The latest announcement from Tehran should command the immediate attention of the American national security establishment. Fars News Agency, one of the Islamic Republic’s principal state-aligned media outlets, has announced the launch of an intelligence and surveillance system called “Alaj,” whose declared purpose is to identify and track Iranians abroad who Tehran considers to be acting against the regime’s interests and national security.
The announcement should not be dismissed as another exercise in intimidation. When a regime with a long record of extraterritorial terrorism openly establishes a mechanism for identifying, monitoring, and pursuing its adversaries beyond its borders, Washington must ask a more urgent question: Does Iran have sleeper cells on U.S. soil, and are existing networks being prepared for a more dangerous mission?
This question becomes considerably more serious when the announcement is viewed against the broader architecture of Iranian intelligence activity in America. For decades, the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Ministry of Intelligence and Security (MOIS), and the Guard’s Intelligence Organization have developed methods for reaching adversaries far beyond Iran’s borders. Their operations do not necessarily depend upon easily identifiable intelligence officers. They can operate through intermediaries, recruited individuals, criminal networks, sympathizers, cultural institutions, religious organizations, and apparently legitimate civilian relationships. The United States cannot afford to assume that an Iranian sleeper network would resemble the clandestine cells of a Cold War spy novel. The greater danger is a multilayered ecosystem in which different actors perform different functions, sometimes without knowing the purpose of the larger structure.
A second layer that requires counterintelligence attention comprises charities, religious centers, mosques, cultural associations, and other institutions receiving financial, ideological, or organizational support from entities connected to the Islamic Republic. The issue is not religion or ethnicity, nor the legitimate activities of Iranian-Americans or American Muslims, whose constitutional freedoms must be protected. The question is whether a hostile foreign government can exploit the openness of American society to cultivate relationships, identify targets, move resources, or establish networks capable of serving its strategic objectives. Religious liberty is an American principle; using religion as camouflage for the interests of a foreign intelligence apparatus is something entirely different.
A third layer is the constellation of lobbying, advocacy, and influence networks that have, directly or indirectly, advanced positions favorable to Tehran inside the United States. Their activities deserve scrutiny when political advocacy overlaps with foreign influence, organized propaganda, or coordinated efforts to shape American policy. Demonstrations on American university campuses under the banner of defending Palestine have, at times, created environments in which Hamas and Hezbollah are defended or glorified. Such networks can also provide opportunities for political mobilization, recruitment, and relationships extending beyond a single demonstration. The same concern applies to efforts to influence American elections and political discourse. Tehran understands that shaping narratives, cultivating political contacts, and exploiting divisions within American society may sometimes accomplish more than an act of terrorism.
The fourth layer is the media ecosystem. Persian-language broadcasting in the United States should not be exempt from scrutiny merely because it operates under the banner of journalism. Voice of America, financed by American taxpayers, and Channel One TV in Los Angeles are among the outlets whose editorial conduct deserves examination when their programming functions as an echo chamber for narratives favorable to the Islamic Republic. This is not an assertion that every journalist or employee is an Iranian operative. It is recognition that information warfare is itself a component of national security and that Tehran, with its extensive experience in propaganda and psychological operations, naturally seeks influence within the information environment of its principal adversary.
The fifth layer lies within academia. Individuals introduced to American audiences as professors, researchers, scholars, or Iran experts can gain access to policymakers, journalists, students, think tanks, and institutions that shape political debate. Academic freedom must remain protected, but an academic title cannot provide immunity from legitimate counterintelligence scrutiny when evidence indicates relationships with a hostile foreign power. Tehran understands the strategic value of American universities. Today’s student may become tomorrow’s diplomat, intelligence analyst, journalist, congressional adviser, or government official. Influence cultivated in academia can therefore yield political dividends for decades.
The sixth layer is more diffuse: individuals connected to Tehran through political, commercial, ideological, religious, media, or social covers who can participate in domestic networking when circumstances require it. Intelligence services rarely construct networks by publicly identifying their members. They cultivate relationships, compartmentalize responsibilities, exploit vulnerabilities, and preserve apparently innocuous connections until they become useful. Someone who today appears merely to be an activist, intermediary, propagandist, fundraiser, or community figure could tomorrow be approached for information, surveillance, logistics, access, or introductions. Not everyone sympathetic to Tehran is an intelligence operative, and political speech is constitutionally protected. But constitutional tolerance must never become counterintelligence blindness.
The seventh and most dangerous layer is the possibility that elements within this ecosystem could be assembled or activated for an operational mission. This is precisely why “Alaj” deserves attention. Target identification is often the beginning of intelligence work. Who are Tehran’s most influential opponents in America? Where do they live? What are their routines? Who attends their meetings? Who surrounds them? Who can approach them without generating suspicion? When a regime publicly announces a mechanism intended to identify and monitor opponents abroad while possessing intelligence organizations experienced in operating beyond its borders, American authorities should not wait for violence before asking whether the components of an operational network were already visible.
The FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Forces, the Secret Service, the Department of Homeland Security, and the various components of America’s counterterrorism and counterintelligence architecture should examine these seven layers as parts of the same onion. Each may appear disconnected when viewed separately — their significance emerges when the architecture is examined as a whole. Protecting American national security is not an excuse for violating civil liberties. It is essential to protect the rule of law, democracy, constitutional freedom, and the values of an open society. Counterintelligence should not criminalize opinions, religions, ethnicities, or lawful political activity — its responsibility is to prevent a hostile foreign regime from exploiting those freedoms against the country that guarantees them.
America is dealing with a ruthless adversary, yet Washington has repeatedly been slow to understand the ideological character of radical Islamism and Islamist terrorism. More than two decades have passed since Iran was placed within the “axis of evil,” yet Washington still lacks the sustained political will necessary to confront a wounded, failing, but dangerous religious dictatorship in Tehran. American policy has too often resembled a yo-yo: pressure followed by accommodation, confrontation by hesitation, isolation by relief. Just when the regime appears to be suffocating under the consequences of its own behavior, Washington gives it another oxygen capsule. Such inconsistency does not destroy this malignant tumor of the 21st century; it prolongs its life and gives it further opportunities to reorganize, infiltrate, threaten, and strike.
Whatever Washington ultimately decides about the future of the Islamic Republic, there can be no excuse for complacency inside the United States. If Tehran is openly constructing mechanisms for identifying opponents abroad while the Quds Force, MOIS, Guard Intelligence, influence networks, religious and cultural institutions, media platforms, academic relationships, and other intermediaries provide potential layers through which information and operations can move, the possibility of Iranian sleeper cells on U.S. soil cannot be treated as an abstract scenario. America should not wait for an assassination, terrorist operation, or other act of violence and then commission another investigation into the warning signs that were missed.
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The warning signs are visible now, but suspicion alone is not intelligence. The task for the FBI, its Joint Terrorism Task Forces, DHS, and the wider U.S. counterintelligence community is to connect seven critical indicators: foreign direction — whether a demonstrable link leads to the Quds Force, MOIS, Guard Intelligence, or a known operative; mission — whether individuals have been tasked with target identification, surveillance, financing, covert propaganda, money transfers, or violence; capability — whether they possess the means to execute that mission; intent — whether evidence demonstrates preparation for illegal or violent action; organization — whether identifiable roles, command relationships, secure communications, or division of labor exist; support — whether money, equipment, fraudulent documents, suspicious travel, or criminal intermediaries sustain the network; and target selection — whether specific individuals have been surveilled and their homes, movements, routines, or vulnerabilities systematically mapped.
Finding one indicator may prove little. Finding several converging around the same network could reveal something entirely different: not political activism, not protected speech, but the architecture of a foreign-directed operation on American soil. America must identify that architecture before Tehran decides to activate it.
Erfan Fard is a counterterrorism analyst and Middle East studies researcher based in Washington, with a particular focus on Iran, Islamic terrorism, and ethnic conflicts in the region.