THE ASSIGNATION OF A GENERAL

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Qasem Soleimani was an Iranian major general who was in charge of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. From 1998 until his death on January 3^rd 2020 at age 62. he was the commander of its Quds Force, a division primarily responsible for extraterritorial military and clandestine operations. In his later years, he was considered the second most powerful person of Iran behind Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Khamenei.

Soleimani began his military career at the start of the Iran–Iraq War during the 1980s, eventually commanding the 41st Division. He was later involved in extraterritorial operations, providing military assistance to Hezbollah in Lebanon. In 2012, Soleimani helped bolster the government of Bashar al-Assad, a key Iranian ally, during Iran's operations in the Syrian Civil War and helped to plan the Russian military intervention in Syria. Soleimani oversaw the Kurdish and Shia militia forces in Iraq, and assisted the Iraqi forces that advanced against  the terrorist group  ISIL in 2014–2015.  Soleimani was one of the first to support Kurdish forces, providing them with arms.

Soleimani was widely popular among Iranians, where his supporters viewed him as a "selfless hero fighting Iran's enemies." Soleimani was personally sanctioned by the United Nations and the European Union, and was designated as a terrorist by the United States.

Soleimani was killed in a targeted U.S. drone strike on the 3^rd  of  January 2020 in Baghdad, which was approved by President Donald Trump. A multi-city funeral was held in Iraq and Iran for the killed general and other casualties. Hours after Soleimani's burial on the  7^th of  January 2020, the Iranian military launched two missiles against U.S. bases in Iraq There were n0American or Iraqi lives lost or injured in the attack because according to Iran, the missiles  were not aimed at the housing of the Americans  or  Iraqi forces. Further. the Iranians informed the president of Iraq that  missiles were being  fired at the America air base and he in turn, informed the Americans of the missiles being fired at them.  That was a smart move on the part of the Iranians because if American and Iraqi forces were killed, it would have been deemed as a declaration of war on the part of Iran. 

That raises an interesting question. If the missile that killed Soleimani in Iran, could it be considered a declaration of war by the Americans against Iran. President Trump who sanctioned the assassination is a stupid man but he wasn’t that stupid. That is why Soleimani was assassinated in Iraq,

Soleimani strengthened the relationship between Quds Force and Hezbollah upon his appointment, and supported the latter by sending in operatives to retake southern Lebanon. In an interview aired in October 2019, he said he was in Lebanon during the 2006 Israel–Hezbollah War to oversee the conflict.

Soleimani was described by an ex-CIA operative as "the single most powerful operative in the Middle East today" and the principal military strategist and tactician in Iran's effort to combat Western influence and promote the expansion of Shiite and Iranian influence throughout the Middle East. In Iraq, he was the commander of the Quds Force and  he was believed to have strongly influenced the organization of the Iraqi government, notably supporting the election of previous Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Malik.

According to several sources, including Riad Hijab, a former Syrian premier who defected in August 2012, Soleimani was one of the staunchest supporters of the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad in the Syrian Civil War. In the later half of 2012, Soleimani assumed personal control of the Iranian intervention in the Syrian Civil War, when the Iranians became deeply concerned about the Assad government's lack of ability to fight the opposition, and the fallout to the Islamic Republic if the Syrian government fell. He reportedly coordinated the war from a base in Damascus at which a Lebanese Hezbollah commander and an Iraqi Shiite militia coordinator were mobilized, in addition to Syrian and Iranian officers. Under Soleimani the command "coordinated attacks, trained militias, and set up an elaborate system to monitor rebel communications". According to a Middle Eastern security official Dexter Filkins talked to, thousands of Quds Force and Iraqi Shiite militiamen in Syria were "spread out across the entire country".^[ The retaking of Qusayr in May 2013 from rebel forces and Al-Nusra Front was, according to John Maguire, a former CIA officer in Iraq, "orchestrated" by Soleimani.

Soleimani was much credited in Syria for the strategy that assisted President Bashar al-Assad in finally repulsing rebel forces and recapturing key cities and towns. He was involved in the training of government-allied militias and the coordination of decisive military offensives.^[2] The sighting of Iranian UAVs  in Syria strongly suggested that his command, the Quds Force, was involved in the civil war.

In 2015, Soleimani began gathering support from various sources to combat the newly resurgent ISIL and rebel groups which had both successfully taken large swaths of territory from Assad's forces. He was reportedly the main architect of the joint intervention involving Russia as a new partner with Assad and Hezbollah.

According to Reuters, at a meeting in Moscow in July, Soleimani unfurled a map of Syria to explain to his Russian hosts how a series of defeats for President Bashar al-Assad could be turned into victory – with Russia's help. Soleimani's visit to Moscow was the first step in planning for a Russian military intervention that has reshaped the Syrian war and forged a new Iran–Russia alliance in support of the Syrian (and Iraqi) governments. Iran's supreme leader, Ali Khamenei also sent a senior envoy to Moscow to meet President Vladimir Putin. "Putin reportedly told a senior Iranian envoy 'Okay we will intervene. Send Qassem Soleimani.'General Soleimani went to explain the map of the theatre and coordinate the strategic escalation of military forces in Syria.

Soleimani had a decisive impact on the theater of operations, which led to a strong advance in southern Aleppo with the government and allied forces re-capturing two military bases and dozens of towns and villages in a matter of weeks. There was also a series of major advances towards Kuweiris air-base to the north-east.^[75] By mid-November, the Syrian army and its allies had gained ground in southern areas of Aleppo Governorate, capturing numerous rebel strongholds. Soleimani was reported to have personally led the drive deep into the southern Aleppo countryside where many towns and villages fell into government hands. He reportedly commanded the Syrian Arab Army's 4th Mechanized Division, Hezbollah, Harakat Al-Nujaba (Iraqi), Kata'ib Hezbollah (Iraqi), Liwaa Abu Fadl Al-Abbas (Iraqi), and Firqa Fatayyemoun (Afghan/Iranian volunteers

In early February 2016, backed by Russian and Syrian air force airstrikes, the 4^th  Mechanized Division – in close coordination with Hezbollah, the National Defense Forces (NDF), Kata'eb Hezbollah, and Harakat Al-Nujaba – launched an offensive in Aleppo Governorate's northern countryside, which eventually broke the three-year siege of Nubl and Al-Zahraa and cut off the rebels' main supply route from Turkey. According to a senior, non-Syrian security source close to Damascus, Iranian fighters played a crucial role in the conflict. "Qassem Soleimani is there in the same area", he said. In December 2016, new photos emerged of Soleimani at the Citadel of Aleppo, though the exact date of the photos is unknown.

As you an see from the above info, the Iranian major general played an important role in the battles re fighting the ISIS terrorists in Syria and Iraq. 

However, he was also assisting the dictator of Syria who is an evil man to stay in power. Does that make the major general a war criminal? I don’t think so.  Even though he was the head of the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, that also doesn’t make him a war criminal.

President Trump in attempting to justify the assassination of Soleimani publically stated that Soleimani was an imminent danger to the United States. military. For days, he didn’t say what the imminent danger was until a few days later when he said that  Soleimani was going to order attacks on American embassies in  the area. 

What proof did President Trump have to bolster that statement? Did he presume that since the American embassy in Iraq was attacked by a mob, it was ordered by Soleimani?

Trump is such a bald-face liar since he has lied thousands of times to the public since he ran for office as president. His words are worth as little as a small grain of salt.  It is only the members of the Republican party who believe that what that pathological liar says is the gospel truth.

Soleimani played a key role in Iran's fight against ISIL in Iraq. He is described as the "linchpin" bringing together Kurdish and Shia forces to fight ISIS, overseeing joint operations conducted by the two groups In 2014, Soleimani was in the Iraqi city of Amirli, to work with Iraqi forces to push back ISIL militants.^[24][83] The Los Angeles Times reported that Amirli was the first town to successfully withstand an ISIL invasion, and was secured thanks to "an unusual partnership of Iraqi and Kurdish soldiers, Iranian-backed Shiite militias and U.S. warplanes".

A senior Iraqi official told the BBC that when the city of Mosul fell, the rapid reaction of Iran, rather than American bombing, was what prevented a more widespread collapse. Soleimani also seems to have been instrumental in planning the operation to relieve Amirli in Saladin Governorate, where ISIL had laid siege to an important city. In fact, the Quds force operatives under Soleimani's command seem to have been deeply involved with not only the Iraqi army and Shi'ite militias but also the Kurdish forces in the Battle of Amirli, by providing not only liaisons for intelligence-sharing but also the supply of arms and munitions in addition to expertise.

 Soleimani played an integral role in the organization and planning of the crucial operation to retake the city of Tikrit in Iraq from ISIL. The city of Tikrit rests on the left bank of the Tigris river and is the largest and most important city between Baghdad and Mosul, giving it a high strategic value. The city fell to ISIL during 2014 when ISIL made immense gains in northern and central Iraq. After its capture, ISIL's massacre at Camp Speicher led to 1,600 to 1,700 deaths of Iraqi Army cadets and soldiers. After months of careful preparation and intelligence gathering an offensive to encircle and capture Tikrit was launched in early March 2015.

In 2016, photos published by a Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) source showed Soleimani attending a meeting of PMF commanders in Iraq to discuss the Battle of Fallujah

The then CIA chief Mike Pompeo said that he sent Soleimani and other Iranian leaders a letter holding them responsible for any attacks on U.S. interests by forces under their control. According to Mohammad Mohammadi Golpayegani, a senior aide for Iran's supreme leader, Soleimani ignored the letter when it was handed over to him during the Abu Kamal offensive against ISIL, saying "I will not take your letter nor read it and I have nothing to say to these people.’

Soleimani was killed on the  3^rd of January 2020 around 1:00 a.m. local time (22:00 UTC 2 January), by missiles shot from American drones which targeted his convoy near Baghdad InternationalAirport.^. The BBC, NBC News, DW News, Time, The Guardian and other media outlets have said Soleimani was assassinated or described the killing as an assassination.

Iraqi prime minister Mahdi said Soleimani was bringing Iran's response to a letter that Iraq had sent out on behalf of Saudi Arabia in order to ease tensions between the two countries in the region. 

Regarding the decision to kill Soleimani, the Pentagon focused on both his past actions and a deterrent to his future action.  The airstrike followed attacks on the American embassy in Baghdad by supporters of an Iran-backed Iraqi Shia militia and the 2019 K-1 Air Base attack. Anonymous officials told The New York Times that Trump had initially decided to strike at the Shia militia, but instead chose the most extreme option proposed –the  killing of Soleimani  after seeing television footage of the attack on the embassy.  Trump said to reporters. “Soleimani should have been eliminated by former presidents.”

That statement was made by a coward who had no concept of war.  I said he was a coward because during the war in Viet Nam,  he was to be drafted into the American armed forces but he managed to avoid the draft.

The U.S. Defense Department said the strike was carried out "at the direction of the President" and asserted that Soleimani had been planning further attacks on American diplomats and military personnel and had approved the attacks on the American embassy in Baghdad in response to U.S. airstrikes in Iraq and Syria on 29 December 2019, and that the strike was meant to deter future attacks.

Here is a difficult question to be answered. What proof did the Defence Department have in their possession to make that presumption? If they don’t disclose that information, the decision by Trump will be highly suspect.

It is ironic when you think about it. Trump was seriously thinking of sending missiles into Iranian cultural sites. When comparing him with the man he ordered to be assassinated, which of these two men is closer to being a war criminal?  The question is obviously academic.