Will Iraq Be A US Proxy Again?

I did a triple take when I saw the following headline from Gulf News - Fears of military action on Iraq-Iran border. Surely, the article was referring to the yet another US "operation" against "insurgents." However, the announced offensives are on the Syrian border ("Operation Spear", Al Jazeera, Wa. Post, AP) not the Iranian border.

According to the Gulf News article:

Tensions between Iran and Iraq have escalated in recent weeks to the extent that threats of military action have been made, a senior member of Iraq's security forces said.

General Nazim Mohammad, chief of Iraq's Border Police in Muntheria, told Gulf News he had personally told his Iranian counterparts their soldiers would be shot if they strayed too close to Iraqi fortifications.

Why is this bizarre? Well, as far as I know, Iraq has virtually no "army." The U.S. disbanded the army. The U.S. is (for all intents and purposes) the Iraqi army. While there is an Iraqi government in place, they have no control over US forces. The U.S. is building and training an Iraqi "security force."

The U.S. (and Israel) have been threatening Iran on their "nuclear program." Bush has bad mouthed the Iran elections (Wa. Post, 6/17/05).

The use of "proxies" is nothing new in U.S. (and Russian) warfare. That is where the Al Qaida came from (U.S. proxy in the conflict with the then U.S.S.R.). And, the U.S. armed Saddam Hussein (including chemical weapons) in the Iraq-Iran war. But this recent report turns the proxy concept inside out and upside down.

In this case, rather than the U.S. arming a group (or government) to fight in its stead, we have a proxy government for the U.S. threatening hostilities against another nation using U.S. forces. While I imagine the spin machine thinks that having Iraq do the "threatening" rather than the U.S. somehow improves "legitimacy" (and perhaps gives the impression of the Iraqi government's "autonomy"), the deceit is so blatant it is insulting.

Now this would be an interesting twist. Since Israel has been threatening to preemptively bomb Iran, and Israel is a long term enemy of Iraq, that "Iraq" and Israel could become "allies" in attacking Iran. Now that would be an interesting "message" to send to the so-called "Arab" world. Headlines ... "Israel Joins Iraq In Putting Down Iranian Power Grab". After all, Iraq is much closer than Israel to Iran's (alleged) nuclear arsenal.