DEJA FUT? (tense correction welcome)

Some bright spark googled " Gertrude Bell letters, Al-Sadr, in" and came up with this one which mentions:

You'll be interested to hear that Saiyid Muhammad al Sadr, the son of the old mujtahid you went to see at Kadhimain [(Al Kazimiyah)], is the leading figure in the present disturbances.

While letter has much which is not exactly deju vu, it is certainly be termed deja lu.

We have had a stormy week. The Nationalist propaganda increases. There are constant meetings in mosques where the mental temp. rises a great deal about 110. I enclose an exposition of the moderate party. The extremists are out for independence, without a mandate. At least they say they are, knowing full well in their hearts that they couldn't work it. They play for all they are worth on the passions of the mob and what with the Unity of Islam and the Rights of the Arab Race they make a fine figure. They have created a reign of terror; if anyone says boo in the bazaar it shuts like an oyster. There has been practically no business done for the last fortnight. They send bagsful of letters daily to all the tribes urging them to throw off the infidel yoke.

Patrick Bishop in The Telegraph, Wednesday 21 September, 2005, starts:

Call the gunmen's bluff and get out of Iraq

which roughly coincides with my, now, jaundiced view. If they want an Islamic state in the south, then let them have one. Who are we to deny them what they yearn for? This will of course mean virtual control from Tehran, but should we care? We're all be driving around in electric noddy cars soon and the Middle East just won't matter to us anymore.

But he then Bishop returns to the structured vithdrawal. What if the central government insisted we stay? After all they wouldn't remain very central once the foreign kelebs have gone. In fact most of the Iraqi government will be scattered all over the place, either blown to bits or in cosy capitals such as Amman or London.

The war in Iraq was based on a lie - and policing Basra is an illusion

By Boris Johnson, The Telegraph, 22 September 2005

::

The distinct impression is being created all that will be left intact in the soon-to-be Balkanised Iraq will be the socialist paradise of Kurdistan under the leadership of Jalal Talabani. Presumably that is where the U.S. bases will be. That's the lot Christopher Hitchens is so fond of. And where post-1991 Gulf War we saw the images of the refugees in their hundered of thousands streaming across the snow towards the eastern mountains despite the northern no-fly zone. Reemember? Instead of putting forces on the ground we sent in nice little fellows (an masses of the meja) to stand around going, "Tut! Tut! Oh dear! Oh dearly me!" and getting lots of wonderful shots for us to sit at home n the comfort of our lounges emoting about.

Here we see the British leaving before the job had been done...

1991: UK forces withdraw from Kurdish haven

and here:

Iran-Iraq Border: Plight of Kurdish Refugees

a human tragedy which we some forget. Now, the Kurds are with western help in a position to look after themselves, though the Turks are not too happy about a strong Kurdish State.



  ¶ Wednesday, September 21, 2005