Posted on 05/15/2007 9:44:06 AM PDT by Sleeping Beauty
Oil will not be Federalized in Iraq. Essentially, the Kurds want their own nation.
So, where does that leave us? I see three potential outcomes:
1. We seize Iraq, make it a US territory, and take their oil.
2. We allow it to remain a civil battlefield, hope that it continue to attract Al Qaeda fighters, and we fight with them for as long as they show up.
3. We walk away and allow Iran and Syria to divide it up. Once they get their oil thing together -- we buy the oil.
Okay critical thinkers -- what other outcomes do you see?
Sounds like a problem that needs compromise. The Kurds get some of the wells, and the Iraqi government gets others. Same in the south with the Shias.
At some point, Iraq's government has to make the tough choices or they have to suffer the consequences. That's not "cut-and-run" argument, but instead an argument that you don't keep throwing more American lives away on a nation that won't make the tough choices thmeselves.
Option 4, as we did in the Philippines in the Insurrection, we crush the opposition ultimately, turning it into a relatively peaceful area, and break the back of international jihadism right there in Iraq. We have to fight them somewhere, and someplace will be the battlefield.
It sounds like the Kurds have thrown down the gauntlet that will make them the new country of Kurdistan but the question will be, do we let them be annexed?
A good new option, tobyhill!
We support the new Kurdish nation. We even send our troops to help them get it together. They are sitting on most of the world's oil. We become their favorite customer.
Everyone lives happily ever after. Our children will thank us.
The Kurds are right, for a number of reasons. The first is that there is no reason to entrust the country's oil to a (so far) unstable kleptocracy in the south of Iraq. Let the government exact a modest tax per barrel as international investors make the oil boom begin.
The second reason is that the Kurds not only have a good economy that is just what we're trying to create elsewhere in the country. Allowing a sane form of government to continue there will spread the idea that free markets lead to peace elsewhere in Iraq.
The final, and key reason is that the Kurds could clobber any Shiite army that tried to invade. If they don't want to join Iraq, it's not going to happen. And good for them.
There is an 800 Lb Gorilla in the room regarding “Kurdistan” becoming a seperate nation. That Gorilla’s name is Turkey.
That's why we need to send our troops -- to protect them while they get sovereignty.
That oil does NOT belong to the Turks. Let them join the EU and STFU.
“That’s why we need to send our troops”
What troops? Getting tired of this nation building....
That's not entirely correct. They have the sixth largest oil reserve. Lots of oil anyway.
Some weeks ago there were articles reporting that lots of oil has been discovered in the Sunni Anbar province. If this is true, each faction in Iraq would have their own oil reserves. Iraq could then be largely federalized.
Yes, yes, 100 times yes.
Pi$$ on Bagdad and the rest of Iraq. Let's go with a winner for once.
Okay critical thinkers -- what other outcomes do you see?
Who says that Iran and Syria divide it up peacefully? I see the Saudis and other Sunnis trying to counter the Shia Iranians militarily. Perhaps Iraq will be their final battlefield. In that case, it's a damn good thing to get our people out of the way.
We have well over a billion Islamunists to conquer, the more of them that kill each other, the less mop-up the West has to do.
What troops? Getting tired of this nation building....
Oops, I wasn't clear. Let's move our troops OUT of the rest of Iraq and move them into Kurdishland.
Oh, we can send in the shock and awe guys who want to kill Al Qaeda (if they still bother to show up -- with no infidels there to fight with).
One more combatant in the coming pan-Islamic war.
Because of how much it's affecting you?
The Turks primary concerns are not the oil or even the Iraqi Kurds. What they worry about is that a separate Kurdistan would spark a civil war in the Kurdish portion of Turkey in an effort by Turkish Kurds to partition off the southwest portion of Turkey that has a Kurd majority and join an independent Kurdistan. This is a real flashpoint for Turkey and they would definitely send in their troops to protect their interests. The Iraqi Kurds need to make the oil sharing deal and make it soon. It is the center of any political arrangement to a peaceful Iraq.
Good one, hunter!
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