Iraq is losing its western shield to prevent Sunni jihadi infiltration.
The United States’ framework for sustaining success against the Islamic State in Iraq and al Sham (ISIS) in northeastern Syria is collapsing. The risk that fighting in the northeast will significantly imperil the US mission to combat ISIS remains high unless negotiations or Kurdish operations can slow the pace of government advance towards Kurdish-majority areas.
There could be a Kurdish insurgency and the Kurds could face violence as they have so often in the region. Perhaps the Turkish, Iraqi, and Iranian Kurds get back in the secession game.
Iraqi government officials remain concerned that instability in Syria will cause the threat of ISIS to spill over into Iraq.
Iraq got its wish for all American forces to leave Iraq (except for the Kurdish region). It got that wish in 2011, too. What happens to Iraq's fragile democratic structure if it faces another Sunni Islamist invasion as it did during the Iraq War (Syria ratlines) and more overtly during the rise of ISIL (ISIS) in 2014?
The Kurdish-led SDF and America's small presence (along with some allies) in eastern Syria provided a shield to keep jihadis from again infiltrating Iraq to wreak havoc. And if Iran's mullahs don't go down, the mullahs will be in a better position to take over Shia-majority Iraq from the inside.
And now leaving Syria is on the table again. Also, the U.S. had to race to begin transferring jihadis from SDF prisons to Iraqi prisons.
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NOTE: Map with my crude edits from Brookings.
