Iraq is breaking

If ISIS was the only crisis in Iraq, then Iraqis would be a much happier, safer people.
That should give you an idea of how bad things have gotten there.

Some of the crises in Iraq are happening today. Others are destined to happen later this year.

Crisis #1: Fallujah Starving

The Siege of Fallujah is reaching a climax.

Government forces trying to recapture the area from so-called Islamic State (IS) militants have cut supply routes, and IS stops people from leaving.
What little food available is being sold at exorbitant prices, forcing some to eat soup made from grass, HRW says.
HRW said Iraqi activists who were in contact with Falluja residents reported that people in the city were reduced to eating ground date seed flat bread as well as grass soup.
According to a medical source, starving children arrive at a local hospital every day.

The Baghdad government has been dropping barrel bombs on Fallujah hospitals and schools for nearly two years, but unlike when Assad does it in Syria, we've looked the other way.

Crises #2, #3, and #4: Bankrupt, Corrupt, and Popular Unrest

Iraq was always a poor nation, but the crash in oil prices have made that much worse.

Each month, Iraq’s government pays out nearly $4 billion in salaries and pensions to the military and a bloated array of public-sector workers. But with more than 90 percent of government revenue coming from oil, it is bringing in only about half that as crude prices plunge.
The United States is stepping in to try to make sure the country can continue military spending while it seeks international loans and embarks on an austerity plan. Still, some Iraqi officials and analysts say the government might struggle later this year to pay the 7 million people on the public payroll, which could trigger mass unrest.

Iraq's economy shrank last year and unemployment is around 25%. Baghdad has turned to the IMF for loans to get by, but that comes with the price of painful austerity, including "a cut in the food rationing system, basic commodity price rises, cuts in the government pay roll, cuts in government wages and increased charges for government services."
However, it's the fact Iraq is the 8th most corrupt nation in the world that is the cause for unrest.
There already huge protests against the corruption before this happened last week.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, in response to a report by Australia’s Fairfax Media and Huffington Post, ordered an investigation into allegations that improper international oil bids were brokered by people including the country’s former deputy prime minister and current education minister, Hussain al-Shahrestani.

The failure of the Iraqi state is so obvious and complete that a political (and economic) crisis is all but inevitable sometime this year.

Ironically, in the face of geographical (though certainly not ideological nor organizational) military success against Daesh, because of the problems laid out above, we will see rising levels of extra-parliamentary protest and violence and the further de-legitimization of the Iraqi state. This violence will primarily be amongst those groups claiming to represent Shia public opinion not Sunni.
I suppose whether Abadi survives as Prime Minister is not really that important, it is whether the Iraqi state can survive and avoid a return to civil war, a war which looks as if it could be fought amongst Shia groups, fighting for what will be left of the Iraqi state.

Crisis #5: Kurdish Independence

It's been 100 years coming, but it finally appears that the Kurds will have a homeland....at the cost of an Iraqi state.

Masoud Barzani, the president of the Kurdistan region in northern Iraq previously said in an interview that after the scheduled referendum in October this year, his region is certainly going for independence. Moreover, Barzani said that he hopes the United States will support it, in spite of opposing it in the past.
However, the US State Department said they are against it.
“Again, we support Kurdish region as a part of Iraq.” State Department spokesman Mark Toner said on Thursday....US analysts say the statement is nothing new and it doesn’t indicate any change in the ‘one Iraq policy’ of the US.

Masoud Barzani recently said, “I think that within themselves, [world leaders] have come to this conclusion that the era of Sykes-Picot is over. Whether they say it or not, accept it or not, the reality on the ground is that. But as you know, diplomats are conservatives and they give their assessment in the late stages of things. And sometimes they can’t even keep up with developments.”
The ultimate struggle will be over the city of Kirkuk, which the Kurds have long claimed, but Baghdad doesn't want to give up.

Crisis #6: Mosul Dam

Not enough crisis for you? How about one more.

Early last year, Kurdish Peshmerga fighters pushed ISIS out of Wana with the help of US airstrikes.
But a potentially bigger threat looms just six miles upstream — the deteriorating Mosul Dam, which is holding back billions of cubic meters of water.
In February, the US Embassy in Baghdad issued a warning to American citizens about the possibility of the dam’s collapse, on top of its already stern warnings about travel to Iraq.
The US says the dam is at risk of bursting this spring, sending a flood down the Tigris that could wipe out villages and kill hundreds of thousands of people in a matter of hours.
Upstream at the dam, workers are doing maintenance 24 hours a day, seven days a week. They have to, just to keep it intact....
The riverbed here is composed of unstable soft soil and gypsum, a mineral that dissolves as water runs through it.
In 2006, the US Army Corps of Engineers called it "the most dangerous dam in the world.” Now, cracks form daily in the structure, requiring constant grouting to keep it from collapsing...
But the work stopped for several months when ISIS seized control of the dam in 2014. They held it for less than two weeks. But even after Iraqi forces and Kurdish Peshmerga reclaimed the dam, it took months for the work to start up again. That may have created a permanent weakness in the structure, according the US government...
US officials don’t see it that way. And in February they warned that 500,000 to 1.47 million Iraqis who live along the Tigris “probably would not survive” a dam collapse.

You know things are bad when a possible dam collapse that kills a million people isn't high on the priority list.

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batshit insane.

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This happened three weeks ago

The Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and several allied groups have voted to create an autonomous federation in the northern part of Syria.
PYD officials claimed autonomy for the Kurdish-controlled areas on Thursday after two days of meetings with delegates of different communities in the region...
Both the Syrian government and one of the main opposition blocs immediately rejected the move.
The Syrian foreign ministry issued a warning to "anyone who dares to undermine the unity of the land and the people of Syria under any title."
"Creating a union or a federal system ... contradicts the Syrian constitution and all the national concepts and international resolutions," the statement said.
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I used to follow Turkey with the publication TodaysZaman in English. A couple of months ago it was shut down.

Anyone criticizing Erdogan can be called a terrorist.

Erdogan's power grab included starting the war again against their own Kurdish population and their military unit the PKK.

I just ran a search and found

Erdogan’s stance leaves Turkey’s Kurds with backs against the wall

BEIRUT // Eight months into Turkey’s renewed war with Kurdish separatists, president Recep Tayyip Erdogan has left little doubt there will be few efforts toward reconciliation or compromise with millions of disenfranchised Kurds.

In a speech on Tuesday, just one day after publicly ruling out negotiations with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to end the conflict, Mr Erdogan suggested supporters of the group be stripped of their citizenship.

“We need to be decisive and take all necessary measures, including stripping citizenship to deactivate terrorist organisation supporters," he said, according to the pro-government Daily Sabah newspaper. “They are not even our citizens ... We are not obliged to carry anyone engaged in the betrayal of their state and their people."

Following Mr Erdogan’s remarks, Turkish justice minister Bekir Bozdag said on Wednesday the country would begin to work on new rules that

The Kurds would like to have their own state but it can't get much worse than this

For the government, the key to solving Turkey’s crisis is to win the war by militarily crushing the PKK and its affiliated militias while smothering dissent with arrests, limitations on the press and, potentially, the revocation of citizenship among those who oppose the government.

But for many Kurds, the refusal of dialogue, the potential loss of citizenship and the continuing war will only serve to push their backs further against the wall, driving divisions and feelings that their grievances will never be addressed by the government without pressure.

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Lenzabi's picture

So, much for "Mission Accomplished" and the leaving things as crappy as when we smashed them hard, leaving them worse off and no "Marshall Plan" for them.

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So long, and thanks for all the fish

Martha Pearce-Smith's picture

an unstable ME is what the corporations and the Theocrats wanted, and that is exactly what BushCo delivered.

Beee

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First Nations News

Hasn't all the warring caused oil production to plummet? If control of oil production was the goal, and I believe it was, those pushing it have failed absolutely and totally.

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PastorAgnostic's picture

Thank you, Condi, Dick, and George.

Oh, and Colin, you really need to show more remorse.

But when that dam goes, we - the coalition forces will have the deaths of a million on our hands.

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shaharazade's picture

certainly deserves some credit. Destabilization, mass murder and mayhem under the guise of national security, nation building, and protecting our interests. We come, we see, we kill. The Mad Bomber's says on her web page that she's a bad ass mother fucker who's going to kick ISIS's butt. So here we go. Next up pivoting to Putin and Africa. As SoS Killary in her 'diplomatic' visit to Pakistan said to a village of women who wanted the bombing stopped 'This is a war!'. God help us all. I hope Pluto's right and that the rest of the world will get sick of the madness and do us in.

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Bollox Ref's picture

Hillary did her bit also.

Thank you Ma'am.

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Gëzuar!!
from a reasonably stable genius.

detroitmechworks's picture

and giving them reasons to fight by flooding the area with MORE MONEY.

Go home. Wait a while. See what happens. It has the virtue of not being tried recently.

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I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

ChemBob's picture

We need to leave and only send back some engineers if they want some help with the dam after things settle down. We've done so much harm in that part of the world it is nearly unimaginable. So much money spent destroying things rather than building a future.

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snoopydawg's picture

How can any person in our government continue to do these types of things to innocent civilians going back decades?
What the fuck gives the US the right to go in and destabilize countries so that the damned corporations can steal their resources?
Why can't they make deals like China does?
This is genocide. And continuing war crimes.

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.