Iranian intervention in the Syrian civil war
The Islamic Republic of Iran and the Syrian Arab Republic are close strategic allies, and Iran has provided significant support for the Syrian government in the Syrian civil war, including logistical, technical and financial support, as well as training and some combat troops. Iran sees the survival of the Syrian government as being crucial to its regional interests.[40][41][42] When the uprising developed into the Syrian Civil War, there were increasing reports of Iranian military support, and of Iranian training of the National Defence Forces both in Syria and Iran.[43] From late 2011[44] and early 2012, Iran's IRGC began sending tens of thousands of volunteers in co-ordination with the Syrian government to prevent the collapse of the Syrian Arab Army; thereby polarising the conflict along sectarian lines.[45]
Iranian security and intelligence services are advising and assisting the Syrian military in order to preserve Bashar al-Assad's hold on power.[40] Those efforts include training, technical support, and combat troops.[40][46] Estimates of the number of Iranian personnel in Syria range from hundreds to tens of thousands.[41][47][48] Lebanese Hezbollah fighters, backed by Iran's government, have taken direct combat roles since 2012.[41][49] From the summer of 2013, Iran and Hezbollah provided important battlefield support for Assad, allowing it to make advances on the opposition.[49]
In 2014, coinciding with the peace talks at Geneva II, Iran stepped up support for Syrian President Assad.[41][49] Estimates of financial assistance range from tens to hundreds of billions of dollars.[50][51][52][53][54] Tehran's objectives include attempts to Shi'ification through forced conversions, Shia missionary activities, establishment of shrines and demographic transformations by bringing in foreign Twelver Shia settlers in regime-controlled territories.[55][44]
Iranian troops and allied militias on the ground are supported by ballistic missile and air forces, including armed drones utilizing smart munitions. By October 2018, Iranian drones had launched over 700 strikes on Islamic State forces alone.[56] At the height of its intervention in 2015–18, an estimated 10,000 IRGC forces and 5,000 Iranian Army members had been deployed to Syria. As of 2018, 2000 officers of the Quds Forces command an estimated 131 military garrisons and tens of thousands of Iran-backed Shia jihadists across regime-controlled regions.[30] As of 2023, Iran maintains 55 military bases in Syria and 515 other military points, the majority in Aleppo and Deir Ezzor governorates and the Damascus suburbs; these are 70% of the foreign military sites in the country.[57]
Timeline[edit]
2011[edit]
In the civil uprising phase of the Syrian civil war, Iran was said to be providing Syria with technical support, based on Iran's capabilities developed following the 2009–2010 Iranian election protests.[42]
In April 2011 U.S. President Barack Obama and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice accused Iran of secretly aiding Assad in his efforts to quell the protests,[60] and there were reports of Syrian protesters hearing security-force members speaking Persian.[61]
The Guardian reported in May 2011 that the Iranian government was assisting the Syrian government with riot control equipment and intelligence monitoring techniques.[62] According to US journalist Geneive Abdo writing in September 2011, the Iranian government provided the Syrian government with technology to monitor e-mail, cell phones and social media. Iran developed these capabilities in the wake of the 2009 protests and spent millions of dollars establishing a "cyber army" to track down dissidents online. Iran's monitoring technology is believed to be among the most sophisticated in the world, perhaps only second to China.[42]
2012[edit]
In May 2012, in an interview with the Iranian Students News Agency which was later removed from its website, the deputy head of Iran's Quds Force said that it had provided combat troops to support Syrian military operations.[63] It was alleged by the Western media that Iran also trained fighters from Hezbollah, a Shia militant group based in Lebanon.[64] Iraq, located between Syria and Iran, was criticized by the U.S. for allowing Iran to ship military supplies to Assad over Iraqi airspace.[65]
The Economist said that Iran had, by February 2012, sent the Syrian government $9 billion to help it withstand international sanctions.[46] It has also shipped fuel to the country and sent two warships to a Syrian port in a display of power and support.[66]
In March 2012, anonymous U.S. intelligence officials claimed a spike in Iranian-supplied arms and other aid for the Syrian government. Iranian security officials also allegedly traveled to Damascus to help deliver this assistance. A second senior U.S. official said members of Iran's main intelligence service, the Ministry of Intelligence and Security, were assisting Syrian counterparts in charge of the crackdown.[67]
According to a U.N. panel in May 2012, Iran supplied the Syrian government with arms during the previous year despite a ban on weapons exports by the Islamic Republic. Turkish authorities captured crates and a truck in February 2012, including assault rifles, machine guns, explosives, detonators, 60 mm and 120 mm mortar shells as well as other items on its border. It was believed these were destined for the Syrian government. The confidential report leaked just hours after an article appeared in The Washington Post revealing how Syrian opposition fighters started to receive more, and better, weapons in an effort paid for by Persian Gulf Arab states and co-ordinated partly by the US.[68] The report investigated three large illegal shipments of Iranian weapons over the past year and stated "Iran has continued to defy the international community through illegal arms shipments. Two of these cases involved [Syria], as were the majority of cases inspected by the Panel during its previous mandate, underscoring that Syria continues to be the central party to illicit Iranian arms transfers."[69] More anonymous sources were cited by the UN in May 2012, as it claimed arms were moving both ways between Lebanon and Syria, and alleged weapons brought in from Lebanon were being used to arm the opposition.[70] The alleged spike in Iranian arms was likely a response to a looming influx of weapons and ammunition to the rebels from Gulf states that had been reported shortly before.[71]
On 24 July 2012, Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp commander Massoud Jazayeri said Iranians would not allow enemy plans to change Syria's political system to succeed.[72]
In August 2012 Leon Panetta accused Iran of setting up a pro-Government militia to fight in Syria, and chairman of the joint chiefs of staff General Martin Dempsey compared it to the Mahdi Army of Iraqi Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr. Panetta said that there was evidence that the Iranian Revolutionary Guards were attempting to "train a militia within Syria to be able to fight on behalf of the regime".[73] 48 Iranians were captured by the FSA in Damascus, and U.S. officials said that the men who were captured were "active-duty Iranian Revolutionary Guard members".[74]
In September 2012, Western intelligence officials stated that Iran had sent 150 senior members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards to preserve the Assad government, and had also sent hundreds of tons of military equipment (among them guns, rockets, and shells) to the Assad government via an air corridor that Syria and Iran jointly established. These officials believed that the intensification of Iranian support had led to increased effectiveness against the Free Syrian Army by the Assad government.[75]
According to rebel soldiers speaking in October 2012, Iranian Unmanned aerial vehicles had been used to guide Syrian military planes and gunners to bombard rebel positions. CNN reported that the UAV or drones—which the rebels refer to as "wizwayzi" were "easily visible from the ground and seen in video shot by rebel fighters".
Public opinion[edit]
The fierce insistence of Iran's ruling clerics to engage actively in the Syrian crisis is driven by a sectarian strategy which depicts the conflict as a "religious war",[119] despite the considerable doctrinal differences between the Alawites and the Twelver Shiites and the traditional Arab nationalist and secular orientation of the ruling Baathist party.. Although the Assad government has enjoyed a political alliance with ruling clerics in Iran from the time of its establishment, this alliance is not driven by any common religious/sectarian causes; the Ba'ath government in Syria does not participate in Iranian religious issues, and the Ayatollahs in Iran do not consider Assad a Shiite partner.[120]
In a March 2018 ORB International poll of 1,011 adults across all of Syria's 14 governorates, 64% of Syrians said that Iran's influence on their country was "negative only", while 32% replied Iran's influence was "positive only".[121] Various factions of the Assad regime and many Ba'ath party supporters have also demanded the withdrawal of Hezbollah and other Iran-backed Khomeinist militant groups from Syria.[122]