Sacred Defense no incontestable fact

Rear admiral Ali Shamkhani says the Sacred Defense is no incontestable fact. "Indisputable things are finite. Questioning the Sacred Defense brightens it," he said.

IBNA: The closing ceremony of the 2nd Sacred Defense Documents exhibition titled as the Honor Documents was held last morning (September 27, 2011) in the presence of rear admiral Ali Shamkhani, head of the Strategic Defense Research Center, Eshagh Salahi, head of the National Library and Archives Organization of the Islamic Republic of Iran, commander Ahmad Sodagar, head of the Sacred Defense Sciences Research Center, and representatives of a number of state and private foundations. The ceremony was held at the Documents Treasury of the National Library.

In his opening speech, colonel Kazem Faramarzi, head of the Sacred Defense National Library and Archives Center, called to mind the first edition of the exhibition held last September and stated that the encouraging feedback from the event prompted them to organize the fair this year in the Sacred Defense week.

He asserted that the number-one concern of everyone involved in the defense is recording its events chronologically. "Working on Sacred Defense documents is challenged from four dimensions: linking document centers with research associations, elimination of the documents concerning activities of state organizations, assessment and evaluation of the documents, and oral history."

In the past two decades, oral history, as a reliable source of Sacred Defense data, has been overlooked by most researchers, he added.

Later in the ceremony, rear admiral Ali Shamkhani praised the cause to hold Sacred Defense documents exhibition as a precious measure and stated that the transfer of Sacred Defense issues in an academic fashion by the research center of Sacred Defense Sciences is a positive step which should be followed by the proper classification of the war data.

The military thought has been the case even in the pre-history era but we [Iranians] have been weak in recording and analyzing such theories posed by our commanders, he argued.

A former top Sacred Defense commander, Shamkhani added what we have at hand in Iran regarding war documents is not enough for providing a perfect depiction of what really occurred in the eight years of its happening; rather "we must try to gain access to documents recorded in Iran by its forces. Such documents are expected to help us draw a superior image of why many things happened in the war."

The 2nd Sacred Defense Documents Exhibition was run for three days finishing yesterday (September 27, 2011). The event was arranged jointly by the Sacred Defense Library and Archives Center and the Army of the Guardians of the Islamic Revolution, the Islamic Republic of Iran Army, the Guardian Forces, the Ministry of Agriculture, the Foundation of Martyrs and Veterans' Affairs, the Oil Ministry, the Historical Documents Assessment Center, the President's Documents Research and Measurement Center and the National Library and Archives Organization of the Islamic Republic of Iran.