Iraq: Day One of the "Post-American" Era

It's not as if there was nothing happening in Iraq yesterday, marking the formal "withdrawal" of the US military from the cities (even as 130,000 remain in the country). There were public celebrations, a confident speech by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki which did not even refer to the American troops, and a bombing in Kirkuk that killed 33 people. There was even an embarrassing nationally-television auction of energy rights which pointed out the economic challenge; in the end, foreign investors only sealed the deal for the largest of eight oil and gas fields.

Still, as Dan Balz bluntly put it, "Have We Forgotten Iraq?" Amidst newer crises, including one in the country next door, war fatigue, and an Obama rather than Bush Administration, the situation is not quite violent enough (despite recent bombings) and far too complex to hold attention.

Juan Cole, excellent as always, offers an immediate guide to the situation behind the "withdrawal":

The casualty toll in the Kirkuk bombing on Tuesday has risen to 33, with about 100 injured.

Four US troops were killed in Iraq on Tuesday, as well, though the circumstances are still murky.

The Iraqi civil wars kicked off by the American invasion of 2003 continue. I'm sure a lot of observers think it is all one internal war, but it is not. It is multiple. Nor is the bombing relevant to the American withdrawal from the cities, as some press reports are implying, since there were never very many US troops in Kurdistan or the Iraqi north generally. (Though settling the Arab-Kurdish problem before they leave will be essential to a good exit for Americans).

A bombing like this in Kirkuk means something different than a similar event in Baghdad or in Shiite Nasiriyah in the south. A lot of the violence in the south is among Shiite militias; there are few Sunnis, and their freedom of movement is constrained (a Tikriti "r" is different from the "r" used in the south, and so the religio-ethnic difference can sometimes be heard; plus, Sunnis typically don't know the details of the lives of the 12 Imams sacred to the Shiites and so can fairly easily be caught out.)

A bombing in Baghdad typically indicates continued conflict between Sunni Arabs and Shiite Arabs, though my best guess is that Sunni Arabs are only 10-15% of Baghdad now, so that the bombings are more helpless raging revenge than effective guerrilla politics.

But in Kirkuk, even if it is the radical vigilantes ("Salafi jihadis" or what the US press calls 'al-Qaeda in Iraq') that are behind the bombing, it has a different significance. Kirkuk is the arena for a potentially epochal struggle between the Arabs (both Sunni and Shiite) and the Kurds (mostly Sunni, who do not speak Arabic as their mother tongue).

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