Events
Under the codename Foroughe Javidan (Eternal Shining), the Mujahadeen-e-Khalq (MEK) started their ten day operation after the Iranian government accepted UN Resolution 598. While Iraqi forces attacked Khuzestan, the Mujahedin attacked western Iran and battled the Pasdaran for Kermanshah. Close air support from the Iraqis contributed heavily to the small gains the Mojahedin made into Iran, including the seizing and razing to the ground the small Iranian city of Islamabad-e Gharb.
However, under heavy international pressure for ending the war, Saddam Hussein withdrew his fighter aircraft. Without any air cover, the Mujahedeen could not stop Iranian airborne forces from being dropped behind Mujahadeen-e-Khalq (MEK) lines. The operation ended in a Bay of Pigs invasion-like disaster for the Mujahedeen. Casualties ranged from 2,000 to 10,000. Tehran claims to have killed 4,500 NLA and Iraqi troops during the operation, while insisting that 400 Iranian soldiers were killed.
Read more about this topic: Operation Mersad
Famous quotes containing the word events:
“By many a legendary tale of violence and wrong, as well as by events which have passed before their eyes, these people have been taught to look upon white men with abhorrence.... I can sympathize with the spirit which prompts the Typee warrior to guard all the passes to his valley with the point of his levelled spear, and, standing upon the beach, with his back turned upon his green home, to hold at bay the intruding European.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“When the world was half a thousand years younger all events had much sharper outlines than now. The distance between sadness and joy, between good and bad fortune, seemed to be much greater than for us; every experience had that degree of directness and absoluteness which joy and sadness still have in the mind of a child”
—Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)