ABSTRACT
Iran’s military build-up following the Islamic revolution, and especially since the 1990s, is the outcome of several factors: the changes that have taken place in Iran’s threat perception and strategic environment, as well as the security concept that has been developed by the revolutionary regime; the state of the military infrastructure and the armed forces left by the Shah regime; the changes that took place in the Iranian military system during the eight years of the war with Iraq, 1980–88, and especially the severe losses and damage caused by the traumatic war; the Western arms embargo imposed on Iran since the war; the difficulties in acquiring qualitative arms from non-Western sources; and the economic crisis that affected Iran’s military expenditure during the 1980s and the 1990s, and which still affects its military build-up.
