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Source: http://www.voanews.com/a/iranian-milita-role-syria-iraq-prompts-alarm/3817246.html
Iranian Militia Role in Syria, Iraq Prompts Alarm
(VOA News) Jamie Dettmer - As wars have raged in Syria and Iraq, and as Iran has deepened its military involvement, Gen. Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), increasingly has taken on the role as Iran's viceroy in the region. Syrian rebel commanders credit him with being the principal architect last year of Assad's military strategy to retake the rebel-controlled eastern half of Aleppo, and of channeling rebel militias into the neighboring province of Idlib, shaping what military strategists term a "kill zone." Analysts and Western intelligence are trying to work out whether Iran's longer-term goals are to turn both Syria and Iraq into provinces of Iran and platforms for Tehran's regional ambitions once Islamic State is ousted from Mosul and Raqqa. The power of Iran now in Syria and Iraq comes with the presence of tens of thousands of Shi'ite militiamen linked to Tehran and trained and commanded by Quds Force generals and Soleimani. It is thanks to Shi'ite militias and Iranian combat troops as much as to Russian airpower that battlefield fortunes have shifted in Syria to favor Assad, military observers say. Since January 2013, more than 1,000 members of the Quds Force or other IRGC units have been killed fighting in Syria - most of them Pakistani Shi'ites.