- WASHINGTON (AFP) - US Defense
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has predicted an early violent overthrow of the
Iranian government, or its collapse amid mounting problems and internal
strife.
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- But the forecast, made Wednesday during a radio call-in
show, came in response to a question on whether the administration of President
George W. Bush planned to move on to Iran after achieving its goal of "regime
change" in Iraq.
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- Therefore, it appeared to suggest that the Bush administration
saw no need to resort to overt or covert military measures to topple the
regime in Tehran because it expected it to collapse under its own weight.
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- "I suspect that during my lifetime we're going to
see a change in that situation over there and that the young people and
the women and the people who believe in freedom will overthrow that cleric
government and it will fall in some way of its own weight," Rumsfeld
said on "The Mike Gallagher Show."
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- The defense secretary, who turned 70 last July, called
Iran "an interesting place" controlled by "a very small
clique of clerics."
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- "And the women and the young people don't agree
with how it's being run," he insisted.
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- Iranian officials have been expressing heightened concern
that if Washington decides to invade Iraq and maintain its military presence
in Afghanistan, their country will end up sandwiched between two sizable
contingents of US troops.
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- Iranian Defense Minister Rear-Admiral Ali Shamkhani aired
these worries earlier Wednesday, when he warned Iranians to be prepared
for the possibility of a US attack.
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- "The US government wants to reorganize the region
and as a consequence Iran could constitute a target," Shamkhani said.
"If the Americans are in both Afghanistan and Iraq, this represents
a significant challenge."
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- Copyright © 2001 AFP
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