Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei said Iran’s heroic defense during the eight-year war with Iraq brought security as a reward since it proved to the world the huge cost of aggression against the country.
“The Iranian nation’s defense showed that the cost of aggression and invasion against the county is high, and any aggressor will face a crushing response; so the aggressor will think twice before taking any [hostile] measure and will not see it as worthy,” he said, addressing a commemoration ceremony for Iranian war veterans through a videoconference on Monday, Leader.ir reported.
The Iran-Iraq war was an armed conflict between the two neighbors, which began in 1980, after former Iraqi dictator Saddam launched an invasion.
The war erupted soon after Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution under Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini toppled the American-backed Pahlavi regime. It lasted eight years and ended with Iran accepting a ceasefire brokered by the United Nations.
It is largely referred to as “imposed war” and “sacred defense” in Iran.
The Leader commended Imam Khomeini’s leadership and guidance throughout the war as decisive and awe-inspiring.
“With his wonderful wisdom, he announced that this war is not a conflict between two neighboring countries, but the enemies of the Islamic Revolution and the Iranian nation are arrayed behind Saddam against the Islamic establishment,” he said.
Ayatollah Khamenei noted that the ambitious Saddam was only a tool in the hands of major powers, particularly the United States which was hit by the Islamic Revolution, along with other powers that were wary of a new Islamic-Iranian identity emerging in the region.
“These main opponents in the battle with Iran … incited Saddam to attack to shatter the Islamic system and revolution,” he said.
“Their purpose was to destroy the Islamic government, assume dominance once again and divide the country, but they could not conquer a single inch of Iran’s soil.”
The Leader highlighted the hostility and enmity of western states against Iran, saying they practically invalidated their own claims of human rights by fully supporting the “corrupt, anti-human and dictatorial government of Saddam”.
The Iranian nation, according to Ayatollah Khamenei, could stand up to powers of the East and the West and their allies, and gloriously record a victory.
“On this account, this victorious defense is embedded in Iran’s national identity,” he said.
The Leader also warned about enemies’ attempts to distort the realities of the imposed war, calling for more cultural work to preserve the values of this holy defense.
