Nothing builds national unity like the threat of partition, so perhaps the partition card could be used to prod Sunni Arabs and Shiites to get their act together?
Of course, I'm not talking about a partition among Kurds, Sunni Arabs and Shiites. I'm talking about threatening to partition Iraq among Iran, Saudia Arabia and possibly Turkey. In addition, one could produce an independent Kurdistan by getting Iran to exchange its northern Kurdish areas for any territory it acquires in southern Iraq's Shiite region.
The Kurds might prefer this scenario anyway, so Iraq's Sunni Arabs and Shiites would need to do more than simply reconcile among themselves: they'd also need to court the Kurds and convince them that they're better off as part of a united and stable Iraq -- otherwise, there wouldn't be an effective front against the threat of foreign partition.
Yes, it sounds crazy. But Hitchens is correct about the long-term prospects if Iraq doesn't start to unify: Iran and Saudi Arabia will eventually make a bid for the Iraqi regions that are already linked to them culturally and economically.
Regards,
