By: Colin Bunn
I don’t believe that Kurds will be able to achieve their independence. At least, not peacefully. The Iraqi government has shown that it does not want to lose Kurdistan. What, that’d be something like 15 to 20% of the state of Iraq gone?
The government is already trying to halt the referendum. Threats of sanctions and action being levied against the people. Why would one expect the government to not commit to their threats? Certainly they have done worse.
Not to say that the Kurdish people shouldn’t want a separate state of their own. For their own unique ethnicity to, potentially although unlikely, thrive. But, a corrupt and highly unstable post-war Iraq will not lose them without a fight.
Given that the population of Kurdistan is fueled by their want of freedom and battle hardened from fighting ISIS, I could see a fifty, fifty chance of them gaining independence from a one on one war with Iraq. In the Middle East, its unfortunately never that simple. Russia or some other power would move in to support Iraq or the new Kurdistan. The other side would gain allies as well. A cycle of rebellion then proxy war would begin a new.
Peaceful resolution, at in the foreseeable future, seems like a stretch. Kurdistan might be come the new Palestine. Or Tibet. Fully capable of governing themselves and with the support to do it, just, without the most important thing. Recognition.