Iraq

Partners for mutual or overlapping national security objectives, like the governments in Baghdad and Washington, need a sustained dialogue.

The parliament’s vote on January 5 was driven by emotional rhetoric of sovereignty and patriotism that left no space for dissent and implicitly accused anyone going against the current of betraying Iraq’s sovereignty. The vote displayed majoritarian rule at its worst with the underlying premise that the Shia religious groups can and will determine the interests of Iraq and determine its future, to the exclusion of other communities. The views of Kurds and Sunnis, and indeed of more secular Shia groups, were ignored, with the implication that their patriotism is suspect.

The Iraqi parliament vote to remove US troops confirms that if Iraqis are cornered and forced to choose between the United States and Iran, they will find it safer to choose Iran.

“If this vote tells us anything,” Abbas Kadhim says, “it confirms that if Iraqis are cornered and forced to choose between the United States and Iran, they will find it safer to choose Iran.”

The biggest favor the Iraqi Parliament can do for US President Donald J. Trump right now is to vote to evict the United States from Iraq. The US president has been clear on his preference for drawing down the US presence in the region rather than beefing it up. Right now, he is asking his advisers why the United States should stay in Iraq, where the two stated missions are to train the Iraqi Security Forces and conduct counterterrorism operations.

The assassination of a top Iranian military official in Iraq on January 2 is the most dramatic step yet in the ongoing escalation between the United States and Iran in the Middle East.

No one should think this crisis is over. Iran’s stepped-up campaign to drive the United States out of Iraq will continue in other ways.

The attention on Iraq will shift away from the protesters and the reforms they are calling for to the “more newsworthy” events in the Green Zone and the aftermath of the attack on the US Embassy.

It is a very bad idea to turn Iraq into a battlefield (again). However, it is a worse idea to let Tehran use certain militias to continue to derail Iraq’s recovery, reconciliation, and reconstruction. It is certainly the case that the United States will have to accept a role for Iran in Iraq; however, the Iranians will likewise have to accept a role for the United States. If they do not, then the fault for turning Iraq into a battlefield lies with them.

The United States launched a series of airstrikes against the Iranian-backed group Kata’ib Hezbollah in Iraq and Syria on December 29, 2019.