Known as Iran’s “shadow commander,” Qassem Soleimani was one of the country’s most powerful yet mysterious figures — hailed as a hero, revered as the head of the elite Quds Force and lauded by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as a “living martyr of the revolution.”

But to the US, the 62-year-old major general was a ruthless terrorist.

The Trump administration added the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which includes the Quds Force, to the US list of terrorist groups.

With an estimated 20,000 in personnel, the secretive Quds Force is said to operate as Tehran’s version of a combined CIA and special-forces unit.

Born in a poor mountain village, Soleimani began working at a construction site at age 13 to help his father pay off a government loan, NPR reported.

Unlike other top figures in the Islamic Republic, he did not receive a religious education and is not believed to have taken part in demonstrations that led to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s return to power.

As a member of the Revolutionary Guard in the Iran-Iraq War in the early 1980s, he gained a reputation as a brilliant commander.

After being named head of the Quds Force in 1998, he expanded its reach, establishing close ties with Shiite forces across the region and masterminding Iran’s military operations in Iraq and Syria.

“His soldiers love him. He’s a quiet, charismatic guy, a strategic genius and a tactical operator,” retired US Army Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling, a national security analyst, told CNN.

The Pentagon blamed Soleimani and his fighters “for the deaths of hundreds of American and coalition service members.”

Pentagon officials said that under his direction, Iran supplied explosives that killed many Americans in the Iraq War and that he continued to oversee Shiite militias operating in Iraq.

In 2018, Soleimani issued a stern vow after President Donald Trump tweeted that Iran would “suffer consequences the likes of which few throughout history have ever suffered before” if it made threats on the US.

“Come. We are ready,” he said. “If you begin the war, we will end the war.”