IRAQ NEEDS HELP (WARNING: GRAPHIC PIX)

[HairOfTheDog]

Iraqi oil, maybe not. Yet anyway. Iranian controlled Iranian-Iraqi oil; sooner. Middle Eastern oil; nearly now...

A significant factor in what's going on within the Middle Eastern countries, regardless of western actions and motivations, revolves around regional oil supply and the power that goes with it.

I think Iraq may end up being split into 3 separate factions and at least partially parceled out to bordering countries sometime in the foreseeable future -- something that the US government and others in the west wouldn't likely want to see happen. IMO, the writing is already on the wall though.

If the Kurds can stop politically battling amongst themselves, they could carry some real clout.

Turkey's leadership made a surprising media statement the other day -- it now supports full Kurd independence from Iraq (Kurdistan has been an autonomous region of Iraq for over two decades, but not an independent nation) -- according to Huseyin Celik, a spokesman for Turkey's Justice and Development Party. Turkey's one of the US's key allies in the ME, but they've got their own agendas to consider, of course.



Snip:
Control of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk -- known as "the Kurdish Jerusalem" -- has long been an obstacle to independence. The Kurds controlled it briefly in 1991 before Saddam Hussein drove them out amid a horrific chemical weapons attack. Last week, they retook control of the disputed city when Iraqi forces fled ISIS, and it doesn’t look like they’re going to give up the city’s oil reserves. Kirkuk is capable of producing as much as half of all of Iraq's oil exports, although Kirkuk’s pipeline is currently offline following militant attacks in the spring.

Turkey and Kurdistan have signed a 50-year energy deal and Kurdish oil is exported via a pipeline that connects the autonomous region to the port of Ceyhan on the Mediterranean.

Refs:
http://rudaw.net/english/kurdistan/130620142
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/17..._ref=world