Front Burner - Who are Iran's Revolutionary Guards?

Episode Date: March 13, 2026

U.S. intelligence reports this week show that, despite U.S and Israeli strikes, very little has changed about the Iranian regime’s grip since the start of the war.The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or the IRGC for short, along with interim leaders that stepped in after Supreme leader Ali Khamenei’s death, still retain control of the country.The IRGC has been described as a parallel state, and the most powerful institution in Iran outside of the Supreme Leader’s office. They have broad control over Iran’s industry and major sectors of the country’s economy, and have been designated a terror group by Canada and the U.S.Ali Vaez is the International Crisis Group's Iran Project Director. He joins us to discuss the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps – an organization that has a central place in Iran’s public, private and political life, and a key role in the escalating war in the Middle East.For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts

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This is a CBC podcast. Hey everybody, I'm Jamie Poisson. This week, in response to Trump's demand for unconditional surrender, Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard said it was them, not the U.S. president, that would determine the end of the war. Recent U.S. intelligence reports show that despite U.S. Israeli strikes aimed at decapitating and destabilizing the regime, the Revolutionary Guard or the IRGC, along with the religious leaders now

in power, still retain control of the country. The Revolutionary Guard is a complicated institution central to understanding the way Iran functions. They are a political, economic, military, and intelligence organization created in the wake of the Islamic Revolution that was fortified after a brutal years-long war and invasion suffered at the hands of Saddam Hussein's Iraq, a state within a state that positions itself as the vanguard against Western imperialism and fueled by a belief in the inevitable collapse of the United States. Canada and the U.S. are among the countries that have designated them as a terror organization. Ali Vez is the International Crisis Group's Iran Project Director.

He joins us to discuss the Islamic Revolutionary Guard and their role in the ongoing war in the Middle East. Ali, hi. Thank you so much for coming on to the show today. Hi, it's great to see you. Thanks for having me. People outside of Iran often make the mistake of describing the revolution. Revolutionary Guard is just another branch of the military or somehow muddying the waters between the military and the IRGC. And why don't we start by clarifying that difference and explaining what the IRGC actually is inside the Iranian system? I think what you said in the intro that it's a state within a state is the most accurate description because a military is obviously men with arms. but the IRGC is way beyond that because it has an economic conglomerate, its presence in the Iranian economy is almost ubiquitous. It's in every sector of Iranian economy, small projects, big projects, private sector, semi-private, it doesn't matter, is across the board. It has its own media companies. It has its own TV channels. It has its own newspapers. It has its own social media network.

It's present in all elements of state in the parliament, in the government, in the governor's offices, some of the very senior officials in the system are the veterans of the Revolutionary Guards. So it is really the most present and the most obvious power in the country, the most organized. It is not like the army of any other country or even the Iranian army, which is a class. army that is tasked with the specific, you know, mandates of safeguarding the country's borders and security. On that point, you know, most nations have federal policing bureaus. I'm thinking about the FBI in the U.S., the RCMP here in Canada. Most nations also have foreign intelligence divisions as well, the CIA in the U.S., Mossade in Israel, the GRU in Russia. But this particular kind

of institution, which, as you have explained, has its tentacles spread so widely across so much of the country's security, intelligence, economic, technological, ideological, spiritual life, as well as the security and intelligence operations, outside Iran as well. Why did Iran post-Islamic revolution establish this kind of institution? The reason that the 1979 revolution succeeded, and in fact the day that the Islamic Republic celebrates the revolution day, is the day that the Shah's army declared its neutrality in the conflict between the state and the society. Now, the Shah's army was U.S. trained, U.S. organized, and in fact, it was through pressure of some U.S. generals who were on the ground, that the army decided not to go for a coup or to try to crush the revolution, but actually side with the people.

But for that exact reason, the revolutionaries didn't trust the army. And they needed to create a patalo institution that would be only loyal to them. But they also didn't want to make the mistake that the U.S. committed in 2003 with debatification in Iraq. There will be a vetting process. Part of it will occur when people step forward to do something. People will say, well, wait a minute. Those people were part of the senior bath party, in which case they'll be taken out. Because then you would basically create an insurgency against yourself.

So what they did was that they created a parallel army, which was supposed to only safeguard the revolution. You look at the title of the IRGC. It's called the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. It doesn't even have the word Iran in it because it signifies that its mandate is to protect the revolution. Now, over the years, of course, the border between the Army and the Revolutionary Guards has become very nebulous. There's been a lot of exchanges. Some of the Revolutionary Guards commanders have become Army's commanders or the other way around. And the Revolutionary Guards, especially in the Joint Chief's Office, has always had the upper hand.

And defense ministry has at the upper hand. So now I think the distinction is not as meaningful. as it was in the beginning of the revolution. So that's one point. The second is that also the reason that the revolution guards became so powerful is that in the aftermath of the Iran-Iraq War, which is the crucible in which the revolutioning guards basically learned the art of the war and was matured, there was no place for them. The army had a specific task of safeguarding the country.

but how do you on a daily basis safeguard the revolution when it's peace time? So that's why the Revolution Guards was used in the reconstruction after the war. And that's an economic activity. They were supposed to be engaged only in some mega projects. But then that became a slippery slope and they got engaged in all aspects of the country's economy. And from there, they went into politics and intelligence and so on. and they became the very powerful actor of the arts day. One part of the Guard that we haven't talked about is its elite external operations unit called the Quds Force.

This is the branch responsible for managing Iran's network of proxies and militias, right? Iran often avoids direct confrontation with its adversaries and instead works through like allied militias. And so to what extent has the Quds Force been like the principal architect and foot soldiers of that strategy? So you're absolutely right that, you know, from the early on, the early 1980s, basically, the Iranians realized that one way of trying to deter their enemies was to hire partners and proxies away from their borders to deter attacks on their soil. They cultivated and created Hezbollah in Lebanon in 1982, and there were certain individuals within the Revolutionary Guards who were in charge of those relationships. But it was not really organized as an expeditionary force. It was only in the late 1990s that they created a branch called the Goetz Force, which was in charge of foreign operations. The current commander of the Revolutionary Guards, who took office just after his predecessor and his predecessors,

predecessors were killed in the recent confrontations with Israel, was the first commander of the Goats Force, General Vahidi. And then after him, it was the infamous General Soleimani, who created this massive network of Iranian proxies in the region called the Axis of the Axis of the region, resistance and really managed to project power way beyond Iran's borders. He really spoke in public but gave this interview, saying Iran's IRCG had expanded Islamic resistance to half a million square kilometers, connecting Iran through Iraq and Syria to Lebanon. They're deeply ingrained in the societies in which they operate. They often speak very good Arabic or Dari or order. do or wherever they are based and have proven very effective in cultivating these relationships

so that these groups don't necessarily think that they're doing Iran's bidding, but they are part of this bigger project in which Iran's interests have been advanced. And just for people listening, Soleimani was the guy that Trump assassinated in his first correct, in January 2020. He survived many attacks on his life. inside Iran and abroad. But it would be in Iraq, where Shia militias, trained by his Quds force, killed hundreds of Americans that the U.S. ended his reign, age 62.

I'm curious, like, how did the Supreme Leader feel about overseeing the building of an institution that wielded this kind of power over the public and political life of his country? So the founder of the revolution, Ayatollah Khomeini, was actually against the military getting into politics and had explicitly banned it. But he had the, he was a unique revolutionary leader in the sense that he succeeded in his revolutionary project. He toppled the Shah, ended 2,500 years of monarchy in Iran. He had the charisma, the religious credentials, and the followership to feel secure in his position. But his successor, Ayatallah Khomeini, who was killed in the opening act of this war.

He was an underdog. He religiously was not even an Ayatollah when he became Supreme Leader, was not charismatic, was not very popular. And so he actually saw in the Revolutionary Guards as a lynchpin for his power. And he's the one who basically built the entire edifice of his. dominance of the Islamic Republic on the pillar of the Revolutionary Guards. But they were always subservient to him. And that's because he was the commander-in-chief, and he could always shuffle the commanders in a way that no one would be able to gain

too much popularity within the rank and file, and no one would trust the other commander to be able to coalesce and try to topple Khomey. So he played this game in a very complex way so that he would always remain above the fray and would be able to subjugate the Revolutionary Guards. And I guess to that point, could you tell me more about the role of the IRGC in carrying out acts of repression on dissenting Iranians, anything that might threaten the Ayatollah's leadership, I guess? Yeah, so because there were Ayatollah Khomeini's tools, they would do his bidding across the board, whether a politician would challenge Ayatollah Khomeini's authority. This happened with the reformist president Khatami in early 2000s, and the Revolutionary Guards commanders issued a threatening statement against the setting president

that if he wants to deliver on the agenda that he had promised to the electorate, they will stop him. or, you know, in faced with uprisings, it was the Revolutionary Guards who was responsible for crushing the protests and making sure that any organized movement against the regime was nipped in the bud. But this is not something that they were freelancing on. They were doing all of this on behalf of Ayatollah Khomeini, who had a very firm vision on how he wanted to. rule and in which direction he wanted Iran to move. And whoever challenged that direction, whether they were old allies or elected politicians or civil society actors or even student activists, everybody who stood in his way,

he would ask the Revolutionary Guards to sideline or eliminate. This ascent isn't for everyone. You need grit to climb this high this often. You've got to be an underdog that always over-delivers. You've got to be 6,500 hospital staff, 1,000 doctors, all doing so much with so little. You've got to be Scarborough. Defined by our uphill battle and always striving towards new heights. And you can help us keep climbing.

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And contact Desjardin today. We'd love to talk, business. Since the end of February, now we have seen the elimination of the Supreme Leader and then many other senior leaders, attacks on Iran soil. They are in direct conflict now with the greatest military power in the region and the greatest military power in the world. But like despite all of this, I'm reading and speaking with expert after expert who's talking about the fact that the Iranian political and security apparatus has proven more resilient. than they had even predicted, essentially that the Iranian system was designed in part to sustain and survive through shocks just like this. And I just, do you see evidence of that as well? And, you know, tell me more about why that is. Yeah. So look, one of the maybe benefits of working with the military is that the military is always tasked with learning lessons from other experiences and having contingency plans.

And so Ayatala Khomeini, for instance, after the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, realizing how quickly the U.S. is able to destroy command and control if it's concentrated in the capital, in cooperation with the Revolutionary Guards, came up with this design, which is known as the mosaic setup, in which every province, 31 provinces in Iran, would have their own command and control. and this would make it so much more difficult to basically paralyze the system through decapitation. And by cultivating these relationships for many years, Harmony could also have each Revolutioning Guards commander

having basically four layers of succession already planned. So this is a regime that is deeply entrenched and also deeply benched. You saw in the 12-day war in 2025 and the very impressive operation known as the red wedding that Israel conducted and eliminated two dozen IRGC top generals, the system could replace them in a matter of hours and start punching back. And again, we're seeing it this time around that the elimination of the Supreme Leader, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards, many other senior military leaders really did not paralyze the system. because it was designed to absorb these shocks, remain coherent and cohesive, and be able to retaliate.

This is what I think President Trump underestimated, and this is what has made it very difficult for him to be able to draw a line under this conflict and declare victory. The IRGC's worldview, well, isn't just political, right? It's theological, ideological. I've seen experts liken the way they think about the U.S. not as a dispute

between two nations, but a clash of civilizations. And they have spent decades predicting the collapse of the U.S. Empire, the 2008 crisis, the January 6th capital insurrection, George Floyd protests were all used as evidence of a prophecy being fulfilled.

The idea here being that the decline of the U.S. is divinely ordained, I think, right? And Iran is the force that will be responsive. for accelerating that decline. And just could you tell me about how central this story is to the IRGC's worldview, how it came about? So look, the Iranian Revolution was an ideological movement. And it does have some of those elements sort of ingrained in its narrative, that this is a battle of good against evil and God and Islam are on the side of Iran.

and, you know, Iranians are doing the right thing and eventually they will prevail. But honestly, I think there's a little bit of hype around the ideological elements here because you can see that the Iranian system as a whole of revolutionary guards in particular, they had adjusted their policies whenever necessary and expedient in a way that was much more pragmatic than ideological.

And I give you examples. instance, you know, the Revolutionary Guards agreed not to test any missiles during the two and a half years of negotiations that led to the 2050 nuclear deal. Or, you know, the Iranian regime that portrayed the United States as great Satan, you know, did a nuclear deal with it and implemented it. It's on end of the bargain, you know, religiously even after the U.S. withdrew from the agreement. Or you could see that, you know, the Revolutionary Guards, the first attack that they launched against Israel from their own territory, they telegraphed in advance so that there will be no fatalities on the ground or at least with the aim of minimizing casualties.

This is not a system that is primarily driven by ideology, but is ideology a motivating factor? Does it help them get through difficult periods? Certainly. But I think experience is basically the first part of whatever calculation they come up with. What do you think these guys think of Trump, really? Because I guess on the one hand, he designated them a terrorist group. He has attacked them. But on the other hand, he is a deeply polarizing president.

He is tearing at the fabric. of America. He seems to have this kind of spheres of power view of the world. And I do imagine that these things would be seen by the IRGC as forces to kind of hasten America as decline or influence. And do you think they see him as at all favorable to them? I think they don't understand him. At times they underestimate him. At times they older estimate him. You know, they believe sometimes that he's too strategic and plays the game of deception very well. At other times, they believe that he's a gambler without necessarily having a plan. It is very clear that I think overall they have difficulty understanding how Trump functions

and how Trump sees the world. But one thing is clear. he has killed more Revolutionary Guards senior commanders than any other U.S. president or anybody else for that matter. And therefore, is definitely seen by them as the definition of enemy. But, you know, that doesn't necessarily mean, again, that down the road they would not be willing to act in a pragmatic way. one has to remember that the Saddam regime was also, you know, the enemy that Iran fought against for eight years. And after the end of the Iran-Iraq war, the same people were fighting him, reestablished diplomatic relations with Iraq and even cooperated with Iraq for a period of time before Saddam was toppled. So these are people who, or, you know, the same.

Iranians cooperated or the IRGC cooperated with the U.S. military to topple the Taliban only to end up working with Taliban a few years later when the writing was on the wall that the Taliban would return to power. So at this moment they see him as enemy, but that doesn't mean that that's not going to change in the future. Do you think that they see him as a force that will ultimately weaken America's decline? And is that like something that they they find could help them? So look, I think there was a anti-American circle around Chominee who was giving him all of these like half-baked analysis about the future of America. And at every turn that the U.S. would suffer some sort of setback. They say, well, here's the evidence that this is the beginning of the end.

And of course, that didn't materialize, and Iran actually declined way more and faster than the United States. And there is generally, as a result of this rupture between the two countries, a lot of miscomprehension between the two sides. The Americans don't understand Iran well. Iranians don't understand America well. And I think, you know, there is certainly hope among some circles in Iran that the U.S. is in decline and what Trump is doing would accelerate that decline. But, you know, the problem is that the timelines might not necessarily help with, you know, whatever this regime has in mind because, yes, empires decline. They're not there forever, although the United States is a unique empire because it's, it's

multinational, multicultural, and can constantly reinvent itself, which is a skill that a lot of other historic empires in the world did not have. But even if Russia and China rise and even if there is more competition for the United States, it might not help the Islamic Republic in the short run. That is the one thing that I think Ayatullah Khomey didn't understand. And now we have to see if its successors or the Revolutionary Guards will be able to rectify that miscalation. Israel and the U.S. have said the military campaign they're carrying out today is designed to weaken Iran's government.

And on the U.S. side, I know that those goalposts have shifted, but at one point they did say this. But as we've talked about today, as has been the case with the Revolutionary Guard in the past, this kind of external pressure actually seems to strengthen them, to corroborate their paranoia. Is it possible that if they emerge from this conflict still standing, still governing the official, of the country and claimed they fought the United States in Israel and did not capitulate that they could come out not weaker, but more militarized and hawkish. Well, it's not just possible. It has already happened. You know, the new Supreme leader, who's the son of the last Supreme Leader, is very close to the Revolutionary Guards. The reason he has been selected is because he's the Revolutionary Guards candidates. And without

them, he would not be able to remain in power. And so my argument is that he's not going to be as supreme as his father was. It's going to be subservient to the Revolutionary Guards. The two men who are currently running the country, Speaker of Parliament, Muhammad Baguer Ghali Baf, was the former commander of Revolutionary Guards Air Force. The National Security Advisor, Ali Larijani, is also a veteran of the Revolutionary Guards. So the Revolutionary Guards is already running the country. And whatever comes next is going to be a revolutionary guard's power structure, whether it's officially men with uniforms, assuming positions of power, or whether they are behind the curtain, kind of similar to Pakistan or to Egypt, but the revolutionary

guards is going to call the shots in the future of Iran. And that's the irony of this war. war and all the pressure that Western countries like the U.S., from Canada or the European Union have imposed on the Revolutionary Guards as produced, which is that as a result of sanctions and isolation, the Revolutionary Guards was enriched because it monopolized all channels of trade that were cut off because of sanctions. And as a result of this war, it has reached the most prominent and the pinnacle of power in Iran. So the group that was designated as a foreign terrorist organization by many countries,

including Canada, is the one that the world would have to deal with probably for years to come. Okay, but it feels like a good place for us to end. Ali, thank you very much for this. My pleasure. All right, that is all for today. Front burner was produced this week by Kevin Sexton, Kieran Outtshorn, Shannon Higgins, Matthew Almaha, Lauren Donnelly, and McKenzie Cameron. Thanks this week to David Michael Lamb, Jordan Pearson, and Peter Johnson from CBC's visual verification team and to Leitz of sortsids. Frontburner's intern is Riley Cunningham. Our YouTube producer is John Lean. Our music is by Joseph Shabbison. Our senior producers are Elaine Chow and Imogen Burchard. Our executive producer is Nick McCabe-Locose. And I'm Jamie Ploosso. Thanks so much for listening. Talk to you next week.

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