This note was distributed to my institutional clients on December 2, 2019. I am distributing it on Substack to provide background for upcoming notes.
State and non-state forces move back and forth across the borders of Iraq and Syria with impunity. Zones of control no longer stop at national borders. The outlines of the nation will remain in place and a national government will exist in Baghdad, but the reality of a nation of Iraq is dissolving.
Sadr’s brand of Iraqi Shiite nationalism is dangerous to Iran because it could drive Iraq into the arms of the Arabs. When Sadr visited Qom, he might have been told that he would be made a Grand Ayatollah, making him eligible to be a marja the holy city of Najef, if he limited his nationalist activities. That would remove a huge political and military obstacle to Iran’s objectives.
Protests in Iran and Iraq have persisted despite severe violence by the authorities. The Iranians are hoping that in 2019 Trump will be too worried about reelection to care about protests in Iran.
The stitching holding together Iraq’s diverse but increasingly segregated society is coming apart. Iraq’s citizens appear ready to put aside ethno-sectarian bargaining in favor of national politics. But the constitution put in place by the US occupation force empowered a multi-ethnic/sectarian oligarchy. Each identity group is led by an elite who conspire amongst themselves to the detriment of the Iraqi people. State institutions have withered as government jobs and contracts have become bargaining chips in a constant struggle for power with no stoppages for governance. Voter turnout fell from 80% in 2005 to 45% in 2018 and only 20% of Iraqis believe they live in a democracy. Iraq’s oligarchy is willing to use any means necessary to retain power, as evidenced by the mass killing of protesters.
The internal borders between the Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish areas of the country are becoming harder as outside powers pull at the edges of the Iraqi quilt. The quilt will not completely fall apart. The outlines of the nation will remain in place and a national government will exist in Baghdad, but cleavages have opened between the three major subgroups of Iraq and currently no one seems capable of stitching them back together.
The Plains of Mesopotamia
The fertile plains of Mesopotamia have everything an empire wants: ease of movement and resources to exploit. The result has been that Mesopotamia became the boxing ring of empires vying for regional control. Mesopotamia was the breadbasket of the Middle East right up until the Persian Gulf War (1991). Although the ability to produce food is important, in the modern era the value of Iraq’s fertile soil has been the bounty of oil that it provides. One thing that has never changed is that Iraq and Syria are extremely valuable for the best reason: location, location, location. The Central Corridor in Syria and the river valleys of the Tigris and Euphrates are the strategic highways of the Middle East (Maps A and B). To the north rugged mountain ranges, to the south an endless desert. The Persian and Ottoman Empires fought each other for three centuries over this land. Even today, bloody wars are being fought to control the highways (literal and figurative) of the Middle East.
Although various empires have met for battle in what is now Iraq, the two most applicable here are the Safavids and the Ottomans. The fight between these empires to control Iraq continued, nearly without pause, for the entirety of the Safavid Empire’s existence. The Safavid Empire began in 1501 when Ismail I, a zealous Shiite, decided it was his religious duty to conquer the Muslim world and convert everyone to Shiism. Ismail and his successors were not able to conquer the entire Muslim world, but they did move into portions of Turkey, Iraq and Kuwait. This brought the Safavids into contention with the Ottomans for strategically important territory (Maps C & D). The demographics and ethnic distribution of these three modern-day countries were decided by a pushing contest between empires (Map E).
Militias and the Land Bridge
As mentioned above, Syria and Iraq are transportation corridors, which has made them strategically important for all recorded history. Iran’s leadership, whether they read their history or not, are treading a well-worn path. All one needs to do is look at which armed groups control which sections of the country. Iran has placed its militia units right along the northwest-southeast highway system (Map F), which provides access to crossing points along the Iraq-Syria border (marked with red circles on Map G). Control over the hearts and minds of Iraqi Shia and/or control over Iraq’s oil would be great for Iran, but they have never been the primary goal. Iran’s efforts in Syria and Iraq are first and foremost about providing a land bridge to Hezbollah. Hezbollah’s one-hundred thousand or more rockets, missiles and other flying weapons provide the mutually assured destruction that prevents a pre-empt a pre-emptive attack by Israel. Iran’s leadership sees Hezbollah as protection for them personally against an Israeli strike.
Iran briefly had effective control of a contiguous length of highway from Iran to Lebanon. However, events have developed to the detriment of Iran’s strategic goals. The movement of US and later Turkish troop into northern Syria made the two border crossings from Iraqi Kurdistan to Syria unusable. US Special Forces have created a safety zone at the junction of the Iraq-Syria-Jordan border. That made the southern border crossing unusable as well (Map H).
After the defeat of ISIS and with a US President actively looking for an opportunity to withdraw, the situation seemed to be working out very well for Iran by using the Abu Kamal border crossing in the center of the country. However, US “withdrawal” from Syria was really a re-positioning of US forces further south, where they are more strategically well-placed. The movement of US troops into the oilfields made the highway from the border to the city of Deir ez-Zor unusable. The one route still open runs east-west from the border crossing. However, this is a two-lane road that runs mostly through unpopulated desert, making the route vulnerable. The Syrian government has been building a new highway along the same route as the secondary road, but the regime is short on manpower. Unless conditions change in their favor, it could be years before Iran gets the highway it needs to reconnect the bridge.
The tragedy waiting to happen becomes clear when the areas of control map above (Map F) are compared with the ethno-sectarian map below (Map I). The highway system that Iran needs runs through the middle of Sunni territory. With no outside support and still recovering from Islamic State, radical Sunni groups have kept a very low profile for the past few years. However, if Iran subjects the Sunni population of Iraq to brutal domination, a new insurgency will rise, it will only be a question of when.
Of course, were it possible, the government in Baghdad would move the regular army in and displace the militia, with force if necessary. However, the Iraqi Security Forces are for the most part in shambles and would be unable to take on the militias. Nor do the militias need to be concerned about the federal government cutting public services. As with Hezbollah, Iran has set up its Shia militia in Iraq to function as a state within a state. The militia have taken over healthcare and education services in areas they control, which allows them to justify collecting taxes. Money from tax collections enables the formation of a patronage network. Gradually the local government, and its infrastructure, are absorbed into the pseudo-state.
Another potential source of conflict can be seen in Map J below. With the permission of the Kurdish Regional Government, Turkish forces have moved deep into Iraq in pursuit of PKK forces. The Turkish forces will go right up to the border with Iran and might be tempted to go over the border. This writer has never been to the mountains between Iraq and Iran, but I feel safe assuming there is not a red line painted across the mountains. If Turkish and Iranian forces encountered each other, it would not be the first time a war started because of a relatively small disagreement over exactly where a border lies.
Supreme Leader of Muslims
The bitter sectarianism that Iran has used to its advantage was not in the original plan, quite the opposite. Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini assumed the Islamic Revolution he started in Iran would soon spread across the Muslim world. But, aside from Hezbollah, other Muslims have rejected theocratic totalitarianism. Iran’s foreign policy has become more pragmatic over the years but is still built on the Iranian leadership’s aspiration to lead the Muslim world as the U.S. does “the West”. Indeed, on the current Supreme Leader’s website (Ayatollah Ali Khamenei) he is referred to as “Supreme Leader of Muslims”.
The Bush Administration and Iran’s leadership viewed Iraq as the battleground between theocracy and democracy for Arab hearts and minds. However, the Bush Administration operated under the mistaken belief that Iran’s goal from the start was to stoke sectarian tensions. With Shiites comprising only 10% of the world’s Muslim population, Iran’s Supreme Leader needs to appeal to Sunnis to claim the mantle of Supreme Leader of Muslims. Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guard viewed American dominance of Iraq as prelude to the invasion of Iran. Iran took drastic action in Iraq to stoke sectarian conflict because it felt threatened and now must live the with decision.
Iran’s current foreign policy has three components. First, create the narrative that Iran and the Muslim world share interests and enemies. Second, spread revolution through democratic elections - outside of Iran. The ability of Hamas, Hezbollah and the Muslim Brotherhood to attain political power at the ballot box increased Iran’s confidence that, if given enough time and resources, the revolution would spread. Third, in areas where politics is not an option, spread Iran’s influence using irregular militia highly indoctrinated in Khomeinist ideology.
The Two Ivory Towers
The city of Najef in Iraq has stood as a center of Islamic study for over one-thousand years. The city of about one-million people holds the tomb of Imam Ali, Muhammed’s grandson and, for Shia, the first Imam after Muhammed’s death, making it the third holiest city for Shiites after Mecca and Medina.
The Usali school of Islamic jurisprudence first became popular in Najef in the eighteenth century. This school believes in the use of rational judgement to advance Islamic norms for the benefit of the community. The school allows clerics to act on “probable knowledge” to apply Islamic principles to modern life. The idea being, based on what Muhammed said, how would he most likely react to this new situation.
The city of Qom, Iran was founded in 1922 as a massive seminary for of Islamic studies. The city remained a backwater until Khomeini took power and began pumping resources into the seminaries there. Government efforts in Qom have been focused on creating effective vocational programs for religiously trained bureaucrats and foreign-born missionaries bringing Khomeinist ideology to their homelands.
Najef’s status faded during Saddam Hussein’s reign as the seminaries went into lockdown to prevent government scrutiny. Indeed, Sistani’s seminary was closed from 1994 to 2003 and from 1998 to 2003 he almost never left his home. During the post-Saddam era Najef has experienced a revival. In 2003, Qom had between 40,000-50,000 students, while Najef had only 2,000. After the fall of Saddam, Najef’s ideological significance came roaring back and the seminaries grew back to historically normal levels of 10,000-15,000 students.
Khomeini was exiled from Iran by the Shah in 1964 forcing him to flee to Najef. At Najef, Khomeini put forward his concept of totalitarian rule by cleric (“velayat-e faqih”), but the establishment in Najef rejected the idea. Najef is the center of the quietist school of Shiism. The political philosophy taught in Najef is for an inclusive civil society that respects individual freedoms and does not favor one group over another. The clerics at Najef want a society that acknowledges Islam by refraining from contradicting Islamic principles. Sistani views velayat-e faqih as “juris-consultancy”, which covers all matters to which the Islamic social system, extends. In other words, the purview of the cleric is very broad, but his role is that of a consultant, not of a dictator.
Even in Iran, single cleric remains a contentious issue. Of the top fifteen clerics authorities in Qom, only five support Khamenei. In March 2018 tensions rose when a cleric was arrested for teaching his seminary students that Khamenei was like the pharos of ancient Egypt. The Guardian Council has been pressuring Qom’s seminaries to produce clerics more friendly to the government. Without gravitas or credentials of Khomeini and Sistani, Khamenei has used cash payments to generate loyalty in Qom.
The Quietist
Born in Iran in 1930, Sistani was raised in the center of the Quietist pro-democracy movement in Iran. His father, a cleric, was a leading advocate of constitutionalism and democracy. During his time as a seminary student, Sistani was mentored by leaders of the Quietist movement. In 1960, at the unusually young age of 30 Sistani was granted ijtihad, making him a clerical jurist and entitling him to issue fatwas. Sistani is an expert in ijtihad, the use of reason to apply the values lessons in the Koran to contemporary issues. The goal of ijtihad is to make Islam a living religion that adapts to meet changing conditions. Upon his mentor’s death, in 1992, Sistani was elevated to the status of marja al-akbar, which translates to “The Greatest Source of Emulation” – more on this below.
Quietist clerics stay above the day-to-day partisan bickering but are not passive regarding politics. Because the marja is a source of knowledge to be emulated, he can comment on politics without getting dragged into partisanship. Civic involvement has always been a duty of clerics in the Shia community. During times of stability clerics completely remove themselves from governance, but during difficult times religious leaders are expected to provide guidance.
Sistani has a sincere belief in the importance of the social contract between the ruler and those being ruled. He believes government derives its legitimacy from the consent of the people. As a result, he sees the role of the Grand Ayatollah as a defender of Muslims and Islamic principles, not as an absolute ruler over all private and public affairs. In terms of governance, Sistani supports what could be called “secular Shiism” where instead of separation of church and state or subjugation of the state by the church, the government has respect for the Islamic religious principles that bind the country – Sunni and Shia - together.
Sistani’s Global Network
In Shia Islam, the faithful pay zakat (religious taxes) based on a customary formula. Ninety percent is distributed locally, and ten percent is paid to the Source of Emulation that the worshiper follows. This system has allowed Shia clerics (outside of Iran) to maintain independence from the state. Thousands of wakils around the world act as representatives of the marja to oversee his financial, charitable and educational activities. Sistani’s top wakils are his son and two sons-in-law.
Sistani’s network pays out an estimated five to ten million dollars monthly to seminary students and professors. Sistani’s students receive the best stipends in Najef. Millions more go to his Islamic charities, libraries, schools and hospitals across the world. Indeed, Sistani operates a network of organizations across Iran. His tax revenue, and patronage network, grew substantially after the fall of Saddam because Shia pilgrims were able to visit Najef for the first time in decades. His assets are estimated to be two billion dollars.
Sistani speaks at a whisper and carries a massive stick. He rarely makes direct statements, preferring to speak through associates. But his word was enough to bring down Maliki from his position of Prime Minister and his word was enough to raise an army of citizens to fight Islamic State. The government of Iran has a convenient way to measure the popularity of each Grand Ayatollah. Shiite Muslims making the pilgrimage to Mecca must learn the proper rituals for the marja that they follow. The tour guides the government pays to organize the trip reports back the requests. Sistani has an 80% popularity rating among Shia in Iran. Sistani is a powerful man and, unless he is replaced by someone equally as well respected, a major obstacle will be removed from Khamenei’s efforts to control Iraq politically.
Transitioning to Democracy
Sistani supported the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and called for Shia to support efforts to overthrow Saddam. However, he added the proviso that after helping the Americans his followers should always ask “When are you leaving?” Sistani met with the US-appointed Governing Council and the UN Special Representative but would not meet with any U.S. officials.
Sistani’s position during the entire post-Saddam period has been that only direct elections without a sectarian-based quota system would derive a mandate from the people and thus be considered legitimate. That put him in a more pre-democracy position than US officials who wanted to implement a quota-based system from the top down. In a letter written in 2004 to the U.S. Administrator of Iraq, Ian Bremmer, Sistani wrote: “Mr. Bremmer, You are an American. I am an Iranian. I suggest we leave it to the Iraqis to devise their constitution.”
The Kleptocracy
For Iran, a friendly government in Baghdad is a cornerstone of national security. Nearly 90% of Iraqis live within 100 kilometers of the Iranian border and most of Iran’s oil reserves are in Shia Arab majority areas. Indeed, Saddam Hussein used the justification of “protecting” Iran’s Arabs when he invaded. Turkey and Russia are also regional competitors, but there are mountains between them and Iran. Iraq is nestled right up against Iran’s soft underbelly.
Iraq has over 250 registered parties and a low hurdle for winning seats in Parliament, making for a fragmented legislature. Small parties act as spoilers, lawmakers frequently change parties and bidding for votes is an open secret. In June 2019, the Prime Minister put forward controversial amendments to Iraq’s election laws that would raise the bar for winning seats in Parliament, heavily favoring large political parties. The changes might be necessary in the long run, but voters saw the move as an attempt to entrench a kleptocracy run by the multi-ethnic/sectarian oligarchy. The changes made to election laws set in motion a chain of events leading to political breakdown.
The anger of protester in Iraq has been focused on Iran because the IRGC was sloppy in hiding the level of control it wields in the Iraqi government. The coalition representing the Iranian-backed militias (“Fattah Alliance”), is now the second largest party in Iraqi Parliament. After the Iraqi elections in 2018, Parliament was unable to form a government and the political system was in deadlock. IRGC Commander Qassem Soleimani flew to Baghdad to negotiate the agreement that put the current government into power. The current Prime Minister, Adil Abdul-Mahdi, was chosen as a compromise[1]. Mahdi has never led a party or put forward a governing platform, so he has no electoral mandate. Mahdi is less than a figurehead, he is a placeholder.
Iran has lost much of the Iraqi street, but it still holds sway over the elites. Indeed, the day after protests broke out Soleimani flew to Baghdad, showed up at a cabinet meeting – unannounced - and took the Prime Minister’s seat at the head of the table. He told Iraq’s leadership “We in Iran know how to deal with protests. This happened in Iran and we got it under control.” The next day Iraqi security forces became much more aggressive in confronting protesters and Iran deployed snipers to break up protests. In the space of a week over three hundred civilians were killed.
Iran’s actions belie its reassurances to Iraq’s elite. The leadership is clearly concerned about the protests and reacted violently as a result. The Iranians have made significant progress building their political, economic and military power in Iraq. But, the major weakness of Iran’s proxy model is that Iran can help its proxies get into power, staying in power requires good governance by the proxies.
Khamenei has had to make the tough decision of whether to use Iran’s limited resources to prop up allies and risk domestic unrest or spend the money at home to cushion the impact of U.S. sanctions on Iranian oil. That pressure continues to grow as the US embargo on Iranian oil wreaks havoc on the Iranian economy.
The Protesters
When the protests began, most of Iraq’s leadership reacted by presenting window-dressing reforms aimed at cutting government corruption and improving public services. Only President Salih, who holds a largely ceremonial position, realized the significance of the protests. Salih gathered a group of constitutional experts to reform the system from the ground up. The difficulty is that there is no “regime” to act on the demands of the populace. Government power in Iraq is widely distributed based on an ethno-sectarian formula. The flaws causing the malfunction in governance also make implementing reforms unfeasible.
The protesters are explicitly rejecting an identity-based political system, where voting constituencies are relatively static, in favor of an issues-based system where constituencies differ on a topic-by-topic basis. New social boundaries based on socio-economic differences are forming within the Shia community, rendering the quota system useless. The current system has created a multi-ethnic/sectarian oligarchy dividing the spoils of oil wealth among their patronage networks.
Protests have not yet spread to Sunni or Kurdish areas of the country. Iraqi Kurdistan is becoming increasingly isolated politically and economically from the rest of Iraq. Voters in Kurdistan are angry as well, but their anger is directed as the Kurdistan Regional Government. Sunni areas of the country remain depopulated and in shambles. Sunnis are reluctant to be associated with any anti-government activity for fear of being branded terrorists.
Protests in Iran and Iraq have persisted despite severe violence by the authorities. In Iraq, despite abductions and killings by the authorities, the protests expanded to a second wave that included students and professional society groups (i.e. teachers, lawyers, etc.). The Iraqi protesters are beginning to win over the middle class. In Iran, there have been a string of attacks on banks and other government-controlled companies. The populace remains cautious after the mass killings of protesters in 2009, which the Obama administration turned a blind eye to in hopes of achieving a nuclear weapons treaty. The Iranians are hoping that in 2019 Trump will be too worried about reelection to care about protests in Iran.
Sistani is clearly concerned the Iraqi political elite are not taking the protests seriously enough. He has issued statements calling for political reforms and supporting the protesters. He has also told protesters that they should not go home until the reforms they demand are agreed to. Sistani has reacted with increasingly forceful and direct statements against the government’s violent response to the protests. Indeed, on November 15th Sistani said Iraq will never be the same after the mass killing of protesters.
The Khomeinist
Khamenei is called the “Supreme Leader”, but his power is not absolute or unilateral. Rather, he is the most powerful individual in a highly fractionalized regime. He does not make national decisions alone, but no decisions can be made without his consent. His position is a chief bureaucrat backed by a deep state.
The presidents who have served under Khamenei have been major players in Iranian politics with forceful personalities. However, by playing the long game Khamenei’s policies have won out. He resisted Rafsanjani’s (1989-1997) outreach to Washington. He quashed Khatami’s (1997-2005) movement to democratize. And he restrained Ahmadinejad’s (2005-2013) proclivity for confrontation.
Iran’s constitution originally required the Supreme Leader be a Grand Ayatollah. Months before his death in June 1989, Khomeini had a falling out with his designated successor. The political establishment needed to come up with a Grand Ayatollah interested in being Supreme Leader, who was also an effective bureaucrat and ideologically loyal to Khomeini. No candidates could check all the boxes so Khomeini had the constitution changed to downgrade the minimum credential to Ayatollah. The religious elite in Qom objected, but to no avail.
After an intense period of political bargaining Khamenei was made Supreme Leader and, with the help of a friendly Grand Ayatollah, went from the middle rank of Hujjat al-Islam to Ayatollah overnight. Khamenei was able to able to muster average grades at seminary, but before becoming an ayatollah he was forced to return home to care for his ailing father.
Initially he went out of his way to make assurances to the vested interests that the status quo would not be disturbed. Once competing centers of power stopped paying attention Khamenei set about consolidating his power. First, he built a network of tens of thousands of clerical commissars loyal to him and placed them in strategically important posts throughout the government. Next, he forged an alliance with the Revolutionary Guards and other security institutions. These groups could play the role of kingmaker if the succession process becomes contentious.
Khamenei has laid out three principles that guide his decisions. First, Islam embodies justice and should guide all endeavors. Second, independence requires self-sufficiency in economic output, technology and culture. Third, Iran’s “Revolutionary Islamism” is the country’s greatest source of strength.
Khamenei’s view can best be described as “theocratic socialism” where a stern but benevolent government treats everyone equally, according to shariah law. For Khamenei, the revolution of 1979 was as much about removing corrupting foreign influences in Iran as it was about implementing Islamic governance. The regime justifies Iran’s terrible economy as a necessary price to pay for economic self-sufficiency, which it claims is necessary for political independence. The diplomatic struggle over Iran’s nuclear program embodies Khamenei’s worldview.
Succession
As mentioned above, Sistani currently holds the title of marja al-akbar, which translates to “The Greatest Source of Emulation” and serves as spiritual guide to the world’s two-hundred million Shia. Marja al-akbar is not an official position, but its holder has great influence in the Shia community. In the past, the choice of Najef’s marja al-akbar would have been of religious significance only but Sistani’s role in holding Iraq together makes the position politically important. Sistani’s death will give Iran a once-in-a-generation opportunity to take control of Najef and coopt the seminaries there to spreading Khomeinist Islamic Revolutionary ideology.
There is no set procedure for deciding who will be marja and, as a result, no way to speed up the process in times of uncertainty. The requirements are piety and superiority of knowledge in Islamic jurisprudence. The duty of any layperson is to seek out the highest-ranking living scholar and follow their fatwas. Identifying the most qualified scholars for the title of marja al-akbar is a task for ayatollahs who teach at the seminaries. They have access to all the Grand Ayatollahs and the requisite knowledge to rank their expertise. There are usually a few marja in Najef at any one time, but there is always one who stands above as the most experienced.
Some feel that concerns of an Iranian takeover of Najef after Sistani dies are overdone. The Shia religious establishment in Najef has existed as an independent entity for one thousand years and are staunchly anti-theocratic. The scholars in Najef pride themselves on their financial independence and the political independence that comes with it. The succession process is built on Shia traditions that cannot be changed by force. The Iranians can influence the debate but cannot dictate terms to Najef. However, that does not mean the Iranians won’t try.
Ayatollah Atari
Iran had been positioning one of its leading clerics, Ayatollah Shahroudi, to take over as marja al-akbar in Najef, but he died in December 2018. Shahroudi had the right mix of jurisprudence credentials and ties to Iran’s theocratic establishment. Until recently, Iran would have had a second option in Muqtada Sadr, but they backed a competitor for prime minister in 2018.
Sadr was observant enough that he morphed into an Iraqi nationalist before the backlash against Iran started. Sadr’s new pitch is for Iraqis to put aside sectarianism to focus on pushing foreign powers out. He has positioned himself as a symbol of resistance against foreign intervention and a corruption buster. Sadr has said he wants an “Islamic democracy” in Iraq and has been pushing a nationalist platform to position himself as an Iraqi political leader, rather than a Shia clerical leader.
Sadr’s brand of Iraqi Shiite nationalism is dangerous to Iran because it could drive Iraq into the arms of the Arabs. He is a threat because and he can back up his political threats with his own powerful militia, the Medhi Army. On numerous occasions Sadr has flooded the streets with thousands of followers to “lobby” the government. He is very pragmatic in his politics, even entering a political alliance with the Iraqi Communist Party in 2015.
On November 3rd, with protests ongoing, Sadr flew to Qom and since returning has taken a significantly less hawkish position. Sadr has become known as “Ayatollah Atari” because of his love of video games. To reach the status of marja a cleric must speak Arabic and Persian, have published a risalah (dissertation) endorsed by at least one Grand Ayatollah. Sadr spent five years in Iran during the U.S. occupation studying Persian but has not completed his dissertation.
Sadr hates studying and Khamenei has first-hand experience getting “skipped ahead” in his clerical studies. This writer views it possible that when Sadr visited Qom, he was told that he would be made a Grand Ayatollah, making him eligible to be a marja (although unlikely the marja al-akbar) in Najef, if he limited his nationalist activities. That would remove a huge political and military obstacle to its objectives.
Conclusion
State and non-state forces move back and forth across the borders of Iraq and Syria with impunity. Zones of control no longer stop at national borders. In both countries a functioning government exists in the capital, but the government is unable to prevent territorial infringements because it does not control the entire area of the country as shown on a map. The Iraqi government now controls a rump of a rump and is only able to maintain power because of the support it receives from Iran.
If Iraqi nationalists rise up and demand a revamp of the government, then the survival of Iran’s land bridge will depend on Iran’s willingness and ability to respond with brute force. Based on statements the leadership of Iran has made, it appears their preferred option is mass-killing of civilians. However, perfect control over the highways of Iraq means nothing if there is not also the ability to cross into Syria. As discussed above and in Part 1 of this note, US and Turkish forces are now positioned to block those crossings. Normally, Iranian policy would be to play the long game, but time is against Iran in the current situation.