“There were four to five bases that were involved in this operation …the MQ-9 drones were loitering over the area, they mainly take off from the Ali al-Salem airbase in Kuwait, the helicopters were … flying from the Taji and Ain al-Assad,” aerospace commander General Amir Ali Hajizadeh told Iranian state TV on Wednesday night.
“We always monitor them, we could see their activities but we did not know what their plan was because we were not aware of Haj Qasem’s schedule,” Hajizadeh said of the elite Quds Force commander.
Soleimani, who directed Iran’s overall Middle East military policy, had travelled from Iran to Lebanon and on to Syria in early January. Just after midnight on January 3, he and a handful of his Iranian companions boarded a Syrian civilian passenger jet and flew to Baghdad. His arrival was awaited by the deputy head of the Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Forces Abu Mahdi al-Mohandis and a group of his bodyguards.
Soon after the two senior commanders left the airport, an American MQ-9 Reaper fired several missiles at the two vehicles - killing all those travelling in them.
Soleimani received his orders directly from Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei the ultimate decision maker in Iran. A high-profile figure, he often moved around the region in small convoys to avoid detection.
It is still a mystery why Iran’s most high-profile general, designated as a terrorist by the American Treasury and State Department, would travel to Baghdad airport at a time of such high tension. Iran-backed militias and their supporters had stormed the US embassy compound in Baghdad just a few days earlier, in response to American airstrikes in Iraq and Syria that killed at least 25 militia members. Before that, a December 27 rocket attack on a base in Kirkuk killed a US contractor – an act Washington blamed on an Iraqi militia loyal to Iran.
“No one knew about this [his plans], we also did not know... for instance, the F-15s when they were around 40 to 50 km from Baghdad, would sometimes up their speed to 1100 km to reach this point near the airport but then they moved away, it was obvious,” Hajizadeh said.
“Based on our eavesdropping, we became aware that they were giving the MQ-9 an order, and we became aware that there were technical issues with its weapons [system], but we did not know this interaction was to do with Haj Qasem, and afterwards, when we put everything together, we realized there were at least four airbases involved in this operation.”
A week after the assassination, Hajizadeh’s IRGC forces fired around a dozen missiles from Iran’s western province of Kermanshah at Ain al-Assad airbase, home to US military personnel.
As tension rose with the missile attack, Iran expected American retaliation. Forces under Hajizadeh’s command fired two missiles from a base near Tehran’s Imam Khomeini airport, striking a Ukrainian passenger jet and killing all 176 on board. The air force commander claimed his forces mistook the plane’s takeoff for the incoming of a cruise missile, shooting the airliner down in a tragic accident.
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei appointed Soleimani’s deputy Esmail Qaani as his successor, the same day the Quds Force commander was killed.
Brian Hook, the US special envoy to counter Iran told London-based Asharq Al-Awsat the slaying of Soleimani had left a void unfillable by Tehran.
"If Qaani continues the path of killing Americans, then he will meet the same fate [as Soleimani],” Hook warned.
