Order Code RS22323
November 15, 2005
CRS Report for Congress
Received through the CRS Web
Iran’s Influence in Iraq
Kenneth Katzman
Specialist in Middle Eastern Affairs
Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division
Summary
Iran’s influence over the post-Saddam government in Iraq is substantial because the
predominant parties in that government have long enjoyed Tehran’s sponsorship. An
emerging concern is that Iran’s influence has extended to support for militant groups in
Iraq. Some U.S. statements and press sources say that sophisticated explosive devices
are entering Iraq from Iran, suggesting that Iran, or factions within Iran, are backing
Iraqi factions that use violence to oppose the U.S. and allied military presence in Iraq.
This report will be updated as warranted by regional developments. See also CRS
Report RL32048, Iran: U.S. Concerns and Policy Responses.
Background
The issue of Iranian support for militant groups in Iraq arises within the context of
the accession to power in Iraq of pro-Iranian political groupings that had been active
against Saddam Hussein’s regime for many years, and had long enjoyed Iranian support.
Some of these groups now in power in Iraq were in exile in Iran during the Saddam years,
and had the opportunity to gain substantial familiarity with Iran’s leaders. This
background has led Iranian leaders to characterize Iran’s provision of funds and political
support to Shiite Muslim groups in Iraq as humanitarian and targeted on groups in Iraq
that had long suffered repression at the hands of Saddam Hussein. Moreover, the fall of
Saddam Hussein has opened Iraq and its Shiite holy cities of Najaf and Karbala to an
influx of Shiite pilgrims from Iran, estimated at two million per year. These post-Saddam
trends and developments give Iran an opportunity and justification to send representatives
into Iraq from virtually all of Iran’s various ministries and Shiite Islamic charity
organizations.
Since the fall of Saddam Hussein, Iran has showcased its growing political and
economic influence over and mentorship of the Iraqi government. During exchanges of
high-level visits in the summer of 2005, including a large Iraqi delegation led by Prime
Minister Ibrahim al-Jafari in July, Iraqi officials essentially took responsibility for starting
the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, indirectly blamed Saddam Hussein for ordering the use of
chemical weapons against Iranian forces during that conflict, and condemned Israel.
During a defense ministerial exchange, the two countries signed military cooperation
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agreements, as well as agreements to open diplomatic facilities in Basra and Karbala (two
major cities in Iraq’s mostly Shiite south), and agreements on new transportation and
energy links, including oil swaps and possibly future oil pipeline connections. Iran
offered Iraq a $1 billion credit line as well. Iraq denies that the military agreements
signed include commitments by Iran to train Iraqi forces, saying the cooperation is limited
to border security, landmine removal, remaining POW/MIA issues from the Iran-Iraq war,
and information sharing.
Iran’s Political Strategy in Iraq
Iran’s objective in Iraq is primarily political, now that the conventional military and
weapons of mass destruction (WMD) threat from Saddam Hussein has been removed.
The thrust of Iran’s strategy in Iraq has been to engineer and perpetuate domination of
Iraq’s government by pro-Iranian Shiite Islamist movements that would, in Iran’s view,
likely align Iraq’s foreign policy with that of Iran. To that end, Iran’s leaders and
diplomats have sought to persuade all Iraqi Shiite Islamist factions in Iraq to work
together through the U.S.-orchestrated political process, because the sheer number of
Shiites in Iraq (about 60% of the population) virtually ensures Shiite predominance of
government. To this extent, Iran’s orientation in Iraq differs little from the main emphasis
of U.S. policy in Iraq, which is to set up a democratic process that reflects majority
preferences. Iran’s strategy bore fruit with victory by a Shiite Islamist bloc (“United
Iraqi Alliance”) in the January 30, 2005 National Assembly elections. That bloc, which
won 140 of the 275 Assembly seats, includes all of Iran’s Shiite Islamist protégés in Iraq,
particularly the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), the most
pro-Iranian of the groups, and the Da’wa (Islamic Call) party. The Prime Minister of Iraq
is Da’wa’s leader Ibrahim al-Jafari.
SCIRI controls a militia called the “Badr Brigades” (now renamed the “Badr
Organization”) which number about 20,000. Badr fighters are playing unofficial policing
roles in Basra and other Shiite cities. Those Badr members that have joined the national
Iraqi police and military forces are widely said to retain their loyalties to Badr and SCIRI.
The Badr Brigades were formed, trained, and equipped by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard,
politically aligned with Iran’s hardliners, during the Iran-Iraq war. During that war, Badr
guerrillas conducted forays from Iran into southern Iraq to attack Baath Party officials, but
the Badr forays did not spark broad popular unrest against Saddam Hussein’s regime.
Some Sunnis have accused Badr fighters of conducting retaliatory attacks on Sunnis
suspected of links to the insurgency. (A related militia called the “Wolf Brigade” is a
Badr offshoot that is formally under the Ministry of Interior’s control. It is led by a SCIRI
activist.)
Iranian leaders have also cultivated ties to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the 75-
year-old Iranian-born Shiite cleric who is de-facto leader of mainstream Shiite Islamists.
However, Sistani has differed with Iran’s doctrine of direct clerical involvement. As a
revered Shiite cleric with a large following in Iran itself, Sistani resists political direction
from Iran.
Iran’s relations with Moqtada Al Sadr, another Shiite Islamist cleric, are more
complicated. The 31-year-old is a scion of the revered Sadr clan and he has strongly
criticized the U.S. presence in Iraq. His great uncle, Mohammad Baqr Al Sadr, was a
contemporary and ally of Iran’s Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, and was hung by Saddam

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Hussein in 1980. Unlike SCIRI and Da’wa leaders, Sadr and his clan remained in Iraq
during Saddam’s rule, and Sadr has generally been seen as a rival to those parties for pre-
eminence among Iraq’s Shiites. For these reasons, Iran’s relations with Sadr are
somewhat more tenuous and uneven than Iran’s relations with Da’wa and SCIRI. Iran’s
strategy thus far apparently has been to build ties to Sadr and attempt to persuade him to
work with SCIRI, Da’wa, and Ayatollah Sistani in the political process, while tolerating
— or possibly even encouraging — his occasional challenges to U.S. and British forces
in southern Iraq.
Like SCIRI, Sadr believes that it is useful to maintain his own militia in post-
Saddam southern Iraq. In mid-2003, Sadr began recruiting a militia (the “Mahdi Army”)
to combat U.S. forces. U.S. military operations put down Mahdi Army uprisings in April
2004 and August 2004 in Sadr City (a Shiite-inhabited slum area of Baghdad), Najaf, and
other Shiite cities. In each case, fighting was ended with compromises under which
Mahdi forces stopped fighting in exchange for amnesty for Sadr himself. Since August
2004, the Mahdi Army has largely ended active anti-U.S. activity, but Mahdi fighters
continue to patrol Sadr City and parts of other Shiite cities, particularly in Basra, where
they have sought to ensure that personal behavior conforms to Islam and tradition. Mahdi
(and Badr Brigade) assertiveness in Basra has partly accounted for a sharp deterioration
of relations since July 2005 between Iraqi officials in Basra and the British forces that
conduct peacekeeping in the city.
A variety of press reports say that other Shiite militias are performing informal police
functions in southern Iraq. One such militia is derived from the fighters who challenged
Saddam Hussein’s forces in the southern marsh areas, around the town of Amara, north
of Basra. It goes by the name Hizbollah-Iraq and it is headed by guerrilla leader Abdul
Karim Muhammadawi, who was on the Iraq Governing Council during the U.S.
occupation period (May 2003-June 2004). Hizbollah-Iraq apparently plays a major role
in policing Amara and environs. (Muhammadawi has agreed to run on the slate of Deputy
Prime Minister Ahmad Chalabi in the December 15, 2005 elections. Chalabi has been
politically close to Iran and reportedly has been under U.S. investigation for passing U.S.
military secrets to Iran.)
Iranian support to Sunni Muslim insurgents in Iraq, such as foreign volunteers
commanded by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, would not appear to fit Iran’s political strategy
in Iraq. These factions are attempting to bring down Iraq’s government in which pro-
Iranian factions are predominant, an objective clearly not shared by Iran. On the other
hand, some believe that Iran might want to support Sunni insurgents for no other purpose
than to cause harm to the U.S. military position in Iraq. Another interpretation is that
some of Iran’s assistance to Shiite factions such as Sadr’s group is being re-transferred
to Sunni guerrillas without Iran’s knowledge or support. Sadr has held talks with some
major Sunni militant groups in an effort to forge a Shiite-Sunni anti-U.S. alliance.
Official Assertions of Iranian Support to Armed Groups
Some U.S. and allied officials appear to believe that Iran’s agenda in Iraq might be
broader and more threatening than providing political support to pro-Iranian factions.
According to experts who share this view, Iran might be seeking to develop a broad range
of options in Iraq that include sponsoring insurgent violence to pressure U.S. and British
forces to leave Iraq or simply to weaken the United States in Iraq. In August 2005,

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Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld confirmed press reports that U.S. forces had found some
Iranian-supplied explosives (reportedly including highly lethal shaped explosives) in Iraq.1
He did not specify whether the weapons shipments had formal Iranian government
approval, or even which Iraqi faction(s) the bombs were intended for. On October 6,
2005, British Prime Minister Blair made similar allegations about Iran, backing up press
comments the previous day from an unnamed British government official who alleged
that Iran had supplied explosive devices to Sadr’s Mahdi Army.2 Blair, in his public
comments, attributed the shipments to “Iranian elements” or Iran’s ally, Lebanese
Hizballah, acting on Iran’s behalf, and he asserted that the explosives had been used to
kill eight British soldiers in and around Basra since July 2005.
Recent Press Allegations
The statements of Secretary Rumsfeld and Prime Minister Blair, cited above,
characterized Iran’s aid to militant groups in Iraq in very general terms. Recent press
reports have offered more specific information, which might form the underpinnings of
the official statements. Two major recent articles, one in U.S. News and World Report
and one in Time magazine, as well as other press reports, discuss allegations of Iranian
material support to militant groups in Iraq as follows:3
! According to the Time report, which it says is based on U.S. military
intelligence documents, Iran’s Revolutionary Guard has set up a network
in Iraq, headed by Abu Mustafa al-Sheibani, with the expressed purpose
of committing violence against U.S. and coalition forces in Iraq. The
report adds that it is this network that has brought into Iraq new types of
“shaped” explosive charges that can pierce U.S. armor, which U.S.
commanders in Iraq have warned in November 2005 are a growing
source of lethal attacks on U.S. forces. According to the Time report,
Sheibani’s group “consists of 280 members, divided into 17 bomb-
making teams and death squads. The U.S. believes they train in
Lebanon, in Baghdad’s predominantly Shiite Sadr City district and ‘in
another country’ and have detonated at least 37 bombs against U.S.
forces this year in Baghdad alone.” The report added that it was
explosive devices planted by Sheibani’s group that killed three British
soldiers in Amarah (north of Basra) in July 2005.
! According to the Time report, Iranian-supported militant groups,
including one called Thar Allah (Vengeance of God), are responsible for
assassinations in southern Iraq against former members of Saddam’s
intelligence service and even some (presumably Sunni Muslim) members
of Iraq’s newly reconstituted National Intelligence Service. Thar Allah
is reportedly headed by Yusif al-Musawi. According to other reports,
1 Scarborough, Rowan. “Rumsfeld Says Iran ‘Allowing’ Weapons Into Iraq.” Washington Times,
August 10, 2005.
2 “Blair Warns Iran Over Iraq Bombs.” BBC News, October 6, 2005.
3 See Ware, Michael. “Inside Iran’s Secret War for Iraq.” Time, August 22, 2005; and “The Iran
Connection.” U.S. News and World Report, November 22, 2204.

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Iraqi security officials have recently raided its headquarters and seized
documents showing that it gets financial and logistical support from
Iran.4
! The Time report quotes a British military officer in Basra as saying “[The
Iranians] use the legal checkpoints to move personnel, and the weapons
travel through the marshes and areas to our north.”
! According to the U.S. News report, in the summer of 2003 Iranian agents
gave $20,000 to a team of assassins from a pro-Al Qaeda organization
called Ansar al-Islam, in a plot to kill U.S. administrator for Iraq
Ambassador L. Paul Bremer. The alleged plot was not carried out,
according to the report.
! The U.S. News report appears to support the Blair assertions discussed
above by citing U.S. military reports that Lebanese Hizballah had
established a “team of 30 to 40 operatives” in Najaf to support Moqtada
Al Sadr’s Mahdi militia forces, and that Hizballah had bought rocket-
propelled grenades and anti-tank missiles for the Mahdi forces.
! The Associated Press (reprinted in the Washington Times) reported on
December 16, 2004 that an Iranian group called the “Headquarters for
Commemorating Martyrs of the Global Islamic Movement” had signed
up 4,000 volunteers for suicide attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq or
against Israelis.5 An Iranian government spokesman did not deny the
group’s recruitment drive but he said that the group had no connection to
the Iranian government.
! In late October, the London Sunday Telegraph quoted an Iranian
opposition group (National Council of Resistance) as saying that Iran’s
Revolutionary Guard had set up a network of smuggling routes to ferry
men and equipment for attacks on U.S. and allied troops in Iraq.6
According to the report, the three principal smuggling routes were near
the southern cities of Basra and Amarah, and in central Iraq, directly east
of Baghdad. Some Iraqi security units in Diyala Province (which covers
areas east of Baghdad) appeared to corroborate these assertions by
announcing arrests of Iranian infiltrators.7
! Another London Sunday Telegraph report, quoting “senior politicians in
Baghdad,” said that Iran was sponsoring a campaign by Shiite militants
4 “Iraqi Security Forces Pursue Basra Militias, Arrest Iranian Infiltrators.” BBC News, October
31, 2005.
5 Dareini, Ali Akbar. “Militant Recruiters Out in Open in Tehran.” Washington Times,
December 16, 2004.
6 Coughlin, Con. “Smuggling Route Opened to Supply Iraqi Insurgents.” London Sunday
Telegraph,
October 30, 2005.
7 “Iraqi Police Arrest Nine Iranian ‘Infiltrators’ Near Border.” BBC News, October 29, 2005.

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in Iraq to assassinate former members of Iraq’s air force. Saddam
Hussein had made extensive use of the air force to bomb Iranian targets
during the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war.8
Conclusions
Iran appears to be pursuing multiple options in Iraq. Iran is supporting the U.S.-
engineered political process in Iraq because doing so favors pro-Iranian movements in
Iraq, which have numeric strength and a degree of popularity. However, Iran is
preserving the option of sponsoring militant activity in Iraq either to drive U.S. and allied
forces out of Iraq or to raise the costs of U.S. military intervention close to Iran’s borders.
The significant Iranian influence in Iraq could enable Iran to retaliate against the United
States should the United States succeed in persuading the United Nations to impose
economic sanctions on Iran because of its nuclear program. Iran might also retaliate
through Iraqi proxies if the United States were to undertake direct military action against
Iran’s nuclear facilities or other installations.
Iran’s relationship with Iraq’s Moqtada Al Sadr is relatively new, but Iran appears
to see him as a growing force in Iraqi politics, and a long term asset to Iran. Sadr has a
large and dedicated following particularly among lower-class Shiite Muslims in Iraq, and
his newly formed Mahdi Army now rivals more established Shiite militias in southern
Iraq. Many of the alleged Iranian weapons shipments into Iraq appear to have been
destined for Sadr’s forces. The Mahdi Army has the potential to again come into conflict
with U.S. forces, possibly bringing Iran or its representatives into conflict with the United
States as well.
8 Harnden, Toby, Aqeel Hussein and Colin Freeman. “Iran ‘Sponsors Assassination’ of Sunni
Pilots Who Bombed Teheran.” London Sunday Telegraph, October 30, 2005.