Kurds are the unintentional winners, but what’s really going on in Iraq?

By our Correspondent:

ISIS - secretly backed by Riyadh or Tehran?

ISIS – secretly backed by Riyadh or Tehran?

What is really going on? Here in brief are a couple of theories.

First: Iran may be behind ISIS and back its leaders while the ordinary jihadists jumping on the bandwagon are unaware of the bigger picture. This would be mainly to discredit the Sunnis, as a by-propduct further trashing the reputation of Blair and Bush, and assist in the reappointment of the Shiite Maliki for a third term as prime minister. Iran has big economic interests at stake in Iraq and has been benefiting from rebuilding the country to the tune up to $13 trillion a year since 2003.

Since the recent national election there are more than 200 parliamentary seats that would go against Maliki’s third term. By creating this mess, Maliki could gain constitutional prerogatives to act like Egypt’s Sisi and it could become impossible to remove him.

ISIS has never really fought Iran’s ally, the Assad regime in Syria. I have been watching them closely, and they are always fighting the Syrian opposition and the Kurds’ YPG. Moreover, three months ago, Al Qaeda’s Ayman Al Zawahiry made it absolutely clear that ISIS has nothing to do with Al Qaeda.

There were 60,000 well-equipped Iraqi soldiers in Mosul province (which is the size of Holland). When fewer than 2,000 amateur jihadists with AK47s attacked, the Iraqi forces didn’t fight back, but instead vacated the scene, leaving behind for ISIS their weapons and military equipment, along with $429 million cash in the banks. ISIS took control of Mosul in 6 hours, but in the following days life went on as normal – everywhere was open! It seemed like a well-planned operation.

The second theory is: Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries, plus Turkey, are sponsoring ISIS. This view was propounded by Maliki who this week claimed that, “A number of regional Kings are behind ISIS”. The weaker is Iraq, this argument goes, the stronger these countries will be in exporting oil and gas. Furthermore, they cannot tolerate another Shiite-led government next door to Iran …

It also seems that the West is now trying to use the ISIS card to apply pressure on Iran to abandon their nuclear enrichment programme. A comparable move to the US arming the Taliban against the Soviet Union in the 1980s, begging the question: who will pay the price this time?

Two things are clear:

1. Western intelligence agencies were deep asleep and did not see this coming, while ordinary journalists have been shouting about this all along — foreseeing this and even worse!

2. Kurds are the unintentional winners. The Peshmerga have skilfully and quickly secured the Kurdistan border with the rest of Iraq, taken control of all the disputed territories, including strategical sites such as oil infrastructure, water dams and military compounds and airbases including civilian airports. We might even have the declaration of an independent country of Kurdistan in the near future.

One Response to Kurds are the unintentional winners, but what’s really going on in Iraq?
  1. Baqi
    June 21, 2014 | 15:23

    Washington is behind this entire ISIS scenario. Reasons:

    No 1 reason. To pressure Iran to reach a final deal with P5+1 on its nuclear program.

    2) To undermine Iran-backed Al-Maliki regime. Again related to reason no 1.

    3) Terrify Assad and send a signal back to Tehran that they can revamp the conflict in Syria, should Tehran not cooperate.

    4)To plunder Iraqi oil at a lower price ( corruption)

    5) To make Iraq dependent on USA military aid.

    6) To satisfy Sunni Arab Allies countries

    7) To ultimately weaken the very ISIS at the end after their goals achieved.

    How it benefits South Kurdistan:

    8) To create inflation on purpose to cause fear among public in S.Kurdistan as per Dictator Barzanis request so that they forget about rampant socio-political injustice and corruption.

    9) To prop up Barzani to get credit for reclaiming Kirkuk and Kurdish areas back so that he can extend his term.

    10) To prepare the ground for capitalist system of Gov. based on US model in South Kurdistan.

    11) To promote Kurdish nationalism and suppress religious sentiment in all 4 parts of Kurdistan.

    12) To possibly partition Iraq depending on Kurds lever of exerting pressure. Note foreign media outlets tout Kurdish independence but if Kurdish independence relies heavily on Kurdish leadership shrewdness. Beware of another 75.

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