Perhaps Pentagon press secretary John Kirby thought he was being clever. Rather than blame Iranian-backed militias for actions in Iraq that threaten the Iraqi government and American personnel, in his March 3 press briefing, he blamed “Shia-backed militias.” The subsequent exchange made clear that it was no slip of the tongue:
Q: When you say Shia-backed militias, do you mean Shia militias or Iran-backed —
Kirby: I mean Shia-backed militias.
Q: What does that mean? No, no, seriously, John. I’m —
Kirby: No, seriously. I mean Shia-backed militia.
Q: Like, what does that mean, Shia-backed militia? You’re backed by —
Kirby: I’ve answered your question, sir.
Kirby’s change of phrase appears to be the latest move by the Biden administration to exonerate Iran for backing malign actors across Iraq and the broader Middle East. Such rhetorical sleights of hand are always ineffective. Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s decision, for example, to change “rogue regime” to “states of concern” did not lessen the threats emanating from Iran and North Korea. Nor did Obama-era Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano reduce terrorism when she ordered her department to replace the word “terrorism” with “man-caused disasters.”
In many ways, the Biden administration’s latest iteration of such word games is even worse since it not only obfuscates policy but also crosses the line into bigotry. It is all the more ironic that Kirby does so as Pope Francis made a historic visit to Iraq to meet with Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani.
First, the Shiites are not a monolith. Indeed, emphasis on religious interpretation and individual choice is the basis of Shiism.
Nor are the Shiite militias a monolith. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps founded the Badr Corps in 1982. Kata’ib Hezbollah, designated a terrorist group in 2009, has been active since October 2003. Asa’ib Ahl al Haq was founded in July 2006, and Harakat Hezbollah al Nujaba was formed in 2013. These groups freely acknowledge both loyalty to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and the receipt of Iranian assistance.
The militias formed in 2014, after Sistani called for Iraqi Shiites to defend Iraq from the Islamic State, are different. These Shiites put their lives on the line to defend all Iraqis, regardless of their religion, sect, or ethnicity, and do not compromise Iraq’s sovereignty. To suggest Iran-backed and Shia-backed militias are synonymous insults Sistani and all those who put Iraqi sovereignty first.
More broadly, Kirby seems to ignore that most Shiites — not only in Iraq but also in Iran and Lebanon — want nothing more than to shed the Iranian government’s hijacking of their religion. In December 2020, I visited Nabatieh, a Hezbollah stronghold in the heart of southern Lebanon. There, local residents said they had had enough of Hezbollah, which they understood was more a mafia than a legitimate group. When I did my doctoral research in post-revolutionary Iran, I heard much the same thing about the Iranian regime from Iranians I met on buses, in taxis, and at universities.
To slander Shia as somehow synonymous with the Iranian regime is actually a dream come true for Khamenei, who has tried unsuccessfully for four decades to convince his own people of that point.
Pursuing rapprochement with Iran’s government may be President Biden’s goal. Fair enough. But it should not be done at the expense of liberty or freedom — or by an embrace of religious bigotry.
Michael Rubin (@Mrubin1971) is a contributor to the Washington Examiner’s Beltway Confidential blog. He is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and a former Pentagon official.
