This month, in the wake of the drone strike that killed Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the Iraqi Parliament voted to force the withdrawal of the U.S. military. President Trump has responded by threatening sanctions on Iraq. This sudden display of mutual animosity underlines a disappointing truth: It is a myth that Iraq’s loyalty is torn between American and Iranian influence.
After nearly two decades of occupation, the United States has proven to be a transitory power in Iraq, holding little real leverage other than its military might. All the power and influence in Iraq reside with Iran, despite a complex history that includes the Iran-Iraq war.
Iraq and Iran share a border, and more than 60% of Iraqis follow Twelver Shiism — the state religion of Iran ever since the 16th century. Iran’s presence is particularly strong in southern Iraq, home to Najaf and Karbala. Contacts between the Arabs and the Persians across the border has lasted for 500 years despite the political rivalry between these territories — first between the Ottoman and Safavid empires and later between the modern states of Iraq and Iran.
Even amid the Ottoman-Safavid rift, the commemoration of the martyrdom of Husayn Ibn Ali, grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, was common to both spheres. And in 1964, when Ayatollah Ali Khomeini was expelled from Iran, he went to live in Najaf. Over many years, the different cultural, religious, and personal exchanges in Najaf and Karbala have led to economic and social cooperation and a shared history between Iraq and Iran.
Both Iraqi sites receive millions of religious visitors. They are defended by Iraqi militias financed by Iran. The Iraqi political parties close to Iran also have powerful majorities in this region. In fact, one of the most prominent political parties in Iraq, the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, was established in Iran in 1982. Its former militia, the Badr Organization, once fought against Saddam Hussein during the Iraq-Iran war and, more recently, against ISIS. In 2014, when ISIS came into Anbar province in Iraq, a religious ruling was issued calling on all Iraqis to fight against ISIS. Nevertheless, most Iraqis did not enlist in the disgraced Iraqi armed forces. Rather, they joined militias supported by Iran. Iran has also maintained good relations with the Iraqi Kurds, who had also fought against Saddam.
Under the Ottoman Empire, Iraqi Shiites registered as Persians to avoid service in the Ottoman Army. This designation was inherited by their descendants, and consequently, thousands were expelled to Iran under Saddam. After Saddam was deposed, they returned to Iraq. In fact, many of the current Iraqi political leaders once lived in exile in Iran, such as Qasim al Araji, a member of the Badr Organization who was minister of the interior from 2017 to 2018. Hadi al Amiri, former minister of transportation and a member of the Wataniya, an important political coalition in Parliament, had a strong personal friendship with Soleimani.
The Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq had advocated the implementation of Wilayat al Faqih, a politico-religious doctrine in the Iranian constitution that calls for a Supreme Leader. But this faced opposition from Iraqi leaders in Najaf, who follow a different school of thought, and from Grand Ayatollah Ali al Sistani, who was born in Iran but has lived in Iraq for most of his life. In this context, Iran has been careful not to project its influence in an overly aggressive way in order not to offend the nationalist sensibilities of Iraqis. In fact, it was these sensibilities that led to the military withdrawal of the U.S. back in 2011.
From an Iraqi perspective, the U.S. was first an invader and then an incompetent state builder. Washington placed all its bets on Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki rather than seeking to build a cohesive political culture, strong democratic institutions, and a unified Iraqi army. This strategy helped pull Iraq even further away from the U.S. In fact, Iran was glad to see the emergence of a Shiite regime in Iraq and was able to establish good diplomatic and trade relations.
Washington seemed to imagine that al Maliki was to rule Baghdad for all eternity. In 2010, it even supported his reelection. Instead, the opposition Iraqiyya bloc won a majority in Parliament. Al Maliki, despised by the Sunnis, the Kurds, and many Shiites, nonetheless reached a power-sharing agreement that involved his relinquishing command of the military. Washington failed to ensure that this promise was made — another major strategic failure.
Setting aside the hatred bred by the invasion of Iraq, the country was already deeply divided. When Saddam was deposed, two different muezzins called for prayer, a reminder of religious division and confusion in the country. The man put in charge by the U.S., in the Iraqi Transitional Government from 2003-05, Ibrahim Jaafari, another Shiite, had failed to manage the country. As a result, much of southern and central Iraq fell under the control of the Shiite political parties and militias with links to Iran.
Jaafari’s failures encouraged Shiite leaders to call for the creation of a Shiite federal state. This was supported by Ammar al Hakim, the current leader of the important National Wisdom Movement and one of the thousands of Shiite Iraqis who had fled to Iran because of Saddam’s oppression. This made the Sunnis and the Kurds worry about their political and religious existence.
From this environment of political and religious sectarian division, instigated by politicians whom Washington supported, ISIS would eventually emerge. Ironically, throughout Iraq, locals often repeated that “Saddam Hussein’s Hell was better than the Americans’ paradise.” Is it any wonder?
Carlo J. V. Caro writes on foreign affairs and terrorism.
