Iraq turns to Iran and Russia for arms to fight terrorism

 

Above: Iranian manufactured 125 mm HE rounds for the T-72 main battle tank

According to Reuters:

Iran has signed a deal to sell Iraq arms and ammunition worth $195 million, according to documents seen by Reuters - a move that would break a U.N. embargo on weapons sales by Tehran.

The agreement was reached at the end of November, the documents showed, just weeks after Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki returned from lobbying the Obama administration in Washington for extra weapons to fight al Qaeda-linked militants.

Some in Washington are nervous about providing sensitive U.S. military equipment to a country they worry is becoming too close to Iran. Several Iraqi lawmakers said Maliki had made the deal because he was fed up with delays in U.S. arms deliveries.

"We are launching a war against terrorism and we want to win this war. Nothing prevents us from buying arms and ammunition from any party and it's only ammunition helping us to fight terrorists," said the spokesman, Ali Mussawi.

The official documents seen by Reuters showed that six of eight contracts were signed with Iran's Defense Industries Organization to supply Iraq with light and medium arms, mortar launchers, ammunition for tanks as well as artillery and mortars.

A final two contracts were agreed to with the state-owned Iran Electronic Industries for night vision goggles, communications equipment and mortar-guiding devices.

One of the contracts includes equipment to protect against chemical agents. An Iraqi army major with knowledge of procurement issues said that would include items such as gas masks and gloves, as well as injections. Baghdad has expressed fear the militants will use such agents against its forces.

Where United States policy priorities preference the conflict in Syria and Iraq as a dictatorship putting down a democracy movement or Sunni disenfranchisement, the nations of Syria, Iraq and Iran (and Russia) see the conflict as a war against terror.

Iraq's first choice for arms is from the United States, based on American-made or sourced qualitative superiority. But the Baghdad government finds American prerequisites, conditional for timely or expedited deliveries, as meddling in their own internal affairs, and a weakening of resolve in a conflict they're approaching squarely as counter-terrorism. Meantime, the Iranians position themselves as the more reliable, regional ally.

At the very least, Baghdad is signaling strengthened defense ties with Tehran should specified United States arms deliveries remain, as the Iraqis see it, delinquent.

Below are more examples of the weapon types identified by Reuters that Iraq might take delivery of from Iran:

 

Iranian manufactured 155 mm M107 HE projectiles

Iranian manufactured Saha 77 hand-held calculator device for infantry mortars

Iranian manufactured night vision goggles

 

Iranian manufactured protective hoods. That the Iraqis would order CW protective equipment provides an indirect means of corroborating ISIS/ISIL use of chemical weapons in the war against Syria, and potentially in the war against Iraq. Iran has a well developed CW protection industry following many years of defending against CW attacks during the Iran-Iraq War.

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Referencing Russian arms deliveries to Iraq, according to almanar.com:

Russia and Iraq have agreed to speed up the delivery of Russian arms to the oil-rich Arab country, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Thursday.

Speaking at a joint press conference with Iraqi counterpart Hoshyar Zebari, Lavrov expressed Moscow's concern over what he described as "rampant terrorism" in the Middle East region.

"There's an urgent need for Iraq to have weapons in order to combat terrorism," Lavrov said.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki signed an arms deal with Moscow six months ago with a view to fighting what he described as "terrorists" in the country's western Anbar region.

Iraq reportedly received last month thirteen Russian manufactured Mil Mi-28NE helicopter gunships  [file photo]