Operation Mersad

On 20 July 1987 the Iran–Iraq War was coming to an end under the United Nations Security Council Resolution 598.[7][8] Iran had suffered major defeats in southern Iraq during the Second Battle of Al Faw and Operation Tawakalna ala Allah as well as along the central portion of the border within Iran, and was contemplating on accepting[7] the ceasefire. On July 26 1988, six days after Ayatollah Khomeini had officially announced his acceptance of the UN brokered ceasefire resolution as well as seeing Iraqi victories in the previous months, the MEK advanced under heavy Iraqi air cover, crossing the Iranian border from Iraq.[1] It advanced to a maximum distance of 145 km(90 mi) and along the way seized and razed to the ground the Iranian town of Eslamabad-e Gharb. As it advanced further into Iran, Iraq ceased its air support and Iranian forces cut off NLA (National Liberation Army of Iran i.e.MEK forces) supply lines and counterattacked under cover of fighter planes and helicopter gunships.

The attack agreed upon by the Iraqi leadership would be a two pronged assault. One portion of the MEK force would attack Iranian forces in Iraqi Kurdistan, the area was still in Iranian and Peshmerga hands. When the Iranian troops moved to fight off the MEK attack in Kurdistan, the renegade Iranian militant group the Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK), supported by Iraqi air power, would launch a large scale incursion into the central portion of Iran, aiming towards the heart of Iran. The MEK under their leader Massoud Rajavi harbored the hope that the attack would lead to a general uprising against the Islamic government of Ayatollah Khomeini. Rajavi would lead the Mujahedeen with Iraqi support in an attack on the western borders of Iran.[9]

On 26 July 1988, the MEK, with the support of the Iraqi military, started Operation Forough Javidan (Eternal Light) in central Iran. The Mujahedeen worked with the Iraqi Air Force, advancing towards the Iranian city of Kermanshah and advanced rapidly, seizing and destroying the towns of Qasr-e Shirin, Sarpol-e Zahab, Kerend-e Gharb, and Islamabad-e Gharb.[1][10] The MEK met scant resistance from the limited numbers of Revolutionary Guards, which were promptly defeated, pushing 145 km (90 mi) deep into Iran towards the provincial capital city of Kermanshah and the road to Tehran seemed to be wide open.

Iran's Kurdish fighters did somewhat slow the advance, allowing time for the Iranians to prepare their counteroffensive. Once the MEK had advanced beyond the range of effective Iraqi air cover, giving the Iranians air superiority, the Iranian military launched its counter-attack, Operation Mersad, under Lieutenant General Ali Sayyad Shirazi. Iranian paratroopers landed behind the overstretched MEK lines. Iranian Air Force F-4 Phantoms bombed Mujahedeen convoys on the Kermanshah highway, followed by Army Aviation helicopters using anti-tank missiles. Most enemy armour was destroyed, in a miniature version of the Highway of Death during the Persian Gulf War. The MEK advance had been abruptly and completely halted. The Iranian army and Revolutionary Guard then moved north from Khuzestan, encircling and suppressing the remaining resistance in the city of Kerend-e Gharb on 29 July 1988.

On 31 July, Iran drove MEK forces out of Qasr-e-Shirin and Sarpol Zahab, though the MEK claimed to have "voluntarily withdrawn" from the towns. Iran estimated that 4,500 Mujahedeen soldiers were killed, while 400 Iranian soldiers died. The Iranian successes during Operation Mersad were partially due to their decision to establish a unified command structure and permanently quash the differences between the Army and the Revolutionary Guard.

Mujahedeen members killed in Operation Mersad by Pasdaran in Kermanshah at 1988

Under pressure from other Arab states Saddam and MEK did not launch any more attacks on Iran. Operation Mersad was the last land battle of the Iran–Iraq War.

The last notable combat actions of the war took place on 3 August 1988, in the Persian Gulf when the Iranian navy fired on a freighter and Iraq launched chemical attacks on Iranian civilians, killing an unknown number of them and wounding 2,300.

Both sides eventually withdrew to the international border in the coming weeks, with Resolution 598 becoming effective on 8 August 1988, ending all combat operations between the two countries.[102] By 20 August 1988, peace with Iran was restored. UN peacekeepers belonging to the UNIIMOG mission took the field, remaining on the Iran–Iraq border until 1991. While the war was now over, Iraq spent the rest of August and early September clearing the Kurdish resistance. Using 60,000 troops along with helicopter gunships, chemical weapons (poison gas), and mass executions, Iraq hit 15 villages, killing rebels and civilians, and forced tens of thousands of Kurds to relocate to forced settlements.[99] Many Kurdish civilians immigrated to Iran. By 3 September 1988, the anti-Kurd campaign ended, and all resistance had been crushed.[99] 400 Iraqi soldiers and 50,000 Kurdish civilians and soldiers had been killed.

At least in part as a response to the invasion, Iran executed several thousand political prisoners across the country for treason, mainly members of the MEK, but also members of the Tudeh Party (Communist Party) and other opposition groups.[11] The estimates for number of executions vary from as little as 1,400[12] to as high as 12,000. The most likely number was given by dissident Ayatollah Hussein-Ali Montazeri, as being between 3,800–4,500.[13] The death toll may have been higher for those MEK executed by frontline court-martials or dying in prison.

• Farrokh, Kaveh (20 December 2011). Iran at War: 1500–1988. Osprey Publishing. p. 609. ISBN 978-1-78096-221-4.
• "The Lessons of Modern War - Volume II - The Iran–Iraq War (Chapter 10: The Combination Of Iraqi Offensives And Western Intervention Force Iran To Accept A Cease-Fire: September 1987 To March 1989) - May, 1990 - 9005lessonsiraniraqii-chap10.pdf" (PDF). Retrieved 10 October 2014.

• People's Mujahedin of Iran
• Massoud Rajavi
• Operation Forty Stars

• Media related to Operation Mersad at Wikimedia Commons
• sajed.ir in English – The Official site of Holy Defence – Iraq-Iran War 1980–88