The making of Iraq and the Kurdish Barzani rebellions: Hope & Discord 1920-1958

Today's voicemail is taken from page 1-2 of Quil Lawrence's book, Invisible Nation: How the Kurds' quest for state-hood is shaping Iraq.

In this episode, I turn to look at the Kurdish situation in Iraq, beginning in 1920 with its establishment under a British mandate and the new monarchy. I begin by recounting the Barzani rebellions from 1931-1945, which began primarily due to economic grievances and then evolved to take a more political outlook. There is also discussion on the broader political movements within the Kurds in Iraq as well as among the Arab Iraqis, who are getting to grips with ruling a new nation-state. A plethora of political parties and clubs emerged, aided by factors such as the printing press, communist ideas, anti-imperialism, the early Cold War and the rise of Gamal Abdel Nassir in Egypt, specifically his calls for pan-Arabism.

This episode ended up a lot longer than I had planned when I started recording! So, I ended this one by looking at the 1958 Iraqi Revolution, a military coup against the Hashemite monarchy. The result was the rise of the military and the politics of Abd al-Karim Qasim, who would go on to shape Kurdish political life when Barzani returned from exile in Iran. We will continue the Kurdish saga in Iraq in the next few episodes!

References:
Lawrence, Quil. Invisible nation: how the Kurds' quest for statehood is shaping Iraq and the Middle East. Bloomsbury Publishing USA, 2009.

Franzen, Johan. "The problem of Iraqi nationalism." National Identities 13.3 (2011): 217-234.

Rubin, Avshalom H. "Abd al-Karim Qasim and the kurds of Iraq: Centralization, resistance and revolt, 1958–63." Middle Eastern Studies 43.3 (2007): 353-382.

McDowall, David. A modern history of the Kurds. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2021.