INTRODUCTION

This study aims to analyze Iraqi foreign policy on Syria in the aftermath of the Arab
uprisings labeled as Arab Spring and the following civil war situation in Syria by giving a
historical background of relations and making references to some theoretical approaches.
Iraq’s relations with Syria have been shaped by the interaction between the internal political
dynamics of each state and the forces of the larger regional and international environment.
Hence, and by the very structure of the Middle Eastern region, where state actions have been
dependent on domestic, regional and international level dynamics, this analysis required
adoption of a multifaceted evaluation. In the first place, the historical background of the
relations between Iraq and Syria has been provided in order to understand the ideological,
geopolitical and strategic context into which the relations between the two states. Hence, in
this part, it will be suggested that some of today’s determinants of the relationship took form
in state creation period. One of such determinants will be labeled as ethno-sectarian structure
of the two countries and its influence on domestic and foreign policies. Well until the
beginning of 2000s, in both countries, it will be discussed, power has come to be concentrated
in the hand of small oligarchies of military officers and the Ba’ath Party ideology led by
Saddam Hussein in Iraq and al-Assad family in Syria. For Iraq, the situation has been tried to
be altered completely by the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. In Syria, this process began with the
civil rebellion which began in March 2011. In this study, hence, influences of these two
transformation processes on Iraqi foreign policy will be given a specific place in a
comparative manner. Doing so, it will be argued that explaining the foreign policy behavior of
post-Saddam Iraq, especially in the aftermath of the Arab spring, will require evaluation of
not only domestic and state level analysis but also regional and international levels of
analyses.

In general, political disputes, border tensions, demographic differences and personal

animosities between their political leaders have troubled relations between Syria and Iraq for
many years. Relations were strained also due to the two neighbors’ traditional rivalry for pre-
eminence in the Arab world, allegations of interference in each other’s internal affairs,
disputes over oil transit fees and their stances on Israel, and suspicions that each side was
aiding the opponents of the other’s government with money, training and arms. Despite the
improved ties, several issues continue to divide Iraq and Syria. Sectarian divisions in both
countries threaten regional stability and security. Political tensions persist between Iraqi and
Syrian political leaders, including those in both ruling and opposition parties. In addition,
border security continues to be weak, with migrants and militants easily crossing their
frontiers. Political chaos in both countries continue to challenge bilateral relations. Hence, a
significant dimension of Iraq’s Syrian policy included interdependency stemmed from
geopolitics, economic capabilities and domestic political structures.

A significant determinant of Iraq’s foreign policy behaviors in relations with its

neighbor Syria will be deemed as the legacy of colonial state creation and the following
influence of geopolitics. Geopolitics established a closer relationship between geography and
international relations and foreign policy. Alfred Mackinder’s theory of geopolitics related the
structure of world influence to a country’s geographical position.1 Geopolitics is a method of
foreign policy analysis which seeks to understand, explain, and predict international political
behavior primarily in terms of geographical variables such as natural resources.
Geopolitically, Syria has been in a strategic location to influence extremist and unionist
movements operating in Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon.2 Having placed in ancient Mesopotamia,
Iraqi-Syrian relations have been determined by their long shared border, which made two
states operated in an environment of persistent instability and insecurity. In geopolitical terms,
Iraq and Syria controlled much of the landmass between the Gulf and the Mediterranean-
historically a vital fulcrum in the Soviet-American balance of power in the Middle East.3
Mutual feelings of territorial injury in the demarcation of the states’ territory and centrifugal
forces threatened the continued integrity of the state, intense ideological and territorial
disputes have resulted in bitter inter-state enmity. Disputes have arisen over Syrian closure of
Iraqi oil pipelines, the allocation of water flowing from the Euphrates, and Syrian support of
Iran and Iraqi Kurds during the Iran-Iraq war. In this sense, historically, Iraqi-Syrian relations
also shaped super powers’ foreign and security policies in Middle East. Long continued
disputes over the waters of Euphrates River and oil transit fees and security dilemmas brought
about by permeable borders has much to do with the influence of geopolitics in Iraqi-Syrian
relations, which has continued to date.

Another significant determinant of Iraqi foreign policy on Syria, especially in post-

2003 period has been the influence of identity, domestic political dynamics and leadership

1
Baghat Korany & Ali E. Hillal Dessouki, The Foreign Policies of Arab States: The Challenges of
Globalization, p. 30
2
Richard Hair Dekmejian, Syria and Iraq: Relations and Prospects, p. 41
3
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, p. 1
factor on foreign policy behavior. As Hinnebusch argues, the relative incongruity between
state and identity is perhaps the most distinctive feature of the Middle East states system.4 The
question of identity has come to be a tool for the ruling elite in shaping the foreign policy of
the state. Nowhere was this acute from Iraq’s foreign policy. Until 2003, authoritarian state
record could manipulate identity politics to pursue an aggressive and rigid foreign policy in
Iraq. Permeability of state boundaries and increase in ethno-sectarian violence in post-2003
period, which was illustrated in vulnerability to regional conflicts (especially to Syrian crisis)
had two implications on Iraqi foreign policy (on Syria as well): Pursuit of a survival politics
based on diplomacy across the continuing geopolitical priorities, and proliferation in foreign
policy agenda in line with the rising role of identity in domestic Iraqi politics. Well until
removal of Saddam regime in Iraq in 2003, having similar domestic political dynamics and
the ideological rule of the Ba’ath parties, Iraqi-Syrian relations were also influenced by the
traditional rivalry for pre-eminence in Arab affairs, leadership rivalry on Arab nationalism
and allegations of involvement in each other’s internal politics, and stances towards Israel. In
post-2003 period, intensifying fragmentation in Iraqi domestic politics has increased the role
of identity.

Another, and interconnected significant determinant of Iraqi foreign policy on Syria

has been the implications of the Arab spring, which altered the regional and international
power setting. As will be detailed, the role of identities and sub-state actors in shaping the
politics of Middle East is not a new phenomenon. However, the new power poles’ and
transformations in international system (from bipolarity to multi-polarity) and its reflections
on Middle East coupled with the transformation of the Iraqi state from an authoritarian to a
relatively pluralist polity. The aforementioned survival politics required the Iraqi state to
resettle itself in the regional power structure not by pursuing the national interest only, but by
engaging into tactical and pragmatic alliances for survival. This meant a kind of regional
realpolitik and diplomacy which resulted in Iraq’s pursuing wavy relations with regional
(mainly Iran) and international (mainly US) powers, which had direct implications on Iraq’s
Syria policy. This also meant that permeable nature of the determinants of foreign policy
(domestic and international) required taking into account both Syrian and non-Syrian factors
into account when determining Syrian policy. As stated above, this was made easier by, and
complicated the domestic political determinants of the Iraqi foreign policy.

4
Raymond Hinnebusch, The Politics of Identity in Middle East International Relations, in Louise Fawcett,
International Relations of The Middle East, p. 151.
 HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF IRAQI-SYRIAN RELATIONS

Contemporary Iraqi-Syrian relations were grounded, to a significant extent, in the

historical developments which originated in World War I (WWI). Even during the Arab revolt
in the aftermath of the WWI, serious disputes between the Iraqi and Syrian officers who
served in the revolting army began to emerge. The Syrians blamed the Iraqis for taking over
most of the senior positions in the army. This period was marked by the emergence of new
elites, ideological movements, boundary configurations, and great power involvement, all of
which combined to define the parameters of conflict and cooperation between Iraq and Syria
and the larger Fertile Crescent region.5 Following the San Remo Conference in 1920, Anglo-
French agreement divided the Fertile Crescent into five territorial units: Syria, Lebanon, Iraq,
Palestine and Transjordan.6 In the end of the WWI, Iraq and Syria had no distinct borders.
The border between the two states was fixed at the Khabur River by the Paris Peace
Conference, yet from the determination of the border, conflict between the two states emerged
over annexation of Dayr al-Zur.7

State creation period in Middle East and colonial legacies made Iraq and Syria have
some similar domestic and external determinants which made their foreign policies and
relations interdependent and controversial in Ba’ath period. Some domestic determinants were
ethno-religious heterogeneity of society, historical and territorial differentiation as a result of
the Anglo-French partition of the Fertile Crescent, hegemony of two opposing political elites,
belonging to opposite wings of the Ba’ath Party and dominated by dissimilar sectarian
minorities (Alawites in Syria and Sunnis in Iraq), personalized style of leadership based on
patron-client networks and the consequent centralization of foreign policy-making and
execution in the hands of the two top leaders; legitimacy crisis of ruling elites due to the
failure to utilize a synthesis of competing ideologies- ethno-nationalism, state nationalism,
Arabism, Islamism and socialism, sectarian minority elites ruling sectarian majorities, and
excessive elite reliance on systematic coercion to maintain power; geographical and economic
factors such as foreign aid, the Euphrates river, and the transit of oil. Some shared external
determinants of foreign policies were the two countries’ role in Arab world and concomitant
Arab nationalist pressures, transnational influence of Islamic fundamentalism, the proximity
of Israeli threat, the economic and political influence of intermediate powers-Britain, China,

5
Richard Hair Dekmejian , ibid, p. 23
6
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, p. 3
7
Eliezer Tauber, The Struggle for Dayr-al-Zur: The Determination of borders Between Syria and Iraq,
International Journal of Middle East Studies, p. 379
west Germany, Japan and India; the influence of the non-aligned bloc, the Cold War rivalry
between the US and the SU, the economic and diplomatic role of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf
States, and the Soviet role as provider of political support and military technology.8

The mid-1950s’ regional forces, which heightened the inter-Arab struggle, changed
the patterns of relations between the Arab states as well as between Iraq and Syria. The
consequences of the Arab defeat in Palestine in 1948 and the subsequent creation of Israel
with the Balfour Declaration, the 1952 Egyptian Revolution, the 1955 Bagdad Pact and the
same year’s Arab adherence to non-alignment as well as the emergence of the Ba’ath Party is
Syria in 1955 were among these events. In an attempt to secure their dominant position in the
region, Iraq entered into the Baghdad Pact with Iran, Pakistan and Turkey in 1955. Three
years later, Syria established United Arab Republic with Egypt. While Iraq withdrew from the
Pact in 1959, UAR collapsed in 1961. In 1963, governments of both countries were swept
aside by Ba’athist coups although in Iraq Ba’ath could ascent to power in 1968.9 Despite their
superficial adherence to a shared political ideology, Iraq and Syria’s subsequent coups by
Saddam Hussain in Iraq in 1968 and Hafez al-Assad in Syria in 1970 personalized the rivalry
between the two states and initiated controversial era in their relations. Though both leaders
ruled the states under Baath ideology, they had different styles of ruling and geopolitical
priorities.10

From their very creation in 1920, until the deterioration of the relations between Syria
and Iraq, there occurred many unification attempts by Iraq to unite with Syria. With Iraqi
King Faisal’s ascent to power in Iraq in 1921, Iraq assumed a significant place as center of
Arab nationalist activity. Faisal’s attempt to unite Iraq and Syria proved a long continued
failure which covered the years between 1921 and 1933. This was followed by Nuri al-Said’s
Fertile Crescent Plan in 1943 to unite Iraq with Syria, Lebanon, Palestine and Transjordan,
1958 The Iraq-United Arab Republic (which was formed between Syria and Egypt but lasted
only three years) Plan to unite Iraq with Syria and Egypt, (which failed since the Iraqi
Ba’ath’s unification idea with Syria and Egypt was opposed by the National Democratic Party
and Qasim himself) 1963 attempt to construct a federal union between Iraq, Syria and Egypt,
the 1963 union of Iraqi and Syrian Ba’ath Parties, and 1978 Iraqi-Syrian Unity Charter of
Joint National Action. The promulgation of this charter was considered as a strong and

8
Richard Hair Dekmejian , ibid, pp. 4-9
9
Steven Simon, Won’t You Be My Neighbor: Syria, Iraq and The Changing Strategic Context in The Middle
East, p. 3
10
Steven Simon, ibid, p.3
practical reaction to the total collapse in the Arab stand against Israel, which was deepened by
the peace meetings between Egypt and Israel culminated in Camp David Accords. In 1978,
Hasan al-Bakr and Hafez al-Assad had agreed to a plan unifying Iraq and Syria. The plan was
to come into effect in July 1979. Saddam, fearful of losing his position as Deputy to Hafez al-
Assad, forced Bakr into retirement and cancelled the planned union.

As a result, efforts by both Iraqi and Syrian leaders to unite the two countries since the
creation of Iraq only led to worsening of the relations. Hostility intensified in 1960s, when
the both states were ruled by the different branches of the Ba’ath Party. Relations got better
only in the last years of Saddam. But even in these years, distrust between the rival Ba’athist
regimes, built up over three decades, continued. Short term constructive relations could easily
defeated to mutual enmities on structural problems between the two countries especially to the
personal rivalries between the rival Ba’ath leaders. For instance, Iraq-Syrian joint
involvement in 1973 war against Israel was reversed by geopolitical conflicts and ethno-
sectarian rifts. The sharing of power from the Euphrates River, Syrian distrust of Iraqi
intentions after the Iran-Iraq war, Iraqi opposition to Syrian partial agreements with Israel,
attempts at mutual subversion, Iraqi opposition to Syrian military role in Lebanon.11

Oligarchical composition of the fragile domestic politics in both countries made

foreign policies influenced by domestic politics as well as personalities and perceptions of the
Ba’athist leaders. This became a source of similarity and permeability in two states’ foreign
policy orientations. Ideologically, both Iraq and Syria tried to gain monopoly over the
leadership of Arab nationalism. The two oligarchical rule in Iraq and Syria represented
opposing factions of the Ba’ath Party dominated by different ethno-religious minorities. In
Syria, Assad family’s power was centered on its kinsmen from Alawite minority, which
comprised only about 12% of the population and who ruled over a society where Sunnis
comprised the majority, about 65% of the population.12 Similarly, in Iraq, Hussain’s Sunni
kinsmen from Takrit dominated the Shi’ite majority who comprised about 55% of the
population. Such ‘minority rules’ in both countries coupled with economic disparities became
the main source of internal instability.

The two Ba’aths’ joint involvement in 1973 war against Israel increased the
enthusiasm for both countries with Arab nationalist sentiments. In mid-1970s, realignment

11
Richard Hair Dekmejian , ibid, p. 68
12
Richard Hair Dekmejian , ibid, p. 3
politics in the Arab world against superpowers, disappearance of Egypt from leadership of
pan-Arabism after Camp David Accords increased the likelihood of an Iraq-Iran-Syria
rapprochement which culminated in many economic agreements between Iraq and Syria. Iran.
This cooperation, however, remained short lived and relations deteriorated due to Iraqi
opposition to Syrian partial agreements with Israel and Syrian military role in Lebanon,
Syria’s support to Iran and Iraqi Kurds in 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war. This stemmed from the close
relationship between major issues of internal and external policy and the ultimate survival of
the oligarchies. Kurdish questions and the radical Islam were among such issues. In late
1970s, both countries met with Islamic fundamentalist revolts. In Syria, this revolt was
headed by the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood, whereas in Iraq it was led by the Shi’ite Hizb al-
Da’wah which was supported by Iran. In response, Syria supported Iraq’s Hizb al-Dawah and
formed a Shi’ite axis from Iraq to Lebanon. It also gave support to Kurdish uprisings against
Baghdad. In the same vein, In late 1970s, both countries met with Islamic fundamentalist
revolts. In Syria, this revolt was headed by the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood, whereas in Iraq it
was led by the Shi’ite Hizb al-Da’wah. Iraqi support to Muslim Brotherhood of Syrian branch
in mid-1970s against Asad regime was countered by in 1980 Syria-formed Shi’ite axis Druze
of Lebanon and Syrian Alawites to support Hizb al-Dawa in Iraq. In 1982, Syria closed its
borders to Iraq, accusing Saddam of sending arms to the Islamic militants. Having been
assured of Iranian oil supplies, Syria proceeded to shut down Iraq’s oil pipeline to the sea,
thereby inflicting upon the latter substantial economic hardship.13 With Syrian support to Iran
in 1980-88 Iran Iraq war, as well as to the Kurdish uprisings in Iraq, relations became further
controversial, with each regime supporting opposition groups committed to overthrow of the
other. Having been assured of Iranian oil supplies, Syria deepened the rivalry by shutting
down Iraq’s oil pipeline to the sea. Diplomatic and economic relations were so connected in
Iraqi-Syrian relations that official relations between Iraq and Syria as well as the Agreement
on resuming pumping of oil through the Syrian territories was suspended in 1982.

Following Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait, Syria joined the Allied coalition in 1991
Gulf War. The decision by Syria to support the anti-Iraq coalition during the Gulf War should
also be understand within the wider political, geographic and historical regional context.
Collapse of Syria’s superpower ally, Soviet Union, resulted in Syria supporting the anti-Iraq
international coalition during the 1991 Gulf War in an attempt to regain wider international

13
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, p. 78
legitimacy.14 Iraqi-Syrian relations began to normalize in late 1990s. Baghdad, in an effort to
break free from the United Nations sanction regime, reinstated economic ties with Damascus
in 1997.15 Iraq regarded Syria as a geopolitical asset to escape from UN sanctions, since Iraqi
oil could be pumped via Syria outside of Oil for Food Program. Iraqi-Syrian rapprochement
strengthened with Bashar al-Assad’s ascent to power in Syria in 2000. In November 2000,
Iraqi Vice President Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri became the first Iraqi official to visit Damascus
since 1980s.

Beginning from mid- 1990s, the two states sensed that they did not pose a real threat
to each other; rather could be strong allies against US and Israel. In 2000, Iraq began to export
oil via Syria, Kirkuk-Banias pipeline across high US criticism on Syria. In the end of 2000,
when Palestinian intifada broke out, Saddam moved Iraqi forces to the Syrian border mainly
in order to improve his regional standing rather than sending a warning to Israel. There
occurred in 2002 allegations that Syria was turning a blind eye to the smuggling of weapons
from Eastern Europe to Iraq via Syria. After Bashar al-Assad rose to power in Syria in 2000,
Syria continued to refrain from any kind of strategic alliance with Iraq or renewing diplomatic
relations between the two countries. The then Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz
proposed, during a visit to Damascus that Syria and Iraq should ratify the National Act Treaty
that the two countries signed in 1978, but Saddam had canceled when he rose to power in
1979.

As will be seen from this historical process, in pre-2003 period Iraqi Syrian relations
revealed short periods of harmony and united action illustrated with tactical alliances during
confrontations with Israel and reflections of Arab nationalist enthusiasms. In pre-2003 period,
while relations were best defined by mutual enmity and security dilemma, strong leadership in
both countries and consolidation structures based on securing the minorities’ consent on
regimes increased the enmity between the two states while at the same time providing for an
active, strong, realist and leader-driven foreign policy in Iraq which national interests were
more or less clear. Ironically, even before the fall of Saddam and the current civil war
situation in Syria began, post-Saddam and post-Assad relations were regarded to moderate
enmity but to produce internal stability and external weakness in Iraqi foreign policy. Hence,
the relative strength of ruler’s imperative in pre-2003 period depended on perceptions of

14
Alasdair Drysdale, Syria and Iraq: The Geopathology of a Relationship, GeoJournal, University of Hamsphire
15
Steven Simon, ibid, p. 17.
Saddam and his bureaucrats and his domestic and foreign policy priorities, which produced a
more coherent and one pole foreign policy agenda. This would be a major point of departure
for post-2003 foreign policy orientation in Iraq, which have had significant implications on
Iraq’s Syrian policy.

History of economic relations between Syria and Iraq has often been turbulent. One
immediate cause for wavy relations was sharing of power from the Euphrates River. Iraq
claimed that the Syrian blocking of the Euphrates had caused massive economic difficulties in
the South by depriving millions of people of water. The two states froze diplomatic and
economic ties in 1980s after finding themselves on opposing sides in the Iran-Iraq war.
Relations between the two countries remained uneasy until Baghdad, in an effort to break free
from the UN sanctions regime, reinstated economic ties with Damascus in 1997.16 In Saddam
period bilateral trade between the two countries dramatically increased, which reached at least
3$ billion by the end of 2002.17 The increase in trade between two countries-both direct and
for goods transported through Syria to bypass UN sanctions-was accompanied by a series of
economic agreements, including the establishment of a Syria-Iraq free trade zone and on joint
investments in the two countries.18 An airline route between Baghdad and Damascus was
inaugurated in blatant violation of the sanctions, and July 2001, a railroad line was opened
between Mosul and Aleppo. Since 2003, they have signed several commercial and trade
agreements and a free trade zone to facilitate cross-border movement of goods and people.
However, relations remained to grow relatively slow in oil sector due to the closure of
Kirkuk-Banias pipeline by the US in 2003.

Ba’ath versus Ba’ath: Failure of Unification Ideal, Domestic-Foreign Policy Mix

Like Syria, Iraq’s domestic political setting has come to be heterogeneous. It included
three main nationalities and sects: The Arab Sunnis of central Iraq, the Shi’ites of Baghdad
and the South, the Kurds of the North, and various Christian sects. Beginning from the British
occupation of Iraq, Iraqi political system was dominated by the Sunni minority until the fall of
Saddam in 2003. The Ba’ath regime, headed by Saddam Hussain ruled Iraq between the years
1968-2003. Despite their mutual enmity, the Iraqi and Syrian Ba’aths shared the same
ideology. The Iraqi Ba’ath presented itself faithful to the original pan-Arab orientation of the

16
Steven Simon, ibid, p. 17
17
Eyal Zisser, Syria and The War in Iraq, Middle East review of International Affairs, p.49 from al-Hayat,
October 26, 2011
18
Eyal Zisser, ibid, p. 49
Ba’ath Party in Syria under its founder Michel Aflaq and Salahaddin al-Bitar. Both Ba’aths
refused to share power with other political parties. On the other hand, the Iraqi Ba’ath placed
more emphasis on indoctrination and became less subservient to the military compared to
Syrian Ba’ath. Whereas in Syria military constituted the dominant force, in Iraq the Ba’ath
and the military shared power despite the fact that the real power has come to rest in the hands
of a small Sunni provincial kinship group within the Ba’ath Party. Naturally, in both countries
foreign policy process was influenced by the external environment and mixture of internal
variables-ethno-sectarian structure, the economic system, the military, the party, and the top
oligarch led by the two presidents. Consequently, the content of Iraqi foreign policy was
determined by each leader’s perceptions of self-interest in terms of power preservation.
Calculations of national interest played a secondary role to the ruler’s imperative.19

Regionally and internationally, in Ba’ath period, Iraqi-Syrian relations were under the
influence of Pan Arabism which dominated the politics of Middle East in 1950s and 1960s. In
both countries, pan-Arabism has been seen as a primary form of political identification, and,
equally important, an indispensable source of political legitimacy for narrowly based regimes.
Both Iraq and Syria have tended to equate their own interests with those of the Arabs as a
whole and frequently claimed a special responsibility to speak and act for all Arabs. 20 The
Ba’athist ideology of Pan Arabism with its three historical goals (unity, freedom, socialism)
for the Arab nation had serious implications for Iraq’s foreign policy. It provided Saddam
with a tool for viewing the region as well as defining Iraq’s role in it. The Ba’athists believed
that the Arabs were divided as a result of the centuries of misrule by foreign powers and
reactionary local oligarchies. This decline could be reversed and the Arabs could regain their
rightful position in the world only through the Ba’ath, or renaissance, which required
sweeping away ossified structures. Initially, then, the party appealed to those who yearned for
change and rebirth of the Arab world. Pan-Arabism, then, was both the Ba’ath’s existential
justification and the basis for its appeal.21 The quest for unity was motivated by Arab
nationalist and Islamic feeling to create a strong state to achieve economic self-sufficiency
and military potential against neighbors-especially Israel. However, unity schemes were
defeated not only to ruler’s imperative but also each country’s ethno-sectarian challenge.
Iraq’s Shi’ite majority opposed any unity scheme with Syria, since Iraq’s Shi’ite majority

19
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, p. 16
20
Alasdair Drysdale, ibid, introduction
21
Alasdair Drysdale, ibid, introduction
opposed any unity scheme with Syria, since the latter’s Sunni majority would threaten the
Shi’ites’ majority status. Similarly, the Kurdish minority of Iraq would be submerged into an
Arab ocean in the context of a unified state. Nor would the Alawite ruling minority of Syria
supported a unity scheme that would automatically threaten its dominant position. Arab
nationalism by itself was not sufficiently strong to create strong unionist sentiments among
the Iraqi and Syrian ethno-sectarian communities. Moreover, it would have equally been
difficult to create a unified Iraqi-Syrian entity even if the societies were homogenous, because
of the ruler’s imperative. The opposing wings and leaders of the Ba’ath Party were not eager
to consummate a union because of their personal interests and ideological differences.22

The Ba’ath Party was formed in Syria in 1940 with its three ideals of unity, freedom
and socialism.23 The Ba’athists believed that the Arab decline which was caused by misrule of
the foreign powers could be reversed and the Arabs could regain their rightful position in the
world through the ba’ath, or renaissance. Until 1960s, Syria was regarded as the guardian of
pan-Arabism and entered into a rivalry with Iraq on leadership well until it dissolved United
Arab Republic in 1961, which was formed between Syria and Egypt in 1958. As will be
detailed above, Iraq also encouraged many Arab unity schemes. By 1963, Arab socialism and
revolutionary radicalism became an integral part of the official ideologies of Iraq and Syria.24
In 1963, governments of both Iraq and Syria swept aside by Ba’athist coups although in Iraq
Ba’ath could ascent to power in 1968. Despite their superficial adherence to a shared political
ideology, Iraq’s and Syria’s subsequent coups by Saddam Hussain in 1968 and Hafez al-
Assad in Syria in 1970 personalized the rivalry between Iraq and Syria. Though both leaders
ruled the states under Ba’ath ideology, they had radically different styles of ruling and
geopolitical priorities.25

Even before the beginning of the Ba’ath rules both in Syria and Iraq in 1963, Iraq and
Syria competed for primacy in the Arab world. As stated before, this competition was not
immune from the influence of the nature of the larger regional and international system which
was defined as bipolarity. In an attempt to secure their dominant position in the region, Iraq
entered into Baghdad Pact with Iran, Pakistan and Turkey in 1955 whereas Syria formed UAR

22
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, p. 50
23
Nabil M. Kaylani, The Rise of Syrian Ba’ath 1940-1958: Political Success, Party Failure, International
Journal of Middle East Studies, p. 5
24
George Lencowski, Radical Regimes in Egypt, Syria and Iraq: Some Comparative Observations on Ideologies
and Practices, The Journal of Politics, pp. 33-36.
25
Steven Simon, ibid, p. 3
with Egypt in 1958. Arab nationalist ideology was often sacrificed at the expense of national
interest of these two competing oligarchies. The two elite aimed to ally themselves with any
external power except Israel to further their respective interests regardless of ideological and
historical considerations. Iraq’s settlement with Iran and Syria’s rapprochement with US is
considerable in this sense. Arab nationalist ideology was often sacrificed at the expense of
national interests of these two competing oligarchies. While Syrian Ba’ath regarded Egypt as
an ally and Iraq as a foe as plotting both radical forces and reactionary elements against the
national interests of Syria.26 This was due to the ethno-sectarian bases of the two Ba’aths as
well as with the personalities of the leading actors. Each Ba’ath Party was dominated by
different ethno-religious minorities. In Syria, Assad family’s power was centered on its
kinsmen from Alawite minority, which comprised only about 12% of the population and who
ruled over a society where Sunnis comprised the majority, about 65% of the population.27
Similarly, in Iraq, Hussain’s Sunni kinsmen from Takrit dominated the Shi’ite majority who
comprised about 55% of the population. Such minority rules in both countries coupled with
economic disparities became the main source of internal instability. Moreover, in both
countries foreign policy processes were influenced by the external environment and mixture
of internal variables such as ethno-sectarian structure, the economic system, the military, the
party and the top oligarch led by the two presidents and their perceptions of self-interest
which made national interest a secondary importance compared to the ruler’s imperative.28
Along with internal instability, oligarchical composition of the fragile domestic politics in
both countries made foreign policies influenced by domestic politics as well as personalities
and perceptions of the Ba’athist leaders.

On the surface, Arab nationalist ideal led the two states to attempt unification projects
until the deterioration of relations in 1960s. Efforts by both Iraqi and Syrian leaders to unite
the two countries since the creation of Iraq in 1921 under King Faisal, Iraqi leaders have
aimed to unify the two countries, which only led to worsening of the relations. Relations got
better only in the last years of Saddam. But even in these years, distrust between the rival
Ba’athist regimes, built up over three decades, continued. The long continued hostility began
in 1960s, when the both states were ruled by the different branches of the Ba’ath Party.
Beginning from 1960s, Syrian-Iraqi relations entered a new phase characterized by strong

26
Joshua Landis, Syrian Relations With Iraq-Better Than Ever, Syriacomment.com
27
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, p.3
28
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, p.16
countervailing forces emanating from domestic, regional and international sources. In this
context, Nasser and the Ba’ath Party played the central roles in the ensuing struggle for
power.29 Regarding foreign policies, individual political styles and personalities of Hafez al-
Assad and Saddam Hussain resulted in different foreign policy orientations stemming from
the dissimilarities between the diverging elite priorities.30 As a result the quest for unity has
been counterbalanced by strong polarizing tendencies which have promoted long-term
conflictual relations, especially since the mid-1960s.

For most of Iraq’s history, including the Saddam’s rule, the Sunni minority
monopolized political power by centralizing it in Baghdad and repressing the Shi’ite Arabs
and the Kurds. The situation changed dramatically after Iraq’s first democratic elections in
2005, from which current Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, leader of the loose alliance of
Islamist Shi’ite Arab political parties, emerged as the winner.31 From its initial emergence as a
British mandate following the WWI to the post-independence monarchy from 1932-1958,
through the military coups that ushered the rule of first Ba’ath party in 1968 and then Saddam
Hussein in 1979, external threats and internal tensions have characterized the history of Iraq.
During the Saddam period, the foreign relations of Iraq were influenced by a number of
controversial decisions by Saddam Hussein administration. Hussein had good relations with
the Soviet Union and some Western countries such as France and Germany who provided him
advanced weapons systems. He also developed a tenuous relation with the US who supported
him during the Iran-Iraq war. However, invasion of Kuwait and the subsequent Gulf War
brutally changed Iraq’s relations both with the Arab world and the West. Syria, along with
Egypt and Saudi Arabia supported UN coalition against Saddam.

POST-SADDAM IRAQ, ARAB SPRING and IRAQI POLICY ON SYRIA

Diplomatic relations were limitedly restored in 2001, which made Syria a place for
escape for Ba’athists in the aftermath of US led removal of Saddam regime in 2003. In 2003,
US closed Kirkuk-Banias pipeline between Iraq and Syria. In 2006, Iraq and Syria restored
full diplomatic ties after 25 years. In the same year, the two state signed 5-year defense
cooperation agreement to monitor the shared border. In 2007, Jalal Talabani became the first
president to visit Damascus in 30 years which ended in issue of a joint statement stressing
mutual security interests as well as many economic agreements. Iraq believed that security

29
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, p. 50
30
Richard Hair Dekmejian, ibid, pp. 47-8
31
Richard Weitz, Strategic Posture Review: Iraq, World Politics Review, January 17, 2012
would lead to political and economic growth. But Syria believed that political and economic
umbrella would yield security and condemned Iraq’s de-Ba’athification law and reflected its
readiness to cooperate with ex-Ba’ath officials in Iraq who had worked against Saddam’s
regime. Following Talabani’s visit, Syria made a shift in its open border policy with respect to
the Iraqi refugees, imposing severe restrictions on visas and suspending Iraqi air flights into
Syria. Baghdad responded that much of the violence in Iraq was perpetrated by jihadists who
had gained access through Syria. Although Syria denied such accusations, it seemed unwilling
to take measures to improve Iraq’s security and stability. Hence the dichotomy between
Syria’s apparent diplomatic intent and actual behavior hardened the trajectory of
rapprochement.

In globalization era, standard definition of the defense of the national interest ceased to
help explain foreign policy behaviors. The fact that state is fragmented makes also the foreign
policy a fluctuating action.32 Iraq’s foreign relations are a product of its political and
economic place within the wider regional and international setting, but also a reflection of the
contested ongoing process of policy formation.33 Changing Iraq’s international and regional
status, 2003 War on Iraq and ist short aftermath made Iraq’s foreign policy shaped under
survival politics due to the de facto occupation and state of insurgency. At the same time, Iraq
has gone through a political transition from Saddam’s authoritarian rule to a plural polity that
encompasses varying sects and ideological and political factions.34 This transition has been
provided by a series of general and provincial elections since 2005. However, the ruling
strata’s increasing hold on country’s economic, political resources, Maliki’s increasing
centrist policies making him gain upper hand plus increase in the poles who have claimed
their right on power has complicated the already intermingled domestic policy-foreign policy
mix.

Domestic Politics

Domestic political developments remain among the primary set of influence over the
character of Iraq’s foreign relations. This has mainly two reasons: First, domestic political
patterns govern not only the composition and shape of the Iraqi government and the state but
also its foreign policy aspirations. Second, the immature and fragile post-Saddam Iraqi

32
Baghat Korany & Ali E. Hillal Dessouki, ibid, p. 19
33
Charles Tripp, The Foreign Policy of Iraq, in Raymond Hinnebusch and Anoushiravan Ehteshami, The
Foreign Policies of Middle East States, p. 168
34
Alex M. Jackson and Madison S. Jones, Iraq After Saddam Hussein: Facing Challenges, Securing Gains, p. 1
domestic political setting intensifying it place as an environment in which other states pursue
their own foreign policies-making Iraq a penetrated state in which the national interests of a
range of states are being pursued. Hence, Iraq’s foreign relations take place not only outside
Iraq’s boundaries but within them as well.35 Historically, Iraq’s foreign policy has been to a
great extent shaped under its domestic politics and ethno-sectarian structure of the state. In
post-2003 period, fragility stemmed from the new plural polity and increase in each ethno-
sectarian community’s stake in domestic and regional politics has raised the influence of
domestic politics on foreign policy making. Domestic politics of Iraq interact with foreign
relations not only in terms of how foreign policy is ultimately designed and implemented, and
how relations with other states are conducted, but also in terms of the opportunities given to
other states to exploit political spaces between Iraqis of different identities for their own
national interests.36 This overlapping relationship between the spheres of domestic political
dynamics and foreign relations results in an omni-balancing approach to foreign policy, with
the state seeking to project its national interests while also using foreign relations to legitimate
the regime and weaken or remove domestic opposition. Omni-balancing theory rests on the
assumptions that leaders are weak and illegitimate and that the stakes for domestic policy are
very high.37 This has been a common feature of Iraq’s foreign policy and explains to a
considerable extent the pattern of Iraq’s foreign relations at least in the regional context.

A related influence of the domestic policy on Iraq’s foreign policy has been the
question of the ‘Iraqi identity’. Like in Saddam period, in post-2003 period the question of
whose (ethno-sectarian groups-Kurds, Sunnis or the Shi’ites) nationalist vision would prevail,
which community would control the state narrative, and how power would be held by one
community or divided among all prevails. Moreover, whether Iraq is part of a larger Arab
nation, or whether Kurdish identity continued to prosper, or whether Iraq’s identity will be
dominated by the majority of Shi’ites are all domestic questions that have not been solved yet
and that influence Iraq’s foreign policy. The fact that Iraq’s politics are reflection of the
ethno-sectarian divisions of the country has increased its validity for the post-2003 period.
There are no political forces that bring together different ethno-sectarian groups in a single
unified political party. In the last local elections, which was held pn April 20, 2012 some
parties who joined the elections in different districts with the same lists realized sectarian

35
Gareth Stansfield, The Reformation of Iraq’s Foreign Relations: New Elites and Enduring Legacies,
International Affairs , p. 1404
36
Gareth Stansfield, ibid, p. 1397
37
Malik Mufti, Sovereign Creations: Pan-Arabism and Political Orders in Syria and Iraq, p. 6
alliances in some districts. For instance, in Diyala where the Shi’ites comprise the majority
and which is so close to Vasid (where Shi’ites comprise the majority) and Salahaddin (where
Sunnis comprise the majority), both the Shi’ite and Sunni factions (National Diyalah Alliance
and Iraqiyya list of Diyalah) formed joint lists. In other words, Shi’ite groups could make
presence among the four Sunni dominated districts only in Diyalah. Furthermore, central
government does not hold a monopoly of force, as the KRG has its own peshmerga and the
Sunnis Sons of Iraq.38 Moreover, while his power seems limited by Iraq’s new parliamentary
federal systems, Maliki refuses to share power with his rivals, and his opponents are
weakened over ethnicity, religion, ideology and competing personal ambitions.39 Iraq’s
political stalemate remains a matter of concern, although overshadowed by the country’s
fragile security situation regionally. A power sharing agreement, Arbil Agreement, was signed
in November 2010 at Arbil among Iraq’s key political actors to establish a balanced coalition
government in which key executive branch posts were to be distributed among the main
parties in proportion to their electoral strength and which would bring a kind of checks and
balances system to the governance. Since then, however, Maliki has ignored the Agreement,
and just like Saddam, tried to keep political institutions, including the judiciary, federal
agencies under his personal control. He also kept many national security posts, appointing
major senior police, military officers without the parliament’s approval. Moreover, his
partisans continued to remove Sunnis from national and local offices on the grounds that they
either supported Saddam Hussein’s deposed Ba’athist regime or were aiding Sunni insurgents
that continue to target the government.40 Non-application of the Arbil Agrement and Maliki’s
increasing authoritarian inclinations has served increasing rift between Maliki and opposing
sectarian political factions in Iraq. This made Maliki more alert on Sunni groups, and if Assad
falls and replaced with a Sunni government, this will prove a vital threat. Complicating the
picture furthermore, the vague provisions of the 2005 constitution and the 2010 Arbil
Agreement regarding the powers of the president, prime minister, parliament and other federal
and provincial bodies have been an invitation for Iraqi elites to struggle to define their roles
and other rules of the political game.41 The danger is that if Assad falls, it might encourage
Iraqi Kurdish and Sunni extremists, backed by foreign sponsor, to intensify their efforts to
overthrow the Maliki government in Baghdad by force. The alternative to more power sharing
and political compromise in Iraq could be a return to a foreign-sponsored civil war.

38
World Politics Review, Realist Prism: If Iraq is New Lebanon, Will US Play Syria?
39
Richard Weitz, The Growing Risks of Iraq’s Political Stalemate, World Politics Review, August 3, 2012
40
Richard Weitz, The Growing Risks of Iraq’s Political Stalemate
41
Richard Weitz, The Growing Risks of Iraq’s Political Stalemate
 The problems in the domestic political sphere, caused by the existence of a
heterogeneous population, are exacerbated by the geopolitical environment in which Iraq’s
survival politics-run foreign policy continues to be under the influence of psychological and
political insecurities relating to Iraq’s territorial integrity and exploitation and management of
natural resources. Geopolitically, Iraq is part of different regions, including the Arab world
and non-Arab world. Hence it faces with significant challenges in terms of rationalizing
national interests and constructing a coherent set of foreign policies and developing
constructive foreign relations.42 Flexibility is also difficult since there has been a pressure of
domestic political dynamics, which results in Iraq’s promotion of a rigid and reactive foreign
policy. The role of domestic politics on formation of foreign policy increased in post-2003
period. Even, in post-2003 period, Iraq is more strongly penetrated by regional actors than
before, its borders are more permeable and the domestic challenges are more severe.

Role of the geopolitics of water and hydrocarbons as structural determinants of Iraqi

foreign policy has also increased its significance in post-2003 period foreign policy agenda.
International politics of water has always been a contentious issue between the states through
which the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers flow-Iraq (the Tigris and Euphrates), Syria (the
Euphrates) and Turkey (the Tigris and Euphrates).43 With an agricultural sector dependent on
irrigation from these rivers, in the past Iraq nearly come to blows with Syria over the
damming of the Euphrates in the 1970s. With its population of this riparian state increasing
and in face of significant economic challenges geopolitics of water supply has increased its
influence in Iraq’s foreign policy on Syria. Exploitation and management of hydrocarbon (gas
and oil) is equally significant. The importance of hydrocarbons to the Iraqi economy is acute:
it is the fourth largest proven reserves of oil in the world and significant natural gas reserves.
Removal of Saddam regime and subsequent ending of sanctions, Iraq has to realize high level
of exports of oil in order to repair the state. An Arab spring scenario for Iraq is also often
discussed, since it suffers from high unemployment especially among the youth, a
dependency on natural resource exports, popular complaints over inadequate public services
and other factors that have contributed to mass protests in other Arab countries.

42
Gareth Stansfield, ibid, p. 1399
43
Gareth Stansfield, ibid, p. 1400
Foreign Policy in post-Saddam Era

Writing about the foreign policy of Iraq under Saddam Hussein, Charles Tripp says
that it is significant to understand the degree to which Iraqi state policies during the past few
decades have been shaped both by the constraints under which Iraqi leaders must operate and
by the choices their cognitive environment presented them.44 Comparing to Saddam period,
there are certain similarities and dissimilarities in Iraq’s foreign policy orientation. However,
what is new in post-Saddam Iraq is that Iraq’s domestic politics is far more penetrated by
regional and international actors. A significant departure for post-2003 period is that Iraq’s
interaction with its neighbors and the wider international community was dramatically
transformed by the regime change, changing Iraq’s regional setting. On the other hand,
externally, geopolitical, economic factors and the insecurity engendered by Iraq’s peculiar
geopolitical situation continues to alarm Iraq’s leaders to questions concerning territorial
integrity, border disputes. Access to waterways, utilization of the waters of the Tigris and
Euphrates, the importance of hydrocarbons to the Iraqi economy, relationship between
economic independence and national advancement, and in domestic politics, question of
national identity has remained as perennial determinants of Iraq’s foreign policy.

Removal of the Ba’ath regime in 2003 was a watershed in the sense that in domestic
and foreign policy realms, removal of the authoritarian structures of Saddam regime gave
space and opportunity to a range of previously subordinated actors to carve out power centers
of their own.45 Yet, similar to Saddam era, domestic politics has still run by patrimonial-client
relations, official foreign policy is still in the hands of a small bureaucrats of the command
and intelligence services and decisions are controlled by few men. Complicating the things
further, contrary to Saddam period, there’s no longer one single foreign policy orientation.
Instead, there are multiple foreign policies emanating from interests of different sets of
political elites act autonomously in deciding what they consider to be Iraq’s foreign policy
interests, from their own normative positions and particular perspectives, and engage in
foreign relations often irrespective of what the formal government line may be. 46 This is
because foreign policy is not purely in the domain of the government and the foreign ministry.
Rather it has much to do with the aspirations and actions of the most prominent political
groupings. This in turn is related with the fact that, in post-2003 era domestic political

44
Charles Tripp, The Foreign Policy of Iraq, p. 167
46
Gareth Stansfield, ibid, p. 1402
landscape is further fractured, power is further localized to the point that the state has often
struggled to exert itself or has been forced to negotiate with local power-holders and the
political groupings themselves have their own well-established links to patrons many of
whom are foreign.47 Stansfield provides two main reasons for the emergence of many poles in
foreign policy in post-Saddam Iraq: the first is that the opposition groups to Saddam, that is
the Shi’ites and the Kurds enjoyed assistance at particular times when they were well placed
to support the national interests of the parties in conflict with Saddam. While the patronage
ties could change often, by the 1990s a basic pattern had emerged: The main Shi’ite parties-
Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq (ISCI) and also different wings of Dawa, Kurdish parties-
KDP, PUK and some Kurdish Islamist Parties and some secular cross-cutting groups
(particularly the Iraqi National congress-INC- and Iraqi National Alliance-INA- had all
developed their own visions of what a post-Saddam Iraq should be like, and had begun to
formulate their own tentative foreign policies and relationships with neighboring powers. 48 A
second factor behind the emergence of fragmented political system concerns the
institutionalization of the opposition groups as the building blocks of the post-Saddam
political system. After toppling the old regime, US-led coalition faced a political vacuum, and
found it secular to engage with Saddam period’s exiled opposition groups. Coalition’s
adoption of a consociational governmental structure for Iraq produced fragmentation and
poles of foreign policy.

In the aftermath of US withdrawal, Maliki has faced with the necessity of both manage
these interrelated challenges while trying to reintegrate Iraq into the regional and international
order from which it has been isolated since 1991.49 According to Hosyar Zhabari, the main
departure from Saddam era foreign policy in terms of international order was transformation
to bipolar world to multi-polar world. Accordingly, authoritarian nature of the Saddam
regime, which could manage domestic opposition by forming a regime on consent (appointing
non-Sunnis as well to significant posts) and the bipolar nature of the international system, in
which Saddam could play the superpowers off against each other, had provided for
emergence of a much more aggressive foreign policy. Post-Saddam Iraq consolidation process
has intersected both with the disintegration in the Arab world and the multi-polar forces in
Middle East politics both in local, regional and international level (Radical Islamic groups
such as al-Qaeda, Hezbollah; new regional leaders such as Iran, GCC states and turkey, and

47
Gareth Stansfield, ibid, p. 1403
48
Gareth Stansfield, ibid, p. 1403.
49
Richard Weitz, Strategic Posture Review: Iraq
international powers such as Russia and China along the US). In such an environment, given
the Iraq’s new and fractured political landscape, the task assigned to new foreign policy has
become the normalization of diplomatic relations with the international community on the
basis of mutual interests and international law and erase disastrous legacy of Iraq’s foreign
policy under the Saddam regime. In this sense, increasing security dilemma and fragility has
made realism a significant-just one point among the many- dimension of foreign policy.50

Arab Uprisings, Syrian Crisis and Iraq’s Syrian Policy

Arab spring uprisings which began at the end of 2010 have added multiple dimensions
to the structure of Iraqi foreign policy as well as regional politics. With the Arab Spring and
the subsequent Syrian crisis, Middle Eastern boundaries of post-WWI have come under
threat. As a result of the civil war in Syria Iraq, Lebanon, Turkey, and even Israel (via the
Druze in Golan) are under threat.51 Taking into account the spillover effects of the Arab
uprisings and renewed sectarian violence, the political future of Iraq and the regional balance
of power remain highly unstable.52 Moreover, although different in their roots, and although it
is hard to draw a clear connection between the fall of the authoritarian regime in Iraq and
beginning of Arab uprisings, their implications resembled each other when novel features of
domestic, regional and international order are concerned. Whereas the Iraqi authoritarian
regime was ousted by an external war, Arab uprisings were brought about by discontent with
the authoritarian regimes of Egypt, Tunisia and Libya. On the other hand, Arab uprisings
further deepened the fragility of Iraqi politics. Following the example of the Tunisian and
Egyptian uprisings, Baghdad’s own Tahrir Square also became the site of a series of popular
protests against the government led by Nuri al-Maliki.53 Moreover, in the aftermath of the US
withdrawal from Iraq, the main challenge to Iraq’s stability and security has been the fear to
return to a civil war situation especially between the Shi’ites and Sunnis, which also have had
major implications for foreign policy agenda.54

Since the fall of Saddam in 2003, two issues have dominated the Iraqi-Syrian
relations: Syria’s initial decision to host the remnants of the Iraqi Ba’ath Party and Iraqi
suspicion of Syria on allowing insurgents to move men and supplies across the border into

50
Mohamed Soffar, Foreign Policy Under Occupation: Does Iraq Need A Foreign Policy? İn Baghat Korany
and Ali E. Hillal Dessouki, ibid, p. 221
51
Henri J. Barkey, Syrian Crisis and future of Iraq, The American Interest
52
Louise Fawcett, The Iraq War Ten Yeras on: Assessing the Fallout, International Affairs, p. 325
53
Jack Healy and Michael Schmidt, Demonstration Turn Violent in Iraq, New York Times, February 25, 2011.
54
Richard Weitz, Strategc Posture Review: Iraq
Iraq. This created a controversial relationship. However, in post-2003 period shared codes of
fears increased between the especially regarding the two countries’ fragile ethno-sectarian
policies. For instance, the both governments shared an interest in preventing their Kurdish
minorities from pursuing greater autonomy.55 Moreover, collapse of the Assad regime carries
the threat to bring to power a Sunni Muslim government that would align with GCC countries
against Iraq’s Shi’ite led government. If Assad regime survives, it may also seek to punish
Iraq for any support it gave to Syrian opposition by revitalizing for Iraq’s insurgents.56 Hence,
Iraqi policy on Syria and Syrian crisis both reflect Iraq’s internal divisions and competing
external alignments, with different Iraqi factions maneuvering to exploit to advance their
interests. Although Iraqi-Syrian relations have been wavy since 1990s, the Arab uprisings,
and the civil war in Syria, and the increasingly sectarian nature of politics have provoked a
new rapprochement.57

In post-Saddam period, Iraqi-Syrian relations have become more under the influence
of the both states’ vulnerability across each other’s domestic political contexts and the pivotal
roles they have assumed in regional politics. In the short aftermath of Saddam’s fall, Iraqi
Syrian relations first entered into an era of complexity, since the both were facing significant
internal turmoil. While Syria opposed to US invasion of Iraq and supported its territorial
integrity, during 2003 war and its aftermath, it turned a blind eye to the infiltration of jihadists
across the Syria-Iraq border, fearing that if it prevented them from going to Iraq to unleash
their anger against the Americans, the jihadists would take it out on the Syrian government.58
It also provided refugee for many members of the Iraqi Ba’ath which was thought to have
organized arms and funding for the insurgents.59 From the very beginning of Syrian crisis,
Maliki promoted an ambiguous dual-track policy and a centrist position between supporters
and opponents of the Syrian regime: Publicly, the Iraqi leadership repeatedly called for
dialogue between Assad and the Syrian opposition because a negotiated political solution
offers the most viable way to end the conflict-and, at the same time it is likely to necessitate a
power-sharing compromise that will ensure that Syria does not fall completely under the
influence of potentially hostile Syrian and regional Sunni forces. Privately, however, Iraqi

55
Richard Weitz, Syria-Iraq Relations Without Saddam, World Politisc Review, September 9, 2012
56
Richard Gowan, Global Insights: Interests aligned, Iraq’s Maliki Sticks By Syria, World Politics Review,
August 21, 2012
57
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq, European Council on Foreign Relations, June 14, 2013
58
Sami Moubayed, What Can Syria Deliver in Iraq?, World Politics Review, December 18, 2006
59
Syrian-Iraqi Relations To Resume After 24 Years, Nbcnews.com-Middle East and North Africa,
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/15826195/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/t/syrian-iraq-relations-resume-after-
years/#.UevLWNLOH9s
government has increasingly acted in a pro-Assad manner, including by permitting Iranian
overflights allegedly delivering weapons and supplies to the Syrian military.60 At the same
time, Baghdad has done little to stem an increasing flow of Iraqi Shi’ite fighters travelling to
Syria to fight on behalf of the Assad regime. Most of these militias are affiliated with Iranian-
backed Hezbollah and the League of the Righteous. As an illustration of how conflict in Syria
is becoming sectarian with its spillover effects to Iraq, these Shi’te militias have mobilized
around a call to protect the Sayyida Zainab shrine (one of Islam’s holiest), located in southern
Damascus.61 Maliki’s fear is that a Syrian spillover in Iraq in the form of a Sunni movement
could directly threaten Maliki’s grip on power.

In post-Saddam period, hence, Iraqi policy on Syria has been marked by a kind of
regional realpolitik with pragmatic domestic demands.62 Syria’s political ties and
geographical position made it a significant regional pivotal state, which continued to influence
Iraqi policy on Syria. Shared history and improved trade and security agreements have also
strengthened this precarious relationship between Iraq and Syria. After a quarter century of
enmity, which persisted especially over Iraqi suspicions that Syria was still helping Iraqi
insurgents, Iraq restored its relations with Syria after 25 years on November 2006 with Syrian
Foreign Minister Walid Moallem’s official visit to Baghdad.63 The two states resent their
ambassadors in the same year. In 2009, relations worsened due to the Iraqi blame on Syria for
August 19 bombings to government institutions in Baghdad. Iraqi government accused ex-
Ba’ath officials of Sattam Farhan and Mohammed Younis al-Ahmad, who escaped to Syria
after Saddam’s fall. Relations normalized in 2010 with the UN and Turkish mediation. 2010
marked a significant stage in the development of a post-Ba’athist development of Iraq’s
foreign relations as a sovereign country.64 Maliki has forced a pragmatic relationship with
Assad, winning Syrian backing for the coalition government he formed in 2010. In return, he
pressed on his policy of rapprochement with Syria.65 Diplomatic rapprochement also brought
economic cooperation. In 2011, official meetings were held between Syria and government

60
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq
61
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq
62
Iraq Juggles Interests Over Syria Crisis, http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/18/us-syria-diplomacy-
idUSTRE77H3DG20110818
63
Nbcnews.com-Middle East and North Africa, Syrial-Iraqi relations To Resume fter 24 Years,
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/15826195/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/t/syrian-iraq-relations-resume-after-
years/#.UevLWNLOH9s
64
Gareth Stansfield, ibid, p. 1395
65
Richard Gowan, Global Insights: Interests aligned, Iraq’s Maliki Sticks By Syria
officials to discuss closer economic ties including the construction of a gas pipeline that
would run through Iraq to Syria.

Increasing fragmentation in Iraq’s domestic politics has also had implications in Syria
crisis. Given their deepening rivalry on power, Iraqi politicians are not united on how to
respond Syrian crisis. Some politicians see current situation as an opportunity to establish a
more benign regime in a neighboring country, perhaps another Arab democracy. Some
politicians, however, fear that the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria will empower Islamic
fundamentalists throughout the Middle East.66 Although they are not united on Syrian policy
or the pro-Iranian outlook of Iraq, they continue to shape Iraq’s Syrian policy on sectarian
lines rather than national interest, and try to avoid spillover effects of the civil war in Syria.
Despite its professed neutrality, Iraqi government has collaborated with the Syrian
government due to the fears of spillover effect stemmed from a probable collapse of the
Syrian state along ethno-sectarian lines. Iraq has worried that, the unrest in Syria, which
began in March 2011 could not only fragment the state along sectarian lines and, ultimately
create a hostile Sunni government in Damascus instead of the Alawite rule of Assad. 67 Hence,
Maliki gave support to Syrian government to limit the activities of Sunni militants in the long
Iraqi-Syrian border. Against al-Qaeda linked Sunni militants cooperate with Syrian rebels, the
Iraqi Shi’ite fighters cooperate with Hezbollah to fight along the forces loyal to Assad’s
Iranian backed regime.68 Maliki fears that the potential of sectarian conflict in neighboring
countries will adversely affect Iraq’s fragile ethnic and sectarian balance. In the same vein, if
Iraq collapses into a new civil war and disintegrate into separate ethnic states, this has the
potential to encourage Syria’s Kurdish minority and other minority groups to seek greater
autonomy or secession. Hence, doubts over if Assad can hold on, and over who might replace
him, has kept Iraq’s parties- Sunni, Shi’ite and the Kurdish- alarmed over the Syrian crisis.69
This reveals the pivotal natures of both Iraq and Syria, policies and politics of which have far-
reaching implications at regional and international level.

Considering the fact that Iraq and Syria shares a long border, any kind of spillover
effect to Iraq has the potential of destabilizing not only Iraq but also Middle East. As a pivotal
state, Iraq is key to regional and international politics. Along with the ethnic and sectarian

66
Richard Gowan, Global Insights: Interests aligned, Iraq’s Maliki Sticks By Syria
67
Iraq Juggles Interests Over Syria Crisis, http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/18/us-syria-diplomacy-
idUSTRE77H3DG20110818
68
Adam Schrek, Iraq Increasingly Drawn Into Syrian Battlefield, The Seattle Times, June 12, 2013,
http://seattletimes.com/html/nationworld/2021176140_iraqsyriaxml.html
69
Iraq Juggles Interests Over Syria Crisis
lines which intersects in Iraq, its economic significance stemmed from oil is increasing due to
the increasing amount of oil reserves and potentials. Iraq is a significant oil exporter for the
rising economies (China, Brazil, India, Turkey) the Iraqi government believed that a victory
of the Syrian rebels meant not only a post-Assad neighbor under the influence of hostile Gulf
states intent on destabilizing Maliki’s rule, but also a resurgent al-Qaeda at home. Iraq
accused GGC states and Israel of backing al-Qaeda who is believed to use Syria as a base to
launch attacks in Iraq and in the region. A jihadist group, Jabhat al-Nusra is the most
effective opposition fighting force in Syria and has established strong links with al-Qaeda.70
Iraqi security officials have feared that many al-Qaeda militants, who have left Iraq for Syria,
will turn back when their mission in Syria is completed. This is regarded as a significant
security threat which had the potential to revitalize the Sunni insurgency in Iraq both
substantially and ideologically. Sunni militants in Iraq are based mostly in Anbar that borders
Syria. Moreover, Maliki has marginalized Sunni political actors and forces, providing a fertile
ground for widening Sunni popular support for armed action against the government.

International and Regional Dimension

Iraqi political groups’ position vis a vis the crisis in Syria have been under the
influence of the geopolitical rivalry between the Sunni and the Shi’ite blocs of the region
which has further crystallized with the US withdrawal from Iraq. The War on Iraq in 2003 and
the subsequent Arab uprisings has had a significant implication on foreign policy making not
only in Iraq but also in regional and international system. On the one hand, implications of
both events revealed the multi-polar structure of international relations of the Middle East,
since both events revealed the plurality of power groups in the Middle East. These power
groups have ranged from strong international players such as US, China, Russia to regional
pivotal states such as Iran, Iraq and Syria as well as glocal Islamic fundamentalist groups such
as Muslim Brotherhood, Hezbollah and al-Qaeda. In this multi-polarity many power groups
and stakes have had stakes and proxies in Middle East. Moreover, Syrian crisis has gone
beyond the boundaries from its very beginning in a way to include these power groups and
ethno-sectarian sub groups. In this sense, Syrian crisis has revealed the fragility of the Middle
Eastern states and their ethno-sectarian vulnerabilities. As a result of Iraq war and Arab
uprisings, the region-wide jihadist or resistance movements that developed in response to the
Iraq War and occupation have been redeployed in Syria and elsewhere. Regionally, their

70
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq
influence, in turn, relates to the new regional balance of power post-Iraq which pitted the
interests of the Sunni Gulf monarchies against those of the Shi’ite Iran and its allies. 71 In this
regional balance of power, Iraq sided with Iran, Russia and China on Syria crisis in pro-Assad
camp against Saudi Arabia, GCC states, Turkey, EU, US and NATO in anti-Assad camp. For
Saudi Arabia and its allies, Syria represents a significant geopolitical prize in the Middle East.
Ousting Assad would weaken the principal Shi’ite power, Iran, and enhance Saudi Arabia’s
influence as a leading Sunni power. To the US and NATO, removing Assad is crucial first
step in thwarting Iran’s nuclear ambitions and achieving forcible regime change.72

Both the Iraq War and Arab uprisings increased instability from the growth of
sectarianism and the activities of radical transnational movements. In post-2003 period, US
labeled Syria and Iran as sponsors of terrorism. Civil wars and weak states are viewed as
chronic sources of instability with spillover effects for regional and international order. In the
aftermath of Arab Spring, Syria, Iran and their regional allies Hamas and Hezbollah that
emerged as major competitors to the crumbling Arab order. Fawcett regards this as new
regionalism in which Western supported Arab monarchies, the GCC and League of Arab
States began to increase their influence in regional politics, although this new balance of
power is a fragile one.73 Apart from its fragility, Middle East has witnessed a low level
regional engagement, and there is a reluctance to use direct force and a preference for
multilateral action. This seems to be reversed only if the core interests are threatened
especially in Syria. Hence, in contemporary international relations of the Middle East, it is not
international system that shapes, but regional, domestic or even local actors shape the Middle
East politics and the policies of international players. Arab spring also proves region’s
resistance to external pressures for change.

Shifts in the regional balance of power resulting from the Iraq War, which transformed
Iraq from relatively strong to a weak state have been further consolidated following the Arab
Spring turmoil, giving rise to realignments in which Turkey, the Gulf Cooperation Council
(GCC) states of Arab Gulf, have emerged as sources of regional leadership.74 In post-Saddam
era, hence Iraq’s foreign policy has been more under the influence of multi-polar forces in

71
Louise Fawcet, ibid, p. 327
72
Ted Galen Carpenter, The Syrian Crisis: Iraq Caught Between Iran and United States,
http://www.cato.org/publcations/commentary/syrian-crisis-iraq-caught-between-iran-united-states, June 23, 2012
73
Louise, Fawcett, ibid, p. 334
74
Louise Fawcett, ibid, p. 326.
Middle East. As stated before, it entered into an international and regional alliance involving
Iran, Russia and Syria, and Syrian crisis is strengthening this alliance.

On the other hand, Syrian crisis and the Shi’ite Iraqi government’s continuing fragility
stemmed from deepening ethno-sectarian rift in domestic politics reminded the need for
clinging on survival politics and continue to treat diplomacy as the core of foreign policy. In
the aftermath of the US withdrawal from Iraq, politicians had wanted to pursue a more
independent foreign policy, putting Iraq’s national interests to the forefront of the foreign
policy agenda. However, Iraq is placed in an extremely uncomfortable position. If it sides
with the West and Arab Gulf, it will antagonize Tehran. This would have implications on both
domestic and international policy, given Iran’s influence on the Iraqi Shi’ites. It is also risky
for Maliki to wholly ignore Saudi Arabia and US, especially regarding Riyad’s conflict with
Tehran. Saudi Arabia has already provided arms and money to Sunni Arab factions in Iraq-
groups that have resisted Maliki’s increasing authority, often with violence. It is also more
risky for Iraq to defy US. US leaders have long regarded this as uncooperative government
and enemy of US and candidates for removal from power. Maliki regime is already becoming
closer to have such a status both across increasing domestic opposition and from US due to its
close ties with Iran. Thwarting the US goal of overthrowing Assad could well bring relations
between US and Iraq to their lowest point in post-Saddam era. Naturally, the Syrian conflict
has contributed to Baghdad’s continuing alienation from GCC and has made Maliki more
dependent on Iran in its survival politics.75 This new regional context, which puts the Shi’ite
Tehran-Baghdad axis against a Sunni Levant and the Gulf has been the most significant
geopolitical regional effect of the Syria crisis.76 Maliki’s support for Assad has illustrated how
much Iraq’s position in the Middle East has shifted towards an axis led by Iran.77

Shifts in domestic politics, led by Maliki, had its implications on foreign policy, in
which Iraq chose to comply with Iranian policies and the network of regional and
international alliances. Iraq’s Syria policy cannot be understood without taking into account
Iran-Iraq relations in recent years. Since the removal of Saddam, Iran has become the most
influential foreign country in Iraq by developing economic, religious, social, political and
security ties with a wide range of the country’s Shi’ite parties and factions. Tehran disposes of

75
Richard Gowan, Global Insights: Interests aligned, Iraq’s Maliki Sticks By Syria
76
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq
77
Michael S. Schmidt and Yasir Ghazi, Iraqi Leader Backs Syria, With A Nudge From Iran
several important assets in the country, including geographic proximity, a newly self-
conscious and empowered Shi’ite majority that appreciates Iran’s centrality to the Shi’ite
faith, and influential pro-Iranian factions embedded within Iraq’s government, military, and
economy. Iran also enjoys clear military superiority over Iraq’s armed forces.78 Contemporary
relations between Iran and Iraq were marked by an increase in Iranian support to Maliki’s
continued rule in the face of his opponents both within the Shi’ite sect and among the Iraqi
elite.79 Rapprochement between the two states has also been acute in Iraq’s warming relations
with Russia, which was exemplified in Iraqi-Russian arms deal (and its support to Assad
regime together with Iran and Russia). Even though Iraq’s Syria policy cannot be reduced to
its-pro Iranian outlook, that the Syria presents nearly the most significant item in Iran’s
contemporary foreign policy, given his need for Iranian backing across the rising domestic
challenges, Maliki has not felt himself in a position to pursue an anti-Iranian foreign policy.
Another reason of rapprochement between Iran and Iraq over Syria crisis is that, in case of
Assad’s fall, which would empower Kurds and Sunnis in both countries, Shi’ite forces would
be expected to play some kind of spoiler role in Syria to avoid a consolidation of hostile
forces on Iraq’s border. This would seem to drive Iraq closer to Iran for which also Iraq’s
influence will increase if Syria falls out of its influence. Iraq has also provided Syria with oil
to meet the growing needs of Syria’s military operations. Iraq also allowed Iraqi militias to go
to Syria border to defend the Syrian regime from its opponents. At the same time, however,
Iraq has prevented the entry of Syrian refugees who fled Dayr al Zur’s bombardment and
invasion, and this policy has increased Syrian suffering.

On the other hand, although much of Maliki’s pro-Syrian stance has much to do with
Iraq’s growing ties with Iran, Maliki’s positioning reflects his own strategic and political
calculations rather than full obedience to Iran. Although Iran’s and Iraq’s interests are aligned,
especially on their mutual threat perceptions across Saudi Arabia, they do not precisely act in
the same manner. Iraq’s fear of a Sunni dominated and unstable post-Assad Syria seems
irrelevant to Iran whose main concern is to hold a pro-Iranian government in Syria to serve as
a corridor to Lebanon and Hezbollah. Iraq’s position in Syrian crisis has been a key mediator
and regional powerbroker. While it has maintained a close alliance with Iran, Iraq
nevertheless was able to establish talks with the international community over a possible
governmental transition in Syria. Within Syria, it has opened channels of communication with

78
Richard Weitz, Strategic Posture Review: Iraq
79
Fayez Sarah, Iraq Steps into Iran’s Line On Syria Policy, http://www.al-monitor.com/plse/politics/2012/iraq-
steps-into-irans-line-on-syria-policy.html#ixzz2bCCi06kH, November 9, 2012
both regime and opposition groups. This showed how Iraq’s realization of foreign policy
ambitions still mainly depends on the ability of the Maliki’s government to overcome its
ongoing domestic crisis and fragility in domestic politics. Iraq abstained from the Arab league
votes in November 2011 to suspend Syria’s membership and impose sanctions, but it also
voted in favor of the August 2012 UN Resolution to end violence.80 Unlike other Arab
League members, Iraq maintains its embassy in Syria. While Maliki initially refrained from
taking apposition on the violence in Syria, since Arab Summit in March 2012 he and his allies
supported the positions of China, Russia and Iran that the Syrians should be left to resolve
their internal differences through dialogue and political reform, with international community
providing only mediation and monitors of a cease-fire. However, as the Syrian conflict has
grown more sectarian and suspicions about the role of al-Qaeda and other Sunni extremists
have arisen, so has Baghdad’s alarm.81

Syrian crisis also ascertained the fragmentation in Arab world by dividing the Arab
League on the issue. Given their authoritarian governance record, at the beginning of the Arab
uprisings and the subsequent Syrian crisis, Arab states remained silent. However, in time, pro-
Western GCC states began to pursue an active policy on Syria. Arab League’s first reaction to
Syria was illustrated with decision of October 2011, which called for end of violence. As
stated above, Iraq abstained from the Arab League votes in November 2011 to suspend
Syria’s membership and impose sanctions, but it also voted in favor of the August 2012 UN
resolution to end violence.82 Iraq maintains direct relationship and realpolitik with the Syrian
regime and refuses entry to Syrian refugees, even it is contrary to Iraq’s international
obligations. In this sense, Iraq’s Syria policy is highly ambiguous: from outside, Iraq seems to
have adopted a dissociation policy similar to that adopted by Lebanon regarding the Syria’s
political status. In reality, however, Iraq supports the Syrian regime. Al-Maliki has repeatedly
called for a peaceful political solution to the crisis, although he also warned that a victory for
the rebels would unleash sectarian war in Iraq and Lebanon. But as the cross-border violence
increased, with Sunni insurgents have the ability to spill over Iraq, Maliki virtually helped
Assad regime and deployed his soldiers in Anbar and Ninevah, the border provinces between
Iraq and Syria against al-Qaeda and Syrian rebels.

80
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq
81
Richard Gowan, Global Insights: Interests aligned, Iraq’s Maliki Sticks By Syria
82
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq
 Pivotal aspects of both Iraq and Syria make it necessary to take into account US as a
significant actor to evaluate today’s relationship between fragile Iraq and equally fragile
Syria. Syria had opposed to US War on Iraq in 2003 and stressed to maintain independence of
Iraq and support its political process in order to prevent spillover effect of a disintegration of
ethnically fragile neighboring state. It also demanded a timetable for withdrawal of
occupation forces in Iraq and hosted more than 2 million Iraqi refugees. The then Syria vice-
President said: Iraq is a strategic hinterland for Syria in its conflict with Israel. We supported
Kuwait when Iraq invaded its territory, but today Iraq is under attack and therefore we are
standing at its side.83 Until 2003, Syria had cooperated with US against al-Qaeda. After 2003,
Syria both regarded it as a de facto enemy of the post-Ba’athist Iraqi state and its guardian
US, and even as the next target of US especially considering the fact that many ex Ba’ath
leaders sought to exile in Syria and Sunni jihadists found the route to Iraq through Syria.

Hence, in post-2003 period, Iraqi-Syrian relations began in a state of deterioration due

to Maliki’s accusation of Syrian help to al-Qaeda. Indeed, Syria hosted political opponents of
successive Iraqi governments for most of the 20th century.84 For instance, after the Iraqi
Ba’athist coup in 1963, many Iraqi communists, nationalists and other opposition leaders
were forced into exile in Iran or Syria. Syria did not side with respective Iraqi regimes, rather
used it as to take a lever influence in Iraqi politics. Syria’s help to KDP in early 1980s is
considerable in this sense. In post-2003 period, Damascus has used the presence of the former
regime elements of Iraq in Syria and their perceived influence over the Iraqi Sunni insurgency
as strategic leverage against the international community, especially US. Relations between
Iraq and Syria began to mute in real sense when it became clear that US troops would depart
Iraq. The Syrians felt they no longer had to tolerate al-Qaeda moving across the border to
keep US off balance, and began cooperation to secure the border.

Syria conflict also complicated US Iraqi relations. Division between US and Iraq on
Syria had the potential of straining US-Iraqi relations, though both parties have sought to
avoid focusing on Syrian question. US continues to criticize Syria for its inadequate
monitoring of its border with Iraq.85 At the same time accusing Iraqi leaders for their close
ties with Tehran. In Syrian case, US found itself in a dichotomy to arm Syrian rebels to the
detriment of worsening relations with Iraq. The spillover violence from Syria tops a growing

83
Eyal Zisser, Syria and The War in Iraq, from Syrian New Agency, September 6, 2002
84
Steven Simon, ibid, p. 9
85
Seth Wikas, Syrian-Iraqi Relations: A New Chapter?, World Politics Review, February 8, 2007
concern that a delegation of senior Iraqi officials went to Washington to discuss that Iraq’s
security is threatened by the stalemate between the Syrian government and Free Syrian Army
rebels.86 Iraq believed that US is not near Iraq against Syrian spillover. In addition, Iraq is
repeating the Iranian position that what is happening in Syria is an international conspiracy to
make Syria a center for extremism and an al-Qaeda stronghold, and that the only way to solve
the problem is to adopt an internal politics solution without any outside intervention. US
regarded better Iraq-Syria relations as a key to stability in Iraq, since the regional power play
in 2003 War on Iraq and its aftermath began to disintegrate US interests in the region which
was supported by US backed Sunni Arab states and Israel. Since 2003, the Shi’ite Iraqi
government has drawn closer to the Shi’ite Iran and Syria in its regional power struggle with
US-backed Sunni ruled states.

Role of the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG)

Syria’s Kurds have become loyal to central governments and did not openly pursue
pan-Kurdish sentiments due to their weakness. A significant implication of the Arab Spring
and the ensuing crisis in Syria has been its implications on the growing likelihood of a
Kurdish Spring in Syria. KRG’s policies and its influence on Syrian Kurds have become vital
in this sense. Despite its anti-Assad outlook, at the beginning, KRG chose to remain neutral
and not to channel support to any opposition group. This was brought about the KDP’s and
the PUK’s rooted relations with the Syrian governments. In time, however, KRG left its
neutrality and began to give support to Kurdish opposition in Syria. Beginning from 2012,
Barzani gathered Kurdish opposition groups, who also opposed to the actions of the PYD
(PKK’s Syrian branch) under Kurdish National Council (KNC) and secured a cooperation
between KNC and Syrian National Council (SNC). KRG began to channel help to KNC from
the budget it was allocated to KRG from federal budget. Excluding the PYD from KNC and
suppressing its dominance in KNC, KRG could both reinsert its influence on Syrian Kurds
and guaranteed its growing ties with Turkey.

The KRG’s display of an anti-Assad policy has many reasons: After all, if Assad falls,
Iran would get closer to Iran and the KRG in regional balance of power structure. The major
implication of this for the KRG that in such a situation Iran will need Kurdish-Shi’ite
cooperation against Sunni factions both in Syria and Iraq. Hence, post-Assad Iraq means
increase in Iraqi and Syrian Kurds’ bargaining power as regional actors. Just as in post-2003

86
J.J. Gren, Syrian Conflict Complicates US-Iraq Relations, JWTOP, June 3, 2013
Iraqi political context, this would also enhance the mediator positions of the Kurds between
the Shi’ites and the Sunnis, thereby strengthening their domestic and regional power. On the
other hand, inside the KRG, unlike their unified stance across Baghdad, Kurdish parties do
not have a vision of a monolith KRG policy on Syrian crisis. While KDP and Barzani regards
himself as the leader of all the Kurds, including Syrian Kurds, PUK promotes a much more
cautious policy and blames KDP together with the other parties in KRG. This somewhat
threatens the strategic agreement between the KDP and the PUK which brought a degree of
stability to KRG’s governance. KDP’s attempts to reconcile PYD and KNC with Arbil
Agreement in July 2013 (after July 18 events, when Kurdish populated areas in Syria have
been controlled by the KNC-PYD alliance) has also threatened its strong position in regional
balance of power, and especially its growing ties with Turkey.

KRG’s Syria policy also deepens the rift between Baghdad and Arbil. The gap
between the KRG and federal Iraqi government is widening when it comes to foreign policy,
which is illustrated their place in Syrian crisis, as the Kurds increasingly side with the Syrian
opposition and Baghdad stands by the Assad regime.87 Maliki aspires to place Iraq in its right
place in regional setting as an influential regional player, while the KRG aim at expanding
their political influence in Kurdish populated areas in Syria. Hence, each of Iraq’s domestic
political actors interprets the Syrian conflict in its own interest. While the Shi’ites and the
government sees it as a threat, Sunnis and the Kurds see it as an opportunity. 88 The fact that
Iraq’s increasingly fracturing domestic political landscape produces many poles and
interpretations of foreign policy suits Syrian case in this sense. Iraqi Kurds see Syrian crisis as
an opportunity to increase the autonomy of their brethren in Syria and to widen Arbil’s
regional influence by gaining a stake in any post-Assad settlement. In Iraq, this has been
among other issues, a significant determinant on conflictual relations between Baghdad and
Arbil, with Maliki fearing that Iraqi Kurds will use the Syria crisis and their growing
influence over Syrian Kurds to strengthen their domestic hand on issues of longstanding
dispute with Baghdad, including questions of autonomy and control over disputed territories
and oil resources.89 If The Assad government has essentially withdrawn from many parts of
the Kurdish dominated northeast to concentrate on fighting the rebels, allowing local Kurds
de facto autonomy. A collapse of Syria, if accompanied by a Kurdish secession from Iraq,

87
Mohammed A. Salih, Syrian Conflict Threatens To Fracturate Iraq, Correspondent, December 27, 2012
88
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq
89
Haydar al-Khoei, Syria: The View From Iraq
would also exacerbate the conflict between the Shi’ites and Sunnis in Iraq. Kurds are a
balancing actor between the two in Iraq.90 KRG sees the crisis as a double opportunity. It has
the potential to be a means of strengthening ties with Turkey, since KRG can contribute to
Turkish security by using its influence to moderate the policies of Syria’s Kurds, a major
source of concern in Ankara. If the Syrian state disintegrates, the subsequent weakening of the
Iraqi government and state would give a significant opening for cross-border cooperation
among the Kurds in Syria, Iraq, Turkey and Iran. Moreover, Iraq’s Sunnis would be
encouraged to overthrow Maliki or even led a sectarian division of Iraq if a Sunni-led
government takes the rule from Assad. All in all, KRG has a significant position of
permeability in Syrian conflict.

CONCLUDING REMARKS: A THEORY-POLICY DEBATE ON IRAQ-SYRIA

RELATIONS

Since Cold War period, mainstream approach of Realism has long been dominant lens
through which it is viewed what is going on in Middle East. It is even still argued that post-
Cold War changes in security understanding applied to West or other parts of the world
cannot be applied to Middle East where traditional conceptions of security still prevailed as a
traditionally conflict-ridden region. These views strengthened more with continuation of Cold
War approaches to Middle East both by big powers and by non-state actors through 1990-1
Gulf war and more recently with 2003 US war on Iraq. This has proved true only to some
extent. What was missing that regional actors’ view of security policies due to their perceived
threats in Middle East has come to include non-state actors and glocal players and the bumpy
changing alliances between them. Neither realist, nor liberal and nor neo-neo variants of the
mainstream have achieved to explain the role of ideas, identities, and changing alliances
affecting the behavior of regional actors, which required double re-conceptualization of
security. This reconceptualization requires to make micro-level information-gathering about
individual states and their pursuit of interests as sources of both cooperation and conflict; and
to make a macro-level analysis transcending state boundaries as well as going beyond mere
military issues in order to be familiar with multidimensional character of ‘new’
internationalized conflicts, including societal, economic, ethnic, and political environment.
Such a focus on globalizing nature of security as well as of conflict which has become to be
intermestic (combination of domestic and international) in nature. Camps in Syrian crisis and

90
Eyal Zisser, ibid, p. 3
Iraqi policy on Syria presents a good example for the interplay between the regional,
international and local actors of this intermestic conflict.

Transformation from bipolarity to globalization without military confrontation

between the two superpowers, and the 9/11 Middle increased the need for theorizing about
non-state actors and the necessity of bringing the religion in into the international relations
debate. These events necessitated to adopt a critical perspective concerning security
conceptions attached to Middle East. Hence, new approaches to IR such as reflectivism and
constructivism, which argues that state behavior, in the international domain, is based on
cultures in the sense of shared ideas, norms and experiences, were added to the old paradigm
debate between realism and liberalism. Foreign policy analysis cannot be excluded from this
debate.91 The state-centric approaches to foreign policy, realism and neo-realism, long
persisted as the source of foreign policy with its references to ‘defense of national interest’
and the policy of state survival. However, this overemphasis on state centrism and
international anarchy emphasizes mainly external and systemic determinants and neglects
domestic sources of foreign policy.92 Moreover, in multiethnic societies, what does national
interest mean is fragmented among minorities such as in Iraq. According to the new, critical,
IR theories, mainstream approaches were incapable of accounting for forms of politics
enabled by the current climate of rapid change, for it ignored the importance of political
identities. What was political, was argued, not operating within state boundaries. Rather,
trans-locality and the resulting hybridity has been combined with the continuing conflict-
ridden geopolitical concerns. A significant dimension Iraq’s foreign policy on Syria may be
explained with this combination.

Such neglects of realism and neo-realism led to emergence of an alternative approach

of individual-based psychological-approach which was supported by Synder, Bruck and
Sapin. This approach identified the state and its national interest under the influence of
decision makers, usually the leader at the top, such as Assad and Saddam. It argued that
decision makers act in line with not the real world, but to their perceptions of that world
reality. Rosenau’s pre-theory and Brecher’s input-conversation output framework constituted
a middle way between these individualist and state-centric extremes. Rosenau constructed his
pre-theory on five sets of independent or explanatory variables: from micro individual factors
to the macro or global-systemic factor. While doing this, he took into consideration the size

91
Baghat Korany & Ali E. Hillal Dessouki, The Foreign Policies of Arab States p. 22
92
Baghat Korany & Ali E. Hillal Dessouki, ibid, pp. 22-3
(large or small country), state of the economy (developed or underdeveloped); political
accountability (open or closed political system); degree of penetration or non-penetration of
the country, and issue area (status, territorial issues, human and non-human resources). In this
sense, Iraq’s historical and contemporary foreign policy behaviors fit Rosenau’s foreign
policy scheme with the influence of the relatively accountable or authoritarian domestic
political record, vulnerability to permeability and penetration of the fragmented political
system and lively significance of territorial issues.

Meanwhile, 1960s witnessed emergence of Foreign Policy Analysis which rests on a

body of literature that, while aware of the importance of states and systems, seeks to go
beyond the category of state. It questioned how far analysis should focus on the conventional,
‘realist’, core of international relations, namely states, and how far differences within the state
and other factors, be they economic or transnational, should come into play. The two
comparative studies regarding Middle East by Hinnebusch and Ehteshami, took Foreign
Policy Analysis and realist concerns and showed how external context and internal factors
shape outcomes. The other by Korany and Dessouki had taken four components of foreign
policy as analytic starting points: domestic environment, foreign policy orientation, decision-
making process, foreign policy behavior. In both these cases, it was precisely not the unitary
state actor but the wider set of concerns that explained foreign policy. One of the main
insights of foreign policy analysis has been in regard to the role of different institutions within
the state, or bureaucracy, in shaping policy, be this in crises or over a longer period. As can be
applicable to Iraqi policy (on Syria), foreign policy analysis study examines the impact of
different political factions (Kurds, Sunnis and the Shi’ite groups and sub-groups in Iraq) on
making foreign policy. Doing so, this analysis break the monopoly of the realist model of the
unitary state and provides a more complex, subtle, explanatory system and research agenda.

Historically, Iraqi Syrian relations were explained by many theories. One such theory
is theories on multi-ethnic societies, focusing on ethno-sectarian conflicts and their political
and economic consequences (Lijphardt, Kuper and Smith, Dekmejian). The second is theories
of military rule, centering on the modalities of state clientalism to the ruling military elite
(Huntington, Hurewitz, Dekmejian). The third is theories on single party systems, centering
on ideology, leadership, organization and recruitment of cadres (Brzezinski, Abu Jaber). The
fourth is theories of foreign policy formulation centering on the linkages between domestic
conditions and foreign policy, and their consequences for interstate relations. (Holsti,
Rosenau, Snyder). The last is theories of personality, focusing on the psychological profiles of
the top leaders. (Erikson, Barber). In Iraqi foreign policy, the interaction between domestic
and foreign policies has been conceived as the product of ethno-sectarian relationships and the
interventionist roles of the state elites. Moreover, all these were influenced by the
personalities and perceptions of the single leaders. In Iraq, domestic political system has come
to operate in unstable political and socio-economic environments, characterized by inter-
sectarian conflicts, economic disparities, inter-elite and intra-elite power struggles and the
destabilizing pressures from the regional and international environment. The linkages between
domestic political instability and externally unstable environments produce two dimensional
interactions, culminating in ever-escalating levels of both domestic and external instability.
Foreign policies of the internally unstable states, like Iraq, reflect the discontinuous, erratic
and unharmonious nature of the political systems. As in Iraqi-Syrian relations especially since
the Syrian crisis and the growing political stalemate in Iraq, conflictual external environment
of interstate relations cause increasing level of internal political instability affecting the elite
and its political destiny.

A significant cult of the foreign policy behavior has continued to include the
geopolitics dimension, which can also be seen in Iraq’s foreign policy on Syria (and in the
Middle East). However, in contemporary Iraqi policy on Syria geopolitical concerns are
intermingled with not only the state’s national interests as a monolith actor. Rather, each
ethno-sectarian group has its own say and ability to pursue its own interest regardless of the
national interest. This has stemmed from the increasing vulnerability of the frontiers due to
the increasing sensitiveness of ethno-sectarian balances as a result of Arab uprising and
Syrian crisis. Geopolitically, Iraq is the first state that would disintegrate in case of the
collapse of the Syrian state. Nowhere was this acute in Iraq’s pro-Assad outlook against a
spillover effect of the Syrian crisis. However, not all groups in Iraq interpret Syrian crisis in
Maliki’s terms. KRG regards the crisis as a lever to increase its strength in regional power
balance. Regionally, all states have different stakes on Syria’s civil war. Hence, the picture
has been further complicated the by the proliferation of regional and international actors, and
power groups shaping the policies of the Middle East. Writers such as Toby Dodge,
Hinnebusch, Richards and Waterbury and Ehteshami who supported the continued importance
of geopolitics in Middle East even across the forces of globalization. Arab uprisings, the
subsequent Syrian crisis have all increased the likelihood of a domino-effect as a result of the
permeability of the fragile state boundaries by ethno-sectarian spillovers. The argument on
local-international dichotomy, which culminated in production of the word glocal is also
considerable in this sense. As reflectivists and constructivist argue, and as can be seen from
the features of the Iraqi policy on Syria, identities (in our case, ethno-sectarian affiliations) are
significant to understand state and sub-state group strategies, since the states are not only the
actors unitarily pursuing national interest; rather than transnationalism and complex
interdependency plus micro-level constituents of state began to gain upper hand in policy
making.
As a result, Iraq’s foreign policy on Syria in post-2003 period and Arab spring has
been labeled as domestic-foreign policy mix which cover the issues from geopolitical,
economic, political concerns to leadership factors and each state’s fragile ethno-sectarian
composition and the ensuing domestic and regional vulnerability. The intermingled nature of
domestic and foreign policy priorities of the two states have made their relationship highly
interdependent. This interdependency has produced both diplomacy and confrontation
between the two states. Iraq and Syria exerts influence on one another’s behavior, which
makes interdependency a significant cult of Iraqi foreign policy on Syria. After all, Syria
provides Iraq access to Mediterranean while Syrians have significant ties with some Iraqi
political actors including tribal shaiks, representatives of the Sunni parties and religious
organizations, leaders of Iraqi Kurdish factions and, with the help of Lebanon’s Hezbollah,
representatives of Iraq’s Shi’ite community. Moreover, today’s main Iraqi figures, including
al-Maliki and Talabani lived in exile during Saddam’s regime. Syrian politicians try to exploit
these ties to promote Iraqi policies that benefit Iran and Syria. This also revealed a regional
power politics on Syrian issue. Some Sunni leaders have even talked of the emergence of
Shi’ite Crescent covering Iran, Iraq, Syria and Hezbollah-controlled Lebanon.93 Despite the
wavy and mostly controversial relationship, the two countries have also needed good
economic relations, which made them engage into constructive agreements and investment
projects especially from mid-1990s on. On the other hand, despite recently covered ties, many
issues continue to produce conflict between the two states. Sectarian divisions and the ensuing
political chaos in domestic politics of the both countries and their vulnerability to the events
in each country threaten not only domestic stabilities of these states but also regional security
and security. This is a significant aspect of the pivotal roles the both countries have in
international relations of the Middle East. Signifying the continuing relevance of geopolitics,
the long border between Iraq and Syria, the weak border security makes it easier for the
migrants, militants and others to cross the frontiers easily. In the aftermath of US invasion of

93
Iraq Juggles Interests Over Syria Crisis
Iraq, Syria was a refuge for many Iraqi ex-Ba’athists, and the Syrian government was accused
for its help to jihadists to use Syrian territory as a base for jihadists to infiltrate into Iraq.
Now, it is Syrian government complains about Sunni extremists based in Iraq supporting the
insurgency in Syria. This reflects the intermingled nature of the policies and the politics of
Iraq and Syria as significant pivotal states of the Middle East and the complex
interdependency between them.