Temperature Rising: Iran Revolutionary Guards and Wars in the Middle East

by Nader Uskowi

Iran is a country at war – in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. The founder of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Khomeini, always told audiences that the revolution was not about Iran, but the whole region. To establish an arc of Shia influence across the Middle East, the Islamic Republic created the Quds Force, the extraterritorial branch of its Revolutionary Guards. Hundreds of thousands of Shia youths were recruited, trained, armed, and organized in militia groups across the region. The book tells the story of how the Quds Force and its Shia militias fought on the three fronts to advance the Islamic Republic’s militant interpretation of Shia Islam and create a contiguous land corridor linking Iran through Iraq to Syria, Lebanon, and the Israeli northern fronts. The Iran-led operations are creating enormous political and security challenges for the Sunni Arabs and all regional powers, creating further instabilities in an already turbulent Middle East, with specters of direct military conflicts looming, pitting Iran against the Arab states and Israel.

Genres: Middle East, Iran, War

240 pages, Hardcover

First published December 15, 2018

Reviews

[Barry Sierer · Rating 4 out of 5]

A useful primer on how the Quds Force structures itself and operates to carry out Iran’s proxy wars. Its particularly relevant now.

[Zare · Rating 3 out of 5]

For the first time I am going to give a full break-up listing resulting in the final rating. It is very interesting and exhaustive book on history of IRGC and their secretive and deadly Quds department, but it has its ups and downs.

Book historical information: 5/5
Style: 3/5
Lack of bias/author's political views: 2/5

Above amounts to average of 3 stars. Now let me explain.

Content of the book is what makes it very unique.I have not come across a book covering IRGC let alone Quds in this amount of detail. From its creation in post-revolution Iran, involvement in combat both in areas near Iran (Iraq, Afghanistan) and in outer reaches (Syria, Lebanon/Levant and Yemen). It is very interesting to see how systematically entire thing was approached, executed with the long term goals in sight. Thing here is that Iran did not just manage to recruit sufficient number of people, but to arm them, train them and then keep the expertise available for future operations (I am very much sure that both West and Israel were aiming to destroy this core all the time). Amount of details on the organization, combat use (including weaponry, especially missiles) and available logistic chains and financial sources indicate that IRGC and Quds are very capable and deadly organizations, able to survive even under direst of circumstances. Even if one takes only 70% of details presented here as true (and my feeling is that book in entirety is definitely true) picture reader gets is one of the most resilient and heavily armed paramilitary force in the world today, capable of actions in the entire area of Levant, South Asia and Arabian peninsula.

Style of the book is something that messed up with reading tempo. Style is reminiscent of modern day documentaries - every new chapter is 40% repetition of the previously said followed by new information. Somewhere in the last third of the book, repetition goes down but nevertheless it is present. This level of repetition is not present in the educational materials, usually you get references but not direct copies of blocks of text from the previous chapters. Because of this book looks like collection of essays and reports, collected into the book as an afterthought. If author just took more time this would be more streamlined work, much easier to read.

Now we get to the author's bias. Book is dedicated to author's father, who was officer in Shah's army. Also in several places, author mentions direct meeting with Khomeini so this indicates that author is not your every day Iranian. I would even go as far as saying that author is expert on the subject and definitely part of the intelligence circles and all of that is fine. But then we get in touch with some of the statements. Saying that Sunni-Shia schism is not real and is little bit silly, especially for someone with roots in the area. Sunni-Shia schism caused creation of the infamous Assassins (Ismaili's are Shia's). To say Muslim Brotherhood is peaceful organization is also weird, especially when one looks into their ties with Afghanistan in 1980s and beyond. To speak about Saudis (following latest change in the royal family) as above militant Islamism is also very, very weird. I understand that author works for the government and needs to stick to the spiel, but so many things have been published about all of these players that author's statements seem ..... will repeat, they seem weird. Not to go into details about Shia population in Syria that was hunted down by Sunni militants (same as in Iraq) is little bit superficial. As every ethnic/religious conflict, there are atrocities on both sides, but to concentrate only on one side of conflict is pretty biased approach. Also talk how USA was not involved in Syria in combat operations - I mean, c'mon. Not only was USA and NATO involved from the beginning - Russian ships in the main ports messing things up because NATO could not execute full scale air assaults - but they, together with NATO allies provided arms and special forces on the ground tot heir Arab allies. Complexity came about when Turkey got involved around Kurdish forces - this created strains between Turkey and everyone else, Russia and NATO.
Strangely when talking about Iraq Shia recruited into Quds, author constantly says "and they went against their own country", but when he, shyly mentions MEK or Baluchistan insurgents they I guess are fighting for the "correct" side? And finally we get to the point where every western book on their antagonists fails - they are always portrayed as through eyes of schizophrenic. They are powerful and capable but actually at the brink of destruction. Situation is like this for years. For decades. For decades to come. You get what I mean?

All of this stains author's expertise, and makes book very biased. But again this is as expected. Imagine reading White Army's officer works about Bolsheviks - it would hardly be non-biased, right?

So all in all very interesting and informative book about the secretive military force and its influence, definitely single volume on the subject as far as I know. But take everything said with pinch of salt and do read about the events mentioned from other sources to get more complete picture.

Recommended to military historians and those interested in Middle East and South Asia turmoils.

[Diane · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is a study of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards, and their involvement in conflicts through the Middle East. The book brings together material on the Guards' activities in different countries, and shows how these activities are connected. This is one of the book's strengths, showing how the Iranian regime is pursuing a deliberate policy rather than a haphazard one. The author also provides some of the history of Iran's relations with various countries in the region, some of which is not widely known. While filled with interesting facts, I thought the author had a tendency to repeat himself too much from one chapter to another; the book would have benefited from a better editor.

[Macka · Rating 1 out of 5]

I hate to write a bad review here as it is a very interesting topic, but the writing here is poor. Majority of the content is repeated 3 or 4 times across chapters or even within the same chapter.
Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is insanity, and I follow the same idea when reading. I made it 3/4 of the way through and realised my time was being wasted.