Iraqi conflict

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Iraqi conflict
Part of the War on terror
Airstrike in Fallujah, 2004
Date High-intensity hostilities: 20 March 2003 – 9 December 2017[1] (14 years, 8 months, 2 weeks and 5 days) Low-intensity hostilities: 9 December 2017 – present (7 years, 4 months and 4 weeks) Location Iraq Result 2003–2011: Iraq War 2003: American-led invasion 2003–2011: Occupation of Iraq 2003–2011: Iraqi insurgency 2003–2006 phase 2006–2008 civil war 2007–2011: American withdrawal 2011–2013: Iraqi insurgency 2012–2013 protests 2013–2017: Renewed full-scale war in Iraq 2014–2021: American-led intervention 2017–present: Islamic State insurgency
Casualties and losses
275,000–306,000 killed[2] 9.2 million displaced (per the Watson Institute, as of August 2021)[3]

The Iraqi conflict is a series of violent events that began with the 2003 American-led invasion of Iraq and deposition of Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, followed by a series of conflicts including the protracted Iraq War (2003–2011), the Iraqi insurgency (2011–2013), the War in Iraq (2013–2017), and most recently, the small-scale Islamic State insurgency in 4 provinces located in Northern Iraq since 2017.^[a]

In the ensuing 2003–2011 Iraq War, the Multi-National Force (MNF–I) led by the United States helped to establish a Shia-dominated federal government, which was soon opposed by an Iraqi insurgency.^[5] Insurgent groups mostly fought the new government and MNF-I, but also each other, mostly along sectarian lines between Shias and Sunnis. In 2011, the MNF–I withdrew from Iraq, leading to renewed sectarian violence and enabling the emergence of the Islamic State (IS). The renewed war drew an American-led intervention in 2014.^[6] Full-scale fighting in the country came to a close in 2017 as the Iraqi government and its allies largely defeated the IS. A low-level IS insurgency continues in the rural northern parts of the country.^[1]

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