The Growing Threat

Please read this article titled “Kurdish leaders warn of strains with Maliki” published in today’s Washington Post. The article highlights the growing sense of tension between Kurdistan and the certain elements within the federal government in Baghdad.

Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki’s growing sense of assertiveness coupled with the upcoming federal provincial elections penciled in for January 2010, will no doubt give opportunities for him and other folks in Baghdad to stir up Arab nationalism to their advantage.

Many believe that out of instability, Prime Minister Maliki can use the Arab nationalist card to unite Sunni’s and Shiites (against the Kurds) and assert greater dominance in the country. This is dangerous. Even in his most vile state, Saddam never stoked Arab nationalism against us. He called us traitors and used the Iraqi nationalism instead.

Saddam did use Arab nationalism to try to impose his dominance throughout the Arab world, using the Iranian and Palestinian cards to serve, with some success, his intended goal. While Prime Minster Maliki has no intentions on trying to dominate the Middle East, he does want to dominate Iraq, and raising Arab, and not Iraqi, nationalism appears to be his tactic.

Unlike Saddam however, Prime Minister Maliki dare not use the Iranian card, as he knows that the Iranians would hurt him. Nor could he sell the Palestinian issue to Iraqis, (or the Palestinians for that matter!); so the only card he has left to play with, to stoke Arab nationalist sentiments in order to assert dominance in Iraq is the Kurdish one. This is a dangerous game that I hope the US government will strongly discourage when Prime Minister Maliki visits the United States next week.