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Created page with "{{Use mdy dates|date=April 2021}} {{Essay-like|date=April 2021}} The '''Partition of Iraq''' refers to a number of proposed geopolitical partitions of varying severity of the..."
{{Use mdy dates|date=April 2021}}
{{Essay-like|date=April 2021}}
The '''Partition of Iraq''' refers to a number of proposed geopolitical partitions of varying severity of the nation of [[Iraq]]. Such a partition has been proposed in a "soft form" (in which Iraq becomes a [[federal state]]) and a "hard form" (in which Iraq becomes three separate countries, one for [[Sunni Arabs]] in western Iraq, [[Kurdistan|one for Kurds]] in northern Iraq, and one for [[Shi'a Arabs]] in southern Iraq). The subject is controversial and has had heavy discussion in the [[Western world|Western]] [[Media (communication)|media]] since the [[2003 invasion of Iraq]].
==Supporters of this idea==
In addition to both [[Joe Biden]] and [[Leslie H. Gelb]],<ref name = "biden">{{Cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/01/opinion/01biden.html|title=Opinion | Unity Through Autonomy in Iraq|first1=JOSEPH R. BIDEN|last1=JR|first2=LESLIE H.|last2=GELB|date=May 1, 2006|via=NYTimes.com}}</ref> prominent supporters of the idea of a soft partition of Iraq have included Edward P. Joseph and [[Michael E. O'Hanlon]]<ref>[https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-case-for-soft-partition-in-iraq/]</ref> as well as Iraqi [[business mogul]] Khamis Khanjar, former [[Nineveh Governorate|Mosul Province]] governor [[Atheel al-Nujaifi]], former Iraqi [[Finance Minister]] Rafaa al-Issawi,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-khanjar-insight-idUSKCN0YN4XF|title=Could a millionaire businessman save Iraq’s Sunnis?|first=Ned|last=Parker|date=June 2, 2016|via=www.reuters.com}}</ref> and [[Ali Khedery]] (who was described in a 2016 ''New York Times'' article as "an American former official in Iraq who served as an aide to several ambassadors and generals").<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/iraq/2015-09-22/iraq-pieces|title=Iraq in Pieces|first=Ali|last=Khedery|date=October 5, 2016|via=www.foreignaffairs.com}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/29/world/middleeast/with-iraq-mired-in-turmoil-some-call-for-partitioning-the-country.html|title=With Iraq Mired in Turmoil, Some Call for Partitioning the Country|first=Tim|last=Arango|date=April 28, 2016|via=NYTimes.com}}</ref><ref>[https://www.brookings.edu/blog/brookings-now/2014/07/09/the-right-way-to-partition-iraq-if-necessary/]</ref> Meanwhile, in a 2015 ''New York Times'' article, former [[U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations]] and then-future [[U.S. National Security Advisor]] [[John Bolton]] endorsed the idea of a hard partition of Iraq to defeat [[ISIS]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/25/opinion/john-bolton-to-defeat-isis-create-a-sunni-state.html|title=Opinion | John Bolton: To Defeat ISIS, Create a Sunni State|first=John R.|last=Bolton|date=November 24, 2015|via=NYTimes.com}}</ref> In a 2015 ''[[World Affairs]]'' article, U.S. journalist and author [[Michael J. Totten]] likewise endorsed allowing Iraq to die through partition, arguing that doing this would be comparable to removing "an expiring, cancerous nation" from [[life support]].<ref>{{Cite journal|url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/43555265|title=LET IRAQ DIE: A Case for Partition|author=Totten, Michael J.|year=2015|journal=World Affairs|volume=177|issue=6|pages=17–23|via=JSTOR}}</ref>
==Arguments in favor==
[[File:Ethnoreligious Iraq.svg|thumb|right|Iraq's ethnoreligious composition.]]
In a 2006 ''[[New York Times]]'' article, [[U.S. Senator]] and future U.S. Vice President and U.S. President [[Joe Biden]] and correspondent and U.S. government official [[Leslie H. Gelb]] put forward an argument in favor of a soft partition of Iraq that would transform Iraq into a federal state, or federation, along [[ethnoreligious]] lines.<ref name = "biden"/><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.vox.com/2015/8/5/9097133/iraq-biden|title=Why DC loves Biden's terrible plan to divide Iraq|first=Max|last=Fisher|date=August 5, 2015|website=Vox}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/12/14/iraq-after-trump|title=Biden should not repeat Trump and Obama’s mistakes in Iraq|first=Zeidon|last=Alkinani|website=www.aljazeera.com}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2010/jul/21/joe-biden/joe-biden-says-he-never-called-partition-iraq/|title=PolitiFact – Joe Biden says he never called for partition of Iraq|website=@politifact}}</ref> In this article, Biden and Gelb involved the partition of [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]] as a result of the [[Dayton Accords]] following the [[Bosnian War]] to be a success story that allowed the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina to go on with their lives and for their country to recover after years of extremely bloody and brutal warfare.<ref name = "biden"/> Biden and Gelb advocated allowing each of Iraq's main groups–specifically Sunni Arabs, Kurds, and Shi'a Arabs–to run their own affairs while leaving the [[Iraqi central government]] in charge of their common interests.<ref name = "biden"/> Elaborating on this, Biden and Gelb argued that the Kurdish, Sunni and Shiite regions within a federal Iraq would all have their own domestic laws, administration, and internal security whereas the Iraqi central government would control border defense, foreign affairs, and oil revenues, with Baghdad becoming a federal zone while densely populated areas with mixed religious demographics would get both multi-sectarian and international police protection to significantly reduce the risk of religious and ethnic tensions and violence there.<ref name = "biden"/> Biden and Gelb argue that while critics might say that their plan would result in ethnic cleansing, ethnic cleansing has already been underway in Iraq and thus their plan would change nothing in this regard other than possibly making additional ethnic cleansing and an outright hard partition of Iraq less likely down the road.<ref name = "biden"/> Supporters of partition also point out that not all partitions have either resulted in bloodshed or ended badly, with the 1993 [[Velvet Divorce|partition of Czechoslovakia]], [[Slovenia]]'s 1991 secession from [[Yugoslavia]], and most of the [[break-up of the Soviet Union]] being both successful and peaceful cases of partition.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://mondediplo.com/outsidein/iraq-partition|title=In Iraq, breaking up is hard to do|first=Tanya|last=Goudsouzian|date=March 3, 2021|website=Le Monde diplomatique}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.independent.org/news/article.asp?id=1829|title=Partitioning: The Way Out of Iraq | Ivan Eland|website=The Independent Institute}}</ref> In addition, Biden and Gelb's proposal also called for Sunni Arabs to receive 20% of all revenues in Iraq since this would be proportional to their share of the total Iraqi population.<ref name = "biden"/> Their proposal also called for an increase in U.S. aid to Iraq but making this increase condition on respect for the rights of women and ethnoreligious minorities, especially but not only in Iraq's Shi'a-majority southern region.<ref name = "biden"/> Finally, Biden and Gelb advocated for the calling of a religional conference under international or U.N. aegis for Iraq's neighbors to guarantee both Iraq's borders and the new federal arrangement that they proposed for Iraq in this article.<ref name = "biden"/>
==Criticism of this idea==
In a 2016 article, [[Ben Connable]] strongly criticized the idea of partitioning Iraq in both its soft and hard forms.<ref name = "connable">{{Cite web|url=https://warontherocks.com/2016/05/partitioning-iraq-make-a-detailed-case-or-cease-and-desist/|title=Partitioning Iraq: Make a Detailed Case, or Cease and Desist|date=May 16, 2016|website=War on the Rocks}}</ref> First of all, Connable points out that neither Iraqi Sunni Arabs nor Iraqi Shi'a Arabs–and, for that matter, none of Iraq's prominent political factions–actually want the partition of Iraq, in either its soft or hard forms.<ref name = "connable"/> This is something that is also confirmed in Iraqi opinion polls.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/gulf-and-arabian-peninsula/iraq/why-soft-partition-iraq-wont-work|title=Why 'Soft Partition' of Iraq Won't Work|date=March 12, 2007|website=Crisis Group}}</ref> Connable points out that Iran, the biggest beneficiary of expanded influence in Iraq in the event of a U.S. withdrawal from there, likewise does not seek the partition of Iraq and that in any case neither the United States nor any other country would actually be able to order Iraq's leadership to partition their country against their own will.<ref name = "connable"/> Connable also points out that even if the partition of Iraq were somehow accomplished, the Shi'a-led government in the southern, rump part of Iraq would be even less willing to cooperate with Iraq's Sunni Arabs if they were a part of an independent state as opposed to if they remained a part of Iraq.<ref name = "connable"/> In addition, he argues that the scale of [[ethnic cleansing]] that is likely to take place after a partition of Iraq, whether soft or hard, is likely to be much worse than the scale of the ethnic cleansing that was currently happening in Iraq.<ref name = "connable"/> In this regard, Connable's argument is shared by Robert Mackey, who pointed out to the terrible effects that partition and the ethnic cleansing that subsequently accompanied it previously had in [[Partition of Ireland|Ireland]], [[Partition of India|India]], and [[Partition of Palestine|Palestine]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://theintercept.com/2019/09/06/joe-biden-defends-record-iraq-including-plan-divide-along-sectarian-lines/|title=Biden's Plan to Segregate Iraq Would Have Unleashed Chaos|first1=Robert MackeyRobert|last1=MackeySeptember 6 2019|first2=7:03|last2=P.m|website=The Intercept}}</ref> In a 2015 article, ''[[Vox (website)|Vox]]'' journalist Max Fisher likewise invokes the extreme violence and forced displacement that occurred as a result of the partition of India as an argument against partitioning Iraq.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.vox.com/2015/6/22/8824069/iraq-breakup|title=This is a terrible idea for fixing Iraq, and Washington loves it|first=Max|last=Fisher|date=June 22, 2015|website=Vox}}</ref> [[Anthony Cordesman]] argues that Iraq does not have clear and neatly dividing internal ethnoreligious borders and as well as no reliable ethnoreligious census data, with [[Daniel Serwer]] arguing that in the event of a hard partition of Iraq, war could literally break out over disputed, vital, important, and ethnically mixed areas.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/iraq-partition-proposal-based-on-several-false-premises-1.1002684|title=Iraq partition proposal based on several false premises|website=The Irish Times}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/7/30/why-a-partitionediraqisabadidea.html|title=Why a partitioned Iraq is a bad idea|website=america.aljazeera.com}}</ref> Meanwhile, Ben Connable also raises other problems with partition, such as the question of why exactly an independent rump Shi'a-majority state in southern Iraq would actually be willing to share some of the profits from its vast [[oil reserves]] with a poor, backward, landlocked, and possibly hostile independent Sunni Arab state in western Iraq, especially if this Shi'a-majority state actually saw things through a sectarian lens, which is a necessary precondition for any partition of Iraq.<ref name = "connable"/> In addition, in a 2006 article of his on ''[[openDemocracy]]'', Reidar Visser pointed out that Iraqi Shi'a Arabs do not view themselves as a molithic group and that ever since the summer of 2004, local Shi'a Arab politicians in the oil-rich areas of [[Basra]], [[Amarah]], and [[Nasiriya]] have advocated the creation of a small Iraqi federal unit limited to these three southernmost provinces of Iraq so that they would not have to be ruled over and dominated by other Iraqi Shi'a Arabs further to the north.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/partition_3565jsp/|title=Iraq's partition fantasy|website=openDemocracy}}</ref>
==References==
{{Reflist}}
[[Category:Dissolutions of countries]]
[[Category:Divided regions]]
[[Category:Partition (politics)]]
==External links==
*[https://historiae.org/soft_partition.asp A list of articles discussing a hypothetical soft partition of Iraq from between 2006 and 2009]
{{Essay-like|date=April 2021}}
The '''Partition of Iraq''' refers to a number of proposed geopolitical partitions of varying severity of the nation of [[Iraq]]. Such a partition has been proposed in a "soft form" (in which Iraq becomes a [[federal state]]) and a "hard form" (in which Iraq becomes three separate countries, one for [[Sunni Arabs]] in western Iraq, [[Kurdistan|one for Kurds]] in northern Iraq, and one for [[Shi'a Arabs]] in southern Iraq). The subject is controversial and has had heavy discussion in the [[Western world|Western]] [[Media (communication)|media]] since the [[2003 invasion of Iraq]].
==Supporters of this idea==
In addition to both [[Joe Biden]] and [[Leslie H. Gelb]],<ref name = "biden">{{Cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/01/opinion/01biden.html|title=Opinion | Unity Through Autonomy in Iraq|first1=JOSEPH R. BIDEN|last1=JR|first2=LESLIE H.|last2=GELB|date=May 1, 2006|via=NYTimes.com}}</ref> prominent supporters of the idea of a soft partition of Iraq have included Edward P. Joseph and [[Michael E. O'Hanlon]]<ref>[https://www.brookings.edu/research/the-case-for-soft-partition-in-iraq/]</ref> as well as Iraqi [[business mogul]] Khamis Khanjar, former [[Nineveh Governorate|Mosul Province]] governor [[Atheel al-Nujaifi]], former Iraqi [[Finance Minister]] Rafaa al-Issawi,<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-khanjar-insight-idUSKCN0YN4XF|title=Could a millionaire businessman save Iraq’s Sunnis?|first=Ned|last=Parker|date=June 2, 2016|via=www.reuters.com}}</ref> and [[Ali Khedery]] (who was described in a 2016 ''New York Times'' article as "an American former official in Iraq who served as an aide to several ambassadors and generals").<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/iraq/2015-09-22/iraq-pieces|title=Iraq in Pieces|first=Ali|last=Khedery|date=October 5, 2016|via=www.foreignaffairs.com}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/29/world/middleeast/with-iraq-mired-in-turmoil-some-call-for-partitioning-the-country.html|title=With Iraq Mired in Turmoil, Some Call for Partitioning the Country|first=Tim|last=Arango|date=April 28, 2016|via=NYTimes.com}}</ref><ref>[https://www.brookings.edu/blog/brookings-now/2014/07/09/the-right-way-to-partition-iraq-if-necessary/]</ref> Meanwhile, in a 2015 ''New York Times'' article, former [[U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations]] and then-future [[U.S. National Security Advisor]] [[John Bolton]] endorsed the idea of a hard partition of Iraq to defeat [[ISIS]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/25/opinion/john-bolton-to-defeat-isis-create-a-sunni-state.html|title=Opinion | John Bolton: To Defeat ISIS, Create a Sunni State|first=John R.|last=Bolton|date=November 24, 2015|via=NYTimes.com}}</ref> In a 2015 ''[[World Affairs]]'' article, U.S. journalist and author [[Michael J. Totten]] likewise endorsed allowing Iraq to die through partition, arguing that doing this would be comparable to removing "an expiring, cancerous nation" from [[life support]].<ref>{{Cite journal|url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/43555265|title=LET IRAQ DIE: A Case for Partition|author=Totten, Michael J.|year=2015|journal=World Affairs|volume=177|issue=6|pages=17–23|via=JSTOR}}</ref>
==Arguments in favor==
[[File:Ethnoreligious Iraq.svg|thumb|right|Iraq's ethnoreligious composition.]]
In a 2006 ''[[New York Times]]'' article, [[U.S. Senator]] and future U.S. Vice President and U.S. President [[Joe Biden]] and correspondent and U.S. government official [[Leslie H. Gelb]] put forward an argument in favor of a soft partition of Iraq that would transform Iraq into a federal state, or federation, along [[ethnoreligious]] lines.<ref name = "biden"/><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.vox.com/2015/8/5/9097133/iraq-biden|title=Why DC loves Biden's terrible plan to divide Iraq|first=Max|last=Fisher|date=August 5, 2015|website=Vox}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/12/14/iraq-after-trump|title=Biden should not repeat Trump and Obama’s mistakes in Iraq|first=Zeidon|last=Alkinani|website=www.aljazeera.com}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2010/jul/21/joe-biden/joe-biden-says-he-never-called-partition-iraq/|title=PolitiFact – Joe Biden says he never called for partition of Iraq|website=@politifact}}</ref> In this article, Biden and Gelb involved the partition of [[Bosnia and Herzegovina]] as a result of the [[Dayton Accords]] following the [[Bosnian War]] to be a success story that allowed the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina to go on with their lives and for their country to recover after years of extremely bloody and brutal warfare.<ref name = "biden"/> Biden and Gelb advocated allowing each of Iraq's main groups–specifically Sunni Arabs, Kurds, and Shi'a Arabs–to run their own affairs while leaving the [[Iraqi central government]] in charge of their common interests.<ref name = "biden"/> Elaborating on this, Biden and Gelb argued that the Kurdish, Sunni and Shiite regions within a federal Iraq would all have their own domestic laws, administration, and internal security whereas the Iraqi central government would control border defense, foreign affairs, and oil revenues, with Baghdad becoming a federal zone while densely populated areas with mixed religious demographics would get both multi-sectarian and international police protection to significantly reduce the risk of religious and ethnic tensions and violence there.<ref name = "biden"/> Biden and Gelb argue that while critics might say that their plan would result in ethnic cleansing, ethnic cleansing has already been underway in Iraq and thus their plan would change nothing in this regard other than possibly making additional ethnic cleansing and an outright hard partition of Iraq less likely down the road.<ref name = "biden"/> Supporters of partition also point out that not all partitions have either resulted in bloodshed or ended badly, with the 1993 [[Velvet Divorce|partition of Czechoslovakia]], [[Slovenia]]'s 1991 secession from [[Yugoslavia]], and most of the [[break-up of the Soviet Union]] being both successful and peaceful cases of partition.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://mondediplo.com/outsidein/iraq-partition|title=In Iraq, breaking up is hard to do|first=Tanya|last=Goudsouzian|date=March 3, 2021|website=Le Monde diplomatique}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.independent.org/news/article.asp?id=1829|title=Partitioning: The Way Out of Iraq | Ivan Eland|website=The Independent Institute}}</ref> In addition, Biden and Gelb's proposal also called for Sunni Arabs to receive 20% of all revenues in Iraq since this would be proportional to their share of the total Iraqi population.<ref name = "biden"/> Their proposal also called for an increase in U.S. aid to Iraq but making this increase condition on respect for the rights of women and ethnoreligious minorities, especially but not only in Iraq's Shi'a-majority southern region.<ref name = "biden"/> Finally, Biden and Gelb advocated for the calling of a religional conference under international or U.N. aegis for Iraq's neighbors to guarantee both Iraq's borders and the new federal arrangement that they proposed for Iraq in this article.<ref name = "biden"/>
==Criticism of this idea==
In a 2016 article, [[Ben Connable]] strongly criticized the idea of partitioning Iraq in both its soft and hard forms.<ref name = "connable">{{Cite web|url=https://warontherocks.com/2016/05/partitioning-iraq-make-a-detailed-case-or-cease-and-desist/|title=Partitioning Iraq: Make a Detailed Case, or Cease and Desist|date=May 16, 2016|website=War on the Rocks}}</ref> First of all, Connable points out that neither Iraqi Sunni Arabs nor Iraqi Shi'a Arabs–and, for that matter, none of Iraq's prominent political factions–actually want the partition of Iraq, in either its soft or hard forms.<ref name = "connable"/> This is something that is also confirmed in Iraqi opinion polls.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.crisisgroup.org/middle-east-north-africa/gulf-and-arabian-peninsula/iraq/why-soft-partition-iraq-wont-work|title=Why 'Soft Partition' of Iraq Won't Work|date=March 12, 2007|website=Crisis Group}}</ref> Connable points out that Iran, the biggest beneficiary of expanded influence in Iraq in the event of a U.S. withdrawal from there, likewise does not seek the partition of Iraq and that in any case neither the United States nor any other country would actually be able to order Iraq's leadership to partition their country against their own will.<ref name = "connable"/> Connable also points out that even if the partition of Iraq were somehow accomplished, the Shi'a-led government in the southern, rump part of Iraq would be even less willing to cooperate with Iraq's Sunni Arabs if they were a part of an independent state as opposed to if they remained a part of Iraq.<ref name = "connable"/> In addition, he argues that the scale of [[ethnic cleansing]] that is likely to take place after a partition of Iraq, whether soft or hard, is likely to be much worse than the scale of the ethnic cleansing that was currently happening in Iraq.<ref name = "connable"/> In this regard, Connable's argument is shared by Robert Mackey, who pointed out to the terrible effects that partition and the ethnic cleansing that subsequently accompanied it previously had in [[Partition of Ireland|Ireland]], [[Partition of India|India]], and [[Partition of Palestine|Palestine]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://theintercept.com/2019/09/06/joe-biden-defends-record-iraq-including-plan-divide-along-sectarian-lines/|title=Biden's Plan to Segregate Iraq Would Have Unleashed Chaos|first1=Robert MackeyRobert|last1=MackeySeptember 6 2019|first2=7:03|last2=P.m|website=The Intercept}}</ref> In a 2015 article, ''[[Vox (website)|Vox]]'' journalist Max Fisher likewise invokes the extreme violence and forced displacement that occurred as a result of the partition of India as an argument against partitioning Iraq.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.vox.com/2015/6/22/8824069/iraq-breakup|title=This is a terrible idea for fixing Iraq, and Washington loves it|first=Max|last=Fisher|date=June 22, 2015|website=Vox}}</ref> [[Anthony Cordesman]] argues that Iraq does not have clear and neatly dividing internal ethnoreligious borders and as well as no reliable ethnoreligious census data, with [[Daniel Serwer]] arguing that in the event of a hard partition of Iraq, war could literally break out over disputed, vital, important, and ethnically mixed areas.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/iraq-partition-proposal-based-on-several-false-premises-1.1002684|title=Iraq partition proposal based on several false premises|website=The Irish Times}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/7/30/why-a-partitionediraqisabadidea.html|title=Why a partitioned Iraq is a bad idea|website=america.aljazeera.com}}</ref> Meanwhile, Ben Connable also raises other problems with partition, such as the question of why exactly an independent rump Shi'a-majority state in southern Iraq would actually be willing to share some of the profits from its vast [[oil reserves]] with a poor, backward, landlocked, and possibly hostile independent Sunni Arab state in western Iraq, especially if this Shi'a-majority state actually saw things through a sectarian lens, which is a necessary precondition for any partition of Iraq.<ref name = "connable"/> In addition, in a 2006 article of his on ''[[openDemocracy]]'', Reidar Visser pointed out that Iraqi Shi'a Arabs do not view themselves as a molithic group and that ever since the summer of 2004, local Shi'a Arab politicians in the oil-rich areas of [[Basra]], [[Amarah]], and [[Nasiriya]] have advocated the creation of a small Iraqi federal unit limited to these three southernmost provinces of Iraq so that they would not have to be ruled over and dominated by other Iraqi Shi'a Arabs further to the north.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/partition_3565jsp/|title=Iraq's partition fantasy|website=openDemocracy}}</ref>
==References==
{{Reflist}}
[[Category:Dissolutions of countries]]
[[Category:Divided regions]]
[[Category:Partition (politics)]]
==External links==
*[https://historiae.org/soft_partition.asp A list of articles discussing a hypothetical soft partition of Iraq from between 2006 and 2009]