
The United States is again putting an end to the war in Iraq. By the end of December, all US military involved in operations in this country (which were officially terminated on December 9) will be pulled out. Whatever forces do stay behind will be charged solely with safeguarding American key objectives, such as the Embassy in Baghdad, or with the training of local security forces. This is the second withdrawal from Iraq: the Americans had been here before, leaving at the end of 2011. It is also the fourth time in three decades when an American war in Iraq comes to an end. This follows a few months after the last US military left Afghanistan. This time around, the Americans are not leaving behind some failed state, led by an extremist organization, nor will we witness the scenes of chaos and dread that accompanied the US military withdrawal from Kabul. And yet, Iraq is far from being a stable country itself. The situation in the country remains tense, the risk of tension escalating remains high, and so does the probability of a resurge of violence, which in fact never went away. Even the darkest of scenarios remain possible: the outbreak of a new civil war, the total collapse of the country – unlikely as they might sound, they are all possible nonetheless. Various groups that have fought the Americans over the years have preserved a foothold in Iraq, although they don’t have full control of the state like the Taliban do in Afghanistan. America’s oldest regional enemy, Iran, maintains an influence in Iraq which the ayatollahs could only dream of before the ousting of Saddam.
From the liberation of Kuwait to the toppling of Saddam and the war against Al-Qaeda in Iraq
In 1991, when the Iraqi army was crushed in Kuwait, the Americans – had they wanted to – could have reached Baghdad and ridden themselves of Saddam Hussein then and there. They didn’t, however, one of the reasons being that Saddam still served a purpose in offsetting the growing military might of Iran, which starting 1979 became the USA’s archenemy, also posing a major threat to Washington’s allies in the Gulf. The decision not to press the advantage cost tens, maybe hundreds of thousands of lives. Encouraged by the Americans, the Shiites in southern Iraq and the Kurds in the north rebelled, although they were no match for Saddam’s army by themselves, although his army had been weakened by the war in Kuwait.
12 years after the Gulf War, the United States was again waging war on Iraq, whom they accused of being tied to Al-Qaeda and holding a secret cache of WMDs (both allegations eventually turned out to be baseless). This time around, the United States went the whole nine yards, taking control of the country and forcing Saddam to flee. On May 1, George W. Bush proclaimed the end of large-scale military operations. It was the second war the Americans had won in Iraq, a country which the neo-Conservative factions in Washington now wanted to turn into a liberal democracy and thus an ally of the United States. Instead of the peaceful democratic transition, a new war followed – or better said, the actual war, which would cost the Americans and their allies thousands of dead and tens of thousands of wounded soldiers (the losses would be a few dozen times bigger than those sustained during the invasion, prior to May 1), while the casualties on the Iraqi side stood in the hundreds of thousands. Among the Sunnis that rose against the Americans were elements of the former regime, Iraqi nationalists, more or less moderate Islamists, some tribes and especially jihadis – including thousands of foreign combatants – led by Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, whose organization was an official affiliate of Al-Qaeda. Zarqawi’s force staged its first suicide bomb attacks in August, 2003. The targets were the Jordanian Embassy, the UN Office in Baghdad and a major Shi’a cleric, Ayatollah Mohammad Bakir al-Hakim. Zarqawi had no qualms when it came to picking his victims: foreigners and Shiites, whom Sunni extremists regarded as apostates. Zarqawi had one more reason to attack the Shi’a: he was hoping it would trigger a response and a wave of attacks on the Sunni, who would thus be forced to pick up arms and join the jihad, which is exactly what happened a few years later.
The Shi’a raised militias of their own. The Mahdi Army was loyal to Muqtada al-Sadr, a member of one of the most prestigious families of Iraqi clerics, which had been decimated prior to 2003 by order of Saddam (Muqtada’s father, brothers and uncle had been killed). Al-Sadr was very popular among the poor Shi’a, who venerated him and his family (and continue to do so). Another strong Shi’a militia was the Badr Organization, the military wing of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), a faction that was closely involved in politics, which in turn helped the Badr Organization gain influence with the newly-formed security forces, in particular the police, which they had deeply infiltrated. The Organization was growing strong real fast, to the point that it became an independent political group, separating from SCIRI. The Badr Organization was despised among the Sunni from the very start, due to its brutal and violent methods, and was involved in the civil war the broke out between the Shi’a and the Sunni in 2006-2007. There was an whole group of militias that were closely tied to Iran – Iran supplied them with fighters, weapons and equipment, especially explosives (commonly known as IEDs – improvised explosive devices), which killed many hundreds of US military. Iran-backed militias were supported and coordinated by the so-called Quds Force of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, under the command of Qassem Soleimani.
The insurrection continued to build momentum up until 2007-2008, when two key things happened: first, a mass-deployment of American troops, the so-called “surge” strategy designed by General David Petraeus, and second, the Sunnis took up arms against the jihadis. The latter had started recruiting and radicalizing young people from Sunni tribes, becoming a threat to their very way of life. This prompted their leaders – the sheikhs –to take action. Their concerted efforts against the jihadis, in addition to the measures taken against the most prominent militia at the time, the Mahdi Army, ensured a relative stability in Iraq.
The Americans pulled out of Iraq by the end of 2011. The Jihadis seemed to have lost the war. The insurrection had played down significantly, both in Sunni-controlled areas, as well as in Shi’a bastions. The civil war was over. The local security force had now grown in strength, and a new political class was now in power, which struck a balance between the main confessional and ethnic groups. Finally, elections were now being held in significantly better conditions. The war had been won (again).
Jihadis and Shi’a militias
The next day after the Americans pulled out, the authorities issued an arrest warrant in the name of Iraq’s Sunni vice-president, Tariq al-Hashimi, who was accused of having orchestrated terrorist attacks. This was the first signal that the new Shi’a politicians who now ruled the country – many of whom were representatives of groups whom Saddam had persecuted – were unwilling to make their peace with the Sunnis after the civil war. The incident was followed by more arrests, all part of an alleged anti-terror campaign. When the Sunni population, tired of being persecuted and marginalized, started protesting in 2012 and 2013, inter-confessional violence escalated. At the same time, the jihadis were also mobilizing and rallying their forces. They launched attacks on prison colonies, liberating hundreds of their militants. After civil war broke out in neighboring Syria, the Islamic State in Iraq, which was the name given at the time to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi’s organization, deployed troops across the border, at first under orders from Al-Qaeda, who wanted a Syrian cell of its own. Shortly afterwards a fracture occurred, and the Iraqi militia, renamed the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant or Greater Syria (ISIS/ISIL) broke away and started competing with Al-Qaeda. In the summer of 2014, a few hundred jihadis launched a lightning sweep on Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city. The Iraqi army, trained and equipped by the Americans, despite having a few dozen thousand soldiers deployed in the area, was overrun. Soon, the entire Sunni-controlled region of Iraq – the huge al-Anbar province in the west, the center, and the north up to the border with the Kurdish Autonomous Region – fell into the hands of the Islamic State, the new name given to ISIS. The atrocities committed by the jihadis and the real risk they might storm Baghdad forced Barrack Obama to send his army to the area once again. This time, the focus was on ground forces – their presence being limited. It took three years for the Islamic State to be fully defeated and lose control of its territories – which does not mean the jihadist threat has been eliminated. Some of the militants have gone into hiding, simply living among the civilian population, as they have done before.
Throughout the campaign against the Islamic State, the Americans were on the same side as the Shiite militias, which were mobilized after the northern army sent to stop the jihadis had been crushed. These combatants had a strong ideological motivation, and besides, they knew the Islamic State would show them no mercy, so running or turning themselves in, like the army had done, was not an option. The militias that mobilized against the jihadist threat were the same who had fought in the civil war and the guerilla war against the Americans up to 2011, including some close to Iran. In fact, the commander of the Quds Force, Qassem Solimani, was photographed one time close to the frontline while coordinating the militias.
Once the Islamic State had been defeated, Iran-linked militias started harassing the Americans again, although the attacks lacked the intensity of the previous decade. The American presence in Iraq was much less visible and limited than in previous years, and so was the influence of the government in Baghdad, so the air strikes targeting their bases should be interpreted as part of the USA’s regional dispute with Iran (who acted by proxy in order to avoid direct responsibility) rather than an insurrection against a foreign military force. At first, America’s retaliation was low-key. The army bombed military objectives of the militias, in particular in Syria, where they had rallied in order to support Teheran’s client, Bashar al-Assad. On January 3, 2020, Washington significantly raised the stakes. Qassem Soleimani, the mastermind behind the so-called Shi’a Crescent whereby Teheran created a sphere of influence comprising statal and non-statal actors from Iraq to the Mediterranean, was killed in Baghdad in a targeted American drone strike. The attack also killed Abu-Mahdi al-Muhandis, the leader of another anti-American militia group, Kata’ib Hezbollah, and the deputy commander of the Popular Mobilization Forces, an umbrella organization comprising a number of militias that fought the Islamic State. For a brief moment, it seemed that a war with Iran, and by extension, with the Shi’a Iraqi militias, was inevitable. However, Teheran took a step back after launching missile attacks on two American military bases in Iraq, an attack that was aimed more at saving face rather than causing significant losses that would have forced the Americans to retaliate again. Not even the Iraqi militias staged any large-scale operations against the American troops. On the contrary, deprived of Soleimani’s and al-Muhandis’s leadership, they turned the aggression down a notch. That doesn’t mean their hostility towards the Americans or their eagerness to fight are gone: in November, one of these militias, set up with the precise aim of fighting in the civil war in Syria, announced it has called up tens of thousands of volunteers to fight any US forces that remain in Iraq after December 31.
What remains when the Americans are gone?
On October 10, 2021, Iraq played host to general elections. Most deputy seats were grabbed by Muqtada al-Sadr’s party, which is however far from securing a majority. The surprise was not Sadr’s victory, but the unequivocal defeat sustained by pro-Iranian militias and their political wings, which had made up the number one political force in the previous Parliament. Everyone knew the militias’ popular support was waning, all the more so as the population blamed them for the precarious state of the country’s economy, but also for the growing tension with the Sunni. In 2019, Iraq saw the advent of a far-reaching anti-government movement, prompting hundreds of thousands of people to take to the streets and voice their discontentment with endemic corruption, but also with political repression and inter-confessional tensions. The militias stood up against the protesters, killing hundreds of them, but this did not stop them. The government was forced out of office, and the new cabinet had to call early elections. The overarching campaign designed to intimidate the population and the string of assassinations right before the elections, in addition to the low voter turnout, failed to swing the vote in favor of the militias.
These militant groups seem rather unwilling to give up the influence they have constantly built and consolidated after Saddam’s demise. Right before the election was called, the militias staged protests that escalated into violent clashes with the riot police, killing and wounding dozens in the process. Then, the Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi survived an assassination attempt. The Iraqi security forces suspect Iran-backed militias are behind the explosive drone attack. So far, no red lines have been crossed, but this might change if militias were to become the target of an organized campaign. Muqtada al-Sadr has already urged militias to lay down their weapons, calling on the country’s paramilitary groups (which the militias themselves control and supply with fighters) to purge any “undisciplined” members. Iran’s standpoint in this respect also weighs heavily. Should it consider its position in Iraq threatened or the stability of its operations in the region in any way undermined, it might order the militias to take action. Right now, it’s unclear in which direction things will evolve. For the time being, the militias remain a force to be reckoned with. It’s also interesting to note that, the very year America decided to pull out, the power struggle in Iraq is pitting the very Shiite forces that had fought the Americans.
Shi’a militias are but a piece of the Iraqi puzzle. We should also take into account the crowds of protesters who joined forces, tired of all the fighting and deep-seated corruption. We should not forget the majority of people who chose not to vote because they cannot relate with the current class of politicians. The Sunnis that refuse to be marginalized and discriminated against, and who are still waiting for their cities to be rebuilt after having been razed to the ground in the war against the Islamic State. We should also take into account the jihadis who all these years continued to stage attacks on a regular basis; admittedly, the attacks lack the frequency and sophistication of previous years, but the fact that jihadis are still active proves that at any point in time a new generation of disillusioned youngsters can be talked into choosing jihad. Finally, we should not overlook the Kurds, who are slowly moving towards independence, which has prompted a response from Baghdad, at times taking on more or less violent forms.
History has repeatedly shown that, even in times of relative peace, Iraq is a powder keg that might go off any time, which means everything can turn to dust real fast, just like in 2014, when the Americans were forced to return.