Military news

Division Overview The 58th 'Zulfiqar' Commando Division is based in the Semnan province, east of Tehran. Like other divisions, it is transitioning to the NEZAJA's new force-structure of independent combat brigades subordinate to regional operations headquarters. (1) Two of the division's newly-independent brigades can be identified: the 158th in Shahrud, and the 258th 45 km north-east of Shahrud. One can assume that a third brigade exists, though no reference to it in open-source literature has been found. The function of the remaining divisional-HQ under the new organization is unclear, but – as per the pattern established in other divisions – it is reasonable to believe it persists, at least as a transitory body. As of April 2013, the division's commander is Brigadier General 2nd-Class Mehboob Qurbani and the deputy commander is BG 2nd-Class Reza Yusef-Zadeh (2) (3) 158th Brigade The 158th 'Shahid Abbasali Keshavarzian' Independent Commando Brigade (ICB) ...

The Sepah's 8th 'Najaf Ashraf' Armored Division is based near the town of Najafabad, west of the greater-Isfahan urban area. Along with the 14th Division, and the 15th and 40th artillery groups, it is subordinate to the Sepah's Seyyed al-Shohada operational-HQ in Isfahan. (1) Wikimapia annotations suggest the division's garrison is named 'Ashura', though this cannot be independently verified. It's current commander is unknown. This unit has contributed to the Sepah's mission in Syria, advising pro-government forces in armored warfare tactics. (2) At least two of the division's soldiers have been killed during these operations. (3) There is currently no evidence to suggest that the division deploys its constituent brigades in separate garrisons in the same manner as the Army. This may be a function of the rule-of-thumb that Sepah divisions are closer in size to brigade's rather than a true division. Based on garrison configuration described ...

On 'Navy Day 2013', the IRIN commander - Admiral Sayyari - noted that the service was continuing to develop their infrastructure along the country's south-eastern coast, including the expansion of ports at Sirik, Jask, Kuhestak, Konarak, and Pasabandar. [1] Although the current IRIN construction is absent from currently available IMINT, one of these locations - Kuhestak - is already host to a legacy ASCM battery dating from height of the Tanker War. In the mid/late-1980s, attacks on commercial shipping in the Persian Gulf began to heat up, first as Iraq sought to slow Iran's ground offensives, and then as Iran sought to retaliate in kind. For their part, Tehran found themselves relying on lightweight air and surface-launched weapons that limited their ability to project power. To remedy this, Tehran attempted to procure more potent weapons like the HY-2 anti-ship cruise missile (ASCM). The first examples were captured from Iraqi positions on the Faw peninsula in Februar...