Iraq is a republic in Southwest Asia which contains some of world's greatest ancient civilizations, such as Assyria, Babylonia, Mesopotamia, and Sumer. The cultural heritage of Iraq is mainly Arabic which is still represented today in many of the antiquities of the country such as the Kadhimain Mosque, the Abbasid Palace, and the Shrine of Samarra.

Modern Iraq's history begins with the last phase of the Turkish rule, during the 18th century. After the Turkish conquest in 1534 Turkish rule was used in many sovereigns. However, in 1831, when Sultan Ali Reza Pasha demoted the last of the Mesopotamian leaders, the province of Iraq came directly under Turkish administration. The Arabs began to have difficulties with the new types of laws which were brought upon them, such as tax collection. These burdens were new and unfamiliar to the Arabs, and their strong spirit began to rise as a local resentment for the new type of government grew. The Arabs wanted to rise up against the Turkish rule but did not have the military strength to do so.

At the end of the 19th century, Great Britain and Germany began to fight over ideas of commercial development of the Mesopotamian area. The British wanted to utilize Iraq as a trade route; a direct overland route to India. In 1861, the British established a steamship company to navigate the Tigris River to the port of Al Basrah. Germany, on the other hand, wanted to construct a railroad into the Middle East, to run "from Berlin to Baghdad". The Germans were able to overcome the opposition given to them by the British and built a railroad to the Persian Gulf. Even with this defeat on their shoulders, the British government was able to create treaties of protection with local Arab chieftains. Many British financiers were also able to obtain concessions in 1901 to exploit the oil fields of Iran and in 1909 the Anglo-Persian Oil Company, later entitled the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, was formed to develop the oil industry in the Middle East.

When World War I began, the British tried to invade southern Mesopotamia in November of 1914, and were eventually able to push northward against Turkish opposition. The British leaders in an effort to have the Arabs rise up against the Turks and hence help British troops, promised a group of Arab leaders that their people would receive independence if a revolt proved to be successful. So, in June of 1916, Faisal al-Husein led an uprising in the Hejaz and was able to achieve victory over the Turkish army. Thus, the Arabian territory was liberated and led to the eventual peace armistice signed with Turkey in 1918. The British and French governments issued a joint declaration stating that they hoped to assist in establishing independent Arab nations in the Arab areas formerly controlled by Turkey. After some disputes, the British civil commissioner created a plan for a provisional government of the new state of Iraq. The government of this new kingdom of Iraq was to be directed by a council of Arab ministers under the watch of a British high commissioner. In August of 1921, Faisal was elected by an overwhelming majority to be the king of the new nation of Iraq.

This new kingdom of Iraq was not entirely safe from neighboring countries though, and nearly immediately problems began brewing. The Shiites of the Euphrates River and the Kurdish tribes of the north acted along with the Turkish armed forces to try to reclaim lands in the Mosul area for Turkey. The British had to remain in Iraq to try to protect the newly founded kingdom and agitation against the British mandate continued. King Faisal requested that the mandate be exchanged for a treaty of alliance between the two nations, and the British government concurred. Therefore, in 1922, a 20- year treaty of alliance and protection between Great Britain and Iraq was signed. In 1932, Iraq was declared a free and independent state and was allowed to enter the League of Nations as such. When King Faisal died in 1933 his son, King Ghazi I took over. Before his death, King Faisal, backed by the Iraqi government, signed an agreement with the Iraq Petroleum Company to grant that company the sole right to develop the oil fields of the Mosul region so long as the company guaranteed to pay the Iraqi government annual royalties. One of King Ghazi's first acts as king was to move towards a general alliance with other nations of the Arab world to create a treaty of nonagression, reaffirming a fundamental Arab kinship. This was signed with the king of Saudi Arabia. Three years after this pact, in 1939, King Ghazi was killed leaving his three-year-old son heir to the throne.

At the beginning of World War II, Iraq kept up its alliance with Great Britain until Rashid Ali al-Gailani became the premier in 1940. He immediately began a policy of non-cooperation with the British leading to a military revolt on April 30, 1941 when a new pro-Axis government was formed by the Iraqi leader. Alarmed by the sudden lack of cooperation with their ally, British troops arrived at Al Basrah, infuriating the Iraqi government, who felt this act was a betrayal of their treaty. In May of 1941, war broke out between Great Britain and Iraq but the duration of the war was short and Iraq quickly accepted defeat. The terms of armistice brought back some of the old rule, with British control over Iraq's transport, a provision of the 1930 alliance. In 1943, back as an ally with the British forces, Iraq became the first independent Muslim state to declare war on the Axis powers. This continued Allied war effort made the Arab states stronger and more unified.

During 1945 and 1946, the Kurdish tribes in Iraq were at a state of unrest, and aided by the USSR. The British feared that the soviets would encroach on Iraq's oil fields and moved troops in. At around the same time, the Iraq government decided to negotiate with the king of Transjordan (present-day Jordan) for the two nations to be united. In April 1947 a treaty of kinship and alliance was signed by the two kingdoms, allowing mutual military and diplomatic aid. In 1948, after the declaration of independence by Israel, the armies of Iraq and Transjordan entered the new state and fought the Israelis. Later that year Iraq joined the king of Transjordan, Abdullah ibn Husein in denouncing the establishment of an Arab government in Palestine. Even with the combination of the two kingdom's armies, the Arab forces were met with defeat and began plans to negotiate an armistice. On May 11, 1949, a cease-fire agreement was signed between Israel and Transjordan, but the Iraqi troops continued to fight Israelis in Palestine.

In 1955, Iraq concluded the Baghdad Pact, a security treaty with Turkey. It was planned that the alliance would be turned into a Middle Eastern defense system and other countries were encouraged to adhere to the pact. Great Britain, Pakistan, and Iran all joined the pact establishing the Middle East Treaty Organization (METO). In January of 1957 Iraq endorsed the Eisenhower Doctrine which stated that the United States would give military assistance to any government within the Middle East whose stability was threatened by Communism. The following year, Jordan and Iraq were federated, creating the Arab Union of Jordan and Iraq.

In March of 1959, Iraq withdrew from the Baghdad Pact, and several months later they also withdrew from the sterling bloc, terminating the connection of Iraqi currency and the British pound. When the British protectorate over Kuwait was terminated in 1960, Iraq claimed the area saying that the area of Kuwait had always been a part of Iraq and the Mesopotamian area. British forces entered Kuwait at the invitation of the Kuwait leader, and the United Nations Security Council would not follow the Iraqi request to have them removed. During this time, Iraq continued to have problems with Kurdish unrest in northern Iraq.

In 1967, with Abdul Rahman Arif as the Iraqi president, the Arab-Israeli Six Day War Broke forth as Iraqi troops marched to the Jordan-Israeli border with fighter planes not far behind them. Iraq declared war on Israel and closed its oil pipelines which supplied the Western nations. At this point, the diplomatic relations which had been built up with the United States were ruined. The war continued with Major General Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, a former premier, taking over as head of the Revolutionary Command Council. For many years Iraq continued with hostile relations towards the West and a kinship with the USSR. This led to the 1971 closure of Iraq's borders because of Jordan's wish to diminish the Palestinian guerrilla movement by operating from inside Iraq's borders. Iraq's troubles with Israel continued into Syria's Yom Kippur War of October 1973 in which Iraq provided Syria with troops and material for military action against Israel.

In 1974, after non-stop war and trouble for a long amount of time, Iraq entered into a war with Iran. This war rose up from a division between the government forces of Iraq and Kurdish nationalists who did not want to live by the Kurdish autonomy law which was created in a 1970 agreement. The Kurds were led by Mustafa al-Barzani and received arms and supplies from Iran. However, Iran stopped aiding the Kurds the next year when Iraq decided to negotiate and work out border disputes between the two nations. In 1979, President Bakr was succeeded by General Saddam Hussein, a Sunni Muslim and member of the socialist party.

Though the Kurdish revolt had been quieted when their aid was pulled out their tension began to again build up in 1979. As the Iranian Kurd's unrest spilled over into Iraq yet another conflict between the two nations was built up. In late 1980, Iraq stated that the agreement over land disputes that had been created in 1975 with Iraq was null and void. Iraq quickly claimed a disputed area, the Shatt al Arab estuary. A full-scale war followed in which Iraq entered Iran and destroyed a large province. In early summer of the following year, Baghdad was attacked by Israeli troops and a nuclear reactor was destroyed. By 1982, Iran had launched a counteroffensive and was able to reclaim much of its lost territory. This hardly ended the fighting though, and each side presented much harm to the other. Although the United States had declared neutrality in the war, 1984 marked a rebirth of diplomatic relations with Iraq. In August of 1988, a cease-fire was issued and the war died out. Iraq began to rebuild its military machines with grants from Western Europe and the United States.

Though the fighting in Iraq ended with that cease-fire, there are still many issues between Iran and Iraq left to be sorted out, and there is still a troubled future left to come.