Adventures in Iraq: 10 Tales of Iran and its Neighbor

1. The Shah flew himself to exile in Iraq in 1953.

On August 16, 1953, when the Shah believed the CIA and MI6-backed operation to overthrow Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadeq had failed, he flew with his wife Soraya to Baghdad, piloting the plane himself. King Faisal of Iraq granted the Shah and his entourage asylum, but they didn’t stay long. The Shah left for Rome on the 18^th, but not before taking advantage of Shiite religious life in Iraq: he visited Ayatoolah Shahrestani, an anti-Mossadeq cleric, as well as the shrine of Imam Ali in Najaf. It was by Ali’s grace, the Shah later said, that Iran was “saved.”

2. The Ayatollah Khomeini went into exile in Iraq in 1965.

In October 1965, after Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini had spent almost a year in Turkey under the supervision of Turkish authorities and the Shah’s secret police, the Shah agreed to let him continue his exile in Najaf.

Khomeini was ill at ease in the Shia holy city, which he labeled a “den of snakes” because of the suspicion he faced from rival clergymen, among them the Grand Ayatollahs Mohsen Hakim and Abolqasem al-Khoei, whose political quietism he disdained. In 1970 Khomeini began giving lectures on his conception of Islamic government, which he delivered in Persian to avoid trouble from the Baathist regime.

3. Iraq and Iran were Cold War rivals.

Following the Baath Party coup in July 1968, Iraq grew ever closer to the Soviet Union, while the Shah maintained his long-term post-Second World War alliance with the United States. Both countries sought to expand their power in the Persian Gulf. From 1969 they clashed over their shared boundary in the Shatt Al-Arab waterway, which flows into the Persian Gulf.

The Shah repeatedly raised the specter of growing Soviet influence in the region with US President Richard Nixon and his National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger to gain covert US support for Kurdish insurgents in northern Iraq, who could distract Saddam’s military from the Gulf.

4. Khomeini and Saddam Hussein both tore up the 1975 Algiers Accord.

In June 1975 the Shah and Saddam Hussein signed the Algiers Accord, which settled their boundary dispute in the Shatt al-Arab, and ended each country’s support for rebellious minorities on the other’s territory—Iran for Kurds in northern Iraq, and Iraq for Arabs in Khuzestan. While the Algiers accord stabilized the countries’ relations until the Iranian Revolution, Ruhollah Khomeini announced in June 1979 that Iran would no longer be bound by it. The following year Saddam Hussein also declared it void, before invading Iran.

5. Iran quietly supported the US during the first Gulf War.

The Iran-Iraq War left Iran exhausted. Around 300 000 Iranians and 200 000 Iraqis had died. When Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, Iran’s leaders were happy to see the U.S. chasten their old enemy, even if they were also wary of increased US presence in the Persian Gulf. Iran even quietly offered the US support.

Through a Gulf State intermediary, the US approached Iran to make sure it wouldn’t interfere. Iran responded positively, and even offered to return US pilots if they were shot down over Iran. Throughout the war, Iran ignored US planes that strayed into Iranian airspace.

6. Najaf and Qom are rival cities.

Najaf and the Iranian clerical city of Qom vie for leadership of Shia Muslims. Today none of the four grand ayatollahs in Iraq subscribe to Khomeini’s velayat-e faqih, or "guardianship of the jurist," which underpins the Islamic Republic’s political system.

Supporters of Najaf consider their the city to be the historical hub of Shia learning, while seminarians in Qom believe regard their city as intellectual powerhouse of Shia theology. Reformist clerics in Qom, meanwhile, lament the control the Iranian government retains over them.

7. Ahmed Chalabi, an Iraqi politician close to Iran, helped lead the US to war in Iraq.

As confidence in Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki collapsed following the ISIS incursion into Iraq’s north this June, news outlets began speculate about the political resurrection of Ahmad Chalabi.

Chalabi is a wealthy Iraqi formerly on the CIA payroll, whose Iraqi National Congress—also US funded—fed the US much of the intelligence on which it based its decision to invade Iraq in 2003.

Since falling out with the US following the invasion, he has strengthened his ties with Iran, has received backing from Iranian Qods Force General Gassem Suleimani, and has placed himself on the side of Iranian regional interests, paying visits to Bashar Assad’s security chief as the Syrian uprising began, and advising Wefaq, the leading Shia opposition group in Bahrain, during the Arab Spring.

8. Iran offered to help the US in Iraq in 2003, but later attacked US forces.

In 2003 the United States overthrew Iran’s long-time enemy in Iraq, but Iran feared that the US might use Iraq as a base from which to change Iran’s regime next. In 2002, Iran sought to discuss coordination with regard to the US invasion of Iraq, as it had in the run-up to the US invasion of Afghanistan. The US rejected Iran’s approach and advised it to stay out of the conflict.

Iran began to challenge US forces in 2005 by funneling explosive devices to Shia militias, such as Muqtada al Sadr's Mahdi Army. In 2006 the US retaliated by arresting Revolutionary Guards officials and operatives in Iraq. President Nouri al-Maliki’s efforts to rein in Shia militias quieted Iranian activity until around 2010, when some of those same militias targeted the Green Zone.

9. The highest Shia authority in Iraq is an Iranian from Mashhad.

Millions of Shia Muslims worldwide, especially in Iraq and Iran, revere the Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani as an “object of emulation.” They give him substantial donations from their incomes and estates. He runs “Sistani embassies” and a website, Sistani.org, from which followers seek advice on even minor matters.

He has tended toward the quietist tradition in Shiism, thereby avoiding conflict with Saddam Hussein, or with US forces following the 2003 occupation. Post-2003, he refused to meet US officials, but reportedly sent a message to Paul Bremer of the Coalition Provisional Authority that hinted at his influence in Iraq: “You are American, I am Iranian. Let’s let the Iraqi people decide.” He never incited his followers against US forces, but called on them this year to fight the Sunni jihadist group ISIS.

On August 25, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Mohammad Zarif met with Ayatollah Ali Sistani in Najaf to discuss ISIS and increased threats in the region.

10. The rise of the Islamic State is a major setback for Iran.

The ISIS incursion into Iraq’s north represents a major setback for Iran. When US forces withdrew from Iraq, Maliki controlled Iraq, Bashar al-Assad controlled Syria, and Hezbollah dominated Lebanon. Now Tehran is left only with pieces of each region under its influence. From Iran’s perspective, ISIS rode the wave of an Iraqi Sunni uprising against the Maliki government. Recently, Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said that Iran would join the fight against ISIS, or IS as it is now known, in exchange for the lifting of Western sanctions directed against Iran’s nuclear program.

Photos: Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi and Foreign Affairs Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif. 

This article is an edited version of From Enmity to Influence: Iran and Iraq