Iraq's Security Situation After the US Withdrawal, Explained
- 🔑 The US and coalition partners completed their withdrawal from Iraq on September 30, 2026, when the final personnel left Erbil Air Base in the Kurdistan region, according to US Central Command. The move ends Operation Inherent Resolve, the 12-year anti-ISIS mission, and roughly 23 years of continuous US military presence in Iraq dating to 2003.
- CENTCOM has said Erbil Air Base “had hosted 1,500 troops from the US and other coalition forces” over the campaign’s life, while separate reporting describes the group that actually departed on the final day as a much smaller contingent, in the hundreds, reflecting a drawdown already underway since 2025.
- Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell called the departure “orderly” and said responsibility for ISIS remnants and Iran-aligned militias now rests with Iraq’s government; CENTCOM commander Adm. Brad Cooper said Iraqi forces have “the capacity, leadership and independence” to handle threats, with US forces elsewhere in the region on standby.
- Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi has set a deadline, pushed back from September 30, 2026 to June 2027, for Iran-aligned armed factions to disarm and fold into the state-run Popular Mobilization Forces; al-Zaidi has said the US and militias separately agreed to a 90-day mutual non-aggression understanding after the withdrawal.
- Kurdistan Regional Government officials have voiced concern about losing US air-defense support after the region faced more than 1,000 drone and missile strikes during the separate US-Israel-Iran conflict earlier in 2026; Iran-aligned faction Kataib Hezbollah instead welcomed the pullout as a step toward “full sovereignty.”
- This is a fast-moving, just-completed story: exact troop-count figures and any post-withdrawal security developments in Iraq or Kurdistan could still be updated by wire services in the hours and days after publication. This article makes no forecast about whether Iraq’s security situation will stabilize or deteriorate.
The US and its coalition partners completed their military withdrawal from Iraq on September 30, 2026, when the last personnel left Erbil Air Base in the Kurdistan region, ending the 12-year anti-ISIS mission known as Operation Inherent Resolve and roughly 23 years of continuous American military presence in the country. US Central Command (CENTCOM) confirmed the departure the same day, and Iraqi, Kurdish, and Iran-aligned voices have all since weighed in on what the pullout means for the country’s security going forward. Here’s what’s actually been confirmed, and what officials on multiple sides are saying comes next.
What happened at Erbil Air Base on September 30, 2026?
CENTCOM announced that US and coalition forces completed an “orderly departure” from Erbil Air Base on September 30, 2026, ending Operation Inherent Resolve. The base, in Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region, had served as the coalition’s last operating hub for the anti-ISIS mission. Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell described the departure as a transition “from a wartime coalition mission to an Iraqi-led security effort,” and said responsibility for remaining threats, including ISIS remnants and Iran-aligned militias, now sits with Iraq’s government.
What is the timeline that led to this withdrawal?
The Erbil departure was the final step in a drawdown that was agreed to in 2024 and carried out in phases starting in 2025. The original deadline came out of talks between the Biden administration and Baghdad; it was then carried through by the Trump administration and Iraq’s current prime minister, Ali al-Zaidi.
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| Sept 2024 | Biden administration and Baghdad agree to end the US military mission in Iraq by 2026 |
| Aug 2025 | Phased drawdown begins, starting with bases such as Al-Asad |
| Sept 30, 2026 | Final personnel depart Erbil Air Base; CENTCOM declares the withdrawal complete |
How many US troops were actually still in Iraq?
Reported figures vary because they describe two different things rather than contradicting each other. CENTCOM has said Erbil Air Base “had hosted 1,500 troops from the US and other coalition forces” over the life of the counter-ISIS campaign there. Separate reporting describes the group that actually departed on the final day as a much smaller contingent, in the hundreds, reflecting a drawdown that had already been underway for more than a year. We’re treating the 1,500 figure as CENTCOM’s cumulative, mission-wide number for the base, not as the exact headcount that left on September 30.
What did US officials say about the withdrawal?
Senior US officials framed the pullout as the planned conclusion of the anti-ISIS mission rather than a retreat. CENTCOM commander Adm. Brad Cooper said Iraqi and Kurdish Peshmerga forces now have “the capacity, leadership and independence” to handle security threats on their own, and that US and coalition forces stationed elsewhere in the region would “remain ready to respond to any ISIS threats that arise.” President Trump, in a statement posted to Truth Social, called the withdrawal “a victory for the United States, a victory for Iraq, and a decisive victory over ISIS.” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said separately that Iraq “must assert its sovereignty and disarm the Iran-aligned militias” responsible for more than 600 attacks on US personnel in spring 2026.
What security threats remain in Iraq?
Two threats dominate the post-withdrawal picture: ISIS remnants and Iran-aligned militias. Officials and analysts agree ISIS no longer holds territory in Iraq or Syria but still maintains sleeper cells in both countries. Separately, Iran-aligned armed factions, some tied to the spring 2026 attacks Hegseth referenced, remain active and armed. A security official with one such faction, Kataib Hezbollah, said the US departure marked “the beginning of full sovereignty,” while also warning Iraq’s government against what he described as pursuing American objectives.
Is Kurdistan more exposed without US forces there?
Kurdish officials have said publicly that they’re concerned, specifically about losing US air-defense coverage. The Kurdistan Regional Government’s Peshmerga Ministry said in a statement that the US departure, “without the provision of a defense system,” was “a matter of concern,” noting the region had faced more than 1,000 drone and ballistic-missile attacks during the separate US-Israel-Iran conflict earlier in 2026. That conflict is distinct from the anti-ISIS mission but forms part of the backdrop to Kurdish officials’ concerns about what protection remains available to them.
What is Iraq doing about Iran-aligned militias?
Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi has set a deadline for Iran-aligned militias to disarm and fold into the state-controlled Popular Mobilization Forces, and that deadline has already moved once. Originally targeted for September 30, 2026, to line up with the US withdrawal, it has since been pushed back to June 2027. Al-Zaidi has said the US and Iran-aligned militias separately gave assurances that they would refrain from attacks for 90 days following the withdrawal, a mutual non-aggression understanding meant to buy time for the disarmament process. Some armed groups have signaled they intend to keep their weapons regardless, pointing to the continued presence of foreign forces elsewhere in the region as justification.
What happens to the US-Iraq relationship now?
The relationship shifts from a visible troop presence to a bilateral framework built on the two countries’ 2008 security agreement. Going forward, US-Iraq cooperation is expected to center on training, intelligence-sharing, and economic ties rather than stationed combat forces, with US troops remaining elsewhere in the region, including Syria, available to respond if ISIS regains strength.
Bottom line
The withdrawal itself is complete and confirmed by CENTCOM, the Pentagon, and multiple regional sources. What comes next, how Iraq balances ISIS remnants, armed Iran-aligned factions, and Kurdish security concerns without a US troop presence, is the part still playing out. We’ll be watching how the June 2027 militia-disarmament deadline holds up and what happens once the reported 90-day non-aggression window runs its course.
How we verified this
Official statements and figures were checked against wire-service and regional-outlet reporting that quoted CENTCOM’s own release directly, along with separate reporting quoting Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, CENTCOM commander Adm. Brad Cooper, and President Trump’s public statement on the withdrawal — at least four independent outlet types in agreement on the core facts.
The troop-count discrepancy flagged before writing was resolved by reading CENTCOM’s own framing directly: one report quotes CENTCOM saying Erbil Air Base “had hosted 1,500 troops from the US and other coalition forces” over the life of the mission, while a separate outlet describes the US presence in Kurdistan just before the final departure as “a small presence of hundreds of troops.” This piece uses 1,500 only as CENTCOM’s cumulative, mission-wide figure for the base, and describes the final departing group as in the hundreds — rather than presenting either number as the single definitive final-day headcount.
PM al-Zaidi’s militia-disarmament deadline was checked against multiple independent outlets reporting the same June 2027 date, extended from an original September 30, 2026 target, plus a reference to al-Zaidi’s own comments on a 90-day non-aggression understanding.
Kurdish and militia reactions are attributed to a named KRG ministry statement and a named Iran-aligned faction’s security-official statement, not characterized as a settled consensus, and no claim about Iraq’s political disputes is stated as fact beyond what named officials said.
No betting odds, spreads, or win-probability models appear anywhere on this page, and this article does not forecast whether Iraq will stabilize, what Iran will do next, or how the militia-disarmament effort will turn out.
This is a same-day story. Exact final-day troop-count figures were still being reported inconsistently across outlets at the time of writing, and any new security incident in Iraq or Kurdistan since publication would not be reflected here.