Since the day that Ayatollah Khomeini explicitly ordered the ban on armed forces entering politics until the commander of Sepah in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad said, “Don’t worry, Sepah will have an active presence in politics,” forty years have passed. During these forty years, the Sepah Pasdaran have rooted themselves so deeply in the fabric of people’s lives as one of the pillars of the armed forces that there is no room left for breathing.

The explicit order of Ayatollah Khomeini to prevent armed forces from entering politics.Minimum of four direct quotes from the founder of the Islamic Republic regarding the prohibition of armed forces from entering the political arena exist.
• “It is not permissible for the army, the Revolutionary Guards, the military forces, and the police to enter political parties, it leads to corruption. I say that those at the head of the army and those at the head of the Revolutionary Guards are obligated to keep the army, the Revolutionary Guards, and other armed forces away from parties.” Sahifeh Imam Khomeini, Volume 16, page 110.
• “My strong advice to the armed forces is that just as it is prohibited for military personnel to enter parties and groups, they should also refrain from it and the armed forces, whether military, police, Revolutionary Guards, Basij, and others, should not enter any party and keep themselves away from political games.” Sahifeh Imam Khomeini, Volume 21, page 432.
• “The entry of politics into the army is the

“Sepah and the opaque sea of politics”
To achieve a clearer picture of the way the Revolutionary Guards entered politics, we must first examine their role in the economy. In the past two decades, almost no profitable economic activity has taken place without the direct or indirect involvement of the Guards. The use of informational rents and the organized military force has made the Guards a dominant player in the fields of trade and production. The economic activities of the Guards range from banking to the oil industry. The largest construction and road-building companies, as well as the most important industries and factories, either belong to the Guards or are subsidiaries of this military institution. Article 147 of the Constitution gives the government the authority to use “the personnel and technical equipment of the army for relief, educational, production, and construction jihad activities during peacetime.” Apparently, this article serves as the basis for the economic activities of the military. With the support of this article and under the pretext of economic crises in the years following the war, the Revolutionary Guards gradually moved closer to

Public entry of the Sepah into the political arena.
The 88 presidential election may be considered as the first public presence of the Revolutionary Guards in politics, particularly in the election process. In the past months, several videos of speeches by former commanders of the Guards have been released, clearly demonstrating the role of the Guards in these elections. However, for the first time, the creators of the Guards did not only deny their involvement in politics and elections, but also considered it as the inherent duty of the Guards. Mojtaba Zolnour, former deputy of the Supreme Leader in the Revolutionary Guards and current representative in the parliament, had said in response to the released video of the speeches of the Guards commanders after the 88 election: “Having concerns and monitoring the changes in society is not the involvement of the Guards in politics.” He emphasized that if the meaning of “involvement of the Guards in politics” is to “preserve the revolution”, “have concerns and monitor the changes in society and the lines that may help or harm the revolutionی

Social life, Achilles heel of the military

Among these, the only remaining stronghold until just a few years ago was the social sphere; a place that until the late 1980s was still free from the control of the Revolutionary Guards.

However, gradually the Revolutionary Guards also entered the cultural sphere and as a result, the social life of the people. From newspapers and magazines to cultural organizations like the Ouj Organization, over the past decade, they have been created by the Revolutionary Guards to influence the culture of the general public and affect their social life.

Most of these seemingly cultural institutions serve as advertising tools to promote the desires of the Revolutionary Guards.

Articles, reports, films, etc. are produced to influence the audience and prevent them from thinking beyond what is repeated through the loudspeakers of the Revolutionary Guards.

On the other hand, the security-judicial arm of the Revolutionary Guards responds to different voices by suppressing them.

Independent journalists, if they are able to expose the economic-cronyism crises created by the Revolutionary Guards,