Iran Meantime Back in Tehran

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The third candidate, President Khamene'i, is the only one who has remained unaffected by the U.S. affair. He has been the prime mover recently in Iran's somewhat improved relations with the Soviet Union and the resumption of natural-gas exports to Moscow. This is not likely to strengthen his chances for leadership. Since 1984, the Khomeini regime has arrested, imprisoned or executed most of the leaders of Tudeh, the Iranian Communist Party. The continued Soviet occupation of Muslim Afghanistan has intensified Iranian opposition to Moscow. Afghan refugees have poured into Iran bearing tales of Soviet brutality, and Iran has been stepping up its support of the anti-Soviet Afghan rebels.

For the moment, neither Montazeri nor Rafsanjani appears to have been irreparably damaged by the recent brush with the U.S. Some Western diplomats believe that if Khomeini were to die tomorrow, Montazeri would become the country's religious leader and rule from the holy city of Qum, while Rafsanjani would run the government. But given the range of problems that Iran faces right now, such assessments could quickly change.

The attention of the Iranian leadership was focused last week on the war with Iraq and the so-called final offensive that Iran has vowed to launch before the end of March. Two weeks ago Iranian forces attacked four Iraqi-held islands in the Shatt al Arab, the waterway that separates the southern parts of the two countries. The Iranians briefly captured the islands, but were forced to retreat after Iraq counterattacked with helicopter gunships, heavy artillery, missiles and rockets. Visiting the battlefield later, journalists saw the bodies of hundreds of Iranian soldiers on the ground or in the swampy waters to the east of the Iraqi port city of Basra. The Iraqis' claim that 32,000 Iranians were killed in the fighting was undoubtedly exaggerated. But Lieut. General Mahir Abdel Rashid of the Iraqi Third Army Corps may have accurately described the engagement as "one of the bloodiest battles we've fought in six years of war."

Iranian leaders, including Rafsanjani, vehemently denied that the attack had been the beginning of the long-awaited offensive. Iran, boasted Rafsanjani, was still "counting down for the decisive final blow." On the other hand, some Western analysts contended that the wall of defenses around Basra, Iraq's second largest city, had prevented the Iranians from achieving even the limited objective of holding onto the four islands.

Despite Baghdad's success in repelling the latest Iranian attack, President Saddam Hussein has been unable to end the conflict with Iran through either force or negotiation. Some Middle East experts wondered whether his trip to Saudi Arabia last week, an unusual move for a man who does not often venture outside his own country, was a sign of nervousness. After visiting the Islamic holy cities of Mecca and Medina, Saddam went on to al Ihsa for talks with King Fahd. The two leaders were said to have discussed the gulf war and the Islamic summit conference to be held on Jan. 26 in Kuwait.