Imagine if we'd added them to the bombing rolls?

The Bush Administration's clever plan of not so cleverly creating Iran's largest client state has a least one advantage.

When the rest of the left-overs rise up, they have an interest in maintaining their inadvertently gotten gains.

General Qassem Suleimani, the commander of Iran’s elite Quds force - one of the key players in the war against Islamic State (Isis), normally keeps a very low profile. But a recent spate of photographs – showing a shy, silvery-haired man in his late 50s wearing a revolutionary scarf around his neck – point to a striking shift in Tehran’s strategy in its fight against the jihadi insurgents who have taken over large parts of Iraq and Syria. Once rare and amateurish, images of Suleimani are now taken professionally as Iran publicises its indispensable role in Iraq

Strange...and ignored bedfellows and all that.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]