Arab News Editorial: US secret missions

Arab News Editorial: US secret missions

The news that American special forces were from last September ordered to be deployed in both friendly and hostile countries within the Middle East in the campaign against international terror is both disturbing and puzzling.

Gen. David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command, has signed off the tasking of elite special forces troops to undertake surveillance missions and partner with local forces in the campaign against Al-Qaeda and its militant allies. Now while special forces around the world certainly do mount surveillance operations, these are generally a preparation for military action of some sort.

If that is what Washington is doing, then the US military simply cannot be acting outside its UN mandates in Iraq and Afghanistan. The imperative of countering terrorism cannot justify the infringement of any national sovereignty. Implicit in Petraeus' detailed seven-page instructions is the unacceptable reality that the US will send its special forces into a country without authorization, if the local military is either not trusted or if authorization for such an incursion would certainly be refused.

The order also speaks of cultivating local contacts to boost the surveillance missions. Signing up informers in an attempt to generate fresh flows of information is more associated with the cloak-and-dagger world of established intelligence agencies than special forces from the military.

And it is a high-risk strategy. Were a covert US mission to be caught and confronted by local troops, the diplomatic consequences could be dire. Once again, it seems that the means the US is choosing to combat terrorism could probably have the effect of boosting it, by reinforcing the notion that Washington is acting as a quasi-colonial power and bullying friendly states into doing what it wants in the same way that it has bullied post-invasion Iraqi governments.

However, the puzzling element to the leaking of this secret order is that it is absolutely the last thing that a commander would wish, because it immediately compromises any missions that are either under way or planned. However good soldiers in the US Delta Force, Navy Seal and Army Ranger units might be, their chances of success are much diminished if it is known they are coming.

And therein perhaps lies the explanation for the revealing of instructions which because they must have been tagged "Top Secret" could hardly have escaped from the Pentagon without some connivance by the US military. The Iranians are already paranoid about US interference in their country. Confirming their fears will stir Tehran into further efforts to counter US spies. It can be expected that the protection of sensitive facilities will be further improved. Yet Washington has more than enough satellite technology to watch the Iranians. It does not need to send special forces crawling around taking photographs.

Maybe therefore the Petraeus order is a bluff, designed to prompt the Iranians into showing where their key sites actually are. As Tehran increases its defenses, US satellites will watch and record the coordinates, which can be programmed into their weapons systems.