Colin H. Kahl is an associate professor in Georgetown University’s Security Studies Program and a senior fellow and Director of the Middle East Security Program at the Center for a New American Security. From February 2009 to December 2011, he was the U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for the Middle East.

The surprising advances by jihadists in northern and western Iraq have produced at least one unsurprising result: accusations that President Obama’s “abandonment” of Iraq is responsible for the catastrophe. Critics have launched a two-pronged attack on the administration’s Iraq policy: They blame Obama for being unwilling or unable to reach a deal with Baghdad to leave U.S. troops in Iraq beyond the Dec. 31, 2011 deadline for withdrawal established by the Bush administration; and they assert that such a residual presence would have proved decisive in heading off the current calamity. Neither criticism withstands much scrutiny.

Here are the facts.


As the senior Pentagon official responsible for Iraq policy during the first three years of the Obama administration, I had a front-row seat for the internal deliberations over how to end the war. Through the first half of 2011, there was a vigorous debate within the administration about whether U.S. forces should remain in Iraq beyond December, and if so, in what numbers and with what missions. Ultimately, at great political risk, President Obama approved negotiations with the Iraqi government to allow a force of around 5,000 American troops to stay in Iraq to provide counterterrorism support and air cover and to train the Iraqi army. But, as commander in chief, he was unwilling to strand U.S. forces in a hostile, anti-American environment without the legal protections and immunities required to ensure soldiers didn’t end up in Iraqi jails. These protections, which are common in nearly every country where U.S. forces operate, were guaranteed under the 2008 status of forces agreement negotiated by the Bush administration; Obama simply demanded that they continue under any follow-on accord.

Iraq’s prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki, told U.S. negotiators that he was willing to sign an executive memorandum of understanding that included these legal protections. But for any agreement to be binding under the Iraqi constitution, it had to be approved by the Iraqi parliament. This was the judgment of every senior administration lawyer and Maliki’s own legal adviser, and no senior U.S. military commander made the case that we should leave forces behind without these protections. Even Sen. John McCain, perhaps the administration’s harshest Iraq critic, admitted in a December 2011 speech discussing the withdrawal that the president’s demand for binding legal immunities “was a matter of vital importance.” Moreover, because the 2008 security agreement had been approved by the Iraqi parliament, it seemed both unrealistic and politically unsustainable to apply a lower standard this time around.

Unfortunately, Iraqi domestic politics made it impossible to reach a deal. Iraqi public opinion surveys consistently showed that the U.S. military presence was deeply unpopular (only in Iraqi Kurdistan did a majority of people want American G.I.s to stay). Maliki was willing to consider going to parliament to approve a follow-on agreement, but he was not willing to stick his neck out. Other political factions would have to support the move, and the support wasn’t there. The Sadrists, a populist Shia movement that was now a major bloc in the parliament, were dead set against U.S. troops remaining. Ayad Allawi and Sunni politicians aligned with the Iraqiyya coalition supported a continued U.S. presence, but they knew that most of their Sunni constituents did not. They also wanted to condition their support on Maliki agreeing to additional political concessions. The Kurds were more active in their advocacy for a follow-on agreement, but they could not convince others to go along. So when Iraq’s major political bloc leaders met in early October 2011 in an all-night session, they agreed on the need for continued U.S. “trainers” but said they were unwilling to seek immunities for these troops through the parliament. The die was thus cast. Obama and Maliki spoke on Oct. 21 and agreed that U.S. forces would depart as scheduled by the end of the year.

Some critics assert that the administration was unwilling to offer enough forces to make it worth the Iraqis’ while. But it is not clear Maliki wanted that many troops. Indeed, he was conscious of the extreme unpopularity of a continued U.S. presence among his Shia base, and he had no interest in a sizable U.S. contingent along the Arab-Kurd divide, which is what all of our military’s troop options above the 10,000-man threshold assumed. These disputed boundary areas include Kirkuk as well as parts of Nineveh province north of Mosul and portions of Diyala province—precisely where jihadists are making inroads today.

Others claim the administration spent more time negotiating with itself than it did trying to get a deal from the Iraqis. Perhaps. But, in the end, the immunities issue would likely not have been resolved even if the administration had started negotiations earlier and offered more. There was little the administration could have offered or threatened to change their calculations. It was simply too toxic, politically, for Iraqi politicians to accept.

Ironically, part of the difficulty in securing an agreement in 2011 stemmed from perceived “success.” Violence levels were down and, unlike 2008, Iraqi politicians in 2011 believed that Iraqi security forces were now numerous and capable enough to keep insurgents at bay. So they were simply not as desperate for us to stick around as they were in 2008. Yes, many recognized the value of a continued U.S. training mission, and Iraq’s top military brass lobbied for a continued presence. But most Iraqi politicians prioritized their narrow political interests in opposing a U.S. presence and outflanking their domestic rivals over the benefits to Iraq as a whole.

What if U.S. troops had remained, with or without protections? Would it have proven decisive in shielding Iraq against the current onslaught? There is little doubt that the presence of American counterterrorism advisers, providing intelligence to assist Iraqi forces in targeting al Qaeda in Iraq (which became the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS), would have helped keep pressure on the network. Air support and more robust training assistance would also have improved the capabilities of the Iraqi army – or, at the very least, slowed the degradation of these capabilities. It was precisely for these reasons that Obama was willing to consider leaving some U.S. forces in Iraq.

But the idea that such a force would have completely stopped the jihadists is a fantasy. In 2011, when the Syrian protest movement was only just beginning to morph into a nationwide insurgency, few analysts anticipated the sheer scale of the spillover into neighboring Iraq. The enormous boon this created for ISIS could have overwhelmed Iraqi counterterrorism capabilities even if U.S. advisers had remained.

And, crucially, a hypothetical follow-on force would have done little to ameliorate the political dynamics underlying the current crisis. The litany of Maliki’s failures to accommodate Sunni aspirations is well known: his failure to live up to power-sharing promises made in 2010; his extra-constitutional abuses of power; his persecution of Sunni politicians; his failure to sustain ties with Sunni tribes in western Iraq; his refusal to follow through on commitments to integrate “Awakening” fighters into Iraqi security forces; and his heavy-handed response to Sunni political protests in Anbar province last year. The resulting Sunni alienation has produced fertile ground for ISIS’s expansion. The group, which regularly tortures and executes anybody who dares deviate from its strict interpretation of Islamic law, enjoys little sympathy among Iraq’s Sunni population, but Maliki enjoys even less. Public estimates suggest that there are fewer than 10,000 ISIS fighters in Iraq; they simply could not have made the territorial gains seen in Mosul, Tikrit and elsewhere in the past week without at least passive acquiescence from the local population.

The biggest deficiencies plaguing the Iraqi army, four divisions of which melted away in the face of ISIS attacks, are similarly political. Iraqi training and logistics have suffered greatly since the U.S. departure. But rampant corruption and Maliki’s decision to replace many seasoned commanders with political loyalists has produced a dispirited and poorly led force with little willingness to fight.

Reversing these dynamics will require real power sharing in Baghdad and substantial outreach to local Sunni communities throughout northern and western Iraq. This is why the Obama administration is right to tie pledges of enhanced military aid to concrete Iraqi political commitments. It remains unclear whether Maliki – even facing a true existential crisis – will take the necessary steps to rescue his country. But it is perfectly clear that we were unable to persuade and cajole Iraqi politicians to reconcile when we had 175,000 troops in Iraq. The notion that a post-2011 presence of 5,000 U.S. troops, or even 20,000, would have solved these political challenges is magical thinking.

In dire moments like this, the easiest thing for Washington politicians to do is point fingers. Future historians will ultimately sort out whether Obama “grabbed defeat from the jaws of victory” or if it was the “original sin” of Bush’s 2003 invasion that accounts for Iraq’s current troubles. But, in the present, our national interests should compel us to put aside the “who lost Iraq” debate and focus instead on how best to save it.