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WASHINGTON (Reuters) — The United States believes Iran's shadowy Quds Force is becoming increasingly aggressive overseas and may be working on other international plots beyond the alleged plan to kill Saudi Arabia's ambassador to Washington, three U.S. officials told Reuters.
U.S. allegations last week of a foiled plot in Washington have escalated tensions between the United States and Iran. They have also renewed Washington's focus on the Quds Force, the covert operations arm of Iran's powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, which is believed to have sponsored attacks on U.S. targets in the Middle East -- but never before in the United States.
"They're being more aggressive ... not only in Iraq but worldwide," one senior U.S. official said in an interview. The official and others insisted on anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record and because of the sensitive nature of the matter.
U.S. officials have long charged that the Quds Force -- the Arabic word for Jerusalem -- has used proxies to attack U.S. troops in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
The Quds Force, whose power within Iran is believed to be growing, is also active in Lebanon, the Gulf, Syria and elsewhere, officials said.
[See a collection of political cartoons on Iran.]
Many Iran specialists have reacted skeptically to the disclosure of an alleged Iranian plot within the United States itself. Tehran has dismissed the charges as a fabrication.
Some foreign nations briefed on the plot have raised questions. While President Barack Obama has so far demanded tougher sanctions on Iran and not a military reprisal, representatives of those nations are nonetheless wary, given the flawed intelligence case President George W. Bush made for war in Iraq.
Even U.S. officials now convinced of the plot's authenticity acknowledged they were initially doubtful due to the case's odd facts, including the bumbling nature of the Iranian-American now in custody, and his approach to a supposed Mexican drug cartel figure who happened to be a U.S. federal informant.
U.S. officials who spoke to Reuters declined to provide details of the evidence that the Quds Force may have other plots in the works. But two officials stressed they were based on more than just speculation or analysis.
"These are not merely aspirational plots dreamed up by the Quds Force. In fact, there is active planning around them," a second senior U.S. official told Reuters. Both senior officials played down concerns any attack was imminent.
A third U.S. official said the recklessness of the alleged attempt to assassinate Saudi Ambassador Adel al-Jubeir in Washington suggested that Quds "may be involved in other actions."
In the wake of the U.S. government's disclosure of the alleged plot, counterterrorism investigators in Britain are examining the possibility that other plots hatched in Iran were under way, a European government source said.
But the source said he and his colleagues were unaware of any current Iranian plots similar to the one the Americans said they had uncovered and disrupted.
IRAN'S 'SECOND MOST POWERFUL MAN'
U.S. officials said they believed Iran's Quds Force had expanded its power in recent years, exerting more control over the country's foreign policy.
Its commander, Qasem Suleimani, a brigadier general, has led the group's efforts to broaden Iran's influence in the Middle East, including by supporting Iraq factions that oppose the U.S. presence.
"His prominence within the Quds Force cannot be overstated. He is directly responsible for everything the Quds Force does," one U.S. military official, who is an expert on Iran, told Reuters on condition of anonymity.
Karim Sadjadpour, an associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, described Suleimani as "arguably the second most powerful man in Iran after the supreme leader," Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
[See a collection of political cartoons on the turmoil in the Middle East.]
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