War with Isis: Iraq's government fights to win back Tikrit from militants - but then what?
3/4/2015
Some 60 miles from his office in the capital of Iraq’s oil-rich province of Kirkuk, a battle is raging for control of Tikrit. It might seem a hopeful sign that Baghdad is finally attempting to win back a key city from the control of Isis, the jihadist group that swept into a great swathe of Iraq last year. But Kirkuk’s governor, Najmaldin Karim, is not optimistic about the long-term outcome.
It is not the military but the political consequences of the fighting that worry him. “What are you going to do after you liberate these areas... are the people who fled from there going to be able to go back?” In other words, is the war in Iraq now so pervasively sectarian that Sunnis can no longer accept rule by a Shia Muslim-dominated central government?
Before the self-proclaimed Islamic State (also known as Isis) captured Tikrit on 11 June last year, the city had a population of about 260,000, almost all of them Sunni. The offensive to drive out Isis that is now under way is very much a Shia affair with 30,000 soldiers, half from the regular army and half Shia militias. Significantly, it is taking place with the support of Iran and without the backing of US air strikes. Iran and the US may have a common enemy in Isis, but in Iraq they are fighting two very different wars.
Dr Karim says there is no alternative for the Baghdad government but to rely on the Shia militiamen. “The army is pretty well incapable of taking on major operations, while the militias are better equipped and probably have better fighters,” he told The Independent in an interview at his Kirkuk office.
in full:http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/war-with-isis-iraqs-government-fights-to-win-back-tikrit-from-militants--but-then-what-10086311.html
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The people we Promised"Freedom and Democracy"[/b to after "Liberating them from their Dictators"with our invasions and bombs and then the CHAOS.
What do they have to move forward but to try to move to countries that don't want them if they don't do menial work for pennies?
How can Europe deal with these desperate people fleeing the wars? How will they handle these masses of starving people thrown out of their Homelands without any way of sustaining themselves?
