Defense Culture

As a treasure of revolutionary thinking, morale, and behavior in defense of religion and the country, the Sacred Defense, has a similarity and distinction function to distinguish insiders (friends) from outsiders (enemies), which has given it a unique feature. The Sacred Defense is the answer to who, what, and how we are in defensive arenas, telling the boundary between the civilization friends and enemies of the revolution and Iran. This article aims to explain the unique aspects of the Sacred Defense towards other Iranian and world wars in three cognitive, affective, and behavioral dimensions by using descriptive-analytical methods. The results show that in the mental dimension, revolutionary Islam and the theory of Velayat-e Faqih and convention of the Leadership of Velayat-e Faqih in the war with the title of "Commander-in-chief" is the exclusive feature of the Sacred Defense. In the affective dimension, the consolidation of the Islamic-Iranian identity bond is another unique feature that has created general mobilization in defense of the religion and land of Iran as a rendezvous for Velayi Islam. In the behavioral dimension, the accelerated growth of sacrificial behaviors, jihad, martyrdom, resistance, trust (in God), self-sacrifice, sincerity, etc., is another unique feature that has highlighted the Sacred Defense in the form of a civilization defense in Iran's history. Therefore, the Sacred Defense was a "Civilization Defense against the Enemies of the Civilization," which brought the enemies to their knees with an entire trilogy: ‘Velayi leadership based on the admission of Velayat-e Faqih’, ‘mass mobilization based on Islamic and Iranian identity bond’, and ‘jihad and sacrifice based on the belief in the divine salvation.