The US Department of Defense announced that F-15 fighters targeted sites belonging to the Iraqi Hezbollah Brigade, three of them in Iraq and two in Syria, in response to the Hezbolla’s missile attacks against a US military base in Kirkuk that killed an American contractor and wounded American and Iraqi soldiers. For its part, the Hezbollah confirmed the killing of 25 of its fighters and the wounding of others in this attack, vowing to “battle with America open to all possibilities.”
It is well known that these brigades are part of the “popular crowd” factions, which consist of factions openly loyal to Iran and through direct military, security and logistical coordination with the “Quds Force” led by Qasim Soleimani. However, the “crowd” was officially annexed to the Iraqi army with the aim of confronting the terrorist organization ISIS in the aftermath of the fall of Mosul, and the Iraqi Ministry of Defense allowed the expansion of its factions deep into Syrian territory, whether within the framework of fighting it or supporting the Syrian regime militarily.
For his part, the US Secretary of Defense, Mark Esber, announced that the strikes that targeted Hezbollah facilities in Iraq and Syria, on Sunday evening, were successful, pointing out that he does not rule out any other steps “if necessary.” Esper see, during a press conference hours after Announcing the strikes, “The United States has taken offensive measures against an Iranian-sponsored group.” “We will take further measures if necessary to defend oneself and deter the militias or Iran from committing hostile acts,” Mark Esber told reporters, quoted by al-Hurrah channel.
For its part, the Iraqi government announced that the American air strikes pushed it to “review the relationship” with the United States. “The American forces relied on their own conclusions and their political priorities, not the priorities as viewed by the government and people of Iraq,” a statement of the Iraqi National Security Ministerial Council, which held an emergency meeting to study the implications of the aircraft attack. It added that “the protection of Iraq, its camps, the forces present in it and the representations are the exclusive responsibility of the Iraqi security forces.” It continued, “This sinful attack which violates the goals and principles for which the international coalition is formed, pushing Iraq to review the relationship and security and political and legal work contexts in a manner that preserves the sovereignty and security of the country, protecting the lives of its people and promoting common interests.”
Washington is currently working to tighten pressure on Tehran and besiege the Iranian strategy relentlessly by tightening the screws on its armed arms in the region. For his part, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confirmed that his country would not “accept the Islamic Republic of Iran to take actions that endanger American women and men.”
In the first reaction by the United States to the supporters of the Iraqi “Hezbollah Brigades” storming the headquarters of the Washington embassy in Baghdad today, Tuesday, US President Donald Trump called on the Iraqi authorities to use their forces to protect the embassy, accusing Iran of being behind what is going on.
The American president wrote, on his account on Twitter, that “Iran killed an American collaborator, and caused injuries to others.” We have responded vigorously to that, and we will always do so,”referring to the US raids that targeted the militia in response to an attack in which an American collaborator was killed in Iraq. Trump continued in his tweet “Now Iran is preparing an attack on the American embassy in Iraq. They will bear the full consequences of that. Moreover, we expect Iraq to use all of its forces to protect the embassy, and we have told them. ”
Accordingly, the question revolves around the various possible possibilities in Iraq according to the rule of action and reaction :
-The first possibility revolves around the continuation of attacks and counterattacks, but to a limited extent, without turning it into a full-scale US-Iranian war.
-The second possibility revolves around a phased political agreement of the American administration through the Iraqi government with Iran to calm things down and neutralize the country.
-The third possibility is based on the escalation of clashes to the extent that Washington will carry out in the coming months a wide operation to eradicate the Iranian military force in Iraq.
The three scenarios are connected with a time limit represented in the first nine months of 2020 until reaching the presidential elections. There are two directions, either that Trump be re-elected and thus have certain scenarios, or a Democratic president will be elected, and thus the stage of returning to the nuclear agreement begins.
The most obvious possibility is the continuation of confrontations because the Iranian leadership wants to use these clashes for more than one reason, the most important of which is diverting attention to a clash between the Americans and pro-militia militias, which weakens the interest in the protests in Iraq, especially in the Shiite areas. This factor may be the most important for them, and it reminds us of what Hizbullah did after the Cedar Revolution in 2005 when it triggered a war with Israel that weakened the revolution. So are the Iranians planning confrontations with the Americans with the aim of weakening the Iraqi revolution? This is more than possible.
Another reason for the Iranian escalation against the American bases is to weaken Washington’s resolve in the region and reduce its capabilities until the elections, and the two reasons are likely to be concomitant (weakening the Iraqi revolution and weakening the Americans). With regard to the Trump administration, we have noted a determination that the American image in the Middle East in general should not be weakened and in Iraq in particular, the National Security Council and the Ministry of Defense stress the need for the American field situation to be decisive, so both sides have a determination to confront and not retreat.
And the Iraqi airspace is practically in the hands of Washington, but the land of confrontation, if it happened, is more complicated than expected. If the Americans decide their affairs and stand in their areas of existence, it is expected that field uprisings will start in Anbar and Kurdistan, where the majority in these areas support the United States at the expense of Tehran, and everyone knows wide youth sectors in the Shiite regions are already revolting against the Iranian presence.
It can be said, according to the prevalence of the possibility of confrontation, that the “silent” consensus has ended between the “crowd” and the pro-Iranian factions in general, on the one hand, and approximately 5,000 American soldiers who returned to Iraq in 2014 to confront the terrorist group of ISIS on the other hand. Therefore, the repeated defeats that the organization suffered later ensured the recharge of tension between the two parties, especially after the withdrawal of the United States from the West’s nuclear agreement with Iran, and the exacerbation of what is known as the “proxy war” that Iran is waging through its affiliated organizations in Iraq, or the United States is fighting it across the its agents in the area.
In this sense, the recent military developments herald the entry of Iraq into new and very dangerous chapters of the proxy war between Washington and Tehran.
Iraqi Studies Unit
Rawabet Center for Research and Strategic Studies