Detaching IAM policies and removing IAM role in AWS CLI

Hey all,

I was surprised not to find an easy copy-pasteable script online for “how to delete AWS IAM roles & detach policies with AWS CLI in Bash”, so here’s my take. I’ve recently had to run a cleanup of some roles, so this is what I used.

roles=("RoleA" "RoleB" "RoleC")
for role in ${roles[@]} ;
do
  echo "Role $role"
  role_attached_policies=$(aws iam list-attached-role-policies --role-name $role --query 'AttachedPolicies[*].PolicyArn' --output text)
  for policy_arn in $role_attached_policies ;
  do
    aws iam detach-role-policy --role-name $role --policy-arn $policy_arn
  done
role_inline_policies=$(aws iam list-role-policies --role-name $role --query 'PolicyNames' --output text)
  for policy_name in $role_inline_policies ;
  do
    aws iam delete-role-policy --role-name $role --policy-name $policy_name
  done
  
  aws iam delete-role --role-name $role
done