IRGC General Komeil Kohansal, a former advisor to the IRGC Commander-in-Chief, said in a February 5, 2020 interview on Khorasan Shomali TV (Iran) that Qasem Soleimani had "snatched" Iraq out of the hands of the Americans and been responsible for the establishment of the Iraqi PMU. General Kohansal, who served alongside Qasem Soleimani in Syria and Iraq, said that the PMU has the same hierarchy that the IRGC, the Iranian Army, and the Basij have. He added that Soleimani had spent up to 15 days at a time in Iraq speaking to Sadrists, Kurds, and various Sunni and Shiite groups until an Iraqi government that would protect the resistance was formed. He also said that Soleimani had "thwarted" the Americans' plans to "implement the Judaization approach" in Iraq and enable the Zionists to expand from the Nile River to the Euphrates River, and expanded Iran's "Security Depth" all the way to the Mediterranean shore.
Komeil Kohansal: "Hajj Qasem [Soleimani] snatched Iraq out of the hands [of the Americans.] In Iraq, he put together the popular forces. These popular forces were founded on the ideas of the Islamic revolution, and are subjected to the Iraqi source of authority [Ayatollah Al-Sistani.] The same hierarchy that exists in the forces of the Revolution - the IRGC, the Basij, and the army - also exists in the popular forces [in Iraq.] The Popular Mobilization Units [PMU]... We don't know... The establishment of the PMU, in a region to which the Americans had brought all their equipment and capabilities, and, along with all their allies, are trying to sever the ties between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the body of the Islamic nation in the region, and especially in Iraq, the cradle of the Iranian people's faith and religion...
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"Hajj Qasem managed to emerge from this battle victorious. He thwarted all the schemes of the Americans. In addition, when the government in Iraq was forming, he would sometimes spend as much as 15 days in Iraq at a time, talking to the Sadrist movement, to the Kurdish movement in Kurdistan, and with the other Sunni and Shiite groups in Iraq, until the formation of a government that would protect the resistance, and confront the ominous goals of the Americans.
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"The [Americans] wanted to turn this part of the Islamic nation into very small islands, so that they would be able to impose all their wishes, and implement the Judaization approach and the goals of 'from the Nile to the Euphrates' - or, in other words, to enable the Zionists to take over these countries. Hajj Qasem thwarted this and confronted this approach. Now the Iraqis, the Syrians, and all that business in Yemen - they all owe their security to Hajj Qasem. What Hajj Qasem did was to expand the security depth of the Islamic Republic all the way to the Mediterranean shore, right next to the ear of the Zionists and occupiers of Palestine."