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US President Joe Biden and Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi on Monday sealed an agreement formally ending the U.S. combat mission in Iraq by the end of 2021, more than 18 years after U.S. troops were sent to the country.
Coupled with Biden’s withdrawal of the last American forces in Afghanistan by the end of August, the Democratic president is completing U.S. combat missions in the two wars that then-President George W. Bush began under his watch.
Biden and Kadhimi met in the Oval Office for their first face-to-face talks as part of a strategic dialogue between the United States and Iraq.
“Our role in Iraq will be … to be available, to continue to train, to assist, to help and to deal with ISIS as it arises, but we’re not going to be, by the end of the year, in a combat mission,” Biden told reporters as he and Kadhimi met.
There are currently 2,500 U.S. troops in Iraq focusing on countering the remnants of the Islamic State. The U.S. role in Iraq will shift entirely to training and advising the Iraqi military to defend itself.
A US-led coalition invaded Iraq in March 2003 based on charges that then-Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s government possessed weapons of mass destruction. Saddam was ousted from power, but such weapons were never found.
The senior administration official would not say how many U.S. troops would remain on the ground in Iraq for advising and training.
The U.S.-Iraqi statement is expected to detail a number of non-military agreements related to health, energy, and other matters.
The United States plans to provide Iraq with 500,000 doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech, COVID-19 vaccine under the global COVAX vaccine-sharing program. Biden said the doses should arrive in a couple of weeks.
The United States will also provide $5.2 million to help fund a U.N. mission to monitor October elections in Iraq.
“We’re looking forward to seeing an election in October,” said Biden.
