Recent developments in Iraq are frightening and disappointing for all those who were looking for a stable and prosperous Iraq after all the efforts and sacrifices of International community and Iraqi public. At the same time, it gave away numerous lessons for the politicians and political experts of the world. First important lesson is not to consider small and ignore a problem. When the Islamic State (IS) separated from Al-Qaeda and announced to carry out its activities as a separate Jihadi organization, it was not given any importance. Later on, when they captured Fallujah in Iraq in 2013, it was ignored on grounds of being a small group comprising of a few hundred militants and not able to inflict any serious harms to the security of the country. This ignorance gave them a full-fledged opportunity to gain strength, get professional training for their militants, acquire weapons from wherever possible and develop a very nice hierarchy within the organization due to which they are able to operate like a professional army. Same ignorance also cost a lot for the supporters of democratic Iraq when the old generals and political experts of Saddam government were not chased and hunted down who joined the lines of ISIS as soon as they saw the opportunity and brought for them all their expertise, skills and experience. Had these old generals being caught and trialed in the beginning, they could have never performed their role in today’s political and military turmoil of the country.

Next important lesson was the ignorance of social and economic injustice in the country. International community poured the country with billions of dollars but this huge sum was never used properly and transparently. Massive corruption made some hundreds of Iraqis millionaires about whom we heard unbelievable stories. There were Iraqis rich enough to afford holidays in Europe, shopping in Dubai, education in the United States and they were able to establish their private armies and luxurious villas in almost all the parts of the country and different countries of the world. But unfortunately, majority of the Iraqis remained suffering with their miseries. Increasing violence and militancy negatively affected the economic activities of the country and all these resulted in the increased poverty of the middle and lower classes of the society. All these circumstances gave birth to a perception that democracy was for the sake of some limited people only and majority of the common public remained indifferent to it. It is the reason why, when there were news of increasing influence and control of IS in different parts of the country, there were also present those who were happy of this, expecting a kind of change in the present status-quo of the country.

Some political experts believe that the Coalition Forces deliberately gave rise to the differences and clash between these Shia and Sunni due to their own hidden agendas. It was an idea that if the two groups clashed with each other, the work of the coalition forces would be easier. It was also said that if the two groups of country kept fighting with each other, they would grow weak. But this sectarian bloodshed got so intensified in 2006-07 that coalition forces had to revisit their policies and strategies in this regard.  This was another lesson from Iraq that an evil way would never lead to a virtuous destiny. It was wrong right from the beginning that country should be ruled on the policy of ‘Divide and Rule’, rather national solidarity and respect for differences could have been more productive and fruitful. It remains a fact that the snake you reared for others might turn against you one day and cause the trouble that you were thinking of inflicting on others.

It also remains a fact that all classes and regions of the country were not given equal representation in the new democratic setup of the country. It is the reason why, present government is not having the full moral support of all the classes and groups of the country. This problem started when the group or groups that were ready to cooperate with the Coalition Forces were given preference while those groups that insisted on political freedom, sovereignty of the country and more Iraqi influence in national politics were ignored and sidelined which resulted in the situation when the country got divided on political lines as well.

In all these issues, we see that there were divisions on the basis of economy, political representation, and sectarian and religious differences which divided the country into large number of groups. Between these groups, similarities were less while the differences were high which gave birth to antagonistic feelings against each other.

It has also been noticed that Iraqi forces were less trained and equipped comparing to the IS militants. IS militants were able to defeat the Iraqi forces on the war-front and they did not face much difficulty in capturing large number of towns and cities of the country. This poor performance of Iraqi army depicts a fact that American forces left the country and gave its charge to Iraqi forces when they were not ready to handle it properly. It is also a fact that an army should not only be trained and established but also provided with proper equipment because Iraqi army is not happy of the weapons they have and they are also complaining of the lack of adequate air support. Iraqi army has only some helicopters and doesn’t have a well-established air force.

And most importantly, this disturbance is also due to the interference of large number of international players. There are also those powers that are working to bring down the government that is supporting the policies of the West so that they should be able to bring a government that should serve their policies as well. Whoever may be the players, it is for sure that there are so many big powers supporting this militancy because a group with such strong army and support in form of weapons and money cannot exist and continue on its own.

All these important lessons are very crucial in the scenario of Afghanistan as well. We are also sharing the similar circumstances in form of social, economic and political inequalities and injustices. We can avoid the similar situation in our country by bringing reforms in our present setup to bring more economic equality, expansion of social and political freedom and participation. We also need to make our army and police strong and work incessantly against the militants and anti-state elements, no matter how small or less active they are, without giving them any chance to grow and emerge as a real threat to our democratic setup.