But the problem up north remained. It is a problem left by Saddam's ethnic cleansing of Kurds and the current struggle to determine how much of that can and should be reversed given the oil at stake depending on who dominates territory along the boundaries of the Kurdish and Arab regions.
What I didn't expect was that the Arab-Kurd divide would provide an opening for al Qaeda types to surge back into Iraq:
In the last month, about a hundred al Qaeda suspects have been arrested, and several safe houses and weapons workshops seized (along with over six tons of explosives). Documents and interrogations confirmed that foreign recruits were still coming to Iraq, either to bases in Western Iraq (Anbar) or straight to the north (Mosul) where Kurds and Sunni Arabs battle for control of the city and nearby oil fields. The "Battle for Mosul" has become a popular cause among Islamic radicals everywhere, and over a hundred foreign terrorist volunteers are believed entering the country a month, which is ten times as many who were entering the country each month a year ago.
We need to help the Iraqi government defeat these Sunni Arab terrorists inside Iraq before they grow into a major threat again, stop Syria from letting the terrorists pass through Syria, and throttle the Sunni Arab financial support coming from our allies' people.
Nothing is ever easy over there ...
