U.S. again links Iran to bombs

BAGHDAD, Iraq – In the latest attempt to link the deadliest form of roadside bombs in Iraq to components manufactured in Iran, U.S. Army officers Monday displayed plastic explosives they said were made in Iran and recovered during a raid Saturday in violence-racked Diyala Province.

An Army explosives expert said the C-4 plastic explosives were used to make lethal bombs which the military calls EFPs – explosively formed projectiles. The explosives were found alongside enough bomb-making materials to build 150 EFPs, according to the expert, Maj. Martin Weber.

Mortars and rockets found in the same cache also were manufactured in Iran, Weber said. The cache included 150 machine-milled copper plates that form a shaped, concave lid on the projectile. When the weapons explode, those lids form balls of molten metal that can punch through the armor on vehicles.

The cache was believed to be the first EFP manufacturing site found inside Iraq, officers said. They had previously assumed that most EFPs were assembled outside the country and brought in nearly whole.

Officers said they did not know where the copper plates were manufactured, or by whom. They also said they could not prove who supplied the materials or who was building the EFPs.

The briefing was the third in two weeks in which U.S. military officials set forth evidence that they said showed Iran’s hand in Iraq’s violence. In contrast with previous sessions, officers at Monday’s display were careful not to accuse the Iranian government of involvement. U.S. officials have had to backtrack from previous assertions of direct involvement by Iran’s top government officials.

“I don’t think there’s any way for us to know if it’s tied to any government,” said Maj. Jeremy Siegrist, executive officer for the unit that recovered the materials.

EFPs have killed at least 170 U.S. troops, according to U.S. officials. So far, 3,156 U.S. troops have died in the war.

The Bush administration is mounting a campaign to isolate and discredit Iran over its nuclear program and its role inside Iraq. It has accused the Al Quds Brigade, a unit of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, of supporting Shiite attacks against U.S. forces in Iraq.