Why not split Iraq into three countries?

[boolean]

I notice that nobody, not even the Democrats, bring up the idea that Iraq should be split up into the three countries. It's all talk about either "cut and run" or "stay the course" or "immediate pullout" or "phased pullout"...These are not actual IDEAS to solve the Iraq problem.

Why not have the Kurds, the Shia and the Sunnis all have their own separate countries. Find a way to fairly separate the oil if that's what it takes. Get a bunch of representatives from each group together to talk and negotiate borders and resources. There are leaders on each side that are causing the violence right now. Stop calling them terrorists and GET THEM TOGETHER to TALK. It's not like the insurgents are not organized. They are following orders. Get the people giving those orders to stop this bullshit.

[AlCzervik]

1. um Biden has been talking about that for months.

[rockymountaindem]

2. The answer is simple

1) If we create an independent Kurdistan then the Kurds in Turkey, and most likely in Iran will also want to join it. This will create a huge problem with our NATO ally Turkey, potentially bringing it into war with the newly-created Kurdistan and possibly Iran.

2) Iran will either annex the Shiite part of the former Iraq, or run it with a puppet regime

3) Nobody will ever be satisfied with the borders of the three states, and the fratricide will continue nonetheless, so why bother risking the other two?

[anakie]

12. but you know that when they do do this

and it results in the above scenario (which imho it will) they will once again say that "no one could have foreseen this".

That answer so irritates me when we in here have been correct time and time again; eg lack of wmd, the quagmire that Iraq has decended into, etc.

[rockymountaindem]

17. True, true. n.t.

[benddem]

19. besides that

the Saudis won't be happy with that big Shiite country Iran and So. Iraq sitting on their border.
While I do think it is the best option (for us to get out of that hell hole) Turkey and Saudi Arabia won't stand for it.

[mike_c]

3. this is quite likely what will eventually happen-- only a despot...

...like Saddam Hussein will succeed in keeping a partition from happening. Unfortunately, there is no likely sectarian partition that will equally divide the country's resources, especially oil. It is likely that division along current sectarian lines will simply draw the battle lines for full on civil war. I think that is inevitable, and should not be a reason for keeping U.S. troops in Iraq for even one more day, but folks need to understand the inevitability as a consequence of the chaos we have already sown in Iraq IMO and not expect anything else.

[roamer65]

4. Because the Turks won't allow...

an independent Kurdistan. They'll invade northern Iraq and make things much worse. Raisinbrain has gotten us into an absolute "no win" scenario. The only way we may be able to work this now, is withdrawl troops to Iraqi Kurdistan and let southern Iraq convulse and work itself out. There is just no clean way out of this...

[Thickasabrick]

5. Because it is not our country to split up.

[Phrogman]

7. Thank you very much for the right answer!

USA OUT of Iraq, now!

Completely out!

[noamnety]

8. thank you

Aside from the paternalistic colonialism involved in trying to manage their affairs for them, the idea that the US has any reasonable track record meddling in the governments of other countries is laughable.

[helderheid]

6. Biden has. I just want to know how you'd feel if you've lived in one

place all your life and was forced to move to another section that you are assigned to?

I move all the time so that's no problem for me but I can bet that would be a problem for many there.

[Selatius]

9. The country will split on its own. No need for the US to do it.

Just look what happened to Yugoslavia. They didn't want to live under the same roof anymore, so they left.

[burythehatchet]

10. Further weakens and disempowers the citizenry

they will descend into endless conflict if partitioned. I can relate very well to the experience with India's partition. It's hardly ever a good thing.

[DoYouEverWonder]

11. Because of resources

The north and south have all the oil, but the middle has most of the water.

[bowens43]

13. That's easy

First one group would get all the oil and the wealth.

Second another group will get nothing but desert.

Third Turkey will not allow the Kurds to have their own country on their border.

Dividing the country will mean endless war in the region.

[Name removed]

14. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[KittyWampus]

15. Why not a loose Confederation?

[dailykoff]

16. It's a rotten idea, and one PNACers have been pushing for

all along. Hence their ginned-up civil war nursed by U.S. death squads dressed as Iraqi "police."

It didn't it work for India and Pakistan, and you can bet that's just what the PNACers want -- permanent bloodshed and no hope of a unified goverment that might in any way threaten their criminal oil thievery.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

18. Why not let the Iraqis decide what to do with their country?

Without our "help".

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

20. And we can call 'em Larry, Moe, and Curly Joe.

Works for me. :shrug:

[alcibiades_mystery]

21. The Sunni areas have no oil

That's the simple high and low of it. That's what the fighting's all about. Don't let people tell you that it is a religious war about descendants of the Prophet Mohammed, or some such nonsense. That's all window dressing. The very simple problem of Iraq is this: the Kurdish and Shia areas are oil rich; the Sunni area is a desert. This is the reason Saddam brutally repressed the Shia and the Kurds in the first fucking place: he was a representative of Sunni hegemony over the oil resources (that is to say, the wealth) of the Iraqi polis.