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Hotel Booking Saturday, 21st January 2006
Iran Focus

Tehran, Iran, Jan. 21 - A senior commander of Iran's Revolutionary Guards who once vowed that "no part of the Islamic world is going to be safe and secure for America" was named as the new head of the Guards' Air Force.

Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei issued a decree on Saturday, appointing Brigadier General Hossein Salami as the new commander of the Air Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC). Another senior Guards commander, Brigadier General Mohammad-Reza Zahedi, was put in charge of the IRGC Ground Forces.

Salami is known as the father of the IRGC's "asymmetric warfare" doctrine, which he helped to develop in the months preceding the war in Iraq. At the time, Salami was Director of Operations in the IRGC command headquarters.

The military doctrine is based on two components as strategic tools in any military confrontation: the massive use of suicide operations to target U.S. and Western interests around the world, and the use of weapons of mass destruction.

On July 4, 2004, General Salami called for the destruction of the United States during a ceremony to recruit suicide bombers that were willing to attack Western and Israeli targets.

"Now, America knows that Muslims with their desires for martyrdom have discovered a new technology and are capable of technological production. This has made [the U.S.] fear them", Salami was quoted as saying by the state-run news agency ISNA.

In his new position as commander of the IRGC's Air force, General Salami will be in charge of the country's ballistic missile development project, a key component of the asymmetric warfare doctrine. Missiles are important as means of delivery for such weapons.

In November, Khamenei had appointed Salami as Vice-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the IRGC.

In the July 2004 speech, Salami had argued for the use of oil as a weapon by Muslim countries to put pressure on the West.

Salami said that because of the strategic location and resources of the Middle East, the United States had a goal of dominating the region, but was faced with the world of Islam.

Referring to suicide attacks against Israel, Salami said, "A young group following the ideology of Imam [Ruhollah] Khomeini and the [1979] Islamic revolution have started a new strategy of struggle and jihad against the Israelis".

"With martyrdom-seeking operations, the fight against Israel has taken on a religious quality and has spread Islamic values. It was these martyrdom-seeking operations that brought about victory for the Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon".

He said that the West and Israel were terrified of suicide operations. "Now, no part of the Islamic world is safe and secure for America, thus the U.S. cannot move forward in the region and is currently trying to secure its present location".

The Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps was founded in the early days of the Islamic revolution in 1979 as an armed force loyal to Iran's clerical rulers. Its commanders directly report to the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and their mission is to "protect and propagate the Islamic revolution".

The appointments come 12 days after a plane crash in northwest Iran, which killed 11 senior IRGC commanders, including the commander of the IRGC Ground Forces. The crash was a serious blow to the IRGC at a critical time when the force has been given huge powers by the Supreme Leader in the wake of the consolidation of power by the ultra-conservative faction after hard-liner Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took office as president.

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