Iran's Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has appointed six new senior military commanders, formalizing the wartime leadership structure. Major General Pilot Ali Abdollahi has been appointed chief of staff of the armed forces, and Brigadier General Ahmad Vahidi has been appointed commander-in-chief of the IRGC with the rank of major general.
Abdollahi replaces Abdolrahim Mousavi, who was killed alongside Pakpour and Defence Minister Aziz Nasirzadeh in strikes on the opening day of the war. Abdollahi previously served as commander of the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, the joint operational command responsible for coordinating Iran’s armed forces in wartime. He rose to be one of Tehran’s most visible military commanders during the conflict, issuing warnings to the United States and Israel and overseeing Iran’s missile operations and its use of the Strait of Hormuz as military leverage.
Khamenei also formally appointed Ahmad Vahidi as commander-in-chief of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and promoted him to the rank of major general. Mostafa Izadi, the former commander of the Cyber and New Threats Headquarters of the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, was named deputy commander-in-chief of the IRGC. Rear Admiral Ali Azmaei was formally appointed as commander of the IRGC Navy, while Hossein Taeb, the powerful former head of the IRGC Intelligence Organization, was named commander of the Basij paramilitary force.
The decrees confirm the positions of Vahidi and Azmaei, who had already been publicly presented as commanders of the IRGC and its navy respectively without published appointment orders from Khamenei. Vahidi had been introduced as IRGC chief after Mohammad Pakpour was killed earlier this year, while Azmaei emerged publicly as the Guards’ naval commander in July following the killing of Alireza Tangsiri. The appointments fill some of the most consequential vacancies created by US-Israeli strikes.
