TEHRAN -- Iran has begun publicly preparing for a possible U.S. attack, announcing efforts to mobilize militia recruits and making plans for the kind of scattershot warfare that has plagued U.S. troops in neighbouring Iraq, officials and analysts say.
"Iran would respond within 15 minutes to any attack by the United States or any other country," said an official close to the conservative camp that runs Iran's security and military apparatus, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Tensions between Iran and the United States have increased over Iran's pursuit of nuclear technology. The Islamic republic says it needs nuclear power to meet domestic energy needs and bolster scientific pursuits, but the U.S. government accuses it of seeking a weapons program. The Pentagon said recently that it has upgraded its battle plans for Iran -- an act it described as routine.
Iranian authorities say they, too, are preparing for war. Newspapers have announced efforts to increase the number of troops in the country's Basiji militia, now seven million strong, who were deployed in human-wave attacks during the Iran-Iraq war.
The military has paraded long-range Shahab missiles, designed by North Korea, before television cameras. In December, Iran said it was conducting its most extensive war games ever, deploying 120,000 troops as well as tanks, helicopters and armoured vehicles along its western border with Iraq.
A Western military expert based in Tehran said Iran is sharpening its ability to wage guerrilla war. "Over the last year they've developed their tactics of asymmetrical war, which would aim not at resisting a penetration of foreign forces, but to then use them on the ground to all kinds of harmful effect," he said.
How much of the activity is actual mobilization and how much is propaganda remains unclear. Iranian officials and analysts have said they want to raise the stakes for U.S. officials and a potentially war-weary U.S. public by highlighting the possible cost of an attack.
"Right now it's a psychological war," said Nasser Hadian, a University of Tehran political science professor who recently returned from a three-year stint as a scholar at New York's Columbia University. "If America decides to attack, the only ones who could stop it are Iranians."
It is an open question whether young Iranian men -- more materialistic than those who battled Iraq in an eight-year war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives -- would fight with enthusiasm against the United States.
Ali, a 28-year-old who runs a small advertising firm and describes himself as a staunch nationalist, said veterans of the Iraq war have been neglected. "I see all the men who went to the front and fought are damaged and ignored and all those who didn't are the ones running the country," he said. "I love Iran and I'm no friend of America, but I won't fight."
Hamid-Reza, a 23-year-old clothing store manager who lost relatives in the Iraq war, said he would fight the United States, but feared Iran would be no match for it.
"What will I do?" he asked. "Get inside an inner tube and go fight against the American battleships in the Persian Gulf?"
Iran's army includes 350,000 active-duty soldiers and 220,000 conscripts. The elite Revolutionary Guard numbers 120,000, many of them draftees. There are 70,000 in the navy and air force.
The armed forces have about 2,000 tanks, 300 combat aircraft, three submarines and hundreds of helicopters. There are at least a dozen Russian-made Scud missile launchers, of the type Saddam Hussein used against Israel during the 1991 Persian Gulf War, and an undetermined number of Shahab missiles.
But Iran's antiquated conventional hardware, worn down by years of international sanctions, would be little match for high-tech U.S. wizardry, outside military experts and Iranians concede.
Still, Iran could create trouble for Washington and the world.
Its spy agencies have extensive overseas experience and assets, experts say. The highly classified Quds forces are believed to have operations in Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Turkey, the Persian Gulf, Central Asia and North Africa, as well as Europe and North America, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
Within minutes of any attack, Iran's air and sea forces could threaten oil shipments in the Persian Gulf or the Gulf of Oman. Iran controls the northern coast of the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway through which tankers leave the Persian Gulf.
Iranian-allied Hezbollah militia in Lebanon could launch attacks on Israel. Its operatives could attack U.S. interests in Azerbaijan, Central Asia or Turkey. "Iran can escalate the war," Prof. Hadian said. "It's not going to be all that hard to target U.S. forces in these countries."
Many analysts say Iran's most powerful card is its influence in Iraq, where Iraqis who spent years in Iran as exiles are about to assume control of the government.
"If Iran wanted, it could make Iraq a hell for the United States," Hamid al-Bayati, Iraq's deputy foreign minister, said in a recent interview.
"Iran would respond within 15 minutes to any attack by the United States or any other country," said an official close to the conservative camp that runs Iran's security and military apparatus, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Tensions between Iran and the United States have increased over Iran's pursuit of nuclear technology. The Islamic republic says it needs nuclear power to meet domestic energy needs and bolster scientific pursuits, but the U.S. government accuses it of seeking a weapons program. The Pentagon said recently that it has upgraded its battle plans for Iran -- an act it described as routine.
Iranian authorities say they, too, are preparing for war. Newspapers have announced efforts to increase the number of troops in the country's Basiji militia, now seven million strong, who were deployed in human-wave attacks during the Iran-Iraq war.
The military has paraded long-range Shahab missiles, designed by North Korea, before television cameras. In December, Iran said it was conducting its most extensive war games ever, deploying 120,000 troops as well as tanks, helicopters and armoured vehicles along its western border with Iraq.
A Western military expert based in Tehran said Iran is sharpening its ability to wage guerrilla war. "Over the last year they've developed their tactics of asymmetrical war, which would aim not at resisting a penetration of foreign forces, but to then use them on the ground to all kinds of harmful effect," he said.
How much of the activity is actual mobilization and how much is propaganda remains unclear. Iranian officials and analysts have said they want to raise the stakes for U.S. officials and a potentially war-weary U.S. public by highlighting the possible cost of an attack.
"Right now it's a psychological war," said Nasser Hadian, a University of Tehran political science professor who recently returned from a three-year stint as a scholar at New York's Columbia University. "If America decides to attack, the only ones who could stop it are Iranians."
It is an open question whether young Iranian men -- more materialistic than those who battled Iraq in an eight-year war that cost hundreds of thousands of lives -- would fight with enthusiasm against the United States.
Ali, a 28-year-old who runs a small advertising firm and describes himself as a staunch nationalist, said veterans of the Iraq war have been neglected. "I see all the men who went to the front and fought are damaged and ignored and all those who didn't are the ones running the country," he said. "I love Iran and I'm no friend of America, but I won't fight."
Hamid-Reza, a 23-year-old clothing store manager who lost relatives in the Iraq war, said he would fight the United States, but feared Iran would be no match for it.
"What will I do?" he asked. "Get inside an inner tube and go fight against the American battleships in the Persian Gulf?"
Iran's army includes 350,000 active-duty soldiers and 220,000 conscripts. The elite Revolutionary Guard numbers 120,000, many of them draftees. There are 70,000 in the navy and air force.
The armed forces have about 2,000 tanks, 300 combat aircraft, three submarines and hundreds of helicopters. There are at least a dozen Russian-made Scud missile launchers, of the type Saddam Hussein used against Israel during the 1991 Persian Gulf War, and an undetermined number of Shahab missiles.
But Iran's antiquated conventional hardware, worn down by years of international sanctions, would be little match for high-tech U.S. wizardry, outside military experts and Iranians concede.
Still, Iran could create trouble for Washington and the world.
Its spy agencies have extensive overseas experience and assets, experts say. The highly classified Quds forces are believed to have operations in Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Turkey, the Persian Gulf, Central Asia and North Africa, as well as Europe and North America, according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.
Within minutes of any attack, Iran's air and sea forces could threaten oil shipments in the Persian Gulf or the Gulf of Oman. Iran controls the northern coast of the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow waterway through which tankers leave the Persian Gulf.
Iranian-allied Hezbollah militia in Lebanon could launch attacks on Israel. Its operatives could attack U.S. interests in Azerbaijan, Central Asia or Turkey. "Iran can escalate the war," Prof. Hadian said. "It's not going to be all that hard to target U.S. forces in these countries."
Many analysts say Iran's most powerful card is its influence in Iraq, where Iraqis who spent years in Iran as exiles are about to assume control of the government.
"If Iran wanted, it could make Iraq a hell for the United States," Hamid al-Bayati, Iraq's deputy foreign minister, said in a recent interview.
