- State affiliation · Iran
- Vigil category device · not official insignia
Identity provenance
State affiliation: Iran.
Vigil category device — drawn from this record’s own domain, echelon and role. Not an official insignia.
In brief
The Artesh's airborne special-forces brigade, known by its Persian acronym NOHED — the oldest special-operations formation in Iran, raised in 1959 and made an independent brigade in 1991 from the 23rd Commando Division; the Artesh counterpart of the Guard's Saberin brigade, and the Artesh formation Iran acknowledged deploying to Syria.
- Scope
- Structure, role, lineage and links. No subordinate records published.
- Subordination
- Subordination reported
- Sources
- 3 on the record
- Record state
- Partial
- Broad area of activity
- Held at the ground force's disposal; deployed to Syria in 2016 by Iranian account. No location is authored.
- Notable history
- The formation descends from the officers the imperial army sent to France for parachute training in 1953 and the airborne special-forces unit raised in 1959, whose first operation was in Oman's Dhofar war in support of the sultan. After the revolution it fought the Iran–Iraq war as the airborne brigade of the 23rd Commando Division, and in 1991 it was separated from the division as an independent brigade under the ground force. Its acronym, NOHED — airborne special forces — has become the name by which Iranian media and the compiled references know it. In 2016 Iranian officials acknowledged that Artesh special forces had been sent to Syria as advisers, the first admitted Artesh deployment abroad since the revolution, and the brigade was the unit named; the Guard's Saberin brigade had preceded it there. That acknowledgement is the brigade's significance here: it marks the point at which the conventional service was drawn into the Guard's external war.
- Strengths
- The country's oldest and, in the compiled assessments, best-trained special-operations formation; a lineage and professional culture that predate the state it serves.
- Limitations
- A single brigade beside a Guard that fields several special-operations formations and controls the external mission; a Syria deployment described by Iran as advisory and by no one else in detail. Nothing here describes strength, basing or readiness.
Lineage & institutional history
Predecessors: 23rd Takavar Division
Sensitivity: Public · structural Confidence: Moderate Sources: Iranian armed-forces institutional reference · Official government statements · Established international media reporting Methodology Corrections
Assessed as of — 2026-09 Last reviewed — 2026-09-28
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