US forces exit Iraq after two decades, leaving opening for Iran

US forces are set to pull out from their last bases in Iraq by Wednesday, a departure celebrated as a victory by Iran and its allies, ​who now influence the country where around 4,500 US soldiers died during more than two decades of war.

Iraqi security experts say the withdrawal — agreed in 2024 under President Joe Biden and carried ‌out by Donald Trump's administration even as it wages war against Iran — could give Tehran and its allies free rein, while also allowing other US enemies to stage a comeback, including Islamic State.

"Iran stands to benefit strategically from the coalition's departure because it removes a military presence that for years acted as a counterweight to Tehran's influence in Iraq," said Jasim al-Bahadli, an Iraqi security analyst specialising in studying groups aligned with Iran.

He predicted that the pro-Iranian military groups would not only portray the departure as a victory for their movement, ​but also "seek to translate that momentum into greater influence over security and political decision-making".

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Abu Mojtaba al-Yasiri, a commander in the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, an umbrella group of Iran-backed armed factions, described the US withdrawal as "a ​historic victory for the Iraqi Islamic resistance groups and honourable Iraqis, and a crushing defeat for the American project".

"On September 30, we will celebrate the turning of a black page ⁠in Iraq’s history and the failure of the occupation to impose its will on our country," he told Reuters. "Iraq has proven that its sovereignty cannot be secured by foreign forces, but by the resistance and the will of its people."

Not ready

While the eventual departure of US forces is broadly popular among Iraqis, those who worry about the strength of the Iran-backed groups fear the withdrawal is premature.

"We believe Iraq is still not fully ready to take over the security file ​at this time," Abdulrahman al-Zobaie, a tribal leader in Fallujah, told Reuters.

"All Iraqis aspire to full sovereignty, and no Iraqi would dispute that. But I believe that the (US-led coalition) leaving in this way and creating a vacuum is what all Iraqis fear."

American forces invaded Iraq in 2003 and went on to occupy the country, forcibly installing a government sympathetic to US interests and leaving a million Iraqis dead due to conflict before withdrawing at the end of 2011.

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They returned less than three years later to help Iraqi ​forces defeat the Islamic State in a major war from 2014 to 2017.

Around twice as many US soldiers were killed in "Operation Iraqi Freedom" as in the parallel war in Afghanistan, which ended with an abrupt US withdrawal in 2021.

In ​recent years, Iraq has been the only country to maintain close political and military alliances with both the United States and Iran.

The United States killed a top Iranian commander, Qasem Soleimani, with a strike on ‌Baghdad Airport ⁠in 2020. Iran's allies repeatedly fired retaliatory strikes on US bases, sometimes drawing reprisals.

In this year's war against Iran, 7 of the 18 US service members listed as killed were in Iraq, the last an army sergeant who died during the controlled detonation of a drone at a base near Erbil in July.

Victory for Iran's axis

Iran, which says its ultimate aim is to force American forces to leave the entire Middle East, casts the US withdrawal from Iraq as a victory for its "axis of resistance" of allied armed groups across the region.

"Lasting security will prevail in Iraq" once the Americans leave the country and the region, the deputy chairman of the National Security Commission of Iran's Parliament, Amir Hayat Moqaddam, said on Monday.

Iran "welcomes the withdrawal of ​American troops from Iraq and will undoubtedly support it," he ​told Iran's parliamentary news service. "Resistance groups are currently ⁠taking action, sometimes targeting and confronting American troops."

Also read: Iran slams 'clear aggression' after US-Saudi strikes on Iraq kill 20 PMF fighters

Washington has accused Iran-backed groups in Iraq of playing a role in the wider Middle East conflict by launching attacks on neighbouring countries at the direction of Tehran, most recently hitting a major Saudi oil pipeline this month. The Baghdad government says it is trying to curb their influence.

New life for Islamic State?

Some ​Iraqi security officials, both in the federal government and the semi-autonomous northern Kurdish region, say the US pullout also risks giving new life to Islamic State fighters, who, despite ​the defeat of their self-proclaimed ⁠caliphate nearly a decade ago, retain a sleeper cell network.

At their height, the fighters occupied a third of Iraq and killed thousands of people, including hundreds they videotaped themselves gunning down inside a former US military base.

A lack of US intelligence, logistical support and drones will give Islamic State a chance to regroup, said Kurdish commander Sirwan Barzani.

"For more than two weeks, we have noticed movement by (Islamic State) sleeper cells, after it was announced in the general media that there will be an official withdrawal of ⁠the international coalition from ​Iraq by the end of September," he said. "This has boosted, in my opinion, the morale" of the fighters.

Iraqi security forces said a suspected ​Islamic State cell was preparing suicide attacks to coincide with the pullout. The plot highlighted concerns that the group remains capable of exploiting security gaps despite years of military setbacks, said four Iraqi security and army officials.

Islamic State "is seeking to send a message that the group is still powerful ​and capable of launching bloody attacks," said Colonel Khalid al-Bayati, a senior security official in the strategic oil town of Kirkuk.

With input from Web Desk