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Tuesday, January 25, 20051106705100
Iraq, Kurdsitan, The Blasted Lands?
"U.S. wants Iraqi government to maintain 'unified state'," Kuwait News Agency, http://www.kuna.net.kw/Home/Story.aspx?Language=en&DSNO=699593, 25 January 2005 (from Roth Report).
Is there serious movement among Shia to allow both Kurdistan and the Sunni Triangle (what's the word for "The Blasted Lands" in Arabic?) to seceed, forming an overwhelming Shia state?
Serious enough to for us to decry it, at least
Responding to reports that Shia provinces in southern Iraq want to form their own political entity similar to the Kurdish enclave in northern Iraq, State Department spokesman Richard Boucher on Tuesday said the United States wants the Iraqi government to organize within "a unified state." Asked by KUNA how concerned the United States would be if Sunni turnout in the Iraqi elections on Sunday was so low that Iraq might eventually splinter into three separate political entities, Boucher said the United States has always supported "Iraq's territorial integrity, and for the ability of Iraqis to work out their politics and their government organization in a system that allows the participation of all Iraqis of different ethnic backgrounds or religious backgrounds -- but always within a unified state."
As long as a unified state is the aim of the Iraqi government, fine. But if the elections on January 1st give a governing party that does not wish a unified state, we should not stop them. Iraqi is their country, and if the Shia do not wish to rule over the Kurds or deal with murderous salafist violence, they should not have too.
I trifurcated Iraqi state would be a success. It would represent a victory for local democracy. It would improve connectivity. And it would prove a valuable warning for future regimes.
Iraq was not democratically created. There were no founding fathers or great constitutional convention after the end of the Great War. It was merely one of four new states (along with Lebanon, Syria, Transjordan, and Iraq) carved out by two victors. Of the original four, one has already disintegrated (Transjordan into Jordan and Israel, which will soon splinter into Israel and Palestine) and another (Lebanon) has lost territorial integrity. Allowing local sovereigns that represent the will of actual peoples would be a step up, if they wish it so.
Iraq has not been connected. Before Saddam Iraq was poor, illiterate, and backwards, and after a brief rebrith it sank almost all the way back again. Even though they were the original Westernizers, it appears that a significant fraction of Iraq's Sunnis are hostile to globalization and connectivity. No people can be pulled ahead unwillingly. Even if modern-term strategy requires us to abandon the Sunni Triangle, hooking Kurdistan and Shia Iraq to the rest of the world is a tremendous victory. A free, democratic, and peaceful Kurdistan shows a future worth creating to both Turks and Turkish Kurds. And a non-authoritarian Shia Iraq is a bright light for Shia Iran. The Sunnis represent only 20% of Iraq. 80% victory is not 100% victory, but it is still victory.
And last, Iraq lost a war. In war, victors have to punish the losing nation to dissuade future aggression. Fiscal punishments do more harm than good, but there are concrete ways to dissuade patriots from fighting on the wrong side. While we gave fortunes to Germany after the Second World War, they lost Prussia and Silesia forever. In East Asia, Japan will never regain Taiwan or Korea. And if Iraq falls apart, the Sunnis will never regain Kirkuk, Baghdad, or Basra. The threat of losing forever is valuable. Pyongyang will be waching. Korean patriots in the North have to realize that one possible future is the annexation by the DPRK into China. Showing them how the Iraqi Sunnis lost forever would be instructive.
I do not favor forcing Iraq to break up. But it would not be serious set back. And it would have its uses.
20:05 Posted by Dan tdaxp (Webmaster) in Connectivity, Iraq | Permalink | Comments (0) | Email this | Tags: kurdistan