Iraq, the Kurds and the Americans

Four months ago, with little fanfare, the State Department sent a full-time senior diplomat, Alan Misenheimer, to live in Iraq’s disputed oil-rich city Kirkuk. For the Obama administration, which had been hoping to back out of its day-to-day involvement in Iraq’s fractious politics, it was a smart, if belated, call.

It was a recognition that the bitter discord between Iraq’s Kurdish regional government and the Shiite-Arab- dominated central government — over land, oil and the power of the central government — is the most dangerous fault line in Iraq today. It was also an acknowledgment that if these conflicts are to be settled, or at least kept from igniting a new civil war, there must be deft and sustained American involvement.
The situation cannot be left to drift. Washington must make clear it will not accept a Kurdish secession or a Kurdish grab for Kirkuk, and that either would mean the end of American support. Baghdad must engage in good-faith negotiations over disputed territory and ensure that the Kurds receive an equitable share of oil revenue. But the Kurds must abandon any dream of controlling all of the region’s oil revenue. The United States estimates Kurdistan has 10-15 percent of Iraq’s reserves while the Kirkuk area holds as much as 25 percent.

New York Times