Why the Iranian Navy keeps losing warships in accidents, after its Sahand frigate capsized and sank

Since the 1979 revolution, the ruling authorities in Iran favored the IRGC over the regular military.

“The IRGCN is certainly favored in the Iranian government, partly because it is seen as more loyal to the Supreme Leader and partly because it operates businesses that provide cash to government officials,” Hudson’s Clark said.

“The design flaws that seem to be a contributor to the problems experienced by these ships are not directly attributable to the government’s budget priorities,” Clark added. “But the lack of training and maintenance that directly led to these accidents can probably be traced to the IRIN having lower precedence in budget competitions to the IRGCN.”

Farzin Nadimi, a defense and security analyst and senior fellow of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, noted that “on the surface,” the regime tries to portray the IRGCN and IRIN as cooperating, while the reality is much more sinister.

“In effect, the IRGC is eating into the IRIN’s turf and budget with all these new ‘oceangoing’ vessels they are commissioning, while they were supposed to limit their area of responsibility to the littorals,” Nadimi told BI.

“Therefore, sabotage by the IRGC in order to undermine and weaken the IRIN in at least some of those cases should not be ruled out,” Nadimi said.

More generally, he noted the accidents “show a major flaw” in the IRIN command and “possible flaws in indigenous warship designs and production methods.”

“They are losing warships at such a pace in peacetime,” Nadimi said. “Who knows how quickly they will lose ships in wartime!”