US troop withdrawal from Iraq: Strategic uncertainty and regional consequences

The Americans withdrew from Iraq once in 2011, only to return three years later. So it is not said that Iraq has seen the last US soldier 23 years after Bush's invasion, which became a catastrophe for the country and the region. This is true even under Trump, who once ran to end America's eternal wars. In Iran, he is continuing the tradition of ill-advised interventions in the Middle East that have contributed so much to the military and political overreach of world power.

In the civil war that followed the fall of Saddam Hussein, it is estimated that hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have been killed over the years, as well as thousands of American soldiers. Even with the US withdrawal, the prospects for the country remain precarious, as sectarian and ethnic divisions remain.

The “Islamic State,” which American troops were supposed to fight upon their return, is weakened but not defeated. Above all, it is uncertain what will happen to the Shiite militias, which have not yet been disbanded. They are Iran's means of power in its neighboring country; the Tehran leadership uses them in the war against the USA to attack American positions throughout the region.

Trump's strategic short-sightedness is revealed here again. He is abandoning a key Arab country to the Iranians, just as he is abandoning the Saudis in the fight against the Houthis. He sees this as a policy of strength. America's adversaries won't do it.