The top Iranian general in Syria has contradicted the official line taken by Iranian leaders on the sudden fall of their ally Bashar al-Assad, saying in a remarkably frank speech last week that Iran had suffered a major defeat but he would still try to operate in Syria. the country.
An audio recording of the speech given last week by Brig. Gen. Behrouz Esbati at a Tehran mosque, publicly surfaced in Iranian media on Monday, stood in stark contrast to remarks by Iran’s president, foreign minister and other senior Iranian leaders. They have for weeks downplayed the scale of Iran’s strategic loss in Syria last month, when rebels ousted Mr. al-Assad from power, and said Iran would respect any political outcome decided by the Syrian people.
“I do not consider losing Syria to be a reason that I can be proud of,” General Esbati said according to the audio recording of his speech, which Abdi Media, a Geneva-based news site focused on Iran, published Monday. “We were defeated, and very badly, we took a very big blow and it was very difficult.”
General Esbati revealed that Iran’s relations with Mr al-Assad had been strained for months leading to his ouster, saying the Syrian leader had rejected several requests to Iran-backed militias to open a front against Israel from Syria, in the aftermath of the war. Attack carried out by Hamas on October 7, 2023.
Iran presented Mr. al-Assad with comprehensive military plans for how it could use its military resources in Syria to attack Israel, he said.
The general also accused Russia, considered a key ally, of misleading Iran by telling it that Russian planes were bombing Syrian rebels when in reality they were dropping bombs on open fields . He also said that over the past year, as Israel struck Iranian targets in Syria, Russia had “turned off the radars,” making these attacks easier.
For more than a decade, Iran has supported Mr. al-Assad by sending commanders and troops to help him fight opposition rebels and the Islamic State terrorist group.
Under Mr. al-Assad, Syria was Iran’s regional command center from which it supplied weapons and money to its network of regional militias, including Hezbollah in Lebanon and Palestinian militants in the West Bank. Iran also controlled airports, warehouses and operated missile and drone manufacturing bases in Syria.
The rebel coalition has now taken control of much of Syria and is trying to form a government. Gen. Esbati said in his speech that Iran would look for ways to recruit insurgents, whatever form the new Syria takes.
“We can activate all the networks that we have worked with over the years,” he said. “We can activate the social strata our guys have lived in for years; we can be active on social networks and form resistance cells.
He added: “We can now operate there as we do on other international stages, and we have already started. »
The general’s comments stunned Iranians, both with their unfiltered content and the speaker’s stature. He is a top commander of the Iranian Armed Forces, the umbrella organization for the military and the Revolutionary Guard Corps, with a track record of important roles, including commander-in-chief of the armed forces’ cyber division.
In Syria, he oversaw Iranian military operations and coordinated closely with Syrian ministers and defense officials as well as Russian generals – even going beyond the commander in chief of the Quds Force, General Ismail Ghaani, who oversees the network of regional militias supported by Iran.
Mehdi Rahmati, a prominent analyst in Tehran and an expert on Syria, said in a telephone interview that Gen. Esbati’s speech was significant because it showed that some top officials were separating themselves from government propaganda and leveling with the public .
“Everyone talks about this speech in meetings and wonders why he said these things, especially in a public forum,” Mr. Rahmati said. “He laid out very clearly what happened to Iran and where it is today. In a way, this can be a warning for domestic politics.”
General Esbati said the fall of the Assad regime was inevitable given the widespread corruption, political oppression and economic hardship the population faced due to lack of energy to feed themselves and obtain sufficient income. He said Mr al-Assad had ignored warnings for reform. Mr. Rahmati, the analyst, said the comparison with Iran’s current situation was hard to miss.
Despite the general’s claims about activating the networks, it remains unclear exactly what Iran can realistically do in Syria, given the public and political opposition it faces in the country and the land and air access challenges. Israel has warned it will decimate any Iranian efforts detected on the ground in Syria.
And although Iran has experience operating in Iraq after the US invasion in 2003 – including stirring up trouble – Syria’s geography and political landscape differ significantly, presenting more challenges.
An Iranian member of the Revolutionary Guards who spent years in Iraq as a military strategist alongside top commanders said in a telephone interview that General Esbati’s comments on Iran’s recruitment of insurgents could be more ambitious than practical at this stage. He added that although Gen. Esbati acknowledged a serious defeat, he also sought to boost morale and appease conservatives who were demanding that Iran act more forcefully.
The Guards official, who asked that his name not be used because he was discussing sensitive issues, said Iran policy was not yet finalized but that consensus had emerged in meetings he attended. had attended and where the strategy was debated. He said Iran would benefit if Syria descended into chaos because Iran knew how to prosper and secure its interests in a turbulent landscape.
In Iran, the Revolutionary Guards have the power to set regional policy and bypass the Foreign Ministry.
Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final say on key state issues, has said in at least two speeches since Mr al-Assad’s fall that resistance was not dead in Syria , adding that Syrian youth would take back their country from the ruling rebels. , whom he described as stooges of Israel and the United States. President Masoud Pezeshkian and Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi were more conciliatory, saying they favored stability in Syria and diplomatic relations with the new government.
Tensions surrounding these divergent views on Syria have concerned policymakers enough that they embarked on a public damage control campaign last week. Top military commanders and experts close to the government gave speeches and held question-and-answer sessions with the public at mosques and community centers in several cities.
General Esbati’s speech, delivered on December 31 at the Valiasr Mosque in central Tehran, was addressed to the military and members of the mosque, according to a public notice of the event, titled “Answering Questions About collapse of Syria.
The session began when Gen. Esbati told the crowd that he left Syria on the last military plane to Tehran the night before Damascus fell to rebels. It ended with him answering questions from audience members. He offered his most sober assessment of Iran’s military capacity to fight Israel and the United States.
Asked whether Iran would retaliate for Israel’s killing of longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, he said Iran had already done so, referring to a barrage of missiles in the fall last. Asked if Iran planned to carry out a third round of direct strikes against Israel, he said “the situation” does not realistically allow for another attack on Israel to be handled at this time.
When asked why Iran would not fire missiles at US military bases in the region, he said that would result in greater retaliation against Iran and its allies from the US, adding that Iran’s regular missiles – not advanced missiles – would not be able to penetrate America’s forward defense. systems.
Despite these assessments, Gen. Esbati said he wanted to assure everyone not to worry: Iran and its allies, he said, still had the upper hand on the ground in the region.
