Iran will be closely and cautiously following the potential trajectories of Russia’s military and political involvement in Syria, especially after Russian President Vladimir Putin, on December 11, announced that a significant part of the Russian military contingent in Syria is returning home.  

The development cannot be dissociated from recent statements delivered by Iranian officials who signaled Tehran’s willingness to consolidate its military presence in Syria and Iraq in the coming period, an indication of Iran’s attempts to fill the void left by Russia’s withdrawal from Syria. Any such Iranian plan is related to Tehran’s own view of the possibility of escalation with regional and world powers opposing Iranian interference in the wider region, beyond Syria, Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen.

Multiple ٍSignals

It was not enough for Iran to try to propagandize its self-proclaimed role in the war on ISIS after the terror group recently suffered substantial losses in Syria and Iraq. Most recently, influential hard-line newspaper Kayhan Kayhan, believed to reflect the views of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, claimed that there is clamoring for statues of Qassem Soleimani, the commander of Quds Force, the commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps’ extraterritorial arm, to be installed in Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut, cities that the paper claimed he has saved from ISIS.

Additionally, Iran is perhaps seeking to escalate its military, economic and social involvement in Syria and Iraq in a bid to deal with new realities imposed by Russia’s withdrawal from Syria and the end of war against ISIS. 

Within this context, the commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Mohammad Ali Jafari, on December 14, said that Iran will consolidate its military presence in Syria and Iraq in the coming period. Moreover, Ali Saeedi, Khamenei's representative to the IRGC, explained that one of the reasons of this bid is Iran’s ability to transform extraterritorial confrontations from a conventional conflict into an “asymmetric” war.

These statements coincided with calls from Iranian officials to further leverage Iran’s economic influence inside these two countries through expanding its role in reconstruction in Syria and seizing control of bids for Iraq’s oil fields development. 

Multiple Indications

Iran’s bid to strengthen its influence in Iraq and Syria has several indications, which are as follows:

1- Mounting Pressure.

Iran’s expansionist bid in the two countries indicate that it became aware of the mounting pressure it came under from regional and international powers over its interference in the internal affairs of countries in the region, including its support for terrorist armed organizations operating in crisis-hit countries. The international and regional powers continue to demand Iran stop its policy that contributed towards spreading chaos and instability.

In other words, Iran is deliberately sending out those messages at this stage driven by its view that consolidating its influence in Iraq and Syria is a significant mechanism through which it can counter mounting regional and international pressure over, and opposition to its continuous violation of the 2015 nuclear deal and development of its ballistic missile program thus threatening the security and stability of regional countries. 

Interestingly, Secretary of the Expediency Council and former commander of the IRGC Mohsen Mohsen Rezaei was keen to assert that if Iran is late to move towards strengthening its influence in Syria, it would give other powers a chance to fill the void there. He further indicated that reconstruction which will start in Syria in the coming period will be the center of rivalry between several parties looking for a share in the process. 

2- Growing Concerns

It cannot be ruled out that Russia coordinated with Iran, Bashar al-Assad’s regime and sectarian militias before announcing that it will pull a part of its military forces from Syria. Nonetheless, this does not negate the possibility that Tehran is perhaps concerned because this step might be taken by Russia after it reached understandings with other powers opposing Iran, primarily the United States and Israel. What supports this is that Russia has a great interest in continuing political and military coordination with the United States and Israel in order to deal with political developments as well as developments on the ground in Syria. This represents a motive driving Tehran to seek to expand its influence to deal with such possibility that, in its view, cannot be ruled out.

3- Responding to Criticism from U.S. 

Jafari’s statements about Iran’s plan to expand its military influence in Syria and Iraq appear to be a response to severe criticism from the US Administration of President Donald Trump. The strongest and most recent criticism came from U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley who on December 14 showed evidence intending to prove Iran provided Houthi rebels in Yemen with arms in evident violation of United Nations Security Council’s Resolutions 2216 and 2231. Calling for an international action against Iran’s “malign influence”, Haley, in a press conference at Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling in Washington, D.C., stated that “there is no terrorist group in the Middle East that has no fingerprints of Iran.”

It should be noted that Iran’s recent statements came after the United States warned Tehran several times not to target American troops deployed in Iraq. This means Iran may seek to use its military presence and influence on its loyal Shiite militias, and the Popular Mobilization Forces (Hashd al-Shaabi) in particular, as a leverage if and when escalation with the United States reaches unprecedented heights in the coming period.

4- Entrenching Guerrilla Warfare Policy

Despite hurling threats every now and then, Iran appears to have no interest in entering into a direct confrontation with the United States or Israel. Aware of its historical experience of failures in conventional wars, Tehran knows very well that such a direct confrontation with the Americans will certainly impose severe consequences on Iran. 

Hence, the messages that several Iranian officials deliberately sent out indicate that Iran is willing to use its allied sectarian militias to confront opposing powers. Such messages were especially evident in the statements made by Ali Saeedi, Khamenei's representative to the IRGC, who said that the regional equations changed in favor of Iran after “growing resistance forces spread across the region and the IRGC shifted from “symmetric” wars to “asymmetric” and proxy wars, using sectarian Iranian-aligned militias to leverage its role in the region and counter opposing factions.

That said, it can possibly be argued that Iran can no longer find a replacement for terrorism and armed militias operating in some countries in the region, especially under the mounting pressure on it. Another reason is that influential radical state institutions of the Iranian regime are looking forward to take advantage of current regional and international developments to leverage its own influence on Iran’s decision-making circles after some parties in the regime attempted to use the 2015 nuclear deal to reduce and restrict this influence.