If Amiri is any example to go by during the Iran-Iraq War, Iraqi Shia jihadists would attack US interests, forcing a kinetic response from the White House.

​Iran absolutely loves to make a song and a dance about how it stands up to the American “Great Satan.”

Tehran will not miss an opportunity to remind the world that it stands opposed to the United States and that it is ready and willing to use violence to achieve its aims and to harm US interests in the Middle East and beyond.

Its proxies who fight with money, training and arms from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) spare no expense in dedicating airtime to how they would seek “martyrdom” in any fight against the United States. It is with some surprise to Iraq observers, then, that these zealots are oddly timid about the prospect of a war between Iran and the United States.

Baghdad must unify its foreign policy and fix its domestic politics before it can realistically play that role.

​Tensions have again flared between the US and Iran. The Trump administration’s withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal, followed by Tehran’s warnings of resuming its nuclear programme, have revived a crisis that spans several decades. 

Within the Trump administration, influential leaders - including National Security Adviser John Bolton and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo - seem to be steering the US into conflict with Iran.  

This conflict has never been a direct confrontation, instead mainly featuring in countries across the Middle East. Iraq has been the most cherished prize for both sides. Recently citing an increased threat, the US evacuated all non-essential staff from Iraq. Then, a rocket suspected to have been fired by a pro-Iranian militia landed near the US embassy in the Green Zone; President Donald Trump subsequently warned that any escalation would be the end of Iran.

Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) is at it again. And by "it," I mean willingly offering up information about questionable shit he did while he served as a Marine.

​In an interview for Barstool Sports' Zero Blog Thirty podcast, Hunter was asked about his support of Navy SEAL Chief Edward "Eddie" Gallagher, who has been accused of war crimes including stabbing a captured ISIS fighter to death.

Hunter responded that he "frankly [doesn't] care" if the ISIS fighter was killed, and that "even if everything the prosecutors say is true in this case, then Eddie Gallagher should still be given a break, I think."

"I just feel like it's such a slippery slope, and it goes against our honor so egregiously if that is the case," one of the hosts, also a former Marine, said to Hunter.

​Wars require preparation and forethought about the post-conflict aftermath—that's something America didn't do when it withdrew from Iraq.

F​ifteen years removed from the first night of Operation Iraqi Freedom, most Americans have come to the conclusion that the war in Iraq was a blunder of epic proportions. In its naive pursuit of Western-style freedom and democracy in the Middle East, the George W. Bush administration went into Iraq underprepared, overconfident in what it could accomplish, and negligent about the post-conflict aftermath.

​The terrible planning, misplaced assumptions, and ideological close-mindedness were bad enough—add in the dumb decision to disband the Iraqi army and ignorance about Iraqi history and demography, and it was amateur hour in the Bush White House.

But what about the human costs of the war? How many people have been killed by the various parties in these conflicts? The disturbing reality is that we simply don’t know. There are a variety of data sets in the public domain, but they only provide us with a rough estimate of the fatalities.

In November 2005, two terminals for a new secure communications platform arrived at the U.S. military base at Bagram Airfield, outside Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul. The first of its kind, the system would enable the U.S.’s electronic eavesdropping organization, the National Security Agency, to instantaneously share select classified information with America’s closest allies in the fight against the Taliban, speeding the delivery of critical information to soldiers.

​Previously, the only way to pass intelligence at Bagram between the U.S. and partner nations was to hand it over as hard copy. These two first nodes in what would eventually become a larger network, known as CENTER ICE, would end the paper shuffling, ultimately saving the lives of troops in combat.

The NSA was to set up one of the two initial systems at Bagram for its own use, and the other for its counterpart from Norway, the Norwegian Intelligence Service, or NIS. The Norwegians were perfect guinea pigs. A “gregarious, friendly bunch” who threw good barbecue parties, they had “almost no collection capability” to eavesdrop independently and were thus “heavily dependent on the U.S.,” an NSA staffer at Bagram later wrote on an internal agency news site, SIDtoday. (The article and the other intelligence documents in this story were provided by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.) One of the new terminals failed when the NSA attempted to turn it on, but after the provision of some “necessary spares,” both were operational.

​Spies from the two nations were about to get a dramatic example of how powerful the digitization of intelligence-sharing could be. One morning a few weeks after CENTER ICE went live, the Norwegians sent an urgent email using the new system: “Our guys think they are being shadowed… Are you seeing anything?”

​Soldiers pay attention to example. Murderous leaders command murderous units.

​In early 2003, as a cavalry officer, I stood in front of my scout platoon at dusk after a long day preparing to deploy to Iraq. I spoke with them about the law of war and how they should treat civilians when we got into theater.

​It wasn’t a long conversation, but I felt that giving clear guidance about what was acceptable — and not acceptable — was important. They should treat the civilians as they would neighbors, I told them. Soldiers take most seriously the things their leadership makes most serious.

On Monday, President Trump pardoned the convicted war criminal Michael Behenna, who had murdered Ali Mansur, an unarmed, naked Iraqi, by shooting him in the head and chest. Making a specious claim of self-defense, Behenna argued that Mansur threw a piece of concrete at him and “ stood up like he’s coming at me.”

And so he neutralized this threat, a naked man, already released by the Army. Behenna was supposed to be returning Mansur home to his village. A military court convicted Behenna of unpremeditated murder. American soldiers testified against him. The military court of appeals and a review panel upheld that conviction, though he was paroled early, in 2014.

After ISIL's defeat in Iraq, IDP children struggle to obtain education, healthcare, without adequate identification.

​Khazer IDP camp, Iraq - Huda Mahmood Ali's children often ask her why they cannot go to school like the other children.

"They love to go to school, sometimes they go to the classes anyway and the teachers kick them out because they are not registered," she says. "I'm afraid my children have no future."

The 34-year-old mother has tried to explain to her five undocumented children that it is simply because their IDs were lost when they fled their home in July 2017.

"We were running from Mosul, I was carrying the children and lost the bag that had all my documents and IDs in it. I wasn't concentrating on it. Everyone was running," Huda says.

Stabbing a defenseless teenage captive to death. Picking off a school-age girl and an old man from a sniper’s roost. Indiscriminately spraying neighborhoods with rockets and machine-gun fire.

Navy SEAL commandos from Team 7’s Alpha Platoon said they had seen their highly decorated platoon chief commit shocking acts in Iraq. And they had spoken up, repeatedly. But their frustration grew as months passed and they saw no sign of official action.

Tired of being brushed off, seven members of the platoon called a private meeting with their troop commander in March 2018 at Naval Base Coronado near San Diego. According to a confidential Navy criminal investigation report obtained by The New York Times, they gave him the bloody details and asked for a formal investigation.

But instead of launching an investigation that day, the troop commander and his senior enlisted aide — both longtime comrades of the accused platoon leader, Special Operations Chief Edward Gallagher — warned the seven platoon members that speaking out could cost them and others their careers, according to the report.

Iran and Iraq have reached an understanding about developing two oilfields on their mutual border, Iran’s oil minister was quoted saying on Sunday, a day after Iranian President Hassan Rouhani called for increased trade between the two countries.

​The focus of the understanding is the development of the Naft Shahr and Khorramshahr oilfields, Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh said according to a report on Iran’s oil ministry website on Sunday, without giving any details of the plan.

Rouhani called on Saturday for Iran and Iraq to expand their gas, electricity and oil dealings and boost bilateral trade to $20 billion, state TV reported, despite difficulties caused by U.S. sanctions against Tehran.
​
“We hope that our plans to expand trade volume to $20 billion will be realized within the next few months or years,” Rouhani said, after a meeting with visiting Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi, in remarks carried by state television.