Iraqi PM to Visit Washington Monday, Oil and Gas Deals on Agenda

Iraq’s prime minister is scheduled to arrive in Washington on Monday for talks expected to produce a set of energy agreements with American companies — a visit that comes as Iranian military action across the Gulf has disrupted regional energy flows and raised new questions about where secure oil supply comes from.

An Iraqi government spokesperson confirmed the scope of the planned accords. “The agreements to be signed will include several memorandums of understanding in the oil and gas sector as Iraq prepares to bring in various US companies,” the spokesperson said, according to the Jerusalem Post. Reuters separately confirmed the visit and the expected oil and gas accords.

The trip arrives against a backdrop of widening Iranian military activity. Iran launched drone and missile strikes against Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, and Qatar following US military strikes on Iranian targets, according to the Times of Israel. Three people, including a child, were reported hurt by falling debris in Kuwait. Qatar condemned what it described as a “dangerous escalation” after being struck for the first time since April. One Iranian soldier was killed in the prior US strikes.

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps released video it said showed its retaliatory missile strikes, Al Jazeera reported — a deliberate display of operational capacity directed at both domestic and regional audiences.

Tehran’s calculus was articulated more directly by an adviser to Iran’s supreme leader. The Strait of Hormuz, the adviser told Middle East Eye, was “more important” than “dozens of atomic bombs.” The statement is a strategic framing, not a technical comparison — it signals that Iran’s leadership views control over the world’s most critical oil chokepoint as its highest-value leverage in any extended conflict with the United States.

Iraq at the Intersection

Iraq is not a neutral party in this crisis. Baghdad maintains formal relations with Tehran and carries significant economic ties to Iran, while simultaneously hosting US forces and participating in American-led regional security structures. That dual positioning has always made Iraqi foreign policy a careful balancing act, and the prime minister’s decision to travel to Washington for commercial energy agreements reflects a deliberate tilt toward the American economic orbit.

The agreements expected from the visit — memorandums of understanding with US energy companies — would deepen that orientation. While specific company names were not announced, agreements of this type typically cover exploration rights, field-services contracts, and infrastructure partnerships. For the US side, commercial exposure in Iraqi fields translates into a political stake in their security and continuity of output.

Iraq is a major OPEC producer. Any arrangement that increases US company presence in Iraqi operations gives Washington a commercial interest in the stability of Iraqi energy exports independent of the broader Gulf security picture.

The Hormuz Variable

The central energy question raised by Iran’s escalation is whether Gulf export routes remain reliable. An IRGC declaration closing Hormuz would immediately affect roughly 20 percent of global oil supply, with cascading effects on prices and supply chains. Iraq’s Basra oil terminal sits at the northern tip of the Persian Gulf — geographically distinct from Saudi and Emirati export terminals that must route through the strait’s narrowest passage, though not fully insulated from any Hormuz disruption.

Iraq has also been developing overland pipeline capacity that would bypass Hormuz entirely, a route that becomes strategically valuable in precisely the scenarios where the strait is contested. The Kirkuk-Baniyas corridor to Mediterranean export terminals is one such option, detailed in our earlier pipeline bypass report.

If the agreements signed Monday include any component tied to non-Hormuz export capacity, they would represent a significant commercial commitment to Iraqi energy as an alternative supply anchor during an active conflict.

What Comes Next

Monday’s visit is a single data point in a rapidly shifting landscape. Iran’s strikes on four Gulf states — Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, and Qatar — represent a geographic expansion of the conflict beyond the direct US-Iran exchange, and Iran’s broader missile and drone campaign against Gulf facilities continues to evolve. The IRGC’s public release of strike video signals that Tehran is not moving toward de-escalation.

Against that backdrop, the Iraqi PM’s Washington visit is part of a larger pattern in which regional governments are making positioning decisions — quietly and quickly — about which direction they intend to move as the conflict matures. For Baghdad, the direction on Monday is toward Washington, in the form of oil and gas agreements with American companies.