Outside military analysts have questioned how many of these sorts of weapons actually come from Iran. The technology used to make them is simple and widely known in the Middle East, they note. Iran is a likely source for some of the more sophisticated devices, but other countries could also be pitching in.
"A lot of rather sophisticated weapons have actually been released by Syria," said Peter Felstead, editor of the London-based Jane's Defense Weekly.
Others note that smugglers could be bringing weapons across the border from Iran without government approval.
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'They are significant'
A second high-ranking U.S. intelligence official in Washington acknowledged that only a "small percentage" of explosions in Iraq could be linked to shaped charges coming from Iran.
"But in terms of American casualties, they are significant," he said, because they are much more lethal than standard roadside bombs.
A senior U.S. military intelligence official said coalition forces in Iraq had also found shaped charges "in the presence of Iranians captured in the country." He declined to elaborate but noted that U.S. operatives who raided an Iranian office in the Iraqi city of Irbil this month captured documents and computer drives he called a "treasure trove" on Iran's "networks, supply lines, sourcing and funding."
Five Iranians were taken into custody in the raid, prompting angry protests from the Iraqi government.
U.S. intelligence officials emphasized that Iran intentionally stops short of steps that would be seen as direct provocation and provide justification for a military response. For example, Iran has refrained from supplying Shiite militias with surface-to-air missiles and other weaponry that was part of Hezbollah's arsenal in its fight with Israel last summer, they said.
A high-ranking U.S. intelligence official called it a "careful calibration" that probably reflected disagreements within the Islamic regime. "I don't doubt that Iranian national security council meetings are very contentious," the official said.
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zavis@latimes.com
greg.miller@latimes.com
Zavis reported from Baqubah and Miller from Washington. Times staff writers Peter Spiegel in Washington and Solomon Moore in Baghdad contributed to this report.
