Iran Vows Quick Revenge for U.S. Attack

Iran charged Tuesday that the United States caused $500 million worth of damage during the attack on one of its offshore oil platforms and threatened to retaliate in the next few days.

“God willing, we will carry out our duty in the coming days and make them sorry,” the Speaker of Iran’s Parliament, Hashemi Rafsanjani, said in a speech broadcast by Tehran radio.

Rafsanjani, who is Iran’s chief spokesman on the war, joined a growing chorus of Iranian public figures who demanded revenge for the American attack Monday, despite the hope expressed in Washington that the attacks would not escalate.

“It is not a threat nor an attempt at intimidation when we say we will respond to intimidation,” Rafsanjani said.

Platform Ablaze

The country’s oil minister, Gholamreza Aghazadeh, told reporters in Tehran that the oil platform in the Persian Gulf that was attacked by the United States on Monday was still burning out of control 24 hours later.

Gulf shipping executives said that commercial traffic in the waterway appeared normal. U.S. military sources said three of the destroyers, brought into the gulf for the attack, had sailed back out through the narrow Strait of Hormuz to rejoin their battle groups in the Arabian Sea.

Aghazadeh said two crewmen were seriously injured in the attack and added that a preliminary estimate of the damage was $500 million. He vowed that Iran would file a complaint alleging aggression with international bodies.

In Washington, Pentagon spokesman Fred Hoffman denied that any Iranians were injured. The Pentagon said Monday that the platform crew had been given 20 to 30 minutes to abandon the platform before the attack began.

Captain Was Blinded

The United States said it was retaliating for an Iranian missile attack last week against a U.S.-registered Kuwaiti tanker near Kuwait’s main oil terminal. The missile attack blinded the American captain of the Sea Isle City and wounded 17 members of the crew.

Four U.S. Navy destroyers pounded the two sections of one oil platform with 1,000 five-inch shells, finishing off the job of destruction with demolition teams. Later, Navy commandos boarded a another nearby platform that had been abandoned by its Iranian crew and blew up radar and communications equipment they found there, according to the Pentagon.

Aghazadeh denied that the platform had been used as a military command post to launch gunboat attacks against merchant shipping as Defense Secretary Caspar W. Weinberger asserted. He said the only weapons installed on the platforms were machine guns.

Reaction to the American strike, the third clash with Iran in less than a month, was muted among Arab states in the gulf.

“Maybe it won’t end the gulf war, but it could help avoid a real disaster,” said Bahrain’s minister of information, Tarik Moayyid. “I don’t think it looks like an escalation.”

A government spokesman in Kuwait expressed approval of the U.S. move, describing it as only a limited military response.

Warnings Noted

“Kuwait and the international community have warned Iran of the outcome of its aggressive practices in the gulf,” the spokesman said. “The limited military step came as an answer to Iran’s continuation of these practices.”

The English-language newspaper Kuwait Times, whose content is carefully controlled by the government, said the U.S. raid “only looks like a benign reprisal.”

Editorials in government-guided newspapers in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates reflected clear support for the U.S. action, but the governments themselves remained silent. Commentators in Qatar and Oman took a more cautious attitude.

Speaking privately, Arab officials expressed surprise at the U.S. choice of targets, saying that they wish the United States had sought a larger military target instead of hitting an oil drilling platform with a limited military role. The apparent fear is that Iran will now be emboldened to attack oil platforms in the gulf belonging to Arab states. There are dozens belonging to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates sprinkled through the gulf.

“To strike an oil rig is not an achievement to boast of,” said Iranian President Ali Khamenei.

Until now, Iran has attempted to bring pressure to bear on its long-time adversaries in Iraq by striking at Kuwait’s oil exports. Kuwait has provided substantial financial assistance to the regime in Baghdad.

12th Convoy Under Way

In previous incidents with the Iranians, the United States had appeared to inflict a direct reprisal. On Sept. 21, it captured an Iranian ship laying mines north of Bahrain and two weeks later disabled three gunboats after they had reportedly fired on an American observation helicopter.

Meanwhile, the 12th U.S.-escorted convoy set out, moving south from Kuwait on the 550-mile voyage out of the gulf. It consists of two reflagged Kuwaiti tankers--the 80,000-ton Ocean City and the 46,000-ton Gas King--and the guided-missile frigate Ford, the Pentagon said.