Iraqi Kurds sees opportunities – and risks – in the withdrawal of US troops

The last U.S. forces departed Erbil Air Base on Sept. 30, 2026, ending a military presence that had simultaneously protected Iraqi Kurdistan and made it a target. The region, home to 6.5 million mostly Kurdish people, now faces Iranian-aligned militia threats without the air-defense capability the Americans provided, even as it completed a long-sought unification of Peshmerga forces under one command.

Iraq marked the withdrawal as sovereignty day, but Baghdad just extended its own deadline for disarming armed groups outside state control from September to next June, under pressure from the groups it was supposed to be disarming. Kurdish leaders, including Prime Minister Masrour Barzani, are now asking for exactly the advanced weapons and air-defense systems the departing Americans used to supply.

More than 1,000 drones and missiles have hit the region since February, per Kurdish accounts, while the national air-defense system meant to replace U.S. coverage remains unfinished. The practical test of sovereignty, as one regional president put it, is not whether foreign troops left but whether the state left behind can actually do the job.

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