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When the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, it was taking control of the most indebted nation in the world.

Why it matters: Iraq's debt at the time was an astonishing $130 billion, and the eradication of that debt was a rare example of international unity and cooperation in the interests of a debtor country.

The big picture: Iraq had very few debts before the Iran-Iraq war of 19801988. Western countries armed Iraq during that war, and accepted IOUs for their weapons despite knowing that Iraq was already insolvent.

After the war, the UN took the extraordinary step of immunizing all of Iraq's assets from attachment by creditors. That put Iraq in an extremely strong negotiating position, and ultimately the country managed to persuade creditors to accept a reduction of 80% in the value of their debts.

Where it stands: Iraq today may be facing political turmoil, but its sovereign finances are in good shape, with a low debt-to-GDP ratio, substantial foreign reserves, and a healthy fiscal surplus.

Go deeper: U.S. to send "additional forces" after embassy in Baghdad attacked by protesters

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Tracing Iraq's transformation from the most indebted country in the world in 2003 - Axios

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) escalated his offensive Monday on fellow 2020 candidate Joe Biden, going after the former vice president for his past positions on myriad issues, including the Iraq War.

Joe Biden voted and helped lead the effort for the war in Iraq, the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in the modern history of this country, Sanders told CNNs Anderson Cooper.

The remarks by Sanders, who prides himself on being among the few lawmakers who voted against invading Iraq, came just days after Biden falsely suggested again to voters that he opposed the war when it began in 2003.

The president then went ahead with Shock and Awe, and right after that and from the very moment he did that, right after that I opposed what he was doing and spoke to him, Biden told voters in Iowa on Saturday, referring to former President George W. Bush, according to CNN.

Biden has attempted several times to recharacterize his vote on Iraq in an effort to appeal to Democratic voters skeptical of his history of foreign policy decisions. While Monday was not the first time Sanders has attacked Biden for his stance on the now 17-year war on terrorism, the senator took it a notch higher by going after his rivals stances on several additional issues.

Joe Biden voted for the disastrous trade agreements like NAFTA and permanent normal trade relations with China, which cost us millions of jobs. You think thats going to play well in Michigan or Wisconsin or Pennsylvania? Sanders told Cooper. You know, Joe Biden has been on the floor of the Senate talking about the need to cut Social Security or Medicare or Medicaid. Joe Biden pushed a bankruptcy bill, which has caused enormous financial problems for working families.

The 2020 Democrats original positions on the Iraq War are considered especially important now that President Donald Trump is rapidly escalating tensions with Iran, a conflict that stems from the 2003 intervention in the Middle East. Many Americans fear another war after the Trump administration assassinated Irans Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani last week, a move that could further destabilize the region.

On Saturday, Sanders announced a measure he plans to introduce with Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) that would block any funding for a war with Iran that does not have congressional authorization.

All of that suffering, all of that debt, all of that huge expenditure of money for what? Sanders said at an Iowa town hall on Friday of the Iraq War. It gives me no pleasure to tell you that at this moment we face a similar crossroads fraught with danger. Once again, we must worry about unintended consequences and the impact of unilateral decision-making.

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Bernie Sanders Goes After Biden Over His Claims About Opposing The Iraq War - HuffPost

Photograph Source: Freedom Monument, Tahrir square in Downtown Baghdad, taken by Aziz1005 CC BY 4.0

Iraqis have a well-honed instinct about approaching danger which stems from their grim experience during 40 years of crisis and war. Three months ago, I asked a friend in Baghdad how she and her friends viewed the future, adding Iraq seemed to me to be more peaceful than at any time since the US and British invaded in 2003.

She replied that the general mood among people she knew was gloomy because they believed that the next war between the US and Iran might be fought out in Iraq. She said: Many of my friends are so nervous about a US-Iran war that they are using their severance pay on leaving government service to buy houses in Turkey. She was thinking of doing the same.

My Iraqi friends turned out to have been all too right in their depressing prognosis: the killing of IranianMajor General Qassem Soleimani by a US drone at Baghdad airport is an act of escalation by President Donald Trump that ensures that Iraq faces a violent future. It may not lead to a full-scale military conflict, but Iraq will be the political and military arena where the US-Iranian rivalry will be fought out. The Iranians and their Iraqi allies may or may not carry out some immediate retaliatory act against the US, but their most important counter-stroke will be to pressure the Iraqi government, parliament and security forces into pushing the US entirely out of Iraq.

Ever since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, Iran has generally come out ahead of the US in any struggle for influence within Iraq. The main reason for thishas been that the Shia community in Iraq, two-thirds of the population and politically dominant, has looked to its fellow Shia in Iran for support against its enemies. Ironically, Iranian influence and popularity had been seriously damaged because of GeneralSoleimani overseeing the brutal efforts by pro-Iranian security forces and paramilitary groups to crush Iraqi street protests, killing at least 400 protesters and injuring another 15,000.

Mounting Iraqi popular rage against Iran for its interference in Iraqs internal affairs is now likely to be counter-balanced by the even more blatant assault on Iraqs national sovereignty by the US. It is difficult to think of a grosser act of interference by a foreign state than killing a foreign general who was openly and legally in Iraq. Also killed by the drone was Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the leader of Kataib Hezbollah, the powerful pro-Iranian paramilitary group. The US may consider paramilitary commanders like him to be evil terrorists, but for many Shia Iraqis, they are the people who fought against Saddam Hussein and defended them against Isis.

I was speaking to my pessimistic friend in Baghdad in late September, in what turned out to be the last peaceable days before violence returned to Iraq. I interviewed a number of paramilitary commanders from the Hashd al-Shaabi, the Popular Mobilisation Forces, who all claimed that the US and Israel were escalating attacks on them inside the country. I wondered how much of this was paranoia.

I spoke to Abu Alaa al-Walai, the leader of Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada, a splinter group of Kataib Hezbollah, one of whose camps had been destroyed by a drone attack in August. He said that 50 tons of weapons and ammunition had been blown up, blaming the Israelis and the Americans acting in concert. Asked if his men would attack US forces in Iraq in the event of a US-Iran war, he said: Absolutely yes. Later I visited the camp, called al-Saqr, on the outskirts of Baghdad where a massive explosion had gutted sheds and littered the burnt-out compound with shattered pieces of equipment.

I saw other pro-Iranian paramilitary leaders at this time. The drone attacks had made them edgy, but I got the impression that they did not really expect a US-Iran war. Qais al-Khazali, the head of Asaib Ahl al-Haq, told me that he did not think there would be a war because Trump does not want one. As evidence of this, he pointed to the failure of Trump to retaliate after the drone attack on Saudi oil facilities earlier in September that Washington had blamed on Iran.

In fact, events developed very differently from what both I and the paramilitary commanders expected. A few days after I had spoken to them, there was a small demonstration in central Baghdad demanding jobs, public services and an end to corruption. The security forces and the pro-Iranian paramilitaries opened fire, killing and wounding many peaceful demonstrators. Though Qais al-Khazali later claimed that he and other Hashd leaders were trying to thwart a US-Israeli conspiracy, he had said nothing to me about it. It seemed likely that GeneralSoleimani wrongly suspected that the paltry demonstrations were a real threat and had ordered the pro-Iranian paramilitaries to open fire and put a plan for suppressing the demonstrations into operation.

All this could have been disastrous for Iranian influence in Iraq. Soleimani had made the classic mistake of a successful general in imagining that a whiff of grapeshot will swiftly repress any signs of popular discontent. Sometimes this works, often it does not and Iraq turned out to belong to the second category.

GeneralSoleimani died in the wake of his greatest failure and misjudgement. But the manner of his killing may convince many Shia Iraqis that the threat to Iraqi independence from the US is greater than that from Iran. The next few days will tell if the protest movement, whichhas endured the violence used against it with much bravery, will be deflated by the killings at Baghdad airport.

Wars are reputedly won by generals who make the fewest mistakes. GeneralSoleimani made a bad mistake over the last three months by turning a modest protest into something close to a mass uprising. Trump may have made an even worse mistake by killing GeneralSoleimani and making Iraq, a place where Iran has far more going for it than the US, the arena in which the rivalry between these two powers will be fought out. I can see now that my friend in Baghdad may well have been right three months ago in suggesting that retirement to Turkey might be the safest option.

Read more here:
Iraq's Worst Fears Have Come True: a Proxy War on Its Doorstep - CounterPunch

France's President Emmanuel Macron and Niger President Mahamadou Issoufou (not pictured) give a news conference during a ceremony paying homage to Niger soldiers killed in an attack on a military camp which Islamic State claimed responsibility for in Niamey, Niger December 22, 2019. REUTERS/ Tagaza Djibo

PARIS (Reuters) - French President Emmanuel Macron agreed with his Iraqi counterpart on Saturday to make efforts to dampen tensions in the Middle East after Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani was killed in a U.S. air strike.

The two presidents agreed to remain in close contact to avoid any further escalation in tensions and in order to act to ensure stability in Iraq and the broader region, Macrons office said of his telephone discussion with Iraqi President Barham Salih.

On Saturday, tens of thousands of people marched in Baghdad to mourn Irans military chief Soleimani and Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, after the two were killed in a U.S. air strike which has raised the specter of wider conflict in the Middle East.

Macron also discussed Middle East developments with the de facto ruler of the United Arab Emirates, Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan. The two leaders underlined the importance of fighting Islamic State and dealing with the political crisis in Libya, Macrons office said.

Earlier on Saturday, Frances Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said he had discussed the situation in the Middle East with his German foreign minister Heiko Maas and senior Chinese diplomat Wang Yi.

We all noted in particular our agreement in the importance of preserving the stability and sovereignty of Iraq, and the whole of the region in general, as well as the need for Iran to avoid any new violation of the Vienna Agreement, Le Drian said.

Under the 2015 Vienna agreement, most international sanctions against Tehran were lifted in 2016, in exchange for limitations on Irans nuclear work. U.S. President Donald Trumps administration however pulled out of the deal.

Reporting by Sudip Kar-Gupta; Editing by Gareth Jones and James Drummond

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France's Macron discusses Middle East tensions with Iraq's Salih and UAE - Reuters

She told The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald that Australia, along with its international partners, had "long been concerned" by Iran's behaviour in the Middle East.

Senator Reynolds said the government was following the situation in Iraq and the broader region "very closely" and continued to "encourage restraint and avoid escalation".

People hold posters of Iranian Revolutionary Guard Major General Qassem Soleimani and during a protest outside the US Consulate in Turkey on Sunday. Credit:Getty Images

"Australia's focus remains on supporting Iraq's stability and unity and ensuring a de-escalation of tensions," Senator Reynolds said.

"The safety and security of Australians in Iraq and across the region, including our embassy staff and ADF personnel, remains our top priority."

The region is bracing for an Iranian retaliation with the region on high alert after the leader of Lebanon's Hezbollah group warned US military across the region "will pay the price".

Australia has about 350 troops based in Iraq as part of Operation OKRA, with about 2000 more throughout the Middle East and North Africa in a support capacity.

Defence Minister Linda Reynolds said the safety of Australians remains the "top priority".Credit:AAP

The Australian embassy in Iraq was placed into lockdown on Saturday following the drone strike, which Prime Minister Scott Morrison admitted on Saturday had blindsided the US's allies in the region.

Mr Morrison said he was not advised of the Trump administration's intentions prior to the strikes, but was in "constant contact" with allies in the region and had made efforts to ensure the safety of Australians.

"The United States took this action based on their own information and they took that action without discussing it with partners," Mr Morrison said on Saturday.

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He said he had "been aware" of Mr Trump's concerns in relation to some practices by Iranians "for some time", but he would "leave it to them to talk to what their actions are".

The US-led Operation Inherent Resolve, a training mission to which Australia contributes, paused its operations on Monday due to heightened security concerns.

In a statement on Monday, the Combined Joint Task Force said it was "fully committed to protecting the Iraqi bases that host Coalition troops".

"This has limited our capacity to conduct training with partners and to support their operations against Daesh and we have therefore paused these activities, subject to continuous review."

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"We remain resolute as partners of the Government of Iraq and the Iraqi people that have welcomed us into their country to help defeat ISIS.

"We remain ready to return our full attention and efforts back to our shared goal of ensuring the lasting defeat of Daesh."

Mr Trump doubled down on his claim that he would target Iranian cultural sites if Iran retaliated on Monday and threatened "very big sanctions" on Iraq if US troops were forced to leave the country.

Rob Harris is the National Affairs Editor for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, based at Parliament House in Canberra

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Australian government 'strongly concerned' after US troops told to leave Iraq - The Age