The Hidden Hand Behind the Islamic State

The Washington Post ^ | April 4, 2015 | Liz Sly

[firebrand]

Excellent point.

[firebrand]

Why did we get mixed up in Gulf War one?

Because Iraq had crossed Kuwait and was approaching the Saudi Arabian border? Nah, that couldn't have been why.

[firebrand]

So true.

[lentulusgracchus]

Did The New Yorker ever nail it with that cover. And they thought they were just kidding.

[lentulusgracchus]

..there are many Christian Kurds. I don't know the numbers, but it is significant.

The Kurds are an ethnicity, not a religion, and they are not monochromatic. Their history is long, often violent, and rocky as they contended with Persians, Arabs, Turks, and others.

[piasa]

bump

[piasa]

2) Gorbachev was in serious danger of being deposed and the Russian thaw going into deep freeze.

Two Russian Generals involved in that effort to depose Gorbachev were given award medals by Saddam Hussein a week or so before the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. [snip] Gen. Achalov was a former Soviet deputy defense minister and airborne troops commander and chief of the rapid-reaction forces. Gen. Maltsev was chief of the Soviet air defense forces. Both backed the aborted coup against Russian President Mikhail Gorbachev in 1991 and were sacked afterward. A third photograph shows the two generals with the head of the Iraqi chief of the general staff, Gen. Izzat Ibrahim. .... [/snip] -----Washington Times4

[Cronos]

Kurds very rarely “contended” with Persians. Remember that Persians are less than half of the population of Iran, the rest are other Iranian groups (including Kurds) and Azeris (Turkicized Iranians) and some Arabs.