Don’t Bomb Iran

In August the New York Times reported that of the 25000 detainees in US custody, about 280 are foreigner fighters - with 197 coming from Egypt, Syria, Saudi, Jordan and Sudan - no figure was given for Iranian detainees, but it cannot have been more than 83 out of 25 thousand detainees if these figures are correct. That’s not many.

Perhaps all the Iranian forces we hear dire warnings about are hard to capture, or they are in Iraqi custody. But given that the Iraqi prime minister describes Iran as a helpful influence in his country, that is doubtful. The article, “With Troop Rise, Iraqi Detainees Soar in Number” reports that according to

headquarters of Task Force 134, the American military unit in charge of detention operations in Iraq, there are about 280 detainees from countries other than Iraq. Of those, 55 are identified as Egyptian, 53 as Syrian, 37 as Saudi, 28 as Jordanian and 24 as Sudanese.

It adds that in February there were 16 thousand detainees, there were 25 thousand by August, and that 3300 had been released.� Nearly 85% of detainees are Sunni Arabs, although they are a minority of the population.