Iraq Engulfed.

                  

Thunderously terrifying noises of guns and grenades scream to mark the omen of the impending disaster of the ISIS or Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham approaching near the capital city of Iraq, Baghdad to snatch out in-toto control of the Iraqi state from the government and establish it as a nation with Sunni rule. Today Iraq remains as a war-torn nation which besides bearing the brunt of the American invasion is now made to tolerate the pain of a Sunni-muslim revolt which has left the whole nation bereft and grieved.

Iraq has always been destroyed by war and now it’s condition has become a sort of inexplicable one.

To get a good grasp of the situation of Iraq which has rocked all the corners of the world we need to move back in time.

Saddam Hussein had invaded Kuwait in order to integrate Kuwait into Iraq by saying that Kuwait was in itself nothing but an integral part of Iraq, separated out by the Britishers during the rule of English Kingdom. Hussein’s war on Kuwait raised the eyebrows of Uncle Sam. First and foremost reason behind the vexation faced by the United States of America over Saddam Hussein's move was that the United States was fed up of Iraq and also the arrogant nature of Saddam Hussein, the other reason that made America bubble up in anger following this Saddam's this tactic was because of the vested interest of the American nation as well as its investors in the Kuwaiti and Iraqi nations' oil reserve which would be jeopardised by Saddam Hussein’s war on the Kuwaiti region. United States initially warned the former Iraqi president of the consequences which could follow but the stubborn leader escalated the problem by even declaring Kuwait as the 19^th Governorate of Iraq on 28 August 1990. Still at such a moment of time Saddam Hussein didn't want to back out from Kuwait and proclaimed that he would leave Kuwait if Israel was ready to abdicate the control of its occupied territories like West Bank, the Golan Heights and the Gaza Strip. Other countries forbade to view any similarities between the Kuwait crisis and Palestine problem and the UNSC (United Nation Security Council) asked Iraq to vacate Kuwait within a certain period of time but Saddam Hussein rebutted to abide by the order of UNSC and didn’t meet the deadline set up the by UNSC . At last all this propelled the United States to resort to violence and to stop warning and start doing and as a result, on February 1991, American troops were dispatched to Kuwait in order to drive the Iraqi troops out from the country of Kuwait. The US troops scrapped out all forms of Iraqi forces from Kuwait killed around 85,000 militants and around 175,000 Iraqis were taken as Prisoners of War.     

  

After this period only a rebellion started which now contemporarily has blasted the whole of Iraq. In the aftermath of the Gulf war, uprising erupted in various regions of Iraq threatening the stability of the government of Saddam Hussein. In many regions Sunni muslims, Kurds rocked the foundation of Saddam Hussein government because the whole nation had undergone a very bad time and had seen the slaying down of thousands of denizens because of the whim of Saddam Hussein to take the charge of Kuwaiti region. US for a very long time had been playing a significant role in instigating rebellions against the government of Saddam Hussein, but this time America was nowhere to be seen. American government did nothing to help the dissidents and this gave a way to Saddam Hussein to crush the rebellion.

 Saddam Hussein now thought of giving the grudge between himself and America a form of dispute between the Arab world and the Western world and his this move made Uncle Sam flew into fury and Bill Clinton, the then President of the United States, ordered the American forces to conduct air strikes against the Iraqi forces in the “Iraqi-no-fly-zone” under Operation Desert Fox. America justified its military actions against Iraq stating that Iraq under Saddam Hussein had developed weapons of mass destruction and had violated the ceasefire. The firing continued for around two years (1997-1998) and after some sporadic strikes US and British war planes at last started harder strikes near the region of Baghdad in the year 2001. This led to huge unpopularity of Saddam Hussein. Even his staunch followers from various regions forsook him in the middle of the problems, which erupted due to his own activities.

In the year 2003, a resolution was passed by the world powers named UN Security Council Resolution 1441, which demanded Baghdad to give full cooperation to United Nations in the UN’s inspection of the weapons of destruction being harboured by Iraq. UN ran an inspection in the nation of Iraq and found no weapon of mass destruction in Baghdad. But still the United States believed that Iraq played a major role in helping Al Qaida conduct the 9/11 attacks on the United States and therefore launched a full scale war against Saddam Hussein. Iraqi forces could hardly resist the technologically advanced American forces and therefore collapsed totally and at last Saddam Hussein was hanged to death.

After the killing of Saddam Hussein, control of Iraq fell into the hands of the United States which in turn left a lot of army personnel in the Iraq to mend the nation but actually the opposite of what was deemed to happen, took place. US government under President George Bush faced a lot of heat from its own citizens as well as the whole world. US in this process had crahshed its own economy.  Till January 2010, more than 112,000 soldiers of United States were deployed in Iraq, which was also a major reason behind the opposition of US administration by the US citizens. United States then established Coalition Provisional Authority in 2004 in order to run the nation but the organisation indeed was just for namesake. US President George Bush continued his program with Iraq, making Iraq a puppet in the hands of Unites States. Under the Bush administration America spent a humongous amount of $29 Billion just in order to train the Iraqi army, all this led to a huge decry against George Bush by the citizens of America.

But then the administration of United States changed when the Democratic Party’s Barack Obama took over the Presidential seat. Barack Obama had previously shown his flak for the Bush administration’s move to carry on with American troops in Iraq and that’s why after coming to power, American President Barack Obama started his programme to roll out soldiers from the annihilated nation.

Vali Nasr in his book “The Dispensable Nation” notes that Obama’s foreign policy was not aimed at promoting Iraqi unity or stability, neither it was to strengthen Iraq’s democratic institutions, but actually it was to just take out the American forces from the country of Iraq and that’s why Obama administration at last averred falsely that Iraq’s military was ready to mend itself. Obama was so desperate to take out his soldiers from Iraq that when it was proposed that around 35000 soldiers of United States would remain in Iraq, Obama changed it all to just 3000 army soldiers. The White House was completely aware of the outrage of Americans against the government over its unending role in the Iraq crisis and just wanted a way to take out all its soldiers and this was made possible when Iraqi leaders opposed the American forces in the nation. Citing this incidence, United States took away all its troops from Iraq by December 2011.

Retraction of American soldiers from Iraq led to huge crisis in the nation of Iraq. Iraqi government was a very fragile one and therefore was not able to uphold peace in the nation. When US soldiers went back, the pandemonium in Iraq exacerbated very much. Iraq was completely deprived of any supporting force and Iraqi military was not adept at saving the nation. The democratic government which was established also neglected the demands of the Sunni Muslims in the countries and Shias were preferred. Sunni Muslims had been raising their voice against the system since the death of Saddam Hussein but now ISIS took birth.

ISIS is a very brute and cruel organisation with only one agenda, of making Iraq a Sunni Muslim nation. Today ISIS forces have devastated the whole of Iraqi army and have even reached Baghdad and it is next to impossible for the Iraqi forces to stop this group, whose cruelty has even shocked the Al Qaida leaders. America now doesn’t want to again plunge into the war because of strong condemnation that it has received from its own people during the previous phase of American involvement in Iraq while other countries also don't want to take any chance and this has made the future of Iraq fall into complete darkness.

One more thing to worry about is that around 40 Indian workers and more than 30 Indian nurses are also stranded in Iraq. ISIS abducted India’s 40 workers, one of whom has managed to escape. Now I would like to request the government to do something as soon as possible in order to bring back Indians kidnapped and detained in Iraq.

Jai Hind, Jai Bharat

Jai Ma Bharti.