My pleasure.

Re. Iranian spending in Syria: that’s an excellent question, and — IMHO — answer is crucial for understanding of this war already since…

My pleasure.

Re. Iranian spending in Syria: that’s an excellent question, and — IMHO — answer is crucial for understanding of this war already since late 2012.

Generally, in regards of how much are Iranians spending there I tend to agree with much (not all) of what can be read here: Inside the Glasshouse.

(Points I disagree with are about the number of IRGC’s troops in Syria, their organization etc.)

Namely, essence of warfare are supplies. No supplies = no war (especially not a lengthy war of attrition, like this one in Syria). 
And in this regards, my info is that Assad went bankrupt already back in November 2011 (at least for the first time). Ever since, Tehran — i.e. the IRGC — should be supporting him with about US$ 500 million in fuel, and about US$1 billion in cash — provided every single month.

This might sound surprisingly lot, but is actually none of that. On the contrary, considering what one can get to hear about the collapse of Syrian economy and the state of the Syrian budget this is actually not surprising at all.

Of course, it is prompting questions like: how comes Iranians are spending so much in Syria, without

• a) bankrupting themselves?

Answer is that Tehran was already on the verge of bankruptcy (because of Syria), back in early 2014. Then the Daesh ‘invaded’ Mosul, i.e. Iraq, and Iraq began ordering Iranian weapons, China was granted permission to lend money to Tehran, then Obama got horny about that nuclear deal etc., etc., etc…

• b) getting anything in return?

Actually, Tehran is getting a lot back. It might appear ‘unusual’ what are they getting back, but they do get a lot. See here for example: Iran Buying Syrian Lands , or: Iran’s Stakes in Syrian Economy, or: Iran Spends Billions to Prop Up Assad.

So, it could be said that from the standpoint of all the cliques that matter in Tehran, it’s an investment of the sort the USA have spent for building the Panama Canal (and establishing Panama as an ‘independent’ state in the process, just for example).

The rest (of conclusions) is on hand: the guys with the money are running the show - because they can afford supplies. And the guys with the money in Syria are the IRGC — not Assad, not Russians, or anybody else.