Iraq's Maliki: I won't quit as condition of US strikes against Isis militants

[happyslug]

13. Another example of the effectiveness of the House of Saud Lobby.

This "revolt" is the latest effort by Saudi Arabia to undo the main achievement of Bush's invasion of Iraq, which was Iraq became a close ally of Iran. The Shiite-Sunni split is just the latest version of the old Roman Empire - Persian Empire division of before the time of Christ. It was Pagan Rome vs Pagan Parthian Empire, centered on present day Iran till about 250 AD, then it was Christian Rome vs Zoroastrianic Sasanian Person Empire from about 300 till 700 AD.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sasanian_Empire

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthian_Empire

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoroastrianism

Now, the split is actually a three way split, Egypt, Asia Minor and Iran. Under the first Persian Empire, Persia had two of these three areas (You can NOT hold Asia Minor without Greece unless Greece and Asia Minor are in constant conflict (mostly a "Cold War" but sometimes a "Hot War&quot . This is the present split between Greece and Turkey means Turkey really can not intervene in the Middle East. Alexander the Great held all three areas but he was dead by the time he was 33 and his empire fell apart, back into Greece and Asia Minor., Egypt and Iran. Rome ended up taking over Greece and Asia Minor along with Egypt, but consistently failed to expand into Iraq (Roman Armies would reach into Iraq, but only occasionally getting to South East Iraq and then never more then a few years, in most cases just a few months. Thus the three way split became a two way split under Roman Rule but return to a three way split after 600 AD.,

After the Islamic movement out of Arabia in the early 600, both the Persian and Roman Empire went into rapid change (Both Empires had engaged in a violent struggle and were both in bad conditions do to those wars when the successor of Mohammad made his move out of present day Arabia). Roman Emperor Heraclius had completely destroyed the army of the Sasanian Persia Empire, but he had to leave the Sasanian hold Egypt for several years, in which Egyptians found rule by foreigners could be to their profit, for they did not have to pay rent to their Roman Landlords as long a Persia ruled Egypt. Thus 15 years after Roman Rule of Egypt was restored, and the Arabs took Egypt, the People of Egypt, remained Christians till the Crusades over 600 years made a clear perference for rule by these Foreigners over Rule by their Christian Landlords.

This was complicated for the Roman Emperor of that time period, Heraclius, holding onto Greece and Asia Minor while rebuilding the Roman Army and converting it from paid mercenary army it had been since 109 BC to one where ownership of land was tied in with military service, i.e. what we call Feudalism.

Anyway, the Roman-Persian spit continued, the later Byzantine-Arab appears to be a continuance of the older Roman-Sasanian conflict, through like the time period before the Roman Empire, Egypt, Syria and Palestine was part of the Persian area of dominance. The Arabs moved their capital to Baghdad, just north of the old Sassanian Capital and became more and more Persian into the 800s and 900s. The Sunni-Shiite split started at this time (Shiite can be translated as "Follow of Ali", Ali was the son in law of Mohammad, and his followers believed he should have been made Caliph at the death of Mohammad. Ali became the fourth Caliph but was killed and succeeded by successors of the first three Caliphs. Thus both Sunni and Shittes accept the first four Caliphs as legitimate, but the Shiites hold the Caliphs after Ali are not, the Caliphate should have gone to Ali's son (Mohammad's grandson) not to the family of the youngest wife of Mohammad (who had born Mohammad no children).

Anyway, you have echos of the Roman-Persian fight in the growing split between the Sunni and the Shittes. As the Arab Empire collapsed in the late 700s and early 800s this split became more pronounced, through it would take a weird turn of events. Sunni Islam became the dominate form of Islam in the old Roman Areas of the Middle East, while Shiite became the dominate Religion of the old pro-Persian areas of the Middle East. Greek Orthodox remained dominate in the Byzantine Empire held areas of Asia Minor and various local allies of the Byzantine Empire in the Middle East.

The sole exception to this rule was Egypt. By the 800s, Egypt was ruled by the Shiite Fatima Dynasty, but they hold was weak. The population of Egypt was still overwhelmingly Christian, but not in communion with Constantinople (This is the historical Egypt-Greek Split that goes back to the time of Alexander the Great, if not before, but made permanet by the Arab Conquest of Egypt). This paper is on the Shiite-Sunni Split, not the Greek-Egypt division of the Eastern Mediterranean, through the Greek-Egypt Split is the one of the many reasons Egypt, Palestine and Syria, tend to accept Persian Rule more then present day Turkey or Greece.

The Fatima Dynasty hold on Egypt was weak, this was discovered by the First Crusade, but by the time that weakness was shown the First Crusade was also to weak to take Egypt, thus a Sunni Army from Syria took Egypt instead between the Second and Third Crusades.

Now the Crusades were directed at the rulers of Palestine, and that tended to be Sunni Islamic States from Baghdad to the Mediterranean Coast (From the Third Crusades onward, that included Egypt). The Shiites were thus driven from Egypt, but they still had stronghold around Barsa, through subject to Sunni Rulers at that time period. From they base in what is now Eastern Iraq the Shiite spread into Iran. The Sunni rulers turn increasingly to Turks from Central Asia as they troops, for they did not trust the Persians under their rule (Zoroastrianism would remain the main religion of Persia for centuries after the Arab Conquest, but as we near the modern period became a very small minority do to prejudice against them by their Islamic rulers, mostly Sunnis till after the Mongol Invasion of 1248 AD)/

Now in the 1200s you have the Islamic invasion of Persia and its annexation into the Mongol Empire. The Mongols did not care what religion you were as long as you paid your taxes to them. Under this system the Shiite thrived in Persia, replacing the Sunni in local positions of power.

At the same time, the Turks who had been ruling much of Iran were forced into Asia Minor by the Mongols. The Turks became allied with the remains of the Byzantine Empire and subsequent Ottoman Empire has been called a Joint Turk-Islamic and Greek-Orthodox empire (The Ottoman Empire till about 1600s had strong indications of BOTH threads, one of the reason for today's Greek=Turk hatred is that starting in the 1600s these two parts of the Ottoman Empire became "Divorced" and like many divorces hatred replaced love).

Anyway, the Greeks and Turks were forced even more into each other's hands when Timerlane, based out of Iran, in the mid 1400s, to become the single greatest conqueror since Alexander the Great (and in many ways a Greater Conquered, he failed to take Greece, but he did take Delhi in India and fought the Golden Horde of modern Russia).

From the death to Timberlane, the old Roman-Persian line reappeared, this time as a Ottoman Empire-Persia split that has remain roughly where it has been. Under the Ottoman Empire, this "Roman" Division extended to Barsa. Egypt would come under Turkish rule but never for long except when the Ottoman Empire control over Egypt was purely nominal i.e. local rulers made the rules for Egypt including where Egyptian troops would go, while saying they were under Ottoman Rule.

Now, if you look into the above splits, you see the Persian line has extended to Egypt, but never to Greece (Except for brief time periods). On the other hand the "Roman" line has extended to Basra and the Persian Gulf, but never to Persia itself (Again except for brief time periods). Between these two extremes the border between the Roman and Persian "Empires" have gone back and forth since the time of Alexander the Great.

Into this mix, comes present day Saudi Arabia and its oil wealth. The House of Saud is Sunni and this tied in with the Islamic parts of the old Roman/Byzantine/Ottoman empire. The Shiites, are tied in with Iran and the old Persian Empire. Notice the religions reflect historical divisions more then any division over religious doctrine and that is why the House of Saud is doing all it can to support "Sunni" groups, while Iran is supporting "Shiite" Groups. The split in Islam has evolved to reflect the underlying geographical split between the old Persian Empire (and the concept of "Greater Persia&quot and the concept of unity built up under the Roman Empire, and preserved in the concept of Christianity and Sunni Islam and their concept of unity.

What the US has to accept is that who do we want to rule Iraq? Iran, Turkey or Egypt (and Egypt will rule via Saudi Arabia for present day Egypt is under the pay and thus control of Saudi Arabia). Turkey has expressed a desire NOT to rule Iraq, Turkey remembers the last days of the Ottoman Empire where Iraq (along with Yemen) became bloody battlefields (and Greece is hostile to Turkey even while both are members of NATO, the main funding for the Kurds in the 1990s was from Greece). Furthermore Turkey is dependent on Iranian Natural Gas and thus will NOT do anything to make Iran to mad at them.

Thus it is Egypt/Saudi Arabia vs Iran. Given the lack of oil money in Egypt and the overwhelming oil money in Saudi Arabia it is Saudi Arabia and the House of Saud vs Iran.

The House of Saud knows one of the main areas of this fight is the hall of the US Congress, so the House of Saud keeps a lot of lobbyists on retainer. The arrange deals that benefits various US Congressmen through NOT through direct political donation (which are illegal for Saudi Arabia is a foreign nation) i.e offer to buy something made in the district of the house member (or the State of the Senator) and to make sure it is known that it was done through the efforts of that member of Congress (what efforts are not mentioned). Another way to to give donation to domestic US groups that can donate to members of Congress. There are ways around the ban on donation including hiring relatives of the member of Congress or having them hired by other groups.

All I am saying is what is being said by members of Congress as to removing Maliki is do to the fact Maliki is viewed by the House of Saud as am ally of Iran and must be eliminated by any means possible. These statements may also indicate the the US wants Maliki gone for the US views Maliki as to pro-Iran.

All I am saying is this is the Political Split, where three overlapping Empire meet. This has been true for Centuries (and while I start with the Persian Empire, early traces of it exist as early as the first written Records). Right now, one of those three Empire has other concerns (Turkey) thus the other two are fighting it out over who will rule what in the Middle East.