|
Why hold on to a single Iraq when it's
splitting along sectarian lines?
9.8.2006
'Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq' By
Thomas E. Ricks
|
|
|
|
Why hold on to a single
Iraq when the country is splitting along sectarian
lines?
Iraq is already broken in two. The Kurds are off on
their own. They don't allow any other militias
except their own in their section of Iraq: no Iraqi
police there. They have their own elections,
democratic institutions, free media, secular
society, and although still terribly tribal, they
are really a model of what America wanted to do with
Iraq.
America helped them be what they've become even
while Saddam was in power, by keeping the Kurds free
from his influence when they established a no-fly
no-intervention zone there.
So, we could get out of Iraq and point to the Kurds
as a great American success. Jeez, they even love
us, perhaps the only bunch besides the Israelis in
the Middle East who do.
We might as well apply the same approach to the rest
of Iraq: let them split the country between the
Sunnis and the Shiites so they don't have to fight
each other.
The only problem will be Baghdad, where there are
Sunnis and Shiites stuck together in the same city,
although they are fast settling down in separate
areas, because you risk being killed if you are a
Shiite in a predominantly Sunni neighborhood and
vice versa. |
To obtain a copy of "Fiasco: The American Military
Adventure in Iraq" By Thomas E. Ricks |
|
But there is a precedent for this: the old Berlin
when Germany was split in two. Baghdad could become
the Berlin of two neighboring states, a place shared
by Sunnis and Shiites, each with their own
municipality, and each tied to a relationship with
the two Iraqi Sunni and Shiite countries.
If we do allow Iraq to split in three, it will be a
totally new thing that we can end up being very
proud of, since we will be seen as redressing the
ills of colonialism.
After all, one of the terrible legacies of Western
colonialism was that countries were arbitrarily made
up, with borders established for Western
convenience, which meant yanking different
ethnicities together into single countries. Most of
the problems in Africa are caused by this artificial
creation of countries without regard to sectarian
and tribal integrity.
This would be a great exit strategy and an easy
salve for our own sense of achievement: we would've
liberated three ethnicities instead of one
country, and helped three new countries to
democracy.
It would also be something those three countries, as
well as the rest of the Middle East, might be able
to thank us for.
We'd win the hearts and minds of three ethnicities
instead of inducing another Arab country to hate us.
blogcritics.org
Top |
Kurd Net
does not take credit for and is not responsible for the content of news
information on this page
|
® 