OPINION:
Americans can be forgiven if they don’t understand what is going on in Iraq regarding the embassy siege and the killing of Iranian Gen. Soleimani because it is becoming increasingly clear that the Iraqi government doesn’t either.
For Washington Times readers who don’t have a scorecard, let me give a Cliff’s Notes summary. When we invaded Iraq to oust Saddam Hussein in 2003, we had the avowed intention of replacing Saddam with democratic rule. Because the former dictatorship had been run by minority Sunnis, we realized that any democratic government would be dominated by majority Shiite politicians. What we did not realize was how slimy Iraqi Shiite politics really is.
Although most Iraqis — Shiite and Sunni alike — are Arabs, Shiite politics are dominated by Persian Iranians. It took us Americans a while to figure this out as cultural intelligence is not our forte. In fairness to us, it took Iraq’s Shiite population almost as long to figure out what had been foisted upon them. Iranian-financed political parties and militias have dominated Iraqi politics since the first elections a decade ago. The result has been corruption, incompetence and general misrule that has driven one of the world’s most oil rich nations into a state of misery that rivals the worst years of Saddam’s regime.
That orgy of incompetence goes a long way toward explaining how the Sunni-dominated ISIS forces could overrun much of Iraq in 2014. Political elites promoted senior military and police officers on cronyism rather than competence while Sunni, Kurd and other religious minorities were systematically overlooked or actively persecuted. Training and morale in the security services plummeted, making them easy fodder for the fanatic and ruthless forces of the Islamic State.
As the nation neared collapse, the panicked Baghdad government sought support wherever it could get it. This included American air and firepower, but it also made heavy use of Shiite militias, including Kataib Hezbollah, which launched the New Year embassy attack. Professionally led by Iranian Quds (special forces) officers directed by the late Soleimani. These militias had the discipline and dedication too often absent in rank-and-file government forces. The Americans asked little in return. But, post-ISIS the militias and their Iranian masters demanded and got their pound of flesh in return for favors rendered.
Meanwhile. the rest of the country suffered. Political hacks failed to supervise basic services such as garbage pick-up, street cleaning and infrastructure maintenance. Unemployment in oil-rich Iraq hit all time highs, and the government stood by while the Iranians were allowed to dump cheap exports in Iraqi markets hurting small farmers and businessmen.
The situation came to a head in 2019, when large sections of the population — particularly young — rose up in the streets against their own government and their Iranian overlords. Iranian consulates and other facilities have been burned and Iranian-backed militias, including Kataib Hezbollah, have battled protesters in the streets when Arab Shiite police and soldiers have refused to open fire on their countrymen. To some extent, one is reminded of the Cossack mercenaries who attempted to subdue demonstrators in Russia during the 1917 revolution because native Russian troops refused to do so.
At the present time, Iraq’s Shiite governing elite is more frightened of their allies in Iran than of their own population, but that is likely to change in the next year. The pot is boiling. The government refused to order the Iraqi forces in the Green Zone, where the U.S. embassy is located, to protect the facility in violation of international law and norms. This allowed hundreds of anti-American militia members to attack the embassy compound. But outside the Green Zone, hundreds of thousands of demonstrators want to get in to attack their own government, not the Americans. The Green Zone’s Shiite fat cats should be very afraid indeed.
What should America’s position be in all this? Other than to use our information operations capabilities to remind the Iraqi public of Iran’s meddling in its internal affairs and economy, we should keep our hands off. We no longer have a vital interest in Iraq. Our nation is becoming virtually energy independent. Iraqi’s internal problems with governance is an Iraqi affair.
Iran’s puppets in the Baghdad government are claiming that the killing of Qassem Soleimani and attacks on the Iranian surrogate Kataib Hezbollah militia by American forces violate Iranian sovereignty, but the very presence of a senior Iranian official orchestrating the suppression of legitimate dissent is the true insult to the Iraqi nation’s independence.
• Gary Anderson lectures on Alternative Analysis at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. He has served as a civilian adviser in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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