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You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / War / Your Civil War Checklist

Your Civil War Checklist

by Tim F|  September 20, 20069:36 am| 12 Comments

This post is in: War

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Step 3: Citizens form competing governments. From an NPR story this morning:

Saddam Hussein’s trial in Baghdad was disrupted when a witness wore a lapel pin with the image of the Kurdish, rather than the Iraqi flag. The flag issue has taken on greater importance in Iraq since Sept. 1. That’s when Massoud Barzani, the president of Iraq’s Kurdish region, banned the flying of the Iraqi flag at government buildings.

No transcript yet, so listen to the whole thing. It is perfectly understandable that the Kurds would resist hanging a flag which features Saddam’s personal handwriting. However the flag issue represents something much more significant. Since 1991 Iraqi Kurdistan has developed into practically its own country with a shadow government and passport checks at the border with Iraq proper. The Kurds plan a referendum next year in Kirkuk over its allegiance to Iraq or Kurdistan, but have promised to begin oil exploration beforehand as if the referendum has already been decided. These displays of separatism will become increasingly intolerable for the Iraqi central government. Even more than the Shiite-Sunni problem Kurdish resitveness may spark the first major act in the potential breakup of the Iraqi state.

However, whatever problems Kurdistan has right now the mess in the Sunni-Shiite regions, and particularly in Sarajevo Baghdad, make Kurdistan look like a Swedish day spa. Steve Benen summarizes the latest. If Iraq has any good news at the moment it is keeping a very low profile.

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Reader Interactions

12Comments

  1. 1.

    Pb

    September 20, 2006 at 9:59 am

    Incidentally, Iraq is #4 on the failed states index for 2006, the same as it was for 2005, and beaten out by the same 3 African nations. Somalia is down to #7, and Afghanistan is up to #10.

  2. 2.

    Keith

    September 20, 2006 at 10:09 am

    We should have been the ones to break up Iraq instead of forcing these people to all be “Iraqis”. If we’re gonna force American democracy on people, we don’t necessarily want to give them the American melting pot mentality (and ours didn’t ensure us a bloodless past, either).

  3. 3.

    Jim

    September 20, 2006 at 11:49 am

    I am just waiting for the day when Turkey get’s pissed (rightly or wrongly) about Kurdish rebels having safe harbor in Iraqi Kurdistan and asking for other NATO members to help in Turkey’s defense.

  4. 4.

    Louise

    September 20, 2006 at 12:44 pm

    And Kurdistan has its own travel & tourism campaign, the tv spot for which I saw first on The Daily Show and then during one of the Sunday morning talkfests.

  5. 5.

    mrmobi

    September 20, 2006 at 1:02 pm

    …the day when Turkey get’s pissed (rightly or wrongly) about Kurdish rebels having safe harbor in Iraqi Kurdistan…

    Didn’t Turkey just do some shooting near the Iraq Border recently? I don’t think we have long to wait for the above to happen.
    Once again, if the US has anything to do with it, the Kurds get fucked.

    By the way, the mainstream media is still “debating” whether Iraq is in civil war.

    In my business, which is very deadline sensitive, we have a saying that when someone isn’t doing their job correctly, that they are “pushing the turd,” as in, a job arrives on your desk, you incompletely do something to it, then push it to the next desk for further processing.

    The turd-pushers’ involvement with it is over, and whatever is wrong with the job is someone else’s problem. Todays media are mainly turd-pushers, with a few full-blown propagandists thrown in. Have any of you watched the “Today” show lately? It kills brain cells and causes “foam-at-the-mouth” rage. It should be illegal to be that stupid.

    If it weren’t for Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, Keith Olbermann and the internets, god bless them, we wouldn’t be able to find our own asses with both hands and a map.

    Oh, one more thing, can we please just get the fuck out of Iraq?

  6. 6.

    Tsulagi

    September 20, 2006 at 3:21 pm

    first major act in the potential breakup of the Iraqi state

    I think rather than “potential,” eventual is the word to use. Gee, ya think the possibility by ethnic groups to attempt breaking up Iraq might have been something worthy of pondering pre-invasion? Nope, our PNAC choir boys knew the truth. And Chalabi helpfully confirmed it for them back then.

    You could see this breakup coming three years ago. Plus our admin idiots happily greased the way through their mind-boggling incompetence. Hell, the current Iraqi constitution passed a year ago even contains the framework for a breakup federalism. The Sunnis held up passage then against the Shia/Kurd majority claiming Iraq would break into three parts and the part they would get would be what the Shia don’t want. No problem; stay the course.

    Have to hand it to the Kurds they’ve played this one really well so far. They’ve got the North, have expanded it, and are consolidating power. Their Pershmerga after years of experience holding off the Turks, Iranians and Saddam are far more than a match against the drill-happy Shia militias if they ventured north. Plus the Kurds can piss off Turkey and Iran if they choose. They got a get out of jail free card. Us. We’re on the hook to defend Iraq’s borders from outside invasion. We broke it, we own it. Well, maybe not, we just get to pay the bills.

  7. 7.

    RSA

    September 20, 2006 at 3:43 pm

    Citizens form competing governments.

    Don’t neocons love free markets? Oh, sorry, that’s the former libertarian wing of the Republican party.

  8. 8.

    BlogReeder

    September 20, 2006 at 5:07 pm

    Since 1991 Iraqi Kurdistan has developed into practically its own country with a shadow government and passport checks at the border with Iraq proper

    Is Kurdistan a democratic republic? I thought I heard where it was holding elections during Saddam’s regime.

  9. 9.

    Once-ler

    September 20, 2006 at 8:22 pm

    Plus the Kurds can piss off Turkey and Iran if they choose. They got a get out of jail free card. Us.

    There’s an interesting comment over at Juan Cole’s blog. It’s worth reading the whole thing, but the main point is this:

    “Americans be damned, Turkey will crush the Kurds before it allows Kurdistan to happen.”

  10. 10.

    Tsulagi

    September 20, 2006 at 11:40 pm

    Yeah, during Saddam’s day if the Kurds got too uppity Turkey could have brought some hurt to them. Saddam probably wouldn’t have given a shit especially since it would have been within the No Fly zone.

    But for now, we are on the line for Iraq’s borders. If Turkey were to cross that northern border with sizable ground and air forces, they wouldn’t last a week. Our people in country would probably salivate at the chance for conventional battle, to do something they’ve actually trained for.

Comments are closed.

Trackbacks

  1. Balloon Juice says:
    September 26, 2006 at 10:50 am

    […] […]

  2. Balloon Juice says:
    October 13, 2006 at 10:21 am

    […] Quite the contrary, my civil war checklist passed another milestone recently when the Iraqi government passed a law condoning the separation of Iraq into semi-autonomous federal states. Who will get Kirkuk do you suppose? Baghdad? You don’t quell a violent situation by making it easier to define ‘us’ versus ‘them.’ […]

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