With the President’s decision to start a war with Iran, I thought it would be a good idea to get a book on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the military that seems to be running the Iranian Government. Fortunately, Amazon didn’t disappoint as they had a book readily available. That 2023 book was “The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps: Defining Iran’s Military Doctrine.” The book gave me an overview on the Corps’ history, military tactics, purpose, and overall impact on the region.
Now, the book itself isn’t a thorough history book or overview of the IRGC itself. Rather, it serves mostly as a literature review of other writings on the military force and a general background on them. It wasn’t super in-depth, but I enjoyed it as someone unfamiliar with the IRGC because it served as a primer for understanding them and their relation to US policy. So, I’ll be giving an overview of its contents as I’m hoping that may help others understand it and the current war as well.
To start off on its history, the IRGC was created by Iran’s former Supreme Leader, Ruhollah Khomeini, as a paramilitary organization to defend the revolution that brought him to power and ousted the Shah. Its primary focus was purging institutions, especially the military, of elements disloyal to the 1979 Iranian Revolution and enforcing edicts passed by the country's leaders. Over time though, its role greatly expanded as it ended up supplanting the country’s military, the Artesh, and controlling the country itself.
During the Iran-Iraq War, the IRGC saw its role greatly expand in defending the country against the invading forces of Saddam Hussein. Shortly after that, the death of Supreme Leader Khomeini resulted in his replacement by Ali Khamenei. According to the book, the IRGC helped with his rise to power and he, in turn, greatly expanded their power in the country.
With the IRGC serving as the institution defending Khamenei’s reign, it played a key role in keeping the government in check. Almost every President elected in the 90s up until the mid 2000s was a reformer, and the IRGC opposed every attempt at reform. It sent orders to the President, put down protests, and worked to make sure its own people were constantly in control or running the government.
Then, in 2005, it helped get hardliner and Mayor of Tehran Mahmoud Ahmadinejad elected President. Despite not being seen as an intellectual heavyweight, Ahmadinejad did continue on his predecessor’s push to privatize the country’s economy. Unfortunately, Ahmadinejad had a bunch of the government’s companies sold to people with ties to the IRGC, which was not the point of privatization. So after that, the IRGC started to control the economy and thus the country at large. The only thing worth consideration is that Ahmadinejad’s successor also attempted reform, and failed, so the history of Iran’s civilian government is to try and fail to reform what is now a military dictatorship.
Now, going back to the Iranian Revolution, the book also chronicles failures in the US to actually address Iran throughout its history. Specifically, back during the Shah’s reign, Jimmy Carter wavered in his support for the Shah which Khomeini used as justification to return to Iran and that lack of confidence led to the Shah’s overthrow. The Reagan Administration was equally inconsistent as it on one hand supported Saddam’s war with Iran, and then sold weapons to Iran to fund a war in Nicaragua.
After that, the next three US Presidents, H.W. Bush, Clinton, and W. Bush didn’t really have much of an Iran policy as they all became focused on Iraq. In the vacuum that was created by Saddam’s removal though, Iran started greatly expanding its military network into Iraq and improving economic ties with them. So the US didn’t have a consistent policy on Iran until the 2010s, and its actions greatly helped Iran expand its influence in the region.
The book then discussed Obama’s policy of negotiation with the Iranian government and the 2015 deal that was struck and Trump’s decision to withdraw. The book tended to lean more in favor of Obama’s approach, which is why it notes more flaws in Trump’s proposal like how they started building more centrifuges after the US withdrew from the deal. The withdrawal was also used by the IRGC to portray weakness by President Rouhani and justify curtailing his attempts at reform. In short, the US hasn’t had a serious approach towards Iran until 2015 and now we are in the midst of a war with them.
Of note, the book also discussed the IRGC’s approach towards war. Specifically, they support an emerging tactic known as “Hybrid War” which is still being defined. The idea is that the IRGC uses a combination of military tactics including conventional war, guerilla war, terrorism, and cyberwarfare to complete its military objectives. It also supports militias and paramilitary organizations in other countries such as Iraq and the Houthis accomplish its goals internationally. So it’s not fighting a traditional enemy as they’ll support whoever or whatever to accomplish their military objectives. As a result, a conventional war is not what’s going to take them down.
Finally, the book discusses what that means for future negotiations and handling Iran BEFORE the US’s invasion which took out Khamenei. It did have some key points such as that Iran would never abandon its missile program so the focus should instead be on addressing its nuclear program. It also notes that Islam is, ironically, becoming less of a focus for the IRGC as they become increasingly focused on controlling and maintaining the government. Similarly, they would prevent the government from doing anything without their approval which meant any actual negotiations would not be possible without their approval so they would be a key roadblock to any meaningful negotiations. A lot of this is irrelevant now that we are at war and Khamenei is dead, but there is one point that remains clear: the IRGC is the main power in the country, they have no intention of doing anything the reduces their power, and a lot of what they want is at odds with the US’s objectives in the region and the country.
I’m not posting this not to say I agree with every tenant of the book, but more to give a brief overview of it. A lot of this does explain how we got to where we are, what’s going on now, and what we can expect after the war. For that reason, I recommend giving the book a read.
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