America broke Iraq. Iran needs to fix it.

It's time to amend the famous Pottery Barn rule

Iraq
(Image credit: (REUTERS/ Essam Al-Sudani))

The old maxim about politics making for strange bedfellows barely begins to cover the shared interest Iran and the U.S. have in preventing Iraq's government from falling to Sunni Islamist militants sweeping toward Baghdad from the north.

So dire is the situation for Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki that he's asking for military aid from both the U.S., a country he declined to sign a status-of-forces agreement with in 2011, and Iran, a nation that Iraq fought in a brutal and bloody civil war in the 1980s. And U.S. and Iranian interests are aligned enough that the two longtime enemies are actually considering working together to fight off the encroaching Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) insurgency.

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Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.