The U.S. drone strike that killed an Iran-backed militia commander in Iraq risks further straining relations with Baghdad and intensifying popular and political pressure on the Iraqi government to expel the U.S.-led coalition aiding the fight against Islamic State in the country.
Wednesday’s strike in the Iraqi capital killed a commander of the Kataib Hezbollah militia, which the Pentagon said was responsible for directly planning and participating in attacks on American forces in the region.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed al-Sudani on Thursday accused the U.S. of violating his country’s sovereignty, saying the strike would push Baghdad to terminate the mission of the U.S.-led military coalition, according to his spokesperson.
The recent strikes could amplify political pressure on Sudani to set a clear timeline for the withdrawal, said Aniseh Bassiri Tabrizi, Abu Dhabi based expert on Iraq and Iran with Control Risks, a consulting firm.
“The strikes are seen by political actors across Iraq’s federal government, including Sudani, as a demonstration that the U.S. presence in Iraq is destabilizing the country and increasing the chances of Iraq being drawn into a regional confrontation and dragged into war,” she said.
Yesterday, Trump assassinated Qasem Soleimani, Iran’s military leader. Ironically, Soleimani was on a peace mission in Iraq invited by the Iraq prime minister.
Iraq’s parliament voted Sunday to expel U.S. troops from the country, after the killing of an Iranian general put the country at the centre of an escalating conflict between its two key allies.
In his address to parliament on Sunday, Mr. Abdul-Mahdi said he had been due to meet Gen. Soleimani at 8:30 a.m. on the morning he was killed as he left Baghdad International airport. Mr. Abdul-Mahdi said Gen. Soleimani was carrying Iran’s response to a message Iraq had conveyed on behalf of Saudi Arabia aimed at easing tensions between the two countries in the region.
Nonbinding Request
The request is allegedly nonbinding because the US installed a puppet government in Iraq with certain conditions pre-attached.
Trump Beats the War Drums
After illegally assassinating Soleimani , while on a peace mission no less, President Trump renewed threats to hit back at Iran “VERY FAST AND VERY HARD” in the event of further strikes targeting Americans or U.S. assets.
Hey, let’s carry out an illegal assassination and then for good measure, in an undeclared war, follow up by blasting Iranian oil refineries.
Didn’t Trump promise his supporters he will bring US troops back home from Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq? Now he threatens Iraq not to kick him out? https://t.co/GQM4twrYM1
“We believe the justifications for the international coalition have ended,” Prime Minister Mohammed al-Sudani told The Wall Street Journal, as the war in Gaza frays Iraqi relations with Washington.
Knowing that, President Biden ordered a drone strike in Iraq anyway, just as Trump did in 2020.
And why does Iraq have a government led by Shiites? For that we need to go back to the idiotic war started by George W. Bush.
The US took out Saddam Hussein in response to 9/11, despite the fact that it was Saudi nationals who attacked the US in 9/11. According to US idiotic thinking at the time, “Iraq had rich targets.”
The overthrow of Hussein led to the formation of ISIS. UK’s Prime Minister at the time, Tony Blair, now admits this.
Hussein was a secular leader. His only rule was don’t mess with Hussein. There was freedom of religion in Iraq before, not now. Pockets of ISIS still exist.
And so here we are, in a very tangled brew of our own making, in which the puppet government the US helped install in Iraq, no longer wants us in their country.
The idiot warmongers, some in each party, want the US to strike Iran. Expect the US media to get in on it.
Foreign Policy for Dummies
US meddling f’d up in Iran, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria costing trillions of dollars.
Idiots want more meddling
Subscribe to MishTalk Email Alerts.
Subscribers get an email alert of each post as they happen. Read the ones
you like and you can unsubscribe at any time.
”
US meddling f’d up in Iran, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria costing trillions of dollars.
Idiots want more meddling
”
…And: 50+ years of completely unhinged central banking, have ensured that absolutely all positions of wealth, power and influence in the US; public as well as private; are; almost without a single remaining exception at all; filled by noone who is not a complete idiot.
Hence: F’ing up is what the US does now. It’s all it does. All it knows how to do.
Columbo
2 years ago
I bet the US troops are going nowhere and staying in Iraq. This is just a virtue signal by the Iraqi government.
Micheal Engel
2 years ago
We need new immigrants. They volunteer to the army in order to become US citizens. Most Americans believe that the US is sinking in the mud in Iraq, Afghanistan, Taiwan, Japan, S.Korea…. and that we are a bunch of losers. We are pacifist, obese, tired and depressed. That’s why Al Sisi, Mexico president, opened the southern border gates.
Last edited 2 years ago by Micheal Engel
Avery2
2 years ago
Hopefully any Iraqis coming over the southern border find their way to Crawford Texas. Truly MISSION ACCOMPLISHED
Rogerroger
2 years ago
It seems to me if the us is there as guess of Iraq. Should not they be protecting our troops from harm.
Think we should be pissed.
MI6
2 years ago
There were good reasons for keeping troops in Afghanistan (well, just a few air bases so we could bomb the Taliban just to remind them to toe the line) but I can’t think of any reason to keep a single soldier in Iraq. What’s the worse thing that can happen? They’ll be conquered by Iran. A Persian-Shiite nation trying to digest an Arab-Sunni chunk of real estate. A win-win for the West.
Last edited 2 years ago by MI6
JRM
2 years ago
Is it convenient two days after the US told Iraq’s Prime Minister, that we were ready to start implementing the withdrawal of US and coalition forces from Iraq, that 3 US soldiers were successfully killed??
Now the media and WAR HAWKS, are pushing the drumbeat, we need to remain until we defeat these Militia’s!!
Also, the US response, to the supposed death of US soldiers, comes two days after the Iraq Central Bank, calls for Iraq to get away from the US dollar!!!
Which seems to have backfired, cause the Iraq Central Bank went ahead and told Eight Iraqi banks to stop using US dollars!!!
You are raising an obvious question: DID they make up the “3 soldiers were killed” story? HOW would anyone know when a lie is foisted upon us? WHO was there to confirm it? If our media was present, they are propaganda machines. THUS, it is a very real possibility. ALL a crock of shit, as always.
Norbert
2 years ago
Trump has no idea where Iraq even is. He just heard some buzz about it and incorporated it into his word salad.
Alex
2 years ago
I heard that Iraq told the US to leave but the US refused.
babelthuap
2 years ago
I remember flying into Afghanistan, looking out the window at mud hut houses and their farming fields and my super smart home schooled SSG saying, “these people are living like 1,000 years ago.”
He was right. And that’s when it hit me. No way we were defeating these people. Not unless you kill all of them. They don’t live, think, worship or care about things we do. They can keep fighting for a long long time. Time is not a pressure cooker to them.
Later on I read an intel report. It was a Taliban farmer. He said he was done fighting for “season” until after the crops were harvested. Fighting was seasonal to them.
At that point my main focus was keeping our Men alive. I didn’t care if they hated me for things I ordered them to do to save their lives. They were going to go home in one piece. They all did thank God and they thanked me later for taking extreme measures to make it so.
These recent wars provide nothing of value to average Americans. We get nothing out of it. There is no real goal other than to line the pockets of people who think of common Americans as garbage. I’m not garbage. Neither were they. Damn good people thinking they were doing something good. Lining the pockets of D.C. and their friends is not good. It’s the apex of evil.
The main defense of Afghanistan is that it contains nothing that anybody wants. We went in only because the person to blew up the twin towers took refuge in Afghanistan. When we asked the Taiban to give him to us, they refused so we went to get him. Justified vengeance is easy to understand but Iraq was seen as just plain mean and unjustified and it was.
You forget Mish, the United States owns the world.
Six000MileYear
2 years ago
If the US is expelled from Iraq, US citizens will get hit hard in the wallet, support for keeping illegal aliens warm will reach the point of demanding elected officials expel them from the country.
Jojo, do not forget that the MIC are WHORES who will sell your Grandma to Junkies.
Joseph
2 years ago
Iraq is just begging for some cruise missile freedom.
Micheal Engel
2 years ago
If u want peace prepare for a war. The wars between wars kept WW III away for 80 years. US gov $34T debt was not spent on wars. The $14B package to Israel includes $2.5B to the Central Command to fight the Hooties.
US forces in the ME keep the 5 mini superpowers : Turkey, Egypt, Israel Iran and the Saudies from killing each other. Bashing Bibi and Israel replaced the Elders of Zion,
After Sept 11 2001 we entered Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s a jungle out there. We stabilized the region. If u bleed u will be eaten alive. China is watching us on the sidelines.
I forget how many nations fought in Korea. Under the United Nations, it was a world war of a different sort. The U.S. didn’t prevent Saddam from invading Iran or the wars between Israel and its neighboring Arab states. Egypt lost the Sinai for a number of years. Israel still holds Syria’s Golan heights and the west bank.
Maybe it is the atomic bomb which has prevented a total war WW3 situation for 80 years now.
shamrockva
2 years ago
Hopefully Biden will take this opportunity to get us out of there, where Trump failed, yet again.
General Ghaany, who replaced general Suleimani, ordered his Shia proxies in Iraq to behave themselves. Iran isn’t interested in having a war with the US or Israel. Harassing them, annoying them, threatening them is ok, but attacking US forces in Jordan isn’t ok. The real risk is Al Sisi king pharaoh of Egypt, not from the Quds forces.
But, but, we did pretty good with Germany and Japan in 1945!! FWIW, when the USSR broke up the Ukraine agreed to give the nukes on its soil to Russia in exchange for the US defending them against any aggressors. Yeah, we all know what the word of the US government is worth. Just sayin, we made a promise that in honor we should keep. Of course, only a profound idiot (0bama and Hilary) would have thought Russia would ever tolerate a Western-leaning Ukraine which is what they arranged by meddling in Ukraine elections. Even Gorbachev made that clear, he was just providing information so no one would make a stupid mistake. We started this war. Russia was fine with a neutralist Ukraine.
“Meddling”? Empires can’t help but “meddle”, especially when they’re in decline and looking for avenues to boost profits and shore up competitive positions. The US war on Iraq was as much about military positioning against a rising Iran in the Middle East, and about economic positioning against Germany, China, Japan, France as it was “the global war on terror”. There will be more “meddling” all around and you can blame it on “idiots” but the bottom line is a generalized war drive among competing capitalist governments trying to stave off economic crisis and popular revolts.
I’d be tickled pink if you’d actually address my initial analysis of “meddling” versus declining capitalism heading into its self-generated crisis that results in more wars (again) and a trend toward depression conditions.
Empires first crumble from within before without. Obviously, our country is in shambles. What is the key factor in all major empire declines? Too much war. We can’t govern ourselves domestically, yet we’re still trying to rule the world.
We should focus on our own problems and the systemic issues causing all our problems. This involves looking to evolve capitalism and neoliberalism.
The big picture is that all countries always want/need more more money, which is usually obtained via taxes. When its peoples can no longer be milked for increased levies/taxes, the only way to get more is to invade other countries and force the conquered to pay taxes.
We are humans and humans meddle. There has never been a time when different tribes (countries) have not mettled. The only way to avoid it is to not be human.
You seem to excuse Russian, Chinese and Iranian meddling. Are you expecting that they will suddenly stop meddling with us and our allies? I rather doubt that since their stated goals are to supplant us. Myself, I prefer to live under our system rather than theirs because that is what it comes down to.
According to the non-interventionists, we are supposed to fugitively curl up with a thumb in our mouth and watch until China/Russia/Iran control all the remainder of the world and then turn their attention to North America.
These countries and groups tell us in plain language exactly what they want to do and how they will do it and many people refuse to believe them. They prefer to stick their heads in the sand and pretend that there is no problem or worse yet, join the other side and propose submission to them as the solution to the problem. Neither path leads to survival.
Hmmm… Yeah, its so irritating to learn that Russia, China and Iran put their countries so close to our military bases! Shame on them. Shame on China for meddling by building airports, trains and ports. They should send bombs like we do. We know how to make friends.
You’re a strange one, Doug. You seem to think that there should be no response to aggression, lies and meddling as long as it’s by your US government. This isn’t the chicken and egg analogy; the US stirs the pot and demands no response. A man with a hammer sees nothing but nails.
Hmm… I can think of 3.8 billion reasons Israel is a friend. Even so, Israel is such a friend that it keeps rejecting US positions while accepting more bombs and money. And it keeps trying to provoke its neighbors so it can drag us into a hot war with them….just like Ukraine would love to drag us into a war with Russia. And can you think of any reason the people in the Middle East might be mad at us? Or do they just hate us for our freedoms? Maybe they wouldn’t burn our flags if we didn’t burn their children? Just for your consideration.
I supported the Iraq war at the time. I was thoroughly wrong. Now I agree with Mish.
”
US meddling f’d up in Iran, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria costing trillions of dollars.
Idiots want more meddling
”
…And: 50+ years of completely unhinged central banking, have ensured that absolutely all positions of wealth, power and influence in the US; public as well as private; are; almost without a single remaining exception at all; filled by noone who is not a complete idiot.
Hence: F’ing up is what the US does now. It’s all it does. All it knows how to do.
I bet the US troops are going nowhere and staying in Iraq. This is just a virtue signal by the Iraqi government.
We need new immigrants. They volunteer to the army in order to become US citizens. Most Americans believe that the US is sinking in the mud in Iraq, Afghanistan, Taiwan, Japan, S.Korea…. and that we are a bunch of losers. We are pacifist, obese, tired and depressed. That’s why Al Sisi, Mexico president, opened the southern border gates.
Hopefully any Iraqis coming over the southern border find their way to Crawford Texas. Truly MISSION ACCOMPLISHED
It seems to me if the us is there as guess of Iraq. Should not they be protecting our troops from harm.
Think we should be pissed.
There were good reasons for keeping troops in Afghanistan (well, just a few air bases so we could bomb the Taliban just to remind them to toe the line) but I can’t think of any reason to keep a single soldier in Iraq. What’s the worse thing that can happen? They’ll be conquered by Iran. A Persian-Shiite nation trying to digest an Arab-Sunni chunk of real estate. A win-win for the West.
Is it convenient two days after the US told Iraq’s Prime Minister, that we were ready to start implementing the withdrawal of US and coalition forces from Iraq, that 3 US soldiers were successfully killed??
Now the media and WAR HAWKS, are pushing the drumbeat, we need to remain until we defeat these Militia’s!!
Also, the US response, to the supposed death of US soldiers, comes two days after the Iraq Central Bank, calls for Iraq to get away from the US dollar!!!
Which seems to have backfired, cause the Iraq Central Bank went ahead and told Eight Iraqi banks to stop using US dollars!!!
You are raising an obvious question: DID they make up the “3 soldiers were killed” story? HOW would anyone know when a lie is foisted upon us? WHO was there to confirm it? If our media was present, they are propaganda machines. THUS, it is a very real possibility. ALL a crock of shit, as always.
Trump has no idea where Iraq even is. He just heard some buzz about it and incorporated it into his word salad.
I heard that Iraq told the US to leave but the US refused.
I remember flying into Afghanistan, looking out the window at mud hut houses and their farming fields and my super smart home schooled SSG saying, “these people are living like 1,000 years ago.”
He was right. And that’s when it hit me. No way we were defeating these people. Not unless you kill all of them. They don’t live, think, worship or care about things we do. They can keep fighting for a long long time. Time is not a pressure cooker to them.
Later on I read an intel report. It was a Taliban farmer. He said he was done fighting for “season” until after the crops were harvested. Fighting was seasonal to them.
At that point my main focus was keeping our Men alive. I didn’t care if they hated me for things I ordered them to do to save their lives. They were going to go home in one piece. They all did thank God and they thanked me later for taking extreme measures to make it so.
These recent wars provide nothing of value to average Americans. We get nothing out of it. There is no real goal other than to line the pockets of people who think of common Americans as garbage. I’m not garbage. Neither were they. Damn good people thinking they were doing something good. Lining the pockets of D.C. and their friends is not good. It’s the apex of evil.
The main defense of Afghanistan is that it contains nothing that anybody wants. We went in only because the person to blew up the twin towers took refuge in Afghanistan. When we asked the Taiban to give him to us, they refused so we went to get him. Justified vengeance is easy to understand but Iraq was seen as just plain mean and unjustified and it was.
Thanks for your real life story here.
You forget Mish, the United States owns the world.
If the US is expelled from Iraq, US citizens will get hit hard in the wallet, support for keeping illegal aliens warm will reach the point of demanding elected officials expel them from the country.
Huh?
Huh?
Selling or giving weapons to any nation that is predominantly islamic is just plain ignorant as well as immoral.
And yet here we are selling weapons and F-16’s to Turkey, Saudi Arabia and others.
Jojo, do not forget that the MIC are WHORES who will sell your Grandma to Junkies.
Iraq is just begging for some cruise missile freedom.
If u want peace prepare for a war. The wars between wars kept WW III away for 80 years. US gov $34T debt was not spent on wars. The $14B package to Israel includes $2.5B to the Central Command to fight the Hooties.
US forces in the ME keep the 5 mini superpowers : Turkey, Egypt, Israel Iran and the Saudies from killing each other. Bashing Bibi and Israel replaced the Elders of Zion,
After Sept 11 2001 we entered Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s a jungle out there. We stabilized the region. If u bleed u will be eaten alive. China is watching us on the sidelines.
I forget how many nations fought in Korea. Under the United Nations, it was a world war of a different sort. The U.S. didn’t prevent Saddam from invading Iran or the wars between Israel and its neighboring Arab states. Egypt lost the Sinai for a number of years. Israel still holds Syria’s Golan heights and the west bank.
Maybe it is the atomic bomb which has prevented a total war WW3 situation for 80 years now.
Hopefully Biden will take this opportunity to get us out of there, where Trump failed, yet again.
Iraq is politically in disarray. If we leave and Iran decides to attack them again, they are toast.
Is that any of YOUR business ?
General Ghaany, who replaced general Suleimani, ordered his Shia proxies in Iraq to behave themselves. Iran isn’t interested in having a war with the US or Israel. Harassing them, annoying them, threatening them is ok, but attacking US forces in Jordan isn’t ok. The real risk is Al Sisi king pharaoh of Egypt, not from the Quds forces.
Foreign Policy for Dummies
US meddling f’d up in Iran, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria costing trillions of dollars.
Idiots want more meddling.
🎯
You can also add Ukraine (2014), Yemen (since obama in 2009), Niger, and Somalia in last 20 years.
And much of South and Central America in the 80s and 90s.
The U.S is great at F’ng places up….. sorry I got carried away there. I meant the U.S is great at “spreading freedom and democracy” 😳
Why stop there? Iran in ’53, Guatemala in ’57, Cuba in 61, Chile in ’73, Dom Rep in ’62, Brazil in ’65. I’m starting to see a trend.
But, but, we did pretty good with Germany and Japan in 1945!! FWIW, when the USSR broke up the Ukraine agreed to give the nukes on its soil to Russia in exchange for the US defending them against any aggressors. Yeah, we all know what the word of the US government is worth. Just sayin, we made a promise that in honor we should keep. Of course, only a profound idiot (0bama and Hilary) would have thought Russia would ever tolerate a Western-leaning Ukraine which is what they arranged by meddling in Ukraine elections. Even Gorbachev made that clear, he was just providing information so no one would make a stupid mistake. We started this war. Russia was fine with a neutralist Ukraine.
Don’t do it again! Be sure to add that we are a “POSITIVE FORCE IN THE WORLD.”
“Meddling”? Empires can’t help but “meddle”, especially when they’re in decline and looking for avenues to boost profits and shore up competitive positions. The US war on Iraq was as much about military positioning against a rising Iran in the Middle East, and about economic positioning against Germany, China, Japan, France as it was “the global war on terror”. There will be more “meddling” all around and you can blame it on “idiots” but the bottom line is a generalized war drive among competing capitalist governments trying to stave off economic crisis and popular revolts.
I see you have the Marxist version down pat.
I see you can’t answer it.
You want a rundown on the fallacy Marxist economics?
I’d be tickled pink if you’d actually address my initial analysis of “meddling” versus declining capitalism heading into its self-generated crisis that results in more wars (again) and a trend toward depression conditions.
I agree. When trapped, a Crazed animal will gnaw off its own leg.
Empires first crumble from within before without. Obviously, our country is in shambles. What is the key factor in all major empire declines? Too much war. We can’t govern ourselves domestically, yet we’re still trying to rule the world.
We should focus on our own problems and the systemic issues causing all our problems. This involves looking to evolve capitalism and neoliberalism.
Draft the illegals!
The big picture is that all countries always want/need more more money, which is usually obtained via taxes. When its peoples can no longer be milked for increased levies/taxes, the only way to get more is to invade other countries and force the conquered to pay taxes.
There is a way more GREEDY MONEY in ruling the world.
You forgot to add Ukraine.
Foreign policy for dummies:
Israel is a friend and a democracy.
That people in Middle East who burn American flags are foes, with tirants as rulers.
Foreign Policy For Dummies
US meddling f’d up in Iran, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria costing trillions of dollars.
Idiots want mor meddling
Probably you are right, I don’t defend wars. I’m again giving billions of dollars in weapons to Egypt or Pakistan, for example.
We are humans and humans meddle. There has never been a time when different tribes (countries) have not mettled. The only way to avoid it is to not be human.
The U.S. founders signed a declaration of independence, as they wanted an end to the meddling.
For Dummies…
You seem to excuse Russian, Chinese and Iranian meddling. Are you expecting that they will suddenly stop meddling with us and our allies? I rather doubt that since their stated goals are to supplant us. Myself, I prefer to live under our system rather than theirs because that is what it comes down to.
According to the non-interventionists, we are supposed to fugitively curl up with a thumb in our mouth and watch until China/Russia/Iran control all the remainder of the world and then turn their attention to North America.
These countries and groups tell us in plain language exactly what they want to do and how they will do it and many people refuse to believe them. They prefer to stick their heads in the sand and pretend that there is no problem or worse yet, join the other side and propose submission to them as the solution to the problem. Neither path leads to survival.
Hmmm… Yeah, its so irritating to learn that Russia, China and Iran put their countries so close to our military bases! Shame on them. Shame on China for meddling by building airports, trains and ports. They should send bombs like we do. We know how to make friends.
Nomen est omen.
You’re a strange one, Doug. You seem to think that there should be no response to aggression, lies and meddling as long as it’s by your US government. This isn’t the chicken and egg analogy; the US stirs the pot and demands no response. A man with a hammer sees nothing but nails.
A good reason to leave those sheetholes to their own devices, and their populations away from your borders.
Hmm… I can think of 3.8 billion reasons Israel is a friend. Even so, Israel is such a friend that it keeps rejecting US positions while accepting more bombs and money. And it keeps trying to provoke its neighbors so it can drag us into a hot war with them….just like Ukraine would love to drag us into a war with Russia. And can you think of any reason the people in the Middle East might be mad at us? Or do they just hate us for our freedoms? Maybe they wouldn’t burn our flags if we didn’t burn their children? Just for your consideration.
I supported the Iraq war at the time. I was thoroughly wrong. Now I agree with Mish.
Facts for dummies:
The USA. Israel, UK & NATO are war- criminal civilian slaughtering terrorist entities. End evil by ending them.