The Unfinished History of the Iran-Iraq War: Faith, Firepower, and Iran's Revolutionary Guards

by Annie Tracy Samuel

Overview

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), founded after the Iranian revolution in 1979, is one of the most powerful and prominent but least understood organizations in Iran. In this book, Annie Tracy Samuel presents an innovative and compelling history of this organization and, by using the Iran-Iraq War as a focal point, analyzes the links between war and revolution. Tracy Samuel provides an internal view of the IRGC by examining how the Revolutionary Guards have recorded and assessed the history of the war in the massive volume of Persian language publications produced by the organization's top members and units. This not only enhances our comprehension of the IRGC's roles and power in contemporary Iran, but also demonstrates how the history of the Iran-Iraq War has immense bearing on the Islamic Republic's present and future. In doing so, the book reveals how analyzing Iran's history provides the critical tools for understanding its actions today.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781108787185
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	10/21/2021
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

Annie Tracy Samuel is a scholar specializing in the modern history of Iran and the Middle East. She is Associate Professor in the Department of History at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and previously served as a research fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School's Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. Her publications include journal articles in International Security and Diplomatic History; her commentary on current events has been published in Lawfare, The Hill, CNN, and The Atlantic; and she has delivered talks at universities and conferences and briefed government agencies in the United States, Europe, and the Middle East.

Table of Contents

1. Introduction; 2. Guards: the establishment of the IRGC; 3. Historians: the IRGC's history of the Iran-Iraq war; 4. Striking while the Revolution's hot: the causes of the Iran-Iraq war; 5. Willing and unable: Iran confronts the Iraqi invasion; 6. The epic of Khorramshahr: Iran in the war from occupation to liberation; 7. Pursuing the aggressor: Iran's invasion of Iraq; 8. War for peace: the Iran-Iraq war, 1985-1987; 9. An end to a war without end: the Iran-Iraq war, 1987-1988; 10. Faith and firepower: Iran's prosecution of the Iran-Iraq war; 11. The holy defense continues: the Iran-Iraq war and Iran's national security; 12. Unfinished history: the IRGC and the Holy Defense Research and Documentation Center since the war; 13. Keeping the war alive: the IRGC's commitment to writing the history of the Iran-Iraq war.

Editorial Reviews

The Iran–Iraq war was a defining period in the formation of the Islamic Republic of Iran and its upstart military: the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). In this impressive monograph, Annie Tracy Samuel dives deeply into the IRGC’s own historiography and explores how the organization understands the conflict and how it wants the war to be remembered in Iran’s political consciousness. More broadly, it is a book about war and memory, and of the politics and meaning-making of institutional histories.' Afshon Ostovar, Naval Postgraduate School

'The IRGC’s role in the Iran–Iraq War has not terminated with the end of war-related activities, but continued with a mission of writing the history of the ‘holy defense.’ Considering the critical roles of the war and the IRGC in state-building of the Islamic Republican regime, Tracy Samuel’s study provides an impressive account of the IRGC’s framing of the long-lasting war.' Bayram Sinkaya, Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University

'This probing analysis makes for compelling reading. … Highly recommended.' R. P. Matthee, Choice

‘… a useful contribution to the literature.’ Ray Takeyh, Survival

‘[T]he book is highly valuable as it introduces the wealth of primary sources created by the IRGC over the decades, which are seldom examined in historical studies.’ Mateo Mohammad Farzaneh

‘[The] book is required reading for students and specialists of Iranian and Middle Eastern history and politics and, more generally, armed conflict, social revolution, and collective memory. It makes a significant scholarly contribution by delving into untapped sources and by offering unique insights into the IRGC, the Iran-Iraq War, and the Islamic Republic. Finally, the book raises stimulating and engaging questions about military historiography as a national project in Iran and beyond. These questions will surely prompt path-breaking research within the disciplines of history, area studies, and comparative politics in the future.’ Eric Lob, Iranian Studies

‘… a valuable monograph not only for students of the contemporary Middle East, Iran, and the IRGC, but for anyone with an interest in historiography, narrative construction, and military history, at large. … Tracy Samuel’s book challenges [the traditional] narrative through a meticulous study of the IRGC’s war historiography. … [it] will be an undeniable resource for future research … In addition to laying the grounds for an engaged study of sources produced in Iran, The Unfinished History of the Iran-Iraq War offers an important analytical path forward.’ Maryam Alemzadeh, International Journal of Middle East Studies

From the Publisher