When we look back at the history of US intervention in Iraq, what we have is arguably the most well documented case of imperialist destabilization seen in real time.
A river of blood running red down the streets of Mosul, buildings completely leveled to the foundation in Fallujah, neighborhoods devastated with depleted uranium in Baghdad. Estimates of over a million dead, nine million displaced, generations born with birth defects, countless lives forever destroyed. A once vibrant nation, rich in history and culture tracing back to the foundation of human civilization now the site of unimaginable catastrophe, forever transformed in only twenty three years into an eternal scar of carnage. This is the story of Iraq.
On September 30th, 2026, news broke that after over two decades the last of US forces in Iraq had finally withdrawn. It seems, finally, that this bloody chapter in American history has come to a close. The war, it appears, is over. The lasting consequences, however, will remain a fixture in the American psyche and the geopolitics of the world likely for many more generations to come.
The US presence in Iraq serves as the American empire’s longest perpetual occupation and military conflict in its history, lasting over twice as long as the Vietnam war, and surpassing the occupation of Afghanistan by three and a half years.
But while the current conflict in Iraq has lasted just over two decades, US-lead destabilization in the region has lasted considerably longer.
Western aggression against Iraq began relatively early in the Cold War, in response to the 1958 uprising that ousted the Hashemite monarchy which had served to the benefit of Anglo-American corporate interests. The Iraqi nationalist Abd al-Karim Qasim, the leading figure of the revolution, quickly seized power as Prime Minister and declared that Iraq would be a republic, instituting sweeping programs to the benefit of the Iraqi people ― including agrarian reforms, women’s rights laws (among the first of their kind in the Arab world), housing development, the expansion of education, and seizing control of the Iraqi oil reserves which had for decades been controlled by American and British companies.
Iraq was declared to be sovereign, and this didn’t sit well with the Western political hegemon that had already hedged itself financially upon controlling the flow of oil throughout the Middle East.
As such, American and British intelligence began covertly lending their support to what was at the time a little known political faction within Iraq, the Ba’ath party, to be the primary driver behind a regime change plot.
One of the primary figures of the Ba’ath party at the time, Saddam Hussein, would become an asset of the CIA, and, in October of 1959, Saddam along with five other hitmen would undertake a CIA sanctioned assassination attempt against Qasim on the streets of Baghdad. The attempt failed miserably, and Saddam was forced to flee to Egypt in exile under the care of Egypt’s General Intelligence Service to avoid capture and execution for his role in the conspiracy.
During Saddam’s time in Cairo he would make frequent visits to the American embassy and deepen his ties with the CIA.
