War commander narrates Operation Fat’h al-Mobin

Chenaneh

Mahya Hafezi
Translated by M. B. Khoshnevisan

2023-12-26

The book “Chenaneh” authored by the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Brigadier General Fatollah Jafari is about different phases of Operation Fat’h al-Mobin. Jafari is the founder of IRGC combat units. He also set up the IRGC 3^rd Combat Brigade and Division. The book’s title has been chosen from the name of a village in Shush area liberated during the operation.

The book begins with the publisher’s preface and the author’s introduction. The introduction says that the author has tried to compile his observations from the 18-month events before and during the Operation Fat’h al-Mobin. To do this, he has used his observations at the Golf base (the headquarters of IRGC operations in the south), the headquarters of Karbala, Fat’h, Fajr, Nasr, Quds, and the clash scenes of the operation. Also, to compile this book, the documents obtained from the Ba’ath army, the interrogation report of Iraqi prisoners, reconnaissance and operation reports, conversations with the commanders of the army and the IRGC, calculations and maps prepared by martyr Hassan Bagheri, as well as the author's diary calendar since 1360 (1981), has been used.

In continuation, we are facing eleven chapters. The first chapter titled "Generalities" is an introduction to the beginning of the war and Iraq's military strategy in attacking northern Khuzestan. In this chapter, the author has an overview of the events that happened during the war up to the Operation Fat’h al-Mobin.

The second chapter titled "The First Armored Units of the IRGC" is a narrative that starts from Azar 1360 (December 1981):

On the morning of Friday 13th of Azar 1360 (December 4, 1981), it was not yet light when I put on the cap of the radio receiver of the T-62 tank of the Iraqis. Without changing the frequency, on the other side of the wireless, I heard the voice of the Iraqi commander (Brigadier Maher Abdul Rashid) shouting angrily at the troops under his command. This commander had failed in recapturing the city of Bostan and crossing the Sableh Bridge, he was trying to vent his anger on his subordinates... We should have transferred those seven abandoned tanks to the back of our embankment as soon as possible; because the enemy wanted to destroy them so that they don't fall into our hands.

After the history of the formation of the first armored units of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the book deals with the training and development of armored battalions, attending the planning sessions of the Operation Fat’h al-Mobin, explaining the stages and routes of this operation, as well as its achievements. One of the important features of the book is the description of the various phases of the operation and the analysis of the war commanders form the weak and strong points.

The book has fluent prose and is written like a story, and the reader is not bored and encouraged to read it. This work is one of the few oral history books for which a lot of time, precision and patience have been spent to illustrate the content. Many footnotes can be seen in various places of the pages until the end of the book.

Another feature of the book is the use of many and suitable pictures next to the text. Wherever a person's name is mentioned, there is a picture of him. The pictures are not limited to individuals, and wherever necessary, pictures of military equipment, operational areas, aerial photographs, war maps, etc. are also included in the book. Although the images are printed in black and white, they are of high quality. Of course, the appendices are printed in four colors.

The 11th and final chapter of the book ends this way:

After the meeting, I went to Reza Amani in Shush and carefully visited all the liberated areas with him. After that, we once again went to the liberated village of Chenaneh, where we had been waiting to see for a year and a half.

The most important point in the area was the Sendal swamp, where seventy tanks from the 29th Armored Battalion and the Abu Obeidah Tank Battalion from the 51st Armored Brigade of Iraq were caught in it while escaping. The 35th brigade of Imam Sajjad (PBUH) had taken the light vehicles, motorcycles and portable equipment. We kept the headquarters in Shush so that we could remove the tanks from this swamp in addition to armored transferring from the area.

In the section of appendices, relatively detailed descriptions of military equipment, along with their photos, are given. Also, in this section, there are colored pictures of operational maps, liberated areas, and the Basijis sent to the operational area of Fat’h al Mobin. The final part of the book is a very complete index that will be of great help to researchers in 26 pages.

The first edition of “Chenaneh” has been published by the Center for Holy Defense Documents and Research in 480 pages and 1000 copies in the year 1402 (2023).