According to this article, several rockets that were launched from Iraq have targeted an American base in Northeastern Syria, making the first attack since February to be targeting US troops, when groups that were backed by Iran brought an end to a campaign in Iraq that was making regular strikes against the US-led international coalition. Hostilities had resumed a day after the Prime Minister of Iraq paid a visit to President Biden in the United States. A post from a Telegram group that is associated with Kataib Hezbollah claimed that armed factions in Iraq had decided to resume attacks after little progress was made to end the US-led military coalition in Iraq. However, Kataib Hezbollah said they did not issue any statement about resuming attacks on US forces. They said that the earlier announcement had been “fabricated.”
This article is interesting as it is discussing an attack on American troops by rockets launched from Iraq. I am just thankful to hear that no one was injured from the attack. Whoever was behind this attack must have been working outside of Kataib Hezbollah and outside the Iraqi forces to frame them for the attack on American troops. This could have been a false flag operation by someone from an outside party to escalate tensions between the United States and Iraq even further. This could have severe ramifications on the national security of both states as well as in Syria as the attack occurred in their territory.
In International Relations, we have discussed several global challenges such as achieving peace and reducing violence and war. The attack on the US base in Northeastern Syria could make it harder to achieve peace between the US and Iraq and make the military coalition even longer. We have also talked about the collective goods problem, which is the situation where shared and conflicting interests in states collide with each other. Iraq and the United States’ interests will collide with one another because of the attack on the base in Syria. We have also talked about how there are state sponsored terrorists groups that posed as a security threat since they are controlled by a state’s intelligence agency to achieve political aims. Iran is known to have supported Kataib Hezbollah, who might be framed for the attack on the US base in Syria.