Dangerous distances / Why didn't people come to the front?

Jafar Shir Alinia

1987 July 28, a few days after the approval of Resolution 598 in the UN Security Council, Khomeini said about the whispers of the end of the war: "Now that we have reached the border of absolute victory and are taking our last steps, the unfamiliar voice of pacifism is also coming from the mouths of oppressors and warmongers. It is heard."
And he said that fighting until the departure of Saddam and the Baath Party and reaching the right and just conditions is "a religious duty and a divine obligation that we will never violate."
And he emphasized: "Today, without a doubt, the fate of all Islamic nations and countries is tied to our fate in the war." And "the fever of war in our country will not subside until the fall of Saddam and, God willing, there is not much distance left until this goal is reached." (Sahifah, vol. 20, pp. 325 to 333)

The works published in the IRGC about this period not only show Iran on the verge of absolute victory but also narrate the deadlock of the war on the southern front.

Sardar Drodian, one of the leading analysts of the history of the IRGC war, writes about the period after Karbala 5, from the words of the IRGC commander: "A significant part of the IRGC's strength was grounded by deployment in Faw, Majnoon, and Shalamcheh areas."
Drodian continues: "The country's strategy for mobilizing facilities failed. We reached a deadlock in the southern region and the possibility of surprising the enemy disappeared." (Iran-Iraq War, topics and issues, p. 212)

The book "War Diary" of the IRGC has recorded many evidences of the chaotic situation of the Iranian front in 1966, one of which is the report of the meetings of IRGC commanders with Hashemi in December 1987; where Ahmad Kazemi said that his battalion does not have a deputy. He said that when a group of 22 people, their commander is martyred, there is no one to collect the group.

When the commanders told about the problems, Hashemi also said about the country's empty coffers and that: "In the city, we see people lining up in front of the banks. They want to get money from the bank, but there is no money. In such a situation, we gave 5 billion tomans from the treasury to the IRGC to solve the problems of the units.
The narrator of the IRGC political office who was in the meeting wrote a note titled "Commanders' fatigue!" "Severe lack of personnel" in which it is written: "All were martyred, only a few generals remained from the companions of the first year of the war, the rest are the second and third generation of war commanders." And he narrated that Morteza Ghorbani, one of the brave commanders of the first generation, said to Mohsen Rezaei in a corner of the trench: "Isn't it possible for Aqamah Hassan to rest and rebuild the 25th army of Karbala for a while? Another one will come?" God knows we are tired" (Jang Journal, Revolutionary Guard War Studies Center, Vol. 52, pp. 357-360)

At this point, there are many reports of the strange strengthening of Saddam's army. Indeed, which reports had led the Imam to such perceptions of the situation of the insider and the enemy?
At the end of 1987, the range of Iraqi missiles reached Tehran and the rain of rockets in the capital made the situation difficult. On March 2, Khomeini said that the situation of the Iranian nation is unprecedented throughout history, and he said that the rain of missiles does not scare the martyrdom-seeking people of Iran, and he pointed out that during the time of the Prophet and Imam Ali, people were divided about going to war, but today in Iran, people are willing to go to war. He talked about families who are ready to send their other children to the front despite the martyrdom of their children. (Sahifah, vol. 20, p. 496)

A few days later, Iran captured ten Iraqi Halabjas in the Wal-Fajr operation. At the end of his congratulatory message, Khomeini asked the people and the "zealous youth of the country" to go to the fronts.

In his book, Hossein Alaei, the commander of the IRGC Navy at the time, wrote about the weakening of people's acceptance to join the front in late 1987, and the "decrease in the desire of the Basijians to join the front" reduced Iran's offensive power. He wrote that before the fall of Faw (April 17, 1988); "By mobilizing all facilities and carrying out extensive propaganda, only 16 thousand people went to the front, of which "only 3 thousand people were new and the rest were redeployed volunteers" (Analytical History of the Iran-Iraq War, Vol. 2, p. 416).

With successive failures, a few months later (July 18, 1988), Iran accepted Resolution 598 a year after its approval. In the letter Imam wrote to justify the officials for accepting the resolution, one of the points was: "Political officials say that since the people have realized that a quick victory will not be achieved, their desire to go to the front has decreased."

Did the people in the last years of the war see the evaluations of the Imam as consistent with the reality of their lives and the front?
The gap between the opinion of the leaders and the perception of the people, regardless of which is more realistic, is worrying and alarming.