Rubio Delivered a Warning to Iraq and Baghdad Pretended Not to Hear It
A missile just hit a helipad inside the US Embassy in Baghdad.
That's not a near miss. That's not a warning shot.
That's Iran's hired guns telling America to get out – and Iraq's prime minister is sitting on his hands while it happens.
Baghdad Collects Paychecks and Plays Dumb
Secretary of State Marco Rubio called Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani on March 9.
The message was unambiguous: the Iraqi government must take all possible measures to safeguard U.S. diplomatic personnel and facilities.
Sudani's response was a masterpiece of deliberate nothing.
His office put out a statement affirming Iraq's "commitment to protecting diplomatic missions" – and conspicuously failed to mention Iran, the militias, or the 300-plus drone and missile attacks that have hammered U.S. positions and Kurdish civilians since Operation Epic Fury began on February 28.
A Kurdish – sigh, yes that playbook again – official told Fox News Digital exactly what Sudani didn't say out loud.
The Popular Mobilization Forces – the umbrella network of Iran-backed militias running the attacks – are "paid and armed by the Iraqi government."
"They are on the Iraqi payroll," the official said.
"Many of these leaders are part of al-Sudani's government and his very coalition."
The Kurdish official, of course, is almost certainly attempting to leverage this latest Middle East war for advancing a Kurdish State – and why shouldn’t they have a right to a homeland.
A better question might be why the Kurds – who are spread across parts of Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran – keep popping up in almost every war in recent memory.
The answer is just that to a great extent but it’s interesting how there’s frequently some indigenous ethnic people winds up straddling the borders of geopolitical hotspots.
The Kurds in the Middle East during all the recent wars.
In the Vietnam War, it was the Hmong of the Golden Triangle region where Laos, Myanmar, and Thailand all butt together.
In Afghanistan, the Pashtun live along the Durand Line that divides Afghanistan and Pakistan.
In the case of the Kurds and the Pashtun, perhaps the pejorative term Perfidious Albion comes to mind.
Further rabbit trailing on inhabitants of various border ridings’ usefulness to outside interests is warranted but we’ll leave it for another day.
For now, our working theory is that House Stuart and House Tudor both realized the advantages of working with Border Reivers during the Wars of the Roses and never forgot that lesson.
Back to the Kurdish folk.
Iraq is collecting $3.6 billion a year in government budget allocations for the PMF – a force whose leadership answers to Tehran, not Baghdad.
The Iraqi government arrested militia suspects tied to previous attacks.
Then released them on bail.
Then watched them flee to Iran.
"The al-Sudani government has been unwilling to confront them," the Kurdish official said.
The Iraqi IRGC in Plain Sight
Entifadh Qanbar – a former spokesman for Iraq's deputy prime minister – told Fox News Digital there's no mystery about what the PMF actually is.
"One could even describe the PMF as the Iraqi branch of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, effectively functioning as an Iraqi Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps," Qanbar said.
That framing is not rhetorical.
The PMF's leadership structure runs straight to Tehran – its chief of staff declared publicly in 2024 that the force takes direction from Iran's supreme leader, and six of its major factions, including Kataib Hezbollah and Asaib Ahl al-Haq, carry official U.S. terrorist designations.
They sit inside Iraq's official security apparatus, draw government paychecks, and fire on American personnel.
Iran's proxies killed at least 603 American troops in Iraq between 2003 and 2011 – the Pentagon counted them – and Washington did nothing lasting about it.
They put 109 U.S. troops in the hospital with traumatic brain injuries in a single January 2020 missile strike, and the media called it a near-miss.
Since October 2023, Iran and its proxies launched more than 180 attacks on American forces across Iraq, Syria, and Jordan.
Every time America looked away, the number went up.
Rubio Warned Them – Now Come the Options
The State Department's message to al-Sudani was pointed: "We retain a range of options to protect our interests."
That sentence does real work.
The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad is already telling Americans to leave Iraq immediately – airspace is closed, overland routes to Jordan, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey are the only exits, and Iran-aligned militias have repeatedly attacked the International Zone in central Baghdad.
U.S. and Israeli airstrikes have already begun hitting PMF positions across Iraq – Kirkuk, Anbar, Nineveh, Karbala – though neither government has publicly claimed the strikes.
The PMF itself told the Iraqi News Agency that American forces have conducted 32 airstrikes against PMF headquarters since February 28.
Kurdish officials are pushing Washington to go further: cut the PMF's funding and dismantle the financial networks keeping the militias armed.
Qanbar put the bottom line plainly.
"As long as the PMF exists, militias operating under its umbrella will continue to attack U.S. forces and regional targets."
Al-Sudani knows this.
He knows his coalition partners are tied to the same militia leaders directing drone strikes at American diplomats.
He knows arrested suspects walked free and caught flights to Tehran.
And after Rubio's call, he issued a statement that didn't mention a single militia, a single attack, or a single name.
That's not ignorance.
That's a government that has decided America's patience is a resource worth exploiting – and it's betting Rubio won't follow through on "a range of options."
They've made that bet before.
Trump made them regret it in January 2020 when he ordered the strike that killed Qasem Soleimani.
The PMF and everyone in al-Sudani's coalition remembers exactly how that turned out.
Sources:
- Benjamin Weinthal, "US warns Iraq must act against Iran-backed militia attacks on American assets," Fox News, March 16, 2026.
- U.S. Embassy Baghdad, "Security Alert – U.S. Embassy Baghdad, Iraq – March 16, 2026," U.S. Embassy & Consulate in Iraq, March 16, 2026.
- Seth J. Frantzman, "US condemns Iranian and militia attacks in Iraq amid unclaimed airstrikes on Tehran-backed militias," FDD's Long War Journal, March 11, 2026.
- Seth J. Frantzman, "Iran-backed militias in Iraq suffer increased losses as airstrikes hit multiple bases," The Jerusalem Post, March 12, 2026.
- Bill Roggio, "Iranian-backed militias continue attacks on US forces in Iraq," FDD's Long War Journal, March 5, 2026.
- The White House, "The Iranian Regime's Decades of Terrorism Against American Citizens," WhiteHouse.gov, March 2026.
- David Schenker, "If Iraq Passes the New PMF Law, the U.S. Response Should Be Severe," The Washington Institute, 2025.
