Response:

Secretary of Defense Gates is more circumspect: he merely claims that Iranian arms are falling into the arms of the Taliban, a much more limited claim.²

In any case, what these accounts ignore is the fact that the Taliban is a long-term enemy of Iran with the blood of many Shiites on its hands. Iran spent over $750 million helping the United States topple the Taliban after 9/11 and was rewarded for its efforts with an "Axis of Evil" designation.³ The United States then sheltered the MKO, a terrorist group that had tried to assassinate the Iranian Supreme Leader, while simultaneously demanding that Iran release al Qaeda operatives in its custody to the United States.

Given these provocations, it is not inconceivable that elements in Iran are now helping the Taliban, just as America armed the Taliban to battle the Soviet Union (America's enemy) in the Eighties.

It also should be obvious that the best way to change that situation is to end the provocations, cool the rhetoric, and explore ways to achieve detente with Iran.

Footnotes

1. This charge originally reported by CBS News in 2007 has been leveled by the neo-conservative scholar, Michael Rubin, Ambassador Nicholas Burns, former British prime minister Tony Blair, and others. [back]
2. CBS News Broadcast, June 13, 2007 ("Last week, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said in Afghanistan that Iranian weapons were falling into the hands of Taliban fighters, but stopped short of blaming the government itself.") [back]
3. James Dobbins, “Negotiating with Iran: Testimony by James Dobbins before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs,” November 7, 2007; Slavin, Bitter Friends, Bosom Enemies, pp. 199-201. [back]