At War on All Fronts

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Though Khomeini has forbidden public criticism of the arms deal, the explosive revelations have forced all factions in Tehran to talk and act tough. "To be perceived as nonrevolutionary in Iran is the kiss of death," says Iranian Expert Gary Sick. Almost overnight the softening face that Iran presented to the world reverted to a furious scowl. Khomeini reportedly was in his blackest mood in years as the annual Mecca pilgrimage neared. "Break the teeth of the Americans," he told the 150,000 Iranians who set out on the trip.

The war with Iraq continues to dominate Iranian policy at home and abroad. Since Baghdad started the conflict by invading Iran in September 1980, some 300,000 Iranians and 200,000 Iraqis have lost their lives in the fighting. Tehran's hopes for victory soared in January, when its troops pushed within a few miles of Basra, Iraq's second largest city. In the past few months, however, Iran has made little headway in its drive to crush Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. Indeed, the Iraqis have succeeded in reclaiming much of their lost ground.

Even the number of Iranian war victims reflects the country's political divisions. Iranian troops are split among the regular military, the fanatical Revolutionary Guards and the often ragtag volunteer corps known as the basij. During Iran's moderate phase in the mid-1980s, Tehran reduced the death toll by relying on trained professional soldiers for most of the fighting. Rafsanjani announced in 1985 that Iran intended "to achieve victory with as few casualties as possible." But last year champions of the zealous Guards gained a stronger voice in ruling circles. The Guards have scant concern for casualties and favor launching human waves against enemy positions. In a unanimous vote last month, the U.N. Security Council demanded that Iran and Iraq declare a cease-fire, and last week the U.S. pushed efforts for a resolution calling for an arms embargo on Iran.

The relentless war with Iraq is only the most visible sign of Khomeini's determination to defeat heretics. No less important are Tehran's ties with the terrorist networks of Shi'ite radicals that stand ready to do the Ayatullah's bidding. Though tactics may shift, Khomeini's ultimate goal remains the same as when he came to power in Iran in 1979: to extend Shi'ite fundamentalism over all of Islam and recover the unity and power that the Muslim world has lost since the Middle Ages. "Khomeini is a one-track fanatic," contends a senior Israeli official. "But he is very cunning, very clever and knows what he wants to do."

So far, though, Khomeini has failed to export his revolution much farther than Beirut. That is the stronghold of the Hizballah, or Party of God, terrorists who revere Khomeini. Acting under such names as the Islamic Jihad and the Revolutionary Justice Organization, the Hizballah is suspected of holding most of the 24 foreign hostages, including nine Americans and Anglican Envoy Terry Waite, who are missing in Lebanon. As the Iran-contra hearings showed, Reagan's arms sales to Iran were designed primarily to pry Americans from Hizballah's grasp. The deals apparently did secure the release of three Americans -- though four more were subsequently kidnaped -- just as French contacts with Iran appeared to win freedom for five Frenchmen last year.