Al Asad Airbase in Anbar province has passed from American to Iraqi control, a transfer marked by the fluttering of the Iraqi flag and lines of fully armed Iraqi soldiers where U.S. personnel once stood. On 17 January, Baghdad formally announced that its armed forces had fully taken over the sprawling facility, an act that resonated across a country long fatigued by foreign intervention and chronic insecurity.
The handover is freighted with history. The U.S. invasion of 2003 and the rapid withdrawal in 2011 fractured Iraq’s institutions and social balance, creating the conditions for the rise of the Islamic State in 2014 and the subsequent return of U.S. forces as part of a coalition to combat the insurgency. The 2020 drone strike that killed Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al‑Muhandis inflamed popular anger, catalysing sustained calls for foreign troops to leave and prompting frequent rocket and drone attacks on bases housing U.S. personnel.
The transfer of Al Asad is therefore more than the exchange of buildings and runways; it is a highly symbolic restitution of sovereignty. Baghdad residents greeted the moment with relief and, in some quarters, jubilation. Protest gatherings in mid‑January—some staged near the Iranian embassy and marked by anti‑U.S. chants and pro‑Iranian flags—underscored a public mood that equates foreign military footprints with lost agency and recurrent violence.
Yet symbolism will not erase the structural problems that plague Iraq. Decades of conflict have hollowed out state capacity, left the economy dependent on oil, and entrenched militia networks that retain arms and political influence. Reclaiming a base does not substitute for building a reliable national security architecture, restoring services, or healing sectarian divisions that are as political as they are social.
Regionally, the handover recalibrates, but does not resolve, great‑power competition. A reduced U.S. visible presence may satisfy domestic pressures in Baghdad and limit flashpoints associated with foreign troops, but it could also open space for Tehran to deepen ties with Iraqi political factions and security actors. For Washington, the strategic dilemma remains: how to support Iraq’s stability and counter remnants of ISIS without a footprint that fuels domestic backlashes or becomes a target.
Practically, the transition raises immediate questions about logistics, training and intelligence cooperation. Iraqi forces will now be responsible for perimeter security and base operations, but many capabilities—air refuelling, ISR platforms, precision strikes—have depended on coalition assets. Continued partnership could survive in different forms, such as advisory roles, intelligence sharing and over‑the‑horizon capabilities, but such arrangements will be sensitive politically and operationally.
The recovery of Al Asad is a necessary, not sufficient, condition for progress. For Iraqis it is an encouraging sign that the state can reclaim space once ceded to foreign powers. For policymakers in Baghdad and abroad, the challenge is to convert that symbolic victory into durable governance gains, credible security institutions and an inclusive political settlement that reduces the appeal of militias and foreign patrons.