New Delhi: Indicating that Washington had adopted a more confrontational approach towards Tehran even as it denied plans to attack the country, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Bush had issued an order several months ago to undertake a broad military offensive against Iranian operatives.
In an interview with the New York Times, Rice said US President George W Bush had authorised the recent series of raids against Iranians in Iraq as part of a broad military offensive.
The White House decision to authorise the aggressive steps against Iranians in Iraq, the Times said, appears to formalise the American effort to contain Iran's ambitions as a new front in the Iraq war.
Also it reflected "a new" hostility to Iran that was first evident in Bush's speech to the nation on Wednesday night, in which he accused Tehran of providing material support for attacks on American troops and vowed to respond.
"There has been a decision to go after these networks," Rice said in the interview on Friday, before leaving on a trip to the West Asia. Rice said Bush had acted "after a period of time in which we saw increasing activity among Iranians in Iraq, "and increasing lethality in what they were producing".
So far administration officials have declined to say whether Bush ordered such actions despite a series of raids in which Iranians have been seized by American forces in Baghdad and other cities in Iraq.
Rice, the paper said, was vague on the question of when Bush issued the order, but said his decision grew out of questions that the president and members of his National Security Council raised in the fall.
Rice described the military effort against Iranians in Iraq as a defensive "force protection mission", but said it was also motivated by concerns that Iran was trying to further destabilise the country.
American officials charge, Iran has provided components, including explosives and infrared triggering devices, for sophisticated roadside bombs that are designed to penetrate armor.
“We think they are providing help to the militias as well, and maybe even the more violent element of these militias,” said Rice.
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