Commander: Shiites moving into Kirkuk to jockey for position

[leftchick]

http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=36640


ARLINGTON, Va. — Shiites are starting to move into the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, jockeying for position alongside the Kurds and Sunnis who have been on the verge of open war over the oil-rich prize since Saddam’s ouster, according to a U.S. commander in charge of the city’s security.

Both private Shiite citizens and representatives of Shiite militias, including the powerful and quasi-official Badr Corps, “are coming in bits and pieces,” Army Col. David Gray, commander of the 1st Brigade, 101st Airborne Division, told Pentagon reporters during a live briefing from Iraq.

“It’s all part of the game to figure out who is going to control Kirkuk in the future,” Gray said Friday.

The Badr Corps consists of former Iraqi officers and soldiers who defected from the Iraqi army during Saddam Hussein’s rule. They remain active despite U.S. calls that the militia disband.

There are no official reports of the Shiite influx, just observations and reports from the local population, “the Iraqi army and Iraqi police patrols in this area, and our own patrols,” Gray said.

.... it isn't a "game" commander.

[xchrom]

1. oh yes -- that's going to go well.

:eyes:

[Kagemusha]

2. The new Iraqi PM is a compromise between Badr/SCIRI and the Kurds.

So Badr is offering a PM on the one hand and putting boots on the ground with the other.

Up to this point Badr had kept its hands off. So this is where things get "interesting".

[tatertop]

3. The Kurds never learn. Note this:

"After Saddam’s fall, many Kurds believed that they should be rewarded for fighting alongside U.S. forces during the invasion by being allowed to return to the homes they had lost in Kirkuk and reclaim the city as part of an independent Kurdistan."

The Kurds, as you may recall, were a weak partner at best.
Their only interest, understandably, was retaking property
lost under Saddam, securing oil fields for themselves, and perhaps
grabbing a few extras in the bargain. They will end up with little
or nothing. O how they will come to long for the days when
the No Fly Zone and free money ruled the day.

[0007]

4. This will indeed become nasty and there is not a damn thing

the U.S. can do except jack off its jaws and watch.

Sunnis living in Kirkuk objected to that plan.

Fearing bloodshed, U.S. officials have kept a precarious peace between the factions, counseling patience until Iraq had a government in place to decide the matter of who should “own” Kirkuk — and its precious oil.

The constitution approved by Iraqi voters last year includes a provision that calls for a census of Kirkuk’s population before the government decides which population has a majority in the city.

Now, with the Shiites starting to move into Kirkuk, a new element has been added to a mission for the 101st that Gray likened to “an amalgamation of a knife fight, a gunfight, and a three-dimensional chess game.”

....and they tell us there is no civil war.

[acmavm]

5. And anyone who didn't see this one coming had their heads up

their butts eating a chicken salad sandwich.

This was a given from the get-go.

[stillcool]

6. a little history

The Treaty of Sevres (signed August 10, 1921) anticipated an independent Kurdish state to cover large portions of the former Ottoman Kurdistan. Unimpressed by the Kurds' many bloody uprisings for independence, France and Britain divided up Ottoman Kurdistan between Turkey, Syria and Iraq. The Treaty of Lausanne (signed June 24, 1923) formalized this division. Kurds of Persia/Iran, meanwhile, were kept where they were by Teheran.
<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="" border="0" alt="Image hosting by Photobucket"></a>

After World War I, France and the UK divided up large areas of the Middle East between them. The Kurds were forgotten and ended up being distributed between several countries (Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria) with no homeland of their own. This is a map of historical Kurdistan.


<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="" border="0" alt="Image hosting by Photobucket"></a>

[alfredo]

7. I always felt the Kurds would be the "deal breaker" They had some

independence during the period between Desert Storm and Operation Iraqi Liberation. They are not going to stand for yet another loss of land and independence.