"The controversial transfer of hundreds of millions of dollars in cash to Tehran by the Obama administration a few months ago is likely being used to expand Iran’s defense budget, according to an analysis by the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).
According to former senior MEMRI analyst Dr. Nimrod Raphaeli, though “money is fungible,” and it cannot be established that the $1.7 billion (originally reported as $400 million) delivered in two tranches to the Islamic Republic in exchange for the release of American hostages has gone directly to Iran’s various military branches and operations,...at a minimum, enabled the government to release an equal amount of money for defense purposes. It is noteworthy that the increase in the proposed defense budget for 2017 is approximately equal to the amount transferred by the US.
...Raphaeli wrote that since mid-2013, when Hassan Rouhani succeeded Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as president, the regime’s allocations to the military have continuously grown.
But ahead of the next fiscal year (March 2017-March 2018), the government submitted a draft budget that sees a sharp increase of 39 percent – amounting to a total of $10.3 billion – for defense, including a big increase in the budget of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)...
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