Posted on 06/19/2014 3:34:39 PM PDT by xzins
The country of Iraq is, for all intents and purposes, dead and has been replaced by three successor states, former CIA director Gen. Michael Hayden told Newsmax TV Wednesday.
"The state of Iraq as we know it is gone, and it's not going to be reconstituted," he told "The Steve Malzberg Show."
"We've got three successor states there now," Hayden, a retired four star Air Force general added. "As much as we might look for opportunities to keep Iraq together, we need to be prepared for the reality that it's not going to stay together.
"We should snuggle up comfortable with the Kurds in Kurdistan, who have always been pro-American and actually have a functioning society and state right now.
We should give help to the Maliki government, sufficient to settle the current conflict so it just doesn't turn into a humanitarian disaster," Hayden said.
"For example, there's fighting around Beiji right now, the oil refinery north of Baghdad. Baghdad needs that for that part of the country to survive, and so we've got to settle the lines of this conflict in a way that Nouri al-Maliki's surviving state, which I'll call Shiastan, has Beiji within it.
"Then we've got Sunnistan, and that's the state under the control of ISIS right now, and frankly, we've got to treat that as if it were a safe haven for terrorists and begin to think about it the way we had thought about Waziristan for the last decade-plus. That's a tough message, and I'm afraid that's where we are.
"Now we're at a point where we really don't have good options," Hayden told Malzberg.
Hayden said "Sunnistan" consists of western Iraq and eastern Syria. "There is no border now," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at newsmax.com ...
“We should snuggle up comfortable with the Kurds in Kurdistan, who have always been pro-American and actually have a functioning society and state right now.
Yep.
Iraq was an artificial construct by the British, in 1918.
Like Yugoslavia, it hung together only while there was a ruthless strongman in charge.
It’s demise was inevitable without a strongman.
This is exactly the thing Bush promised the Arabs would not happen. Turkey feared Kurdistan. Saudi’s feared a new Shiastan. Everybody else feared a new Sunistan. Now, everybody’s fears have appeared and then some.
On the good side, they’ll be fighting each other over the oil for a long time to come. On the bad side, somebody will be selling the oil that they get and will at some point be very rich and very radicalized.
Convert Sunnistan into the state of ExxonMobilstan. Pump it dry then return it to the hoards.
Obama supported this group when it was in Syria, part of the so-called rebels fighting Assad.
I’ve wondered if Obama would like to see them become Iraq’s ‘strongman’ again. Push Hillary’s famous ‘reset’ button and go back to Sunni Hussein dictating for the entire area. (Most of Indonesia is Sunni, btw. I wonder if we should factor that into our consideration of Obama’s thoughts? Especially in light of his obeisance to the King of Mecca who also is Sunni.)
Had it been split in the beginning, we could have saved many lives and trillions. Which is why many wanted it that way from the start.
Keeping a country together by force always ends this way. Many here in America should have a good look at their future thanks to the even split we have.
Sucks. But it is what it is.
Had a poster last week explain that the Turks don’t like the communist Kurd terror group the PKK, but that they do like this group in Iraq, and he gave their initials but I forget them....something like GKP???
We should call it Obamistan.
“Then we’ve got SUNNISTAN...we’ve go to treat that as if it were a safe haven for terrorists”
Just another foreign policy accomplishment of Barack Obama. ben laden never offered up that kind of threat. “Sunnistan” just came into possession of half a billion dollars to finance their terrorism.
au contraire’, my FRiend. Turkey couldn’t be more pleased - and, in a when-pigs-fly policy change, are embracing a Kurdish state:
http://time.com/2898883/iraq-turkey-kurd-isis/
Turkey will never allow a Kurdistan on its border. The PKK still represents a threat despite the recent cease fire. They want to unite with the Kurds in Turkey and Iran.
Barack Hussein Obama will fly in on a magic carpet towing a “Mission Accomplished” banner
Turkey had no skin in the game and they refused to allow the US to drive an armor assault across the Turkish border. Therefore their desires should have been ignored.
MORE boots on the ground: Obama to send up to 300 military advisers to Iraq to train forces days after deploying 275 Marines to protect Baghdad embassy
By Francesca Chambers and David Martosko
Published: 11:31 EST, 19 June 2014 | Updated: 14:35 EST, 19 June 2014
Turkey has gone into Iraq multiple times to pursue the PKK. They could care less what the US thinks or does when it comes to the Kurds. They will do what is best in their national interests. And we can’t do a thing about it.
“au contraire’, my FRiend. Turkey couldn’t be more pleased - and, in a when-pigs-fly policy change, are embracing a Kurdish state:”
I read that and I flat don’t believe it. Nearly half of the proposed Kurdistan lies inside the present borders of Turkey. The Turks have essentially been in a low-grade civil war for decades. An actual, official Kurdish state, the current leaders of which are actively hostile to Turkey and supporting their own local anti-Turk terrorists is unthinkable to the Turks.
Same should’ve been done with every oil rich Middle Eastern hellhole on the day oil was discovered. Look at the mess the anti-colonial bleeding hearts created.
We gave savages technical knowledge and piles of treasure which they used for terrorist attacks and to subvert our media and government. All to force us to submit to their war/death cult known as Islam. Now they build mile high buildings and run luxury airlines while we get groped to fly in a cattle car because of their fanatics.
“Had it been split in the beginning, we could have saved many lives and trillions.”
As a Senator, Biden suggested that.
What will happen is the state of Shiastan will be incorporated into Iran. Sunnistan might as well be called Alqueadastan. Kurdistan will be the most stable as long as the Turks and Iranians stay out.
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