Amir Hossein Ardebili was sentenced to five years after pleading guilty last year to violating U.S. arms-control laws.

The case underlined the growing tension between the United States and Iran as negotiations to find a settlement on Iran's contentious nuclear program appear to be foundering.

But it also suggests that the Islamic Republic has accelerated its efforts to acquire arms and upgrade its military systems to counter pre-emptive strikes threatened by Israel, which views Iran's nuclear ambitions as an existential threat.

One of the dangers of an Israeli strike is that Iran would retaliate against both the Jewish state and the United States, Israel's longtime strategic ally.

Ardebili, 36, has been a key player in Iran's largely clandestine procurement network. It has been built up since the United States imposed an arms embargo on the Islamic Republic soon after the overthrow of the pro-Western shah in early 1979.

Much of Iran's arsenal was inherited from the shah, and much of that came from the United States throughout the 1970s. This included the Vietnam-era F-4 and the more advanced F-14 aircraft, which are now largely obsolete and non-operational because of a lack of spare parts.

According to court documents, Ardebili admitted during interrogation after he was caught in an undercover sting operation by U.S. federal agents in Georgia that he "had acquired thousands of components for the government of Iran."

"By his own admission, Ardebili was assisting Iran in preparing for war with the United States," the documents state.

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency began tracking him in 2004 and found he was a big fish in the elaborate global network of front companies and agents Iran has built up over the years to acquire arms.

Ardebili was lured to Tbilisi, Georgia's capital, to meet undercover agents posing as arms dealers. He was arrested and secretly transferred to the United States in January 2008. He later admitted to 14 counts of arms trafficking.

On Dec. 7 Iran's foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, demanded the release of Ardebili and 10 other Iranians he claimed were abducted by the Americans, including a nuclear scientist and a former defense minister.

Tehran announced Monday it plans to put on trial three American backpackers caught in the Kurdish region in July and charged with espionage.

In another elaborate U.S. undercover operation, Belgian trafficker Jacques Monsieur was arrested in New York in August when he landed there en route from South America to Belgium.

Monsieur is a former intelligence agent who has been a major arms dealer for many years. He had been negotiating with undercover agents to buy J85-21 engines for Iran's U.S.-built F-5 fighters.

On Nov. 23 he pleaded guilty to conspiracy to illegally export the engines to Iran. He faces five years in prison on conviction.

In September two Dutchmen, Robert Kraaipoel and his son Neils, pleaded guilty in Washington to exporting 290 items of U.S.-made aircraft parts to Iran in violation of U.S. embargoes between 2005 and 2007.

They were allowed to return to the Netherlands until sentencing.

In April Canadian police, tipped off by U.S. authorities, arrested Toronto resident Mahmoud Yadegari on charges of trying to ship nuclear technology to Iran.

In July the freighter ANL Australia was seized in the United Arab Emirates with 10 containers loaded with North Korean arms and rocket components bound for Iran.

North Korea has been a major player in Iran's ballistic missile and nuclear programs.

On Dec. 11 security authorities in Thailand intercepted a 35-ton shipment of North Korean arms, which officials suspect was bound for Iran, aboard a Georgian-registered Ilyushin Il-76 cargo plane when it landed at Bangkok airport.

Its six crewmembers, who claimed they were hauling oil-field equipment, are in police custody. The Thais swooped on a tip from U.S. intelligence.

All told, six vessels have been seized this year carrying large, clandestine shipments of arms for either Iran or its proxies, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip, who would be ordered to attack Israel in retaliation for any assault on Iran.

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