After the mostly indecisive Dawn operations in 1983, Iran opened a new, surprise amphibious offensive in the lakes of the Hawizeh Marshes in Iraqi Tigris–Euphrates river system.

They also began training thousands of Revolutionary Guard commandos in amphibious warfare, as southern Iraq is marshy and filled with wetlands.

[4] Unlike Iraq, Iran could no longer use its air force at this stage of the war, so it relied mostly on helicopters to support its troops.

More than half these missions were successful providing detailed information on Iraqi defenses even reporting the size of bunker doors.

The Combat Engineer Corps built bridges across water obstacles, laid minefields, and prepared new defence lines and fortifications.

[7][8] With such static defenses, the Iraqis had effectively made frontal assault through the flat lands virtually impossible for the Iranians.

[7] They saw the Iranians attempting to capture Al-Amarah, Iraq and sever the highway connecting Baghdad to Basra, which would impede Iraqi coordination of supplies and defences.

The area, located on a large waterway, had been considered impenetrable by the Iraqis, but Iranian troops crossed the river using Boghammar speedboats in a surprise attack.

By 1984, the Iranian ground forces were reorganised well enough for the Revolutionary Guard to start Operation Kheibar,[9] which lasted from 24 February to 19 March.

[11] Operation Kheibar began on 24 February when Iranian infantrymen crossed the Hawizeh Marshes using speedboats in an amphibious assault.

Iraq in response to the attacks ran live electrical cables through the water, electrocuting numerous Iranian troops and then displaying their corpses on state television.

But by this time, the Iranians had broken out of the marshes and returned to open terrain, and were confronted by the conventional Iraqi forces including artillery, tanks and air power, as well as mustard gas.