{"id":6449,"date":"2019-04-15T14:47:26","date_gmt":"2019-04-15T11:47:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/?p=6449"},"modified":"2019-04-15T14:47:26","modified_gmt":"2019-04-15T11:47:26","slug":"the-us-designates-the-irgc-as-a-terror-group-without-a-coherent-strategy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/monitoring-and-translation\/reports\/the-us-designates-the-irgc-as-a-terror-group-without-a-coherent-strategy\/","title":{"rendered":"The US Designates the IRGC as a Terror Group Without a Coherent Strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"

When the United States declared Iran\u2019s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) a foreign terrorist organization (FTO), the decision provoked mixed reactions globally. The US President, Donald J Trump,\u00a0justified<\/a>\u00a0the decision by stating, \u201cThis unprecedented step, led by the Department of State, recognizes the reality that Iran is not only a state sponsor of terrorism, but that the IRGC actively participates in, finances, and promotes terrorism as a tool of statecraft.\u201d As a result of this decision, the IRGC becomes the world\u2019s only regular military organization to be listed as a terrorist entity by another state. Back in 2007, Washington designated the IRGC-affiliated Quds force. This latest decision is aimed at encircling the IRGC economically while the decision by the George W Bush administration was aimed at capitulating the IRGC-affiliated Quds force militarily.<\/p>\n

The White House aims to squeeze the financial pipeline for Iran\u2019s praetorian guards, thus seeking an end to its sponsorship of deadly proxy militias stretching from Afghanistan to Lebanon and beyond. Regardless of the threats posed to Europe by the IRGC, the US designation was not lauded by European capitals even though the European states maintain no military-to-military ties with Iran and have also expressed concern over Iran\u2019s ballistic missile program on several occasions.
\nIran\u2019s response was nothing but expected. Playing a victim, Iran\u2019s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali\u00a0Khamenei\u00a0stated<\/a>, \u201cIn spite of all the pressure in the past 40 years, Americans have failed to do a damn thing and their vicious move will bear no fruit.\u201d He urged unity amongst Iranians in the wake of the decision by the United States and predicted that the IRGC will \u201cgrow more popular in Iran and in the region.\u201d Devoid of any consequential impact, the Iranian government symbolically branded the US as\u00a0a state sponsor of terrorism.
\nIran\u2019s Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi was anything but diplomatic in his choice of words. While declaring the US military bases and its armed forces in the Middle East as terrorist\u00a0entities, he\u00a0vowed<\/a>\u00a0to confront them.
\nThe US administration\u2019s move is aimed at strengthening the firewall around Iran to deter foreign entities from doing business with its entities. \u00a0Since the IRGC\u2019s front companies for business are not always declared or known, the partner organizations run the risk of landing themselves in unchartered territory. Ironically, US President Trump\u2019s own organization is said to have engaged in business with an IRGC front company,\u00a0Azarpassillo<\/a>, for a Trump Tower project in Baku, Azerbaijan. The skyscraper could never be built though.
\nThe sanctions specific to the IRGC will not only help restrain it economically but also limit its bilateral and multilateral military cooperation. Iraqi and Lebanese entities and their respective armies will in particular be closely observed. Similarly, the IRGC\u2019s affiliated airlines and discreet banking channels will be securitized and penalized. The question arises as to whether the sanctions have limited the Quds force over the past 12 years? The data proves that the sanctions did not deter the Quds force as according to the\u00a0US Central Command<\/a>, some 196 US troops and combatants fell prey to the Quds force\u2019s Explosively Formed Penetrators (EFPs) between November 2005 and December 2011. Also, its Commander, Qassem Soleimani, moved freely during these 12 years and commanded Shiite militias in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon.
\nReportedly, the US Department of State, the Pentagon, and\u00a0the CIA opposed the decision to designate the IRGC as a FTO as it can risk the security of the United States\u2019 military assets as well as its personnel in the Arabian Gulf and\u00a0 the Middle East. The proxy militias<\/a> under the command of General Qassem Soleimani\u00a0are\u00a0capable of effective subversive actions in Iraq, Syria\u00a0and\u00a0Afghanistan. Various reports suggest<\/a> that preventive measures against such likely attacks are yet to be taken by the US military and intelligence assets in the Middle East. Instead of US foreign and security policy imperatives, the haste in designating an already sanctioned IRGC coincided with elections in Israel. This correlation between the United States designating the IRGC as a FTO and the Israeli elections has been definitely noticed and propagated in Iran, not only to boost hatred against the US but also to prop up public support for the IRGC. Ironically, the lackluster response to the floods which have struck Iran has not helped the Iranian government or the IRGC.
\nThe prospect of the IRGC limiting its subversive footprint in Syria, Iraq and\u00a0Afghanistan seem far from likely. Instead, Shiite extremists will be increasingly motivated to join IRGC-affiliated militias. The clerics are invoking the spirit of sacrifice in Karbala. The legal and economic punitive actions by the United States are devoid of supportive military and political countermeasures.
\nThe coercive approach to bring Iran to the negotiating table may not succeed after all. The risk of Iran explicitly abandoning the nuclear deal has become ever more real. For Washington, the possibility of internal pressure is more likely to bring down the regime than a negotiated settlement concerning Iran\u2019s nuclear program and its clandestine missile projects.
\nIn the coming weeks, the United States aspires to reduce sanctions waivers to fewer than eight nations. Iran\u2019s economic woes will worsen to unprecedented levels. However, the clerics will deem sitting down with the US as well as with other western nations for talks as humiliating. The future course of action depends on two factors: a). how the US Department of Treasury proceeds with punitive actions against IRGC-affiliated business entities and external companies that do business with them, b). if Iran\u2019s armed forces initiate any provocative actions against US military assets in the Gulf and the Middle East.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When the United States declared Iran\u2019s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) a foreign terrorist organization (FTO), the decision provoked mixed reactions globally. The US President, Donald J Trump,\u00a0justified\u00a0the decision by stating, \u201cThis unprecedented step, led by the Department of State, recognizes the reality that Iran is not only a state sponsor of terrorism, but that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":6450,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[355,1387,3027,3028,3020],"class_list":["post-6449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-reports","tag-irgc","tag-strategy","tag-terror-group","tag-the-us-designates-the-irgc-as-a-terror-group-without-a-coherent-strategy","tag-us-designates"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6449"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6449\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6451,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6449\/revisions\/6451"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6450"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rasanah-iiis.org\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}