It’s enouragong that Trump met with both @BarhamSalih & @IKRPresident on the sidelines of Davos. It’s less encouraging that Trump used the time to say “we took the oil” and doesn’t seem to know the difference between northern Syria and Iraqi Kurdistan.
Presidents Barzani and Salih are vital partners. We could not have fought ISIS without them. They’re both courageous and striving for a truly independent, fully sovereign, federal Iraq. The U.S. needs a strong policy to support them and see Iraq through new UN-backed elections.
The election in 2018 due to low turnout and other factors did not reflect the nationalist, youthful, and patriotic current in Iraq that grew out of Iraq’s war against ISIS. Moqtada Sadr came in first. Iranian-backed groups second. This did not reflect the pulse of the country.
Below are two examples from @CSIS polling, which has been generally reliable over the years 👉 csis-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/ev…
1) Support for Iraq’s legitimate security forces (the ones our @coalition trains) stands at nearly 80 percent and support for religiously-based governance has plummeted dramatically since the campaign against ISIS. The trend is post-sectarian, patriotic, nationalist.👇 
2) And while only 9 percent of Iraqis outside Kurdistan viewed the US as a reliable partner in 2009, nearly 45 percent do so today (higher than the figure for Iran). This spike came out of the campaign against ISIS, and should be nurtured, not squandered.
The US can have an engaged policy supporting patriotic Iraqis with a clear and achievable goal: early UN-backed elections under a new election law. It’s also critical to continue the D-ISIS fight. (Iraq not long ago saw 40 suicide bombs/month. Networks reconstitute w/o pressure.)
The policy can be coordinated and reinforced with the nearly twenty military contributors in Iraq supporting the D-ISIS campaign. This historic @coalition also brings political heft and influence when positions are fully coordinated in capitals. Doesn’t seem to happening now.
I’ll remain hopeful some of this (not just “we took the oil”) was discussed with Presidents Salih and Barzani. Staying in neutral or halting all activities benefits KH, which is threatening Barham’s life, rocketing American troops, and killing youthful protestors in the streets.
