Libya to dissolve militias as Islamist strongholds fall

Libyan authorities have decided to dissolve all armed militias that are not controlled by the new central government. This comes after pro-government activists stormed the HQ of a radical Salafist group in Benghazi.

The government urged the army to impose its authority by putting its own officers at the head of armed brigades that sprang up during the last year’s uprising against Muammar Gaddafi rule, AFP reports.

The violent takeover of the Benghazi stronghold of Ansar al-Sharia militia by local residents on Friday claimed at least 11 lives and left some 70 wounded.  Six of them were militiamen, apparently executed, whose bodies were found at the outskirts of the city.

The government decided to put in place “operation rooms” in the eastern city, bringing together the military, forces of interior and defense ministries and brigades comprising former rebels.

Following the events in Benghazi – the hotbed of the last year’s revolution – two Islamist militias in another city announced that they will disband.

The Abu Slim and Ansar al-Sharia militias based in Derna, a city in eastern Libya, known as an Islamist stronghold, withdrew from their bases on Saturday, Reuters reports.

Local residents believe the announcements by the militias were motivated by the recent violence in Benghazi.

"The militia in Derna saw what happened last night and they decided: we will not kill our brothers. So they disbanded," Siraj Shennib, a 29-year-old linguistics professor who had been part of protests against the militia, told Reuters. "They said they no longer exist as militias in Derna. They will go home and leave security to the interior ministry and army."

Abu al-Shalali, 27, an Abu Slim fighter told the news agency that fighters decided to disband following a non-violent confrontation with protesters.

Libyan authorities have been struggling to secure control over the numerous, but not always allied, militias and other groups that brought about Gaddafi's downfall in 2011.The widespread proliferation of weapons became one the biggest threats to security in the whole region.

Islamic Rubbish - 'Tomatoes are Christian,' Egyptian Salafi group warns

A Salafi group called the "Popular Egyptian Islamic Association" has warned Muslims against eating tomatoes on the grounds that the fruit is a "Christian food," NowLebanon.com has reported.

The group based its claim on the fact that a shape resembling a cross is revealed when one cuts a tomato in half.

The association published the warning on its Facebook page with a photo of a tomato cut in half, revealing a cross-shaped interior.

A message posted on the page read, "Eating tomatoes is forbidden because they are Christian. [The tomato] praises the cross instead of Allah and says that Allah is three [in reference to the Holy Trinity]."

The message went on to say, "I implore you to spread this photo because there is a sister from Palestine who saw the Prophet of Allah in a vision and he was crying, warning his nation against eating [tomatoes]. If you don’t spread this [message], know that it is the devil who stopped you.”

The message caused outrage among Facebook users, which prompted the group to clarify their warning, saying they did not tell people not to eat tomatoes. "We said don’t cut it in [such a way that it reveals] the cross shape.”

Taliban Thugs and Savage Religious Zealots - The Perilous Pushtun Paradox

Over the last few years the Taliban have adopted a new strategy that emphasizes avoiding contact with foreign troops and concentrating attacks, and bribery efforts, on Afghan soldiers, police, and politicians. The latter includes senior tribal leaders and local strongmen in general. As they did in the 1990s, the Taliban use a carrot and stick approach to controlling the country. Those who are willing to make a deal, to share control, are accommodated, even if it includes bribes. Areas that refuse to submit are subjected to terror attacks, mainly directed at the local leadership. But ordinary civilians are victims as well, in order to generate popular pressure against the local leadership to make a deal with the Taliban. It's not working as well as it did in the 1990s, when the population was destitute and worn down by fifteen years of war with the Russians and after the Russians left in 1989, each other (civil war). The last decade has been one of growing prosperity fueled by more economic activity, foreign aid, and drug (heroin/opium) profits. In some parts of Afghanistan the new tactics have worked. That means the Taliban and drug gangs are left alone. The bribed/intimidated security forces and local leaders will still go after bandits and shake down local citizens who do not have powerful friends. That includes foreign aid operations, which have always been the target of thieves and corrupt officials.

The problem the Taliban has is that they lose all control in areas where foreign troops operate and have a very hard time in places occupied by non-Pushtuns (meaning most of Afghanistan) and the growing number of Pushtun tribes that are fed up with the Taliban and drug gangs and fighting back. The Taliban maintain the illusion of success (at least among themselves) by killing and bribing more Afghan police, soldiers, and leaders. Back in Pakistan (Quetta, Baluchistan, south of Helmand, and Kandahar) the Taliban leadership knows better.  Areas of Taliban influence are shrinking and the number of Afghans actively resisting or organizing militias and fighting the Taliban are increasing. Most Afghans do not see the Taliban as religiously inspired nationalists (as the Islamic radicals view themselves) but depraved hired guns for the drug gangs. Despite strict orders to behave, many Taliban use their power to loot and abuse the women (and young boys). The Taliban are not building support after two decades of effort but instead a more intense hatred.

Increasingly, Taliban leaders are questioning their chances of eventual victory. This is picked up, with increasing frequency, by electronic intelligence monitoring. Captured Taliban tell of security men for senior leaders passing on tidbits from that kind of talk by their bosses, in closely guarded meetings of senior Taliban. Some Taliban leaders are even talking to the media about this but confidentially. A growing number of Taliban want to make some kind of peace deal with the government but the Old Guard is still willing to go down fighting. That sort of thing is all-too-common in Afghanistan, especially among the Pushtun.

There is growing panic in eastern Afghanistan and among three million Afghan refugees across the border in Pakistan. That's because the Pakistanis plan to try and expel all Afghan refugees and illegal migrants from Pakistan by the end of the year. Some of these Afghans have been in Pakistan for 30 years (having fled the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in 1980). In the last decade some four million Afghan refugees have come home. Many of those remaining in Pakistan have put down roots and prospered and don't want to return (often to land that has been stolen or subject to some old family feud). The Afghans in Pakistan are living in communities full of fellow Pushtuns (most of the refugees are Pushtuns from southern Afghanistan), often people from the same tribe or extended family. The Afghan/Pakistan border was drawn (in 1893) without regard to the territorial integrity of Pushtun tribes. Only about 60 percent of the Afghans in Pakistan are registered as refugees and only about 600,000 still live in refugee camps (actually large towns administered, and supported, by foreign aid organizations). About a third of the Afghan refugees live in other parts of Pakistan, particularly the port city of Karachi. This is the largest metropolis in Pakistan and the Afghans there dominate the criminal underground. For that reason alone most Pakistanis would like to see the Afghan refugees forced to go back to Afghanistan. The Pakistanis will be able to expel some, maybe even half, of the refugees. The rest will resist, with bribes, violence, or just by hiding. But the effort will cause much violence on the Pakistani side of the border and turmoil on the Afghan side as the refugees seek to integrate themselves into an area they fled decades ago.

The U.S. has withdrawn about 11,000 troops so far this year and another 12,000 will go before the year ends. That will leave about 68,000 American troops. Afghan security forces (over 300,000 soldiers and police) are taking control of more of the country and by the end of the year the army and police should contain 350,000 armed men. The force is more tribal than anything else. The soldiers and police are often illiterate, poorly trained, and led by NCOs and officers who aren't much better. Foreign trainers are frequently confronted by violent, short tempered Afghans who do not take well to instruction or orders from foreigners.

July 22, 2012: Some Taliban publicly whipped two men in a village in eastern Pakistan. The two were caught trying to kidnap a ten year old boy and hold him for ransom. The Taliban like to publicize their law and order efforts. What the Taliban don't make public is the growing problem with their own men stealing and misbehaving. These fellows are sometimes executed, quietly, but most of the time the bad behavior is tolerated in order to keep Taliban gunmen on the job.

July 21, 2012: In the east (Kunar province) Pakistani troops fired over 300 rockets and artillery shells into Afghanistan over the last two days, apparently in an effort to hit Pakistani Taliban bases in Afghanistan. There were four known civilian casualties and no reports of Taliban losses. The Afghan government protested to Pakistan but these protests are usually ignored or dismissed with denials. Pakistan considers Afghanistan a client state. The Afghans are considered a collection of fractious tribes pretending to be a nation. With no access to the sea, most Afghan road connections to ports are with Pakistan. The Afghans resent this, especially since for thousands of years invasions of northern India (which, historically, lowland Pakistan is a part) came through Pakistan where many Pushtun tribesmen would join the invaders. Pakistan and India are well aware of this but still consider the Pushtuns a bunch of bloodthirsty savages from the mountains. Afghanistan has only been around for a few centuries, and Pakistan was carved out of British India in 1947 (before that it was a collection of feudal states and tribal territories). When you get right down to it, Pakistan's big problem is that it contains two-thirds of the Pushtun people (who are 15 percent of Pakistan's population) while Afghanistan contains the other third (who are 40 percent of Afghanistan's population). "Pushtunstan" is a nation of 30 million Pushtuns caught between Pakistan (still over 150 million people) and northern Afghanistan (with about 18 million non-Pushtuns). Without Pushtuns Afghanistan would become yet another Central Asian country with a small population (neighboring Tajikistan has 7.7 million and Uzbekistan has 30 million). But Pushtunstan is never going to happen because the Pushtuns have long been divided by tribal politics and cultural differences. When the Pushtun aren't fighting outsiders, they fight each other. The violent and fractious Pushtuns are a core problem in the region and have been for centuries. There is no easy solution to this.

July 18, 2012: In the north (Samangan Province) the Taliban made a rare attack on NATO supply trucks bringing fuel and other supplies from railroad depots just across the border from Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. The attack used bombs and gunfire to destroy or damage 22 trucks parked overnight. The Taliban attackers are in big trouble now because the northerners are making a lot of money from the trucking and security contracts. Most of the northerners are not Pushtun, while most Taliban are. A special attack team was probably sent north and now has to try and get back south in one piece.

July 14, 2012: In the north a Taliban suicide bomber got into a wedding reception and set off his bomb near a prominent (non-Pushtun) anti-Taliban politician, Ahmad Khan Samangani, killing him and 22 others (mostly civilians). This is supposed to intimidate northern leaders. It certainly scares many of them but the net result is for the northerners to call for even more aggressive action against the Pushtun Taliban.

July 13, 2012: In eastern Afghanistan the regional head of women’s affairs (Hanifa Safi) was killed by a Taliban bomb that had been attached to her car. The Taliban are violently opposed to education for girls or women working outside the home. Female government officials are seen as blasphemous by the Taliban.

July 8, 2012: In the east (Parwan Province), local officials began a major manhunt for a group of Taliban who had recently publicly executed a 22 year old woman for adultery. The killing, using an assault rifle, was captured in a cell-phone video and went viral. It later turned out that the killing was the resolution of a love triangle between the woman, who was married to a Taliban leader, and another Taliban leader. Rather than try to kill each other (as Afghan men usually do in such situations), the two openly accused the woman of adultery, held a quick trial, condemned her to death and executed her. All this took about an hour and locals were startled by the savagery and duplicity of it all.

Foreign donors have agreed to provide Afghanistan with $15 billion in aid through the end of 2015. The only catch is there will be vigorous efforts to control the corruption (mainly the outright theft of aid money or materials). Afghan officials protest such accusations and prepare to get around the latest anti-corruption efforts.

Brotherhood to launch party for post-Assad era

Members of Syria’s Brotherhood attend a press meeting in Istanbul. The group plans to launch a political party, saying it was ready for the post-al-Assad era.

Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood, a key opponent of President Bashar al-Assad’s regime, announced plans on July 20 to launch an Islamist political party, saying it was ready for the post-al-Assad era.

“The decision has been taken to create an Islamic party,” the head of the Brotherhood’s political wing, Ali Beyanouni, told journalists after the group completed a four-day conference in Istanbul. The new party would be “open to all Syrians” and will promote a “democratic and pluralist” vision of the state based on the equality of all citizens, Beyanouni said.

“We are ready for the post-Assad era, we have plans for the economy, the courts, politics,” said Mulhem al-Droubi, the Brotherhood’s spokesman. The Muslim Brotherhood is an Islamist political movement founded in Egypt in 1928 and has branches and affiliates around the world.

The Brotherhood plays a key role in the Syrian National Council, the opposition coalition opposing al-Assad.

Russia - The Beast In The East

The Russian plan to spend $700 billion during the next decade, to buy new military equipment has come off the rails because of the falling price of oil. Currently it's under $90 a barrel, while the Russian defense buildup program was based on a price of $110 or higher. A disproportionate amount of the new stuff was for the Far East, to protect territories that are claimed by China. Japan is also making noise about its claims on the South Kuril Islands, but that is nothing compared to the amount of real estate China insists was stolen from them over the last few centuries. China has been quiet about these claims since the Cold War ended, but has not withdrawn them. China is also spending more on its military, although more of that new stuff is directed at the United States and India, not Russia. While Russia makes a lot of noise about the threat from the West, the real problem is in the East, and Russia would rather not talk about this openly.

The Russian parliament (Duma) has recently passed laws allowing greater censorship of the Internet and resuming Soviet era laws that allowed prosecution of anyone who criticized the government. There are also new laws increasing punishments for those who hold unauthorized demonstrations. At the same time, the government continues to do nothing about the apparent use of police death squads to murder active critics of the government (especially journalists.)

The government has also passed new laws that declare foreigners working for NGOs (Non-Government Organizations, like the Red Cross and pro-democracy groups) as "foreign agents" who must register with the government and be subject to constant supervision. The FSB (the Russian FBI/CIA) has long accused Western nations of working with pro-democracy Russian NGOs to spy on Russia. Western states deny it. The government has been campaigning against NGOs, and foreign influences in general over the last six years.

The government believes that most of its political opponents are concentrated in Moscow and other large cities. For example, a recent opinion poll found that 60 percent of Russians approved of Vladimir Putin and his policies (which are rebuilding a Soviet style police state). But in Moscow, only 38 percent approved of Putin.

A Russian admiral made it clear that Russia expects to keep its naval base in Syria no matter what happens to the Assad government. That could get interesting. The Soviet Union made a deal in the 1970s, with Hafez Assad's father, to establish a naval support facility at the Syrian port of Tartus. That base has been in use ever since. Several hundred Russian personnel are there now upgrading those facilities and Russia continues to deliver weapons and military equipment to Syria. However, these only appear to be for pre-revolution deals. Russia recently announced that it would make no new arms deals, and deliveries to Syria. The 16 month old uprising in Syria has been going badly for the Assad family. Rebels are closing in on the capital (Damascus) and have taken over most of the countryside. A NATO naval patrol off Tartus seems to be daring the Russians to try and violate the international arms sanctions against Syria. Russia has been using its UN veto to prevent the UN from doing anything drastic to condemn the Assad's slaughter of their unarmed citizens. For Russia, it’s a matter of preventing international intervention to remove a dictatorship that has declared war on its own people. Such a policy would adversely impact many Russian allies and arms customers. For that reason, Russian officials have been insisting that Russian warships would escort Russian arms shipments into Tartus.

The Defense Ministry has decided to replace many of the tracked combat and combat support vehicles in the army with wheeled versions. Thus the Russian military would look more like Western forces. For example, the U.S. military employs over 10,000 hummers, and the Russia has begun obtaining a locally made equivalent (Tigr) over the last five years. Russia is developing new wheeled armored vehicles, again similar to the U.S. Stryker (and West European models on which Stryker was based.) A lot of the tracked vehicles in Russian service are Cold War vintage and wearing out anyway. This shift is confirmation that Russia is not planning on large, cross-country World War II style mechanized operations. Russia's army is too small for that. Nuclear weapons are now the main defense against invasion. The army now helps keep the peace internally. Wheels are cheaper to use for that sort of thing.

July 17, 2012: Russia and Tajikistan have reached an agreement on what Russia will pay for its base in Tajikistan and extended the lease 49 years. That base is used for 7,000 Russian troops of the 201st Motor Rifle Division. That unit is at half strength and has sent most of its heavy weapons back to Russia. Current gear includes 96 tanks, 300 Infantry Fighting Vehicles, 54 self-propelled artillery vehicles, 1,100 other vehicles, eight helicopters and 5 ground attack aircraft. The 201st was there during the Soviet period and the post-Soviet Union Tajik government asked Russia to leave the 201st in place to help with internal security. This was a problem because Tajikistan shares a long border with Afghanistan, which Russian troops had only left a few years earlier.

Tajikistan is a part of the Heroin Highway that brings these drugs into Russia from Afghanistan. Corruption in Tajikistan, and brutal violence used by the Afghan smugglers has meant that most of the heroin gets through to Russia. The presence of the 201st Motor Rifle Division has had little effect on the drug smuggling. Russia has several million drug addicts and has been willing to cooperate with NATO to attack the drug production in Afghanistan. As part of that cooperation, Russia has offered more and more assistance in moving NATO supplies and troops to Afghanistan via Russian railroads and air space. The Russians have refrained from charging extortionate fees because they want NATO forces to continue fighting the Afghan drug gangs. This effort is currently in doubt, as most NATO forces are expected to be out of Afghanistan by 2015.

July 16, 2012: Off Russia's Pacific coast, a coast guard ship opened fire on two Chinese fishing ships that were operating illegally in Russian waters and refused orders to stop. The Russians eventually forced the 36 Chinese poachers to surrender, after a three hour chase.  There were no injuries, but one of the Chinese boats suffered some damage.

July 14, 2012: In Dagestan two policemen were shot dead. The assailants were believed to be from one of the twelve Islamic terror or nationalist rebel groups operating in Dagestan. While these groups have only about 300 active (and armed) members, they have thousands of supporters among the general population. Elsewhere in the Caucasus Russian commandos killed eight Islamic terrorists, including two wanted leaders.

July 9, 2012: Floods over the weekend in southern Russia left nearly 200 dead and thousands injured or homeless. Victims are blaming inept local officials for not doing much of anything to avoid the catastrophe, or helping the victims.

July 4, 2012:  The government revealed that its counter-terrorism policies include willingness to shoot down hijacked passenger planes if those aircraft seem to be headed for a nuclear plant (or other sensitive facility), military base or city for a suicidal attack.

Over the last few days police in Dagestan arrested 40 members of one of the largest criminal gangs in the area. Gangsters outnumber Islamic terrorists and rebels in the Caucasus, but these criminal gangs often provide support and services for the terrorists.

July 3, 2012: In the Caucasus (Kabardino-Balkaria) a wanted Islamic terrorist leader and an associate were caught at a checkpoint. The terrorist leader was killed in a gun fight while his associate escaped.

July 2, 2012: The Defense Ministry revealed that government spending on military research and development (R&D) had declined 50 percent in the last seven years. Many defense officials blame this for the failure of Russian weapons to keep up with the West. But many others in the military see the cuts as justified, because Soviet era R&D produced mostly second rate weapons and the end of the Cold War (and the Soviet Union) in 1991 did not change the quality of Russian R&D efforts. Since 2005, the government has pushed the military make deals with Western firms to get better military tech. This has involved buying an increasing number of Western weapons, usually with technology transfer and some production in Russia. While Russian government propaganda depicts the West as a potential enemy, the West doesn't see it that way and sells Russia the more advanced weapons technology. Welcome to Russian Logic. 

July 1, 2012: Russia revealed that in the first six months of the year 194 militants (Islamic terrorists, rebels, gangsters pretending to be rebels) were killed in the Caucasus. This included 25 wanted terrorists, mostly leaders. Another 235 terrorists were arrested and eight surrendered. The security forces lost 104 dead. There were also 32 civilians killed, out of 160 who were attacked (often for cooperating with the police.) In that period, the security forces carried out 1,200 counter-terror operations. In the same period last year 209 terrorists were killed. This fighting, especially in Chechnya, has been going on since 1991. Actually, it's been going on for several centuries, but during the Soviet period (1921-91) state terrorism (secret police, death squads and mass deportations) kept things pretty quiet. These tactics, however, caused even more hatred towards the Russians and fuels a lot of the current terrorism in the Caucasus.

Afghan women protest over woman's public execution

Dozens of Afghan women's rights activists took to the streets  today to protest against the recent public execution of a young woman for alleged adultery, which was captured in a horrific video.

The 22-year-old victim was shot dead as dozens of men cheered in a village about 100 kilometres (60 miles) north of the capital Kabul.

The execution was blamed by the authorities on Taliban militants and caused global outrage, with world leaders denouncing the Islamists, who are waging an insurgency against the Western-backed government.

"We want justice," the protesters, almost all women, shouted as they marched from the women's affairs ministry towards the UN headquarters in Kabul.

"The execution of the woman by the Taliban was a crime... the government must do everything to bring the culprits to justice," parliamentarian Shinkai Karokhail, who joined the march, told AFP. "This is the duty of the government to deliver justice." President Hamid Karzai condemned the killing as un-Islamic and unforgivable, while security forces have launched a manhunt for those responsible.

The commander of NATO's 130,000 troops in Afghanistan, General John Allen, offered to help local security forces track and capture the men involved in what he called "an atrocity of unspeakable cruelty".

Public executions of alleged adulterers were common when the Taliban were in power from 1996 until 2001, when they were ousted by a US-led invasion for harbouring Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden after the 9/11 attacks.

Islamic Terrorists Lose Popular Support

The Islamic radical violence in the south has forced the government to confront the endemic and long-standing dominance of criminal gangs down there. One reason for seizing control of the area a century ago was to control the gangs, who preyed on nearby Thai populations. But until a decade ago, the government was content to leave the gangs alone as long as these Moslem criminals kept a low profile. But nine years ago the gangs decided to exploit the religion angle. The three southern provinces are Moslem and when the government came down hard (killing dozens) on Islamic radicals, the gangs saw an opportunity. . The "terrorists" are a combination of Islamic radicals (most of the people in the three southern provinces are Moslem), Malay nationalists (nearly all the Moslems are ethnic Malay, not Thai, which 97 percent of Thailand's population is) and gangsters (smuggling has long been a big business down there). The ethnic Thai majority refused (as they usually do) to back down in the face of Malay Moslem violence, and now the Moslem minority is increasingly hostile to the Islamic terrorists, and cooperating with the police. This happened gradually as it became obvious over the last eight years that the Thai government was never going to give in. As a result of this, the militants turned on the Moslem civilians, which is a downward spiral that eventually destroys the Islamic radicals. The national government has also sent more economic aid to the south and improved the educational system.

The army claims that, in the last eight years, the number of Islamic militants in the south has been reduced more than half, to under 5,000. The violence has also declined, but all this is mainly because more and more southerners are fed up with years of violence. Eight years of unrest down there has meant nearly 12,000 violent acts, 5,200 dead and over 9,000 wounded. The gangs provided weapons, technical advice and some muscle to get the Islamic terrorism going, and now to keep it going. The Moslem population down there is fed up with the gangs and their Islamic radical allies. The government offers lots of economic development, but that cannot really happen until the terrorism is eliminated. The gangs are under pressure to turn on the Islamic terrorists, and fade into the background again. This would allow external (from the government and foreigners) investment to come in while the gangs went back to avoiding the police and smuggling drugs and other goods from Malaysia. Some of the gang leaders are opposed to dropping support for the Islamic terrorists, because this has distracted the police and made it easier to operate. But other gang leaders point out that the terrorism has brought many more police and soldiers into the south and that the Thais have made it clear that they will never surrender control of the three Moslem provinces. Given the dominance of Thais and Buddhists (97 percent of the population) and the fighting reputation of Thais (fierce and persistent), a growing number of gangsters are willing to admit the error and dump the Islamic terrorists, before the Thai government grinds down the terrorists and the gangs.

July 3, 2012: In the south, three roadside bombs left one dead and six wounded.

June 29, 2012: In the south, two Buddhist defense volunteers were shot dead while driving along a road.

June 25, 2012:  Malaysia has agreed to send back to Thailand an Iranian terrorist who was arrested in Malaysia last February as he sought to flee from Thailand back to Iran. The Thai government is prosecuting five Iranians for their terrorist activity last February. One of the suspects fled to Iran and another got caught in Malaysia. The government has been told by India that the five were connected with similar attacks against Israelis in Georgia and India. Iran has not cooperated with the Thai investigation and denies any involvement.

June 21, 2012:  In the south, a roadside bomb wounded a soldier and civilian.

June 18, 2012: Indian investigators have concluded that Iran was behind attacks last February against Israelis in Thailand, Georgia and India.

The Mad Mullah’s Republic of Iran Propaganda - Iran tests "Khalij Fars" missiles as part of military drills

Iran tested its "Khalij Fars" missiles as part of the third day of "Great Prophet 7" military drills today, Fars reported.

Iran's IRGC continues its military drills today, which started on June 2.

Yesterday Iran's Revolutionary Guards tested the various range missiles (Shahab I, II and III, Zelzal, Fateh, Tondar, Qiyam) stationed in various locations across the country to bomb fake targets in country's Semnan and Lut deserts.

Hajizadeh said that on the third day of the drills, naval military maneuvers will take place in an area of Persian Gulf and the Hormuz Strait.

Today at the maneuvers, IRGC also tested jet fighters and unmanned aircrafts.

The "Great Prophet IV" land exercises were held in Iran in June-July of 2011. During those, Iran introduced missiles launched from an underground launcher and tested the Fateh-10 missile.

According to Tehran, the exercises were held solely to demonstrate the country's defense abilities under the slogan "peace and friendship."