Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps or IRGC: Key Points and Summary – More powerful than Tehran’s conventional army, the IRGC is deeply involved in many aspects of Iranian politics, economics, and foreign policy.
Data You Need to Know –Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) is more than just a military branch; it’s a powerful, ideologically driven parallel state that reports directly to the Supreme Leader.
-Founded during the 1979 revolution to protect the regime, the IRGC has its own army, navy, and air force, and oversees Iran’s critical ballistic missile program.
-Through its expeditionary Quds Force, it projects power abroad by arming, training, and funding an “axis of resistance” of proxy groups like Hezbollah and the Houthis.
-Deeply entrenched in Iran’s politics and economy, the IRGC is a formidable force, even as it faces new vulnerabilities.
The IRGC is Dangerous for Many Reasons
The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, better known as the IRGC, is one of Iran’s armed forces branches that was founded during the 1979 revolution to guard the then newly formed Islamic Republic better and keep a thumb on internal dissent.
Although the IRGC exists parallel to Iran’s army, the IRGC’s political and economic reach, not to mention its ideological rigidity, runs much deeper.
Fast forward to today, and the IRGC is one of the most powerful of the many institutions in Iran, with deep influence in the country’s politics and economics, not to mention its intelligence and foreign policy.
The IRGC is quite different than Tehran’s conventional military in that the IRGC reports directly to Iran’s Supreme Leader and is tasked with ensuring the survival of the regime.
Larger than a conventional army, the IRGC also encompasses missile and air command as well as the IRGC’s Navy, with which Tehran challenges traffic in the Persian Gulf.
“The IRGC is also highly influential in Iran’s national politics. Many corps veterans have moved on to senior government roles, including in the cabinet, parliament, and provinces,” the Council on Foreign Relations, a think tank, explains.
“The corps has meanwhile enriched itself with billions of dollars by running illicit commercial and financial networks around international sanctions. Many regional experts expect the IRGC to play a pivotal role in selecting a successor to the aging Khamenei, which could further consolidate the group’s power and increase barriers to political reform.”
Quds Force
However, the IRGC’s Quds Force is perhaps its most noteworthy element, which conducts operations outside of Iran and both drives and disperses support for Iran’s allies abroad in the form of proxy forces as well as militias. This includes Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthi rebels in Yemen, and other militias traditionally in Syria and Iraq.
“The IRGC began sponsoring nonstate armed groups in the region in 1980s, first deploying in the Iran-Iraq War. The Quds Force emerged as the IRGC’s de facto external affairs branch, and it has developed ties with armed groups from Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories, Yemen, and elsewhere, providing them with training, weapons, money, and military advice to project Iran’s power abroad,” the Center on Foreign Relations explains.
“Some of these groups frequently operate independently of Iran and each other, but Tehran views them as part of an anti-West “axis of resistance” under its sway. Experts say Iran has attempted to strengthen cooperation within this alliance in recent years.”
Iran’s tensions with Israel have long been one of the most significant elements of the IRGC’s foreign policy, as the country is Iran’s number one threat in the region. Tehran’s support for its “Axis of Resistance” proxies in Lebanon, Syria, among Palestinians, and in Yemen have drawn Israeli and international ire.
The American Connection
The United States has also taken an active role, under the Trump administration, to strike the IRGC.
In 2020, an American drone strike hilled Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani while in Baghdad, Iraq.
While his death was a significant symbolic blow to the organization, his successor has continued the Quds Force’s mission of resistance to Israel, the United States, and other countries sympathetic to or allied with either.
However, following the recent attacks by Israel and the United States against Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, the IRGC is arguably at its lowest ebb since the 1979 revolution.
Although the group has morphed into a transnational organization with regional and, to a certain extent, global power projection aspirations, it appears more vulnerable today than at any other time.
Still, the Quds Force, as well as the IRGC, are able to draw upon a significant amount of financial and material resources from the Iranian regime, given their importance in preserving the Supreme Leader’s position as the head of the Iranian state.
Considering their deep ranks, it remains to be seen if a decapitation strategy, like the ongoing operation against Iran’s proxies in the region, will be as successful.
What Next for IRGC?
The group’s ranks number in the tens if not hundreds of thousands, and many of those are strongly ideologically motivated.
Whether the current regime survives in the short to medium term is an open question — but perhaps another important question is, regardless of what happens to the Supreme Leader in Tehran, what will the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps do?
And that question, it seems, is anybody’s guess.
About the Author: Caleb Larson
Caleb Larson is an American multiformat journalist based in Berlin, Germany. His work covers the intersection of conflict and society, focusing on American foreign policy and European security. He has reported from Germany, Russia, and the United States. Most recently, he covered the war in Ukraine, reporting extensively on the war’s shifting battle lines from Donbas and writing on the war’s civilian and humanitarian toll. Previously, he worked as a Defense Reporter for POLITICO Europe. You can follow his latest work on X.
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