Q&A: Iran's Revolutionary Guard

Last Modified: 15 Aug 2007
By: Sarah Smith

US administration officials are reported to be preparing to declare that Iran's Revolutionary Guard is a terrorist organisation.

"[Iran's Revolutionary Guard] now have tentacles into all sorts of different activities: business activities, banking activities. We all knew about their support for those groups going after our troops in Iraq. We've also talked about their supplying arms to the Taliban in Afghanistan, and there have also been numerous other reports about their links with Hezbollah and other terrorist groups around the world."
Sean McCormack, US State Department spokesman

It would be first time that the US has put the armed forces of a sovereign government on its list of proscribed organisations.

And it would mean treasury officials could target the revolutionary guard's finances. Our Washington correspondent Sarah Smith joins us now.

Alex: Why is the US thinking of doing this now?

Sarah: Well, as you know America has been deeply frustrated with Iran for a long time, but also with what they see as the failure of the international community to deal with Iran's nuclear programme and with the Revolutionary Guard's support for America's enemies in the Middle East.

A state department spokesman made it very clear today that while it's the Revolutionary Guard's military activities that they see as threatening to US interests, it is possible to target them, and try to prevent them, by targeting their business activities.

Alex: Well, it's not like the Revolutionary Guard are some kind of retail outlet in Milwaukee, what is the actual intended effect of all this?

Sarah: Well they are actually much more than a military organisation inside Iran. To strengthen their power base they've been moving into all kinds of commercial activities: oil production, building airports, they even provide cell phone services.

But the thing is most of these businesses have almost nothing to do with any US companies and not that much to do with international banking and finance institutions so this may be much more of a symbolic rather than a financially effective move.

Alex: Ok so the intended effect of all of this therefore both home and abroad would be...?

Sarah: To pressure not actually so much Iran as America's diplomatic allies; countries like Britain, other European and Asian allies.

A move like this would have two instant effects. Firstly it would try and pacify some of the hawks in the administration who've been arguing recently that the diplomatic group with Iran simply isn't working, and so they've been trying to re-open the case for military action against Iran.

The State Department don't want to consider that yet so they're looking for a way to put that argument back in its box.

But this move would also have a second effect, and it would send a message to allies, to countries like Britain, that America is prepared to take unilateral action over Iran if these countries won't help them, and if these countries want to avoid any sort of military confrontation with Iran, and most of them desperately do want to avoid military confrontations, the message from America is 'you're going to have to get behind a much tougher sanctions regime'.

There is another meeting of the general assembly of United Nations in New York towards the end of September. The US really want to see a very strong resolution going through there that will target Iran much more stringently than either of the previous two resolutions.

They're using this threat against the Revolutionary Guard to try and ratchet up the diplomatic pressure on countries who would possibly vote for that, and those who would possibly vote against it, like China.

Transcript taken from Channel 4 News on Wednesday 15 August 2007