page_title: Syrian Armed Forces
section_title: Syrian Army
hierarchical_section_title: Syrian Armed Forces / Structure / Syrian Army
caption_attribution_description: English: A Syrian soldier aims an TYPE 56-1S (China made AK47) assault rifle from his position in a foxhole during a firepower demonstration, part of Operation Desert Shield. The soldier is wearing a Soviet-made Model ShMS nuclear-biological-chemical warfare masks. Deutsch: Ein syrischer Soldat mit einem AK-47 Sturmgewehr während einer Schießübung. Der Soldat trägt eine sowjetische ShMS-ABC-Maske. Italiano: Un soldato siriano armato di Tipo 56-1 e tuta NBC in esercitazione durante l'operazione Desert Shield. Français&#160;: Un soldat syrien du Joint Force Command-North en tenue de protection NBC et armé d'un AK-47 durant l'opération Bouclier du désert.
context_page_description: The Syrian Arab Armed Forces are the military forces of the Syrian Arab Republic. They consist of the Syrian Arab Army, Syrian Arab Air Force, Syrian Arab Navy, Syrian Arab Air Defense Force, and several paramilitary forces, such as the National Defence Force. According to the Syrian constitution, the President of Syria is the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces.
  The military is a conscripted force; males serve in the military upon reaching the age of 18, but they are exempted from service if they don't have another brother who can take care of their parents. Since the Syrian Civil War, the enlisted members of the Syrian military have dropped by over half from a pre-civil war figure of 325,000 to 150,000 soldiers in the army in December 2014, due to casualties, desertions and draft dodging, reaching between 178,000 and 220,000 soldiers in the army, in addition to 80,000 to 100,000 irregular forces.
  Before the start of the Syrian Civil War, the obligatory military service period was being decreased over time. In 2005, it was reduced from two and a half years to two years, in 2008 to 21 months and in 2011 to a year and a half.
context_section_description: In 1987 Joshua Sinai of the Library of Congress wrote that the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) was the dominant military service, and as such controlled the senior-most posts in the armed forces and had the most manpower, approximately 80% of the combined services. In 1987 Sinai wrote that the major development in force organization was the establishment of an additional divisional framework based on the special forces and the organization of ground formations into two corps. In 2010 the International Institute for Strategic Studies estimated army regulars at 220,000, with an additional 280,000 reserves. That figure was unchanged in the 2011 edition of the Military Balance, but in the 2013 edition, in the midst of the war, the IISS estimated that army strength was 110,000. By the end of 2017, analysts estimated the SAA to have just 25,000 combat-ready troops.
  The army's formations included three army corps (the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd), eight armored divisions (with one independent armored brigade), three mechanized divisions, one armored-special forces division and ten independent airborne-special forces brigades. The army had 11 divisional formations reported in 2011, with a fall in the number of armored divisions reported from the 2010 edition from eight to seven. The independent armored brigade had been replaced by an independent tank regiment. However, in addition to the 14th Special Forces Division, the 15th Special Forces Division has been identified by Human Rights Watch in 2011.
  The former Defense companies were merged into the Syrian Army as the 4th Armored Division and the Republican Guard. The 4th Armored Division became one of the Assad government's most trusted security forces.
caption: A Syrian soldier aims a Type 56 assault rifle from his position in a foxhole during a firepower demonstration, part of Operation Desert Shield. The soldier is wearing a Soviet-made Model ShMS nuclear-biological-chemical warfare mask.
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