At the beginning of 20^th century, the United States (US) was emerging as a global superpower. The end of the Cold War determined changes in the security architecture of Central Asia and AfPak regions but certain patterns remained. It is the case of Afghanistan’s strive to oppose external intervention, that survived the end of the Cold War. The 1979 Iranian Revolution (Enelāb-e Eslāmī) was also strongly opposed by the US and its allies, but nowadays it is at least as vigorous as it was at the beginnings.

On September 11^th, 2001, the global security landscape was revised. It marked a major deviation from an approach based on United Nations Security Council (UNSC) decision-making. However, the political maneuvering combined with various constraint tactics, sticks and carrots being one of the most popular, did not achieve much. Jaish al-Adl’s role and activities in the region are primarily connected with the unconventional confrontation Western (and Israeli) opposers and Iran, but it might have become increasingly relevant in the context of Chinese economic development and regional relations.

Keeping in mind the above-mentioned general background, this article analyses major post-2001 characterizes of the geopolitical and security landscape in Iran’s region, and the implications of Jaish al-Adl’s actions for Iran and the region.

A review of post-9/11 geopolitical and security landscape in West Asia

In early 2001, the US was claiming and enjoying a relatively unchallenged leadership role in global affairs. Unlike nowadays, the Russian Federation was still engaged in a potential cooperation discussion with NATO, many Asian nations were either competing or not collaborating in trade and security, and American-backed institutions like the World Bank (WB) or International Monetary Fund (IMF) were basically unchallenged in terms of large-scale financing. Furthermore, in late 2001, China was joining World Trade Organization (WTO) and the US was the still the most important buyer of Saudi oil.

In the late 20^th century, the only country with a high number of military bases abroad was the US. Not only did it have significant military presence abroad, but the warfare assets, including conventional and non-conventional, were relatively significant. For example, the propaganda platform “Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty” (RFE/RL), that focused initially on Eastern Europe, restarted its Dari and Pashto broadcasts in Afghanistan in 2002, after a decade of absence. The offensive to win “hearts and minds” in West Asia led to the platform beginning to broadcast for citizens of Iraq and Iran in 1998 (Rafferty, 2024). Whether this represented military and foreign policy overcapacity or not, cannot be easily assessed, but from a confrontation perspective, redirection and augmentation of assets that had aimed to improve American stance in West Asia was ongoing as of 2001. Radio Farda for example, was founded in Prague (RFE/RL’s headquarters is in the same city) in late 2002 and broadcasts in Farsi.

The pre-9/11 international relations had been relatively stable, but an American (and allied) offensive towards former Soviet territories, Iran and Afpak was already visible. After September 11^th, a fierce direct war with individuals or sub-state groups was unleashed by the US, some of the interventions with no international or host country approval. The so-called War on Terror (WoT) instated a change in engagement rules, with state actors pursuing goals and on  territories of other states in what was constantly portrayed as self-defense. The invasion of Afghanistan in 2001 aimed allegedly the capturing of Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, but although this happened in 2011, the American troops withdrew only in 2021.

Meanwhile, the invasion of Iraq was carried out, Libya was bombed in 2011 and Syria entered a so-called civil war in 2011, American troops being deployed in 2014 in this country as well. The fight against al-Qaeda morphed into the fight against the so-called Islamic State (IS) but success in this fight can be assessed as partial at best. The so-called IS is not directly relevant for this research, but from the perspective of emerging extremist groups, the emergence of such entities is relatively significant.  Seumas Milne claimed in 2015 that Western states “incubated” the so-called IS (Milne, 2015). Chris Kanthan claimed that the US and allies created, funded, and armed the Islamic State of Syria and Iraq (ISIS) (Kanthan, 2024). The same message is repeated by Jonas E. Alexis (Alexis, 2017), while other outlets claim that the so-called IS received US funding, for example from the Obama administration (Adl-Tabatabai, 2017). The analyst Pepe Escobar published a relatively recent article (2024) claiming that “the fake ‘War on Terror’ collapses”, and emphasizing that “…the US executed Israel’s regional destabilization program using phantom terrorists as justification for the ‘War on Terror’…” (Escobar, 2024). Irrespective of these reports’ accuracy, the role of US and its allies in regional affairs is difficult to overlook. Likewise, its engagement with the Taliban in order to confront (former) USSR in the past was acknowledged at official level. Hence, there is a credible background in asymmetrical engagements in the region.

Confronting Iran became (an American) policy in 1979. The stages will not be detailed in this paper, but the escalation included empowering enemies, sanctions, sabotage, boycotting, among others. From a divide et impera perspective, the Kurds appear to have been instrumentalized in all four countries: Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Türkiye. Likewise, the instrumentalization of groups like Mojahedin-E-Khalq (MEK), has become a hallmark of “countering” Iran. The US Democrats-led Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) was subsequently cancelled by the Trump Administration.

In regional affairs, the US, and its allies, mainly Israel, are directly and indirectly confronting Iran. In the Middle East, the alliances appear to shift, with Egypt and Türkiye increasingly scrutinizing Israel’s apparent plans to occupy the Gaza Strip and at least new regions of the West Bank, while Iran’s allies are increasing the confrontation level with Israel. In the region eastwards of Iran, Pakistan remained, probably, the best option for the US to maintain presence near Iran, in the aftermath of its withdrawal from Afghanistan. The relations between the US and Pakistan appear to rebound, but the regional equation is not a simple one: while India and Pakistan compete in regional issues, trade routes like Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), India – Middle-East – Europe (Economic) Corridor (IMEC) or International North-Soth Transport Corridor (INSTC) are realigning interests and access to resources.

The post-9/11 geopolitical and security landscape in West Asia has become more tense, WoT being one of the contentious aspects of inter-state relations and actions on the field. US presence and pressure has increased, and no response on the same scale has been provided by regional countries or Asian alliances so far. But at the same time, Iran, Central Asia and Afpak appear to increasingly reconsider their options on the internal scene as BRICS+ and other organizations emerge. However, there is no direct causal relation yet between the new structures and regional peace. Iran, and probably other regional countries, are caught in a confrontation for survival and influence, especially in the Middle East. And Jaish al-Adl is only one of the visible instances of this confrontation.

Jaish al-Adl: a simple separatist group?

Sometimes, Jundallah (Soldiers of God) and Jaish al-Adl (Army of Justice) are presented as different organizations, but the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated in 2022 that Jundallah changed its name to Jaish al-Adl (JAA) in 2012, and are known also as the “People’s Resistance of Iran”. According to the source, its members are “unknown”, but its leader would be Abdolrahim Mullahzadeh (aka Salahoodin Farooqi). The organization would target Iranian security, government officials, “Shia civilians” with ambushes, assassinations, assaults, raids, kidnappings and (suicide) bombings (DNI.GOV, 2022).

Jundallah (assumed precursor of Jaish al-Adl) was founded by Abdulmalik Rigi in 2002. In February 2010, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty details the arrest of Rigi by Iranian authorities. Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi reportedly cautioned the US and the United Kingdom (UK) against supporting such groups and sedition attempts, explaining that Iran had had photos with Rigi at an American base from Afghanistan one day before capturing him. He also reportedly presented copies of an identity card prepared by Americans for Rigi in Pakistan and an Afghan passport (RFE/RL, 2010). Abdulmalik Rigi was executed by Iranian authorities in June 2010 (DNI.GOV, 2022), but the Jundallah case was not finalized. On September 11^th, 2024, news broke out that an Iranian justice court sentenced the United States to pay US $ 4 billion as damages in the aftermath of a 2009 Jundallah bombing, which, the court established, was carried with American complicity. The ruling referred to the suicide bombing attack from Pishin District in Sistan, carried out on October 18^th, 2009, that killed 45 people and injured 57 more (PRESS TV, 2024). The article claims that the court ruling identified the US government as a supporter of such groups, detailing that the paperwork submitted by Rigi after being detained contained evidence of US involvement in terms of finances, logistics and military training.

A 2017 Reuters article states that Jaish al-Adl would be a “Sunni militant group” that had carried out attacks on Iranian security forces throughout Sistan and Baluchistan, claiming responsibility for an earlier attack that killed ten Iranian border guards in April (2017). The article mentions Jundallah as a separate entity with locations in Pakistan as well, Ansar al-Furqan and the Movement for Liberation of Ahwaz as further other militant groups that attacked Iranian security forces (Reuters Staff, 2017). In August 2020, the Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Abbas Mousavi asks the US to be held accountable for “supporting terrorist groups”, referring in this specific intervention to Tondar (Thunder), who provoked an explosion in 2008 in Shiraz, killing 14 people, including children, and injuring 214 others (Khoei, 2020). In April 2022, announced that Mossad agents had been arrested in Sistan and Baluchistan (News Desk The Cradle, 2022).

The publication al Mayadeen emphasized in January 2024 that the “Salafist separatist group” formed/declared in 2012 would have been allowed to operate, allegedly, by Pakistan in the light of Saudi Arabia’s confrontation with Iran until recent peace deal brokered by China (Al Mayadeen, 2024). Pakistan denied the allegations (FP Explainers, 2024).

On January 10^th, 2024, an Iranian policeman was reportedly killed by militants in Sistan and Baluchistan region, the attack being claimed by Jaish al-Adl (The National, 2024). In a rare escalation, Iran reportedly carried out strikes on the alleged locations of Jaish al-Adl in Pakistan in less than a week after the incident (Adams & Davies, 2024). Tensions further increased, after Pakistan retaliated with strikes on what was reportedly called “hideouts” of extremist groups hostile to Pakistan on Iranian soil (eHalal Group, 2024). The events, however, did not continue the path of escalation, as the two neighbors did not continue strikes on each other’s territory.

Should Jaish al-Adl’s support by the US be one of the confrontation tools against Iran, the sophistication of asymmetrical warfare did not stop at weaponizing internal tensions or sanctions. A June 2019 newspaper article reports that the US government funded a troll campaign aimed to attack American citizens that criticized the hardline policy on Iran. The US State Department (DoS) claimed that at the time of the article that funding for “Iran Disinformation Project” was suspended, but $ 1.5 million had been dispatched in order to counter activists, scholars, and journalists challenging President Trump’s “maximum pressure campaign” on Iran (Mortazavi & Daragahi, 2019).

Consequently, Jaish al-Adl does not appear as a simple separatist group, as some claims. Should the sources considered be reasonably accurate, this group inherited or took over Jundallah’s heritage of attacking Iranian security forces, officials, and nationals. Connections with foreign peers can hardly be claimed, and it is not the only group that has been either directly or indirectly supported in order to weaken the Iranian state. Furthermore, these groups have not been the only warfare type launched against Iran. Direct confrontation, sanctions, deception, sabotage, disinformation campaigns appear to have been carried out, among others, to weaken Iran.

Discussion and Conclusions

This article approached the role of Jaish al-Adl/ Jundallah in a post-9/11 world, particularly in the South-West Asia. the analysis identified the post-9/11 world as one in which asymmetric warfare escalated to combined kinetic and non-kinetic confrontations. As WoT appears to follow a divisive, essentially divide et impera pattern, it inherited a significant infrastructure or at least the remaining of previous major confrontation, i.e. the Cold War.

While warfare infrastructure may have yielded results in the confrontation with Iran, the economic burden it places on economy of supporter countries cannot be underestimated. As such, the new type of international cooperation based on economic corridors, trade and multipolarism appears to develop very fast and provide alternatives to the, now-established, confrontational approach.

Jaish al-Adl appears to be a significant, but in essence, one of the extremist organizations that recure to violent acts against its country’s population or government. It does not appear to have particular characteristics other than the region is acts in, reportedly with exogenous support. In the post-9/11 era, extremist organizations have been fought against, but in some cases thrived. It is not just the case of Sistan and Baluchistan, but Idlib in Syria, various regions with Kurdish population, the border region Pakistan-Afghanistan, etc.

Jaish al-Adl will certainly not succeed in its mission to weaken Iran. Despite the border barrier being built with Pakistan and the announced border wall with Afghanistan, Iran does not appear to have been cornered in any way recently. The tragic deaths of civilians and law-enforcement agents on both sides of the Iran – Pakistan border cannot be rolled back, but the two states appear to increasingly collaborate and build resilience.

The sophistication of asymmetric warfare increased in the post-9/11 era, but awareness as well. Claims like the (unconfirmed officially) news from 2017, according to which the arrested IS member Abu Hafs was Eprahim Benjamin, a Mossad agent (Webb, 2017), prompt targets of aggressive campaigns to increase attention and readiness.

On September, 13^th, 2024, the Democratic Republic of Congo sentenced 37 people to death in the aftermath of a failed coup, among which three Americans, a British, a Belgian and a Canadian (Chibelushi, 2024). On September 14^th, 2024, Venezuela announced the arrest of three Americans, two Spaniards and one Czech national over alleged participation in a plot aiming to kill President Nicolas Maduro (Di Sario, 2024). Should contemporary wars rely on subversion or unofficial support for groups like Jaish al-Adl, then these do not represent surprise elements anymore. Hence the chances to stun opponents are reduced at least to half. At the same time, it must be emphasized, that, no matter how perfected the warfare tools are, the cause of waging role has at least an equal role in determining the ultimate outcome, and the course of history.

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About the author

Prof. Ecaterina MATOI

Prof. Ecaterina MATOI is Program Director at MEPEI.