Will Iraq Start To Unravel?

Kurdish calls for autonomy are generating fears of ethnic conflict that could complicate U.S. exit plans

If you want a glimpse into the challenge the U.S. faces as it tries to prevent Iraq from coming apart, consider the plight of Salim Izzat. Five months before the U.S. invasion last March, Saddam Hussein's Baathist regime ordered Izzat to vacate his farm outside the northern-Iraq town of Dibagan, 50 miles southeast of Mosul. The command was part of the regime's systematic, 15-year-long campaign to populate the predominantly Kurdish reaches of northern Iraq with ethnic Arabs. Kurds like Izzat were pushed out of their homes by force; dissenters, including Izzat's brother, were executed. A few days before the war, most...

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