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Iraq declared Sovereignty Day to begin a four-day holiday celebrating the withdrawal of the last United States military forces from its territory. Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi described the event as a milestone affirming Iraq's path toward full sovereignty and institutional strength. The departure marks the end of a complex presence that began with the 2003 invasion and included a later coalition effort to defeat the Islamic State group.
Iraq has declared today to be Sovereignty Day, the start of a four-day holiday to celebrate the withdrawal this week of the last United States forces from its territory 23 years after the invasion that overthrew Saddam Hussein .
Iran is rejoicing too. Mission accomplished? For months before the last American troops left Iraq on Wednesday, there were only a few hundred of them left, mostly at an airbase in Erbil in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region in the north of the country. But Iraqi prime minister Ali al-Zaidi told a ceremony in Baghdad that the end of the US military presence was an important national occasion that affirmed the completion of Iraq’s path towards sovereignty.
“A new phase has begun, defined by Iraq’s sovereignty, the strength of its institutions, the readiness of its forces, unity of decision-making and balanced partnerships with its friends,” he said. US troops invaded Iraq without a United Nations Security Council mandate in March 2003 on the basis of a bogus claim that Saddam Hussein had developed weapons of mass destruction.
Six weeks later, George W Bush stood on an aircraft carrier in front of a banner that said Mission Accomplished, but it was another eight years before Barack Obama withdrew US forces in 2011. Three years later, the Iraqi government invited them back to help fight Islamic State , a jihadist group that was born out of the disorder created by the American invasion and occupation.
US forces fought alongside the Iraqi military and Shia militias backed by Iran under the command of the Popular Mobilization Forces, defeating IS on the battlefield by 2017. The alliance between the US and the Iran-backed militias disintegrated after that and American forces in western Iraq and Baghdad soon became targets for attack. Washington has also used Iraqi territory to strike against Iran, assassinating senior Iranian military commander Qasem Soleimani while he was visiting Baghdad in January 2020.
US troop numbers in Iraq dwindled over the years, and Joe Biden agreed with the Iraqi government in 2024 to the withdrawal that was completed this week.
“The orderly departure of Coalition forces and equipment from Erbil Air Base marks the successful conclusion of the military mission that defeated Isis in Iraq,” Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said on Wednesday. “This milestone reflects the success of a 12-year campaign that defeated Isis as an organised military threat in Iraq and across the region. It also marks a transition from a wartime coalition mission to an Iraqi-led security effort supported by a more normal bilateral security relationship.
” Iraq is unique in the Middle East in enjoying close economic and political ties with both Tehran and Washington but the US has sought over the years to reduce Iranian influence in the country. Last year, Washington vetoed the return of Nouri al-Maliki as prime minister because he was perceived as too close to Tehran, threatening to cut aid to Iraq if he was nominated.
The US has been pressing Iraq to disarm the Iranian-backed militias, some of which have attacked US and Israeli targets in recent months, but al-Zaidi has postponed a deadline for doing so until June 2027. Already a daunting challenge, it is likely to become more difficult as the US withdrawal serves to increase Iran’s influence in Iraq, just as the invasion did more than two decades ago, at the cost of hundreds of thousands of lives.
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