After Britain Blames the IRGC for Air Base Incident, Iran Faces 'False Flag' Operation

Iran Accused of Plotting Against Air Base in Britain

Tehran, Iran – Iran's Foreign Ministry has condemned the attribution of an alleged British plot near a military air base in the town of Fairford to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), which it sees as part of a wider Western effort.

British Prime Minister Andy Burnham told parliament on Monday that last month's suspected plot against a Royal Air Force base was "most likely coordinated in Iran" and "almost certainly directed by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps."

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The end of Burnham's list promised action against what he described as "criminal networks" linked to Iran and their financing networks.

Britain has sanctioned two Iranian nationals for alleged "hostile activity" at RAF Fairford in southern England.

It follows an incident around the base, which hosts US military aircraft, in the early hours of September 27, when five British men in their 20s were arrested on suspicion of "terrorism" and explosives offences. These people were not charged and released on police bail. Two other men were also arrested and later released.

Information about a suspected security threat to RAF Fairford and the events are unclear.

In a statement late on Monday, the ministry described British claims about Iran's role as an "ugly conspiracy" that also served to "evade accountability for Britain's involvement" in the ongoing war against Iran on February 28.

The statement said Britain had failed to provide sufficient evidence to support its claims and dismissed allegations of Iranian involvement as a "clumsy false flag operation".

"The UK's track record of falsifying security claims against other countries, which in some cases has led to destructive tensions and conflicts in West Asia, is well known," the ministry said, without elaborating.

British Home Secretary Shabana Mahmoud said investigators assessed the coordinator as someone known to Iran, although she did not name the person or reveal his connections, financial records or other information.

RAF Fairford is a prominent base for US aircraft involved in the war against Iran, which began on February 28 after US-Israeli strikes killed several Iranian leaders and officials, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

After news of the incident, the United States withdrew about 12 B-1 bombers from Fairford Air Force Base.

US media, citing unnamed sources, claimed that there was information indicating that the bombers could be exposed to small drone attacks.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly claimed in early October that his government had warned Britain about the plot.

Netanyahu criticized Britain's actions in response to the illegal expansion of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank amid diplomatic disputes.

Earlier this month, Tehran grouped the Fairford incident with allegations of an attack on the cockpit of a FlyDubai plane - which UAE officials claimed was a "suicide" mission to crash the plane at Israel's Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv.

"I think even a student realized how amateurishly it was designed," Foreign Ministry spokesman Ismail Beqaei said of the plane crash.

He also argued that such incidents are fabricated to blame and justify the war that public dissidents face in the United States and elsewhere.

Ambassador Arjan, the official website of the Iranian government, argued in an analysis last week that the West's vote in the International Atomic Energy Agency's Board of Governors to refer Iran's nuclear program to the United Nations Security Council could be classified as another attempt to pressure Iran to submit to US demands.

The statement said that increasing reports in recent weeks that attribute the main role and responsibility to Tehran for the Houthis' significant advances in Yemen point to "a plan to identify Iran as the main cause of insecurity" on the regional and global stage.

"The series of recent suspicious events that the president and senior officials of the United States have attributed to Iran without providing any evidence appear. It is a coordinated wave to smear Iran."

But the British authorities have taken measures against Iran in response to the Fairford incident.

Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband summoned Iran's ambassador and sanctioned one known to be the IRGC's counterintelligence chief and another as a facilitator of a criminal network. These measures included asset freezes and travel bans. But the two men named were not explicitly identified as Fairford's organizers.

The British government designated the IRGC as a "terrorist" organization in July.

On Friday, the UK was among 32 countries, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany and the US, which "strongly condemned Iran's use of violent attacks, including lethal measures, arson, sabotage, cyber attacks and other combined activities against us and our partners".

We recognize the UK's attribution of Iran's involvement in the RAF Fairford incident on 27 September. The UK has also concluded that this incident demonstrates the IRGC's continued willingness to project hostile activities beyond its borders through clandestine networks and proxy actors.