(Reuters) Babak Deghganpisheh - Experts believe Tehran may have as many as 3,000 troops in Syria. Since early October, nearly 100 Revolutionary Guard fighters or military advisers, including at least four senior commanders, have been killed there, according to a tally from Iranian websites. "The Iranians have increased the extent of their direct military involvement in the conflict mostly in order to make up for the heavy attrition among Syrian army units," said Hilal Khashan, a political science professor at the American University of Beirut. "The SAA (Syrian Arab Army) is a gutted institution," said a Western diplomat in Beirut. "There's defections, there's fleeing." Iran and its allied militias have recently taken the lead in the fight against the opposition. The timing of Iran's increased involvement was coordinated with the start of Russia's air campaign in September. Despite the combat deaths in Syria, there has not been a huge public backlash against the war among ordinary Iranians. Many have accepted the government message that the Sunni Islamic State, which has threatened to carry out attacks in Shi'ite Iran, represents an existential threat. "No one wants to shed Iranian blood to save the throne of Bashar al-Assad, but everyone hates Islamic State," said Ali Alfoneh, an Iran expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.
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