Iraq: Out of the desert into Mosul (closed)

[KingJaja]

Let me also add that I'm not sure the US fully understands what's going on here - it is focused on "terrorism" with a minor focus on "social justice", but one thing that escapes the attention of many US analysts is this: the post-colonial order in Afrika and the Middle-east is being challenged.

There is state failure and yes, there is state formation. Somalia is a failed state, it gave rise to terrorism, but it also gave raise to Somaliland - a de facto, not de jure state under international law. In the 20 odd years in which the rest of Somalia failed, Somaliland has done remarkably well in building its own institutions.

Just like US prefers to maintain the fiction that Congo is a "state", it persisted in maintaining the fiction that a united Iraq can exist without a brutal, unifying dictator. ISIS has triggered what was always going to happen - a partition of Iraq & has also created new facts on the ground.

US has spent the past 50 years maintaining French, British & Portuguese spheres of influence in the developing World without asking deep questions about the "hows" and the "whys" of "state formation" in these parts of the globe.

US is invested in the Sahel, ostensibly to check the "spread of terrorism" - but has anyone asked about the roots of the Toureg rebellions of 1962 -64, 1990 - 95 and 2012 in Mali?

US intervenes, then it looks like Iraq again - a lot of the underlying issues were kept hidden by the French, then US discovers a lot of stuff it should have known going in.

[AmericanPride]

US has spent the past 50 years maintaining French, British & Portuguese spheres of influence in the developing World without asking deep questions about the "hows" and the "whys" of "state formation" in these parts of the globe.

I think this is central to what is going on in Iraq. Compared to the West, all of the states in the Middle East are relatively young (some exception could be argued for Iran and Turkey). Iraqi state formation never achieved the level of stability found in Europe - and this problem existed before the emergence of organizations like Al Qaeda and ISIS. The collapse (read: destruction) of the Iraqi state in the midst of the revival of militant Islam created an opportunity for the formation of such groups.