The 19-Month War Before the Eight-Year War with Iraq

The official start date of the war in Iran is considered to be September 22, 1980. However, an examination of the tense relations between Iran and Iraq after the revolution reveals that the war's origins date back several months prior to this date. In fact, September 22, 1980, coincided with the bombing of Mehrabad Airport and the aerial and ground attacks of the Iraqi army on Khuzestan province, marking the escalation of the Iran-Iraq conflict from limited border skirmishes to a full-scale military confrontation. Border clashes between Iran and Iraq began around March 1979. There were also sporadic conflicts along the western borders of the country during the late Shah's regime. Seyyed Mahmoud Dowai, the first Iranian ambassador to Iraq after the revolution, states that Iraq began attacking Iranian border points in November 1978, coinciding with the countdown to the fall of Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi's regime, with the aim of nullifying the 1975 Algiers Agreement. He says, "The truth is that the Iran-Iraq war began in November 1978. That is when Saddam realized that the Shah's regime was collapsing and the Shah's security and military institutions were crumbling, with SAVAK on the verge of dissolution and the army undergoing purges. Saddam harbored a suppressed grudge since the signing of the Algiers Agreement, which had been imposed on Iraq, and he had accepted some issues in this agreement from a position of weakness, always waiting for an opportunity to take revenge. When he saw the state of the country, he planned a retaliatory attack. The Ba'ath forces established their headquarters in Basra, and Adnan al-Tikriti was appointed as its commander, marking the true beginning of the war from November 1978, several months before the victory of the Islamic Revolution. Before the revolution, Iraq had established two active consulates in Khorramshahr and Kermanshah, which were fed with intelligence and military personnel, attempting to gather forces in those areas by influencing elements sympathetic to Iraq. After the revolution, they were waiting for an opportunity to exploit these elements favorably. "Hassan al-Bakr," who was then the head of the Iraqi government, was not in favor of these moves, but Saddam, as his first deputy, plotted to remove this obstacle, leading to Hassan al-Bakr's resignation and his own rise as President and Secretary-General of the Ba'ath Party, marking the beginning of a period that would clearly seek aggression and conflict with the Islamic Republic of Iran." However, it seems that the pre-revolution attacks were not significantly related to destabilizing the 1975 Algiers Agreement. The then-Iraqi government was engaged with Kurdish forces in Iraq. One of the significant outcomes of the 1975 Algiers Agreement was the cessation of the Shah's support for the Kurdish insurgency in Iraq. Before the signing of the agreement, when Iran and Iraq were on the brink of war, the Shah used the Kurdish forces as leverage against Baghdad. However, with the weakening of the Shah's regime, both Iraqi and Iranian Kurdish forces found opportunities for renewed activity, leading to increased Kurdish activities against the Iraqi government along Iran's western borders. The Ba'athist government of Iraq welcomed the formation of the Islamic Revolution and initially sought to strengthen good relations with the Islamic Republic. Iran's alignment with the anti-Israel front in the region and its positive engagement with the Arabs were reasons for Iraq's welcome, as well as the strengthening of Arab nationalism in Khuzestan and the shifting balance of power between the two countries in favor of Iraq, which pushed the Iraqi government towards closer ties with the new Iranian government. At the same time, the annulment of the Algiers Agreement and the expansion of Iraqi border points into Khuzestan were also interests and inclinations of the Ba'ath Party, particularly Saddam Hussein. However, these interests had no capacity for execution at the beginning of the revolution, and the Iraqi government sought to maximize its influence in Khuzestan and, consequently, Iran by strengthening groups like the Arab Movement and establishing a branch of the Ba'ath Party in Khuzestan. However, various factors prevented the improvement of Iraq's relations with post-revolution Iran, leading to one of the deadliest and longest wars in the region between the two countries. The pre-war period of the eight-year conflict had distinct characteristics. Its scale and scope were limited to clashes between military outposts. Multiple factors contributed to the formation, continuation, and escalation of conflicts before the eight-year war. First, the renewed activity of Talabani and Barzani after the fall of the Shah's regime. In subsequent periods, the resurgence of the Shiite religious movement in Iraq against Saddam Hussein and attempts to change the government led by Ayatollah Seyyed Muhammad Baqir al-Sadr, along with the Iraqi government's response to him, ignited border clashes between the two countries. The widespread expulsion of Iranian nationals or religious opponents from Iraq and their push towards Iran unsettled the western borders of the country. During this nearly 19-month period, hundreds of military personnel and residents of border villages were killed. A significant number of heavy military weapons, such as tanks, mortars, artillery, and military aircraft were destroyed, and oil facilities in border areas were damaged. According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Iraqi army attacked Iran's land, air, and sea borders 397 times during this 19-month period. (Source: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Analysis of the Imposed War, cited from Parsa Doost, Us and Iraq from Ancient Times to Today, same, p. 505) Some other statistics mention 636 incidents, which seem inaccurate. Since April 1979, Iranian government officials believed in U.S. cooperation with Iraq in instigating war against Iran, and border clashes were seen as part of a U.S. conspiracy against the Islamic Revolution of Iran. Iran's response until the summer of 1979 was defensive, with military activities by the army, gendarmerie, IRGC, and volunteer forces limited to repelling attacks and driving Iraqi invading forces from Iran's borders. However, from July 1979, Iran's attacks shifted from purely defensive to also offensive and confrontational. Iranian military forces also entered Iraqi territory. The pattern of clashes until the beginning of 1979 was sporadic and disorganized, but from April 1979 until the end of September of that year, there was a continuous military confrontation between the two countries at border points, which increased steadily and ultimately escalated to a full-scale war. Almost all border clashes occurred in the western country and the provinces of Kermanshah and Ilam. Limited clashes occurred between Iranian and Iraqi military forces in Kurdistan province. The southern borders of the country and the border strip of Khuzestan became the arena for military conflict between the two sides from late September 1979. Until late summer 1979, Iran effectively repelled attacks and stabilized its sovereignty over border areas. However, from September 1979, Iraqi forces gradually gained a better position at the borders and occupied parts of Iranian territory. Iraq's policy during the initial border clashes was to conduct harassing actions without pursuing the goal of seizing specific areas. However, from the summer of 1979 onwards, it aimed for advancement and acquisition of Iranian border areas. Meanwhile, the unrest in Kurdistan and the emergence of armed conflict between the regime and Kurdish identity-seeking groups and some opponents also led to increased border clashes between Iran and Iraq. Prior to this, clashes in Khuzestan between Arab ethnic activists and the government had increased tensions between Iran and Iraq and expanded border conflicts. The dimensions of border clashes with Iraq before the eight-year war were large and extensive, but they have been overlooked in official and popular narratives of the military confrontation between Iran and Iraq. One of the fundamental criticisms of the political and military officials at the time was their negligence regarding this event and the lack of preparation to prevent the escalation of war or to prepare for resistance against the widespread Iraqi invasion of the southern borders of the country. Iraq's comprehensive attack caught Iranian military forces and the government by surprise, allowing Iraq to easily occupy significant parts of Khuzestan. While the likelihood of an Iraqi attack was high due to the 18-month military conflict that had been on the rise. Before the war, the Iraqi government undertook the following actions to prepare for a prolonged battle: strengthening border outposts, constructing trenches and defensive positions, troop movements and logistics, constructing roads and digging canals, transferring artillery to the borders, reinforcing its military forces along the border, limited aerial incursions, border reconnaissance and infiltration into Iranian territory, light and heavy fire on Iranian border outposts, and dispatching combat patrols. Additionally, various political and diplomatic actions were taken to lay the groundwork for the Algiers Agreement and to build regional and global alliances. However, a serious question arises: why did Iranian officials not react appropriately? While Abolhassan Banisadr and Mohammad Ali Rajaei, the then President and Prime Minister, visited the western part of the country in August 1979 and participated in meetings of the joint operations headquarters of the army in the west, apparently from the government's perspective, the war with Iraq had begun, but Iran's military posture was not at all commensurate with that situation, and army divisions did not move to the southern front, and there was no extraordinary organization. Answering these questions and similar inquiries reveals the hidden dimensions of the eight-year war between Iran and Iraq.