Politics: Iraq: Partitioning Iraq is up to the Iraqis, and their history goes against the very idea
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Reidar Visser takes on the "supporters of an Iraq divided into three," who he finds "ignore the lessons of Iraq's history." Visser, a historian who has written in English on Basra, the Failed Gulf State: Separatism and Nationalism in Southern Iraq (2005), details the errors of Western politicians and think-tankers who conduct exercizes in re-writing internal Iraq boundaries. Visser finds the religious and ethnic divisions of Iraqis today not so absolute as the partitionists claim, insisting that regionalism is more a factor for autonomy movements within the country.
In the north, there are regionalist splits between the Kurds along east vs west lines; there are some Basra independentists grouped without regard to ethno-religious differences among themselves.
But none of these regionalist tendencies are strong enuff to break-up the country. And this is the time for all such to set themselves ahowling, because the Constitution offers them a window of opportunity, after which the unity of Iraq will be confirmed. Exceptionalisms are possible in the abstract, as the Constitution details some specific guidelines for a would-be region's establishing its relative autonomy. But this set of possiblities are not the leading probabilties, and the fact that a first full-Iraqi government has been formed, with an admirable measure of pluralism (if not perfection), while the Gates of Hell have not prevailed against it, says something about a very widespread national Iraqi identity that people of all kinds of additional interests are loathe to abandon. The terrorists have not been able to kill off Iraqi national idenity. - Politicarp
Further Resources:
BBC's doddier - The Struggle for Iraq
Blair-Bush confab - troop size in Iraq
Top Marine checks on civlian deaths in Iraq
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