American military officials in Baghdad offered evidence to what they believe shows Iran is arming Shia militias in Iraq with a deadly IED filled with “molten balls of copper that cut through armor.”

After nearly two weeks of delays and last-minute modifications, three senior American officers in Baghdad yesterday presented a roomful of reporters with slides, old ordnance, and a briefing that accused the Iranian regime of culpability in the deaths of 170 soldiers.

The main culprit in the killings were 10-inch-long, 6-inch-wide pipes known as explosive formed projectiles, a roadside bomb capable of piercing the armor of America’s Abrams tanks, according to the Associated Press. (source)

Clearly the presentation was not hastily pulled together, but that didn’t stop the New York Times from re-writing the initial article on the subject matter to one that comes up with theories such as the inference of the Iranian government’s intentional involvement might be “suspicious that the Bush administration is trying to find a scapegoat for its problems in Iraq” or could lay the ground work for war with Iran. Hey, since we’re simply shooting from the hip here, the inference also might suggest a sub-human race of soil dwellers control copper balls and many live below Baghdad.

What’s interesting about the Times piece is that usually when you include a theory in a news article, you back that theory up with a quote from someone or at least attribute that thought to someone. Neither appear in the Times article. Take what you will about that one.

According to intelligence officials interviewed by The New York Sun over the last month, the trail leading to Iran began after military investigations of individual soldier deaths in 2005 turned up a pattern of the new roadside bombs and noted that their sophisticated design and deadly effect appeared to come from specialized equipment. From those investigations, the Treasury Department began tracking the serial numbers on the exploded bombs to a set of factories in Iran. As more of the investigations into the roadside deaths came in, “a pattern emerged back to Iran,” an American intelligence analyst said.

But the issue was not settled in the intelligence community until late December, after the interrogation of senior Iranian members of the Quds Force, some of whom were captured in the compound of the Shiite Iraqi leader Abdel-Aziz al-Hakim. The Associated Press quoted a senior official in yesterday’s briefing as saying most of the roadside bombs were made in 2006. The wire service also said Iranians captured in January at the Kurdish city of Erbil “were caught trying to flush documents down the toilet. … They had also tried to change their appearance by shaving their heads. Bags of their hair were found during the raid.”

And indeed there was to be a press conference where senior American officials were to show the connections between Iran and the insurgency in Iraq a couple of weeks ago, but it was canceled at the behest of Secretary of Defense Robert Gates who wanted to make sure the evidence stacks up. It is therefore solid evidence tying Iran to the IEDs, but the link between the Iranian government and the IEDs is a bit more foggy at this point in time.

Bill Gertz reports the briefing yesterday also included other devices than just IEDs, including shoulder fired rockets capable of taking down helicopters. That particular weapon is of great concern since there has been a rash of helicopter crashes in recent weeks. To further complicate matters, if Iran supplied the rockets to shoot down those helicopters, Iran is not just helping Shia militias but also Al Qaida in Iraq.

ABC News’ Diane Sawyer is in Tehran to interview Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Ahmadinejad “skirted questions about weapons smuggling” and instead offered:

We shy away from any kind of conflict and any kind of bloodshed, and we will be sad by such. We are opposed to any kind of conflict and as we have said repeatedly we think the world problem can be solved through dialogue, the use of logic and a sense of friendship. There is no need for the use of force . . .

And our position for Iraq is very clear: We are asking for peace, we are asking for security, and we will be sad to see people get killed, no matter who they are. It could be Iraqis. We will be sad if we hear they are killed or anyone who is brought there by force and is put in the middle of the conflict.

The bullshit meter is nearly overworked here.

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