Tehran’s most durable achievement in Iraq is not its militia network but, rather, its penetration of Iraq’s security institutions. As Iran-aligned personnel consolidate positions inside Iraq’s state military and security apparatus, Tehran shifts its influence from organizations that Washington can sanction or Baghdad can dissolve into state institutions that possess legal authority, government resources, and international legitimacy. Unless the United States prioritizes removing Iranian loyalists from Iraq’s security establishment, militia disarmament alone will leave Tehran’s most valuable strategic gains intact.
The Maksusi family’s trajectory illustrates how Iranian power relies upon institutional continuity rather than isolated appointments. Leaked intelligence documents show how Hatem Al-Maksusi, previously director of Military Intelligence, was willing to place Iraqi intelligence capabilities—including U.S.-provided intelligence systems—at Tehran’s disposal. Hatem’s nephew, Zaid Al-Maksusi, rose from deputy director of Military Intelligence to director before assuming a senior position in the Counter-Terrorism Service. Simultaneously, Hatem’s son, Ali, entered the parliament through the Arak Party, led by militia leader Muhammad al-Bawi.
Unless the United States prioritizes removing Iranian loyalists from Iraq’s security establishment, militia disarmament alone will leave Tehran’s most valuable strategic gains intact.
These connections reveal a broader mechanism: Iranian influence in Iraq operates through overlapping security, political, and militia networks that reinforce one another and seek to create institutional continuity that survives changes in government.
When Saad Al-Allaq served as director of Military Intelligence, he ordered the deletion from databases of intelligence on Iran-backed militias, including U.S.-sanctioned figures like Rayan al-Kildani. Zaid Al-Maksusi has now followed suit by erasing electronic records relating to Muhammad Al-Bawi from Military Intelligence databases.
Iraqi institutions routinely destroy paper files after five years. This purging of records allows militia leaders and affiliated networks to claim that government files contain no evidence of misconduct, while Iraqi authorities deny possessing information that would require criminal investigations, administrative action, or cooperation with U.S. sanctions enforcement. Bureaucratic erasure thus becomes an instrument of strategic protection, shielding both sanctioned actors and the state institutions that failed to act against them.
Since 2020, Iraqi Military Intelligence has dismissed field reporting identifying Iran-backed militias responsible for attacks against U.S. military installations in Iraq and Syria. During the same period, officers affiliated with Kataib Hezbollah and Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq joined Military Intelligence in significant numbers, and they even participated in the interrogation of personnel whom they accused of spying for the United States due to previous service alongside American forces at Iraqi military bases. Iraqi Military Intelligence has become the proverbial fox guarding the hen house.
Military Intelligence directors declined to intervene when Military Intelligence officers investigated extortion networks operating through Popular Mobilization Forces checkpoints—particularly in the Ninawa, Salahudin, and Diyala provinces—and received militia threats to alter their findings shortly after submitting reports to the field commanders. These developments transformed Military Intelligence from an institution intended to counter external threats into one capable of suppressing investigations that threatened Iran-backed networks.
The ultimate manifestation of this institutional capture is the recent penetration of the Counter-Terrorism Service, an elite formation once insulated from Iranian influence due to U.S. support and training, whose independence Prime Minister Mohammad Al-Sudani dismantled. Prime Minister Ali Al-Zaidi’s May 22, 2026, appointment of Zaid Al-Maksusi to the Counter-Terrorism Service’s security undersecretary position, and then as its director in July, now extends a Khomeinist-linked family network from Military Intelligence into Iraq’s premier counterterrorism institution.
Iraqi Military Intelligence has become the proverbial fox guarding the hen house.
Such systemic penetration allows Iran-backed networks to conduct operations, like the 2015 Qatari abduction in Iraq, using the official cover and logistics of the Iraqi Ministry of Interior.
As commander of the Rapid Response Force, Thamer Al-Husseini draws personnel disproportionately from the Badr Corps. Similarly, Badr Corps operative Karim Abu Ragheef spent over a decade hijacking Ministry of Interior intelligence positions to serve Tehran’s objectives.
For U.S. policymakers, continuing to treat Iraq’s security apparatus, military, and the Counter-Terrorism Service as sovereign partners without demanding a thorough purge of their leadership is a strategic failure. A narrow focus on militia disarmament may accelerate Iran’s position by enabling Tehran to “concede” the dissolution of politically costly armed factions but still retain control. Washington, meanwhile, must recognize that Iranian interests have hijacked its multibillion-dollar investments in Iraqi security training and intelligence technology.
Purging loyalists from Iraq’s security institutions is, therefore, not a secondary reform but the central requirement for restoring Iraq’s sovereignty and strengthening U.S. regional security interests and economic opportunities. Without that effort, Tehran’s greatest victory in Iraq will not be the survival of its militias; it will be their transformation into the state itself.
