| Publication |
2012.
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| Summary/Abstract |
On 19 December 2011, one week after US President Barack Obama welcomed Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to the White House, and as the final US troops were leaving Iraq, an Iraqi judicial panel issued an arrest warrant for Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, a Sunni from the rival Iraqi National Movement (also known as 'al-Iraqiyya'), for running a death squad. The warrant provoked yet another crisis in Iraqi politics, and was followed by yet another wave of terrorist bombings that killed and wounded scores.
American expectations about Iraq have been misplaced since the United States decided to invade and topple Saddam Hussein. Iraq was never a threat to the United States, and was not, and is not likely to be, a model for democracy in the Middle East, at least not any time soon. The post-war period in Iraq, and in US-Iraq relations, will instead be marked by uncertainty about Iraq's future and role in the region. Iraq remains a fragile, potentially failing state, where ethnic and sectarian politics still carry the day and external powers all too easily meddle. There is a deep-seated and fundamental lack of consensus about governance among Iraq's leaders. The federal, decentralised state model, enshrined in the Iraqi constitution, is openly contested.
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