Embassy of the United States, Baghdad | |
---|---|
Location | Baghdad, Iraq |
Coordinates | 33°17′56″N 44°23′46″E / 33.299°N 44.396°E |
Opened | May 2008 |
Ambassador | Alina Romanowski (since 2022) |
The Embassy of the United States of America in Baghdad (Arabic: سفارة الولايات المتحدة، بغداد) is the diplomatic mission of the United States of America in the Republic of Iraq. Ambassador Alina Romanowski is currently the chief of mission.[1]
At 104 acres (42 ha), it is the largest U.S. embassy in the world; it is nearly as large as Vatican City.[2] The embassy complex is about 2.5 times the size of the Embassy of the United States, Beirut, which is the second-largest U.S. diplomatic mission abroad, as well as over three times the size of the Embassy of the United States, Islamabad, which is the third-largest U.S. diplomatic mission abroad.[3]
The embassy opened in January 2009 following a series of construction delays. It replaced the previous embassy, which opened July 1, 2004 in Baghdad's Green Zone in a former Palace of Saddam Hussein.[4] The embassy complex cost US$750 million to build and reached a peak staffing of 16,000 employees and contractors in 2012.[5] The U.S. thereafter embarked on a major personnel reduction that reduced the total staffing to 11,500 in January 2013 and to 5,500 by 2014.[6] Total headcount was reduced to 486 by late 2019 and 349 by mid-2020.[7]
On 31 December 2019, the embassy was attacked by supporters of Popular Mobilization Forces militia in response to airstrikes in Iraq and Syria conducted by United States Air Force the previous Sunday.[8] The embassy was also repeatedly attacked by Iranian-aligned Iraqi Shiite militias and Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps following President Trump's order for a drone strike assassination against Qasem Soleimani and Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis in Baghdad Airport on 3 January 2020.
A massive new U.S. Embassy, the second-largest in the world after the heavily fortified compound in Baghdad, formally opens in the Chinese capital this week, a testament to the depth and breadth of the ties binding the trading partners and sometimes rivals.