Iraqi Kurdistan Independence by 2016: Former Obama Advisor
Khanna said Kurdish gas and oil especially could play a decisive role in the issue of support for their independence.------ Photo/krg.org.
ERBIL, Iraqi Kurdistan: The Iraqi Kurds will win independence by 2016, and Iraq and neighboring Turkey and Syria, who are now principally against the establishment of a Kurdish state, will accept the reality, argues former election adviser to United States President Barack Obama.
Parag Khanna, an Indian American, is now the current director of the Global Governance Initiative, which was set up by the New American Foundation think tank in the US. He is known as an international relations expert and has been involved with several other major US think tanks in recent years.
In his book released in 2008, “The Second World: Empires and Influence in the New Global Order,” Khanna predicted the Kurds would become independent by 2016 and that 20,000 US troops would be stationed in Kurdistan by that time.
He praised the Kurdish economy and said the US should support the Iraqi Kurds, since they were a secular ally.
Khanna said he was convinced the US, which had been opposed to independence for greater Kurdistan, which spans parts of Iran, Turkey, Syria and Iraq, could be convinced to support Kurdish independence in Iraq.
He also said he hoped for the support of the countries neighboring Iraqi Kurdistan.
“I believe that the incentives can be aligned for Turkey and Syria and Iraq, though I am less sure about Iran,” said Khanna. “Yet Iran has traditionally had less dispute with the Kurds. One of the key steps is to make clear that the borders [of an independent Kurdistan] would be [only] those of Iraqi Kurdistan [and not the surrounding countries].”
Khanna said Kurdish gas and oil especially could play a decisive role in the issue of support for their independence.
“Turkish businesses are profiting handsomely from Kurdistan's development, and as the country becomes ever more a conduit for Western energy, Kurdistan/Iraq present an important new supply to Europe,” said the author. “If the Nabucco pipeline comes through, it would be an important channel for Iraq/Kurdistan energy flow.”
Nabucco is a proposed natural gas pipeline which will run from Turkey to Austria, and which is expected to decrease Europe’s dependence on Russian gas. Kurdistan is expected to be a major supplier for the pipeline, with an estimated 3 to 6 trillion cubic meters of gas reserves.
Khanna saw the development of oil and gas reserves as being crucial to Iraqi Kurdistan’s future, and disagreed with the present view of many Kurdish politicians that Dubai was an ideal model for the Kurdish economy.
“Dubai is not a meaningful or sensible model for Kurdistan,” said Khanna. “Dubai's development has been real-estate driven, not oil driven. Kurdistan seeks to maintain a politically stable climate for its own economic growth and consolidation of autonomy.”
In addition, Khanna said he believed the future of the Obama administration would not be dependent on continued hostility towards Iran, as recently claimed by Brain Binley, a member of the British Parliamentary Committee for Iran Freedom.
“I do not believe that Obama's continuation as president will hinge on whether or not he is hostile towards Iran, “ said Khanna. “In any case, the US position towards Iran continues to be somewhat confrontational, so we remain in a status quo from the Bush administration.”
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To achieve independence and not turn into a satellite state, the Kurds who currently live in the nation state of Iraq must work on preparing the society to be self sufficient and minimize dependency on regional states for goods and services. Kurdistan is rich in resources and can be developed to benefit the population as whole and not just the ruling class. Transforming Kurdish society in southern Kurdistan would take far more than five years to achieve given current state of affairs. Currently there is huge disconnect between leadership and the grass root. The visions we sometime hear from the Kurdish leadership are not being acted upon. Many promises were given by the leaders that were not executed to the disappointment of the population. If the population cannot trust their leaders, independence will not be a successful undertake and will harm the Kurdish cause elsewhere.
Personally, I believe that Kurdistan will become independent, but I cannot date that day and 2016 feels a bit ambitious. Because, there are still some issues that remains unresolved between the countries in the region (i.e., the status of the Kurds in Syria/Turkey and the question of freedom in Iran). As long as these issues are relevant an independent Kurdish nation feels far-reaching.
However, as Khanna suggests the Nubucco pipeline will play a major role in deciding the destiny of the Kurdish nation. It will do this firstly by providing us with more assets to negotiate over. Second, it will prevent the development of violent conflicts, because war would only disrupt the flow of gas to West, which means decreased income to West. Due to this, West would involve itself and prevent the explosion of a conflict just for the sake of securing the flow of energy to their continent. Of course, this real-political reality would benefit us and conversely protect our interests.
@Pushdaree - I agree with you that there is a pressing need that we become self-sufficient, this for several reasons. First of all, this is important because in case that a conflict brakes lose, we would not be dependent on imports in order to keep our military and society functional. In turn this would make our military respond and functionality more efficient, thus deterring an attack on us.
The second reason cannot be totally discerned from the first point, because both these notions are interlinked with each other (i.e., self-sufficiency and independence); imagine for example what would happen the day we declared independence and all the neighbouring countries would close their borders as a response; we would starve to death - and our awareness about this is sued against us.
However, if we would be self-sufficient it would never be used as an option to silence our ambitions. In contrast, if we would provide the rest of Iraq (particularly the Sunni-belt) with agricultural products it would give us a strategic overhand because we could just decrease our exports to the region and they would pretty soon capitulate to our demands. At least until other countries starts to export products to their region, but this disruption would only make their coordinated attacks on us more unlikely and ineffective.
In concluding remarks, I would like to say that self-sufficiency is absolutely necessary for our survival as a state, but on the same time this is nothing that Kurdish officials are unaware of and they struggle to make Kurdistan more self-sufficient; partly due to the strategic importance of self-sufficiency.
Personally, I believe that Kurdistan will become independent, but I cannot date that day and 2016 feels a bit ambitious. Because, there are still some issues that remains unresolved between the countries in the region (i.e., the status of the Kurds in Syria/Turkey and the question of freedom in Iran). As long as these issues are relevant an independent Kurdish nation feels far-reaching.
However, as Khanna suggests the Nubucco pipeline will play a major role in deciding the destiny of the Kurdish nation. It will do this firstly by providing us with more assets to negotiate over. Second, it will prevent the development of violent conflicts, because war would only disrupt the flow of gas to West, which means decreased income to West. Due to this, West would involve itself and prevent the explosion of a conflict just for the sake of securing the flow of energy to their continent. Of course, this real-political reality would benefit us and conversely protect our interests.
@Pushdaree - I agree with you that there is a pressing need that we become self-sufficient, this for several reasons. First of all, this is important because in case that a conflict brakes lose, we would not be dependent on imports in order to keep our military and society functional. In turn this would make our military respond and functionality more efficient, thus deterring an attack on us.
The second reason cannot be totally discerned from the first point, because both these notions are interlinked with each other (i.e., self-sufficiency and independence); imagine for example what would happen the day we declared independence and all the neighbouring countries would close their borders as a response; we would starve to death - and our awareness about this is sued against us.
However, if we would be self-sufficient it would never be used as an option to silence our ambitions. In contrast, if we would provide the rest of Iraq (particularly the Sunni-belt) with agricultural products it would give us a strategic overhand because we could just decrease our exports to the region and they would pretty soon capitulate to our demands. At least until other countries starts to export products to their region, but this disruption would only make their coordinated attacks on us more unlikely and ineffective.
In concluding remarks, I would like to say that self-sufficiency is absolutely necessary for our survival as a state, but on the same time this is nothing that Kurdish officials are unaware of and they struggle to make Kurdistan more self-sufficient; partly due to the strategic importance of self-sufficiency.
the inhabitants of Kurdistan who are born after 1986 have not washed the iron as the older school to study not Saddam and extreme Islam their ideas in school mandatory, therefore, they have their own ideas about Europe and the USA. Europe and USA and all who believe in people, and freedom, free speech, religious skill and no to war. They are with us they have alliance with the Kurds.
Finally I say today or tomorrow, we need to get independence.
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