ties to Ahmadinejad, among other things. In the Republican debate in November, Romney warned that Hezbollah’s activities “throughout Latin America” present a “very significant, imminent threat” against the U.S.

The Obama administration says that Iran is a latent, but not active threat in the region, and that Washington is carefully watching its activity in all of Latin America. But officials privately warn that the U.S. should not react in a disproportionate way to unconfirmed reports.

A State Department official told me that Ahmadinejad is increasingly weak politically in his countries and isolated abroad, and could be exaggerating his ties with Latin America to show his people that he hasn’t become an international pariah.

My opinion: It would be much more desirable that American presidential candidates refer to Latin America with a positive agenda, for example debating the creation of a Trans-American Association, similar to the ambitious project announced by Obama to create a gigantic Trans-Pacific Association to facilitate commerce between the countries of the Pacific Rim.

But I fear that this will not take place. I hope I am wrong, but all indications show that the Iranian connection will eclipse a necessary debate in Washington on how to strengthen economic ties with Latin America. Even without an escalation of conflict with Iran like Israel launching a preventive attack against Iranian nuclear bases and Iran responding by attacking Israeli civilians in Latin America, the way they did in Argentina.