William Safire Exposes an Agenda

     William Safire, it had been said at one point during the Clinton administration, "uncovered 19 of the last 5 scandals in Washington."

     Here, at the International Herald Tribune, the worldwide publishing mouthpeice for the New York Times, Safire asks

First, will Iraq stay whole and its people stay free?

     It doesn't take a rocket scientist to note that a US military occupation doesn't qualify as freedom, that the local (effectively puppet) government declaring Martial Law (from a week after the US elections until after their own) doesn't count as freedom, and that being forced to wear a badge that lets you walk on some roads doesn't for a cotton picking second count as freedom, despite William Safire's crack-addicted addlings and prattling... but here at Remain Calm blog, we find it necessary to point out instances of the rest of Safire's lame query "will Iraq stay whole?"

     Why does Safire care if Iraq stays whole?  What's in it for him?  Who put Iraq together, in the first place?  Here are a few links.  In 1900, the region known as Iraq today was divided into the Vilayets of Mosul, Baghdad and Basra of the Ottoman Empire, while the southwest (almost all desert) regions were in the Anzah district of the Ottoman-influenced Emirate of Jebel Shammar.  Then, during meetings between the victors of the War to End All Wars later renamed WWI, Britain and France divided up the Ottoman Empire, and drew nice straight lines[1].  I guess many people don't realize that the Ottoman were Turkic, rather than Arabic, but that's besides the point.

     After bestowing their best wishes on the new Iraq (Britian hung 9,000 Kurdish rebels, used chemical weapons on the Kurds, bombed whole villages into nothing, operated the country as a military outpost for more than a decade), Iraq spent a few years as a relatively independent Monarchy. Later, Iraq decided to stay neutral, and not work for the British, during WWII (Imagine that!).  The Brits were offended, and so invaded again.

     Now, why does William Safire need these borders?

[1] See especially the border between Iraq and Syria, Iraq and Jordan, Iraq and Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Kuwait, Kuwait and Saudia Arabia.