The 368th Night of Remembrance – Part 2

Compiled by: Iranian Oral History Website
Translated by Kianoush Borzouei

2025-7-9

The 368th session of the Night of Remembrance took place on 1 Khordad 1404 at the Andisheh Hall of the Artistic Sect of the Islamic Republic, dedicated to commemorating the martyrs of public service. In this gathering, Seyed Mohammad Jowzi, Sardar Nasrollah Saeedi, and Masoud Dehnamaki shared their personal accounts. The session was hosted by Davoud Salehi.

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The second speaker of the night was Sardar Nasrollah Saeedi, born on May 23, 1961, in Isfahan. A comrade of the martyred Mohsen Hajbaba, he was attending an IRGC training camp at the onset of the Iran–Iraq War and ultimately served for approximately 73 months on the battlefront.

He opened his remarks by saying:

“I was admitted to university in 1979 and moved to Tehran for my studies. However, in early 1980, with the onset of the Cultural Revolution, universities were shut down.

During this period, I worked briefly with the Jihad of Construction and later in the case-review department of the Ministry of Agriculture.

Militant factions were inciting unrest across the country, and with the universities closed, I decided to enlist in the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

My younger brother—commander of a battalion—was later declared missing in Operation Ramadan.”

Saeedi then spoke about the final days of training before the war:

“On the night of September 21, 1980, as enemy aircraft began their bombing raids, we found ourselves in extremely difficult and chaotic circumstances.

We only had one M1 rifle at our disposal. We were taken into the deserts surrounding a military base that today is the Imam Hossein University. We were told that Iraq might deploy paratroopers and that our mission was to engage them using our rifles—without ammunition—as clubs to disarm and capture their weapons so we could fight.”

He continued:

“At the conclusion of the training period, I was unexpectedly appointed as a commander and tasked with leading our group to the front.

We waited for a week at Imam Hassan Base for our weapons to arrive. Once armed, we deployed to the front.

I was inexperienced—having received only about six weeks of training and fired just a few rounds—but I was assigned command of a 150-man platoon in the 27th Division. Because of my small stature and Isfahani accent, I became the target of relentless teasing and jokes.”

He described the intense security atmosphere of those early days:

“We were warned at the base to beware of infiltrators. If a beggar or cigarette-seller approached and asked, ‘Who is your commander?’ or ‘How many of you are there?’, we were to say nothing.

One of the soldiers asked me, ‘What should we say instead?’ Off the cuff, I said, ‘Just say I don’t know.’

That phrase caught on—everyone responded, ‘I don’t know.’

Later, we boarded a train to Andimeshk, and from there, traveled by night to Ahvaz.

Because of my lack of command experience, by the time I attempted to coordinate transport, the seasoned troops had already boarded the buses and left us behind!

While searching for the deployment officer, I found out he had been asking the troops about their commander and unit size, and they had all replied, ‘I don’t know!’

Finally, he approached me and exclaimed, ‘Brother! Did you feed your men “I-don’t-know” pills?!’

That was when I realized they had repeated exactly what I had trained them to say.”

Saeedi then recounted being wounded on the Susangerd front and transported to Fatemeh Zahra Hospital in Tehran. There, he met a cheerful young man whose leg had been amputated below the knee:

“He asked me, ‘Why are you walking like that?’

I said, ‘I’ve been hit by shrapnel.’

After a while, I asked about his story. He said, ‘I’m probably the only soldier whose leg was amputated without firing a single shot.’ He had rushed to Khorramshahr after hearing about the siege, despite not having a weapon. They told him to wait until a wounded fighter left behind a weapon. But instead, he joined the fight without proper training, and before he could fire even once, a bullet hit his leg.”

He then described the sense of maturity and responsibility among young soldiers:

“I saw how 20-year-olds quickly rose to command entire battalions and played critical roles in major operations like Fath al-Mobin and Ramadan.

They attained a remarkable level of discipline, cohesion, and spiritual insight far beyond their years.”

Saeedi highlighted an incident from Operation Valfajr-2 and the battle to reclaim part of the Haj Omran region:

“We were stationed atop a ridge before we could build any trenches.

Iraq sent in an elite commando battalion to seize the heights.

Down below, Hazrat Qasem Battalion clashed with enemy forces but eventually had to retreat under heavy fire. Iraqi forces advanced close to our position, but retreat never crossed our minds. Fighting escalated to hand-to-hand combat. Despite taking heavy casualties, the Iraqis failed to capture the summit due to the fierce resistance of our fighters. In their desperation, they captured Mohammad Chizari, a small-framed Iranian soldier, and tried to take him back with them.

We couldn’t fire—we feared hitting him.

Later, he recounted: ‘I realized no one could help me, so I grabbed one Iraqi’s ear and twisted it hard. He screamed in pain and let me go, and I escaped.’”

He then recalled the martyrdom of Abbas Qomi:

“He had a beautiful habit—before drinking water, he would first look to the sky, then turn toward Karbala, salute Imam Hussein, and only then drink.

During a battle, as he raised his canteen and turned toward Karbala, he was struck by enemy fire and martyred in that sacred gesture.”

In the final segment of his narrative, Saeedi described Operation Beit al-Moqaddas-2 and displayed a photo of Mawoot, a mountainous region in Iraq:

“The terrain was rugged and treacherous. We had to scale rocks, sometimes using steel cables, and even fabricate rifle grenades by hand just to keep moving forward.”

To be continued…