18 Year Anniversary of Musings On Iraq

  

In 2002 I started researching why the United States was going to invade Iraq. I began writing articles on a message board which eventually led me to start Musings On Iraq in 2008. Even though Iraq is not in the headlines anymore I continue to read 25 newspapers a day, maintain a timeline on Iraqi History and have reviewed over 440 books about the country. I’d like to thank the people that have helped me along the way and all the readers who continue to visit my blog every day.

This Day In Iraqi History - Jun 17 London approved Arab govt with UK advisers to run Iraq under British Mandate

 

1919 British force defeated Sheikh Barzinji near Chamchamal at Bazyan Pass Rebellion put down

(Musings On Iraq Explaining Kurdish Nationalism Interview With Teen Tech Univ Prof Michael Gunter)

This Day In Iraqi History - Jun 16 Iraq protested border treaty with Iran by sending troops into Khuzistan province Led to 88 Iraqi soldiers being killed

 

1920 UK govt decided to cancel proposed UK run provisional govt in Iraq for an Arab govt under

British influence

This Day In Iraqi History - Jun 15 PM Nuri al-Said made cover of Time magazine Was Prime Minister of Iraq 9 times

 

1920 War Min Churchill wrote UK Cabinet that he was ready to give up Mosul province to save

costs

(Musings On Iraq How The Ottoman Province Of Mosul Became Part Of Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq Churchill In His Own Words On Mesopotamia/Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq review Churchill’s Folly, How Winston Churchill Created Modern Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq review Inventing Iraq: The Failure of Nation Building and a History Denied)

(Musings On Iraq review Supremacy And Oil, Iraq, Turkey, and the Anglo-American World Order, 1918-1930)

This Day In Iraqi History - Jun 14 Ayatollah Sistani said his call for Iraqis to defend country meant joining ISF not militias that became Hashd al-Shaabi Was too late

 

1920 UK military governor in Basra reported political agitation from Baghdad trying to raise

support for Iraqi independence in Basra

This Day In Iraqi History - Jun 13 Ayatollah Sistani called for men to defend Iraq after fall of Mosul to ISIS Led to Hashd al-Shaabi

 

1920 War Min Churchill wrote PM George that British army overextended in Mesopotamia

and asked whether UK should give up Mosul province because of costs

(Musings On Iraq How The Ottoman Province Of Mosul Became Part Of Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq Churchill In His Own Words On Mesopotamia/Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq review Churchill’s Folly, How Winston Churchill Created Modern Iraq)

(Musings On Iraq review Inventing Iraq: The Failure of Nation Building and a History Denied)

(Musings On Iraq review Supremacy And Oil, Iraq, Turkey, and the Anglo-American World Order, 1918-1930)

Review Oles Smolansky with Bettie Smolansky, The USSR And Iraq, The Soviet Quest For Influence, Duke University Press, 1991

  

Until the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003 Moscow was Iraq’s biggest supporter. Those ties were developed under the Bakr government and the Soviet Union in the late-1960s. Oles and Bettie Smolanky’s The USSR And Iraq, The Soviet Quest For Influence studies this relationship from the 1950s to the end of the Iran-Iraq War. They refute the common Cold War belief that the Soviets created clientist states like Iraq. Instead the two had common interests that created an alliance between them. The Smolankys argue that Baghdad was able to follow its own national interests without threatening that relationship.