Currently attention is focused on the areas adjacent to the Syrian-Iraqi border, amid questions about who will prevail to impose the control on it; the United States and its allies on the ground or Iran and its allies. Under the impact of battles taking place in the city of Mosul against al Daesh, the Iraqi-Syrian border witnesses, stretching across the desert of Anbar to the city of Mosul, a heated race and a struggle between US forces and its allies on the one hand and the forces of the popular crowd on the other hand in an endeavor to control it. On 28 of the last May, popular crowd forces announced that it has reached the border area with Syria at the level of the village of Um Jeris located within the district of Sinjar. The arrival at the border is a significant development in the course of the war against Daesh which its control over areas of Iraq has been reduced in a number of isolated pockets , including a small area of the western side of the city of Mosul, where the Iraqi forces is narrowing noose on it day after day, while the restoration of border areas will cut on his fighters ways to communicate and Logistics between its strongholds and locations of its control on both sides of the Iraqi-Syrian border. Shiite crowd described its advance to the border with Syria, in a statement on its website, as a “miracle in Ramadan.”
With the arrival of the popular crowd to the Syrian border areas, within the borders of the Iraqi province of Nineveh, it was possible to say that there is a secure land route inside Iraqi territory linking Iran to Syria. It begins from the road from the eastern borders of Iraq with Iran to enter the province of Diyala, then heading towards the northern areas of the province of Salahuddin and is heading towards the western desert of Nineveh, to the Syrian border. The aim of the Iranian corridor to establish a land corridor connecting Tehran to Beirut through the Walid crossing to Damascus or Homs and thus to al- Bekaa and be a way through which Iran can reach the Mediterranean.
The popular crowd forces loyal to Iran undertakes this task. Over the past two years, the leadership of the popular crowd chooses areas of fighting away from the central military plans laid down by the Iraqi government for the war on against al Daesh. Badr Organization and the Asaib ahl al-Haq imposed arms authority over many of border areas of the province of Diyala with Iran to turn the majority of the Sunni population into a Shiite, whereas Asa’ib Ahl-al-Haq (League of the Righteous) and the Brigades of Hezbollah fought in the areas of Baiji, north of Salah al-Din to impose full control over it. The appearance of the commander of the Iranian Quds Force, Qassem Soleimani at the Iraqi-Syrian border is a special significance beyond from just keeping up the progress of militias of popular crowd in Baaj district south of Mosul, the success of the popular crowd in extending its control over most of the border line and the Bab al- Walid crossing represents an important step in the Iranian project to open a direct contact route between Baghdad and Damascus.
The arrival of the popular crowd to the western areas of the Nineveh represents a challenge to the influence of the President of the Kurdistan region, Massoud Barzani, and the Kurds wants to annex the Nineveh Plain and Sinjar area to the Kurdistan region, and the popular crowd and the federal government reject to deduct these areas by the Peshmerga .on its way towards achieving its goal on the border, popular crowd liberated a number of villages inhabited by Ayazdion, but announced that it will hand it over the responsibility to groups of these religious minority loyal to it, not to the groups loyal to the Kurds, which is a direct provocation to the Kurdistan Democratic Party, led by Barzani. Where tensions between the c the popular Shiite crowd and Kurdish Peshmerga have reached an unprecedented level, which threatens to ignite an armed conflict between the two parties, because of disagreements over the security of Sinjar in Nineveh province. Iraqi sources fear that a climate of tension and skirmishes to lead a military confrontation by proxy under the efforts of the crowd to control the areas of Kurdish influence to secure the transit of weapons and fighters from Iran to Syria, while the Kurds have a strong American backing. With the declaration of the crowd for the arrival of the first troops to the border areas in Nineveh, between Iraq and Syria, statements released about its leaders talking about entering the town of Sinjar, and assigning Yezidi power to holding the ground where it has raised the ire of forces al-beshmergah. Al-yezedi fighters are allied with the popular crowd, usually Peshmerga forces called them by the title of “traitors”. The PKK also owns an important military presence in the region, an ally of the crowd, and receives funding from Iran. The move of the popular crowd towards Sinjar is part of Iran’s attempts to encircle the American project, which was announced during a landmark visit by the US President to Riyadh this month, before the project is completed, which enjoys by broad Arab, Islamic consensus . The popular crowd does not seem interested in Kurdish warnings while political analysts considered that the goal of this expansion is to prevent the Iraqi and Syrian Kurds, backed by Washington, from the closure of the Syrian-Iraqi border to Iran.
The United States fears that the popular crowd may take advantage from the military vacuum area that arise on both sides of the border between Iraq and Syria forces , especially with the preoccupation with more than a military party in Syria for the operations of the liberalization of al-Riqa, the most important strongholds of the organization Daesh in Syria. And the US aircraft targeting the regime and its allies from the Shiite militias and military convoys at military Tanf base confirms the stringent in Washington to secure the border in view of what is represented by the arrival of Iranian militias of the threat to troops of opposition stationed in the military base along with a group of US officers and military advisers. According to military experts, the strike was not only a limited work intended through which to direct messages to local and regional actors, showed the importance of the border areas of the US strategic thinking, which extends to the phase of post-organizing Daesh in Syria and Iraq, and the process of arrangement of influence within them, as demonstrated the extent of seriousness in Washington to prevent any forces acting in proxy in the interest of Iran to control the border areas and points of communication between the countries of the region. The popular crowd leaders started to feel the extent of the risk of the uncalculated thrust towards the border, where vast stretches of desert and exposed places what makes its fighters at the mercy of American aviation. The Secretary General of the militia of “Sayyid al-Shuhda ” Abu Ala al-Walai , said US aircraft bombed the forces of the popular crowd in the Abu Kamal area near the Iraqi-Syrian border. Observers say that the arrival of the popular crowd troops to the Syrian border, and the declaration of its intention to go south towards the Qaim area, possibly forcing US troops to impose a military embargo zone to ensure the protection of its troops in the region.
Political analysts believe that the rush of popular crowd to the war is expected in the light of its composition as groups prepared for a proxy war for the benefit of Iran, and this explains the continuous offer of its intervention in Syria along with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces. Analysts warned that the arrogance of crowd, which was taken from the “success” in the war on Daesh after the marginalization of Iraqi forces, could lead to a long war in light of the Kurds possession of great experience and the presence of US -Turkish support for them in the face of Iranian expansion.
Western experts say that the confrontation between the coalition forces and the Iranian axis has become public to control the Syrian-Iraqi border, and they argue that the confrontation for Tehran is inevitable due to its relation to the future of its influence in both countries, and its attempts to progress at the level of this side will continue despite the fact that Western intervention to prevent it has become obvious and direct. Observers for Iranian affairs believe that Tehran is determined to escape forward and use the brinkmanship with US President Donald Trump’s management and drag the Americans to confront on the Syrian- Iraqi border issue, because of the importance of issue may determine the future of the Iranian influence in the entire region.
In light of the above, the features of the outbreak of confrontation between US forces and allies of Iran seem possible according to the observers who interpret Washington’s position of being a move too late to address the military arms of Iran after it was earlier a strategic paper in the face of Daesh inside Iraq as a result of the insistence of the Government of Abadi to grant this popular crowd political cover to legitimize its existence. And the premise of a military clash between Iran’s allies and US forces raises several possibilities that are possible, where some experts believe that Iran’s allies would suffer significant losses due to the lack of air cover and will have to pull back away from the border line, while others likely that these forces will stick to its positions fiercely, even though failed to progress inside Syria.
While another opinion rule out the premise of direct confrontation at the current stage, as long as the war is still going on under the banner of the fight against terrorism, Washington’s need to use the popular crowd forces against Daesh will be present of what is supposed to maintain a minimum level of coherence and coordination between the two sides and to avoid escalation on the border. The US goal is to “drain the armed energies in Iraq and Syria, therefore the matter is entrusted to the completion of the liquidation of the presence Daesh until the United States will begin to end the Iranian project then Tehran will not find route or borders for it with Syria” .And some opinions went to say that the strikes, which the Alliance forces directed to Tehran militias enough to rein its attempts at the present time and the reluctance of any progress towards the border that Iranians and their allies realize that the battle will not be equal and may lead to negative political consequences at the current stage. all these various estimates agreed to consider militias of popular crowd as a rewarded weapon that its use will be finished once there is no more need for it what makes its attempt to employ it by Iran to impose a regional equivalence a failed attempt as it will be faced with an American role for the liquidation of these militias within its plan to end the presence of any troops and militias in the western and northern region from Iraq, what makes the Iranian corridor merely a plan drawn on a map that it is not applicable.
It is clear that the rivalry between Iran and the United States on the Iraqi-Syrian border would be strong after the battle of Mosul, and each party will use local allies in this competition, Iran is using its allies in Iraq, while the United States uses its allies. And it seems that the battle of the border is not only military but also political, as Iran is seeking to find a land route with its ally Syria since years ago, while the United States and its allies are working to prevent it at any cost. while the Air Force and surveillance via satellite are playing a crucial role, which makes the balance of power in the battle to control the border areas tend to the interests of the United States at the expense of Iran.
The Iraqi Studies Unit
Rawabet Center for Research and Strategic Studies