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Introduction
The Iranian Army is the national army of Iran and called the Artesh.
It is important not to confuse the Artesh (regular army) with the IRGC forces, whom are in effect a parallel and ideological army.
Manpower
Iran's army includes 350,000 regular soldiers (non-conscript) and 220,000 conscripts.
Iran can also call on substantial numbers of reservists as most males must carry out a full two year military service at some point in their lives. It is generally acknowledged that the conscript element of the army is not trained nearly as well as the professional active duty army.
Recent Wars
- The Iran-Iraq war occurred 1980-1988. For the first two years of the conflict, Iraq made substantial gains into Iranian territory. The Iranian military, made up of conscripts, began to use human wave attacks, sending thousands of sometimes unarmed troops against Iraqi positions. Since Iran has over double the population of Iraq, this quickly wore the Iraqis down. It is estimated that at least 20,000 Iranian troops were killed during the war due to WMDs, and another 50,000+ were injured, blinded, partially asphyxiated, or paralyzed. The Iranian army was seen during the war as untrained and poor in combat. It is estimated that over 750,000 Iranians (mostly troops) were killed during the eight-year conflict, and over 300,000 Iraqi troops.
See also
Official sites
External links
"Islamic Republic of Iran Army"