The United States is planning on designating the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps a foreign terrorist organization, three US officials told Reuters.
They said that Washington was likely to make the announcement on Monday.
It would mark the first time Washington has formally labeled another country’s military a terrorist group.
The Pentagon declined comment and referred queries to the State Department. The State Department and White House also declined to comment.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, a strident Iran hawk, has advocated for the change in US policy as part of the Trump administration’s tough posture toward Tehran.
The announcement would come ahead of the first anniversary of President Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of a 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran and to reimpose sanctions that had crippled Iran’s economy.
The administration’s decision to make the designation was first reported by the Wall Street Journal.
The United States has already blacklisted dozens of entities and people for affiliations with the IRGC, but the organization as a whole is not.
In 2007, the US Treasury designated the IRGC’s Quds Force, its unit in charge of operations abroad, “for its support of terrorism,” and has described it as Iran’s “primary arm for executing its policy of supporting terrorist and insurgent groups.”
Iran has warned of a “crushing” response should the United States go ahead with the designation.
Iran may put the US military on its terror list if Washington designates the IRGC as terrorists, a senior Iranian lawmaker said on Saturday.
"If the Revolutionary Guards are placed on America's list of terrorist groups, we will put that country's military on the terror blacklist next to ISIS," Heshmatollah Falahatpisheh, head of parliament's national security committee, said on Twitter.
His tweet echoed the warning made by IRGC commander Mohammad Ali Jafari in 2017. He said that “the Revolutionary Guards will consider the American army to be like ISIS all around the world” should Washington blacklist the IRGC.
Such threats are particularly ominous for US forces in places such as Iraq, where Iran-aligned militia are located in close proximity to US troops.
Former Undersecretary of State and lead Iran negotiator, Wendy Sherman, said she worried about implications for US forces.
“One might even suggest, since it’s hard to see why this is in our interest, if the president isn’t looking for a basis for a conflict,” said Sherman, who is director of the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School. “The IRGC is already fully sanctioned and this escalation absolutely endangers our troops in the region.”
Set up after the 1979 Iranian Revolution to protect the clerical ruling system, the IRGC is Iran’s most powerful security organization. It has control over large sectors of the Iranian economy and has a huge influence in its political system.
The IRGC is in charge of Iran’s ballistic missiles and nuclear programs. Tehran has warned that it has missiles with a range of up to 2,000 km (1,242 miles), putting Israel and US military bases in the region within reach.
The IRGC has an estimated 125,000-strong military with army, navy and air units and answers to supreme leader Ali Khamenei.
It is unclear what impact the US designation of the IRGC as a terrorist organization might have on America’s activities in countries that have ties with Tehran, including in Iraq.
A foreign terrorist designation would make any activities of the group toxic for the United States, with any transactions involving US institutions or individuals subject to punishment.
